THE SCOTCH CLERGY CHARGING THE QUEEN WITH HERESY.

Southland Times, Volume 2, Issue 90, 15 September 1863, Page 5 (Supplement)

THE SCOTCH CLERGY CHARGING THE QUEEN WITH HERESY.

An extraordinary speech has been deliveied at the meeting olthe General Assembly of the Free Church, 'by Dr Cand lish, Moderator. On receiving the report on Popery, which expressed somelamentat its increase in Scotland, chiefly from the influx of Iridi, and denounced the course of legislation relative to Maynoeth, the Prison Ministers Bill, &c , Dr. Candlish took notice of what he called the Popish inscription on the " cairn " erected near Balmoral to tha memory of the late Prince Consort. The inscription was taken from the Wisdom of Solomon, chap, iv., verses IS, 1_ : — " He being made perfect iia a short time, fulfilled a long time. For his soul pleased the Lord; therefore hastened He to take him away from among the wicked.'' Dr. Candlish said he did not attach one shadow of suspicion of blame to ber Majesty or any of tlie lioyal family. u There can be no difficulty in tracing it to that small band of clergymen ofthe church, wlio, 1 am sorry lo say, have a very influential standing at Court, and who in their writings, have indicated an extreme desire to put the Apocrypha and the Bible upon a level, and that not in the way of vindicating what may be good and useful in the Apocrypha, but tor the express purpose of undermining the authority of the Scripture — (Applause) — and making out that there can be no distinction drawn between canonical and apocrypha! books, and that the inspired words of Scripture are not materially different from the books of the Apocrypha." (Hear). After noticing in the passage the absence of all reference to a blessed immortality, he said : — "Surely these great divines advising our beloved Queen in her disiress, in the face of broad Scotland — Bible-loving Scotland — how to perpetuate the memory of him whom she mourned, might have found in the writings of the Apostle Paul, or, if they doubted him, tliey might have found in the recorded sayings of his blessed Master, something more to tlie purpose, more hopeful, more pathetic, than this wretched scrap of the Apocrypha. (Applause) I repeat, it is too bad. I do not know whether any representation might not be made on the subject. (Hear^. It is a thing which endures for ages ; and 1 say it is too bad that the Scottish nation, most deeply, most intensely, sympathising with our beloved Sovereign in her mourning, full of admiration of that illustrious Prince who has been prematurely taken away— -I say it is too bad that Scotland, thus sympathising with the Queen, and thus mourning him over whose loss she mourns, should be for ages insulted by having in the flaming forefront of that monument what Scotlahd cannot but regard as an offence io the Bible which Scotland loves, and to the religion which Scotland has inherited, (Applause).