CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
RETROSPECT
ONE striking sequel to the death of Thomas Chalmers was a
veritable spate of funeral orations. In addition to the hundreds that were
printed, by way of excerpt or summary, in city and provincial newspapers, there
were scores that found separate publication in full or augmented form. The bulk
were from Scotland and from the Free Church, but other lands and Churches
joined in to swell the tribute. No other Scottish churchman had ever such a
coronach. While an Argus-eyed critic might see in all this "an indulgence of
authorcraft rather than of grief," and while only in a minority of cases is any
fresh contribution made to the understanding of the man or his work,
nevertheless their mere volume makes its own appeal, and one finds oneself
concurring in the verdict of his colleague, Dr. James Buchanan, who, in opening
the next session in New College, said: "These tokens of a universal interest
and common sympathy . . . which have flowed in one unbroken " current since the
announcement of his departure . show more eloquently than words can tell that
the master-mind of the Free Church, the veteran hero of the Disruption,
tenacious to the last of his peculiar principles, and testifying for them with
his latest breath before rulers and nations, was still recognized and honoured
the world over, as the greatest representative and noblest Specimen of living,
large-hearted catholic-minded Christianity."
The deepest impression
that remains from this mass of reading - and this seems to sum up
Scotlands immediate reaction - is the prevalence of the note, even ir
those most closely associated with him, of veneration from a distance. Dr.
Chalmers is treated as though belonged to another order of being, to a race of
supermen. For this impression the Scripture texts, on which tributes were
founded, may be held partly responsible but only partly. The analogies of Moses
and Abrham and Paul would not have been pushed so far with other leaders. For
one who mingled so much and so constantly with his fellow men of all classes
and conditions, there seems to have been something about him remote and
inaccessible. Even the most outstanding of his brethren looked on him as one
who habitually moved on a height too lofty for them to feel quite at home in
his company. When the protagonist of any worthy cause is removed from the scene
of his earthly warfare this note is never altogether absent in tributes paid to
his memory. But in Chalmers case it was the all-pervading note and grief
for the comrade-in-arms is swallowed up in veneration for the exalted
personality. The uncommon man has almost blotted out the common humanity. It is
no matter for astonishment that, in the situation he had left behind, there
were keen watchful eyes in the land which saw in all this thç incipient
stages of idolatry.
Nor did this marked veneration cease with the
contemporary pulpit tributes. It is quite as emphatic in later verdicts of men
of distinction who had known and heard him. Dr. John Brown, with memories
rekindled by the Posthumous Works, coined for his description a phrase
which is significant. A solar man he termed him, "drawing after him his
own firmament of planets." To Professor David Masson as he looked back on the
days of his youth, there were great Scottish figures in many walks of life, but
the brightest luminary was Chalmers. "He had met no human being in the world,"
he was never tired of saying, "that he would call greater than Chalmers." Even
Thomas Carlyle, who, in a crabbed mood of disagreement, could cavil at him as
"ill-read," was constrained to say, "No preacher ever went so into ones
heart. I suppose there will never again be such a preacher in any Christian
Church"; and later, on hearing of his death, "I believe that there is not in
Scotland, or all Europe, any such Christian priest left."
If that
impression waned the reason is not far to seek. He became associated in
mens minds with a sectional interest, strong and flourishing indeed, but
still sectional. Lesser men outside felt that to indulge in praise of Chalmers
was to increase the prestige of the Free Church, at the expense, perhaps, of
their own. A bigger man like Norman MacLeod regretted that his Assembly took no
notice of the death, and a little later spoke of him to a gathering of the
laymen of the Church of Scotland as one "whose noble character, lofty
enthusiasm, and patriotic views will rear themselves before the eyes of
posterity like Alpine peaks, long after the narrow valleys which have for a
brief period divided us are lost in the far distance of past history." Today,
liberated from this inhibition, all may freely join in the homage paid by the
men of his generation. Over thirty years ago a leading churchman said,
"Chalmers belongs to us all." His words have their force multiplied now.
If we were to seek, from among the manifold activities recorded in the
earlier pages, one phrase which might sum up the ideals of this devoted spirit,
there are many who would choose "the Christian good of Scotland" as the
watchword of his life. A Scotland regenerated in every part, religiously,
morally, economically, and socially was his aim throughout. He burned to see a
people evangelized and evangelizing, steadfast in good; and for good,
industrious, and reaping the rewards of industry. Scotland was to be a vineyard
of the Lord, with the weeds of poverty, crime, and irreligion banished by an
efficient Christian culture.
