0:00:05 > 0:00:08For almost 20 years in the 17th century,
0:00:08 > 0:00:14this island was the most secure prison in the entire British Isles.
0:00:14 > 0:00:18Welcome to the Bass Rock, in the Firth of Forth.
0:00:18 > 0:00:21Welcome to Scotland's Alcatraz.
0:00:25 > 0:00:28There was no escape from the Bass.
0:00:28 > 0:00:31Its cells were home to the country's most dangerous men,
0:00:31 > 0:00:35men whose religious beliefs threatened the stability of Britain itself.
0:00:38 > 0:00:42Their radical vision was declared in a document called the National Covenant.
0:00:44 > 0:00:47The National Covenant would unseat kings,
0:00:47 > 0:00:53license revolution, cost tens of thousands of Scots their lives.
0:00:53 > 0:00:58It started the Civil War that would cost King Charles I his head.
0:00:58 > 0:01:01He struggled to erase the Covenant from history, but to tell the truth,
0:01:01 > 0:01:04there was never any chance that he would succeed.
0:01:04 > 0:01:06After all, he was only a king.
0:01:06 > 0:01:11And the National Covenant was a contract between Scotland and God.
0:01:55 > 0:02:00In 1633, King Charles I came here, to Edinburgh, for his coronation.
0:02:00 > 0:02:03It was a visit he would really rather not have made.
0:02:03 > 0:02:05He had been king for eight years now,
0:02:05 > 0:02:08and if the Scots had agreed to his frequent demands
0:02:08 > 0:02:13that the Scottish Crown Jewels be sent to London, this trip really wouldn't have been necessary.
0:02:13 > 0:02:17But the Scots had said no. Several times. So here he was.
0:02:17 > 0:02:21It was his first visit to Scotland in 30 years.
0:02:25 > 0:02:29Scotland had missed their king.
0:02:29 > 0:02:31They'd missed his father James as well.
0:02:31 > 0:02:33After all, the Stuart dynasty might now be in charge
0:02:33 > 0:02:38of all three kingdoms, but it was Scotland that they came from.
0:02:38 > 0:02:44And now, here Charles was, processing down the Royal Mile towards his palace at Holyrood.
0:02:44 > 0:02:46The crowds were cheering.
0:02:46 > 0:02:49The Scots were pleased to see him.
0:02:49 > 0:02:52Because they hadn't seen him before.
0:02:55 > 0:03:00Charles was ignorant of everything that mattered to his Scottish subjects.
0:03:00 > 0:03:02Especially the Presbyterian kirk.
0:03:02 > 0:03:06It might have helped to meet some of its members. Someone, for instance,
0:03:06 > 0:03:09like Archibald Johnston of Warriston,
0:03:09 > 0:03:11a deeply religious young lawyer.
0:03:13 > 0:03:17Warriston was as sure as his fellow Presbyterians
0:03:17 > 0:03:21that the Scottish church was the closest to perfection on Earth.
0:03:21 > 0:03:28But equally certain that it was still sinful, because it was made of human beings, and humans fall short.
0:03:30 > 0:03:33King Jesus is the perfect one.
0:03:35 > 0:03:39King Jesus supplies the grace and mercy that we lack.
0:03:43 > 0:03:47King Charles, on the other hand, chose his first visit to Scotland
0:03:47 > 0:03:49to show that grace was not his strong point.
0:03:51 > 0:03:56The Scots had made plans for the coronation, but Charles rewrote them.
0:03:56 > 0:04:00He would not be visiting Scone with its charmless and poky chapel.
0:04:00 > 0:04:05He would have the service here, in Holyrood Abbey, with suitable pomp.
0:04:05 > 0:04:07And the coronation service would be Anglican,
0:04:07 > 0:04:11conducted by an English priest.
0:04:11 > 0:04:14A Scottish minister simply wouldn't do.
0:04:18 > 0:04:19Clumsy.
0:04:21 > 0:04:25But Charles sincerely believed he was God's anointed king.
0:04:25 > 0:04:31He sincerely believed that his church, the Anglican church, worshipped God correctly.
0:04:31 > 0:04:34And that the Presbyterian church did not.
0:04:38 > 0:04:42A shiver ran down the spines of Scotland's Presbyterians.
0:04:42 > 0:04:45The King had forced change on their church once before.
0:04:45 > 0:04:49Charles' father had imposed bishops on them,
0:04:49 > 0:04:52but to the Presbyterians, every soul was equal.
0:04:52 > 0:04:54Bishops were distasteful.
0:04:54 > 0:04:58The King's task was to defend the church, not define it.
0:05:03 > 0:05:07But it would take more than courage to say no to the King.
0:05:07 > 0:05:09Warriston kept a diary...
0:05:09 > 0:05:13a window into the mind of a man who would do just that.
0:05:15 > 0:05:18So, this is all diary in here?
0:05:18 > 0:05:21It certainly is.
0:05:21 > 0:05:25- It's fair to say he liked taking notes!- He wrote all the time.
0:05:25 > 0:05:30He wrote when he was in church, he wrote when he was on horseback,
0:05:30 > 0:05:33he wrote and he wrote and he wrote.
0:05:36 > 0:05:40What kind of man is revealed in these pages?
0:05:40 > 0:05:47A fiery, fanatical, energetic, zealous man at the forefront of the revolution.
0:05:47 > 0:05:52Royal authority, it's not something we take very seriously, but in the 17th century,
0:05:52 > 0:05:56you thought God's authority came down through royalty,
0:05:56 > 0:06:00came down through the people to whom royalty delegated their powers.
0:06:00 > 0:06:04If the King tells you to do something, and you are studying your bible,
0:06:04 > 0:06:09and this great feeling is washing through you in prayer, you have the courage to say no to the King,
0:06:09 > 0:06:14even if that leads you to the gallows or the headsman's axe.
0:06:20 > 0:06:25The King provided the Presbyterians with many things to say no to.
0:06:25 > 0:06:32Charles ordered the conversion of Edinburgh's high kirk, St Giles, into an Anglican-style cathedral.
0:06:32 > 0:06:34He appointed new bishops.
0:06:34 > 0:06:41And then, three years after his troubling visit, a rumour came to Warriston's ears.
0:06:41 > 0:06:45The King intended to introduce an Anglican service book in Scotland.
0:06:47 > 0:06:51Scots tended to look down their noses at the English Reformation.
0:06:51 > 0:06:55Technically, both Anglicans and Presbyterians were Protestant,
0:06:55 > 0:06:59both had rejected the Catholic church and the powers of the Pope who led it,
0:06:59 > 0:07:03but as far as the Presbyterians were concerned, all the English had done
0:07:03 > 0:07:06was swap the Pope for their own King.
