the Resolutioners the Tories, of Scotland through that time; and the strife between the parties was all the fiercer because, Scottish autonomy being lost, it was the only native strife left for Scotsmen, and they were battened down to it, as an indulgence among themselves, by a larger and unconcerned rule overhead.  General Assemblies of the Kirk being no longer allowed, it had to be conducted in Provincial Synods and Presbyteries only, or in sermons and pamphlets of mutual reproach.  The exasperation was great; Church-censures and threats of such passed and repassed; all attempts at agreement failed; the best friends were parted.  Leaders among the majority, or Resolutioner clergy, were Mr. Robert Douglas of Edinburgh, who had preached the coronation sermon of Charles II. at Scone, Mr. James Sharp of Crail (these two back for some time from the imprisonment in London to which Monk had sent them in 1651:  Vol.  IV. 296), Mr. James Wood of St. Andrews, old Mr. David Dickson, now Professor of Divinity in Edinburgh, and our perpetual friend Baillie.  The minority, or Protesters, were led by such ministers as Mr. James Guthrie of Stirling, their first oracle, Mr. Patrick Giliespie of Glasgow University, Mr. John Livingston of Ancram, Mr, Samuel Rutherford of St. Andrews, and Mr. Andrew Cant of Aberdeen; with whom, as their best lay head, was Johnstone of Warriston.  Peace-makers, such as Mr. Robert Blair of St. Andrews and Mr. James Durham of Glasgow, negociated between the two sides; and Mr. Robert Leighton, in his Edinburgh Principalship, looked on with saintly and philosophic indifference.  He hoped that, while so many brethren “preached to the times,” one brother might be allowed “to preach on eternity” and that the differences on earth would “make heaven the sweeter.”  In fact, however, the controversy was not merely a theoretical one.  Not only was it involved whether the two last General Assemblies, of 1651 and 1652, swayed as they had been by the Resolutioners, should be recognised and their acts held valid, and what should be the spirit and constitution of the Kirk in future:  present interests were also involved.  It had been to the Protesters that Cromwell had turned with greatest liking and hope, both on political grounds and from spiritual sympathy, when he was fighting in Scotland; and, since the beginning of his Protectorate, they had been most in favour.  Early in 1654 three of their number, Mr. Patrick Gillespie, Mr. John Livingston, and Mr. John Menzies, had been summoned to London to advise the Protector; they had been there two or three months; and the effects of their advice had been visible in an ordinance about vacant Kirk-livings very favourable to the Protesters, and generally in a continued inclination towards the Protesters in the proceedings of the English Government in Scotland.  The ministers and others ejected by Cromwell’s visitors had been mostly of the Resolutioner species; and one of Baillie’s complaints is that Protesters, whether fit or not, were put into vacant livings by the English, and that only Scotsmen of that colour were conjoined with the English in the executive and the judicatories.  Till 1656 all this had been very natural.  The dregs of Stuartism, and consequent antipathy to the Protectorate, had persisted till then most visibly among the Resolutioners.[1]