day, or Wednesday, Glasgow affair will be before the Assembly. Last post Sir T. Parker, now Lord Parker, is Chancellor, and Sir John Pratt in his post, both staunch Whigs, and upon the Dissenters' side. We are told that the hopes of a reconciliation' are reviving; that the Princess is often at Court; that the Duke of Devonshire, and the Duke of Kingston, have been some hours with the King in private. It will be a great mercy if the Lord send it.

2

This day the Committee of Bills were upon the affair of Glasgow, and transmitted it in the forenoon. In the afternoon the Assembly met, and passed the overtures for a fund to ministers' widows and orphans into an act; it was unanimously voted, which I am heartily glad of; but it needs further ripening before it can be put in execution. Another act was passed to shorten the work of the Assembly, that all appeals should be brought up and tabled before the Bills, within three days after the Assembly sit down, otherwise they are not to be received. Then some private petitions came in; and the affair of Glasgow was tabled. The Bills sent it in with this overture, that first the concurrence, and then the transportation, and then the complaint, should be considered. The parties were heard, wherein heat enough appeared, and they got a reprimand for crying out for a vote, before one member of the Assembly was heard upon the transmission. At length, it being agreed to that the concurrence should first come in, the debate, whether the complaint or transportation should first be heard, was delayed till the concurrence was determined. Then the reasons of appeal from the sentence about the concurrence were read, and the Synod's answers, where there were some unguarded expressions, particularly "masked friends." However, Mr Scot and Mr Gray asserted there were some facts [statements] which were untruths, advanced in the answers of the Synod, which raised heat, and after nine at night the matter was adjourned till to-morrow.

'Between the King and his son, the Prince of Wales.

2 This refers to the transportation of the Rev. Mr Anderson of Dumbarton to Glasgow, which was opposed by the ministers of that city, on the ground of the mode of his election, which introduced the question of General and Particular Kirk-Sessions, afterwards the subject of much discussion. (See Correspondence, vol. i. p. 35.)

May 20. This day the Assembly meets at nine, and I fear I shall not have time to write any thing almost, for I never saw such a throng and heat as was yesternight in the house, and probably they shall be little better this day. This day the Assembly sat from nine to three, and the affair of the concurrence was tabled. The papers were read, and parties heard. I was put out of the house as a party, being in the Synod; so I can give no account of the reasonings; only the Assembly came to this, to appoint a committee to inspect the registers, whether the General or Special Session were callers, Mr Flint, Professor Haddow, and Mr Alstoun. In short, this is reckoned an agreement very unfavourable for the magistrates; whether it will be so, I don't know; but the ministers seem to be easier than before, when our Synod are put out. The town, indeed, have none to speak in the Assembly, which is their great loss.

LETTER CXIV.

Wodrow to Mrs Wodrow, No. 4.

Edinburgh, May 21, 1718.

MY DEAREST, This day has been one of the throngest and the closest sitting I have ever seen in the Assembly. I told you in my last that a committee was appointed to search records as to what was the use of the town of Glasgow in calls. The house was full, expecting the answer of the Committee at nine, but we were baulked; and so the Commission book came in, which was approven, with a reserve as to Mr Ninian Hume's business, and another against which a complaint was given in to the Bills. Then Carnwath Committee made their report. The case is, one Mr Scot, a probationer, has been presented to Carnwath. The Presbytery of Lanark went on in his trials, and, with a struggle, approved the different branches of his trials; but when they came to the disputes, they demurred,

and came to be equal in votes, and the moderator refused to cast it, because he was absent at several parts of the trials, and could not judge. They say the young man is none of the greatest abilities, and the people are not so much for him, and his call scrimp; and it's alleged this aversion comes from the Presbytery. So the Assembly pretty unanimously voted that the Assembly [Presbytery] should go on and settle him; and if any difficulty cast up, the Commission should be empowered to settle him, or see to his settlement there.