0:07:08 > 0:07:13In due course, in 1637, the prayer book arrived.
0:07:13 > 0:07:17It was an Anglican prayer book with superficial tweaks.
0:07:17 > 0:07:23The presiding minister was called a Presbyter, but the words he spoke were priestly.
0:07:23 > 0:07:25Popish, to Presbyterian ears.
0:07:25 > 0:07:29Warriston went to a meeting to discuss the prayer book at the end of May.
0:07:29 > 0:07:35When he got home he wrote in his diary that it was the very image of the Beast.
0:07:44 > 0:07:47The 23rd July, 1637 was the day appointed
0:07:47 > 0:07:51for the first use, throughout Scotland, of Charles' new prayer book.
0:07:53 > 0:07:58The Bishop of Brechin had no trouble at all when he conducted the service,
0:07:58 > 0:08:01but the Bishop of Brechin delivered the service
0:08:01 > 0:08:04with a pair of loaded pistols on either side of the service book.
0:08:08 > 0:08:13In Edinburgh, the presiding Bishop and his Dean took no such precautions.
0:08:13 > 0:08:14They were beaten up.
0:08:14 > 0:08:19The new prayer book was ripped to shreds and the Dean had to hide in the clock tower.
0:08:19 > 0:08:23Later, the carriage in which the Bishop and the Dean tried to make their escape
0:08:23 > 0:08:26was rocked, rolled and overturned.
0:08:26 > 0:08:30The rioting lasted for hours, until nightfall.
0:08:32 > 0:08:35In due course, the riots became a revolt.
0:08:35 > 0:08:39Charles had no idea how serious things were getting in Scotland.
0:08:40 > 0:08:45His advisers kept the truth under their flamboyant hats.
0:08:45 > 0:08:48The Scots had formed an alternative government.
0:08:48 > 0:08:51Warriston was appointed as its secretary.
0:08:51 > 0:08:55They wanted a useful Scottish king, who would visit Scotland
0:08:55 > 0:08:59more than once a decade, who understood the Presbyterian kirk.
0:08:59 > 0:09:02They wanted everything that Charles was not.
0:09:02 > 0:09:05So Warriston made a suggestion.
0:09:05 > 0:09:07They should rewrite him.
0:09:13 > 0:09:17This was their rewritten king, the National Covenant of 1638,
0:09:17 > 0:09:23drafted by Warriston with the help of the leading minister of the day, Alexander Henderson.
0:09:23 > 0:09:31It was addressed to an idealised Charles I who already understood his duties as a Presbyterian king.
0:09:31 > 0:09:35It was addressed, in other words, to a king who didn't exist.
0:09:39 > 0:09:42In carefully respectful terms, it attacked all the changes
0:09:42 > 0:09:46that Charles had made, and everything he stood for.
0:09:46 > 0:09:51It demanded a monarchy limited by a constitution, limited in power.
0:09:51 > 0:09:53Limited by laws.
0:10:04 > 0:10:07The Covenant was a contract between three parties -
0:10:07 > 0:10:15the King, whose task was defence of the Presbyterian kirk, the people, and God himself.
0:10:15 > 0:10:19It was called the Covenant as a reference to the Old Testament,
0:10:19 > 0:10:23to the Covenant made by God with his chosen people.
0:10:23 > 0:10:27In the Old Testament, the chosen people had been the Jews.
0:10:30 > 0:10:36But it was and is an article of Christian faith that the coming of Christ,
0:10:36 > 0:10:39and his death on the cross, had changed the Covenant.
0:10:39 > 0:10:42God's chosen people now were Christians.
0:10:42 > 0:10:46The National Covenant of 1638 went a bit further.
0:10:46 > 0:10:51God's chosen people were the faithful members of the most perfect church on the face of the Earth,
0:10:51 > 0:10:54the Scottish Presbyterian kirk.
0:11:00 > 0:11:07A meeting was scheduled here, at Greyfriars Kirk in Edinburgh, for the 28th February, 1638.
0:11:07 > 0:11:11The Covenant was signed by 3,250 people.
0:11:11 > 0:11:16Warriston signed it himself, and in his diary that evening he wrote,
0:11:16 > 0:11:20"This is the glorious marriage day of the Kingdom with God."
0:11:24 > 0:11:28Copies were sent to every parish in Scotland.
0:11:28 > 0:11:33One Sunday in March, Warriston took his family to a kirk south-west of Edinburgh.
0:11:35 > 0:11:40It was a chance to see how the Covenant was being received outside the city.
0:11:40 > 0:11:43The minister explained the Covenant.
0:11:43 > 0:11:45The congregation sat unmoved.
0:11:49 > 0:11:54Then the minister asked them to stand and swear their Covenant to the Almighty God.
0:11:56 > 0:11:59The congregation rose to their feet.
0:11:59 > 0:12:04They raised their hands. They broke down, they wept, they testified.
0:12:04 > 0:12:08The minister was almost suffocated by his own tears.
0:12:08 > 0:12:10They swore their Covenant with God.
0:12:10 > 0:12:14And after 15 minutes, they fell down on their knees and prayed.
0:12:14 > 0:12:16Warriston was stunned.
0:12:16 > 0:12:20"Lord," he wrote, "let me never forget my part in this.
0:12:20 > 0:12:23"There is a very near parallel between Israel and this church,
0:12:23 > 0:12:28"for we are the only two nations sworn unto the Lord.
0:12:28 > 0:12:34"Our Scots kirk in its rediscovered perfection will be a pattern for other nations.
0:12:34 > 0:12:40"We shall extend the royal prerogative of King Jesus the Son of God above all others,
0:12:40 > 0:12:43"perhaps extend his kingdom throughout the Earth."
0:12:58 > 0:13:01The enthusiasm was national in scale.
0:13:01 > 0:13:07At the very least, 60% of Scotland's million people promised themselves to God,
0:13:07 > 0:13:10and believed that God made them a promise in return.
0:13:11 > 0:13:14They were his chosen people.
0:13:16 > 0:13:20And it was indeed the people who signed.
0:13:20 > 0:13:23They weren't even used to holding pens.
0:13:23 > 0:13:27Now they were signing a document of national significance.
0:13:27 > 0:13:33This was a new world where a king like Charles I could soon find it hard to breathe.
0:13:33 > 0:13:37But not all the signatures were freely given.
0:13:37 > 0:13:40Failure to sign the Covenant was considered sinful.
0:13:40 > 0:13:43Dubious. Popish.
0:13:44 > 0:13:49And what if God was watching, and saw that you had failed to sign?
0:13:49 > 0:13:53Not all the signatures were shaky for lack of practice.
0:13:57 > 0:14:04But once they'd signed, whatever their reasons, then they'd made an oath, a contract, a promise to God.
