Bygone Church Life in Scotland Part 3

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Duke's Lodging, Drygait.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Bishop Cameron's Tower Episcopal Palace of Glasgow.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Town Residence of the Rector of Renfrew.]

The history of the See of Glasgow for five centuries after the death of St. Kentigern is almost a total blank; save for some dubious references to certain ecclesiastics supposed to have been the successors of the Saint, there is nothing to show the progress of the church in those days. The reforming zeal of Malcolm Canmore and Queen Margaret led to a revival of religion, as remarkable in its own way as the Protestant Reformation. The Culdees were supplanted by the Romanists, and the foundations were laid of a hierarchy that attained to vast power in Scotland. The reforms of the Queen were princ.i.p.ally confined to the east coast--Dunfermline and St.

Andrews--and it was not until her sixth and youngest son, David, Prince of c.u.mberland (afterwards David I.), ordered an "Inquisitio" as to the property belonging to the See of Glasgow in 1120, that any doc.u.mentary evidence was made available on this point. Prince David had already procured the appointment of his chancellor and tutor John Eochey or Achaius to the bishopric of Glasgow, and with the installation of that prelate a new era began in the history of the city. The Inquisitio or Not.i.tia showed that the lands possessed by the Bishop of Glasgow were co-extensive with the kingdom of Strathclyde, and were in the upper ward of Lanarkshire, and the counties of Peebles, Roxburgh, and Dumfries.

Bishop John Achaius was consecrated in 1115; Prince David came to the throne in 1124; and shortly after this accession the Bishop began the building of the Cathedral, which was dedicated to St. Kentigern on the nones of July, 1136. Bishop John Achaius died in 1147, and the Cathedral which he built did not long survive him. It is probable that it was a wooden structure, for it was destroyed by fire in 1176, and in that year Bishop Jocelin (1175-1199) began to rebuild it with stone. The next "building Bishop" was William de Bondington (1233-1258), who completed the Lower Church (or Crypt) and the Choir. Bishop William Lauder (1408-1425) began the erection of the present tower, and partly built the Chapter-house. These portions were completed by his successor Bishop John Cameron (1426-1446). Robert Blacader (1484-1508), the first Archbishop of Glasgow, erected the crypt at the south transept known as "Blacader's Aisle," built the splendid rood-screen and the stairs leading from the Nave to the Choir and Lower Church, and put the finishing touches to the Cathedral, which had thus taken nearly four hundred years to reach completion.

The gradual development of the Cathedral necessarily led to the increase of the ecclesiastics connected with it. The elaborate ceremonial of the Romish Church required a staff of officials far out-numbering that of the simple Culdee _cella_ of St. Kentigern's time. No definite information is available as to the method adopted for supplying these officials in the early years of the Cathedral's existence. It is reasonable to suppose, however, that the Rectors and Parsons who had charges in the widely-scattered parishes under the control of the Bishop, would have stated periods when they would take their turns of officiating. These clergymen would likely reside temporarily in the Bishop's Palace, to which reference will be made presently. At a later date, as the grandeur of the Cathedral increased and its ceremonial became more ornate, houses were provided for them near the building, and thus a return was made to the social system of the Culdees, though with a celibate clergy. Even so recently as the middle of the present century, about twenty of the manses belonging to different prebends connected with the Cathedral could be identified in its immediate vicinity. It has been credibly conjectured that the remains of a building outside the north wall of the Cathedral mark the site of the Hall of the Vicars Choral, and a narrow lane between the Cathedral and the Bishop's Castle was known as the Vicar's Alley, probably because it gave access to the building. A consideration of some of these clerical homes will give an idea of the social life in a pre-Reformation Cathedral.

