Chapter XXVI: Letter CXII: Her husband, to whom Rutherford expresses his obligations (4)

My dry root would take more dew and summer's-rain than it getteth, were it not that Christ will have dryness and deadness in us to work upon. If there were no timber to work upon, art would die, and never be seen. I see that grace hath a field, to play upon and to course up and down, in our wants; so that I am often thanking God, not for guiltiness, but for guiltiness for Christ to whet and sharpen His grace upon. I am half content to have boils for the sake of the plasters of my Lord Jesus. Sickness hath this advantage, that it draweth our sweet Physician's hand, and His holy and soft fingers, to touch our withered and leper skins. It is a blessed fever that fetcheth Christ to the bedside. I think my Lord's "How doest thou with it, sick body?" is worth all my pained nights. Surely, I have no more for Christ than emptiness and want; take or leave, He will get me no otherwise. I must sell myself and my wants to Him; but I have no price to give for Him. If He would put a fair and real seal upon His love to me, and bestow upon me a larger share of Christ's love (which I would fainest be in hands with of anything; I except not heaven itself), I should go on sighing and singing under His cross. But the worst is, many take me for somebody, because the wind bloweth upon a withered prisoner; but the truth is, that I am both lean and thin in that, wherein many believe I abound. I would, if bartering were in my power, niffer joy with Christ's love and faith, and instead of the hot sunshine, be content to walk under a cloudy shadow with more grief and sadness, to have more faith, and a fair occasion of setting forth and commending Christ, and to make that lovely One, that fair One, that sweetest and dearest Lord Jesus, market-sweet for many ears and hearts in Scotland. And, if it were in my power, to roup Christ to the three kingdoms, and withal persuade buyers to come, and to take such sweet wares as Christ, I would think to have many sweet bargains betwixt Christ and the sons of men. I would that I could be humble and go with a low sail; I would that I had desires with wings, and running upon wheels, swift, and active, and speedy, in longing for Christ's honour. But I know that my Lord is as wise here as I dow be thirsty; and infinitely more zealous of His honour than I can be hungry for the manifestation of it to men and angels. But, oh that my Lord would take my desires off my hand, and a thousand-fold more unto them, and sow spiritual inclinations upon them, for the coming of Christ's kingdom to the sons of men, that they might be higher, and deeper, and longer, and broader! For my longest measures are too short for Christ, my depth is ebb, and the breadth of my affections to Christ narrowed and pinched. Oh for an ingine and a wit, to prescribe ways to men how Christ might be all, in all the world! Wit is here behind affection, and affection behind obligation. Oh, how little dow I give to Christ, and how much hath He given me! Oh that I could sing grace's praises, and love's praises! seeing that I was like a fool soliciting the Law, and making moyen to the Law's court for mercy, and found challenges that way. But now I deny that judge's power; for I am Grace's man. I hold not worth a drink of water, the Law, or any lord but Jesus:--and till I bethought me of this, I was slain with doubtings, and fears, and terrors. I praise the new court, and the new landlord, and the new salvation, purchased in the name of Jesus and at His instance. Let the Old Man, if he please, go make his moan to the Law, and seek acquaintance thereaway, because he is condemned in that court; I hope that the New Man (I and Christ together) will not be heard;[331] and this is the more soft and the more easy way for me and for my cross together. Seeing that Christ singeth my welcome home, and taketh me in, and maketh short accounts and short work of reckoning betwixt me and my Judge, I must be Christ's man, and His tenant, and subject to His court. I am sure that suffering for Christ could not be borne otherwise; but I give my hand and my faith to all who would suffer for Christ, that they shall be well handled, and fare well in the same way, that I have found the cross easy and light.

[331] Not be heard lifting up His voice in that court of the Law.

Grace be with you.

Yours, in his sweet Lord Jesus,

S. R.

ABERDEEN, _July_ 8, 1637.