0:14:04 > 0:14:05Impossible to unmake.
0:14:05 > 0:14:07Impossible to untake.
0:14:07 > 0:14:14A heavy weight on any conscience, a terrible weight for any nation to inflict upon itself.
0:14:14 > 0:14:20A constant pressure towards extremism, fundamentalism, madness.
0:14:30 > 0:14:32It took a year for Charles to realise how far
0:14:32 > 0:14:35his Scottish subjects had gone beyond mere disobedience.
0:14:35 > 0:14:40They would have to be brought to heel. Charles began preparing for war.
0:14:40 > 0:14:44Other Kings of England would have turned to Parliament for money,
0:14:44 > 0:14:50but the English Parliament had shown insufficient sympathy with Charles' belief that his rule was absolute,
0:14:50 > 0:14:53so he hadn't called them for ten years.
0:14:53 > 0:14:56The alternative was war on the never-never.
0:14:56 > 0:15:00Charles began looking for someone to borrow from.
0:15:03 > 0:15:06The Scots raised an army of fervent Covenanters,
0:15:06 > 0:15:10led by expert soldiers who had returned home from foreign wars.
0:15:10 > 0:15:13Charles raised the military equivalent of a tickling stick.
0:15:15 > 0:15:18He lost. Twice.
0:15:18 > 0:15:23By September of 1640, he was shamed and mired in debt.
0:15:23 > 0:15:25He had to call the English Parliament.
0:15:28 > 0:15:31And the English Parliament was full of Protestants
0:15:31 > 0:15:36who wanted the same things as the Scots - limits to his power.
0:15:36 > 0:15:41They didn't understand that he was God's anointed, trying to save their souls.
0:15:43 > 0:15:47Charles declared war on Parliament in August, 1642.
0:15:47 > 0:15:49The English Civil War had begun.
0:16:10 > 0:16:15Warriston had prayed for a chance to extend the power of King Jesus beyond Scotland's borders.
0:16:15 > 0:16:21The English Civil War was a regrettable blood bath, of course, but it was also an opportunity.
0:16:25 > 0:16:28For the first year, the Scots took no part.
0:16:28 > 0:16:32Charles and his Royalist army secured victory after victory.
0:16:32 > 0:16:39And in the autumn of 1643, England's Parliament sent agents north to Scotland, to ask for help.
0:16:46 > 0:16:50The National Covenant had been for Scotland alone.
0:16:50 > 0:16:54The Solemn League and Covenant of 1643 would go much further.
0:16:58 > 0:17:04I wasn't expecting to see this in the form of a little hardback book.
0:17:04 > 0:17:09Unlike the National Covenant, Solemn Leagues actually tend to be printed.
0:17:09 > 0:17:12They are normally a plain printed book that is signed up to.
0:17:12 > 0:17:16- We have these lovely engravings here. - What do they tell us?
0:17:16 > 0:17:21One of my favourite illustrations is this one here.
0:17:21 > 0:17:26It shows how the Covenant is more radical than that of 1638.
0:17:26 > 0:17:29There's no wishy-washy stuff from bishops here.
0:17:29 > 0:17:35It's the extirpation of popery, prelacy, that is bishops.
0:17:35 > 0:17:39And here we have these bishops, prelates, deans, deacons,
0:17:39 > 0:17:43all being cast out of the church, being insulted as they go.
0:17:43 > 0:17:48- Something as benign as a chorister is an evil that has to be extirpated?- Oh, yes, of course.
0:17:52 > 0:17:56This expanded Covenant closed a simple deal.
0:17:56 > 0:17:59In return for their military assistance, the Scots required
0:17:59 > 0:18:06the establishment in both England and Ireland of a Presbyterian kirk, modelled after Scotland's very own.
0:18:06 > 0:18:14Plus expenses. The royal prerogative of King Jesus would extend through all three kingdoms.
0:18:22 > 0:18:25Now the Scots had something serious to fight for.
0:18:25 > 0:18:32They happily sent an army of 20,000 men south, complete with ministers and a battle cry.
0:18:32 > 0:18:34King Jesus.
0:18:36 > 0:18:39In July, at the battle of Marston Moor in Yorkshire,
0:18:39 > 0:18:43they won the first of many victories over Charles' army.
0:18:43 > 0:18:45The Scots had turned the tide.
0:18:45 > 0:18:48Charles would never have the upper hand again.
0:18:53 > 0:18:57Two years later, Charles sent his sons Charles and James to France, for safety,
0:18:57 > 0:18:59and surrendered to the Scots.
0:18:59 > 0:19:02He was taken to Newcastle.
0:19:06 > 0:19:10Alexander Henderson and Warriston, the Covenant's co-authors,
0:19:10 > 0:19:13were sent to persuade him to sign the Covenant.
0:19:13 > 0:19:16There were two paths open to Charles.
0:19:16 > 0:19:23On the one side, a long life as a Covenanted king, limited by laws, but the country's leader still.
0:19:24 > 0:19:29On the other, more war, more loss of life.
0:19:29 > 0:19:33The faint hope of victory for absolute monarchy.
0:19:33 > 0:19:41They got down on their knees and begged Charles to sign the Covenant, accept a kingship limited by laws,
0:19:41 > 0:19:47agree to establish in all three kingdoms a Presbyterian church of which he was in no sense a head.
0:19:47 > 0:19:53They were asking for peace, of course, but they were also asking him to reject his God, to reject his
0:19:53 > 0:19:57entire understanding of himself, his duties, his place on Earth.
0:19:57 > 0:20:01The King could not say yes. It was a syllable too far.
0:20:06 > 0:20:08He did not sign the Covenant.
0:20:10 > 0:20:13The Scots handed the King over to the English Parliament.
0:20:13 > 0:20:17But in his own mind, he was still King by God's grace.
0:20:17 > 0:20:20It would be sinful simply to accept his fate.
0:20:26 > 0:20:32Secretly, he made contact with the nobles of the country that his dynasty had been born in.
0:20:32 > 0:20:36Scotland's nobles had signed the Covenant, but it was Charles' hope
0:20:36 > 0:20:40that their loyalty to his family would prove stronger.
0:20:40 > 0:20:47And he was proved right. The nobles agreed to fight for him again, provided that if they won,
0:20:47 > 0:20:53he would adopt the Covenant and the Presbyterian kirk for a three-year trial period in all his kingdoms.
0:20:56 > 0:20:59The nobles took their secret deal to the rest of the Covenanters.
0:20:59 > 0:21:03And the very idea split the movement in two.
0:21:03 > 0:21:08For the ordinary folk who made up the majority of the movement, the Covenant was everything.
0:21:08 > 0:21:11This talk of three-year trials was nonsense.
0:21:11 > 0:21:14They would not fight for the vague promises of an uncovenanted king.
