SCOTLAND
617
SCOTLAND
King of England. Robert died a few months later,
and was succeeded by his son, David II, out of whose
reign of forty years ten were spent, during his youth,
in France, and eleven in exile in England, where he
was taken prisoner when invading the dominions of
Edward III. During the wars .with England, and
the long and inglorious reign of David, the church and
people of Scotland suffered alike. Bishops forgot
their sacred character, and appeared in armour at the
head of their retainers; the state of religion and morals,
both of clergy and laity, was far from satisfactory,
and contemporary chronicles were full of lamenta-
tions at the degeneracy of the times. Some excellent
bishops there were during the fourteenth century,
notably Eraser and Lamberton of St. Andrews, the
former of whom was chosen one of the regents of
the kingdom, while Lamberton completed the noble
cathedral of St. Andrews. Bishop David of Moray,
a zealous patron of learning, is honoured as the virtual
founder of the historic Scots College in Paris. A proof
that religious zeal was still warm is afforded by the
first foundation in Scotland, at Dunbar, of a collegiate
church, in 1342, precursor of some forty other estab-
lishments of the same kind founded before the
Reformation.
David II died childless, and the first of the long line of Stuart kings now ascended the throne in the person of Robert, son of Marjorie (daughter of Rob- ert Bruce) and the High Steward. During Robert's reign of nineteen years there was almost continual warfare with the English on the Border, France on one occasion sending a force to help her Scottish ally against their common enemy. Robert was succeeded in 1390 by his son Robert III, in whose reign Scotland suffered more from its own turbulent barons than from foreign foes. Robert, Duke of Albany, the king's brother, himself wielded almost royal power, imprisoned and (it was said) starved to death the heir-apparent to the throne; and when the king died in 140(5, leaving his surviving son James a prisoner in England, Albany got him.self appointed regent, and did his best to prevent the new king's return to Scotland. The years of Albany's dictatorship, which coincided with the general unrest in Christendom due to a disputed papal election, were not prosperous ones for the Scottish Church. Spiritual authority was weakened, and the encroachments of the State on the Church became increasingly serious. A collection of synodal statutes of St. Andrews, however, of this date which has come down to us shows that serious efforts were being made by the church authorities to cope with the evils of the time; and the long alliance with France of course brought the French and Scottish churches into a close connexion which was in many ways advantageous, although one effect of it was that Scotland, like France, espoused the cause of the anti- popes against the rightful pontiffs. The young king, James I, was at length released from England in 1424, after twenty years' captivity, returned to his realm, was crowned at Scone, and immediately showed him- self a strong and gifted monarch. He condemned Albany and his two sons to death for high treason, took vigorous steps to improve and encourage com- merce and trade, and evinced the greatest interest in the welfare of religion and the prosperity of the Church. The Parliament of 1425 directed a strict inquisition into the spread of Lollardism or other heresies, and the punishment of those who dissemi- nated them; and James also personally urged the heads of the religious orders in his realm to see to a stricter observance of their rule and discipline. The king sent eight high Scottish ecclesiastics to Basle to attend the general council there; but in the midst of his plans of reform he was assassinated at Perth in February, 1436.
King James's solicitude as to the spread of heresj in Scotland was not without cause; for early in his
reign preachers of the Wyclifite errors had come from
England, prominent among them being John Resby,
who was sentenced to death and suffered at Perth in
1407. The Scottish Parliament passed a special act
against Lollardism in 1425; and Paul Crawar, an
emissary from the Hussites of Bohemia, who appeared
in Scotland on a proselytizing mission in 1433, suffered
the same fate as Resby. An oath to defend the
Church against Lollardism was taken by all graduates
of the new University of St. Andrews, the foundation
of which was a notable event of this reign. It was
formally confirmed in 1414 by Pedro de Luna, recog-
nized by the Scottish Church at that time as Pope
Benedict XIII. Scotland was the la.st state in Chris-
tendom to adhere to the antipope, and only in 1418
declared her allegiance to the rightful pontiff, Martin
V. The year before his death James received a visit
from the learned and distinguished iEneas Sylvius
Piccolomini, who afterwards became Pope Pius II,
About the same time the new Diocese of the Isles
was erected, being severed from that of Argyll; and
the bishops of the new see fixed their residence at
lona.
The new king, James II, had a long minority, dur- ing which there were constant feuds among his nobles ; but he developed at manhood into a firm and prudent ruler, and he was fortunate in having as an adviser Bishop Kennedy of St. Andrews, one of the wisest and best prelates who ever adorned that see. James's early death, owing to an accident, in 1460, was doubly unfortunate, as his son and successor James III was a prince of far weaker character, unable to cope with the turbulent barons, some of whom broke out into open revolt, seducing the youthful heir to the throne to join them. Active hostilities followed, and James was murdered by a trooper of the insurgent army in 1488. The disturbances of his reign had their effect on the Scottish Church, in which abuses, such as the intrusion of laymen into ecclestiastical positions, the deprival suffered by cathedral and monastic bodies of their canonical rights, and the baneful system of commendatory abbots, flourished almost unchecked. New religious foundations there were, chiefly of the orders of friars; and the diocesan development of the Church was completed by the withdrawal of the See of Galloway from the jurisdiction of York, and those of Orkney and the Isles from Norway. This act of consolidation formed part of the provisions of an important Bull of Sixtus IV, dated 1472, erecting the See of St. Andrews into an archbishopric and metro- politan church for the whole realm, with twelve suffragan sees dependent on it. York and Trondh- jem, of course, protested against the change; but it seemed to be equally unwelcome in Scotland. The new metropolitan, Archbishop Graham, found king, clergy, and people all against him ; he was assailed by various serious charges, and finally deprived of his dignities, degraded from his orders, and sentenced to lifelong imprisonment in a monastery. His suc- ce.ssor in the archbishopric, William Sheves, obtained a Bull from Innocent VIII appointing him primate of all Scotland and legalus natus, with the same privi- leges as those enjoyed by the Archbishop of Canter- bury.
The protest of the See of Glasgow was followed by a Bull exempting that see from the jurisdiction of the primate; but in 1489 a law was passed declaring the necessity of Glasgow's being erected into an arch- bishopric. In 1492 the pope created the new arch- bishopric, assigning to it as suffragans the Sees of Dunkeld, Dunblane, Galloway, and Argyll. Two years later we hear of the arrest and trial of a num- ber of Lollards in the new archdiocese; but they seem to have escaped with an admonition. From 1497 to 1513 the primatial see was occupied succes- sively by a brother and a natural son of King James IV. The latter, who was nominated to the
