he was intolerable, in some he was wrong and
self-deceived. He was too eager, too restless, too intent upon doing
everything, forcing the wheels of the great universe and clutching at
his aim whatever conditions of nature might oppose--to be wholly heroic.
Yet there are none of the smoother or even more lovable figures of
history whom it would be less possible to strike from off the list of
heroes. The impression which he left upon the religion and character of
Scotland remains to this day; and if we think, as many have done during
all these ages, that that development of national life is the highest
that could be aimed at, John Knox was one of the greatest of men. But if
he transmitted many great qualities to his country, he also transmitted
the defects of these qualities. He cut Scotland adrift in many respects
from the community of Christendom. He cut her off from her ancestors and
from those hallowing traditions of many ages which are the inheritance
of the universal Church. He taught her to exult in that disruption, not
to regret it; and he left an almost ineradicable conviction of
self-superiority to a world lying in wickedness, in the innermost heart
of the nation. It is a wonderful testimony to a man that he should have
thus been able to imprint his own characteristics upon his race: and no
doubt it is because he was himself of the very quintessence of its
national character to start with, that he has maintained this prodigious
power through these three hundred years.

[Illustration: KNOX'S PULPIT. In the Antiquarian Society's Museum,
Edinburgh.]

He lies, it is thought, if not within the walls of St. Giles's under the
flags between the Cathedral and the Parliament House, with all the busy
life of modern Edinburgh, the feet of generations of men treading out
the hours and years over his head; a more appropriate bed for him than
green mound or marble monument. That stony square is consecrated ground
blessed near a thousand years ago by ancient priests who cared little
more for Rome than do their modern successors now. But little heeded
Knox for priestly blessing or consecrated soil. "The earth is the Lord's
and the fulness thereof" was the only consecration of which he thought.

CHAPTER IV

THE SCHOLAR OF THE REFORMATION

The age of Mary Stewart is in many ways the climax of Scottish national
history, as well as one of the most interesting and exciting chapters in
the history of the world. The Stewa