e and
covenant; vindicating the claim of laymen to preach the gospel and
exhibit their spiritual gifts for the edification of their brethren; and
maintaining that, after the solemn fasts observed by both nations, after
their many and earnest appeals to the God of armies, the victory gained
at Dunbar must be admitted an evident manifestation of the divine will in
favour of the English commonwealth. Finding that he made no proselytes
of his opponents, he published his arguments for the instruction of the
Scottish people; but his zeal did not

[Footnote 1: See a number of letters in Milton's State Papers, 18-35.]

escape suspicion; and the more discerning believed that, under the cover of
a religious controversy, he was in reality tampering with the fidelity of
the governor.[1]

In a short time his attention was withdrawn to a more important
controversy, which ultimately spread the flames of religious discord
throughout the nation. There had all along existed a number of Scots who
approved of the execution of the late king, and condemned even the nominal
authority given to his son. Of these men, formidable by their talents,
still more formidable by their fanaticism, the leaders were Wariston, the
clerk register in the parliament, and Gillespie and Guthrie, two ministers
in the kirk. In parliament the party, though too weak to control, was
sufficiently strong to embarrass, and occasionally to influence, the
proceedings; in the kirk it formed indeed the minority, but a minority too
bold and too numerous to be rashly irritated or incautiously despised.[2]
After the defeat at Dunbar, permission was cheerfully granted by the
committee of estates for a levy of troops in the associated counties of
Renfrew, Air, Galloway, Wigton, and Dumfries, that part of Scotland where
fanaticism had long fermented, and the most rigid notions prevailed. The
crusade was preached by Gillespie; his efforts were successfully seconded
by the other ministers, and in a short time four regiments of horse,
amounting almost to five thousand men, were raised under Strachan, Kerr,
and two other colonels. The real design now began to unfold itself. First,
the officers refused to serve under Leslie; and the parliament consented to
exempt them from his authority. Next, they hinted doubts of the

[Footnote 1: Thurloe, i. 158-163.]

[Footnote 2: Baillie, ii. 353.]

lawfulness of the war in which they were engaged; and Cromwell, in whose
army Strachan had f