Читать книгу The Scottish Reformation - Alexander F. Mitchell - Страница 7

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Archbishop Betoun thought that by Patrick Hamilton's death he had extinguished Lutheranism in Scotland. The University of Louvain applauded his deed; and so also, I regret to say, did John Major, the old Scottish Gallican, then resident at Paris, and preparing for the press his Commentary on the Gospels, the first part of which was to be dedicated to his old patron in Scotland, and was emphatically to express his approval of what that patron had done to root out the tares of Lutheranism.[27] But, according to the well-known saying, "the reek of Patrick Hamilton infected all on whom it did blow."[28] His martyr death riveted for ever in the hearts of his friends the truths he had taught in his life. This was Henry Forrest. especially the case with the younger alumni in the colleges, and the less ignorant and dissolute inmates of the priory and other monastic establishments in the city. As at a later period it was felt certain that a stern Covenanter had been detected when a suspected one refused to own that the killing of Archbishop Sharp was to be regarded as murder, so in these earlier days it was thought a sufficient mark of an incipient Lutheran if he could not be got to acknowledge that Hamilton had deserved his fate. On the charge that he had a copy of the English New Testament, and had been heard to say that Hamilton was no heretic, Henry Forrest was subjected to a rigorous imprisonment and a violent death. Forrest was a native of the county of Linlithgow, and had associated with Hamilton in St. Andrews, and was the first to share his bloody baptism there. He was burned at the north kirk-style of the Abbey Church, that the heretics of Angus might see the fire and take warning from his fate.[29] One for simply touching in his sermons with a firm hand on the corruptions of the clergy had to escape for his life.[30] Another, whose history after being long forgotten has been again brought to light in our own day, for a similar offence was subjected to cruel imprisonment, and at last forced to flee from his native land.

The name of this confessor was Alexander Alane, and it is so entered in the Registers of St. Andrews University; but it is by the name of Alexander Alesius, imposed on him by Melanchthon, that he has been chiefly known to posterity. It may admit of some doubt whether he was absolutely the first after the death of Hamilton to abandon his country[31] and all he held dear, rather than renounce the faith the martyr had taught him, or crouch before the lecherous tyrant who had destined him to a filthy dungeon and a lingering death. But it admits of no doubt that he was the most notable of all the band of young Scottish exiles who had to leave their native country between the martyrdom of Hamilton and that of Wishart, and who were honoured to do faithful service in the cause of the Reformation in England and on the Continent. The story of Alesius, of the shameless cruelties which drove him from his native land, of the hardships he had to bear in the earlier years of his exile, of the high place he gained in the affections of Melanchthon and Beza, and the great work he was to do by his writings and prelections for the Protestant churches of Germany, is one of the most interesting in the Alesius and the Scriptures. great movement of the age. But to be appreciated it must be told in detail, and as most of his work was done out of Scotland, I have decided to reserve it for a supplementary lecture. I must not, however, omit to mention here one special service which he was honoured to do for the cause in his native land soon after he left it, as it casts fresh light on the origin of the Reformation in Scotland. His first publication, printed in 1533, was entitled 'Alexandri Alesii Epistola contra decretum quoddam episcoporum in Scotia, quod prohibet legere Novi Testamenti libros lingua vernacula.' It brought into bold relief, and set high above all minor issues, what had been taught by Wycliffe in the fourteenth century, and maintained by the Lollards of Kyle in the fifteenth, and what had actually been urged as an additional charge against Patrick Hamilton. Save for this epistle of Alesius, and the controversy it occasioned, we might not have known that even in ignorant Scotland the bishops had been so far left to themselves as to issue such a decree.[32] It is still more melancholy to think that even among the better informed controversialists of Germany one was found to champion their cause, and to maintain that there was nothing at variance with sound doctrine in the decree; that nothing but harm could come from the practice of allowing laymen to read the Scriptures in their own tongue; and that it could not fail to make them bad Christians and bad subjects, as Luther's translation had done in Germany.