But at no point in his career were the
boundaries of Scotland his horizon. From the very moment of his
evangelical rebirth at Kilmany it was the world-wide Christian enterprise that
held his allegiance and drew forth his devotion. At the height of his social
experiment he was campaigning for the Moravians. It was while he was commending
to the public the lessons of that experiment that he was kindling the choicest
spirits to serve their Lord in India. In his later years the phrase "the
Christian good of Scotland" almost vanished from his vocabulary. It had been
replaced by the " Universal Home Mission," to which the West Port was more a
personal than a denominational contribution. He yearned to see the organized
religious resources of every branch of the Christian Church united in a
co-ordinated attack on heathenism, destitution, and ignorance. It was as a
defender of the Christian faith that he won his theological spurs ; in the
Churchs practical concerns he was the exponent of a vigorous and
continuous united offensive on a world-wide front. Remembered by many as the
author of division, he was much more markedly the apostle of union. No more
catholic-minded man was ever driven by circumstances into being the founder of
a separate denomination. For it was simply and solely because the Church of
Scotland, established and endowed, was to him the obvious instrument for the
Christian good of the part of the world nearest to his hand, that he sought to
make it efficient. Just as he had counted release from the antiquated machinery
for dealing with poverty in Glasgow necessary for coping with poverty in St.
Johns, there must, he felt, be a similar release from the accumulated
deadweight of a laissez-faire ecclesiastical past, before the Church of
Scotland could fully accomplish its task of dealing with a changed and changing
world. In no spirit of challenge to the State, but simply and solely for the
welfare of its citizens, he embarked on that course of reform which was to end
in the Disruption.
In a retrospect on the Disruption itself it is not
unnecessary to recall the primary intention of the term. It is too often taken
for granted that it meant a disruption of the Church, and that it was adopted
by the "Free Protesting Church" to emphasize its magnitude, as being too
extensive to be called a Secession merely, and in reality, "a rending in
twain," to quote Dr. J. R. Flemings description. And when Anglican
divines heard in Scottish churches phrases like "the glorious Disruption,"
particularly in prayers of thanksgiving, they wondered into what Bedlam they
had strayed. But there was no suggestion of schism in the word. It was not a
disruption of, it was a disruption from; not even a disruption from their
brethren who remained behind, but a disruption from the Establishment. And by
the Establishment they meant the whole privileges, emoluments, status, and
obligations as then interpreted of the State relation. It was a word used by
Dr. Chalmers in various connections throughout his whole career. It appears
early in his journal and letters, applied to very diverse separations, such as
from excessive addiction to secular studies and the Parish of Kilmany.
His own life had seen a "disruption" from these. In its ecdesiastical
application it appears first, so far as one has observed, in his speech in the
Assembly of 1839, where "the calamity of a disruption" manifestly refers to a
disruption from the State. In later speeches it is equated with" a clear, and
an honourable, and withal a Christian outgoing," and "a withdrawal from the
intolerable position forced upon us." The language of the Protest and of the
Deed of Demission bears the same implication; and the mere fact that the latter
was sent to the Government suggests that it was its signing and transmission,
which not only completed but constituted the decisive disruptive act.
Disruption took place when the "true" Church of Scotland thus severed itself
from the State. Tanfield Hall was its scene, not St. Andrews Church,
where the severance of brethren took place. It was this implication which led
the Established Church, at first at least, pointedly to avoid the term. What
was a "glorious Disruption" to the one Church, was to the other a "lamentable
Secession." But, into its original use and fundamental meaning, the thought of
a split in the Church did not enter. The Disruption would have remained a
Disruption, indeed it would have been all the greater a Disruption, had it been
unanimous.
In point of fact, however, it did entail a "rending in
twain," which in turn led to consequences both good and bad. On the credit side
must be entered the awakening of the Christian people of every church in
Scotland to their responsibility for the religious welfare of every corner of
the land and the multiplied provision, in some quarters excessive, for the
worship of God and the education of the children. In the larger centres a
healthier emulation in good works displaced traditional inertia and superseded
less wholesome ancient feuds. To all this there must be added the distinctive
denominational contribution of the Free Church, which, from its initial plans
through its subsequent achievements, alike in evangelism and education, at home
and abroad, through its great teachers and leaders and missionaries, evoked the
admiration of Christendom, as a living branch of the Church Universal abundant
in blossom and equally abundant in fruit.
On the debit side must be placed,
particularly in places with declining population, overlappings of agencies, and
the consequent animosities. Men tended to be esteemed religious in proportion
to the strenuousness and effectiveness of their activities against the other
side. Ecclesiastical allegiance became a first consideration in local secular
appointments, ruling even the granting of leases and the engagement of
shepherds and ploughmen. And that hateful temper, Schadenfreude - for
which the Germans alone have the word, but from which no people is immune -
insinuated itself too often into the hearts of rival churchmen. There was,
unquestionably, a sombre lining to the glory of the Disruption.
