The Waverley novels, by Sir Walter Scott, complete in 12 vol., printed from the latest English ed., embracing the author's last corrections, prefaces & notes.

OLD MORTALITY. 545
with seeking to be at peace with God's enemies, he applied to Morton, by
name, the charge that he had been one of those men of Belial, who, in the
words of his text, had gone out from amongst' them, to withdraw the inhabitants of his city, and to go astray after false gods. To him, and all who
followed him, or approved of his conduct, Mucklewrath denounced fury
and vengeance, and exhorted those who would hold themselves pure and
undefiled to come up from the midst of them.
" Fear not," he said, " because of the neighing of horses, or the glittering
of breastplates. Seek not aid of the Egyptians because of the enemy,
though they may be numerous as locusts, and fierce as dragons. Their trust
is not as our trust, nor their rock as our rock; how else shall a thousand
fly before one, and two put ten thousand to the flight! I dreamed it in the
visions of the night, and the voice said,' Habakkuk, take thy fan and purge
the wheat from the chaff, that they be not both consumed with the fire of
indignation and the lightning of fury.' Wherefore, I say, take this Henry
Morton-this wretched Achan, who hath brought the accursed thing among
ye, and made himself brethren in the camp of the enemy-take him and
stone him with stones, and thereafter burn him with fire, that the wrath
may depart from the children of the Covenant. I-He hath not taken a Babylonish garmuent, but he hath sold the garment of righteousness to the woman
of Babylon - he hath not taken two hundred shekels of fine silver, but he
hath bartered the truth, which is more precious than shekels of silver or
wedges of gold."
At this furious charge, brought so unexpectedly against one of their most
active commanders, the audience broke out into open tumult, some demanding that there should instantly be a new election of officers, into which office
none should hereafter be admitted who had, in their phrase, touched of that
which was accursed, or temporized more or less with the heresies and corruptions of the times. While such was the demand of the Cameronians,
they vociferated loudly, that those who were not with them were against
them, -that it was no time to relinquish the substantial part of the covenanted testimony of the Church, if they expected a blessing on their arms
and their cause, —and that, in their eyes, a lukewarm Presbyterian was
little better than a Prelatist, an anti-Covenanter, and a Nullifidian.
The parties accused repelled the charge of criminal compliance and defection from the truth with scorn and indignation, and charged their
accusers with breach of faith, as well as with wrong-headed and extravagant zeal in introducing such divisions into an army, the joint strength of
which could not, by the most sanguine, be judged more than sufficient to
face their enemies. Poundtext, and one or two others, made some faint
efforts to stem the increasing fury of the factious, exclaiming to those of the
other party, in the words of the Patriarch,-" Let there be no strife, I pray
thee, between me and thee, and between thy herdsmen and my herdsmen,
for we be brethren." No pacific overture could possibly obtain audience.
It was in vain that even Burley himself, when he saw the dissension proceed
to such ruinous lengths, exerted his stern and deep voice, commanding
silence and obedience to discipline. The spirit of insubordination had gone
forth, and it seemed as if the exhortation of Habakkuk Mucklewrath had
communicated a part of his frenzy to all who heard him. The wiser, or
more timid part of the assembly,'were already withdrawing themselves from
the field, and giving up their cause as lost. Others were moderating a harmonious call, as they somewhat improperly termed it, to new officers, and
dismissing those formerly chosen, and that with a tumult and clamour
worthy of the deficiency of good sense and good order implied in the whole
transaction. It was at this moment when Morton arrived in the field and
joined the army, in total confusion, and on the point of dissolving itself.
HIis arrival occasioned loud exclamations of applause on the one side, and
of imprecation on the other.
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