Chapter IV (3)

By the propagation of these and similar stories, in a country already prepared for their reception, the Scotch mind became imbued with a belief in miraculous interposition, to an extent which would be utterly incredible if it were not attested by a host of contemporary and unimpeachable witnesses. The clergy, partly because they shared in the general delusion, and partly because they derived benefit from it, did every thing they could to increase the superstition of their countrymen, and to familiarize them with notions of the supernatural world, such as can only be paralleled in the monastic legends of the middle ages.[483] How they laboured to corrupt the national intellect, and how successful they were in that base vocation, has been hitherto known to no modern reader; because no one has had the patience to peruse their interminable discourses, commentaries, and the other religious literature in which their sentiments are preserved. As, however, the preachers were, in Scotland, more influential than all other classes put together, it is only by comparing their statements with what is to be found in the general memoirs and correspondence of the time, that we can at all succeed in reconstructing the history of a period, which, to the philosophic student of the human mind, is full of great, though melancholy, interest. I shall, therefore, make no apology for entering into still further details respecting these matters; and I hope to put the reader in possession of such facts as will connect the past history of Scotland with its present state, and will enable him to understand why it is, that so great a people are, in many respects, still struggling in darkness, simply because they still live under the shadow of that long and terrible night, which for more than a century, covered the land. It will also appear, that their hardness and moroseness of character, their want of gaiety, and their indifference to many of the enjoyments of life, are traceable to the same cause, and are the natural product of the gloomy and ascetic opinions inculcated by their religious teachers. For, in that age, as in every other, the clergy, once possessed of power, showed themselves harsh and unfeeling masters. They kept the people in a worse than Egyptian bondage, inasmuch as they enslaved mind as well as body, and not only deprived men of innocent amusements, but taught them that those amusements were sinful. And so thoroughly did they do their work, that, though a hundred and fifty years have elapsed since their supremacy began to wane, the imprint of their hands is everywhere discernible. The people still bear the marks of the lash; the memory of their former servitude lives among them; and they crouch before their clergy as they did of old, abandoning their rights, sacrificing their independence, and yielding up their consciences, to the dictates of an intolerant and ambitious priesthood.

[483] In illustration of this, a volume might be filled with extracts
from the writings of the Scotch divines of the seventeenth
century. The following passage is, perhaps, as good as any. 'Yea,
it can hardly be instanced any great change, or revolution in the
earth, which hath not had some such extraordinary herald going
before. Can the world deny how sometimes these prodigious signes
have been shaped out to point at the very nature of the stroke
then imminent, by a strange resemblance to the same, such as a
flaming sword in the air, the appearance of armies fighting even
sometimes upon the earth, to the view of many most sober and
judicious onlookers, also showers of blood, the noise of drummes,
and such like, which are known usually to go before warr and
commotions.' _Fleming's Fulfilling of the Scripture_, 1681,
p. 216.

Of all the means of intimidation employed by the Scotch clergy, none was more efficacious than the doctrines they propounded respecting evil spirits and future punishment. On these subjects they constantly uttered the most appalling threats. The language, which they used, was calculated to madden men with fear, and to drive them to the depths of despair. That it often had this consequence, and produced most fatal results, we shall presently see. And, what made it more effectual was, that it completely harmonized with those other gloomy and ascetic notions which the clergy inculcated, and according to which, pleasures being regarded as sinful, sufferings were regarded as religious. Hence that love of inflicting pain, and that delight in horrible and revolting ideas, which characterized the Scotch mind during the seventeenth century. A few specimens of the prevailing opinions will enable the reader to understand the temper of the time, and to appreciate the resources which the Scotch clergy could wield, and the materials with which they built up the fabric of their power.

It was generally believed, that the world was overrun by evil spirits, who not only went up and down the earth, but also lived in the air, and whose business it was to tempt and hurt mankind.[484] Their number was infinite, and they were to be found at all places and in all seasons. At their head was Satan himself, whose delight it was to appear in person, ensnaring or terrifying every one he met.[485] With this object, he assumed various forms. One day, he would visit the earth as a black dog;[486] on another day, as a raven;[487] on another, he would be heard in the distance, roaring like a bull.[488] He appeared sometimes as a white man in black clothes;[489] and sometimes he came as a black man in black clothes, when it was remarked that his voice was ghastly, that he wore no shoes, and that one of his feet was cloven.[490] His stratagems were endless. For, in the opinion of divines, his cunning increased with his age; and having been studying for more than five thousand years, he had now attained to unexampled dexterity.[491] He could, and he did, seize both men and women, and carry them away through the air.[492] Usually, he wore the garb of laymen, but it was said, that, on more than one occasion, he had impudently attired himself as a minister of the gospel.[493] At all events, in one dress or other, he frequently appeared to the clergy, and tried to coax them over to his side.[494] In that, of course, he failed; but, out of the ministry, few, indeed, could withstand him. He could raise storms and tempests; he could work, not only on the mind, but also on the organs of the body, making men hear and see whatever he chose.[495] Of his victims, some he prompted to commit suicide,[496] others to commit murder.[497] Still, formidable as he was, no Christian was considered to have attained to a full religious experience, unless he had literally seen him, talked to him, and fought with him.[498] The clergy were constantly preaching about him, and preparing their audience for an interview with their great enemy. The consequence was, that the people became almost crazed with fear. Whenever the preacher mentioned Satan, the consternation was so great, that the church resounded with sighs and groans.[499] The aspect of a Scotch congregation in those days, is, indeed, hard for us to conceive. Not unfrequently the people, benumbed and stupefied with awe, were rooted to their seats by the horrible fascination exercised over them, which compelled them to listen, though they are described as gasping for breath, and with their hair standing on end.[500] Such impressions were not easily effaced. Images of terror were left on the mind, and followed the people to their homes, and in their daily pursuits. They believed that the devil was always, and literally, at hand; that he was haunting them, speaking to them, and tempting them. There was no escape. Go where they would, he was there. A sudden noise, nay, even the sight of an inanimate object, such as a stone, was capable of reviving the association of ideas, and of bringing back to the memory the language uttered from the pulpit.[501]

