Strachan's design seems to have been to
stand aloof for the present from either side; but from some not very
intelligible cause he fell into disgrace with his party, and this is
said to have so preyed upon his mind as to have caused his death. From
that time the Wild Westland Whigs, as they began now to be called, had
no ostensible leader. They withdrew sullenly to their own homes,
contenting themselves during the remaining years of the Commonwealth
with protesting against everybody and everything outside their own
narrow circle. They must not be confounded with the general body of the
Remonstrants, between whom and the Resolutioners Cromwell had to keep
the balance. They were a people apart. Throughout the wild
hill-districts of the Western Lowlands they preached their fierce
crusade against all who were not prepared to stand by the spirit of the
Covenant as they chose to interpret it. The toleration they demanded
they would not give. No man should be free to worship God as he pleased:
every man must worship Him in the way which seemed good to them, and in
that way only. The moderate Presbyterians were as hateful to them as
Charles himself and all his bishops; and they in their turn were as
obnoxious to the majority of the Scottish nation as to the English
Government. Cleric and layman alike was weary of the unending squabbles
that had distracted the Church of Scotland since the days of Knox.
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