condemned to commit to memory twenty lines from the Curse of Kehama,' where there is neither rhyme nor reason,-not one single poetical image,-not one scintillation of genius, nor one idea worth remembering!" "But where," said Mr Pearson, smiling, "where, Mr Batty, would you, in that elegant poem, meet with twenty lines such as you mention?""Find them!" rejoined our enraged host; "why, in fifty, in a hundred, in a thousand places; any where, all over, in every page twenty such lines may be discovered. But pardon, excuse me, friend Pearson; I am vexed, you see, horridly vexed; and what I was obliged to conceal at my Lord Mayor's table has now burst from me like a volcanic eruption; but my mind is a little relieved from its tormenting state of perturbation; its ebullitions will now cease, the whirlwind of passion has subsided, and I am now calm; yes, calm as the unruffled deep after a violent storm, when scarcely a zephyr ripples its placid bosom.

"Besides," he resumed, "Dr Strap ingrossed nearly the whole of the conversation; nobody could be heard but himself; I hate such rudeness; one could not squeeze a word an hour in edgeways. He bored the company for a full hour about Greek particles and Latin terminations; I thought he would never have ended; then he gave us a dissertation on the origin of the Celtic, Erse, and Gaelic languages, which, he contended, all came from the same root." "But," said Mr Pearson, "did the company believe him, on his bare assertion?" Certainly," replied Batty, " for no one had the temerity to contradict him. Why, Sir, he would have dragged you back through the dark ages, to the time of the confusion of tongues at the building of Babel; I assure you I wished such learned gibberish, and the reciter of it, both at Old Nick. He was so affected, too; and pomposity, affectation, and egotism, I hold them, you know, in utter detestation!"

How blind are men to their own failings! You may perceive, Sir, that I, your faithful correspondent, am no talker; no, my business is to observe and to listen, that I may know what is said by others, There is, you know, a

proverbial expression, "that a still tongue makes a wise head;" this suits my case very well; but to shew you that I am not vain, I must beg leave to declare that I think the reverse proposition is more to be depended upon, namely, "that a wise head makes a still tongue." This is my opinion; but as different people think and judge differently on the same subjects, I do not, you must observe, give it as my positive opinion, from which there is no appeal; no! and to shew you, at the same time, that I am possessed of a large portion of candour to those who may differ from my decision, I beg permission to refer it to the future consideration of Dr Strap, or my friend Batty, or, if you think it would be better, to the majority of the good people of this happy nation, who will probably treat it as a public question, and adopt that mode of reasoning commonly made use of by the ladies at their tea-parties, or by the gentlemen after dinner, over a glass of wine, or a bumper of whisky punch; and this will certainly be the best manner possible; for reasoning, every one knows, is a very dry subject; where, then, can it be so well managed as in places where there is plenty of drink?

At a late hour, Mr Pearson observed that it was, he thought, nearly time for him to depart, for as it would be high tide at two o'clock in the morning, he should have to rise from his bed at that hour to bathe. "To bathe!" exclaimed Batty, "at two o'clock in the morning! Why, Sir, you'll be then fast enough asleep, I warrant you." "I intend, Sir," rejoined the other, " to bathe at two o'clock; and let me tell you, Mr Batty, I can rise at what hour I please, because I have accustomed myself to do so; and custom, you know, is a kind of second nature, which enables one to perform wonders." "Wonders indeed!" said our host; " pray pardon me, but it must be, not a wonder, but a miracle, that would drag me from my bed at that early hour, to plunge myself into cold water.' "Because you are totally unacquainted, Mr Batty, with the beneficial effects arising from cold-water bathing; why, Sir, it strengthens and braces the nervous system,―prevents obstructions, by