0:21:14 > 0:21:18They became known as the Protesters.
0:21:23 > 0:21:26The appeals of the Protesters fell on deaf ears.
0:21:26 > 0:21:30The nobles marched south to fight for Charles.
0:21:30 > 0:21:38And at Preston, they were defeated utterly by an army led by a former gentleman farmer, Oliver Cromwell.
0:21:38 > 0:21:42For the Protesters, this was no more than God's judgement.
0:21:42 > 0:21:46God did not want the nobles to run the country.
0:21:48 > 0:21:53The Protesters seized the capital and purged the ungodly nobles from power.
0:21:53 > 0:21:56Warriston joined them.
0:21:56 > 0:22:01Now the Protesters were the heart of the Covenanting movement, God's people.
0:22:01 > 0:22:03And a government as well.
0:22:03 > 0:22:07This was the Rule of the Saints.
0:22:07 > 0:22:10They packed the governing session of the kirk with their members.
0:22:10 > 0:22:13They seized control of public conduct.
0:22:14 > 0:22:16Backsliders and opponents would be executed.
0:22:16 > 0:22:20No sin would go unpunished.
0:22:20 > 0:22:25There were floggings, ears nailed to posts, holes bored in tongues.
0:22:26 > 0:22:32The Rule of the Saints marked the high point of the Covenant's power.
0:22:32 > 0:22:36Covenanters in later years would remember it as the golden age.
0:22:36 > 0:22:40But there was no way the Rule of the Saints could ever have lasted.
0:22:40 > 0:22:44It was only possible while certain things remained undecided.
0:22:44 > 0:22:46Such as the fate of the King.
0:22:54 > 0:22:57By December of 1648, Cromwell had become the leader of a faction
0:22:57 > 0:23:02that controlled the English Parliament behind the scenes.
0:23:02 > 0:23:09All those who might have defended the King were purged from Parliament, and an act was passed.
0:23:09 > 0:23:13The King would be prosecuted for treason.
0:23:13 > 0:23:16The trial began on the 20th January, 1649.
0:23:20 > 0:23:22Charles refused to defend himself.
0:23:22 > 0:23:29He refused to recognise the jurisdiction of the court, or the logic of the charge itself.
0:23:29 > 0:23:32But this was the new world, where kings found it hard to breathe.
0:23:32 > 0:23:37On the 30th January, 1649, they cut off his head.
0:23:42 > 0:23:46When the King's head fell, the old world ceased to be.
0:23:50 > 0:23:52It went mad.
0:23:52 > 0:23:56The people were horrified by what Cromwell's faction had done.
0:23:56 > 0:23:59So the English Parliament abolished monarchy.
0:23:59 > 0:24:02If there was no king, there was no crime.
0:24:02 > 0:24:03They had beheaded a nobody.
0:24:06 > 0:24:10No-one had asked the Scots if they wanted their king beheaded.
0:24:10 > 0:24:14Their Covenant needed a king, like King David in the Bible.
0:24:14 > 0:24:17Their Covenant needed his signature.
0:24:17 > 0:24:20A dead king could sign nothing.
0:24:20 > 0:24:26So within a week of the King's execution, they declared his son Charles king instead.
0:24:29 > 0:24:33The 20-year-old Charles returned from France to take the throne.
0:24:33 > 0:24:36It was imperative that he sign the Covenant.
0:24:36 > 0:24:40His ship arrived in the mouth of the Spey, in the north east, in June.
0:24:40 > 0:24:45It anchored, and before he had had a chance to set foot on land, commissioners went on board,
0:24:45 > 0:24:48presented him with a copy of the Covenant, and required his signature.
0:24:58 > 0:24:59He signed.
0:24:59 > 0:25:01Because he had to.
0:25:03 > 0:25:06But in Cromwell's world, there could be no kings.
0:25:06 > 0:25:10As long as there were kings, he was a regicide, a king killer.
0:25:10 > 0:25:15Which meant that Cromwell had a bone or two to pick with the Scots.
0:25:19 > 0:25:23In July of 1650, Cromwell came north.
0:25:23 > 0:25:26At first, his campaign went badly.
0:25:26 > 0:25:29He was forced back to Dunbar, his back to the sea.
0:25:29 > 0:25:33One last push would secure his total defeat.
0:25:33 > 0:25:36The Protesters mustered their army in Leith.
0:25:38 > 0:25:41It was more than double the size of Cromwell's force.
0:25:41 > 0:25:45The godliest of the godly, Warriston amongst them, chose this moment
0:25:45 > 0:25:49to insist that the army be purged of its ungodly elements.
0:25:49 > 0:25:52The ungodly elements, by and large, tended to be
0:25:52 > 0:25:57the professional soldiers on whom the army's success had depended.
0:25:57 > 0:26:01"God can do much with a few," said Warriston. He was right.
0:26:01 > 0:26:05But God chose to do it for the other side.
0:26:09 > 0:26:12One morning in September, Cromwell broke out of Dunbar at dawn,
0:26:12 > 0:26:15killed 4,000, took 10,000 prisoner,
0:26:15 > 0:26:18and put the rest of the Covenanting army to flight.
0:26:18 > 0:26:22It became one of Cromwell's most famous victories.
0:26:22 > 0:26:29It made him seem, at last, like a possible leader, not just of an army, but of the country itself.
0:26:31 > 0:26:36The very next day, the kirk session and the town council fled from Edinburgh.
0:26:36 > 0:26:39The Rule of the Saints was over.
0:26:39 > 0:26:45The young King Charles fled to France, and the English Parliament declared the birth of a new country.
0:26:47 > 0:26:52The Great Britain of the Stuarts, the Union of the Crowns, was gone,
0:26:52 > 0:26:56replaced by the Commonwealth of England, Scotland, and Ireland.
0:27:04 > 0:27:08Behind the pleasant title was a brutal union of conquest,
0:27:08 > 0:27:12secured by pillage, massacre, and the presence in Scotland
0:27:12 > 0:27:16of an English army of occupation, 10,000 strong.
0:27:23 > 0:27:28In 1653, Cromwell became something called Lord Protector.
0:27:28 > 0:27:32Not a king, but still addressed as "Your Highness" by those who served him.
0:27:32 > 0:27:37Behind his back, people called him a tyrant and usurper.
0:27:37 > 0:27:41For four years, Warriston held himself aloof from the new regime.
0:27:41 > 0:27:45But in the end, his ambition required him to collaborate.
0:27:45 > 0:27:47He could not bear being unimportant.
0:27:47 > 0:27:52In 1657, Cromwell made him the Lord Clerk Register,
0:27:52 > 0:27:58chief record keeper of the Scottish government, and gave him a position on the English Council of State.
