works of Buchanan, Rutherford, and Gillespie, bear ample testimony to the enlarged views of their authors in relation to the proper bounds of civil and ecclesiastical authority, and to their fidelity to the cause of genuine liberty.  The same great principles were contended for by Alexander Henderson, embodied in the scriptural attainments of the memorable Second Reformation, and clearly enunciated in the Solemn League and Covenant of the three kingdoms, in which the covenanters explicitly bound themselves to support the king and parliament in “the maintenance of the true reformed religion.”  When the Scottish nation, forgetful of their sacred vows, tamely submitted to the tyranny of the royal brothers, and Presbyterian ministers remained silent under an infamous indulgence, it devolved upon a few despised and persecuted covenanters,—­the Society people,—­to lift up and hold aloft the torch of freedom; and by their faithful testimonies and declarations uttered in fields and on scaffolds, and more still, by their blood freely shed to confirm their righteous cause, to sow broadcast the principles of genuine liberty.  These, after lying buried in the earth for a time, sprung up vigorously, and bore fruit, when the perfidious race of the Stuarts was driven ignominiously from the throne; and, at the Revolution, some of the fundamental truths for which the martyrs of the covenant contended, became ascendant and triumphant.[3]

In the Queensferry Paper, penned by Cargill, in a rough draft, and found on the person of Henry Hall of Haughhead, when he was taken, the heroic sufferers expressly disowned the authority of Charles II. and his government.  The terms employed, it has been remarked, very much resemble those used by the English nation when they rejected the Government of James II., and transferred the crown to William and Mary.

“We reject the king and those associate with him in government from being our king and rulers, being no more bound to them.  They have altered and destroyed the Lord’s established religion,—­overturned the fundamental and established laws of the kingdom—­taken away altogether Christ’s church government, and changed the civil government of this land, which was by a king and free parliament, into tyranny.”  The conclusion expresses sentiments worthy of the most distinguished patriots, and that are fit to be taken as the watchward of struggling freemen all over the world.  “We bind and oblige ourselves to defend ourselves and one another in our worshipping of God, in our natural, civil and divine rights and liberties, till we shall overcome, or send them down under debate to posterity—­that they may begin where we end.”