CCXVII.--_To ALEXANDER GORDON of Garloch._

[ALEXANDER GORDON was proprietor of Garloch, an estate lying in
Kells, about five miles N. W. of New Galloway. It is often
corrupted into "Garroch." He was brother to Robert Gordon of
Knockbrex, formerly noticed. He was a warm promoter of the
Presbyterian cause in his day. Livingstone describes him as a
"very gracious person;" and mentions him as present at a private
meeting for prayer and Christian conference, with a number of
"eminent Christians." John Gordon of Knockbrex, and his brother
Robert, who were publicly executed in 1666, for being concerned
in the insurrection at Pentland Hills, were the grandchildren of
the subject of this notice. See Letter LXV. They were tried for
high treason and rebellion, and sentenced to be hanged at the
Cross of Edinburgh upon the 7th of December that year, their
goods confiscated, their bodies thereafter dismembered, and their
heads fixed on the gate of Kirkcudbright. Other eight were at the
same time condemned; and the arms of all the ten (because they
had with uplifted hands renewed the Covenant at Lanark, previous
to the engagement) were to be cut off and sent to that town, to
be fixed on the top of the prison. This sentence was executed in
all its parts. The case of all the sufferers, but particularly
that of the Gordons, who, as Wodrow informs us, "were youths of
shining piety, and good learning and parts," excited much
sympathy. When turned off the ladder, the two brothers clasped
each other in their arms, and in this affectionate embrace
endured the pangs of death. "They were lovely and pleasant in
their lives, and in their death they were not divided."

Livingstone, in the beginning of his "Historical Relation of his
Life," mentions meetings which he used to hold at Airds (where
Gordon of Earlston at one time resided), and at _Garloch_, or, as
it is printed in different editions, Gairleuch or Garleuch.
Gordon of Garloch was a warm friend to the truth. Gordon, the
"translator of Tacitus," was a descendant of this family.]

(_FREE GRACE FINDING ITS MATERIALS IN US._)

DEAR BROTHER,--Grace, mercy, and peace be to you.--If Christ were as I am, that time could work upon Him to alter Him, or that the morrow could bring a new day to Him, or bring a new mind to Him, as it is to me a new day, I could not keep a house or a covenant with Him. But I find Christ to be Christ, and that He is far, far, even infinite heavens' height above men; and that is all our happiness. Sinners can do nothing but make wounds, that Christ may heal them; and make debts, that He may pay them; and make falls, that He may raise them; and make deaths, that He may quicken them; and spin out and dig hells for themselves, that He may ransom them. Now, I will bless the Lord that ever there was such a thing as the free grace of God, and a free ransom given for sold souls: only, alas! guiltiness maketh me ashamed to apply to Christ, and to think it pride in me to put out my unclean and withered hand to such a Saviour. But it is neither shame nor pride for a drowning man to swim to a rock, nor for a shipbroken soul to run himself ashore upon Christ. Suppose once I be guilty,[332] needforce I dow not, I cannot, go by Christ. We take in good part that pride, viz. that beggars beg from the richer; and who so poor as we? and who so rich as He who selleth fine gold (Rev. iii. 18). I see, then, it is our best (let guiltiness plead what it listeth) that we have no mean under the covering of heaven, but to creep in lowly and submissively with our wants to Christ. I have also cause to give His cross a good name and report. Oh, how worthy is Christ of my feckless and light suffering! and how hath He deserved at my hands that, for His honour and glory, I should lay my back under seven hells' pains in one, if He call me to that! But, alas! my soul is like a ship run on ground through ebbness of water. I am sanded, and my love is stranded, and I find not how to bring it on float again. It is so cold and dead, that I see not how to being it to a flame. Fy, fy upon the meeting that my love hath given Christ. Wo, wo is me! I have a lover Christ, and yet I want love for Him! I have a lovely and desirable Lord, who is love-worthy, and who beggeth my love and heart, and I have nothing to give Him! Dear brother, come further in on Christ, and see a new treasure in Him. Come in, and look down, and see angels' wonder, and heaven and earth's wonder of love, sweetness, majesty, and excellency in Him.

[332] Suppose for once that I were guilty, I dare not pass Christ by.

I forget you not; pray for me, that our Lord would be pleased to send me among you again, fraughted and full of Christ.

Grace, grace be with you.

Yours, in his sweet Lord Jesus,

S. R.

ABERDEEN, 1637.

CCXVIII.--_To_ JOHN BELL, _Elder_.

