Chapter XXV: The Service Book
“He affirmed publickly in the pulpit that the liturgie of the Kirk of England was so excellent and perfect that neither man nor angel could make a better ; saying further, that we were happy if we had such a perfect liturgy instead of our Psalm Book, [12] which was no ways to be compared therewith, chewing what great desire he had of that most corrupt liturgy obtruded upon our Church by our bishops, which every honest heart abhoreth as popish and superstitious. When a commission was sent from the Presbytery to supplicate against the Service Book, [13] he not only protested against their supplicating and sending of a commissioner at the Presbytery table, but also at dinner with the brethren, he said that if the Presbytery would accept of the said book, he would go to Edinburgh with good will to testify the same, albeit he should be stoned ; and when it was replied to him by Mr. Brisbane, who was chosen by the Presbytery to be commissioner, he hoped they should come ill speed that were so willing to run upon an ill cause, ‘he answered in great spite, God send you ill speed, and God gar ye break your neck be the gate, that is going on that errand.’
He likewise taught that it was never a good world since we had so much preaching ; while, as he was commending the Service Book, and affirmed that men nor angels could make a better than the Service Book, he taught, mentioning free will, that notwithstanding Christ said to Peter, ‘Before the cock crow twice, thou shalt deny me thrice,’ Peter might have contained his tongue within his teeth, and not denied Christ. He taught that the world might have been saved, and Christ need not to have suffered.
That the day the Covenant was subscribed he enquired at Patrick Baird, his nurse's husband, if he had subscribed the Covenant, who answered he had. ‘Then,’ replied Mr. John, ‘when you subscribed the petition you subscribed to the devil, now you subscribed to his dame.’
He said in his own house that he wont [14] to have good parochiners, but now he had a pack of devils, and said the devil make me quit of them.’
“He said at my Lord of Abercorn's table that if he were king he should cut off the heads of one half and the hands off the other half of them that withstood the Service Book.
“He being drinking one night with Sir William Ross, Harry Stirling, and some others, in Robert Robeson's house, when they left him so beastly drunk that the Laird of Beltrees, [15] coming in by chance and seeing him in such a pitiful estate, was forced to help his man, Hugh Paterson, to carry him home with great difficulty.
“He sware before above fourscore of the best of his parochiners that he never gave the communion in Paisley sitting, whereas the contrar was presently proven in his face. Let it be judged whether he be mansworn or no, being at the session table, and whether after he ought to be believed or no.
“He taught that those who would not keep the five holy days would not be saved.”
These curious charges were brought against Mr. Crighton, who, for some reason, did not appear to meet them. Seven witnesses were brought against him, who proved to the satisfaction of the Presbytery that most of the utterances of the minister were spoken out of the pulpit. The case of drunkenness was proved by Beltrees and his servant. The chief charges held proven were two that did not appear in the libel. He was said to have performed some cases of baptism without prayer or exhortation, and “to have profaned the sacrament of the Lord's supper by casting away the long table, and placing a short table altarwise, with a fixed rail about it, within which he stood himself, and reached the elements into the people kneeling without about the rail.” To this was added a curious story of his striking a beggar, [16] on his way to church for sermon, “to the effusion of his blood in great plenty.” This was proved on the evidence of a certain Claud Hamilton and his servant. To the impartial reader, the evidence against the poor minister in regard to character appears to have been of the slenderest description. He was evidently a very eccentric man, and seems not to have deemed all important the matters which were to his brethren of vital moment. He was a cousin of the historian Baillie, who, in his letters, mentions him more than once, and always with kindness, though he failed, he tells us, to convince him of what he deemed his errors.
[12] The Book of Common Order, the Liturgy in use after the Reformation.
[13] See ante.
[14] Was accustomed.
[15] No great character himself.
[16] A similar story was brought against another minister deposed by the Assembly at Glasgow. Baillie's Letters, Vol I.