SIR ROBERT SIBBALD. 47 



influence at court, pressing the king to illegal 

 and unaccountable undertakings, and opposing 

 the taking of the allegiance, which I was bound 

 to by oaths. Upon which considerations, I 

 repented of my rashness, and resolved to come 

 home, and return to the church I was born in." 

 And being too ill to travel by land, he set sail 

 for Leith, and after a passage of eight days, 

 arrived safe. " When I was come home, I 

 wrote to the Chancellor my resolution, and 

 declared it to some who visited me. And I 

 went no more to the Popish service, but removed 

 to the country, and went to church. And 

 in September following, I was received by the 

 Bishop of Edinburgh, (upon my acknowledg- 

 ment of my rashness,) in his house, and took 

 the sacrament, according to the way of the 

 Church of England, and kept constantly my 

 parish church." 



There is always a suspicion as to the purity of 

 the motives of any sudden political or religious 

 conversion that takes place under circumstances 

 favourable to the worldly interests of the conver- 

 ted ; and it must be confessed, that, in Sibbald's 

 case, these suspicions might very justly be re- 

 garded at the time in the most unfavourable 

 point of view. But in looking back calmly and 

 dispassionately in the present day, to his own 

 narrative, there is no reason to doubt his integrity, 



the sincerity of his convictions, at the moment 