The Bishop's Castle was for centuries a central point around which the burghal and national life crystallised. The date of its erection is not known. The earliest reference to it is found in a charter of 1258, in which the Bishop alludes to _palacium suum quod est extra castrum Glasguense_. This phrase proves that in the middle of the thirteenth century there was not only a Castle in existence, but also a _palacium_ or minor dwelling--not a "Palace" as the word has been absurdly translated, but a "place," equivalent to the old Scots word "ludging"--which stood outside the wall of the Castle. It is reasonable to suppose that Bishop Jocelin, who rebuilt the Cathedral with stone towards the close of the twelfth century, had caused the erection of the Castle to be begun, and that Bishop William de Bondington, who completed a large part of the Cathedral, also finished the Castle and the _palacium_ referred to in his charter. The Castle would be constructed for defence in those lawless times as well as for residence, and would probably be a square keep surrounded by a moat. There was a Bishop's Garden in 1268, and the Bishop's Castle is mentioned in a doc.u.ment dated 1290. At the latter date Robert Wishart (1272-1316) was Bishop, and as he built rural mansions at Castellstarris (Carstairs) and Ancrum, it is probable that he extended the Castle at Glasgow beside the Cathedral. During the War of Independence this Castle became a stronghold coveted by both belligerents. In 1297 it was captured for Edward I., by Anthony Bek, the famous "fighting Bishop of Durham," and re-taken by Sir William Wallace. After Bishop Wishart's time references to additions made to the Castle are more distinct. Before the middle of the fifteenth century the moat had been partially replaced by a high wall. In 1438 Bishop John Cameron built "a great tower," at the south-western corner of this wall, and his arms with episcopal insignia were visible on this tower in 1752. Archbishop James Beaton (1508-1522) enlarged the tower and completed a wall 15 feet high, which enclosed the grounds of the Castle. In the time of Archbishop Gavin Dunbar (1524-1547) a gate-house or port was erected on the line of the wall to form the main entrance to the Castle. From the fact that a sculptured stone, still in existence, which was taken from this port bears the arms of James Houston, Sub-Dean of Glasgow, it has been conjectured that the gate-way was erected at his expense; and as he had workmen building the Church of the B. V. M.

and St Anne (now the Tron Church) which he founded in 1530, he probably employed them upon this other piece of work at that date. After the Reformation the Bishop's Castle fell into disrepair. It was partly occupied by several of the Protestant Archbishops, but they had not incomes sufficient for its up-keep, and after the abolition of episcopacy by the Revolution of 1688 the Castle degenerated into a prison for rebels and petty offenders. Public executions took place in the Castle-yard so late as 1784--a curious survival of the power of the early Bishops over the lives of their va.s.sals, for it is said that the gallows of modern times was erected on the site of the old "heading-stone" of former days.

In 1755 the Magistrates gave permission to Robert Tennant to use the stones of the ruined Castle for the erection of the Saracen's Head Inn, a building which still exists though now divided into tenements.

During the stormy period of the sixteenth century, when Scotland was constantly in turmoil, through foes within and without the realm, the Bishop's Castle was frequently besieged. The legal proceedings that followed one of these incidents affords a glimpse of life within the Castle at that time. John Mure of Caldwell, acting under the orders of the Earl of Lennox, laid siege to the Castle on 20th February 1515, and captured it. He was soon compelled, by the Duke of Albany, to evacuate this stronghold, but before he retired his followers had sacked and pillaged the Castle. Two years afterwards Archbishop James Beaton claimed damages for the goods destroyed, and obtained a decree in his favour from the Lords of Council. The following articles were specially detailed in this decree, and are of interest as showing the furnishing and contents of an episcopal dwelling of that period:--"xiii feddir bedds furnist, price of ilka bedd v marks; xviii verdour bedds, price of the pere xl{s}.; xii buird claiths, xii tyn quarts, xii tyn pynts, v dusane of peuder vesch.e.l.lis, tua kists, xv swyne, iv dakyr of salt hyds, vi dusane of salmond, ane last of salt herring, xii tunnes of wyne, ane hingand chandlar, ane goun of scarlett lynit with mertricks, vi barrels of gunpulder, ix gunnis, xiv halberks, xiv steill bonnets, vi halberts, iv crossbowis, vi rufs and courtings of say, and iv of lynning, with mony uther insight guds, claithing, jewells, silkes, precius stanes, vesch.e.l.l, harness, vittales, and uther guds." From this list it will be seen that the luxuries of peace in which the prelates indulged had to be defended by the weapons of war.

