had been sullenly
acquiesced in by the Church. Moderates and Evangelicals, though
contending together in the several Church Courts, kept themselves
carefully within the limits of the Church's constitution. But a new
era was about to dawn. The struggle for political liberty which found
expression in the great Reform Act of 1832, had its counterpart also in
the ecclesiastical world. Patronage was again felt to be an
intolerable burden, and the rights of the Christian people to require
vindication. In these changed circumstances it became a difficult and
delicate matter to "redd the marches" between the Church and State.
With level-headed common-sense upon both sides it might have been done.
Unfortunately, in the struggle our most prominent national
characteristics, instead of being combined, got opposed to one another.
The proverbial "canniness" of the Scottish nation was all upon the one
side; the equally proverbial _perfervidum ingenium_ was all upon the
other. Led by the latter feeling, the Church resolved to fall back on
her own inherent rights and to get quit of Patronage by a side wind.
In 1834 she passed the Veto Act, giving power to "the major part of the
male heads of families, members of the vacant congregation," in any
parish to get quit of an unpopular presentee. The Presbytery of
Auchterarder was doomed to be the cockpit in which this great fight was
to be fought out. In the autumn of 1834 the Rev. Robert Young was
presented to the parish of Auchterarder by the Earl of Kinnoull. At
the moderation of his call on 2nd December the Rev. John Clark,
Blackford, preached from Mark xii., 10-11, a text somewhat interesting
in the light of what afterwards took place--"And have ye not read this
scripture: The stone which the builders rejected is become the head of
the corner: This was the Lord's doing, and is marvellous in our eyes?"
Mr Young's call was signed by three persons, for the Earl of Kinnoull
as Patron, and by two members of the congregation. He was vetoed by
287 male heads of families, and the Presbytery had no option under the
Act but to reject the call. This decision was confirmed on appeal to
the Assembly, and Mr Young and the Earl of Kinnoull had to seek redress
in the Civil Courts. The "Auchterarder Case" now attracted the
attention of the whole country. It raised the question of the legality
of the Veto Act. In November, 1837, it was heard before the whole
Court of Session, and the Judges