ble, a revision of the Psalter
and an amendment of "sundry prayers in the Psalm-Book which should be
altered in respect they are not convenient for the time." The
Assembly, however, declined to amend the prayers already in the Book,
or to delete any of them, but ordained that:

"If any brother would have any prayers added, which are meet for the
time.... the same first to be tried and allowed by the Assembly."

The motion thus proposed, and the action of the General Assembly
regarding it, is of interest in that it seems plainly to indicate that
whatever desire there was for change, this desire was not the result of
a movement in favor of a fuller liturgical service, nor on the other
hand, of one which had for its object the entire removal of the form of
worship at that time in use. To this form, commonly employed, no
objection was offered, but owing to changing times and circumstances,
it was regarded as desirable that the matter contained in the suggested
forms of prayer should be so modified as to make them more applicable
to the conditions of the age.

James the Sixth of Scotland ascended the throne of the united kingdoms
in 1603, and many of his Presbyterian subjects cherished the hope that
his influence would be exerted to conform the practice and worship of
the Church of England to that of other Reformed Churches. In this hope
they were destined to severe disappointment, as it very soon became
evident that the aim of the royal theologian was to reduce to the forms
and methods of Episcopacy, those of all the Churches within his realm.
In considering the subject of Presbyterian worship it will not be
necessary to enter fully into the history of the civil struggle between
the Church of Scotland and the Stuart Kings except in those phases of
it which affected the worship of the Church; as these, however, are so
closely interwoven with questions of government it will be impossible
always to avoid reference to the latter or to keep the two absolutely
distinct.

In 1606 it was decided by the Scottish Parliament that the King was
"absolute, Prince, Judge and Governor over all persons, estates, and
causes, both spiritual and temporal, within the realm." Four years
later the General Assembly, composed of commissioners named by the
King, met at Glasgow and issued a decree to the effect that the right
of calling General Assemblies of the Church belonged to the Crown.
This, among other acts of this Assembly, was ra