[There is in the churchyard of Anwoth a tombstone to one of this
name, who died a martyr, and who lived at _Whiteside_. This
person may have been related to him. His name appears at a
petition of the elders and parishioners of Anwoth, presented to
the Commission of the General Assembly, against the removal of
Rutherford from that parish, when applications were made from St.
Andrews and Edinburgh respectively to obtain him. He is
designated "John Bell of Hentoun" (Murray's "Life of Rutherford,"
p. 356). Rutherford here reminds him that "old age was come upon
him." He appears, however, to have lived many years after this;
for so late as January 13, 1657, Marion Bell is retoured "heir of
John Bell of Hentoun, her grandsir," who was probably
Rutherford's correspondent. On the same day she is retoured heir
of "James Bell of Campbelltown in (Twynholm parish), her
guidsir;" and of "John Bell of Campbelltown, her father."
_Henton_ is a small croft, close to the school-house at Laggan,
as you go toward the sea-side from Ardwell to Kirkdale. It was
once a separate property. Before old Anwoth church was pulled
down (see Murray's "Life of Rutherford"), there stood a seat or
pew, on which were cut the letters "J. B." and the date "1631,"
understood to belong to this same person. And (though his
martyrdom occurred after Rutherford was gone to his rest) it may
be interesting here to notice that the ancestor of the martyr,
_John Bell of Whiteside_, in Anwoth, was connected with this
family. Whiteside is half a mile N.E. from Rutherford's Witnesses
on the Skyreburn Road. The ruins of the house where Bell stayed
are pointed out, half a mile from the modern farm; and almost in
the bed of the burn. Near the old ruin is a cave where he died.
The martyr's mother, too, was the grand-daughter of "The guidwife
of Ardwell" (see Letter CI.). His tomb (renewed a few years ago)
is a flat stone near the west end of the old church, with the
date 1685.

"This monument shall tell posterity
That blessed Bell of Whiteside here doth lie;
Who at command of bloody Lag was shot,
A murder strange which should not be forgot.
Douglas of Morton did him quarters give,
Yet cruel Lag would not let him survive.
This martyr sought some time to recommend
His soul to God, before his days did end:
The tyrant said, 'What, Devil? Ye've prayed eneuch
These long seven years on mountain and in cleugh.'
So instantly caused him, with other four,
Be shot to death upon Kirkconnel Moor.
So thus did end the lives of these dear saints
For their adhering to the Covenants."

On the wall is an old slab which contains what seems to be a
general motto for the Bells' burying-ground.]

(_DANGER OF TRUSTING TO A NAME--CONVERSION NO SUPERFICIAL WORK--EXHORTATION TO MAKE SURE._)

MY VERY LOVING FRIEND,--Grace, mercy, and peace be to you.--I have very often and long expected your letter; but if ye be well in soul and body, I am the less solicitous.

I beseech you, in the Lord Jesus, to mind your country above; and now, when old age (the twilight going before the darkness of the grave, and the falling low of your sun before your night) is come upon you, advise with Christ, ere ye put your foot into the ship, and turn your back on this life. Many are beguiled with this, that they are free of scandalous and crying abominations; but the tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is for the fire. The man that is not born again cannot enter into the kingdom of God. Common honesty will not take men to heaven. Alas! that men should think that ever they met with Christ, who had never a sick night, through the terrors of God in their souls, or a sore heart for sin! I know that the Lord hath given you light, and the knowledge of His will; but that is not all, neither will that do your turn. I wish you an awakened soul, and that ye beguile not yourself in the matter of your salvation. My dear brother, search yourself with the candle of God, and try if the life of God and Christ be in you. Salvation is not casten to every man's door. Many are carried over sea and land to a far country in a ship, while-as they sleep much of all the way; but men are not landed at heaven sleeping. The righteous are scarcely saved; and many run as fast as either you or I, who miss the prize and the crown. God send me salvation, and save me from a disappointment, and I seek no more. Men think it but a stride, or step over to heaven; but, when so few are saved (even of a number "like the sand of the sea--but a handful and a remnant," as God's word saith), what cause have we to shake ourselves, and to ask our poor soul, "Whither goest thou? where shalt thou lodge at night? where are thy charters and writs of thy heavenly inheritance?" I have known a man turn a key in a door, and lock it by.[333] Many men leap over, as they think, and leap in. Oh, see! see that ye give not your salvation a wrong cast, and think all is well, and leave your soul loose and uncertain. Look to your building, and to your ground-stone, and what signs of Christ are in you, and set this world behind your back. It is time, now in the evening, to cease from your ordinary work, and high time to know of your lodging at night. It is your salvation that is in dependence; and that is a great and weighty business, though many make light of the matter.

[333] Mislock, or turn the key so as to push the bolt past the socket
into which it should have been put.

Now, the Lord enable you by His grace to work it out.

