The general assembly at Holyrood-house, _anno_ 1602, with the king's consent, indict their next meeting to be kept at Aberdeen, the last tuesday of July _anno_ 1604, and before that day came, the king by his commissioner the laird of Laureston, and Mr. Patrick Galloway moderator of the last general assembly, in a letter directed to the several presbyteries, prorogued the meeting till the first tuesday of July 1605, at the same place; last of all, in June 1605, the expected meeting to have been kept in July following, is by a new letter from the king's commissioner, and the commissioners of the general assembly, absolutely discharged and prohibited, but without naming any day or place, for any other assembly; and so the series of our assemblies expired, never to revive again in due form, till the covenant was renewed _anno_ 1638. However, many of the godly ministers of Scotland, knowing well, if once the hedge of the government was broken, the corruption of the doctrine would soon follow, resolved not to quit their assemblies so. And therefore a number of them convened at Aberdeen, upon the first tuesday of July 1605, being the last day that was distinctly appointed by authority; and when they had met, did no more but constitute themselves and dissolve. Amongst those was Mr. Welch, who, though he had not been present upon that precise day, yet because he came to the place, and approved what his brethren had done, he was accused as guilty of the treasonable fact committed by them. So dangerous a point was the name of a general assembly in king James's jealous judgment. Within a month after this meeting, many of these godly men were incarcerate, some in one prison, some in another. Mr. Welch was sent first to Edinburgh tolbooth, and then to Blackness; and so from prison to prison, till he was banished to France, never to see Scotland again. And now the scene of his life begins to alter; but, before his sufferings, he had this strange warning.