keeping open the pores in the skin, and thus prevents disease, prolongs life, excites health, and renders our situation here comfortable and happy." "Wonderful indeed! why bathing, according to your creed, seems to be the grand panacea," said Batty: " pray, Sir, I hope to give no offence, but are you not employed by Bianchi to preach in favour of his baths? Why, you might make a fortune, if you had not one already, by writing puffs in favour of quackmedicines:-but now tell me, seriously, do you positively intend to rise at two o'clock, to bathe your limbs, for the good of your health?" "Most certainly," replied Pearson, " and I attribute your rudeness to your ignorance, Mr Batty; for the beneficial effects of frequently bathing in salt water are known to every person but yourself,—were known to the ancient Roinans, as well as the Greeks; and the custom is recommended as salubrious by every physician who puts any value upon his reputation. Let me request, Sir, that you will in future pause, before you condemn what you have never practised." "Well, well," replied Batty, "I am, if you wish it, as ignorant as a sheep; I like to bathe in hot weather, but in the month of December, you must excuse me,-nor do I yet believe, friend Pearson, that you are in earnest." "You are at liberty, my theatrical hero, to believe or to doubt just what you please; but I shall bathe if I live, that is certain." Here ended a dialogue, interesting, to be sure, but it contains an abundance of that figure in rhetoric which is denominated by me pompous nonsense.

Mr Jacob, a philosopher, and one of the party, who, like myself, had remained silent to the present time, now took from his side-pocket an octavo volume, and begged to be allowed to read the following article, which, he said, was from a valuable and profound work, just published by his friend, a professor, and one of the greatest men of the present age. "From microscopic observations, it has been computed that the

skin is perforated by a thousand holes in the length of an inch. If we estimate the whole surface of the body of a middle-sized man to be sixteen square feet, it must contain 2,304,000 pores. These pores are the mouths of so many excretory vessels, which perform that important function in the animal economy, insensible perspiration. The lungs discharge every minute six grains, and the surface of the skin from three to twenty grains, the average over the whole body being fifteen grains of lymph, consisting of water, with a very minute admixture of salt, acetic acid, and a trace of iron. If we suppose this perspirable matter to consist of globules only ten times smaller than the red particles of blood, or about the five thousandth part of an inch in diameter, it would require a succession of four hundred of them to issue from each orifice every second."

Mr Pearson now thanked Mr Jacob for thus illustrating his arguments in favour of bathing. "But," said he to that gentleman, "I think, Sir, the fine discovery which you have lately made is not so well known as it deserves to be:" then looking round, "give me leave, my worthy friends, to inform you, that this learned gentleman, who is indefatigable in the cause of science, has lately discovered a new substance, a sort of pebble, which is different in its composition from any known material. Some of our most profound chemists suppose it to belong to the class of metals,-others are certain that it has an alkaline base. Till, however, its properties shall be better known, they have agreed to call it, from the name of the discoverer, (in the new nomenclature,) aJACOBITE!"

All the company expressed a high degree of satisfaction for the honour thus conferred upon one of the votaries of science,-thanked Mr Pearson for the information he had given them—and soon after they adjourned, each man to his home, and I to my chamber, to note down, as I usually do, the transactions of the preceding day.-Ever yours,

PETER PEDAGOGUE, Jun.

WHEN the First General Assembly broke up in December 1560, it was formally "continued to the fifteenth day of January next," and all who were present promised that they would either come to Edinburgh on that day, or cause other Commissioners to be sent in their place. There is no proof, however, of any ecclesiastical meeting having been held at the time appointed. Spottiswood, indeed, says, that the Prior of St. Andrew's, who repaired to France to the Queen, immediately upon the news of her husband's death, was admonished" by the Assemblie of the Kirk, then convened at Edinburgh," not to consent to her having mass said when she came to Scotland. But the appointment of the Prior proceeded from the Convention of the Estates which met about that time, and which Spottiswood seems to have mistaken for an Assembly of the Church. And although the instruction alluded to may have been suggested by the Reformers, it could not come from them as an "Assemblic of the Kirk then convened;" for they did not meet in that capacity till the 26th (according to the Regis ter,) or (according to Calderwood) the 27th of May 1561.

In the "Buik of the Universal Kirk," the proceedings of this Assembly are set down as a continuation of the First, but it may with more propriety be enumerated as the Second General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, as it seems to have met, not according to the terms of any previous continuation or adjournment, but in consequence of an urgent and alarming conjuncture. The Popish party began, about this time, to recover from the consternation into which they had been thrown by the rapid progress of the Reformation, and their hopes of regaining their former affluence and authority were greatly strengthened by the arrival of an Ambassador from France. He was instructed, among other things, to demand, "that the Bishops and Churchmen should be restored to their own places, and suf

fered to intromitt with their rents." (Calderwood's Large MS., Vol. I., p. 702.) A meeting of Parliament was approaching, and the Popish nobility, and their adherents, resorted in great numbers to Edinburgh, and cherished and avowed the most confident anticipations of success. The Reformers, roused by the boldness of their opponents, convened and adopted the most strenuous resolutions in defence of their religious liberty.

