40 
MEMOIR OF 
but was determined still to adhere to its religion. 
The earl entertained no scruple of paying court 
even by the sacrifice of both.” But let us hear 
Sir Robert Sibbald. 
“ Now I come to the difficultest passage of my 
life. The friendship I had with the Earle of 
Perth was come to a great hight, though I had 
improven it only for the good of the Colledge of 
Physitians, and done very little for the bettering 
of my fortune by it. I admired too much him, 
and gave full scouth to my affection for him, 
without considering him more narrowly : by my 
extroversion towards the concerns of the Coledge, 
and greate persute after curious bookes, I had lost 
much of the assiet and firmnesse of mynd I had 
formerly, and had by his meanes been irigadged 
in a controversie about the antiquity of our 
Country and our Kings, upon occasion of the 
Bishop of Asaph, his reflections upon them. 
This had taken me much up, for I wrott two 
bookes in vindication of our history and histo- 
rians upon that account, one in answer to the 
Bishop scara oroidj, and the other a vindication 
of our history, and the contraverted points more 
regularly. This had occasioned in me some 
contempt of the English Clergy upon that 
account, and some prevarications of some of our 
own folks upon some heads, had loused the 
attachment I had for our owne Religion. The 
