the refusal of the Bishops to give him their support, Presbytery was received into favour. From Bishop Rose's Letter, it will be seen, that the persecutions commenced as soon as, if not before, William landed. The rabble began an attack upon the Clergy, which they were permitted to continue without interruption by any of the authorities. "On Christmas Day," says an able writer, by no means favourable to Episcopacy, "the Episcopal Clergy were dragged from their pulpits or altars; they were conducted through their parishes in mock procession; stript of their gowns, and expelled by force, or were permitted peaceably to depart, on a solemn assurance never to return. Two hundred Clergymen of the Episcopal persuasion were thus ejected; and as the same violence prevailed for some weeks through the rest of Scotland, the Revolution was almost equally complete in the Church and in the state." This is the admission of a writer, who even applauds the Cameronians for abstaining "from a massacre of the established Clergy."[1] Such admissions, therefore, may be regarded as confirmatory of the statements of the friends of the Clergy. These however were only the beginning of sorrows. After the abolition of the Church of Scotland, as an established Church, the Clergy were doomed to suffer from two quarters, from the rabble, and from the Presbyterians.
As William supported Presbytery in Scotland, because the Episcopalians refused to recognize him as their Sovereign, the Presbyterians have no room
- ↑ Laing's History of Scotland, iv. 194. It seems, that a rumour was designedly circulated that some Irish Papists had landed, as a signal to the rabble to attack the Clergy, who were treated with the greatest violence. Somers Tracts, xv. 133—136.
