edict of the
tables, whose authority was supreme, an elder from each parish was
ordered to attend the presbytery, and to give his vote in the choice
both of the commissioners and ministers who should be deputed to the
assembly. As it is not usual for the ministers, who are put in the list
of candidates, to claim a vote, all the elections by that means fell
into the hands of the laity: the most furious of all ranks were chosen:
and the more to overawe the clergy, a new device was fallen upon, of
choosing to every commissioner four or five lay assessors, who, though
they could have no vote, might yet interpose with their advice and
authority in the assembly.[**]

The assembly met at Glasgow; and, besides a great concourse of the
people, all the nobility and gentry of any family or interest were
present, either as members, assessors, or spectators; and it was
apparent that the resolutions taken by the Covenanters could here meet
with no manner of opposition. A firm determination had been entered into
of utterly abolishing episcopacy; and as a preparative to it, there was
laid before the presbytery of Edinburgh, and solemnly read in all the
churches of the kingdom, an accusation against the bishops, as guilty,
all of them, of heresy, simony, bribery, perjury, cheating, incest,
adultery, fornication, common swearing, drunkenness, gaming, breach
of the Sabbath, and every other crime that had occurred to the
accusers.[***] The bishops sent a protest, declining the authority of
the assembly: the commissioner, too, protested against the court, as
illegally constituted and elected; and, in his majesty's name, dissolved
it. This measure was foreseen, and little regarded. The court still
continued to sit, and to finish their business.[****]

* A presbytery in Scotland is an inferior ecclesiastical
court, the same that was afterwards called a classis in
England, and is composed of the clergy of the neighboring
parishes, to the number commonly of between twelve and
twenty.

** King's Decl. p. 190, 191, 290. Guthry, p. 39, etc.

*** King's Decl. p. 218. Rush. vol. ii p. 787.

**** May, p. 44.

All the acts of assembly, since the accession of James to the crown
of England, were, upon pretty reasonable grounds, declared null and
invalid. The acts of parliament which affected ecclesiastical affairs
were supposed, on that very account, to have no manner of authority. And
thus episcopacy, th