[484] Durham, after mentioning 'old abbacies or monasteries, or castles
when walls stand and none dwelleth in them,' adds, 'If it be
asked, If there be such a thing, as the haunting of evill spirits
in these desolate places? We answer 1. That there are evill
spirits rangeing up and down through the earth is certain, even
though hell be their prison properly, yet have they a sort of
dominion and abode both in the earth and air; partly, as a piece
of their curse, this is laid on them to wander; partly as their
exercise to tempt men, or bring spirituall or temporall hurt to
them,' &c. _Durham's Commentarie upon the Book of the Revelation_,
p. 582. So, too, Hutcheson (_Exposition of the Book of Job_, p.
9): 'We should remember that we sojourn in a world where Devils
are, and do haunt among us;' and Fleming (_Fulfilling of the
Scripture_, p. 217): 'But the truth itself is sure, that such a
party is at this day, encompassing the earth, and trafficking up
and down there, to prove which by arguments were to light a candle
to let men see that it is day, while it is known what _ordinary
familiar converse many have therewith_.' One of their favourite
abodes was the Shetland Islands, where, in the middle of the
seventeenth century, 'almost every family had a Brouny or evil
spirit so called.' See the account given by the Rev. John Brand,
in his work entitled _A Brief Description of Orkney, Zetland,
Pightland-Firth, and Caithness_, pp. 111, 112, Edinburgh, 1701.

[485] 'There is not one whom he assaulteth not.' _Abernethy's Physicke
for the Soule_, p. 101. 'On the right hand and on the left.'
_Cowper's Heaven Opened_, p. 273. Even early in the eighteenth
century, the 'most popular divines' in Scotland, affirmed that
Satan 'frequently appears clothed in a corporeal substance.'
_Memoirs of Charles Lee Lewes, written by Himself_, vol. iii.
pp. 29, 30, London, 1805.

[486] 'This night James Lochheid told me, that last year, if I mistake
not, at the Communion of Bafrou, he was much helped all day. At
night, when dark somewhat, he went out to the feilds to pray; and
a terrible slavish fear came on him, that he almost lost his
senses. Houever, he resolved to goe on to his duty. By (the time)
he was at the place, his fear was off him; and lying on a
knou-side, a black dogg came to his head and stood. He said he
kneu it to be Satan, and shooke his hand, but found nothing, it
evanishing.' ... 'Lord help against his devices, and strenthen
against them!' _Wodrow's Analecta_, vol. i. p. 24. The _Registers
of the Presbytery of Lanark_, p. 77, contain a declaration, in
1650, that 'the devill appeared like a little whelpe,' and
afterwards, 'like a brown whelpe.'

[487] The celebrated Peden was present when 'there came down the
appearance of a raven, and sat upon one man's head.' ...
Thereupon, 'going home, Mr. Peden said to his land-lord, I always
thought there was Devilry among you, but I never thought that he
did appear visibly among you, till now I have seen it. O, for the
Lord's sake quit this way,' _The Life and Death of Mr. Alexander
Peden, late Minister of the Gospel at New Glenluce in Galloway_,
pp. 111, 112, in vol. i. of _Walker's Biographia Presbyteriana_.

[488] 'I heard a voice just before me on the other side of the hedge,
and it seemed to be like the groaning of an aged man. It continued
so some time. I knew no man could be there; for, on the other side
of the hedge, where I heard the groaning, there was a great stank
or pool. I nothing doubted but it was Satan, and I guessed his
design; but still I went on to beg the child's life. At length he
roared and made a noise like a bull, and that very loud. From all
this I concluded, that I had been provoking God some way or other
in the duty, and that he was angry with me, and had let the enemy
loose on me, and might give him leave to tear me in pieces. This
made me intreat of God, to shew me wherefore he contended, and
begged he would rebuke Satan. The enemy continued to make a noise
like a bull, and seemed to be coming about the hedge towards the
door of the summer-seat, bellowing as he came along.' _Stevenson's
Rare, Soul-Strengthening, and Comforting Cordial for Old and Young
Christians_, p. 29. This book was published, and prepared for the
press, by the Rev. William Cupples. See Mr. Cupples' letter at the
beginning.

[489] In 1684, with 'black cloaths, and a blue band, and white
handcuffs.' _Sinclair's Satan's Invisible World Discovered_, p. 8.

[490] 'He observed one of the black man's feet to be cloven, and that the
black man's apparel was black, and that he had a blue band about
his neck, and white hand-cuffs, and that he had hoggers upon his
legs without shoes; and that the black man's voice was hollow and
ghastly.' _Satan's Invisible World Discovered_, p. 9. 'The devil
appeared in the shape of a black man,' p. 31. See also _Brand's
Description of Orkney_, p. 126: 'all in black.'

