This thesis is the first to explore the life and political thought of Sir James Stewart of Goodtrees (1635-1713). The first part reviews the life of his father, Sir James Stewart of Kirk field (1608-1681) to 1661, and Goodtrees' own life from birth to his admission to the Scots bar in 1661. This provides the backdrop of history necessary to appreciate his contributions as both writer and radical activist. Particular attention focuses on the conflict between Charles I and Charles II, on the one hand, and the Church of Scotland, on the other; the National Covenant (1638) and the Solemn League and Covenant of(1643); the British wars of religion; and the upheavals following the Restoration in the 1660s, culminating in the Pentland Rising of 1666. The next part develops Goodtrees' political philosophy from his two most important writings. Chapter 3 reviews and interprets Naphtali (1667), a defence of those who rose at Pentland. Chapter 4 reviews Andrew Honyman's Survey of Naphtali (1668, 1669), a rebuttal of Naphtali and standard Anglican case for royal absolutism. Chapter 5 reviews and interprets Goodtrees' Jus Populi Vindicatum, or The People's Right, to defend themselves and their Covenanted Religion, vindicated (1669), his rejoinder to Honyman. His Calvinist, covenantal constitutionalism is shown to be an important link between earlier resistance theorists like John Knox and Samuel Rutherford and the later Whigs, represented preeminently by John Locke. The third part (chapters 6-7) reviews Goodtrees' life and minor writings as radical critic of the Restoration monarchy; a participant in plots among British exiles in Holland to overthrow it; a member briefly of James's Scottish government before the Revolution; and lord advocate and churchman pursuing political, legal, and ecclesiastical reforms afterwards.

Text in English / This dissertation offers an analysis of Scottish Presbyterian Church mission policy during the period, 1898 - 1923. The study contains an examination of historiographical methodology, the historical background both in Scotland and South Africa along with the multi-faceted dimensions within the South African context of the time. The Mzimba Secession provides an appropriate historical starting point which led to a serious disruption of the Mission. The role of the major participants, black ministers and elders and missionaries, is assessed as a struggle between them and the Foreign Mission Committee of the United Free Church of Scotland, following the union of two churches in 1900, took place involving the various policy options. This eventually led to the formation of the Bantu Presbyterian Church of South Africa. / Christian Spirituality, Church History & Missiology / M. Th. (Missiology)

Text in English / This dissertation offers an analysis of Scottish Presbyterian Church mission policy during the period, 1898 - 1923. The study contains an examination of historiographical methodology, the historical background both in Scotland and South Africa along with the multi-faceted dimensions within the South African context of the time. The Mzimba Secession provides an appropriate historical starting point which led to a serious disruption of the Mission. The role of the major participants, black ministers and elders and missionaries, is assessed as a struggle between them and the Foreign Mission Committee of the United Free Church of Scotland, following the union of two churches in 1900, took place involving the various policy options. This eventually led to the formation of the Bantu Presbyterian Church of South Africa. / Christian Spirituality, Church History and Missiology / M. Th. (Missiology)

In this thesis I present new insights into aspects of Peter Guthrie Tait's life and work, derived principally from largely-unexplored primary source material: Tait's scrapbook, the Tait–Maxwell school-book and Tait's pocket notebook. By way of associated historical insights, I also come to discuss the innovative and far-reaching mathematics of the elusive Frenchman, C.-V. Mourey. P. G. Tait (1831–1901) F.R.S.E., Professor of Mathematics at the Queen's College, Belfast (1854–1860) and of Natural Philosophy at the University of Edinburgh (1860–1901), was one of the leading physicists and mathematicians in Europe in the nineteenth century. His expertise encompassed the breadth of physical science and mathematics. However, since the nineteenth century he has been unfortunately overlooked—overshadowed, perhaps, by the brilliance of his personal friends, James Clerk Maxwell (1831–1879), Sir William Rowan Hamilton (1805–1865) and William Thomson (1824–1907), later Lord Kelvin. Here I present the results of extensive research into the Tait family history. I explore the spiritual aspect of Tait's life in connection with The Unseen Universe (1875) which Tait co-authored with Balfour Stewart (1828–1887). I also reveal Tait's surprising involvement in statistics and give an account of his introduction to complex numbers, as a schoolboy at the Edinburgh Academy. A highlight of the thesis is a re-evaluation of C.-V. Mourey's 1828 work, La Vraie Théorie des quantités négatives et des quantités prétendues imaginaires, which I consider from the perspective of algebraic reform. The thesis also contains: (i) a transcription of an unpublished paper by Hamilton on the fundamental theorem of algebra which was inspired by Mourey and (ii) new biographical information on Mourey.