e persecutions to follow and for crowns of martyrdom. In and around
their whole Covenanting procedure, there was the atmosphere of a
paradise of communion with God.

These Covenants exhibited the great ecclesiastical breadth of the
Covenanters. The enthronement of the Word of God over the Church was one
of the commanding objects of the Reformers. If only the Church would
hear and honour Christ, her King, speaking in that Word, then would she
be clothed with the sun, and have on her head a crown of twelve stars.
The Reformers resolutely set themselves to apply the Word to the Church,
in all her departments; she must be such an institution as her Lord had
instructed. The will of priest, and prince, and presbyter, and people,
must be set aside in the presence of the will of her sole Sovereign. The
works of demolition and reconstruction must go on together. Built
according to the design of her Lord, her bulwarks, and towers, and
palaces shall command the admiration of the world. The pattern was not
taken from Rome, nor "even from Geneva, but from the blessed Word of
God." No quarter shall be given to hierarchy of Pope or prelate in the
government of the Church, to the "commandments of men" in the doctrine
of the Church, or to unscriptural rites in the worship of the Church. So
great was their success that the Reformers could say that they "had
borrowed nothing from the border of Rome," and had "nothing that ever
flowed from the man of sin." Often the battle raged most fiercely round
the standard of the independence of the Church, but ever the Covenanters
emerged from the struggle victorious. Valorously did they maintain that
Christ ought to "bear the glory of ruling His own kingdom, the Church,"
and fearlessly they defied the monarchs in their invasions of Messiah's
rights. Besides, they were not satisfied with the attainment of a united
Church in their own kingdom alone. They were filled with the spirit of
the Saviour's prayer, "That they all may be one." In the present times,
those who publicly contend for the reunion of a "few scattered
fragments" of the Reformed Church are belauded as men of large hearts
and liberal aims. The Covenanters embodied in their Solemn League and
Covenant an engagement to "bring the Churches of God in the three
kingdoms to the nearest conjunction and uniformity;" and they also
subsequently included the Churches on the Continent in their efforts for
ecclesiastical union. For the purposes of thes