Protestantism in Scotland - James Aitken Wylie

The failure of these two attempts had the effect,
like all suppressed insurrections, of strengthening
the Government which they were intended to
overthrow. His enemies discomfited, the next care
of James was to take vengeance on them. His foes
were entirely at his mercy. This would have been a
plea for clemency with ordinary tyrants; but James
II was a tyrant after the pattern of Caligula and
other despots of ancient times, and he smote his
prostrate enemies with a frightful and merciless
violence. He sent Lord Chief Justice Jeffreys, and
four judges worthy to sit on the same bench with
him, along with General Kirk and a troop of
soldiers, to chastise those counties in the west
which had been the seat of Monmouth's rising. The
cruelties inflicted by these ferocious ministers of
the tyrant were appalling. Jeffreys hanged men and
women by thirties at a time; and Kirk had the
gallows erected before the windows of his
banqueting-room, that the sight of his struggling
victims might give zest to his debauch. From the
bar of Jeffreys there was no escape but by buying
with a great sum that life which the injustice of the
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