18 REMARKS ON BISHOP BURNETt's 



in civil affairs. The ambition he had, no doubt, in common witli 

 other men of great and commanding intellect, of wishing to raise 

 himself " to high places." But it was the honourable and holy 

 ambition of connecting his own with the promotion of the public 

 welfare, — conceiving, and, in my mind» rightly conceiving, that 

 neither his christian vocation nor episcopal office forbad, but, on 

 the contrary, justified and required his political exertions in behalf 

 of a country, which he had ever loved with a patriot's spirit. Yet^ 

 for urging his principles and maxims with so much energy and 

 truth — for displaying the most praiseworthy feelings, he has been 

 ridiculed, scorned, and cursed, by many a renegade Whig, and ul- 

 tra Tory. Undoubtedly it would have been out of place for the 

 servant of the altar, if Jacobitisra had then been what it now is^ 

 merely a name. But every one who is acquainted with the history 

 and transactions of this period, well knows that this was not the 

 case. At the time of the Revolution, a strong Jacobite party ex- 

 isted in the cabinet itself. And not only in the reign of William 

 the Third, but of Anne, and George the First, the accession of a 

 popish king, especially as foreign powers were then favourable to it, 

 was an event not entertained by the chimerical apprehensions of 

 Burnett alone, but was contemplated as something more than barely 

 possible, by some of the leaders in the conflicting parties of the state. 

 But here arise two interesting questions, which, at the first 

 glance, it may appear difficult to answer in a satisfactory manner. 

 Why a man, who was thus forward to assist the progress of just and 

 liberal views among his fellow citizens — whose predominant pas- 

 sions were for religion and liberty, in the cause of which he had 

 laboured, sorrowed, rejoiced, prayed, and to which he dedicated his 

 whole life, should be so insufficiently appreciated by those who wit- 

 nessed these his great merits, as to create in them a dislike bordering 

 on aversion ? And why a divine of his eminence, should be irrecon- 

 cileably repugnant to those, between whose political sentiments and 

 his own opinions there existed the closest bond of union ? It may 

 be answered to the first question, that Burnett, as a Scotchman, 

 was hateful to his countrymen, from his decided attachment to the 

 Church of England ; the members of which, on the other hand, 

 could not resist the belief from his supposed bigotted nationality, 

 that he sympathized too warmly with the presbyterians, and there- 