While the Bishop's Castle was the centre of ecclesiastical influence, the first extension of Glasgow was due to the erection of manses for the minor officials of the Cathedral. To any one acquainted with the topography of Glasgow, the city may be thus "skeletonised" to show the manner of its evolution. The Cathedral stands on an eminence rising gradually from the north bank of the Clyde, and is distant about a mile from the river. The main route from the Cathedral to the Clyde is by an almost straight succession of streets--High Street and Saltmarket--which, unquestionably, follow the line of an ancient footpath. The origin of secular Glasgow was a small collection of huts inhabited by salmon-fishers on the bank of the river. A pathway was formed in course of time between this primitive village and the Cathedral, but for centuries there were no continuous buildings between these two points. In the time of Bishop Jocelin (1175-1199) the village had extended so far along the river-side and up the line of the present Saltmarket that the Bishop deemed it advisable to obtain from William the Lion the grant of a weekly market and an annual fair. About this time also, arrangements were made for the erection of manses for the ecclesiastics near the Cathedral. These houses were built on a road running at right angles with the footpath to the river, the part going westward being called the Rottenrow (Ratoun Raw), while the eastward route was called the Drygait. There was thus a sacerdotal burgh in process of formation on the summit of the hill beside the Cathedral, while a secular burgh was gradually developing on the bank of the river. In the course of centuries these two burghs were conjoined, and thus the "backbone" of Glasgow was formed. The ecclesiastical houses were, of course, more elaborate than those used by the fishermen and tradesmen who were soon attracted to the place by the wealth of the Cathedral; and thus it has happened that the greatest commercial city in Scotland--the second in the United Kingdom--took its rise from the houses of the ecclesiastics by whom the burgh was ruled for a very long period.

No record exists as to the time when the prebendal manses were first erected, but it is certain that Bishop Cameron (1426-1446) increased the number of canons from twenty-five to thirty-two, and caused all of them to build manses within the burgh and near the Cathedral. The sites of many of these manses can be identified from descriptions in old charters, and some of them have only been removed within the past thirty years. The Dean of the Cathedral, who was Parson of Cadzow (now Hamilton), had his manse in the Rottenrow. The Archdeacon of Glasgow was Rector of Menar (now Peebles), and his house stood in the Drygait. Long after the Reformation it came into the possession of the Duke of Montrose, and was known as "the Duke's lodging." It was removed about 1880, to make way for an extension of the North Prison. The Rector of Morebattle, Archdeacon of Teviotdale, had a manse in the Kirkgait, now also absorbed in the grounds of the North Prison. The Sub-Dean was Rector of Monkland, and his house was on the bank of the Molendinar Burn, south-east of the Cathedral. The Chancellor, Rector of Campsie, lived in the Drygait at the place called "the Limmerfield" to which reference is made in Scott's "Rob Roy." The Precentor of the Cathedral, Rector of East Kilbride, had a manse near the Castle, the approach being by the Vicar's Alley. The Treasurer, Rector of Carnwath, also had a manse, though its site has not been identified. The Sacristan of the Cathedral, Rector of Cambuslang, lived in the Drygait, near the house of the Archdeacon. The Bishop's Vicar, Parson of Glasgow, had a manse beside the Castle. The Sub-Precentor, Prebendary of Ancrum, had a parsonage in the Vicar's Alley, north of the Cathedral. The Parson of Eaglesham lived in the Drygait, beside the Archdeacon; and the Rector of Cardross had his manse on the south side of the same street. The manse of the "Canon of Barlanark and Lord of Provan," in Castle Street, is the only remaining house supposed to have been occupied by him, though it seems more likely to have been erected after the Reformation. The Rector of Carstairs resided in a manse in Rottenrow, beside the houses of the Prebendary of Erskine and the Rector of Renfrew. Other officials who lived in the immediate vicinity of the Cathedral were the Rector of Govan, the Vicar of Kirkmahoe, Dumfriesshire, the Rector of Tarbolton, Ayrshire, the Rector of Killearn, Dumbartonshire, the Prebendary of Douglas, Lanarkshire, the Rector of Eddleston, Peeblesshire, the Rector of Stobo, Peeblesshire, and the Rector of Luss, Dumbartonshire. The houses of six of the Prebendaries--Durisdeer, Roxburgh, Ashkirk, Sanquhar, c.u.mnock, and Ayr--have not been identified, though it is extremely probable that they had to comply with Bishop Cameron's command, and to erect manses in the burgh. The Hall of the Vicars Choral, with accommodation for eighteen officials, was built on the north side of the Cathedral, by Bishop Andrew Muirhead (1455-1473).

