ve been expected from his
former relations to Scottish Presbyterianism, his aim now was to
rebuild a good and solid Established Church in Scotland mainly on the
native Presbyterian principle, though under control, and to leave
extravagant spirits, including even those too forward for
Independency among the Scots, to the mere benefits of an outside
toleration. It was not his way to proceed hurriedly, however; and, as
the Protesters were religiously the men most to his liking, and must
by all means be kept within the Kirk, an agreement between them and
the Resolutioners was a political necessity. To this end he had
again, more than once recently, requested some of the leaders of both
parties to come to London for consultation, as Gillespie, Livingston,
and Menzies, for the Protesters, had done before. Appeals to the
Civil Power in ecclesiastical matters being against the Presbyterian
theory which the parties professed in common, that suggestion had not
been taken, notwithstanding the precedent, and the parties had
persisted in their war of mutual invective in Scotland, each getting
what it could by private dealings with the Council there,--the
Resolutioners through Broghill and the Protesters through Monk. But
that could not last for ever; and, in August 1656, strict
Presbyterian theory had been so far waived by both parties that both
had resolved on direct appeal to his Highness in London. The
Resolutioners had the start. They had picked out as their fittest
single emissary Mr. James Sharp of Crail, then forty-three years of
age, already well acquainted with London by his former compulsory
stay there, and with the advantage now of intimacy with Broghill. His
Instructions, signed by three of the leading Resolutioners, were
ready on the 23rd of August. They were substantially that he should
clear the Resolutioners with the Protector from the
misrepresentations of the Protesters, paint the Protesters in return
as mainly hot young spirits and disturbers, and obtain from his
Highness a restoration of Presbyterian use and wont through the whole
Kirk, with preponderance to the Resolutioners, though not with a
General Assembly till times were more quiet. _Per contra_, the
Protesters had drawn out certain propositions to be submitted to
Cromwell. They asked for a Commission for the plantation of kirks, to
be appointed by his authority and to consist of those he might think
fit, to administer the revenues of the Kirk according to