An
adequate assessment of the responsibility for this catastrophic element would
entail a recapitulation of the whole ground already covered. But, undoubtedly,
in the critical final stages the onus rests on the Government of the day. When
it refused to give its mind to "that massive and magnificent state-paper, the
Claim, Declaration, and Protest of 1842," and instead took the opportunity of
roundly rebuking the Church for its swollen pretensions and continued
contumacy, the die was cast.
It has been frequently asserted, however,
in exculpation that had it foreseen the magnitude of the withdrawal it would
have acted otherwise; that, misled by its own particular Scottish
correspondents, it decided that a final demonstration of firmness would ensure
a widespread, almost universal, retreat from the positions, the Church had
taken up. In confirmation, it is pointed out that, in later life, nearly all
the statesmen involved, in one way or another, expressed their great regret at
what had happened. Sir James Graham, in particular, is recorded as saying that
"he would never cease to regard it with the deepest regret and sorrow, as the
saddest event of his life, that he should have had any hand in that most fatal
act" His first biographer, going even further, asserts that he "was convinced,
when too late, of the error into which, in deference to the judgment of others,
he had fallen". That he and the others did regret the sequel to their decision
is unquestionable, but that he or they ever came to regard the decision as an
error in policy is very doubtful. The attempt to represent them later as a
group of penitents in white sheets has no substantial basis. They were, and
remained, consistent Erastians, ready to smother any assertion of her autonomy
on the part of the Church. They would have held up their hands in genuine
horror at the release of the Church of Scotland from the yoke of patronage in
1874, a release, opposed indeed by the Free Church, but hastened by the
contiguity of its system of popular election, and the failure of Lord
Aberdeens Act. And no words would be adequate to describe their
consternation had they been confronted with the spectacle of the Church of
Scotland presenting to their successors in 1921 as articles lawful for her to
enact, those contained in the schedule to the Enabling Bill, in especial
Article IV.2 No! Misinformation may have led them to scamp consideration, and
to act more peremptorily than they might have done; but sound information would
not have altered their decision. They were convinced adherents of what Dr.
Figgis has called "the concession theory of corporate life" the
conception of an independent ecclesiastical authority in the commonwealth was,
to them, a noxious weed to be ruthlessly extirpated. It stands to the credit of
the British Goverument of 192! that, just when totalitarian states were
beginning to assume new forms and were on the eve of a fresh prevalence, it
should so handsomely and unreservedly recognize the historic claims of the
Scottish Church.
It was, indeed, a historic claim on which this
recognition set its seal. It had been blazoned on the Churchs banner from
the beginning. 'Scotland for Christ through a Church free from civil domination
in the ordering of its own spiritual affairs under Him' sums up the witness of
almost four centuries. For Scotlands main contribution to Reformed
Theology has been within this domain of the Erastian Controversy. Dr. William
Cunningham put the matter in his simplest language, when he wrote: "Of all
Protestant countries, England is the one where the claim of civil supremacy
over the Church was most openly put forth, most fully conceded, and most
injuriously exercised; while our own beloved land is that in which it has all
along been most strenuously and successfully resisted." No century has been
without its conflict, and none without its literary defence. The events that
issued in the Disruption constituted the most subtle and penetrating of them
all. When the struggle reached its culmination in the spring of 1843 it looked
as though the Erastian forces had been following a plan. The new outworks
constructed by the Church were first to be levelled with the ground, and then,
by infiltration, the central citadel was to be taken from the rear. For it was
no mere question of jurisdiction that was finally at stake. There are to be
found scattered throughout the opinions of even the majority judges, ample
acknowledgment of the validity and finality of the Churchs jurisdiction -
within the limits conceded or prescribed by statute. Even Sir Robert Peel in
the House of Commons could speak of the exclusive jurisdiction of the Church in
spiritual matters, though what was left of it after the decisions of 1842 - 43
was microscopic. There are, of course, many apparent exceptions, like the
declaration of Lord Wood in the Stewarton Case that the Court of Session had a
two-fold duty to "declare what the Church is bound to do, and enjoin
performance, and what it is bound not to do, . . . and enforce the
restriction." Even this, in its historical context, is less drastic than it
sounds apart from it.
The final quarrel of the courts and legislature
was not with the fact of the Churchs jurisdiction, but with her claim as
to the source of that jurisdiction. It was the high anti-Erastian doctrine of
thc Westminster Confession that was once more challenged that "The Lord Jesus,
as King and Head of His Church, has therein appointed a government in the hands
of Church officers, distinct from the Civil Magistrate " - a doctrine
reasserted in the Resolution of 1838, with the explanatory amplification "that
in all matters touching the doctrine, government, and discipline of this
Church, her judicatories possess an exclusive jurisdiction founded on the Word
of God " - a doctrine which was to be still further defined in the fifth
question of the formula of questions put to all probationers and ministers of
the Free Church that that government is "distinct from, and not subordinate in
its own province to, civil government, and that the civil magistrate does not
possess jurisdiction, or authoritative control, over the regulation of the
affairs of Christs Church" - all of which and more came to be embodied in
the United Free Church Act anent Spiritual Independence (1906) and then in the
Articles Declaratory of the Constitution of the Church of Scotland in Matters
Spiritual (1926), which together constitute the basis of the constitution of
the re-united Church in this matter. It is well at this point to incorporate
Article IV that it may be read in the light of the central points at issue in
1843.