From this list it will be seen how great must have been the influence of this Levite village upon the development of the burgh. The comparatively luxurious style of living among the ecclesiastics would attract craftsmen, artificers of various kinds, and merchants trading with other countries to supply the rich garments, the expensive wines, and the numerous delicacies which were deemed necessaries by ecclesiastical dignitaries of high degree. With the Reformation all this grandeur was swept away, but before that epoch Glasgow had been made the favourite residence of many of the Lowland n.o.blemen; and when the sacerdotal burgh disappeared, the secular and commercial city was ready to take its place. The domination of the Church pa.s.sed, but not before it had prepared the way for its successor.

In other Cathedral cities in Scotland a similar process of development may be traced, though not in so distinct a manner as exhibited in the evolution of Glasgow. Verily, that city owes much of its prosperity to the foresight and patriotism of those who ruled in its pre-Reformation Cathedral!

Public Worship in Olden Times.

BY REV. ALEXANDER WATERS, M.A., B.D.

Many changes in the form of Church service have been witnessed in the Church of Scotland since the Reformation. In the first book of discipline, compiled by Knox and others in 1560, it is stated that "to the churches where no ministers can be had presentlie must be appointed the most apt men that distinctly can read the common prayers and the Scriptures to exercise both themselves and the church till they grow to greater perfection." In accordance with this recommendation there were, in parishes where ministers could not be procured to preach and administer the sacraments, a cla.s.s of men employed in the Church under the name of "readers," whose office was to read the Scriptures and a liturgy of printed prayers such as is used in the public service of the Church of England. After the Church became more fully plenished with ministers, readers were still in many places continued. In parishes supplied with both a reader and a minister there were two distinct services in the church on Sundays. There was, first of all, a preliminary service conducted by the reader. The service consisted of reading the public prayers and portions of Scripture. It usually lasted an hour, and when it ended the minister entered the church and conducted his service of extempore prayer and preaching. In the year 1580 the General a.s.sembly declared that "the office of a reader is not an ordinary office in the Kirk of G.o.d;" and the following year it was expressly ordained that readers should not be appointed in any church. It is evident, however, that readers continued to be employed in the Church of Scotland long after that date, both during the episcopacy that subsisted from 1606 to 1637, and during the ascendency of Presbytery from 1637 to 1645.

The Westminster a.s.sembly of Divines ignored the office of reader, and when the Westminster Directory for Public Worship was adopted by the Church of Scotland in 1645, it may be said that the service of the reader was ostensibly and almost practically brought to an end in Scotland. It has to be stated, however, that readers were, nevertheless, employed in some parishes long after their office had ceased to be recognised in the const.i.tutions of the church. Mr More, in his account of Scotland in 1715, describes the Sunday service in Scottish churches as follows:--"First the precentor, about half an hour before the preacher comes, reads two or three chapters to the congregation of what part of Scripture he pleases, or as the minister gives him directions. As soon as the preacher gets into the pulpit the precentor leaves reading, and sets a psalm-singing with the people, till the minister by some sign orders him to give over. The psalm over, the preacher begins confessing sins and begging pardon ... then he goes to sermon, delivered always by heart, and, therefore, sometimes spoiled by battologies, little impertinences, and incoherence."

