tion of authority; while the generality of the nobles, and
all the preachers, were so much discontented with their administration.
The assembly of the church appointed a solemn fast; of which one of the
avowed reasons was, the danger to which the king was exposed from the
company of wicked persons: [**] and on that day the pulpits resounded
with declamations against Lenox, Arran, and all the present counsellors.
When the minds of the people were sufficiently prepared by these
lectures, a conspiracy of the nobility was formed, probably with the
concurrence of Elizabeth, for seizing the person of James at Ruthven,
a seat of the earl of Gowry's; and the design, being kept secret,
succeeded without any opposition.

* Camden, p. 486.

** Spotswood, p. 319., Spotswood, p. 320.

The leaders in this enterprise were the earl of Gowry himself, the
earl of Marre, the lords Lindesey and Boyd, the masters of Glamis and
Oliphant, the abbots of Dunfermling, Paisley, and Cambuskenneth. The
king wept when he found himself detained a prisoner but the master
of Glamis said, "No matter for his tears, better that boys weep than
bearded men;" an expression which James could never afterwards forgive.
But notwithstanding his resentment, he found it necessary to submit
to the present necessity. He pretended an entire acquiescence in the
conduct of the associators; acknowledged the detention of his person
to be acceptable service; and agreed to summon both an assembly of the
church and a convention of estates, in order to ratify that enterprise.

The assembly, though they had established it as an inviolable rule, that
the king on no account, and under no pretence, should ever intermeddle
in ecclesiastical matters, made no scruple of taking civil affairs under
their cognizance, and of deciding, on this occasion, that the attempt of
the conspirators was acceptable to all that feared God, or tendered the
preservation of the king's person, and prosperous state of the realm.
They even enjoined all the clergy to recommend these sentiments from the
pulpit; and they threatened with ecclesiastical censures every man
who should oppose the authority of the confederated lords.[*] The
convention, being composed chiefly of these lords themselves, added
their sanction to these proceedings. Arran was confined a prisoner in
his own house: Lenox, though he had power to resist, yet, rather than
raise a civil war, or be the cause of bloodshed,[**] chos