62 MEMORIALS OP EDINB UR GH.
land, romed in the mind of Elizabeth that vindictive jealousy, which so largely contributed
to all the miseries that attended the course of Mary of Scotland, from the first moment of
her return to her native land.
From this time forward a fatal change took place in the policy of the Queen Regent.
She abandoned the moderate measures which her own natural disposition inclined her to ;
she lent herself en’tirely to the ambitious projects of the French Court and the Chiefs of
the house of Guise, and the immediate result was a collision between the Catholic and
Protestant parties. Some concessions had been granted at the request of the Lords of
the Congregation ; but now these were entirely withdrawn, a proclamation was issued for
conformity of religion, and several of the leaders of the reforming party were summoned
A provincial synod, worthy of notice, as the last ever held in Scotland during Roman
Catholic times, was convened on the 2d of March, this year, in the Blackfriare’ Church,
Edinburgh, to consult what wae required for the safety of the Church thus endangered.
Resolutions were passed for the amendment of life in the clergy, and the removal of other
crying abuses ; but it can hardly be wondered at that their general tone was by no means
conciliatory ; the decrees of the Council of Trent were again declared obligatory ; the use of
any other language than Latin, in the services of the Church, was expressly forbid ; and,
by an act of this same synod, Sir David Lindsay’R writings were denounced, and ordered
to be burnt.’ According to Calderwood, this, the last synod ‘of the Church, was dissolved
on the 2d of May, the same day that John Knox arrived at Leith,-too striking a coincidence
to be overlo~ked.~
The conducting of the public religious services in an unknown language had long
excited opposition ; and the popularity of such writings as those of Dunbar, Douglas, and
Lindsay, in the vernacular tongue, doubtless tended to increase the general desire for its
u8e in the services of the Church, as well as on all public occasions.
In Kitteis Confeessioun, a satirical poem ascribed to Sir David Lindsay, the dog-lath of
an ignorant father-confeseor is alluded to with sly humourto
answer for their past deeds.‘ . . I
He speirit monie strange case,
How that my lufe did me embrace,
Quhat day, how oft, quhat sort, and quhair 1
Quod he, I wad I had been thair.
He me absolvit for ane plack,
Thocht he with me na price wald rnak ;
And rnekil Latine did he mummill;
I heard na thing bot Aumrnill burnmill.
The poet was already in his grave when his writings were thus condemned. The last
years of hie life had been spent in retirement, and the exact time of his death is unknown,
but‘Henry Charteris, the famous printer, who published Lindsay’s works in 1568, says
that This occurred
in 1558, from which it may be inferred, that he died towards the cloae of the previous
year, 1557.4
shortly after the death of Sir David, they burnt auld Walter Mill.”
1 Tytler, vol. vi. pp 109,110. Pitscottie, vol. ii. p. 526. * Calderwood, vol. i. p. 438. ’ Chalmera’ Sir D. Lindsay, vol. i p. 42. Keith, vol. i p. 156.
