government:--as forfeited several years since, by his perjury, and
breach of Covenant both to God and His truth, and by his tyranny and
breach of the very _leges regnandi_--the very essential conditions of
government, in matters civil." This was a noble deed, and ranks Cameron
and his followers with the purest and most disinterested patriots of any
age or country. It has been justly remarked by an eloquent writer, "The
real matter of fact for which the Cameronians contended was just the old
claim of the Covenanters--'a free Parliament and a free Assembly.'" "It
is the glory of the Cameronians, in which no other party shares, that
when most people lay prostrate, and many of the bravest stood aloof,
they were the first to hoist the flag, disowning the government of the
Stuarts, without whose expulsion liberty was impossible."[4]

The testimony which Cargill and Cameron boldly proclaimed and sealed
with their blood, was cordially espoused by Renwick, and faithfully
maintained by him during the whole course of his public ministry. He was
called, besides, to the great work of preaching a full and free Gospel,
throughout many parts of his native country, to multitudes who were
hungering for the bread of life, when through terror of oppressive
rulers, or from seeking their favour, others shrunk from the performance
of so important and hazardous a duty. He was required, moreover, to
dispense the ordinances of religion in Scriptural purity, to the
scattered, persecuted remnant, and thus to repair "the desolations of
Zion," and to transmit the truth to future generations. In the year of
Cameron's martyrdom, the Societies framed their "General
Correspondence," and formed a simple but effective organization, for
mutual fellowship and edification,--for preserving their precious gospel
liberties, and for taking advantage of any event in public affairs, for
re-establishing the Covenanted order in Church and State, which had been
violently taken away, by despotic power and prelatic intolerance. The