The reader was usually also precentor, and it will be a natural transition, therefore, to pa.s.s on now to an account of that part of the Sunday service which the precentor conducted. In the Reformed Church of Scotland a very limited s.p.a.ce was originally allotted to the service of praise in public worship. "There is perhaps no country in Christendom,"

says Dr Cunningham, "in which psalmody has been as little cultivated as in Scotland. Wherever the Church of Rome reared her altars, music grew up under her shadow, and gave a new charm to her sensuous services. But Presbytery gave little countenance to such a hand-maid." The use of instruments in the service of praise was repudiated or almost abjured.

Organs were not even allowed standing room in church. In 1574 the Kirk Session of Aberdeen gave orders "that the organis with all expedition be removit out of the kirk and made profeit of to the use and support of the puir." On his visit to Scotland in 1617 King James endeavoured to inaugurate a more aesthetic and cultured form of worship in Scotland, after the manner of what he had seen in England. Among other innovations he set up an organ in the Chapel Royal at Holyrood. "Upon Satterday, the 17th May," says Calderwood, "the English service was begun in the Chapel Royal with singing of quirristers, surplices, and playing on organes." The popular feeling, however, that in 1637 was aroused against the service book was turned against the organ also, and among the outbreaks of 1638 Spalding records that "the glorious organes of the Chapell Royall were maisterfullie broken doune, nor no service usit thair bot the haill chaplains, choristis, and musicians dischargeit, and the costlie organes altogether destroyit and unusefull."

The old doctrine of the Church of Scotland in regard to psalmody is tersely expressed in the first book of discipline. "There be two sorts of policie," it is said in that book; "the one of these sorts is utterlie necessary, as, that the word be preached, the sacraments ministered, and common prayers publicly made. The other sort of policy is profitable, but not necessarie, as, that psalms should be sung and certain places of Scripture read when there is no sermon." And in accordance with this doctrine there is very little singing of psalms prescribed as part of public worship in either Knox's Liturgy or the Westminster Directory. In each of these manuals of worship there are only two psalms appointed or supposed to be sung during the minister's service--one before the sermon and another before the benediction. It is possible, however, that there was, from an early period, a third psalm sung in the church by the congregation, although that psalm was not included in the service. Just as in modern churches where instrumental music has been introduced, there is a voluntary played on the organ during the time that the congregation are a.s.sembling, so in very ancient times, long before the Reformation, it was customary over a large part of Christendom for the people "to entertain the time with singing of psalms" till the congregation had gathered. And in Scotland within quite recent times the epithet of the "gathering psalm"

was commonly applied to what is now called the first psalm.

Pasdoran states that, "It was the ancient practice of the Church of Scotland, as it is yet of some Reformed Churches abroad, for the minister or precentor to read over as much of the psalm in metre as was intended to be sung at once, and then the harmony and melody followed without interruption, and people did either learn to read or got most of the psalms by heart." What is here called the ancient practice of the Church of Scotland in the rendering of praise is just the practice that is observed at the present day. But soon after 1645 a different practice arose and continued long in the church. The Westminster Directory for Public Worship recommends that, "for the present, where many in the congregation cannot read, it is convenient that the minister or some other fit person appointed by him and the other ruling elders, do read the psalm line by line before the singing thereof." The practice was accordingly introduced into the Church of Scotland soon after of giving out the psalms in instalments of one line at a time, and so popular did the practice become, and so essential a part of revered use and wont, that very great difficulty was found long afterwards in getting it discontinued. Indeed, the practice of reading the line was pretty general until the beginning of this century.