[491] 'The acquired knowledge of the Devill is great, hee being an
advancing student, and still learning now above five thousand
yeares.' _Rutherford's Christ Dying and Drawing Sinners to
Himselfe_, p. 204. 'He knowes very well, partly by the quicknesse
of his nature, and partly by long experience, being now very neere
six thousand yeeres old.' _Cowper's Heaven Opened_, p. 219. 'Hee,
being compared with vs, hath many vantages; as that he is more
subtill in nature, being of greater experience, and more ancient,
being now almost sixe thousand yeeres old.' _Ibid._ p. 403. 'The
diuell here is both diligent and cunning, and (now almost of sixe
thousand yeeres) of great experience.' _Abernethy's Physicke for
the Soule_, p. 142. 'Satan, such an ingenious and experimented
spirit.' _Binning's Sermons_, vol. i. p. 67. 'His great sleight
and cunning.' _Ibid._ p. 110. Other eulogies of his skill may be
seen in _Fergusson's Exposition of the Epistles of Paul_, p. 475;
and in _Fleming's Fulfilling of the Scripture_, p. 45. A
'minister,' whose name is not mentioned, states that he is 'of an
excellent substance, of great natural parts, long experience, and
deep understanding.' _Sinclair's Satan's Invisible World
Discovered_, p. 78.

[492] In Professor Sinclair's work (_Satan's Invisible World
Discovered_, p. 141), we find, in 1684, 'an evident instance, that
the devil can transport the bodies of men and women through the
air. It is true, he did not carry her far off, but not for want of
skill and power.' Late in the seventeenth century, it was
generally believed that one of Satan's accomplices was literally
'strangled in his chair by the devil, least he should make a
confession to the detriment of the service.' _Crawfurd's History
of the Shire of Renfrew_, part iii. p. 319.

[493] See the account of a young preacher being deceived in this way, in
_Wodrow's Analecta_, vol. i. pp. 103, 104. The Rev. Robert Blair
detected the cheat, and 'with ane awful seriousness appearing in
his countenance, began to tell the youth his hazard, and that the
man whom he took for a Minister was the Divel, who had trepanned
him, and brought him into his net; advised him to be earnest with
God in prayer, and likewise not to give way to dispair, for ther
was yet hope.' The preacher had, on this occasion, been so far
duped as to give the devil 'a written promise' to do whatever he
was requested. As soon as the Rev. Mr. Blair ascertained this
fact, he took the young man before the Presbytery, and narrated
the circumstance to the members. 'They were all strangely affected
with it, and resolved unanimously to dispatch the Presbitry
business presently, and to stay all night in town, and on the
morrow to meet for prayer in one of the most retired churches of
the Presbitry, acquainting none with their business, (but) taking
the youth alongst with them, whom they keeped alwise close by
them. Which was done, and after the Ministers had prayed all of
them round, except Mr. Blair, who prayed last, in time of his
prayer there came a violent rushing of wind upon the church, so
great that they thought the church should have fallen down about
their ears, and with that the youth's paper and covenant' (_i.e._
the covenant which he had signed at the request of Satan) 'droops
down from the roof of the church among the Ministers.'

[494] 'The devil strikes at them, that in them he may strike at the
whole congregation.' _Boston's Sermons_, p. 186. Fleming
(_Fulfilling of the Scripture_, p. 379) gives an account of his
appearing to one of the Scotch clergy. Compare _Wodrow's
Analecta_, vol. iv. p. 110. In 1624, Bruce writes, 'I heard his
voice as vively as ever I heard any thing, not being sleeping, but
waking.' _Life of Bruce_, p. 8, prefixed to _Bruce's Sermons_. The
only remedy was immediate resistance. 'It is the duty of called
ministers to go on with courage in the work of the Lord,
notwithstanding of any discouragement of that kind, receiving
manfully the first onset chiefly of Satan's fury, as knowing their
ceding to him will make him more cruel.' _Fergusson's Exposition
of the Epistles of Paul_, p. 74. In the seventeenth century, the
Scotch clergy often complimented each other on having baffled him,
and thereby put him in a passion. Thus, in 1626, Dickson writes to
Boyd: 'The devil is mad against you, he fears his kingdom.' _Life
of Robert Boyd, in Wodrow's Collections upon the Lives of
Ministers_, vol. ii. part i. p. 238. See also pp. 165, 236.

[495] 'He can delude ears, eyes, &c., either by misrepresenting external
objects, or by inward disturbing of the faculties and organes,
whereby men and women may, and do often, apprehend that they hear,
see, &c. such and such things, which, indeed, they do not.'
_Durham's Commentarie upon the Book of the Revelation_, p. 128.
'Raise tempests.' _Binning's Sermons_, vol. i. p. 122. 'His power
and might, whereby through God's permission, he doth raise up
storms, commove the elements, destroy cattle,' &c. _Fergusson's
Exposition of the Epistles of Paul_, p. 264. 'Hee can work
curiously and strongly on the walls of bodily organs, on the shop
that the understanding soule lodgeth in, and on the necessary
tooles, organs, and powers of fancie, imagination, memory,
humours, senses, spirits, bloud,' &c. _Rutherford's Christ Dying_,
p. 212. Semple, giving notice of his intention to administer the
sacrament, told the congregation 'that the Devil would be so
envious about the good work they were to go about, that he was
afraid he would be permitted to raise a storm in the air with a
speat of rain, to raise the waters, designing to drown some of
them; but it will not be within the compass of his power to drown
any of you, no not so much as a dog.' _Remarkable Passages of the
Life and Death of Mr. John Semple_, _Minister of the Gospel_, pp.
168, 169, in vol. i. of _Walker's Biographia Presbyteriana_.

[496] _Sinclair's Satan's Invisible World Discovered_, p. 137. _Memoirs
of the Life and Experiences of Marion Laird of Greenock, with a
Preface by the Rev. Mr. Cock_, pp. 43, 44, 45, 84, 85, 172, 222,
223.