"IV. This Church, as part. of the Universal Church wherein the
Lord Jesus Christ has appointed a government in the hands of Church
office-bearers, receives from Him, its Divine King and Head, and from Him
alone, the right and power subject to no civil authority to legislate, and to
adjudicate finally, in all matters of doctrine, worship, government, and
discipline in the Church, including the right to determine all questions
concerning membership and office in the Church, the constitution and membership
of its Courts, and the mode of election of its office-bearers, and to define
the boundaries of the spheres of labour of its ministers and other
office-bearers. Recognition by civil authority of the separate and independent
government and jurisdiction of this Church in matters spiritual, in whatever
manner such recognition be expressed, does not in any way affect the character
of this government and jurisdiction as derived from the Divine Head of the
Church alone, or give to the civil authority any right of interference with the
proceedings or judgments of the Church within the sphere of its spiritual
government and jurisdiction."
It was this historic claim that was
the focus of attack and the centre of resistance in the Disruption conflict.
The Lord Justice Clerk specifically denied the possibility of any jurisdiction
which "not being derived from the State, cannot be subjected to the control of
the judgment of the Courts appointed to enforce the laws made by the State."
And many scornful words were directed against the pretensions of Churchmen -
their doctrine of the Headship of Christ - and any independent jurisdiction or
legislative authority flowing therefrom.
Within this generation a
brilliant outside observer, Professor Laski, in language remote from the
terminology of the struggle, thus states its essential meaning. "The
Presbyterians of 1843 were fighting the notion of a unitary state. To them it
seemed obvious that the society to which they belonged was no mere cog-wheel in
the machinery of the State, destined only to work in harmony with its motions.
They felt the strength of a personality which, as they urged, was complete and
self-sufficient, just as the mediaeval state asserted its right to independence
when it was strong enough not merely to resent, but even to repudiate, the
tutelage of the ecclesiastical power. They were fighting a State which had
taken over bodily the principles and ideals of the mediaeval theocracy. They
urged the essential federalism of society, the impossibility of confining
sovereignty to any one of its constituent parts."
Illuminating as this
reading of their action is, the men of the Disruption were not pre-occupied
with questions of political theory. They faced a concrete issue. And while it
can be clearly seen to-day that these fundamental problems were involved, that
was not how they presented themselves to those who had to make a decision which
would shape the future of their land and church. Leaving out of account those
who were moved by considerations of personal security or of personal
popularity, the best of the men of 1843 found themselves confronted with the
old choice of the priority of principle or institution.
To Chalmers and
the like-minded, principle was paramount. An essential element in the
Churchs witness had been denied. Every attempt to attain its recognition
had failed. Full loyalty to the Headship of Christ was impossible within the
now fettered institution. Let us abandon the Establishment, they said, and
continue and deepen our witness to the principle, even if it be without the
gate. Denuded as we will then be of what we have valued, we may do much,
perhaps more than ever, to hold and to win Scotland for Christ.
The
best on the other side stood by the institution. True, the Headship of Christ
had been sadly impaired, but that doctrine had suffered hard knocks before. Let
us, they said, accept the present limitations as transitory, and, even though
some brethren seem content with them, let us work persistently for their
removal. A better day will dawn when we will be able to fly the confessional
banner in the face of all the worid. Within a century a better day did dawn,
but it was the Disruption that had made it possible.
The historical
survey here comes to an end. But a final word may be permitted in another vein,
containing things sermon propiora, "properer for a sermon" as Charles Lamb
translated it. It needed but little imagination, on that 2nd of October 1929,
in the huge hail of reunion, to see the radiant figure of Thomas Chalmers,
dwarfing all other intrusions from the past, raising those speaking hands of
his in benediction, and calling on the great assembly to join, to the tune
Scarborough or Devizes, in the familiar lines of the 147th Psalm:
God doth build up Jerusalem;
And He it is alone
That the dispersed of Israel
Doth gather into one.
Have we lived up to that fine hour, the culmination of many a struggle and the fruit of many a sacrifice? Is the reunited Church doing all that it might for the Christian good of Scotland, and in the Universal Home Mission? With institution and principle now reintegrated does the glow persist? And will it brighten? "Pray ye, therefore, the Lord of the harvest."
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