have left their mark in those records which neither time nor revolution,
neglect nor violence, have been able wholly to destroy--the architecture
of our cathedrals, abbeys, and monasteries.

The primitive buildings of the early Celtic period of the Church have
long since disappeared. Their clay and wattles could not withstand the
wear and tear of time; only in a distant glen or lonely island can we
discover scattered traces of the beehive cell or simple shrine of the
anchorite or missionary. Few relics of the more substantial structures
of that time survive.

The Roman era of Church organisation superseded the Celtic; and with the
Roman dominance came the architecture of the Anglo-Normans, whom the
presence and policy of Margaret, saint and queen, attracted to Scotland.
It developed itself, always with some national characteristics of its
own, until the War of Independence broke off all friendly intercourse
with England.

Later came, in place of alliance with England, the alliance with France,
which lasted till the Reformation, and left its mark on many of the
pages of "The Great Stone Book," which chronicle for us the vicissitudes
of the past, the days of peace and prosperity, of war and penury, of
reviving national health and energy, of new combinations and ideas in
politics and statecraft, of spiritual decay and carnal pride and
ostentation. These annals can be deciphered by the patient student of
the walls and cloisters of the ancient churches and religious houses.

To the founders and the owners of the latter, and chiefly to the great
orders of the Augustinians, the Benedictines, and the Cistercians, we
owe many of our noblest remnants of the past--all of them unhappily
ruined; for the popular violence of the sixteenth century raged more
fiercely against the monasteries than against the cathedrals. To the
Episcopal system of government, introduced under Margaret, we owe the
bishops' churches or cathedrals.

The life and thought of the Church at the present day, move far enough
apart from either prelacy or monasticism to allow us to look at each
with an impartial eye, and to consider whether in its abolition we have
parted with aught that it would have profited the Church to retain.

The monasteries, at first the homes and shelters of charity and
learning, had, before the sixteenth century, waxed fat with unduly
accumulated wealth, become enervated with luxury and corrupt through bad
government. They were swe