[497] 'I shall next show how the murderer Satan visibly appeared to a
wicked man, stirred him up to stab me, and how mercifully I was
delivered therefrom.' _The Autobiography of Mr. Robert Blair,
Minister of St. Andrews_, p. 65. See also _Fleming's Fulfilling of
the Scripture_, pp. 379, 380.

[498] 'One Mr. Thomas Hogg, a very popular presbyterian preacher in the
North, asked a person of great learning, in a religious
conference, whether or not he had seen the Devil? It was answered
him, "That he had never seen him in any visible appearance."
"Then, I assure you," saith Mr. Hogg, "that you can never be happy
till you see him in that manner; that is, until you have both a
personal converse and combat with him."' _Scotch Presbyterian
Eloquence_, pp. 28, 29.

[499] 'Ye go to the kirk, and when ye hear the devil or hell named in
the preaching, ye sigh and make a noise.' _The Last and Heavenly
Speeches of John, Viscount Kenmure_, in _Select Biographies_,
vol. i. p. 405.

[500] Andrew Gray, who died in 1656, used such language, 'that his
contemporary, the foresaid Mr. Durham, observed, That many times
he caused the very hairs of their head to stand up.' _Howie's
Biographia Scoticana_, p. 217. James Hutcheson boasted of this
sort of success. 'As he expressed it, "I was not a quarter of ane
hour in upon it, till I sau a dozen of them all gasping before
me." He preached with great freedome _all day_, and fourteen or
twenty dated their conversion from that sermon.' _Wodrow's
Analecta_, vol. i. p. 131. When Dickson preached, 'many were so
choaked and taken by the heart, that through terrour, the spirit
in such a measure convincing them of sin, in hearing of the word
they have been made to fall over, and thus carried out of the
church.' _Fleming's Fulfilling of the Scripture_, p. 347. There
was hardly any kind of resource which these men disdained.
Alexander Dunlop 'entered into the ministry at Paislay, about the
year 1643 or 1644.' ... 'He used in the pulpit, to have a kind of
a groan at the end of some sentences. Mr. Peebles called it a holy
groan.' _Wodrow's Analecta_, vol. iii. pp. 16, 21.

[501] A schoolmaster, recording his religious experiences (_Wodrow's
Analecta_, vol. i. p. 246), says: 'If any thing had given a knock,
I would start and shiver, the seeing of a dogg made me affrayed,
the seeing of a stone in the feild made me affrayed, and as I
thought a voice in my head saying, "It's Satan."'

Nor is it strange that this should be the case. All over Scotland, the sermons were, with hardly an exception, formed after the same plan, and directed to the same end. To excite fear, was the paramount object.[502] The clergy boasted, that it was their special mission to thunder out the wrath and curses of the Lord.[503] In their eyes, the Deity was not a beneficent being, but a cruel and remorseless tyrant. They declared that all mankind, a very small portion only excepted, were doomed to eternal misery. And when they came to describe what that misery was, their dark imaginations revelled and gloated at the prospect. In the pictures which they drew, they reproduced and heightened the barbarous imagery of a barbarous age. They delighted in telling their hearers, that they would be roasted in great fires, and hung up by their tongues.[504] They were to be lashed with scorpions, and see their companions writhing and howling around them.[505] They were to be thrown into boiling oil and scalding lead.[506] A river of fire and brimstone, broader than the earth, was prepared for them;[507] in that, they were to be immersed; their bones, their lungs, and their liver, were to boil, but never be consumed.[508] At the same time, worms were to prey upon them; and while these were gnawing at their bodies, they were to be surrounded by devils, mocking and making pastime of their pains.[509] Such were the first stages of suffering, and they were only the first. For the torture, besides being unceasing, was to become gradually worse. So refined was the cruelty, that one hell was succeeded by another; and, lest the sufferer should grow callous, he was, after a time, moved on, that he might undergo fresh agonies in fresh places, provision being made that the torment should not pall on the sense, but should be varied in its character, as well as eternal in its duration.[510]

[502] Only those who are extensively read in the theological literature
of that time, can form an idea of this, its almost universal
tendency. During about a hundred and twenty years, the Scotch
pulpits resounded with the most frightful denunciations. The sins
of the people, the vengeance of God, the activity of Satan, and
the pains of hell, were the leading topics. In this world,
calamities of every kind were announced as inevitable; they were
immediately at hand; that generation, perhaps that year, should
not pass away without the worst evils which could be conceived,
falling on the whole country. I will merely quote the opening of a
sermon which is now lying before me, and which was preached, in
1682, by no less a man than Alexander Peden. 'There is three or
four things that I have to tell you this day; and the first is
this, A bloody sword, a bloody sword, a bloody sword, for thee, O
Scotland, that shall reach the most part of you to the very heart.
And the second is this, Many a mile shall ye travel in thee, O
Scotland! and shall see nothing but waste places. The third is
this, The most fertile places in thee, O Scotland! shall be waste
as the mountain tops. And fourthly, The women with child in thee,
O Scotland! shall be dashed in pieces. And fifthly, There hath
been many conventicles in thee, O Scotland! but ere it be long,
God shall have a conventicle in thee, that shall make thee
Scotland tremble. Many a preaching hath God wared on thee, O
Scotland! but ere it be long God's judgments shall be as frequent
in Scotland as these precious meetings, wherein he sent forth his
faithful servants to give faithful warning in his name of their
hazard in apostatizing from God, and in breaking all his noble
vows. God sent out a Welsh, a Cameron, a Cargill, and a Semple to
preach to thee; but ere long God shall preach to thee by a bloody
sword.' _Sermons by Eminent Divines_, pp. 47, 48.