Loud objections were raised to the singing of hymns and what, in Scotland, are commonly called paraphrases; and even within living memory this innovation gave rise to bitter controversy. Not a few persons maintained that the only proper subjects for divine praise in public worship are the metrical versions of the Old Testament Psalms. But from the date of the Reformation down to the sitting of the Westminster a.s.sembly, not only were metrical versions of the psalms, but hymns and doxologies also, generally sung in the public worship of the church. The year 1650, however, witnessed a change in that respect. The present version of the psalms was that year printed for use in public worship, and no hymns nor paraphrases were appended. It was not until 1781 that a Committee appointed by the General a.s.sembly submitted "such a collection of sacred poems as they thought might be submitted to the judgment of the church." It is this 1781 collection of paraphrases that is still, after the lapse of more than a hundred years, bound in Scottish Bibles along with the metrical version of the Psalms of David. The paraphrases have established a secure place in the psalmody of all the Presbyterian Churches in Scotland. But it was not without contention and controversy, strife and bitterness, that the paraphrases made their way into use in the services of public worship. The writer has seen a worthy elder violently close his Bible on the giving out of a paraphrase, and remain seated while it was being sung.

Having described the reader's and precentor's service, there remains the service that specially devolved on the minister. It is well known that a liturgy was at one time, and for a long time, used in the Church of Scotland. Knox's liturgy continued to be used by some ministers and readers down to the year 1637 at least. Its use was by no means universal, however, during that period. Extempore prayers were always popular with the general public, but when young and raw readers, however sparely gifted and not more than half-educated, took on themselves, as they often did, to treat congregations to extempore prayers, the guardians of public manners were shocked. It was a shame to all religion, said King Charles I., to have the majesty of G.o.d so barbarously spoken to; and, as a remedy for this deformity, as he termed it, in the public worship of the Church of Scotland, Charles issued a new service book to be used as a liturgy by all preachers and readers. But neither minister nor people would take the king's liturgy, and extempore prayers became more established in use and favour than ever.

It is well known that in Protestant churches generally, and in the Church of Scotland particularly, the preaching of the word has always been reckoned the chief part of the service of the sanctuary. The quant.i.ty of preaching that ministers had to give and people had to take in olden times was enormous. There were commonly two diets of worship on the Sabbath and very often what was termed a week-day sermon besides. It was customary for ministers to take up a subject or text and on that subject or text to preach for six or eight Sabbaths consecutively. It seems not to have been uncommon for ministers to take an hour to their sermon. And to keep preachers right in this matter, it was customary to set up a sand gla.s.s in the church.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PREACHER'S HOUR GLa.s.s.]

It is doubtful if in olden times there was as much good order observed in church during divine service as there is now. In some of the old ecclesiastical records, we find curious regulations for the preservation of order in church. In the Kirk Session records of Perth we find an instruction minuted that the kirk-officer "have his red staff in the Kirk on the Sabbath days wherewith to waken sleepers and remove greeting bairns." In 1593 complaint was made at Perth of boys in time of preaching running through the church clattering and fighting.

[Ill.u.s.tration: HOUR GLa.s.s STAND.]

The hours of church service on Sundays were much earlier long ago than they are now. In 1615 the Kirk Session of La.s.swade appointed nine o'clock as the hour on which service should begin in the summer months, and half-past nine as the hour of service in winter.

The neglect of public ordinances has at all times been a subject of lamentation. In olden days many devices are said to have been tried to remedy or abate these evils. Those resorted to by the Covenanters in Aberdeen in 1642 were perhaps as ingenious as any that have ever been adopted. "Our minister," says Spalding, "teaches powerfullie and plainlie the word to the gryte comfort of his auditores. He takes strait count of those who c.u.mis not to the communion, nor keepis not the kirk, callis out the absentis out of pulpit, quhilk drew in sic a fair auditorie that the seatis of the kirk was not abill to hold thame, for remeid quhair of he causit big up ane loft athwart the body of the kirk."

