Series 1 > Statutes of the Scottish Church, 1225-1559

5
Scolicance. I have not been able to read word for word these
Prefaces, but I can assure the Society that they in themselves
would make the volumes which they introduce most valuable
portions of the library now in course of publication by the Society.
The extraordinary minuteness and critical faculty and laborious¬
ness of Sir Arthur Mitchell’s Preface earn my admiration.
When we come to think what his age is—though we can never
remember it when we are with him—it seems to me little less
than a miracle that he should have been able to give so much
time, and so much labour, to elucidating the most minute points
in connection with this collection. We owe him, I am sure, the
deepest debt of gratitude for what he has done; and the same
may be said of Dr. Patrick’s Introduction. That is on a broader
scale, and it gives a sketch of the early history of the Church in
Scotland, which is, to me at any rate, largely novel and original,
and which is, at any rate, whether you agree with his conclusions
or not—and I am not sufficiently learned to differ from them or
agree with them—whether you agree with his conclusions or not,
you cannot fail to see that it is a sketch of the most absorbing
interest to any one who is interested in the history of Scotland.
That is all I have to say about the publications of the present
year. Now we come to the large question, which is always before
the Council, and a subject of great interest to the Council, the
general policy of the Society with regard to publications. There
is, for example, the valuable volume on which we are going to
spend a considerable sum, The Charters of India fray. That in
itself will be an addition of great importance to our series,
and it is one of the many debts we owe to Bishop Dowden
that he is undertaking, with Mr. Lindsay, the editing of this
volume. But charters, though they are the raw material of
history, are not by any means the sole, or indeed the direct
purpose of our Society. I am glad that in the absence of any
other society we should publish a volume of charters annually,
or from time to time, so as to vindicate our claim as a serious
Historical Society ; but, as a well-known orator once said of the
Liberal Unionists in connection with the Conservative party, I
view the publication of the charters as rather a crutch than a
prominent object of our being. The prominent object—and I
ought to know it, for I had a great deal to do with the inception
of the Society—was rather to throw light on the social history
of Scotland, as, of course, charters do indirectly, and to furnish