Religion & morality > Cloud of witnesses, for the royal prerogatives of Jesus Christ, or, The last speeches and testimonies of those who suffered for the truth in Scotland, in the years 1681-1688, with an appendix, containing the Queensferry paper, Torwood excommunications, &c

PREFACE.
ceived the Church of Scotland, as one of the utmost isles of
the earth for his possession, by solemn grant from Jeho¬
vah was pleased to call her from the deplorable state of
Pagan, and reform her from the ruinous condition of Anti-
Christian darkness ; so to dignify her in a peculiar manner,
to contend and suffer for that truth, that he is king and
lawgiver to his church, having power to institute her form
of government, to give her laws, officers, and censures,
whereby she should be governed, and hath not left it
vague and uncertain, what government he will have in
force for the ordering of his house, but hath expressly de¬
termined in his word every necessary part thereof, and hath
not put any power into the hands of any mortal, whether
Pope, Prelate, Prince, or Potentate, as a vicarious head in
his personal absence, whereby they may alter the form of
government at their pleasure, and make what kind of officers,
canons, and censures they please: but all the power that
this king hath left in his church, concerning her government,
is purely and properly ministerial, under the direction and
regulation of his sovereign pleasure, revealed in his written
word.
This, this is the most radiant pearl in the Church of Scot¬
land’s garland ; that she hath been honored valiantly to
stand up for the headship and royal prerogatives of her king
and husband, Jesus Christ, in all the periods of her reform¬
ation. For no sooner had she thrown off the yoke of the
Pope’s pretended jurisdiction and authority, but presently,
while she was laboring by means of these censures, that
Christ had instituted to root out the damnable heresies which
that enemy hath sown, all on a sudden, king James VI.,
naturally ambitious, and instigated by interested and pro¬
jecting councillors, attempts a rape upon her chastity and
loyalty to her husband and Lord ; and by his royal order,
stops her freedom of sitting, voting, and acting, in her su¬
preme courts, imprisons some of her most zealous and
faithful ministers, calls them before his council, indicts them
of treason and leese-majesty, for their making use of the
freedom Christ hath given them; and after their declining
his and his council’s usurped authority in spiritual matters,
and so witnessing a good confession for the royal dignity
of their Master, banished them their native country.* Upon
*s8e Calderwood’s History, from p. 491 to 536, and downward.