SCOTLAND.
The Magistrates of Edinburgh have established a very strict quaran- tine by land against such of the labouring poor of Edinburgh or Mus- selburgh ES may be inclined, from idleness or any other motive, to visit one another. Last week, a woman named King contrived to get into Edinburgh from Musselburgh, carrying with her some clothes. She was intercepted in an attempt to return to Musselburgh, and sent to Queensbcry Hospital to perform quarantine, and the clothes and some ham which she had brought from Musselburgh were burned. Above a dozen other individuals are, it seems, confined for the present in Quecnsbery House, under nearly similar circumstances.
The Presbytery of Edinburgh seem to be deeply affected by the in- }hence under which Mr. Perceval has long been labouring ; and their zeal for fasting has displayed itself after a fashion which among a sensible people like the Scotch, cannot be contemplated without spe- cial wonderment. On the supposition that no national fast would he appointed, it had been intended that a fast should be ordered for that part of the country over which the religious dominion of the Presby- teryof Edinburgh extends. This fast was appointed for Thursday the
instant. nstant. When, on the motion of Mr. Perceval, Lord Althorp announced his Majesty's intention of commanding a national fast, Mr. Cockburn, the Solicitor-General, wrote to Mr. Martin of Bathgate, the Moderator (Chairman) of the Presbytery, strongly urging upon him the propriety of suspending the Presbytery's appointment ; the Lord Provost of -Edinburgh addressed Mr. Martin to the same effect ; and the Lord President of the Court of Session also wrote to him. .A. Presbytery was summoned to consider of these several recommen- dations; and, by a majority of '22 to 11, they agreed that they would have their fast on Thursday, and that the King might have his when he liked. Now, if this singular vote had been come to on the old and recognized and Presbyterian ground, that the King, not being ac- knowledged as the head of the Scottish Church, had no authority to direct it in such matters, it would have been intelligible enough ; but the grounds on which it was come to were of a very different character, —of a character, indeed, which, with every desire to touch such mat- ters with a delicate hand, we really know not how to describe without provoking the laughter of our readers. The advocates for the Pres- bytery number among them' we may observe that most estimable man and most eloquent divine Dr. Chalmers- of whom we have always oxpressed our admiration ; they have also the learned Dr. Lee, a man of very considerable reputation in the Scottish Church. The subject was introduced by Dr. Inglis, in a speech of great gravity and soundness : he moved that the fast-day should be for the present post- poned. The reasons why time postponement was asked, were the ex- treme inconvenience of two fast-days coining so close upon each other ; the injury they would inflict on the industrious poor ; the temptation which they offered to the dissipated ; the chance they afforded, in the congregations of the one class, and in the convivial meetings of the other class, of spreading the infection which it was the avowed object of the fast to turn away. These arguments were urged by Dr. Inglis, Mr. Somerville, and Dr. Brunton, with great force and eloquence. Let us hear their opponents. Mr. Balfour ridiculed the notion that two fitst-days could be injurious—because, in that part of the country where he spent the first seventeen years of his clerical life, Ile had a tinct remembrance of such an occurrence. Mr. Tait urged the keep- ing of the fist front the case of Haddington : there the Presbytery had refused to fast, because the plague had departed from them ; but the plague was not to be cheated in that way, for it had returned, and the Presbytery of Haddington were now about to fast with all their heart. Dr. Lee, as befitted a.Professor of Church History, travelled backward to older and more venerable examples : he pleaded the ur- gency of the case—the mortality had increased threefold [this, by the by, is what is called a figure of speech]; and as to the hardship of two fast-days, why, in 1565, the people fasted for a whole week ! Mr. Eimson metaphysicised on the subject : he denied that the two fasts were for the same purpose—the national fast was for the national cho- lera, the Edinburgh fast was for the Edinburgh cholera : besides, if they were to delay their fast for three weeks, they might get no fast at all—the occasion might pass away, or the people might. "Three thousand people might die in three weeks!" Where Mr. Simson got lila arithmetic, we cannot pretend to guess but it is asremarkable as his metaphysics. Since the 26th October, the entire deaths from cho- lera have not amounted to 1,200,—somewhat less than 70_per week, instead of 1,000. Next came Dr. Chalmers let him speak for him- self—" If there was any peculiar virtue in fasting and prayer, he held:. that the proposal of his reverend father went substantially to attenuate- that virtue. With him (Dr. C.) every other argument was of a subor- dinate character. The direct object and advantage of a fast on Thurs- day first [next] was that Hwy might thereby have the more instant recourse' to the likeliest remedy in the present circumstances ; and he would rather. take a preventive medicine within an hour, than delay it till to-morrow.. He held that religion was a mere mockery, if there were no substantial: efficacy in prayer, if there were 110 such process as an actual interchange between heaven and earth of supplicating and receiving a blessing. It was because he wished the pestilence stayed, that he preferred an early day of fasting and prayer. The business object of the appointment was to arrest the progress of tlw destroyer by an early day of prayer and humiliation ; and, .1,elie.I.int:ioltthe.nraltritue of prayer as a request on the one ,ide and a fulfilment on the other, all other considerations of the sub-
-. - . nn before this principle ; and, con. jilt sunk to nothing in fident of the effect of propitiating the clemency oi Cioci by prayer, he thought less of the effect of men's opinions on the subject." So, on thevineiple that an advantageous bargain could not be too • soon secured, the Presbytery agreed, by a majority of 2 to 1, to fast and pray on Thursday the 9th, after a regular and business fashion.
In consequence of the failure of the extensive firm of A. Stein and Co., distillers, Kilbagie, between two and three hundred working peo- ple and their families are cast out of employment. —Stirling Journal.
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