| 1879. | 1899. | 1909. | |
| Congregations:— | |||
| Church of Scotland | 1,337 | 1,447 | 1,687 |
| Free Church | 1,033 | 1,101 | |
| United Presbyterian | 533 | 577 | |
| United Free Church | 1,620 | ||
| Membership:— | |||
| Church of Scotland | 518,146 | 648,476 | 706,653 |
| Free Church | 246,250 | 293,684 | |
| United Presbyterian | 172,150 | 195,498 | |
| United Free Church | 506,573 | ||
| Income:— | |||
| Church of Scotland | £311,378 | £492,816 | £554,145 |
| Free Church | 594,050 | 706,546 | |
| United Presbyterian | 367,915 | 392,116 | |
| United Free Church | 1,089,101 | ||
| (for 1908) |
The Free Church in 1909 had 150 congregations and 77 ministers; its members and adherents are stated to number 60,000, and its income, apart from investments, is £22,542. The membership of the larger churches is that of communicants only; in the Highlands especially the adherents of these churches who do not communicate form a large proportion of those connected with the church.
According to the figures given above the communicants of the Church of Scotland represent 14.7 of the population and those of the United Free 10.6. A study of the figures for many years past shows that the proportion of the people attached to these churches is not decreasing.
The Scottish Episcopal Church in 1909 numbered 388 charges with 52,029 communicants. Its charges are numerous in proportion to its membership, having an average of 134 members, while the Church of Scotland averages 497 and the United Free Church 313 members for each congregation. The adherents of each of these churches outnumber their communicants in a ratio which is variously estimated. The Roman Catholic hierarchy[1] was restored in Scotland in 1878. There are six dioceses (two archbishops, one of Edinburgh and St Andrews and the other of Glasgow; and four suffragans, Aberdeen, Argyll and the Isles, Dunkeld and Galloway), with in 1909, 550 priests; 398 churches, chapels and stations; and a Roman Catholic population estimated at about 519,000.
The original Secession Church has 5 presbyteries and 26 congregations; and the remnant of the Reformed Presbyterian Church which did not join the Free Church in 1876, 2 presbyteries and 11 congregations. The Congregational and Evangelical Union (formed by the amalgamation of the Congregational and Evangelical Churches in 1896), has 183 churches; and the remnant of the Evangelical Union, 7 churches. The Baptist Union has 128 congregations and the Wesleyan Methodists 40 churches.
Literature.—For the earlier history of the kirk the outstanding authorities are the histories of Knox, Calderwood, Baillie's Letters, and Wodrow's History: Knox's liturgy has been edited by Dr Sprott, and on the Westminster Standards the reader may consult Dr Mitchell's Minutes of the Westminster Assembly, and Baird lectures on the same subject. Modern histories of the church have been written by Cook, Hetherington and Principal Cunningham; Dr Story's Church of Scotland in 5 vols. contains information on every side of the subject. Among books professedly dealing with the Free Church question, the most valuable are Sydow's Die Schottische Kirchenfrage (Potsdam, 1845), and The Scottish Church Question (London, 1845); Buchanan's Ten Years' Conflict (1849); Hanna's Life of Chalmers (1852); and Taylor Innes on The Law of Creeds in Scotland (1867). See also Cockburn, Memorials of His Time (Continuation, 1874); Walker, Dr Robert Buchanan: an Ecclesiastical Biography (1877); Annals of the Disruption (published by authority of a committee of the Free Church (1876-1877). On the United Presbyterian Church see McKerrow, History of the United Seccssion Church (1841); Struthers, History of the Relief Church (1843); McKelvie, Annals and Statistics of the United Presbyterian Church (1873). For a concise account of all the Secessions and Unions, Logan, The United Free Church (1681-1906). (A. M.*)