No roll of the Members of this Assembly of the Church has been preserved, but the place of meeting is stated to have been in the Tolbooth. After consultation, it was unanimously concluded, that a humble supplication, with articles of complaint and redress, should be presented to the Lords of the Secret Council. The supplication is set down in Knox's History of the Reformation. It expresses great apprehension of the re-establishment of Popery, and a firm determination to oppose it at every hazard. The Articles of complaint and redress, as given by Calderwood, (Large MS., Vol. I., 704,) were in substance as follow:

I. That idolatry, and all monuments thereof, be suppressed, and the sayers and maintainers of mass punished.

II. That provision be made for the sustenance of Superintendants, Ministers, Exhorters, and Readers; that Superintendants and Ministers be planted where they are needed; and that all who contemn or disobey them, in the exercise of their functions, be punished.

III. That the abusers and contemners of the Sacraments be punished.

IV. That no letters be issued by the Lords of Session, for the payment of tithes, without special provision that the parishioners retain as much as is appointed to the Minister.

V. That neither the Lords of Session, nor any other Judges, proceed upon such precepts as may have been passed at the instance of those who have lately obtained feus

of vicarages, manses, and churchyards; and that six acres of the best of the glebe be always reserved to the Minister.

VI. That some punishment be appointed for such as purchase, bring home, and execute the Pope's bulls within this realm.

These articles may serve to shew the state of dependence and poverty in which the Protestant teachers were still kept, and the many devices which were employed to defraud them of what was allotted to them for their maintenance. From the third article, it would appear that the religious liberty introduced by the Reformation was accompanied by a licentious profanity. The Papists were frequently called abusers of the Sacraments, by the Reformers. But as the sayers and maintainers of mass had already been denounced in the first article, it is probable that, by the contemners and abusers of the Sacraments mentioned in the third article, we are to understand those who neglected the Lord's Supper as of no effect when administered according to the Protestant form, and those who, without any vocation as Ministers, dared to go through this form in derision. This kind of impiety seems to have been but too common about this time, for, in the First Book of Discipline, a distinct head is occupied in demanding the punishment of such contemners and profaners of the Sacraments.

The Assembly seems to have adjourned till the 28th, when a meeting was again held, the Articles and Supplication produced and read, and a Committee appointed to present them. An Act of Secret Council, answering to every head of the Artieles and Supplication, was granted, and letters were immediately raised upon it by sundry Ministers. No other business appears to have been transacted by this Assembly. But it may not be improper to add a few remarks upon an Act which was passed about this time by the Convention of the Estates, as it seems to have been passed at the special request of the Reformers.

In the first of the articles drawn up by this Assembly, it was required that idolatry, and all the monuments thereof, should be suppressed.

It would appear that the Articles were presented to the Convention of the Estates, as well as to the Lords of the Secret Council. But whether it was in consequence of this, or of some separate requisition from the leading Reformers, it is certain that the Convention did issue orders for destroying all places and monuments of idolatry throughout the kingdom. The execution of these orders was committed to the most active and popular among the Reformers. The Earls of Arran, Argyle, and Glencairn, were directed to purify the west country; the northern districts were entrusted to the zeal of the Lord James; and the other parts of the country were assigned to men upon whose alacrity equal dependence could be placed. Calderwood (Large MS., Vol. I., p. 708,) in describing the operations of the Reformers in the west, says, "They burnt Paisley, where the Bastard Bishop narrowly escaped; and demolished Failford, Kilwinning, and part of Crossraguel." Now, all these were places of idolatry; but from the life of the Bishop being put in peril, the work of purification, or demolition, seems to have been gone about in a very unwarrantable way. In an order given by Lord James, on a similar occasion, to some of the Reformers in the north, they are desired to pass to the church of Dunkeld, and cast down the images, and all monuments of idolatry; but they are strictly charged to take care not to injure the stability and comfort of the building. (See Statistical Account, Vol. xx., p. 221.) Indeed it is quite plain, that the intentions and the orders of the Reformers extended merely to places and monuments of idolatry, that is, to religious houses, and images in churches. That their intentions and orders were exceeded-that religious houses were wantonly demolished, and that not merely the images, but the churches, were in some instances destroyed-cannot be denied. Yet the lamentations which have been uttered upon this head have been by far too loud. Baillie, in his Historical Vindication, (p. 40,) distinctly asserts, that "in all the land, not more than three or four churches were cast down, the rest being peaceably purged." "As to the