Mr Cant did not go quite so far, but being annoyed that his afternoon diets were spa.r.s.ely attended, he navely dismissed his forenoon audience without a benediction, and reserved his blessing for those that returned to the second sermon.

Church Music.

BY THOMAS FROST.

Though the use of instrumental music in the services of the Church fell into disfavour after the Reformation, the existence of a sculptured representation of an organ in Melrose Abbey shows that instrument to have been known as early as the fourteenth century. That "regals," as they were then called, were placed in some of the princ.i.p.al churches, and used in worship, is also evidenced by doc.u.ments still in existence. That these, however inferior they may have been to similar instruments of the present day, were carefully constructed, and at considerable cost, appears from the payments made to William Calderwood for "a pair of organs" for the Chapel Royal at Stirling in 1537, and for "a set of organs" for the King's Chapel at Holyrood in 1542. But the Reformation led to these instruments being everywhere discarded as partaking too much of Romanism to be acceptable to the followers of Knox.

The organs of the royal chapels kept their places for a time, but elsewhere the "kists of whistles," as they then came to be called, were broken up and the materials sold in aid of the fund for the poor. But no long time elapsed before the Earl of Mar, as captain of Stirling Castle, caused the organ in the Royal Chapel to be removed and broken up; and in 1571 the Scottish Parliament expressed approval of the act. The prevailing feeling against the organ was intensified when, in 1617, orders were given by James VI. that carved figures of the Apostles should be affixed to the seats of the choir in the Chapel at Holyrood, where the organ was then being repaired, after a long period of disuse and neglect. Instrumental music thus became a.s.sociated in the public mind with what was regarded as idolatry, and so much excitement prevailed that the bishops advised that the restoration of the organ and the choir stalls should be delayed until it subsided.

In 1631 Charles issued an order for the erection of an organ in every cathedral and princ.i.p.al church, and thereby renewed the agitation against the instrument. The order was disregarded, and in 1638, when popular opposition to the introduction of the Anglican prayer-book was being strongly manifested, the General a.s.sembly ruled that the attempt to introduce instrumental music into the services of the Church should be resisted. Spalding, speaking of the agitation of that period, says that "the glorious organs of the Chapel Royal were masterfully broken down, nor no service used there, but the whole chaplains, choristers, and musicians discharged, and the costly organs altogether destroyed and unuseful." Six years later, the General a.s.sembly recorded in their minutes the gladness with which that body had received the news from their commissioners at Westminster of the taking down of the great organs of St. Paul's Cathedral and Westminster Abbey.

Psalmody was little more in favour than the gilded pipes of the organ. The Westminster Directory for Public Worship, adopted by the General a.s.sembly in 1645, recommends that "for the present, where many in the congregation cannot read, it is convenient that the minister, or some other fit person appointed by him and the other ruling officers, do read the psalm, line by line, before the singing thereof." Before this time, in 1642, there had been much controversy in the western Lowlands concerning the singing of the doxology at the end of a psalm, a practice which was popularly regarded as a commandment of men, not to be accepted as a divine ordinance. The General a.s.sembly, in 1643, took the matter into consideration, and ordered the dispute to be dropped. In 1649, however, the subject was again before the a.s.sembly, which then resolved that the singing of the doxology should be discontinued.

In 1647, a committee was named by the General a.s.sembly to examine and revise Rous's paraphrase of the Psalms, and Zachary Boyd was requested to make a metrical version of the other Biblical songs; but nothing was done in the latter direction, probably due to the desire for uniformity with the Presbyterian Church in England, and in 1650 the present metrical version was printed for use in public worship, without the addition of any hymns or paraphrases. Nothing further was done for the improvement of congregational singing for more than half a century.

The question of instrumental music was revived in 1687, by the erection in the Royal Chapel at Holyrood, by order of James II., of a large and magnificent organ, which was regarded as a step towards the introduction of the Romish service. So convinced were the people of this that the clergy of even the Episcopal churches discontinued the use of the organ in public worship. In the following year, when James had abdicated, and the fear of Popish devices had become allayed, the mob of Edinburgh testified to the national joy, and at the same time indulged their latent propensity to mischief by breaking down the organ and burning the materials.