From the time that Alesius fled from Scotland down to the death of James V. in the end of 1542, there was almost continual inquisition made for those who were suspected of having in their possession heretical books, including the New Testament in the vernacular, or who otherwise betrayed a leaning towards the new opinions. In 1532, we are told, "there was ane greit objuratioun of the favouraris of Mertene Lutar in the Abbay of Halyrudhous;"[33] and of course their goods were forfeited to the crown. In 1534 a second great assize against heretics was held in Norman Gourlay and David Stratoun. the same place. The king, as the great Justiciar of the realm, was present in his scarlet robe, and took a prominent part in the proceedings. Betoun was also present and taking part. About sixteen are said to have been convicted and to have had their goods forfeited. James Hamilton, brother of the martyr, had been ordered by the king to flee the country, as he could not otherwise save him. His sister was persuaded to submit to the church. Two were reserved for a fiery death—Norman Gourlay and David Stratoun. Gourlay was a priest in secular orders, and "a man of reassonable eruditioun,"[34] who had been abroad, and there imbibed the new opinions. These he abjured,[35] and was, it seems, really burned for the greater crime of having married a wife.[36] Stratoun was the brother of the Laird of Laureston in the Mearns, and had been reclaimed from his former godless life by his neighbour, Erskine of Dun, but by some free speeches had incurred the resentment of the notorious Prior Hepburn. They were burned at the Rood of Greenside, on the northern side of the Calton Hill.Fugitives and Martyrs. In the same year, Willock, M'Alpine, and M'Dowal had to escape into England. In 1536, when the king and Betoun were abroad, there was comparative peace. In 1537 several were convicted at Ayr, and had their goods forfeited, among whom was Walter Steward,[37] son of Lord Ochiltree. In 1538–39 many were accused and convicted in various burghs in which by that time reformed opinions were spreading, and many had to seek safety in flight. Among these last were Gavin Logie, principal regent in St. Leonard's College,[38] who for a number of years had been exercising a marked influence on the students under him; John Fyfe, who under the designation of Joannes Faithus matriculated at Wittenberg in 1539, and under that of Joannes Fidelis was incorporated into the University of Frankfort on the Oder, and appointed Professor of Divinity there in 1547; George Buchanan, who at the king's command had exposed the hypocrisy of the friars; and George Wishart, who had taught the Greek New Testament in Montrose; also Andrew Charters, John Lyne, and Thomas Cocklaw, John and Robert Richardson and Robert Logic, canons of the Augustinian Abbey of Cambuskenneth. Nearly all of these fugitives took refuge in England. Cocklaw, Calderwood tells us, for marrying a wife had been mewed up within stone walls, but his brother came with crowbars and released him. His goods, as well as those of his wife, were forfeited to the Crown. Large numbers of the wealthy burgesses, even after they had consented to abjure their opinions, were stripped of their possessions, among whom the burgesses of Dundee were conspicuous. "Nor was the good town of Stirling far behind Dundee in the same race of Christian glory. She had less wealth to resign, … but she brought to the altar a larger offering of saintly blood."[39] On 1st March 1538–39, no fewer than four of her citizens were burned at one pile on the Castle Hill of Edinburgh. On the same day with them, and in the same place, perished one of the most sainted and interesting of Scotland's martyrs—Thomas Forret, canon of the Augustinian Abbey of Inchcolm, and thereafter vicar of Dollar, who was universally admired for his attractive character. He taught his parishioners the ten commandments, penned a little catechism for their instruction, and caused a child to commit it to memory and to repeat it publicly, that it might be impressed on the hearts of his parishioners who could not read. He succeeded in leading several of the younger monks in the abbey to more evangelical views; but the old bottles, he said, would not take in the new wine. He preached every Sunday to his people on the epistle or gospel for the day, and showed them, in opposition to the teaching of the friars, that pardon for sin could only be obtained through the blood of Christ.