Your lawful and loving pastor,

S. R.

ABERDEEN, 1637.

CCXIX.--_To_ MR. JOHN ROW.

[John Row, minister of Carnock, was probably the person to whom
this letter is addressed. It could not be his son, of the same
name, who afterwards became minister of St. Nicholas Church,
Aberdeen, and Principal of King's College; for he was at this
time master of the grammar school of Perth, and did not qualify
himself for the ministry till after the overthrow of Prelacy in
1638. John Row of Carnock, the third son of John Row (minister of
Perth, a distinguished Reformer and co-adjutor of Knox), was born
at Perth about the close of the year 1568. He was ordained
minister of Carnock at the end of the year 1592, where he
laboured with great assiduity and success. He opposed the Perth
Articles, and the introduction of Prelacy, with uncompromising
zeal. He is the author of a History of the Kirk of Scotland,
which has been printed by the Wodrow Society. He died on the 26th
of June 1646, aged seventy-eight.]

(_CHRIST'S CROSSES BETTER THAN THE WORLD'S JOYS--CHRIST EXTOLLED._)

REVEREND AND DEAR BROTHER,--I received yours. I bless His high and great name, that I like my sweet Master still the longer the better; a sight of His cross is more awsome than the weight of it. I think the worst things of Christ, even His reproaches and His cross (when I look on these not with bleared eyes), far rather to be chosen than the laughter and worm-eaten joys of my adversaries. Oh that they were as I am, except my bonds! My witness is above, that my ministry, next to Christ, is dearest to me of anything; but I lay it down at Christ's feet, for His glory and His honour as supreme Lawgiver, which is dearer to me.

My dear brother, if ye will receive the testimony of a poor prisoner of Christ, who dare not now dissemble for the world, I believe certainly, and expect thanks from the Prince of the kings of the earth, for my poor hazards (such as they are) for His honourable cause, whom I can never enough extol for His running-over love to my sad soul, since I came hither. Oh that I could get Him set on high and praised! I seek no more, as the top and root of my desires, than that Christ may make glory to Himself, and edification to the weaker (Phil. i. 14), out of my sufferings. I desire ye would help me both to pray and praise.

Grace be with you.

Yours, in his sweet Lord Jesus,

S. R.

ABERDEEN, _July 8, 1637_.

CCXX.--_To my Lord_ CRAIGHALL.

(_DUTY OF BEING DISENTANGLED FROM CHRIST--DISHONOURING COMPLIANCES._)

MY LORD,--I persuade myself that, notwithstanding the greatness of this temptation, ye will not let Christ want a witness of you, to avow Him before this evil generation. And if ye advise with God's truth (the perfect testament of Christ, that forbiddeth all men's additions to His worship), and with the truly learned, and with all the sanctified in this land, and with that warner within you (which will not fail to speak against you, in God's time, if ye be not now fast and fixed for Christ), I hope then that your Lordship will acquit yourself as a man of courage for Christ, and refuse to bow your knee superstitiously and idolatrously to wood or stone, or any creature whatsoever. I persuade myself that when ye shall take good night at this world, ye shall think it God's truth I now write.

Some fear that your Lordship hath obliged yourself to his Majesty by promise to satisfy his desire. If it be so, my dear and worthy Lord, hear me for your soul's good. Think upon swimming ashore after this shipwreck, and be pleased to write your humble apology to his Majesty; it may be that God will give you favour in his eyes. However it be, far be it from you to think a promise made out of weakness, and extorted by the terror of a king, should bind you to wrong your Lord Jesus. But for myself, I give no faith to that report, but I believe that ye will prove fast to Christ. To His grace I recommend you.

Your Lordship's, at all obedience in Christ,

S. R.

ABERDEEN, _July 8, 1637_.

CCXXI.--_For_ MARION M'NAUGHT.

