Series 2 > Diary of Sir Archibald Johnston of Wariston, 1650-1654

INTRODUCTION
XXXIX
supported it were known as Resolutioners, a name derived
from their approval of the resolutions of Commission and
Parliament for the levy of 23rd December.
The Church of Scotland was now unhappily split into
two contending sections. Old friends who had fought
side by side in earlier days became opponents, and there
was much bitterness and occasionally misrepresentations,
due in some cases to misunderstandings, exaggerated
reports or false rumours. Of the Resolutioners, Robert
Douglas was, by head and shoulders, the acknowledged
leader. His ministerial supporters included David
Dickson, Robert Baillie, and James Wood. Among the
Protesters the most outstanding ministers were James
Guthrie, Samuel Rutherfurd, Andrew Cant, Patrick
Gillespie, and John Livingstone; and, of the elders,
Wariston and Sir John Cheisly; the two most strenuous
fighters being Guthrie and Wariston. In the east Robert
Blair, and in the west James Durham, though keenly
interested, tried to be neutral and to soften the asperities
of the contending parties. Their position and attempts
were not always appreciated. Blair used to say that
he was ‘ cuffed upon both haffets ’ by his colleagues,
Rutherfurd and Wood;1 and Wariston refers some¬
what harshly to Durham’s ‘ politik halting betuixt tuo
opinions.’ 2 It is a relief to find that, despite the pre¬
vailing acridity of feeling, Wariston did not disdain to
listen to the sermons of Douglas and Dickson and to
commend them.3
The Diary throws much fresh light on the position, the
aims, and the inner working of the Protesters. It reveals
them in the main as a company of religious enthusiasts,
whose zeal was not weakened, hardly tinged indeed, by
Blair’s Life, p. 343.—Haffets = cheeks.
P. 132.
3 Pp. 239, 258, 269.