From the time that the leading protestants discovered the hostile intentions of the regent, they had used great industry to ascertain the numbers of their friends, to establish means of correspondence among them, and to have them united by the strictest bonds. For this purpose, copies of their religious covenant were committed to persons who procured subscriptions to it in the different districts where they resided.[395] From the designation which they gave themselves in this covenant, or from the union which subsisted among them, they began at this time to be distinguished { 263} by the name of The Congregation. The nobles who had joined the association, were the earls of Argyle, Glencairn, Monteith, and Rothes; lords Ochiltree, Boyd, Ruthven, and the prior of St Andrews. The earl Marischal, and lord Erskine, with some others who were friendly to the reformed religion, still supported the regent, or remained neutral. A large proportion of the lesser barons belonged to the Congregation; particularly those of Mearns, Angus, Strathearn, Monteith, Fyfe, Cunningham, Kyle, Carrick, and Galloway.[396]
In the beginning of June, the lords of the Congregation held a consultation on the measures which they should adopt for their own security, and for the advancement of the Reformation. They had repeatedly applied to the clergy to rectify the abuses which prevailed in the church, and to release them from those unjust and oppressive laws by which their consciences had long been enslaved; but their petitions had been treated with neglect and disdain. “To abandon usurped power, to renounce lucrative error, are sacrifices which the virtue of individuals has, on some occasions, offered to truth; but from any society of men no such effort can be expected. The corruptions of a society, recommended by common utility, and justified by universal practice, are viewed by its members without shame or horror; and reformation never proceeds from themselves, but is always { 264} forced upon them by some foreign hand.”[397] Convinced of this, the protestant leaders had next addressed themselves to the regent, and requested her to employ her authority to bring about a reformation, which could not be much longer deferred, without interrupting the peace of the kingdom. As long as they had any reason to think that she was disposed to listen to their petitions, they had waited with exemplary patience, and restrained the ardour of such of their friends as were inclined, without further delay, to use the right which nature and Christianity gave them; but the regent had disappointed their expectations, and from being a professed friend was become a declared enemy; they could no longer place the smallest dependence on her promises; and they were satisfied that she had formed a systematic plan for suppressing the Reformation, and enforcing the existing ecclesiastical laws in all their rigour. It behoved them now either to submit to have their chains riveted, or by a bold and vigorous effort to shake them off altogether. They determined upon the latter. The scandalous lives of the established clergy, their total neglect of the religious instruction of the people, and the profanation of Christian worship by gross idolatry, were the most glaring abuses. The lords of the Congregation resolved to take immediate steps for removing these, by abolishing the popish service, and setting up the reformed worship in all those places to which their authority or influence { 265} extended, and in which the greater part of the inhabitants were friendly to the design. This step is justified in part by the feudal ideas respecting the jurisdiction of the nobility, which at that time prevailed in Scotland; the urgent and extreme necessity of the case, however, forms its best vindication. A great part of the nation loudly demanded such a reformation, and, had not regular measures been adopted for its introduction, the popular indignation would have effected the work in a more exceptionable way.