0:28:01 > 0:28:03It was a dream of power.
0:28:03 > 0:28:06And a nightmare of betrayal.
0:28:06 > 0:28:10Just what was Warriston loyal to now, apart from himself?
0:28:13 > 0:28:15It was hard to say.
0:28:15 > 0:28:20The Covenant hung over his head as much as anybody's, but there was no king.
0:28:20 > 0:28:23There was someone who looked and behaved increasingly like one.
0:28:23 > 0:28:25But that was Cromwell.
0:28:25 > 0:28:30He began to look like a king reflected in a wicked mirror, ugly, ill-favoured.
0:28:30 > 0:28:33A tyrant with a bloodstained chin.
0:28:33 > 0:28:39Warriston went on with his daily regime of prayer, manufacturing certainty as best he could.
0:28:43 > 0:28:45Then Cromwell died.
0:28:48 > 0:28:51His unreal regime died with him.
0:28:51 > 0:28:54Now the Commonwealth was headless.
0:28:54 > 0:28:56But there was a head available.
0:28:57 > 0:29:00It belonged to Charles II.
0:29:09 > 0:29:15On May 8th, 1660, the English Parliament proclaimed Charles II King of England.
0:29:18 > 0:29:22The Scottish parliament did likewise one week later.
0:29:22 > 0:29:26There were scenes of wild celebration in Edinburgh,
0:29:26 > 0:29:30toasts drunk, glasses shattered, cannons fired.
0:29:32 > 0:29:34The joy was hysterical.
0:29:34 > 0:29:3711 years of guilt unleashed.
0:29:37 > 0:29:43Warriston felt the future tighten around his neck, and fled to Europe.
0:29:59 > 0:30:01The brief and ugly experiment was over.
0:30:01 > 0:30:04The headless king had horrified everyone.
0:30:04 > 0:30:08No-one wanted anything to do with dictators, no-one wanted
0:30:08 > 0:30:11anything to do with the almost-democracy of the Covenant.
0:30:13 > 0:30:16The way ahead was backwards.
0:30:16 > 0:30:20The parliaments of both England and Scotland began undoing things.
0:30:20 > 0:30:22They remade the old world.
0:30:24 > 0:30:27They remade the Union of the Crowns.
0:30:27 > 0:30:29You could hardly see the join.
0:30:33 > 0:30:35It was as though nothing had happened.
0:30:35 > 0:30:39As though this Charles was that Charles.
0:30:39 > 0:30:41His father's ghost was promoted.
0:30:41 > 0:30:44He became King Charles the Martyr.
0:30:44 > 0:30:48Cromwell's body was exhumed and its head cut off.
0:30:52 > 0:30:53There was no Cromwell.
0:30:53 > 0:30:55There had been no Civil War.
0:30:55 > 0:30:57There was no Covenant.
0:30:57 > 0:30:59There would be no Covenanters.
0:31:07 > 0:31:13The English parliament declared the Solemn League and Covenant of 1643 unlawful.
0:31:18 > 0:31:25Surviving copies were collected and burnt by the public hangman, executed as though they were people.
0:31:28 > 0:31:34Charles was destroying the evidence of the new world that had killed his father.
0:31:34 > 0:31:38Everyone knew there would be changes for the Presbyterian church.
0:31:38 > 0:31:42Perhaps it would be enough for Charles that the Protesters no longer ran it.
0:31:44 > 0:31:46It wouldn't.
0:31:54 > 0:31:58Charles appointed bishops and archbishops.
0:31:58 > 0:32:03He ordered Scotland's ministers to swear an Oath of Allegiance to him,
0:32:03 > 0:32:08and also required that every minister seek the nomination of a local member of the gentry.
0:32:12 > 0:32:16262 out of roughly 1,000 ministers failed to make the cut,
0:32:16 > 0:32:18couldn't or wouldn't take the oath,
0:32:18 > 0:32:21couldn't or wouldn't find a noble patron.
0:32:21 > 0:32:26So 262 ministers, mostly in the southwest, were made redundant.
0:32:26 > 0:32:29Alexander Peden was one of them.
0:32:32 > 0:32:39Until 1662, Peden was a minister in the parish of New Luce, in the deep southwest.
0:32:39 > 0:32:42Charles' Oath of Allegiance stuck in his craw.
0:32:42 > 0:32:45He couldn't say it, let alone swear it.
0:32:47 > 0:32:52On the last Sunday before his expulsion, Peden entered the pulpit at New Luce and preached.
0:32:52 > 0:32:55It was a performance to warm the heart of a Warriston.
0:32:55 > 0:32:58He preached from morning until midnight.
0:32:58 > 0:33:01When at last he left the pulpit, he struck its door three times
0:33:01 > 0:33:07and ordered it never to open again, except for a Presbyterian minister like himself.
0:33:24 > 0:33:26This became his pulpit instead.
0:33:26 > 0:33:31Any rock would do, to be honest. And this became his kirk.
0:33:36 > 0:33:39He became a field preacher.
0:33:39 > 0:33:42A man on the run, with a growing reputation.
0:33:42 > 0:33:45His followers called him Prophet Peden.
0:33:45 > 0:33:47The meetings to which he preached were outlawed
0:33:47 > 0:33:52under the new King's regime, but they took place regardless.
0:33:52 > 0:33:56The largest drew crowds of 10,000 and the crowd bore arms.
0:33:56 > 0:34:00Here, and in places like this, he preached to a movement that
0:34:00 > 0:34:06the Covenant had created, to people who had no nobles, no gentry to lead them,
0:34:06 > 0:34:08and never felt the lack.
0:34:14 > 0:34:16They were voices in the wilderness,
0:34:16 > 0:34:23pointing at the Stuart dynasty and crying tyrant, insisting that the King could not do as he wished.
0:34:26 > 0:34:28Almost nobody was listening.
0:34:28 > 0:34:32Once, the Covenanter movement had run the entire country.
0:34:32 > 0:34:38Now it was numerous only in the southwest, numerous and illegal, dismissed by the mainstream.
0:34:38 > 0:34:45The nobles, many of the ministers, and most of the rest of society, had gone back indoors, where it was warm
0:34:45 > 0:34:48under the umbrella of what the King permitted.
0:34:48 > 0:34:50The Protesters stayed outside.
0:34:50 > 0:34:52They liked it cold.
0:34:55 > 0:34:59In Prophet Peden, the Protesters had found a new hero.
0:34:59 > 0:35:01He was desperately needed.
0:35:01 > 0:35:05The government of Charles II was eating up the old ones.
0:35:08 > 0:35:13In 1663, Warriston was finally arrested in France,
0:35:15 > 0:35:20the last of 18 men that Charles held responsible for his father's death.