[503] To 'thunder out the Lord's wrath and curse.' _Durham's Commentarie
upon the Book of the Revelation_, p. 191. 'It is the duty of
Ministers to preach judgments.' _Hutcheson's Exposition on the
Minor Prophets_, vol. i. p. 93. 'If ministers when they threaten
be not the more serious and fervent, the most terrible threatening
will but little affect the most part of hearers.' _Fergusson's
Exposition of the Epistles of Paul_, p. 421.

[504] The clergy were not ashamed to propagate a story of a boy who, in
a trance, had been mysteriously conveyed to hell, and thence
permitted to revisit the earth. His account, which is carefully
preserved by the Rev. Robert Wodrow (_Analecta_, vol. i. p. 51)
was, that 'ther wer great fires and men roasted in them, and then
cast into rivers of cold water, and then into boyling water;
others hung up by the tongue.'

[505] 'Scortched in hell-fire and hear the howling of their
fellow-prisoners, and see the ugly devils, the bloody scorpions
with which Satan lasheth miserable soules.' _Rutherford's Christ
Dying_, pp. 491, 492.

[506] 'Boiling oil, burning brimstone, scalding lead.' _Sermons by
Eminent Divines_, p. 362.

[507] 'A river of fire and brimstone broader than the earth.'
_Rutherford's Religious Letters_, p. 35. 'See the poor wretches
lying in bundles, boiling eternally in that stream of brimstone.'
_Halyburton's Great Concern of Salvation_, p. 53.

[508] 'Tongue, lungs, and liver, bones and all, shall boil and fry in a
torturing fire.' _Rutherford's Religious Letters_, p. 17. 'They
will be universal torments, every part of the creature being
tormented in that flame. When one is cast into a fiery furnace,
the fire makes its way into the very bowels, and leaves no member
untouched: what part then can have ease, when the damned swim in a
lake of fire burning with brimstone?' _Boston's Human Nature in
its Four-fold State_, p. 458.

[509] 'While wormes are sporting with thy bones, the devils shall make
pastime of thy paines.' _Abernethy's Physicke for the Soule_, p.
97. 'They will have the society of devils in their torments, being
shut up with them in hell.' _Boston's Human Nature in its
Four-fold State_, p. 442. 'Their ears filled with frightful
yellings of the infernal crew.' _Ibid._ p. 460.

[510] This fundamental doctrine of the Scotch divines is tersely summed
up in _Binning's Sermons_, vol. iii. p. 130: 'You shall go out of
one hell into a worse; eternity is the measure of its continuance,
and the degrees of itself are answerable to its duration.' The
author of these sermons died in 1653.

All this was the work of the God of the Scotch clergy.[511] It was not only his work, it was his joy and his pride. For, according to them, hell was created before man came into the world; the Almighty, they did not scruple to say, having spent his previous leisure in preparing and completing this place of torture, so that, when the human race appeared, it might be ready for their reception.[512] Ample, however, as the arrangements were, they were insufficient; and hell, not being big enough to contain the countless victims incessantly poured into it, had, in these latter days, been enlarged.[513] There was now sufficient room. But in that vast expanse there was no void, for the whole of it reverberated with the shrieks and yells of undying agony.[514] They rent the air with horrid sound, and, amid their pauses, other scenes occurred, if possible, still more excruciating. Loud reproaches filled the ear: children reproaching their parents, and servants reproaching their masters. Then, indeed, terror was rife, and abounded on every side. For, while the child cursed his father, the father, consumed by remorse, felt his own guilt; and both children and fathers made hell echo with their piercing screams, writhing in convulsive agony at the torments which they suffered, and knowing that other torments more grievous still were reserved for them.[515]

[511] And, according to them, the barbarous cruelty was the natural
result of His Omniscience. It is with pain, that I transcribe the
following impious passage. 'Consider, Who is the contriver of
these torments. There have been some very exquisite torments
contrived by the wit of men, the naming of which, if ye understood
their nature, were enough to fill your hearts with horror; but
_all these fall as far short of the torments ye are to endure, as
the wisdom of man falls short of that of God_.' ... '_Infinite
wisdom has contrived that evil_.' _The Great Concern of Salvation,
by the late Reverend Mr. Thomas Halyburton_, edit. Edinburgh,
1722, p. 154.

[512] 'Men wonder what he could be doing all that time, if we may call
it time which hath no beginning, and how he was employed.' ...
'Remember that which a godly man answered some wanton curious wit,
who, in scorn, demanded the same of him--"He was preparing hell
for curious and proud fools," said he.' _Binning's Sermons_,
vol. i. p. 194.

[513] 'Hell hath inlarged itselfe.' _Abernethy's Physicke for the
Soule_, p. 146.

[514] 'Eternal shriekings.' _Sermons by Eminent Divines_, p. 394.
'Screakings and howlings.' _Gray's Great and Precious Promises_,
p. 20. 'O! the screechs and yels that will be in hell.' _Durham's
Commentarie upon the Book of the Revelation_, p. 654. 'The
horrible scrieches of them who are burnt in it.' _Cowper's Heaven
Opened_, p. 175.

[515] 'When children and servants shall go, as it were, in sholes to the
Pit, cursing their parents and their masters who brought them
there. And parents and masters of families shall be in multitudes
plunged headlong in endless destruction, because they have not
only murdered their own souls, but also imbrued their hands in the
blood of their children and servants. O how doleful will the
reckoning be amongst them at that day! When the children and
servants shall upbraid their parents and masters. "Now, now, we
must to the Pit, and we have you to blame for it; your cursed
example and lamentable negligence has brought us to the Pit."' ...
'And on the other hand, how will the shrieks of parents fill every
ear? "I have damn'd myself, I have damn'd my children, I have
damn'd my servants. While I fed their bodies, and clothed their
backs, I have ruined their souls, and brought double damnation on
myself."' _Halyburton's Great Concern of Salvation_, pp. 527, 528.
See this further worked out in _Boston's Human Nature in its
Four-fold State_, pp. 378, 379: 'curses instead of salutations,
and tearing of themselves, and raging against one another, instead
of the wonted embraces.'

