Chancellor: "conscience is
a vague word, which signifies any thing or nothing." Lockhart, who sate
in Parliament as representative of the great county of Lanark, struck
in. "If conscience," he said, "be a word without meaning, we will change
it for another phrase which, I hope, means something. For conscience let
us put the fundamental laws of Scotland." These words raised a fierce
debate. General Drummond, who represented Perthshire, declared that he
agreed with Hamilton and Lockhart. Most of the Bishops present took the
same side. [142]

It was plain that, even in the Committee of Articles, James could not
command a majority. He was mortified and irritated by the tidings.
He held warm and menacing language, and punished some of his mutinous
servants, in the hope that the rest would take warning. Several
persons were dismissed from the Council board. Several were deprived
of pensions, which formed an important part of their income. Sir George
Mackenzie of Rosehaugh was the most distinguished victim. He had long
held the office of Lord Advocate, and had taken such a part in the
persecution of the Covenanters that to this day he holds, in the
estimation of the austere and godly peasantry of Scotland, a place not
far removed from the unenviable eminence occupied by Claverhouse. The
legal attainments of Mackenzie were not of the highest order: but, as
a scholar, a wit, and an orator, he stood high in the opinion of his
countrymen; and his renown had spread even to the coffeehouses of London
and the cloisters of Oxford. The remains of his forensic speeches prove
him to have been a man of parts, but are somewhat disfigured by what he
doubtless considered as Ciceronian graces, interjections which show more
art than passion, and elaborate amplifications, in which epithet rises
above epithet in wearisome climax. He had now, for the first time, been
found scrupulous. He was, therefore, in spite of all his claims on the
gratitude of the government, deprived of his office. He retired into the
country, and soon after went up to London for the purpose of clearing
himself, but was refused admission to the royal presence. [143]
While the King was thus trying to terrify the Lords of Articles into
submission, the popular voice encouraged them to persist. The utmost
exertions of the Chancellor could not prevent the national sentiment
from expressing itself through the pulpit and the press. One tract,
written with such boldness and acrim