In the afternoon, the report of the Committee anent the usage of Glasgow in calls came in, which made it plain there was but one session there till the 49, [1649,] and when the model was framed, the calls till the 60 [1660] were from the great or general session; and since the Revolution, the practice was still that the general session consented and chose, as well as the particular session. The parties were heard at full length upon that head. And then we had four or five hours of close and handsome reasoning upon the power of general and particular sessions. Upon the one side it was urged, that the practice was various; that the liberties of the Christian people were concerned in preserving the power of the particular session; that in Mr Anderson's case, both the particular and general session concurred. Upon the other side it was argued, that by the stated rule and model in Glasgow, the general session had the power of election; that the passage in the records that seemed to carry another sense was to be understood of money matters, and any other explication would destroy the text; that the question was not, whether both in this case were not for Mr Anderson, but whether a call, which plainly bears the concurrence of the general session, and would be a rule now in time to come, in all calls in burghs, should be concurred with; and that when it was directly contrary to the liberties of the people, which were safer in burghs, from the votes of the general session and magistracy, than of the particular session and magistracy; that the Synod had gone on in this case before Mr Anderson's case as to the letter was considered, though desired. In short, the reasonings generally ran for

the ministers, and for one session in a collegiate life. And the Books of Discipline were cast up, and every thing which could be said on that head. And, indeed, the town of Edinburgh is as much concerned in this cause as to their elections as Glasgow. After long reasonings, the proposal was made, that a committee should be appointed to regulate elections in burghs, and assert the power of the people and eldership, and state the power of particular and general sessions, and obviate the hazard from imposition from ministers. This was reckoned a delator, and opposed, and the vote stated, Commit or Not, and it carried Not, by seven votes. This is reckoned

Then they

a trying vote, and much elevates the magistrates. approved of our Synod's concurrence with the call. After all, I doubt if Mr Anderson be transported; but now a little time will clear this.

May 22. Two of the clock this forenoon the Assembly entered upon Mr Anderson's affair; and, after losing two hours in a debate, whether to enter on the complaint or transportation first, they resolved to read all papers, and then determine as they found cause. This is a turn favourable to the ministers.

I have not time to read this.

LETTER CXV.

Wodrow to Mrs Wodrow, No. 5.

May 23, 1718.

MY DEAREST,-Yesterday afternoon the Assembly spent from four to ten in reading the impertinently long answers and replies to them, concerning the complaint about Mr Anderson. Had the length of the papers been known, I doubt little but the Assembly had gone in to the motion for reading only what related to the doctrinal propositions. But now all is through. Pardovan's answer to

what relates to him was moved to be read, but nobody had patience to think on that. Mr S. [Stuart,] by the draught of this paper, has done no service to the cause in the opinion of some; and the lifelessness and length of the paper quite wearied the hearers, and I am of opinion gave but very ordinary impressions of the persons in whose name it came; at least it put me quite out of humour.

Upon Friday the 24th, the Assembly met at ten, and sat till near three, on the same business. The reasons for transportation were read, and Dumbarton's answers, and Mr Anderson's speech, which, when he had read, as in the Synod, he added a few words to this purpose; that he found he would not be able to speak what he would; that he could by no means go to Glasgow; that he was too old to enter into a flame, and did not love to be found, when his Master came, beating his [fellow] servants; that his reputation was endeavoured to be ruined; and that all he desired was to let him continue at Dumbarton a few weeks, till he made himself ready, and he would remove from the country, and go elsewhere, and no longer be a bone of contention. After all, the Assembly appointed a committee to converse with Mr Anderson and the Ministers of Glasgow, betwixt and their next meeting; Messrs Mitchell, Hamilton, Moncrieff, Alston, and the Solicitor, and Dr Dundas.

In the afternoon, about six, the Assembly met; and, till the committee returned, they fell on the nomination of the Commission, which was drawn up by the committee named a day or two since. The brethren from the Synod of Merse complained that a certain person in their bounds, (Mr Ramsay of Kelso,) who had been 15 years on the Commission, and for that cause had been left out by the three nominators of the Commission for that Synod, was put in without their knowledge; and one whom they had nominate, Mr Douglas, struck out, after he had been read in the committee. This made a terrible flame in the house as ever I saw. The committee was called in, and the one side reasoned that the committee ought to keep by the list given in by the Synods; the other side urged that the committee had the nomination, and could alter the lists. The act of Assembly was read, and it appeared the commit