FREE CHURCH OF SCOTLAND, the name assumed by those who at the " disruption" of the Established church of Scotland, in 1843, withdrew from connection with the state, and formed themselves into a distinct religious community, at the same time claiming to represent the historic church of Scotland, as maintaining the principles for which it has contended since the reformation.
(It is proper to state that. in accordatice with a method adopted in other cases also in this work, the present article is written by a member of the church to which it relates, and is an attempt to exhibit the view of its principles and position generally taken by those within its own pale.) There is no difference between the Free church of Scotland and the Established church in the standards which they receive; and all the laws of the church existing and in force prior to the disruption. are acknowledged as still binding in the one as much as in the other, except in so far as they may since have been repealed. The same Presbyterian constitution subsists in both churches, with the same classes of office bearers and gradations of church courts. The Free church, indeed, professes to maintain this constitution and chnrch-government in a perfection impossible in the present circumstances of the Esiablisged church, because of acts of parliament by which the Established church is trammeled, and interventions of civil authority to which it is liable. And the whole difference between the Free church and the Estab. fished church relates to the consent and submission of the Established church to this control of the civil power in things which the Free church regards as belonging not to the province of civil government, bat to the church of Christ and to its office-bearers and courts, as deriving authority from Him: so that the controversy is often described as respecting the Headship of Christ or the Kingdoutof Christ. It is to be borne in mind, however, that the doctrine of the headship of Christ over his church, as set forth in the Westminster standards, is fully professed both by the Established church and by the Free church of Scotland; the only question between them is, whether or not the exist. fug relations of the Established church of Scotland to the state are consistent with the due maintenance and practical exhibition of this doctrine. And the question does not directly relate to voluntaryism (q.v.) Those who constituted the Free church of Scot land, in 1843, firmly believed that the church might ne connected with the state, and receive countenance and support from it, to the advantage of both; whilst they main tained that there must not, for the sake of any apparent benefits flowing from such con nection, be any sacrifice of the independence or self-government of the church, as the kingdom of Christ., deriving its existence, organization, and laws from Him. Nor has
any change of opinion on this subject been manifested.
The Westminster Confession of Faith asserts. " that there is no other head of the church but the Lord Jesus Christ;" and that "the Lord Jesus, as king and head of his church, path therein appointed a government in the hand of chureli-officers, distinct from the civil magistrate;" it ascribes to these chnrch-oflicers the right of meeting in " synods or councils," which it affirms to he " an ordinance of God;" and represents the exercise of church discipline as intrusted to them as well as the ministry of the word and sacraments. It ascribes to the civil magistrate much power and ninny duties concerning things spiritual, but no power in or over these things themselves. And all this was equally the doctrine of the church of Scotland before the Westminster Con fession was compiled. The support which. in many parts of Europe, princes gave to the cause of the and the circumstance that states as well as churches were shaking off the fetters of Rome, led in many cases to a confounding of the civil and the spiritual. The church of Scotland accomplished its emancipation from Rome, not with the co-operation off the civil power, but in spite of its resistance; and after the reforma tion, the Scottish reformers and their suecesSors were compelled to a closer study of their principles, by the continued attempts of the civil rulers to assume authority over all the internal affairs of the church. But amidst their struggles, the Presbyterians of Scotland so far prevailed as to obtain at different times important acts of parliament in recognition of their principles, and "ratification of the liberty of the true kirk;" and finally, after the revolution of AK an act ratifying the Westminster Confession of Faith itself, and incorporating with the statute law of the realm all its statements con cerning the province of church-judicatories and that of the civil magistrate, and the bounds of their respective powers.