SCOTLAND, EPISCOPAL CHURCH OF, a Scottish church (see above) in communion with, but historically distinct from, the Church of England, and composed of seven dioceses: Aberdeen and Orkney; Argyll and the Isles; Brechin; Edinburgh; Glasgow and Galloway; Moray, Ross and Caithness; and St Andrews, Dunkeld and Dunblane. All, except Edinburgh, founded by Charles I., are pre-Reformation sees. The bishops constitute the episcopal synod, the supreme court of appeal, whose president, elected by the members from among themselves, has the style, not the functions, of a metropolitan, being called primus. The legislature is the provincial synod, consisting of the bishops, at whose discretion it is summoned, and a lower chamber of presbyters. The canons have the authority of this synod. The representative church council, including laymen, administers finance. Each diocese has its synod of the clergy. Its dean is appointed by the bishop, and, on the voidance of the see, summons the clerical and lay electors, at the instance of the primus, to choose a bishop, who is presented to the episcopal synod for confirmation and to the primus for consecration. There are cathedrals at Perth, Inverness, Edinburgh and Cumbrae; the sees of Aberdeen, Brechin and Glasgow have no cathedrals. The Theological College was founded in 1810, incorporated with Trinity College, Glenalmond, in 1848, and re-established at Edinburgh in 1876. There were 356 congregations, with a total membership of 124,335, and 324 working clergy in 1900. No existing ministry can claim regular historic continuity with the ancient hierarchy of Scotland, but the bishops of the Episcopal Church are direct successors of the prelates consecrated to Scottish sees at the Restoration. On the refusal of the bishops to recognize William III. (1689), the Presbyterian polity was established in the kirk, the effect of which on its ecclesiastical status is a matter of theological opinion, but the Comprehension Act of 1690 allowed episcopalian incumbents, on taking the Oath of Allegiance, to retain their benefices, though excluding them from any share in the government without a further declaration of Presbyterian principles. Many non-jurors also succeeded for a time in retaining the use of the parish churches. The extruded bishops were slow to organize the episcopalian remnant under a jurisdiction independent of the state, regarding the then arrangements as provisional, and looking forward to a reconstituted national kirk under a “legitimate” sovereign. A few prelates, known as college bishops, were consecrated without sees, to preserve the succession rather than to exercise a defined authority. But at length the hopelessness of the Stewart cause and the growth of congregations outside the establishment forced the bishops to dissociate canonical jurisdiction from royal prerogative and to reconstitute for themselves a territorial episcopate. The act of Queen Anne (1712), which protects the “Episcopal Communion,” marks its virtual incorporation as a distinct society. But matters were still complicated by a considerable, though declining, number of episcopalian incumbents holding the parish churches. Moreover, the Jacobitism of the non-jurors provoked a state policy of repression in 1715 and 1745, and fostered the growth of new Hanoverian congregations, served by clergy episcopally ordained but amenable to no bishop, who qualified themselves under the act of 1712. This act was further modified in 1746 and 1748 to exclude clergymen ordained in Scotland. These causes reduced the Episcopalians, who included at the Revolution a large section of the people, to what is now, save in a few corners of the west and north-east of Scotland, a small minority. The official recognition of George III. on the death of Charles Edward in 1788, removed the chief bar to progress. The “qualified” congregations were gradually absorbed, though traces of this ecclesiastical solecism still linger. In 1792 the penal laws were repealed, but clerical disabilities were only finally removed in 1864. In 1784 Seabury, the first American bishop, was consecrated at Aberdeen. The Book of Common Prayer, which came into general use at the Revolution, is now the authorized service book. The Scottish Communion Office, compiled by the non-jurors in accordance with primitive models, has had a varying co-ordinate authority, and the modifications of the English liturgy adopted by the American Church were mainly determined by its influence. Among the clergy of post-Revolution days the most eminent are Bishop Sage, a well-known patriotic scholar; Bishop Rattray, liturgiologist; John Skinner, of Longside, author of Tullochgorum; Bishop Gleig, editor of the 3rd edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica; Dean Ramsay, author of Reminiscences of Scottish Life and Character; Bishop A. P. Forbes; G. H. Forbes, liturgiologist; and Bishop Charles Wordsworth.
- ↑ During the long period of proscription, the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland survived in scattered groups; after the Reformation it was at first under the jurisdiction of the English arch-priest, but from 1653 to 1694 it was governed by prefects apostolic and from 1604 to 1878 by vicars apostolic appointed by the pope.
