The persecution lasted twenty-eight years, with few “blinks” to take the chill of horror out of the air.  During this time, 18,000 persons, it is said, suffered death, or utmost hardships, for their faith in Jesus Christ.  Of this number, 7,000 went into voluntary banishment; 2,500 were shipped to distant lands; 800 were outlawed; 680 were killed in battle, or died of their wounds; 500 were murdered in cold blood; 362 were, by form of law, executed.  We have no account of the number that perished in shipwrecks, or succumbed to the horrors of transportation; nor of hundreds that were shot at sight by the soldiers who ravaged the country for years; nor of the thousands who wasted away through cold, hunger, and exposure in the mountains and moors.  Gloomy caves, dripping moss-hags, and unmarked graves, were asylums of mercy to multitudes, who are without any earthly record; but their names are written in heaven.  Truly Scotland has been consecrated to the Lord.  The blood of the martyrs has watered her heather, crimsoned her streams, stained her streets, and bedewed her fields.  Scotland is the Lord’s.  The blood means much.

THE BLOOD EMPHASIZES THE TRUTH OF CHRIST.

The blood of the martyrs testifies to the value of the truth—­the superlative importance of all revealed truth.  Their blood placed emphasis on the sovereignty of God, the supremacy of Christ, the inspiration of the Bible, the preciousness of the Gospel, the independence of the Church, the liberty of conscience and the thousand and one co-related doctrines of salvation.  These Covenanters took their position at Christ’s throne, where the rainbow of the Covenant arches the heavens; and from that point of view the plan of salvation lay before them, in matchless detail and glorious perspective.  These men received enlightenment from the Holy Spirit, and thereby had a broad, clear, rapturous vision of God and His redeeming grace.  They saw the truth in the harmonious teachings of the Bible, and esteemed it as God’s sanctuary, filled with the presence of Jesus Christ.  These Covenanters found Christ in every particle of revealed truth, in every “jot,” and in every “tittle” of the Word of God.  Christ’s life was throbbing in it, His glory was streaming through it, His energy was radiating from it.  They were willing to lose the right eye, the right hand, the right foot, yea, life itself, rather than lose the least fragment of the Scriptures.  Rather would they be jostled out of their homes, and wander in deserts, than depart from Bible doctrines.  James Renwick was offered his life, if he would let a drop of ink fall on a sheet of paper.  He chose death in preference to that compromising act.  Is the truth, the entire system of truth, every stone in the temple of truth, thus dear to us?

A WITNESSING CHURCH IS NEEDED.