The History of the Reformation of Religion within the Realm of Scotland

1790

de Beer Sc 1790 K

Edinburgh: Printed by H. Inglis, Westport

Thomas Carlyle said of John Knox (c.1514–1572) that he was ‘one Scotchman to whom, of all others, his country and the world owe a debt’. Initially a Catholic, Knox came under the influence of George Wishart, a Protestant preacher. In 1551, he moved to London and helped implement the English Reformation. When in exile in Geneva, he met John Calvin; he eventually wrote a defence of Calvin’s doctrine of predestination. On returning to Scotland, and with the support from Scottish Protestant nobles, Knox engineered the anti-French, anti-Catholic revolution that saw Scotland embrace Protestantism in 1560. This is a later printing of his History, first published in 1587.