"bibliothecks which were destroyed, the volumes of the Fathers, and the registers of the church, which were gathered in heaps and consumed,” the mischief has been greatly exaggerated. To hear the account of Archbishop Spottiswood, one might fancy that every Abbey in Scotland had a library as extensive and valuable as the famous and deplored collection at Alexandria, and that the Scottish Reformers were as fatally furious in their enmity to learning as the Caliph Omar had been. "Omne ignotum pro magnifico." But if we may judge of what was lost by what has been spared, our literary regret may be very much alleviated. In England, no such destruction of religious houses took place; and Leland, who visited many of them, has given catalogues (Collectanea, Vol. iv.) of the libraries belonging to them. They seldom contained more than forty or fifty volumes, and these generally consisted of copies of the Gospels, and other portions of scripture, with postils or glosses, extracts from the Fathers, and legends of the Saints. There is no reason to suppose that the libraries of religious houses in Scotland were more ample or valuable than those of England. In an inventory of the effects belonging to the cathedral church of Glasgow, which is preserved in the Chartulary of that See, scarcely any books are mentioned but such as were necessary to the different Priests and Chaplains who officiated in it. In the church of St. Mary and St. Michael, at Stirling, there were only copies of the Gospels, Epistles, and Psalms, with a few Missals, Breviaries, and Processionals, (See the App. to Birrell's Diary.) Nor do the libraries of individuals seem to have been richly furnished. Willock, one of the earliest and most learned preachers among the Reformers, in a sermon which he delivered at Ayr, some time in 1559, had alleged Irenæus, Chrysostom, Hilarius, Origen, and Tertullian, as all condemning the service of the mass. Quintin Kennedy, Abbot of Crossraguel, in speaking of this sermon, charges Willock with having alleged these

Fathers from a belief that their works were not to be found in Scotland, and that he might avail himself of their authority, without fear of question or contradiction. But the charge, how disingenuous soever it may have been, may serve to shew that theological books were not at that time common in the country. Kennedy, indeed, in his letter to the Archbishop of Glasgow, (see Keith's App. p. 193,) says, that he had by him "all the Doctoris Willock had allegeit, and diverse uthors." But Kennedy was one of the most learned and wealthy among the Popish Clergy, and it is probable that few of his cotemporaries were so well furnished with books. A catalogue of the library belonging to one of the Bishops has come down to us: And these desultory notices of the state of theological learning, (which have been brought forward, not to palliate the excesses of the Reformers, but merely to mitigate the exaggerations of their enemies,) may be concluded with a copy of it.

Robert Maxwell was Bishop of Orkney in 1526, and probably for some time afterwards. His see certainly was not one of the richest; but from his adding to the cathedral, and entertaining King James V. in his progress through the Scottish Isles, he seems to have been wealthy and munificent. He was of the ancient family of Nether Pollock, and as he had been Rector of Tarbolton, and Provost of the Collegiate Church of Dumbarton, before he was promoted to the Bishopric of Orkney, his library was probably as well furnished as those of many other Bishops at the time. The following extract is taken from an inventory of his effects:

"The names of ye bukis." "Item ane prent pontificall, ane small text of ane pontificall; item, ane auld written pontificall; item, Seculinorum Scriptura; Cathena Aurea Sancti Thomæ; item, Psalterium cum Commento Edwardi Episcopi ; Biblia in pergameno scripta; ane Inglisse buke of Goweir *; ane Inglisse buke of ye Histories of Saintis liffis and stories of ye Bible; item ye Cornakillis +."