Note 619 — Chapter V

Bower (History of the University of Edinburgh, vol. i. p. 217) says, ‘The history of the universities and of the church is, in modern Europe, and perhaps in every other civilized portion of the globe, very nearly connected. They are more nearly connected in Scotland than in any other civilized country called Protestant; because the General Assembly have the legal power of inquiring into the economy of the institutions, both as it respects the mode of teaching, and the doctrines, whether religious, moral, or physical, which are taught.’ Spalding, under the year 1639, gives an instance of the power of the General Assembly in ‘the College of Old Aberdeen.’ Spalding's History of the Troubles, vol. i. p. 178. See also, on the authority exercised by the General Assembly over the universities, a curious little book, called The Government and Order of the Church of Scotland, Edinburgh, 1690, p. 25.