RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Presbyterians
new churches were organized in poorer districts.
Later on the movement of population made
necessary the systematic planting of
5. Free new churches in growing suburban
Church; De-districts_ In 1869 and 1874 the de-
Thl0iminal Partment of Home Missions received Controver- a Sreat impetus from the revival movesies. ments following the visits of Dwight Lyman Moody (q.v.). The growth of foreign missions may be read in the list of missions brought by the Free Church into the Union. Assistance was also given to colonial churches, and preaching-stations were maintained at some continental resorts. The last twenty years before the Union saw several controversies in the Free Church over the attitude of the church toward the new historical methods of Bible study, especially as seen in the writings of its own professors. Scholarship of the highest order had found a home in its colleges. The more studious students and ministers went to Germany or read German books, and dark rumors went abroad of what was taught there. Then came the bold proclamation of the Gospel from a Darwinian platform by Henry Drummond (q.v.). Conservative minds were offended and scared, in spite of the fact that those they attacked were among the most zealous and evangelical teachers the church possessed. The first storm arose over the articles of William Robertson Smith (q.v. ; then professor of Hebrew in Aberdeen College, afterward of Arabic in Cambridge) in the new Encyclopcedia Britannica. After fierce debates it was made clear that since the Westminster Confession furnished no dicta on such subjects as the date and authorship of the Pentateuch, and since in theology Smith was in hearty agreement with Evangelical Calvinism, no charge of heresy could be established. Eventually, however, in 1881, a majority, angry at his persistence and frightened at his teaching which they could not get condemned, relieved him of his functions, not as a disciplinary measure, involving church censure, but merely in exercise of its discretionary control over the colleges, and with a careful disclaimer of decision upon the matters of scholarship involved. Ten years later the Assembly was again violently divided on the cases of Professors Marcus Dods, and Alexander Balmain Bruce (qq.v.). Dr. Dods had attacked the antiquated theory of verbal inspiration, had met with encouraging words inquirers unable to accept the full doctrine of the church especially in regard to the resurrection, and had spoken of the possibility of truth lying in more than one theory of the Atonement. Dr. Bruce in his Kingdom of God (Edinburgh, 1889) had touched on the problems presented by the existence of four different and sometimes differing Gospel records. After long and heated discussion the assembly passed motions declaring its adherence to certain specified doctrines which no one had attacked and admonishing the professors in words meant more to reassure the Highlands than to edify the professors then under fire. These controversies in one way played a useful part by awakening general interest in the advance of Biblical scholarship. An attempt to renew the controversy by an attack upon Professor
George Adam Smith in 1902 hopelessly collapsed. On the other hand, the passing of the Declaratory Act in 1892 offended an ultra-conservative Highland section which broke off to form the Free Presbyterian Church (see below, 4).
The year 1900 is another historic date in Scottish church history. Immediately after the Disruption vague hopes for a union of the Free Church and existing " voluntary " churches were Move- eXpresseci; the feeling in favor of toward ^s 8rew> an<^ in 1863 committees of Union. both churches were appointed. In regard to doctrine, worship, and organization no obstacles were discovered, but in regard to the almost purely theoretical question of relation of the civil magistrate to the church sharp differences became clear. The great maj ority of the Free Church were in favor of leaving this an open question in the proposed united church and the standards of the United Presbyterian Church contained no pronouncement on the point in dispute. A determined minority of the Free Church, however, held that the question of the duty of the civil magistrate to spend public money on the maintenance of an Established Church was an essential part of the doctrine of the Free Church and in 1873 the majority yielded. A Mutual Eligibility Act, however, was passed, providing for the passage of ministers from one church to the other. The Free Church had been joined in 1854 by most of the Original Seceders (see above, 1, § 2). The Reformed Presbyterians (Cameronians, see above, § 2) had been invited in 1864 to share in the proposed Union. Their views regarding the civil magistrate were satisfactory even to the constitutionalist minority in the Free Church and, after the collapse of the negotiations with the United Presbyterian Church, conferences were reopened with them and a union between them and the Free Church was consummated in 1876. The action of the minority in thwarting the Union was partly stimulated by the movement in the Established Church toward the abolition of patronage. It was felt by some that a wider union on the basis of a reformed establishment was within sight. Such hopes were disappointed, since approaches by the Established Church (see above, 1) in 1878 were met in 1886 on the part of the Free Church by propositions in favor of disestablishment and disendowment. The Established Church refused to negotiate except on the understanding that the Establishment basis would be preserved. The Free Church demanded an open conference without reservation.
This failure concentrated hopes the more definitely upon a union of Free and United Presbyterian churches. In 1896 union committees were appointed. The negotiations took four years, the chief problems being the conciliation 7 t Yonr? and reassurance of the constitutionalist party in the Free Church which suspected the liberal tendencies at work, and the settlement of details personal and financial regarding the consolidation of offices, colleges, and other agencies. Everything was harmoniously arranged, and it seemed up to the last as if the small conservative section of the Free Church would give
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