farther ordained, that the examination and admission of ministers within this realm be only in the power of the Kirk now openly and publickly professed within the same; the presentation of lawit patronages always reserved to their lawful patrons, the patrons presenting ane qualifyed person within six months, otherways the Kirk to have power to dispone the same to a qualifyed person. Provided that if the patron present ane qualifyed person according to his understanding, and the Commission of the Kirk refuses to receive and admit the person presented by the patron, it shall be lawful to appeal to the General Assembly of the haill realm by whom the cause beand decyded, sall tak end, as they decern and declair.

"This power of determining on the qualifications and fitness of ministers, inherent in the reformed Church of Scotland, and acknowledged and ratified by parliament as a part of the established religion, has been maintained and exercised in every period of our church to the present day. What have been the proceedings of every Assembly but the exercise and application of this right? To confine our powers to the mere exercise of administering what parliament had determined, would be to take away our legislative functions. We could not in this case have settled even the qualifications of education; nor have required either the knowledge of philosophy or of languages. The most unqualified persons might have filled our churches. With all my respect for parliament, I must observe

also, that this is not its proper business; nor is it a court adapted for such a purpose. And either this must have been left to the absolute dictates of the sovereign, as in England; or have been the object of laws regularly made by courts composed of ecclesiastical persons of various orders, well adapted to such objects, and wisely directing their power, like those of our civil constitution, to the wants and varying circumstances of the nation. The powers and rights of the Church of Scotland were again acknowledged and ratified by parliament in 1592; and every preceding act which interfered with them was repealed. Agreeably to the desire expressed by the declaration of rights at the revolution, the first parliament after that great event, ratified and confirmed the Presbyterian Church government and discipline, and the former acts in its favour. In this act, also, the Confession of Faith was embodied and ratified, and consequently the powers maintained by it, respecting the Assemblies of the church, were acknowledged and confirmed. Now, respecting synods and councils on the point under consideration, it is declared that 'it belongeth to synods and councils to set down rules and directions for the better ordering of the worship of God, and government of his church, as well as to receive complaints of mal-administration, and authoritatively to determine the same; which decrees and determinations, if consonant to the word of God, are to be received with reverence and submission.' Finally, by the treaty of union

of Scotland with England, it is declared, that the Presbyterian Church government and discipline shall remain and continue unalterable: And that the said Presbyterian government shall be the only government of the church within the kingdom of Scotland.' The sovereign is farther enjoined to swear 'to maintain the government, worship, discipline, rights and privileges of this church.' And this is declared to be a fundamental and essential condition of the treaty of union. The constitution of our church, with all its rights and privileges as then enjoyed, even those which are of a temporal kind, and rising out of the nature of an establishment by law, is thus declared to be among those fundamental principles which cannot be altered even by parliament. These rights are essential to the best interests of the people of this country, and I trust will ever be preserved sacred. In less happy times, and under rulers of a different character from those under whom we have the happiness to live, our privileges have been attempted to be wrested from us by the violence of despotic power: And even venal parliaments have been seen laying at the foot of a faithless and arbitrary prince, not only the religious but the civil rights of their country. In such times the people of Scotland will not soon forget how much they owed to the enlightened and independent spirit of their ministers, when, even in the neighbourhood of this spot where we are assembled, being refused the liberty of being heard on the question of their

rights, they, at the cross of Edinburgh, with their lives in their hands, proclaimed their wrongs, and protested in the face of heaven against the base surrender of the religious and civil liberties of their country. The servility and violence of such times we have no reason to dread; but on the point of principle and in argument, I hesitate not to maintain, that the constitution and privileges of the Church of Scotland are fundamental principles which cannot be destroyed but by the breaking up of the general frame of our government, or by an act of despotic and lawless oppression. (Hear, hear.)"

Dr. Cook, in his address, had maintained, previously to the Lord President's speech, that the church had not the power of control over any man who held the office of professor of theology, unless he held also the charge of a parish. The church may scowl, but it cannot touch him. "Comfortable doctrine!" exclaimed Dr. Macgill, "Comfortable doctrine certainly, to this venerable assembly! what betwixt the Reverend Doctor and the Right Honourable Judge, there will be no longer much ground to complain of the power of the Church of Scotland. Stripped of her rights and her honours, she will lie like a rotten and castaway hulk upon the sand; instead of the noble vessel which rode her course through the storm, the pride of her own country, and the admiration of surrounding nations.”*

To those who have access to such documents as the following,

I would recommend the careful study of the plurality question, as one that goes deep into constitutional law, and the best interests of our ecclesiastical establishments. Report of Presbytery of Glasgow, and Synod of Glasgow and Ayr, published by M'Phun, 1823. -Dr. Chalmers' Speech at Synod, with Preface by Dr. Macgill, 1823. Reports of Debates in Assembly 1825, 1826, by Lindsay & Co. Edinburgh.-Burns on Plurality of office in the Church of Scotland, 1834, Collins,-and various articles in the Edinburgh Christian Instructor for 1824-25-26. The subject has lain dormant since the last of these periods, in so far as church courts are concerned; but the voice of the public is understood to be in accordance with what has hitherto been the verdict of a minority of the General Assembly. If Presbyteries shall make prompt returns to the Plurality Overture of 1842, all such abuses will, we doubt not, be quickly swept away.