0:35:25 > 0:35:29Time passed. The King adopted a more tolerant policy.
0:35:29 > 0:35:33He licensed some of the Protesting ministers to preach once more,
0:35:33 > 0:35:36as long as they accepted that he, not King Jesus,
0:35:36 > 0:35:37was head of the church.
0:35:41 > 0:35:45For Peden and the hardcore of the Protesters this was wickedly similar
0:35:45 > 0:35:52to Catholic Christianity, in which the head of the church was human, and had power over individual souls.
0:35:56 > 0:35:59The King, they were now certain, was popish.
0:36:01 > 0:36:04Even paranoids are right occasionally.
0:36:04 > 0:36:11In 1670, Charles concluded a secret treaty with the most powerful Catholic king in Europe,
0:36:11 > 0:36:13Louis XIV of France.
0:36:17 > 0:36:21Louis XIV agreed to provide Charles with a generous annual pension.
0:36:21 > 0:36:26This was to assist Charles in the restoration of his kingdoms to the arms, the very open arms,
0:36:26 > 0:36:31of the Catholic church, at which point Charles would announce his own Catholicism.
0:36:31 > 0:36:35And Charles promised that once the national conversion was complete,
0:36:35 > 0:36:40he would assist the French in their war with the Protestant Dutch.
0:36:47 > 0:36:49This was a secret that Charles must keep.
0:36:49 > 0:36:52Anyone who accused him of popery must be silenced.
0:36:56 > 0:37:00The most outspoken protesters were confined on the Bass Rock.
0:37:00 > 0:37:03Peden was one of them.
0:37:03 > 0:37:06He was imprisoned there for four long years.
0:37:11 > 0:37:16Their leaders were captives, the King's power seemed limitless.
0:37:16 > 0:37:20Everything that the Protesters had once achieved was being undone.
0:37:26 > 0:37:30The idea grew amongst them that a spectacular act of rebellion
0:37:30 > 0:37:32would recall their countrymen to the one true path.
0:37:35 > 0:37:39Bishops were at the heart of the wicked changes that the King had made.
0:37:39 > 0:37:45And the Archbishop of St Andrews had once been, like themselves, a decent Presbyterian.
0:37:48 > 0:37:54On 3rd May, 1679, Archbishop Sharp was returning to St Andrews with his daughter.
0:37:54 > 0:37:57But nine Protesting Covenanters had lain in wait.
0:37:57 > 0:37:59They gave chase.
0:37:59 > 0:38:04Sharp's coach was no more than two or three miles from safety when they brought it to a standstill.
0:38:26 > 0:38:31It was an assassination, a terrorist act.
0:38:31 > 0:38:37The Government sent a taskforce to the Protesting heartland to stamp on the rats,
0:38:37 > 0:38:43led by a newly appointed captain, John Graham of Claverhouse.
0:38:43 > 0:38:49Claverhouse knew that the crowds at field preachings could sometimes number as much as 10,000.
0:38:49 > 0:38:52But he was unaware that they were half religious service, half army.
0:38:52 > 0:38:56Like the one he blundered into at Drumclog.
0:39:00 > 0:39:03The terrain was boggy and treacherous.
0:39:03 > 0:39:06Claverhouse's men were trained, but outnumbered.
0:39:06 > 0:39:09Manoeuvres were simply not possible.
0:39:09 > 0:39:12They were defeated. Claverhouse was almost killed.
0:39:12 > 0:39:16Soon afterwards, Glasgow fell to the Protesters.
0:39:20 > 0:39:23With this victory, the golden age seemed within their grasp.
0:39:23 > 0:39:27They could have marched on Edinburgh to restore the Rule of the Saints.
0:39:27 > 0:39:31Instead they made camp near Bothwell Brig,
0:39:31 > 0:39:35just south of Glasgow, and settled down for three weeks of discussion.
0:39:39 > 0:39:42Should the ungodly be allowed to join the army?
0:39:42 > 0:39:47Were they fighting to unseat Charles for failing in his duty as a Covenanted king,
0:39:47 > 0:39:53or were they fighting simply to reproach the King and restore him to the path of righteousness?
0:39:53 > 0:39:58During these three weeks, the Protesters dissolved into smaller and smaller factions.
0:39:58 > 0:40:01Tubs were thumped. Hobby horses were ridden.
0:40:01 > 0:40:03Fine points of theology debated.
0:40:09 > 0:40:12Perhaps they were under the illusion that the King was in a mood for clemency.
0:40:12 > 0:40:16After all, Peden was once again at liberty.
0:40:16 > 0:40:18But Peden himself was not at Bothwell.
0:40:18 > 0:40:21He had learnt his lesson on the Bass.
0:40:21 > 0:40:24The best sort of prophet to be was one who was breathing.
0:40:27 > 0:40:33From a safe distance of 40 miles, he prophesied the bloody slaughter of his friends at Bothwell Brig.
0:40:33 > 0:40:37Wherever his information came from, it was accurate.
0:40:46 > 0:40:49400 of the Bothwell debaters were killed,
0:40:49 > 0:40:531,200 taken prisoner, the rest dispersed in terror.
0:40:56 > 0:41:01But Bothwell Brig had shown that the Covenanting movement was still a threat.
0:41:16 > 0:41:18Executions of the Protesters became frequent.
0:41:21 > 0:41:25In 1681, a widow's son from a small town in Dumfriesshire
0:41:25 > 0:41:29came to watch as the very last Protesting minister swung to glory.
0:41:29 > 0:41:34And he decided that a martyr's death would suit him, too.
0:41:37 > 0:41:39His name was James Renwick.
0:41:42 > 0:41:47Later that year, he came into the city to watch another five executions.
0:41:50 > 0:41:53Five more of his fellow Protesters.
0:41:53 > 0:41:56Their heads were stuck on the city's Netherbow gate.
0:41:56 > 0:42:00And that night, Renwick climbed up, took them down,
0:42:00 > 0:42:04and buried the five grisly parcels with all due ceremony.
0:42:04 > 0:42:07He began to rise in the ranks of the Protesters.
0:42:16 > 0:42:18Renwick was in the bloom of youth.
0:42:18 > 0:42:22The King who so offended him, Charles II, was withering on the vine.
0:42:26 > 0:42:28His wife had proved barren.
0:42:31 > 0:42:34Charles had fathered several bastards,
0:42:34 > 0:42:39but male bastards weren't considered king material.
0:42:39 > 0:42:44There was only one alternative, the King's brother, James.
0:42:44 > 0:42:48At the King's command, he was confirmed as Charles II's successor.
0:42:52 > 0:42:57But James had been openly Catholic for almost ten years.
0:43:09 > 0:43:16The vast majority of his future subjects were Protestants, for whom Rome was a byword for tyranny.