Even now such language freezes the blood, when we consider what must have passed through the minds of those who could bring themselves to utter it. The enunciation of such ideas unfolds the character of the men, and lays bare their inmost spirit. We shudder, when we think of the dark and corrupted fancy, the vindictive musings, the wild, lawless, and uncertain thoughts which must have been harboured by those who could combine and arrange the different parts of this hideous scheme. No hesitation, no compunction, no feelings of mercy, ever seem to have entered their breasts. It is evident, that their notions were well matured; it is equally evident, that they delighted in them. They were marked by a unity of conception, and were enforced with a freshness and vigour of language, which shows that their heart was in their work. But before this could have happened, they must have been dead to every emotion of pity and tenderness. Yet, they were the teachers of a great nation, and were, in every respect, the most influential persons in that nation. The people, credulous and grossly ignorant, listened and believed. We, at this distance of time, and living in another realm of thought, can form but a faint conception of the effect which these horrible conceits produced upon them. They were convinced that, in this world, they were incessantly pursued by the devil, and that he, and other evil spirits, were constantly hovering around them, in bodily and visible shape, tempting them, and luring them on to destruction. In the next world, the most frightful and unheard-of punishments awaited them; while both this world and the next were governed by an avenging Deity, whose wrath it was impossible to propitiate. No wonder that, with these ideas before them, their reason should often give way, and that a religious mania should set in, under whose influence they, in black despair, put an end to their lives.[516]

[516] William Vetch, 'preaching in the town of Jedburg to a great
congregation, said, "There are two thousand of you here to day,
but I am sure fourscore of you will not be saved;" upon which,
three of his ignorant hearers being in despair, despatch'd
themselves soon after.' _Scotch Presbyterian Eloquence_, p. 23.
See also the life, or rather panegyric, of Vetch in _Howie's
Biographia Scoticana_, where this circumstance is not denied, but,
on the contrary, stated to be no 'disparagement to him,' p. 606.
The frame of mind which the teachings of the clergy encouraged,
and which provoked self-murder, is vividly depicted by Samuel
Rutherford, the most popular of all the Scotch divines of the
seventeenth century. 'Oh! hee lieth down, and hell beddeth with
him; hee sleepeth, and hell and hee dreame together; hee riseth,
and hell goeth to the fields with him; hee goes to his garden,
there is hell.' ... 'The man goes to his table, O! hee dare not
eat, hee hath no right to the creature; to eat is sin and hell; so
hell is in every dish. To live is sinne, _hee would faine chuse
strangling_; every act of breathing is sin and hell. Hee goes to
church, there is a dog as great as a mountaine before his eye:
Here be terrors.' _Rutherford's Christ Dying_, 1647, 4to, pp. 41,
42. Now, listen to the confessions of two of the tortured victims
of the doctrines enunciated by the clergy; victims who, after
undergoing ineffable agony, were more than once, according to
their own account, tempted to put an end to their lives. 'The
cloud lasted for two years and some months.' ... 'The arrows of
the Almighty did drink up my spirits; night and day his hand lay
heavy upon me, so that even my bodily moisture was turned into the
drought of summer. When I said sometimes that my couch would ease
my complaint, I was filled with tossings to the dawning of the
day.' ... 'Amidst all my downcastings, I had the roaring lion to
grapple with, who likes well to fish in muddy waters. He strongly
suggested to me that I should not eat, because I had no right to
food; or if I ventured to do it, the enemy assured me, that the
wrath of God would go down with my morsel; and that I had
forfeited a right to the divine favour, and, therefore, had
nothing to do with any of God's creatures.' ... 'However, so
violent were the temptations of the strong enemy, that I
frequently forgot to eat my bread, and durst not attempt it; and
when, through the persuasion of my wife, I at any time did it, the
enemy through the day did buffet me in a violent way, assuring me
that the wrath of God had gone over with what I had taken.' ...
'The enemy after all did so pursue me, that he violently suggested
to my soul, that, some time or other, God would suddenly destroy
me as with a thunderclap: which so filled my soul with fear and
pain, that, every now and then, I looked about me, to receive the
divine blow, still expecting it was a coming; yea, many a night I
durst not sleep, lest I had awakened in everlasting flames.'
_Stevenson's Rare Cordial_, pp. 11-13. Another poor creature,
after hearing one of Smiton's sermons, in 1740, says, 'Now, I saw
myself to be a condemned criminal; but I knew not the day of my
execution. I thought that there was nothing between me and hell,
but the brittle thread of natural life.' ... 'And in this dreadful
confusion, I durst not sleep, lest I had awakened in everlasting
flames.' ... 'And Satan violently assaulted me to take away my own
life, seeing there was no mercy for me.' ... 'Soon after this, I
was again violently assaulted by the tempter to take away my own
life; he presented to me a knife therewith to do it; no person
being in the house but myself. The enemy pursued me so close, that
I could not endure so much as to see the knife in my sight, but
laid it away.' ... 'One evening, as I was upon the street, Satan
violently assaulted me to go into the sea and drown myself; it
would be the easiest death. Such a fear of Satan then fell upon
me, as made my joints to shake, so that it was much for me to walk
home; and when I came to the door, I found nobody within; I was
afraid to go into the house, lest Satan should get power over me.'
_Memoirs of the Life and Experiences of Marion Laird of Greenock_,
pp. 13, 14, 19, 45, 223, 224.

