which the Roman Catholics were making to regain their hold upon Scotland, and called the King’s Confession or National Covenant. Based upon the Confession of Faith of 1560, this document denounced the pope and the doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church in no measured terms. It was adopted by the General Assembly, signed by King James VI. and his household, and enjoined on persons of all ranks and classes; and was again subscribed in 1590 and 1596. In 1637 Scotland was in a state of turmoil. Charles I. and Archbishop Laud had just met with a reverse in their efforts to impose the English liturgy upon the Scots; and fearing further measures on the part of the king, it occurred to Archibald Johnston, Lord Warriston, to revive the National Covenant of 1581. Additional matter intended to suit the document to the special circumstances of the time was added, and the covenant was adopted and signed by a large gathering in Greyfriars’ churchyard, Edinburgh, on the 28th of February 1638, after which copies were sent throughout the country for additional signatures. The subscribers engaged by oath to maintain religion in the state in which it existed in 1580, and to reject all innovations introduced since that time, while professed expressions of loyalty to the king were added. The General Assembly of 1638 was composed of ardent Covenanters, and in 1640 the covenant was adopted by the parliament, and its subscription was required from all citizens. Before this date the Covenanters were usually referred to as Supplicants, but from about this time the former designation began to prevail.
A further development took place in 1643. The leaders of the English parliament, worsted in the Civil War, implored the aid of the Scots, which was promised on condition that the Scottish system of church government was adopted in England. After some haggling a document called the Solemn League and Covenant was drawn up. This was practically a treaty between England and Scotland for the preservation of the reformed religion in Scotland, the reformation of religion in England and Ireland “according to the word of God and the example of the best reformed churches,” and the extirpation of popery and prelacy. It was subscribed by many in both kingdoms and also in Ireland, and was approved by the English parliament, and with some slight modifications by the Westminster Assembly of Divines. Charles I. refused to accept it when he surrendered himself to the Scots in 1646, but he made important concessions in this direction in the “Engagement” made with the Scots in December 1647. Charles II. before landing in Scotland in June 1650 declared by a solemn oath his approbation of both covenants, and this was renewed on the occasion of his coronation at Scone in the following January.
From 1638 to 1651 the Covenanters were the dominant party in Scotland, directing her policy both at home and abroad. Their power, however, which had been seriously weakened by Cromwell’s victory at Dunbar in September 1651, was practically destroyed when Charles II. was restored nine years later. Firmly seated upon the throne Charles renounced the covenants, which in 1662 were declared unlawful oaths, and were to be abjured by all persons holding public offices. Episcopacy was restored, the court of high commission was revived, and ministers who refused to recognize the authority of the bishops were expelled from their livings. Gathering around them many of the Covenanters who clung tenaciously to their standards of faith, these ministers began to preach in the fields, and a period of persecution marked by savage hatred and great brutality began. Further oppressive measures were directed against the Covenanters, who took up arms about 1665, and the struggle soon assumed the proportions of a rebellion. The forces of the crown under John Graham of Claverhouse and others were sent against them, and although the insurgents gained isolated successes, in general they were worsted and were treated with great barbarity. They maintained, however, their cherished covenants with a zeal which persecution only intensified; in 1680 the more extreme members of the party signed a document known as the “Sanquhar Declaration,” and were afterwards called Cameronians from the name of their leader, Richard Cameron (q.v.). They renounced their allegiance to King James and were greatly disappointed when their standards found no place in the religious settlement of 1689, continuing to hold the belief that the covenants should be made obligatory upon the entire nation. The Covenanters had a martyrology of their own, and the halo of romance has been cast around their exploits and their sufferings. Their story, however, especially during the time of their political predominance, is part of the general history of Scotland (q.v.).
The texts of the National Covenant and the Solemn League and Covenant are printed in S. R. Gardiner’s Constitutional Documents of the Puritan Revolution (Oxford, 1899). See also J. H. Burton, History of Scotland (Edinburgh, 1905); A. Lang, History of Scotland (Edinburgh, 1900); S. R. Gardiner, History of England (London, 1883–1884); G. Grub, Ecclesiastical History of Scotland (Edinburgh, 1861); J. Macpherson, History of the Church in Scotland (Paisley, 1901); and J. K. Hewison, The Covenanters (1908).
COVENT GARDEN, formerly an open space north of the Strand, London, England, now occupied by the principal flower,
fruit and vegetable market in the metropolis. This was originally
the so-called “convent garden” belonging to the abbey of St
Peter, Westminster. In the first half of the 17th century the
site of the garden was laid out as a square by Inigo Jones, with a
piazza on two sides; and as early as 1656 it was becoming a
market place for the same commodities as are now sold in it.
Covent Garden Theatre (1858) is the chief seat of grand opera
in London. The site has carried a theatre since 1733, but earlier
buildings were burnt in 1809 and 1856.
COVENTRY, SIR JOHN (d. 1682), son of John Coventry, the
second son of Thomas, Lord Keeper Coventry, was returned to
the Long Parliament in 1640 as member for Evesham. During
the Civil War he served for the king, and at the Restoration was
created a knight. In 1667, and in the following parliaments of
1678, 1679 and 1681, he was elected for Weymouth, and opposed
the government. On the 21st of December 1670, owing to a jest
made by Coventry in the House of Commons on the subject of
the king’s amours, Sir Thomas Sandys, an officer of the guards,
with other accomplices, by the order of Monmouth, and (it was
said) with the approval of the king himself, waylaid him as he
was returning home to Suffolk Street and slit his nose to the bone.
The outrage created an extraordinary sensation, and in consequence
a measure known as the “Coventry Act” was passed,
declaring assaults accompanied by personal mutilation a felony
without benefit of clergy. Sir John died in 1682. Sir William
Coventry, his uncle, speaks slightingly of him, ridicules his vanity and wishes him out of the House of Commons to be “out of harm’s way.”
COVENTRY, THOMAS COVENTRY, 1st Baron (1578–1640),
lord keeper of England, eldest son of Sir Thomas Coventry,
judge of the common pleas (a descendant of John Coventry,
lord mayor of London in the reign of Henry VI.), and of Margaret
Jeffreys of Earls Croome, or Croome D’Abitot, in Worcestershire,
was born in 1578. He entered Balliol College, Oxford, in 1592,
and the Inner Temple in 1594, becoming bencher of the society
in 1614, reader in 1616, and holding the office of treasurer from
1617 till 1621. His exceptional legal abilities were rewarded
early with official promotion. On the 16th of November 1616 he
was made recorder of London in spite of Bacon’s opposition, who,
although allowing him to be “a well trained and an honest man,”
objected that he was “bred by my Lord Coke and seasoned in
his ways.”[1] On the 14th of March 1617 he was appointed
solicitor-general and was knighted; was returned for Droitwich
to the parliament of 1621; and on the 11th of January in that
year was made attorney-general. He took part in the proceedings
against Bacon for corruption, and was manager for the Commons
in the impeachment of Edward Floyd for insulting the elector and electress palatine.
On the 1st of November 1625 he was made lord keeper of the great seal; in this capacity he delivered the king’s reprimand to the Commons on the 29th of March 1626, when he declared that “liberty of counsel” alone belonged to them and not “liberty of control.” On the 10th of April 1628 he received the title of Baron Coventry of Aylesborough in Worcestershire. At the
- ↑ Spedding’s Bacon. vi. 97.