0:43:16 > 0:43:19Yet almost nobody dared object.
0:43:19 > 0:43:26He was a Stuart, after all, and guilt for his father's execution stilled most tongues.
0:43:26 > 0:43:30Only the Protesters said out loud that here was the final proof
0:43:30 > 0:43:33that the Stuart dynasty was unfit to rule.
0:43:35 > 0:43:39Since Bothwell Brig, the Protesters' numbers had declined.
0:43:39 > 0:43:45There were no more than 6,000 left, when once the Covenant could have claimed 600,000.
0:43:46 > 0:43:51They didn't care. They rechristened themselves the United Societies,
0:43:51 > 0:43:54declared that they were the country's rightful government,
0:43:54 > 0:43:58and as their leader, they chose James Renwick.
0:43:58 > 0:44:03To announce their presence, they marched into Lanark to the Mercat Cross
0:44:03 > 0:44:09and burnt copies of the acts that made James next in line for the throne.
0:44:09 > 0:44:11Then they made their own declaration.
0:44:13 > 0:44:19In the name of the people, for whom of course they did not speak, they rejected the Stuart dynasty.
0:44:19 > 0:44:22They rejected Charles II as King on the grounds that he had destroyed
0:44:22 > 0:44:27the perfect reformation, on the grounds that he had made his court into a brothel.
0:44:27 > 0:44:31On the grounds of the hateful Catholicism of his intended heir.
0:44:31 > 0:44:38They demanded a return to the years 1648 and 1649, to the Rule of the Saints.
0:44:38 > 0:44:42Then they took up hammers and smashed the Mercat Cross.
0:44:46 > 0:44:49Renwick's United Societies cut a dash.
0:44:49 > 0:44:52They drew the eye of Prophet Peden.
0:44:53 > 0:44:56He took to preaching sermons that supported them.
0:44:58 > 0:45:03He lamented the bad faith of the nobles, gentlemen and ministers
0:45:03 > 0:45:07who had deserted the Covenant for the safety of Charles II's church.
0:45:07 > 0:45:09"They are vile bastards," he said.
0:45:09 > 0:45:15Clearly, Peden hoped the United Societies would take him on as their minister.
0:45:15 > 0:45:19But Renwick let it be known that Peden had been tested and found wanting.
0:45:19 > 0:45:24His numerous absences when others had lost their lives had been noted.
0:45:24 > 0:45:30In fact, he had disgracefully failed to die on several occasions.
0:45:30 > 0:45:34Renwick was more than willing to die if his God required it.
0:45:43 > 0:45:46Renwick was insanely resolute.
0:45:46 > 0:45:51And with his 6,000 men, he was perfectly capable of starting a second civil war.
0:45:55 > 0:45:58He and his followers were eminently worth killing.
0:45:58 > 0:46:02But how could these dangerous men be identified?
0:46:02 > 0:46:05The Government needed to look inside its subjects' heads.
0:46:08 > 0:46:11An oath was framed requiring all citizens to reject
0:46:11 > 0:46:16the United Societies, but there were questions, too.
0:46:16 > 0:46:18Could the subject say, "God save the King"?
0:46:20 > 0:46:24No-one from the United Societies could say that of Charles II.
0:46:24 > 0:46:26Not when God was listening.
0:46:26 > 0:46:29And God was always listening.
0:46:33 > 0:46:38John Graham of Claverhouse, fast becoming the Government's enforcer of choice,
0:46:38 > 0:46:42was sent into the southwest, armed with the oath.
0:46:42 > 0:46:48The oath could be administered on the spot and failure to take it was punishable by instant death.
0:46:48 > 0:46:52These months would be remembered as the Killing Times.
0:46:56 > 0:46:59It wasn't the numbers that made the Killing Times notorious.
0:47:04 > 0:47:06The numbers weren't great.
0:47:10 > 0:47:14It was the summary nature of the executions.
0:47:17 > 0:47:19No courts. No appeals.
0:47:19 > 0:47:21Just a bullet in the head.
0:47:21 > 0:47:24A little over 90 deaths in a little less than a year.
0:47:24 > 0:47:29The killings began in December and provided an unpleasant baptism
0:47:29 > 0:47:35for the beginning of a new and inauspicious reign, the reign of James VII and II.
0:47:39 > 0:47:44In February of 1685, Charles II died of a stroke.
0:47:44 > 0:47:47James' succession was unopposed.
0:47:47 > 0:47:49The Stuart dynasty seemed unassailable.
0:47:51 > 0:47:57Now there were two powerful Catholic monarchs for Europe's Protestants to contend with.
0:47:57 > 0:48:00In France, Louis XIV.
0:48:00 > 0:48:03In Britain, James VII and II.
0:48:06 > 0:48:11For William of Orange, the Calvinist Prince of the Dutch Republic, the prospect of a Catholic alliance
0:48:11 > 0:48:16between Louis XIV and James was too frightening for words.
0:48:16 > 0:48:21He had been fighting the French on and off for years, and he was a Stuart, or very nearly.
0:48:21 > 0:48:25He was James' nephew and his son-in-law.
0:48:25 > 0:48:28In short, he had a claim to James' crowns.
0:48:31 > 0:48:35James set about providing William of Orange with ammunition.
0:48:35 > 0:48:39He decreed that Catholics could not only worship, but hold office.
0:48:39 > 0:48:43He was his father's son. Parliament was not consulted.
0:48:44 > 0:48:47Catholics became a majority on the Privy Council,
0:48:47 > 0:48:52Catholics were appointed to the control of royal burghs.
0:48:52 > 0:48:56Little was lacking from James' victory. Only the United Societies remained.
0:48:56 > 0:49:00He set a price on Renwick's head by proclamation.
0:49:00 > 0:49:03£100, dead or alive.
0:49:06 > 0:49:09It was clear to Renwick what his God required of him.
0:49:11 > 0:49:15He would preach in the fields outside Edinburgh,
0:49:15 > 0:49:18he would even enter the city itself.
0:49:18 > 0:49:20He would make it easy for the King's men to find him.
0:49:23 > 0:49:26The authorities entered the house he was staying in.
0:49:26 > 0:49:30Renwick shot one of them, escaped, but couldn't or wouldn't run.
0:49:30 > 0:49:34He walked this far, to Castle Wynd, where he was captured.
0:49:37 > 0:49:40He was too important a prize for simple execution.
0:49:40 > 0:49:44For two weeks, the authorities attempted to extract from him
0:49:44 > 0:49:46a confession that he had never done God's work.
0:49:46 > 0:49:49This proved impossible.
0:49:56 > 0:50:01His execution was finally fixed for February 17th, 1688.
0:50:01 > 0:50:06On the scaffold, Renwick spoke for King Jesus at considerable length.