As in England down to a much later period, so also in Scotland, a metrical version of the Psalms was alone in use in worship, though several attempts were made at different times in the last century to introduce hymns of a more distinctively Christian character, as well as more poetical than the old paraphrases of Hebrew psalmody. The matter was before the General a.s.sembly in 1707, and again in 1742, when a committee was appointed to prepare some paraphrases of pa.s.sages in the Bible, "to be joined with the Psalms of David, so as to enlarge the Psalmody." Three years afterwards, some examples of religious poetry were submitted by the committee for the judgment of the a.s.sembly; but, as before, nothing was done, and the matter remained in abeyance until 1775, when it was suggested by the Synod of Glasgow and Ayr that the a.s.sembly should take such measures as might be judged necessary to introduce the paraphrases of 1751 into the Psalter of the Church. These were, in consequence, again examined and revised by a committee, but it was not until 1781 that the committee made their report and the a.s.sembly ordered copies of the collection (which had been printed in 1751) to be submitted to the Presbyteries. Pending the Presbyterial judgment, the a.s.sembly allowed the collection to be used in public worship "where the minister finds it for edification."

The permission to use this collection of Biblical paraphrases was never recalled by the a.s.sembly, but it has also never been made a permanent act.

It appears to have been given reluctantly, and only as a measure of policy, in concession to popular feeling in favour of the collection; for it appears to have been previously used in several churches. "Use and wont," says Dr Edgar, in his "Old Church Life in Scotland," "have now given as valid an authority for the singing of the paraphrases in church as a special Act of a.s.sembly could do. The paraphrases have, on the strength of their own merits, established a secure place in the psalmody of all the Presbyterian churches in Scotland."

Instrumental music had, in the meantime, continued to be banished from public worship. The psalm to be sung was announced by the minister, and the precentor, who occupied a smaller pulpit below him, placed in a slit in a lyre-shaped bra.s.s frame in front of him a card bearing the name of the tune in large letters, so as to be visible to all the congregation.

The minister then repeated the first two lines of the verses to be sung, and the precentor struck his tuning-fork on the desk. It was a custom of long standing, probably dating from a time when few of the congregation could read, for the precentor to read and sing a line alternately, which must, to persons unaccustomed to it, have sounded strange, and certainly have destroyed what little harmony there might have been if the psalm had been sung differently.

It was not until the first decade of the present century that the organ was called to the aid of the volume of praise in the Scottish Church. To Dr Ritchie, minister of St. Andrew's Church, Glasgow, belongs the honour of this innovation. With the approval of the congregation, he introduced an organ, which was played for the first time on the 23rd of August, 1807, not without producing a sensation and a protest. The Presbytery was convened, and the Lord Provost appeared before that grave body, at the head of a deputation of influential citizens, to protest against the minister's innovation on long established custom. The Presbytery ruled, "that the use of organs in the public worship of G.o.d is contrary to the law of the land, and to the law and const.i.tution of our Established Church." The organ was summarily silenced, therefore, and the grand tones of that instrument were not again heard in accompaniment of sacred song in the Presbyterian churches of Scotland for more than twenty years.

The ineffective character of unaccompanied congregational singing was very slowly recognised. In 1829, however, the congregation of the Relief Church,[11] at Roxburgh Place, Edinburgh, with the approval of their minister, had an organ erected in their place of worship. The act was clamorously opposed outside his own following, and the Relief Presbytery called upon the minister, John Johnston, to remove the offending instrument, under pain of deprivation. The response of minister and congregation to this command was the severance of their connection with the Synod. In 1845, a Congregational Church in Edinburgh set up an organ in their place of worship, and as each congregation in that denomination is an independent body, no outside opposition or interference was in that case possible.