Little comfort, indeed, could men then gain from their religion. Not only the devil, as the author of all evil, but even He whom we recognise as the author of all good, was, in the eyes of the Scotch clergy, a cruel and vindictive being, moved with anger like themselves. They looked into their own hearts, and there they found the picture of their God. According to them, He was a God of terror, instead of a God of love.[517] To Him they imputed the worst passions of their own peevish and irritable nature. They ascribed to Him, revenge, cunning, and a constant disposition to inflict pain. While they declared that nearly all mankind were sinners beyond the chance of redemption, and were, indeed, predestined to eternal ruin, they did not scruple to accuse the Deity of resorting to artifice against these unhappy victims; lying in wait for them, that He might catch them unawares.[518] The Scotch clergy taught their hearers, that the Almighty was so sanguinary, and so prone to anger, that He raged even against walls and houses and senseless creatures, wreaking His fury more than ever, and scattering desolation on every side.[519] Sooner than miss His fell and malignant purpose, He would, they said, let loose avenging angels, to fall upon men and upon their families.[520] Independently of this resource, He had various ways whereby He could at once content Himself and plague His creatures, as was particularly shown in the devices which He employed to bring famine on a people.[521] When a country was starving, it was because God, in His anger, had smitten the soil, had stopped the clouds from yielding their moisture, and thus made the fruits of the earth to wither.[522] All the intolerable sufferings caused by a want of food, the slow deaths, the agony, the general misery, the crimes which that misery produced, the anguish of the mother as she saw her children wasting away and could give them no bread, all this was His act, and the work of His hands.[523] In His anger, He would sometimes injure the crops by making the spring so backward, and the weather so cold and rainy, as to insure a deficiency in the coming harvest.[524] Or else, he would deceive men, by sending them a favourable season, and, after letting them toil and sweat in the hope of an abundant supply, He would, at the last moment, suddenly step in, and destroy the corn just as it was fit to be reaped.[525] For, the God of the Scotch Kirk was a God who tantalized His creatures as well as punished them; and when He was provoked, He would first allure men by encouraging their expectations, in order that their subsequent misery might be more poignant.[526]

[517] Binning says, that 'since the first rebellion' (that is, the fall
of Adam), 'there is nothing to be seen but the terrible
countenance of an angry God.' _Binning's Sermons_, vol. iii.
p. 254.

[518] 'He will, as it were, lie in wait to take all advantages of
sinners to undo them.' _Hutcheson's Exposition on the Minor
Prophets_, vol. i. p. 247.

[519] 'His wrath rages against walls, and houses, and senselesse
creatures more now then at that time' (_i.e._ at the time when the
Old Testament was written). 'See what desolation he hath wrought
in Ireland, what eating of horses, of infants, and of killed
souldiers, hath beene in that land, and in Germany.' _Rutherford's
Free Disputation against Pretended Liberty of Conscience_,
pp. 244, 245.

[520] 'Albeit there were no earthly man to pursue Christ's enemies; yet
avenging angels, or evil spirits shall be let forth upon them and
their families to trouble them.' _Dickson's Explication of the
First Fifty Psalms_, p. 229.

[521] 'God hath many wayes and meanes whereby to plague man, and _reach
his contentments_.' _Hutcheson's Exposition on the Minor
Prophets_, vol. i. p. 286. 'God hath variety of means whereby to
plague men, and to bring upon them any affliction he intendeth
against them; and particularly he hath several wayes whereby to
bring on famine. He can arme all his creatures to cut off men's
provision, one of them after another; he can make the change of
aire, and small insects do that worke when he pleaseth.' _Ibid._,
vol. i. p. 422. The same divine, in another elaborate treatise,
distinctly imputes to the Deity a sensation of pleasure in
injuring even the innocent. 'When God sends out a scourge, of
sword, famine, or pestilence, suddenly to overthrow and cut people
off, not only are the wicked reached thereby (which is here
supposed), but even the innocent, that is such as are righteous
and free of gross provocations; for, in any other sense, none are
innocent, or free of sin, in this life. Yea, further, in trying of
the innocent by these scourges, _the Lord seems to act as one
delighted with it_, and little resenting the great extremities
wherewith they are pressed.' _Hutcheson's Exposition of the Book
of Job_, 1669, folio, p. 123. Compare p. 359. 'It pleaseth the
Lord to exercise great variety in afflicting the children of men,'
&c. But, after all, mere extracts can give but a faint idea of the
dark and malignant spirit which pervades these writings.

[522] 'The present dearth and famine quhilk seases vpon many, quhairby
God his heavie wrath is evidentlie perceaved to be kindlit against
vs.' _Selections from the Minutes of the Synod of Fife_, p. 98.
'Smiting of the fruits of the ground.' _Hutcheson's Exposition on
the Minor Prophets_, vol. i. p. 277. 'Makes fruits to wither.'
_Ibid._, vol. ii. p. 183. 'Hee restraines the clouds, and bindeth
up the wombe of heaven, in extreme drought.' _Rutherford's Christ
Dying_, p. 52. 'Sometime hee maketh tho heauen aboue as brasse,
and the earth beneath as iron; so that albeit men labour and sow,
yet they receiue no increase: sometime againe hee giues in due
season the first and latter raine, so that the earth renders
abundance, but the Lord by blasting windes, or by the caterpillar,
canker-worme and grasse-hopper doth consume them, who come out as
exacters and officers sent from God to poind men in their goods.'
_Cowper's Heaven Opened_, p. 433.

