deliberations were deep and far-reaching; the men in council were among
the wisest and best in the two kingdoms. They weighed the momentous
interests involved in the pending war, that eventually convulsed England
and watered her soil with fraternal blood. The liberty of both
kingdoms, the progress of the Gospel, the purity of religion, the
independence of the Church, the inheritance of the Covenants, the onward
movement of Christianity--yea, their own homes, possessions, liberties,
and lives--all were at stake in the crisis that darkened the land. These
men turned to God in prayer to meet the task that burdened their hearts
and taxed their wisdom.

Dangers, too, were thickening around Scotland as well as England, like
storm-clouds concentrating for a destructive outburst. The king was
planning to restore the Scottish Prelacy to power; he still hoped to
fight his way victoriously into Edinburgh; he had hired an army of
10,000 men to invade Scotland; he had watched with apparent complacency,
we will not say his sanction, the slaughter of 200,000 Protestants in
Ireland by the Papists. Such were the conditions in both kingdoms, which
these counselors had to face. Dark were the days when this Joint
Commission was in session. Scotland was harassed by internal foes,
England was convulsed in a dreadful strife, and poor Ireland lay
bleeding from a thousand wounds. But here was a band of men whose hearts
reached up to God for counsel, and they were made equal to the occasion.
They knew how to take hold upon Omnipotence and secure the help of
heaven. They had access to the Eternal Throne, and were able to call
into service God's chariots and angels, and fill the mountains with
armies which, though invisible to mortal eyes, were invincible in the
presence of all the hosts of the king, and all the legions of Satan.
Listen to the cry that goes up from that Council Chamber--"The
Covenants! The Covenants!"