wer
of which, hitherto, they had never enjoyed a fraction. It was a movement
_per saltum_, beyond all that history has recorded. At cock-crow, they had
no power at all; when the sun went down, they had gained (if they could
have held) a papal supremacy. And a thing not less memorably strange is,
that even yet the ambitious leaders were not disturbed; what they had
gained was viewed by the public as a collateral gain, indirectly adhering
to a higher object, but forming no part at all of what the clergy had
sought. It required the scrutiny of law courts to unmask and decompose
their true object. The obstinacy of the defence betrayed the real _animus_
of the attempt. It was an attempt which, in connexion with the _Veto_ Act,
(supposing that to have prospered,) would have laid the whole power of the
church at their feet. What the law had distributed amongst three powers,
patron, parish, and presbytery, would have been concentred in themselves.
The _quoad sacra_ parishes would have riveted their majorities in the
presbyteries; and the presbyteries, under the real action of the _Veto_,
would have appointed nearly every incumbent in Scotland. And this is the
answer to the question, when treated merely in outline--_How were these
things done?_ The religion of the times had created new machineries for
propagating a new religious influence. These fell into the hands of the
clergy; and the temptation to abuse these advantages led them into
revolution.

III. Having now stated WHAT was done, as well as HOW it was done, let us
estimate the CONSEQUENCES of these acts; under this present, or _third_
section, reviewing the immediate consequences which have taken effect
already, and under the next section, anticipating the more remote
consequences yet to be expected.

In the spring of 1834, as we have sufficiently explained, the General
Assembly ventured on the fatal attempt to revolutionize the church, and
(as a preliminary towards _that_) on the attempt to revolutionize the
property of patronage. There lay the extravagance of the attempt; its
short-sightedness, if they did not see its civil tendencies; its audacity,
if they _did_. It was one revolution marching to its object through
another; it was a vote, which, if at all sustained, must entail a long
inheritance of contests with the whole civil polity of Scotland.

"Heu quantum fati parva tabella vehit!"

It might seem to strangers a trivial thing, that an obscure court, like
t