Andrew Melville

The end of the Church's troubles in Scotland was still far off. No sooner had the constitution of 1592, which promised to secure her peace and liberty, been set down in the stat...

In 1596, at one of the many conferences which he held with the Commissioners of the Church on the business with which our last chapter was concerned, the King disclosed a new po...

'But who, if he be called upon to face Some awful moment to which Heaven has joined Great issues, good or bad, for human kind, Is happy as a lover.'

'Here spirits that have run their race, and fought, And won the fight, and have not fear'd the frowns Nor lov'd the smiles of greatness, but have wrought Their Master's will, me...

'The love of kings is like the blowing of winds ... or the sea which makes Men hoist their sails in a flattering calm, And to cut their masts in a rough storm.'

In March 1578, James, then in his twelfth year, assumed the government. In Morton he had had an adviser who was not friendly to the Church, but those who displaced Morton and br...

We must go back to the year of Melville's return home, 1574, in order that we may review the supreme labours of his life. It was a time of confusion: Knox was dead, and the Chur...

It was in the interests of education, and for the purpose of reviving Scottish learning, that Melville had been induced to come back to his native land, and it will be convenien...

Melville's birthplace was Baldovy, an estate in the immediate neighbourhood of Montrose, of which his father was laird. He was born on 1st August 1545--a year memorable as that...

While Andrew Melville has other claims on the lasting honour of his countrymen than the part he took in securing for Scotland the ecclesiastical system which has been the most p...

Before we go on to the closing chapter of Melville's personal history, we must glance at the course of events in Scotland from the time he and his brethren were called to London...