[523] 'Under the late dearth this people suffered greatly, the poor were
numerous, and many, especially about the town of Kilsyth, were at
the point of starving; yet, as I frequently observed to them, I
could not see any one turning to _the Lord who smote them_, or
crying to him because of their sins, while _they howled upon their
beds for bread_.' _Robe's Narratives of the Extraordinary Work of
the Spirit of God_, p. 68.

[524] _Nicoll's Diary_, pp. 152, 153. Much rain in the autumn, was 'the
Lord's displeasure upon the land.' _Minutes of the Presbyteries of
Saint Andrews and Cupar_, p. 179.

[525] 'Men sweat, till, sow much, and the sun and summer, and clouds,
warme dewes and raines smile upon cornes and meddowes, yet God
steppeth in betweene the mouth of the husbandman and the sickle,
and blasteth all.' _Rutherford's Christ Dying_, p. 87. Compare
_Baillie's Letters_, vol. iii. p. 52, on the 'continuance of very
intemperate rain upon the corns,' as one of the 'great signs of
the wrath of God.'

[526] 'When the Lord is provoked, he can not only send an affliction,
but so order it, by faire appearances of a better lot, and
heightening of the sinners expectation and desire, as may make it
most sad.' _Hutcheson's Exposition on the Minor Prophets_,
vol. iii. pp. 9, 10.

Under the influence of this horrible creed, and from the unbounded sway exercised by the clergy who advocated it, the Scotch mind was thrown into such a state, that, during the seventeenth, and part of the eighteenth, century, some of the noblest feelings of which our nature is capable, the feelings of hope, of love, and of gratitude, were set aside, and were replaced by the dictates of a servile and ignominous fear. The physical sufferings to which the human frame is liable, nay, even the very accidents to which we are casually exposed, were believed to proceed, not from our ignorance, nor from our carelessness, but from the rage of the Deity. If a fire chanced to break out in Edinburgh, the greatest alarm was excited, because it was the voice of God crying out against a luxurious and dissolute city.[527] If a boil or a sore appeared on your body, that, too, was a divine punishment, and it was more than doubtful whether it might lawfully be cured.[528] The small-pox, being one of the most fatal as well as one of the most loathsome of all diseases, was especially sent by God; and, on that account, the remedy of inoculation was scouted as a profane attempt to frustrate His intentions.[529] Other disorders, which, though less terrible, were very painful, proceeded from the same source, and all owed their origin to the anger of the Almighty.[530] In every thing, His power was displayed, not by increasing the happiness of men, nor by adding to their comforts, but by hurting and vexing them in all possible ways. His hand, always raised against the people, would sometimes deprive them of wine by causing the vintage to fail;[531] sometimes, would destroy their cattle in a storm;[532] and sometimes, would even make dogs bite their legs when they least expected it.[533] Sometimes, He would display His wrath by making the weather excessively dry;[534] sometimes, by making it equally wet.[535] He was always punishing; always busy in increasing the general suffering, or, to use the language of the time, making the creature smart under the rod.[536] Every fresh war was the result of His special interference; it was not caused by the meddling folly or insensate ambition of statesmen, but it was the immediate work of the Deity, who was thus made responsible for all the devastations, the murders, and other crimes more horrible still, which war produces.[537] In the intervals of peace, which, at that period, were very rare, He had other means of vexing mankind. The shock of an earthquake was a mark of His displeasure;[538] a comet was a sign of coming tribulation;[539] and when an eclipse appeared, the panic was so universal, that persons of all ranks hastened to church to deprecate His wrath.[540] What they heard there, would increase their fear, instead of allaying it. For the clergy taught their hearers, that even so ordinary an event as thunder, was meant to excite awe, and was sent for the purpose of showing to men with how terrible a master they had to deal.[541] Not to tremble at thunder, was, therefore, a mark of impiety; and, in this respect, man was unfavourably contrasted with the lower animals, since they were invariably moved by this symptom of divine power.[542]

[527] In 1696, there was a fire in Edinburgh; whereupon Moncrief, in his
sermon next day, 'told us, "That God's voice was crying to this
city, and that he was come to the very ports, and was crying over
the walls to us; that we should amend our ways, lest he should
come to our city, and consume us in a terrible manner." I cannot
tell what this Dispensation of Providence wrought on me,' &c.
_Memoirs or Spiritual Exercises of Elizabeth West, written by her
own Hand_, pp. 41, 42. See also, at pp. 122, 123, the account of
another conflagration, where it is said, 'there was much of God to
be seen in this fire.' Compare a curious passage in _Calderwood's
History of the Kirk of Scotland_, vol. vii. pp. 455, 456.

[528] The Rev. James Fraser had a boil, and afterwards a fever. 'During
this sickness he miraculously allayed the pain of my boil, and
speedily, and that without means, cured it; for however I bought
some things to prevent it, yet, looking on it as a punishment from
God, I knew not if I could be free to take the rod out of his
hand, and to counterwork him.' _Memoirs of the Rev. James Fraser
of Brea, Minister of the Gospel at Culross, written by Himself_,
in _Select Biographies_, vol. ii. p. 223. Durham declaims against
'Sinful shunning and shifting off suffering;' and Rutherford says,
'No man should rejoice at weakness and diseases; but I think we
may have a sort of gladness at boils and sores, because, without
them, Christ's fingers, as a slain Lord, should never have touched
our skin.' _Durham's Law Unsealed_, p. 160; _Rutherford's
Religious Letters_, p. 265. I do not know what effect these
passages may produce upon the reader; but it makes my flesh creep
to quote them. Compare _Stevenson's Rare, Soul-strengthening, and
Comforting Cordial_, p. 35.