(_HER PRAYERS FOR SCOTLAND NOT FORGOTTEN._)

WORTHY AND DEAREST IN THE LORD,--I rejoice that you are a partaker of the sufferings of Christ. Faint not, keep breath, believe; howbeit men, and husband, and friends prove weak, yet your strength faileth not. It is not pride for a drowning man to grip to the rock. It is your glory to lay hold on your Rock. O woman greatly beloved! I testify and avouch it in my Lord, that the prayers ye sent to heaven these many years bygone are come up before the Lord, and shall not be forgotten. What it is that will come, I cannot tell; but I know that, as the Lord liveth, these cries shall bring down mercy. I charge you, and those people with you, to go on without fainting or fear, and still believe, and take no nay-say. If ye leave off, the field is lost; if ye continue, our enemies shall be a tottering wall, and a bowing fence. I write it (and keep this letter), utter, utter desolation shall be to your adversaries, and to the haters of the Virgin-daughter of Scotland. The bride will yet sing, as in the days of her youth. Salvation shall be her walls and bulwarks. The dry olive-tree shall bud again, and dry dead bones shall live; for the Lord will prophesy to the dry bones, and the Spirit shall come upon them, and we shall live.

I rejoice to hear of John Carson! I shall not forget him. Remember me to Grizel and Jean Brown. Your husband hath made me heavy; but be courageous in the Lord. I send blessings to Samuel and William. Show them that I will them to seek God in their youth.

Grace is yours.

Yours, in his sweet Lord Jesus,

S. R.

ABERDEEN, _July 8, 1637_.

CCXXII.--_To my_ LADY CULROSS. [Letter LXII.]

(_CHRIST'S WAY OF SHOWING HIMSELF THE BEST--WHAT FITS FOR HIM--YEARNING AFTER HIM INSATIABLY--DOMESTIC MATTERS._)

MADAM,--Grace, mercy, and peace be to you.--I am much refreshed with your letter, now at length come to me. I find my Lord Jesus cometh not in that precise way that I lay wait for Him; He hath a gate of His own. Oh, how high are His ways above my ways! I see but little of Him. It is best not to offer to learn Him a lesson, but to give Him absolutely His own will, in coming, going, ebbing, flowing, and in the manner of His gracious working. I want nothing but a back-burden of Christ's love. I would go through hell, and the thick of the damned devils, to have a hearty feast of Christ's love; for He hath fettered me with His love, and run away, and left me a chained man.

Wo is me, that I was so loose, rash, vain, and graceless, in my unbelieving thoughts of Christ's love! But what can a soul, under a non-entry (when my rights were wadset and lost), do else, but make a false libel against Christ's love! I know that yourself, Madam, and many more, will be witness against me, if I repent not of my unbelief; for I have been seeking the Pope's wares, some hire for Grace within myself. I have not learned, as I should do, to put my stock and all my treasure into Christ's hand; but I would have a stock of mine own; and ere I was aware, I was taking hire to be the Law's advocate, to seek justification by works. I forgot that grace is the only garland that is worn in heaven upon the heads of the glorified. And now I half rejoice, that I have sickness for Christ to work upon. Since I must have wounds, well is my soul, I have a day's work for my Physician, Christ. I hope to give Christ His own calling: it setteth Him full well to cure diseases.

My ebbings are very low, and the tide is far out when my Beloved goeth away; and then I cry, "Oh, cruelty! to put out the poor man's one eye;" and this was my joy next to Christ, to preach my Well-beloved. Then I make a noise about Christ's house, looking unco-like in at His window, and casting my love and my desires over the wall, till God send better. I am often content that my bill lie in heaven till the day of my departure, providing I had assurance that mercy shall be written on the back of it. I would not care for on-waiting; but when I draw in a tired arm, and an empty hand withal, it is much to me to keep my thoughts in order. But I will not get a gate[334] for Christ's love. When I have done all I can, I would fain yield to His stream, and row with Christ, and not against Him. But while I live, I see that Christ's kingdom in me will not be peaceable, so many thoughts in me rise up against His honour and kingly power. Surely I have not expressed all His sweet kindness to me. I spare to do it, lest I be deemed to seek myself; but His breath hath smelled of the powders of the merchant, and of the King's spikenard. I think that I conceive new thoughts of heaven, because the card and the map of heaven which He letteth me now see is so fair and so sweet. I am sure that we are niggards, and sparing bodies in seeking. I verily judge that we know not how much may be had in this life; there is yet something beyond all that we see, that seeking would light upon. Oh that my love-sickness would put me to a business, when all the world are found sleeping, to cry and knock! But the truth is, that since I came hither I have been wondering that, after my importunity to have my fill of Christ's love, I have not gotten a real sign, but have come from Him crying, "Hunger! hunger!" I think that Christ letteth me see meat in my extremity of hunger, and giveth me none of it. When I am near the apple, He draweth back His hand, and goeth away to cause me follow; and again, when I am within an arm-length of the apple, He maketh a new break to the gate,[335] and I have Him to seek of new. He seemeth not to pity my dwining and swooning for His love. I dare sometimes put my hunger over to Him to be judged, if I would not buy Him with a thousand years in the hottest furnace in hell, so being I might enjoy Him. But my hunger is fed by want and absence. I hunger and I have not; but my comfort is to lie and wait on, and to put my poor soul and my sufferings into Christ's hand. Let Him make anything out of me, so being He be glorified in my salvation; for I know that I am made for Him. Oh that my Lord may win His own gracious end in me! I will not be at ease, while I but stand so far aback. Oh, if I were near Him and with Him, that this poor soul might be satisfied with Himself!