0:50:08 > 0:50:11He recited Psalm 103.
0:50:11 > 0:50:15"The Lord has established His throne in Heaven, and His kingdom rules over all."
0:50:15 > 0:50:18He read from Revelations, Chapter 19.
0:50:18 > 0:50:24"Come and gather yourselves together unto the supper of the great God, that ye may eat the flesh of kings."
0:50:24 > 0:50:29And he concluded, "Lord, I die in the faith that you will not leave Scotland, but that you will
0:50:29 > 0:50:35"make the blood of your witnesses the seed of your Church, and return again and be glorious in our land.
0:50:35 > 0:50:37"And now, Lord, I am ready."
0:50:44 > 0:50:47Renwick's death made James feel safe.
0:50:49 > 0:50:56He could ignore the Covenant. He was anointed by God, an absolute monarch, unchallenged.
0:50:58 > 0:51:03And then he did what his brother had failed to do, he secured the future of the Stuart dynasty.
0:51:06 > 0:51:13On 10th June of that year, the king's wife gave birth to a healthy male heir, James Francis Edward.
0:51:13 > 0:51:17A rhyme began to do the rounds. James should have listened to it.
0:51:19 > 0:51:20It was a prophecy.
0:51:25 > 0:51:29Rock-a-bye baby, on the tree top,
0:51:29 > 0:51:31when the wind blows, the cradle will rock.
0:51:33 > 0:51:36When the bough breaks, the cradle will fall,
0:51:38 > 0:51:41down will come baby, cradle and all.
0:51:46 > 0:51:50The roots of his power as a Catholic king were far from deep.
0:51:50 > 0:51:53They had grown upon stony, Protestant ground.
0:51:58 > 0:52:03William of Orange had begun preparing an invasion fleet two months before the child was born.
0:52:07 > 0:52:11The fleet was ready by the first week of October.
0:52:11 > 0:52:16With sailors and others included, William's force totalled 70,000.
0:52:16 > 0:52:19Clearly he had no intention of doing this twice.
0:52:22 > 0:52:25The army landed in Devon in the first week of November.
0:52:25 > 0:52:31And almost at once, James' support began mysteriously to wither away.
0:52:31 > 0:52:38Because in the end, Stuart or not, son of the headless king or not, he was a Catholic.
0:52:40 > 0:52:46On the night of 9th December, the Queen and the King's young heir fled to France.
0:52:46 > 0:52:49James VII and II followed on the 23rd.
0:52:49 > 0:52:51He had not abdicated.
0:52:51 > 0:52:55But everybody decided to behave as though he had.
0:52:55 > 0:52:58They decided, too, that this wasn't an invasion.
0:52:58 > 0:53:01This would be the Glorious Revolution.
0:53:01 > 0:53:03They had invited William of Orange.
0:53:03 > 0:53:05Do come and take a kingdom!
0:53:05 > 0:53:07Dress: military.
0:53:07 > 0:53:08RSVP.
0:53:20 > 0:53:24In May of 1689, William of Orange and his wife Mary
0:53:24 > 0:53:29accepted a joint monarchy of England, Scotland, and Ireland.
0:53:29 > 0:53:32A monarchy with strings attached.
0:53:32 > 0:53:36The crown could no longer suspend laws, levy taxes,
0:53:36 > 0:53:40or maintain a standing army in peacetime without Parliament's permission.
0:53:42 > 0:53:49Here at last was the new world, 50 years after the Covenanters had first asked for it.
0:53:49 > 0:53:5250 years after Charles I had said no.
0:53:56 > 0:54:01In England, the Stuarts were kings no longer, with hardly a shot fired.
0:54:01 > 0:54:06The Glorious Revolution would acquire another adjective.
0:54:06 > 0:54:08Bloodless.
0:54:08 > 0:54:11But in Scotland, there was blood aplenty.
0:54:11 > 0:54:15Several northern nobles remained faithful to James.
0:54:15 > 0:54:19One of these Jacobites was John Graham of Claverhouse,
0:54:19 > 0:54:23now the Viscount Dundee.
0:54:23 > 0:54:26Claverhouse went north, formed an army,
0:54:26 > 0:54:31won a decisive victory at Killiecrankie, and died of his wounds on the battlefield.
0:54:31 > 0:54:36The first Jacobite rebellion died with him, but its body twitched for some time after.
0:54:36 > 0:54:41It took several months to crush the Jacobite garrison in Edinburgh Castle.
0:54:41 > 0:54:44But the garrison here held out longest of all.
0:54:44 > 0:54:51So it was on the Bass Rock that the Stuart dynasty finally lost its grip on power.
0:55:02 > 0:55:05At last, there was a kind of peace.
0:55:05 > 0:55:10The moderate remnants of the Presbyterians reached a compromise with King William.
0:55:10 > 0:55:15Bishops were abolished, and the Presbyterians resumed control of the Church of Scotland.
0:55:15 > 0:55:18But they were deceiving themselves.
0:55:18 > 0:55:20They were the church of southern Scotland.
0:55:20 > 0:55:27Because in the north, loyalty to the older kind of God-anointed king remained in force.
0:55:27 > 0:55:32The split in the kirk was a split in the country, an unhealed wound,
0:55:32 > 0:55:36and the Stuarts, of course, were far from dead.
0:55:36 > 0:55:41They were only in exile, in France, a long swim across the English Channel.
0:55:42 > 0:55:44A dynastic time bomb.
0:55:47 > 0:55:53For 50 years, the Covenanters had been almost the only voice that constantly resisted the rule
0:55:53 > 0:55:57of the Stuarts, stood against absolute monarchy,
0:55:57 > 0:56:02insisted that the soul of every human weighed the same.
0:56:02 > 0:56:06We can almost see them as martyrs in the cause of civil liberty.
0:56:06 > 0:56:12From a distance of several hundred years, the Covenanters seem almost benign.
0:56:12 > 0:56:14But come closer.
0:56:14 > 0:56:16The Covenanters knew very little of mercy.
0:56:16 > 0:56:20They knew nothing of moderation.
0:56:20 > 0:56:22The only government they could ever have approved
0:56:22 > 0:56:25was the rule of the Presbyterian kirk, with a Covenanted King.
0:56:25 > 0:56:32One nation under God, and bound for glory, sermons once a day and twice on Sunday.
0:56:32 > 0:56:34The freedoms they sought were freedoms for
0:56:34 > 0:56:38Covenanting Presbyterians, and no-one else at all.
0:56:38 > 0:56:43Anyone of another faith could, and certainly would, go to hell.
0:56:43 > 0:56:45Once, this was God's country.
0:56:45 > 0:56:47It's not any more.
0:56:47 > 0:56:48Thank God for that.
0:57:24 > 0:57:27Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd