pretty space, though he uttered no audible words,
yet continued in a praying posture; and after a little space told the
magistrates, They would do well to discharge these travellers their
town, affirming, with great asseveration, the plague was in these packs,
so the magistrates commanded them to be gone, and they went to Cumnock,
a town about twenty miles distant, and there sold their goods, which
kindled such an infection in that place, that the living were hardly
able to bury their dead. This made the people begin to think of Mr.
Welch as an oracle: Yet, as he walked with God, and kept close with him,
so he forgot not man, for he used frequently to dine abroad with such of
his friends as he thought were persons with whom he might maintain the
communion of the saints; and once in the year, he used always to invite
all his familiar acquaintances in the town, to a treat in his house,
where there was a banquet of holiness and sobriety.

He continued the course of his ministry in Ayr, till king James's
purpose of destroying the church of Scotland, by establishing bishops
was ripe, and then it became his duty to edify the church by his
sufferings, as formerly he had done by his doctrine.

The reason why king James was so violent for bishops, was neither their
divine institution, which he denied they had, nor yet the profit the
church should reap by them, for he knew well both the men and their
communications, but merely because he believed they were useful
instruments to turn a limited monarchy into absolute dominion, and
subjects into slaves; the design in the world he minded most.

Always in the pursuit of his design, he followed this method; in the
first place, he resolved to destroy general assemblies, knowing well
that so long as assemblies might convene in freedom, bishops could never
get their designed authority in Scotland; and the dissolution of
assemblies he brought about in this manner.

The general assembly at Holyrood-house, _anno_ 1602, with the king's
consent, indict their next meeting to be kept at Aberdeen, the last
tuesday of July _anno_ 1604, and before that day came, the king by his
commissioner the laird of Laureston, and Mr. Patrick Galloway moderator
of the last general assembly, in a letter directed to the several
presbyteries, prorogued the meeting till the first tuesday of July
1605, at the same place; last of all, in June 1605, the expected meeting
to have been kept in July following, is by a