[334] Fix the way in which He is to show His love. Perhaps we should
read "set" for "get."

[335] Rushes off again toward the road.

Your son-in-law, W. G., is now truly honoured for his Lord and Master's cause. When the Lord is fanning Zion, it is a good token that he is a true branch of the vine, that the Lord beginneth first to dress him. He is strong in his Lord, as he hath written to me, and his wife is his encourager, which should make you rejoice.

As for your son, who is your grief, your Lord waited on you and me, till we were ripe, and brought us in. It is your part to pray and wait upon Him. When he is ripe, he will be spoken for. Who can command our Lord's wind to blow? I know that it shall be your good in the latter end. That is one of your waters to heaven, ye could not go about;[336] there are the fewer behind. I remember you and him, and yours, as I am able; but, alas! I am believed to be something, and I am nothing but an empty reed. Wants are my best riches, because I have these supplied by Christ.

[336] One of the rivers which you could not avoid crossing.

Remember my dearest love to your brother.[337] I know that he pleadeth with his harlot-mother for her apostasy. I know also that ye are kind to my worthy Lady Kenmure, a woman beloved of the Lord, who hath been very mindful of my bonds. The Lord give her, and her child, to find mercy in the day of Christ! Great men are dry and cold in doing for me; the tinkling of the chains for Christ affrighteth them: but let my Lord break all my idols, I will yet bless Him. I am obliged to my Lord Lorn: I wish him mercy.

[337] James Melville of Hallhill, who succeeded his father, Sir James
Melville. By a charter of the barony of Burntisland, granted to him
16th January 1638, he became Sir James Melville of Burntisland
(Douglas' "Peerage," vol. ii. p. 112).

Remember my bonds with praises; and pray for me, that my Lord may leaven the north by my bonds and sufferings.

Grace be with you.

Yours, in his sweet Lord Jesus,

S. R.

ABERDEEN, 1637.

CCXXIII.--_To ALEXANDER GORDON of Knockgray._

(_STATE OF THE CHURCH--BELIEVERS PURIFIED BY AFFLICTION--FOLLY OF SEEKING JOY IN A DOOMED WORLD._)

DEAR BROTHER,--Grace, mercy, and peace be to you.--There is no question but our mother-church hath a Father, and that she shall not die without an heir: her enemies shall not make Mount Zion their heritage. We see that whithersoever Zion's enemies go, suppose they dig many miles under ground, yet our Lord findeth them out: and He hath vengeance laid up in store for them, and the poor and needy shall not always be forgotten. Our hope was drooping and withering, and man was saying, "What can God make out of the old dry bones of this buried kirk?" The prelates and their followers were a grave above us. It is like that our Lord is to open our graves, and purposeth to cause His two slain witnesses to rise on the third day. Oh, how long wait I to hear our weeping Lord Jesus sing again, and triumph and rejoice, and divide the spoil!

I find it hard work to believe when the course of providence goeth cross-wise to our faith, and when misted souls in a dark night cannot know east by west, and our sea-compass seemeth to fail us. Every man is a believer in daylight: a fair day seemeth to be made all of faith and hope. What a trial of gold is it to smoke it a little above the fire! but to keep gold perfectly yellow-coloured amidst the flames, and to be turned from vessel to vessel, and yet to cause our furnace to sound, and speak, and cry the praises of the Lord, is another matter. I know that my Lord made me not for fire, howbeit He hath fitted me in some measure for the fire. I bless His high name that I wax not paler, neither have I lost the colour of gold; and that His fire hath made me somewhat thin, and that my Lord may pour me into any vessel He pleaseth. For a small wager I may justly quit my part of this world's laughter, and give up with time, and cast out with the pleasures of this world.

