Ayrshire > Volume 2

THE MONTGOMERIES OF EGLINTON 83
contumeleous speeches." The Church's affairs were
"in a worse condition in the Presbytery of Irvine than
in any part of our diocese." From the citadel of Ayr
the report was that the ministers had not given the
satisfaction which they had promised to the Earl ; they
had to all appearance offended in the matter of the
conventicles ; and " there are very many loose and
dissolute persons employed in your lordship's manu-
facture whose conversation is very scandalous." The
people of Fenwick would not let the conforming minister
into the manse. Indeed, all over the Earl's jurisdiction
he had to do with what Burnet regarded as a very
froward and treacherous generation, from whom neither
of them was likely to have much credit. Between them,
none the less, they succeeded in placing ministers in a
number of vacant charges, and the Earl evidently acted
with great judgment in refusing to adopt the harsh
measures that were taken by many others, and by the
State, in forcing ministers upon the people contrary to
their wishes.
While Archbishop Burnet was thus involved in the
cares and anxieties that were inevitable to a man in his
position, he suffered a sore domestic affliction in the loss
of his son that evoked a very tender and sympathetic
epistle from the Earl of Eglinton. This letter throws
a strong light on the character and the piety of the
writer : —
" Eglintoun, 27 February, 1665.
" May it please your grace — As I am really afected
in your afliction by the death of your hopfull son, so
I am confident that you, whose eminent stature doth
. cary you to be exemplaire in the exercise of all
Christian vertews, will endeavour now in this chiefly
which the Ford's present dispensation doth call you
even in Christian patience, courage, and humble
submission to God, who can doe His poor fraill cretures
no wronge, and can easily mak up ony seeminge hurt
by giveinge us the equivalent, yea much more
satisfaction and contentment in Himself than what