Old Mortality | Page 3

remarks on in "The Heart of Mid-Lothian," and now he was treated as a
faithless Scotsman. For these reasons he reviewed himself; but it is
probable, as Lockhart says, that William Erskine wrote the literary or
aesthetic part of the criticism (Lockhart, v.174, note).
Dr. McCrie's review may be read, or at least may be found, in the
fourth volume of his collected works (Blackwood, Edinburgh 1857).
The critique amounts to about eighty-five thousand words. Since the
"Princesse de Cleves" was reviewed in a book as long as the original,
never was so lengthy a criticism. As Dr. McCrie's performance scarcely
shares the popularity of "Old Mortality," a note on his ideas may not be
superfluous, though space does not permit a complete statement of his
many objections. The Doctor begins by remarks on novels in general,
then descends to the earlier Waverley romances. "The Antiquary" he
pronounces to be "tame and fatiguing." Acknowledging the merits of
the others, he finds fault with "the foolish lines" (from Burns), "which
must have been foisted without the author's knowledge into the title

page," and he denounces the "bad taste" of the quotation from "Don
Quixote." Burns and Cervantes had done no harm to Dr. McCrie, but
his anger was aroused, and he, like the McCallum More as described by
Andrew Fairservice, "got up wi' an unto' bang, and garr'd them a' look
about them." The view of the Covenanters is "false and distorted."
These worthies are not to be "abused with profane wit or low
buffoonery." "Prayers were not read in the parish churches of Scotland"
at that time. As Episcopacy was restored when Charles II. returned
"upon the unanimous petition of the Scottish Parliament" (Scott's
Collected Works, vol. xix. p. 78) it is not unnatural for the general
reader to suppose that prayers would be read by the curates. Dr. McCrie
maintains that "at the Restoration neither the one nor the other" (neither
the Scotch nor English Prayer Books) "was imposed," and that the
Presbyterians repeatedly "admitted they had no such grievance." No
doubt Dr. McCrie is correct. But Mr. James Guthrie, who was executed
on June 1, 1661, said in his last speech, "Oh that there were not many
who study to build again what they did formerly unwarrantably destroy:
I mean Prelacy and the Service Book, a mystery of iniquity that works
amongst us, whose steps lead unto the house of the great Whore,
Babylon, the mother of fornication," and so forth. Either this mystery of
iniquity, the Book of Common Prayer, "was working amongst us," or it
was not. If it was not, of what did Mr. Guthrie complain? If it was
"working," was read by certain curates, as by Burnet, afterwards
Bishop of Salisbury, at Saltoun, Scott is not incorrect. He makes
Morton, in danger of death, pray in the words of the Prayer Book, "a
circumstance which so enraged his murderers that they determined to
precipitate his fate." Dr. McCrie objects to this incident, which is
merely borrowed, one may conjecture, from the death of Archbishop
Sharpe. The assassins told the Archbishop that they would slay him.
"Hereupon he began to think of death. But (here are just the words of
the person who related the story) behold! God did not give him the
grace to pray to Him without the help of a book. But he pulled out of
his pocket a small book, and began to read over some words to himself,
which filled us with amazement and indignation." So they fired their
pistols into the old man, and then chopped him up with their swords,
supposing that he had a charm against bullets! Dr. McCrie seems to
have forgotten, or may have disbelieved the narrative telling how

Sharpe's use of the Prayer Book, like Morton's, "enraged" his murderers.
The incident does not occur in the story of the murder by Russell, one
of the murderers, a document published in C. K. Sharpe's edition of
Kirkton. It need not be true, but it may have suggested the prayer of
Morton.
If Scott thought that the Prayer Book was ordained to be read in Scotch
churches, he was wrong; if he merely thought that it might have been
read in some churches, was "working amongst us," he was right: at
least, according to Mr. James Guthrie.
Dr. McCrie argues that Burley would never have wrestled with a
soldier in an inn, especially in the circumstances. This, he says, was
inconsistent with Balfour's "character." Wodrow remarks, "I cannot
hear that this gentleman had ever any great character for religion
among those that knew him, and such were the accounts of him, when
abroad, that the reverend ministers of the Scots congregation at
Rotterdam would never allow him to communicate with them." In
Scott's reading of Burley's character, there