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offered a living by a relative, Sir Alexander Burnet, and in 1663 the
living of Saltoun, East Lothian, had been kept open for him by one of his
father's friends. He was not formally inducted at Saltoun until June 1665,
although he had served there since October 1664. For the next five years he
devoted himself to his parish, where he won the respect of all parties. In
1666 he alienated the Scottish bishops by a bold memorial (printed in vol.
ii. of the _Miscellanies_ of the Scottish Historical Society), in which he
pointed out that they were departing from the custom of the primitive
church by their excessive pretensions, and yet his attitude was far too
moderate to please the Presbyterians. In 1669 he resigned his parish to
become professor of divinity in the university of Glasgow, and in the same
year he published an exposition of his ecclesiastical views in his _Modest
and Free Conference between a Conformist and a Nonconformist_ (by "a lover
of peace"). He was Leighton's right hand in the efforts at a compromise
between the episcopal and the presbyterian principle. Meanwhile he had
begun to differ from Lauderdale, whose policy after the failure of the
scheme of "Accommodation" moved in the direction of absolutism and
repression, and during Lauderdale's visit to Scotland in 1672 the
divergence rapidly developed into opposition. He warily refused the offer
of a Scottish bishopric, and published in 1673 his four "conferences,"
entitled _Vindication of the Authority, Constitution and Laws of the Church
and State of Scotland_, in which he insisted on the duty of passive
obedience. It was partly through the influence of Anne (d. 1716), duchess
of Hamilton in her own right, that he had been appointed at Glasgow, and he
made common cause with the Hamiltons against Lauderdale. The duchess had
made over to him the papers of her father and uncle, from which he compiled
the _Memoirs of the Lives and Actions of James and William, dukes of
Hamilton and Castleherald. In which an Account is given of the Rise and
Progress of the Civil Wars of Scotland ... together with many letters ...
written by King Charles I._ (London, 1677; Univ. Press, Oxford, 1852), a
book which was published as the second volume of a _History of the Church
of Scotland_, Spottiswoode's _History_ forming the first. This work
established his reputation as an historian. Meanwhile he had clandestinely
married in 1671 a cousin of Lauderdale, Lady Margaret Kennedy, da