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on of Dr. Robertson, and takes the history own to the union of the kingdoms in Queen Anne's reign. It is written with clearness and recision, but neither with the philosophical epth of Hume, nor with the sprightliness and olish of Robertson. Laing appears to be a ational friend of liberty, and a great enemy of he whole Stuart race, he has a long dissertaion at the beginning of his work, to prove the participation of the unfortunate Mary in the nurder of Darnley. He presents a very intructive view of the ecclesiastical government of Scotland, and of the gradations and abolition of episcopal jurisdiction. After the reformaion, preeminence in sacerdotal rank was abolshed in countries enjoying the blessings of a free government, as incompatible with liberty and the humility of the primitive christians. This ecclesiastical equality was transplanted from Geneva to Scotland, and was productive of a striking alliance between a republican church and a monarchical government. After the death of the bonny earl of Murray, the discipline and forms of the Scotish church were recognized and confirmed by parliament, and "the experience of a century (says Laing) demonstrates that the genius of presbytery can repose in peace under the tranquil shade of a limited monarchy."

The presbyterians of the early kirk must have been a most unamiable set of mortals, if we may judge from the writings of those

times.

Hudibras describes them as a

born crew of errant saints,"

"Such as do build their faith upon
The holy text of pike and gun;
And prove their doctrine orthodox
By apostolic blows and knocks."

"stub.

We are presented in "Old Mortality" with a striking picture of the headlong fanaticism of the Cameronians. Mause Headrigg, Poundtext, Mackbriar and Burley are models of manaical devotion to the wild doctrines which then prevailed. Mackbriar's eloquence was free from the grosser and more ludicrous errors of his contemporaries, and the language of Scripture, which in their mouths was sometimes degraded by misapplication, gave, in his exhortation (says the great novelist) a rich and solemn effect, like that which is produced by the beams of the sun streaming through the storied representation of saints and martyrs on the Gothic window of some ancient cathedral. What a horrible picture is drawn of the personal appearance, "wild and glaring visage," and shocking principles of the fanatical Habbakuk! This ghastly apparition, whose voice "made the very beams of the roof quiver," is described with such frightful truth, that he appears present to the reader's imagination; the daring impiety with which he applies Scriptural phrases to his blood-thirsty purpos es, makes one shudder with horror, and exclaim "what black magician conjures up this

end?" To be sure all the Cameronians and ovenanters were not so frantic as Habbakuk; ut the best of them were elated with spitual pride, and had their good qualities darkned by fierce enthusiasm, which they expressd in strong and emphatic language, rendered nore impressive by the orientalism of Scrip

ure.

The gloom which hung over presbyterianism as in a great measure vanished before the enightening spirit of modern times. Still there re some preachers in Edinburgh, who seem to e relapsing into their former cheerless and epulsive manner.

It appears that their intenion is to infect their hearers with their own nelancholy spirit,

"And force all people, tho' against
Their consciences, to turn saints."

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They are perpetually railing against that most elegant source of amusement, the theatre; the players are styled the "servants of Satan,' and the stage a "seminary of vice and folly,' the "temple of the father of lies," &c. Every one knows the fuss which they made when the accomplished Mr. Home, a minister of the church of Scotland, ushered forth his tragedy of Douglas. The presbytery of Edinburgh attacked the play as highly immoral and irreligious in its tendency, and " lamented the melancholy fact, that there should be a tragedy written by a minister of the church of Scotland." Mr. Home sent in his demission from

the presbytery, and cared not a pin for all the holy rage of his enemies.

He afterwards received a pension from the prince of Wales; but none of his other dramatic works have been so popular as Douglas, in which he introduced the tragic muse into the wilds of Scotland, rendered the banks of the Carron and the Grampian Hills as interesting as the shores of the Adriatic, and engaged the heart for his Matilda, as if she had been Otway's Belvidera.

One of the most fashionable churches in Edinburgh, is that new and magnificent place of worship, which Andrew Thomson occupies, in the finest square and the most elegant neighbourhood of the city. I went to this kirk last Sunday. After a great deal of trouble, I got into a pew; but I was scarcely well seated, before a tall, awkward fellow stalked in, with his wife I was obliged to make way for them, but received no invitation to reseat myself, although there was "locus pluribus umbris." This polite and saintly personage was so meagre, and so plain in his dress, that, to use Falstaff's language, "you might have trussed him and all his apparel into an eel skin!" Scotch, by the way, are generally thin; indeed, if Mr. S- of our city, were to be so mischievous as to come over here, he would be stared at as a perfect non-descript!

The

Mr. Creech, in his view of Scotch manners in '83, says that the number of abandoned women had increased at Edinburgh more than a

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hundred fold in twenty years. Impressed as I was with respect for the puritanical habits of the Scotch, I was greatly astonished at the number of receptacles in which those unhappy beings lie crowded together, mad with intemperance, ghastly with famine, and poisoned with disease. As I was returning home a few evenings ago, I perceived a crowd collected at the door of a house. On inquiry, I learned that a young woman above had swallowed poison in a fit of despair. Actuated by curiosity, I walked up stairs and entered a room crowded with persons of various appearance. On the floor was lying a girl in the agonies of death; on her face was seated the ghastly paleness of approaching dissolution. I was filled with horror at this dreadful scene, and left the room with a person who told me that the unhappy wretch had been seduced by one of those infernal Lovelaces who make a sport of such conquests. When all the gates of virtue were shut against her, she found herself unable to resist the torrent of vice; but she was soon convinced that the class of beings with whom she lived, were devoid of all feeling but the selfish gratification of their passions; even the wages of prostitution were grudgingly paid by lovers who possessed her person without her heart. At length she looked only to death as a refuge against the time when the eye of lewdness shall cease to be allured by her charms; when even the lowest haunts of incontinence shall be clos

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