I know a man who wondered to see any in this life laugh or sport. Surely our Lord seeketh this of us, as to any rejoicing in present perishing things. I see above all things, that we may sit down, and fold legs and arms, and stretch ourselves upon Christ, and laugh at the feathers that children are chasing here. For I think the men of this world like children in a dangerous storm in the sea, that play and make sport with the white foam of the waves thereof, coming in to sink and drown them; so are men making fool's sports with the white pleasures of a stormy world, that will sink them. But, alas! what have we to do with their sports which they make? If Solomon said of laughter, that it was madness, what may we say of this world's laughing and sporting themselves with gold and silver, and honours, and court, and broad large conquests, but that they are poor souls, in the height and rage of a fever gone mad? Then a straw, a fig, for all created sports and rejoicing out of Christ! Nay, I think that this world, at its prime and perfection, when it is come to the top of its excellency and to the bloom, might be bought with an halfpenny; and that it would scarce weigh the worth of a drink of water. There is nothing better than to esteem it our crucified idol (that is, dead and slain), as Paul did (Gal. vi. 14). Then let pleasures be crucified, and riches be crucified, and court and honour be crucified. And since the apostle saith that the world is crucified to him, we may put this world to the hanged man's doom, and to the gallows: and who will give much for a hanged man? as little should we give for a hanged and crucified world. Yet, what a sweet smell hath this dead carrion to many fools in the world! and how many wooers and suitors findeth this hanged carrion! Fools are pulling it off the gallows, and contending for it. Oh, when will we learn to be mortified men, and to have our fill of those things that have but their short summer quarter of this life! If we saw our Father's house, and that great and fair city, the New Jerusalem, which is up above sun and moon, we would cry to be over the water, and to be carried in Christ's arms out of this borrowed prison.

Grace, grace be with you.

Yours, in his sweet Lord Jesus,

S. R.

ABERDEEN, 1637.

CCXXIV.--_To FULWOOD, the Younger._

[WILLIAM SEMPLE of Fulwood, in the parish of Houston, near
Kilmalcolm, in Renfrewshire, was probably connected with Semple
of Beltrees, in the parish of Lochwinnoch.]

(_VANITY OF THE WORLD IN THE LIGHT OF DEATH AND CHRIST--THE PRESENT TRUTH--CHRIST'S COMING._)

MUCH HONOURED SIR,--Grace, mercy, and peace be to you.--Upon the report of this worthy bearer concerning you, I thought good to speak a word to you. It is enough for acquaintance that we are one in Christ.

My earnest desire to you is, that ye would, in the fear of God, compare your inch and hand-breadth of time with vast eternity, and your thoughts of this now fair, blooming, and green world, with the thoughts which ye will have of it when corruption and worms will make their house in your eye-holes, and eat your flesh, and make that body dry bones. If ye so do, I know then that your light of this world's vanity shall be more clear than now it is; and I am persuaded ye will then think that men's labours for this clay idol are to be laughed at. Therefore, come near, and take a view of that transparent beauty that is in Christ, which would busy the love of ten thousand millions of worlds and angels, and hold them all at work. Surely I am grieved, that men will not spend their whole love upon that royal and princely Well-beloved, that high and lofty One; for it is cursed love that runneth another way than upon Him. As for myself, if I had ten loves and ten souls, oh, how glad would I be, if He would break in upon me and take possession of them all! Wo, wo is me, that He and I are so far asunder! I hope we shall be in one country and one house together. Truly pain of love-sickness for Jesus maketh me to think it long, long, long to the dawning of that day. Oh that He would cut short years and months and hours, and over-leap time, that we might meet!

And for this truth, Sir, that ye profess, I avow before the world of men and angels, that it is the way, and the only way to our country; the rest are by-ways; and, that what I suffer for is the apple of Christ's eye, even His honour as Lawgiver and King of His church. I think death too little ere I forsook it.[338] Do not, Sir, I beseech you in the Lord, make Christ's court thinner by drawing back from Him (it is too thin already); for I dare pledge my heaven upon it, that He will win His plea, and that the fools who plea against Him shall lose the wager, which is their part of salvation, except they take better heed to their ways. Sir, free grace, that we give no hire for, is a jewel that our Lord giveth to few. Stand fast in the hope that you are called unto. Our Master will rend the clouds, and will be upon us quickly, and clear our cause, and bring us all out in our blacks and whites. Clean, clean garments, in the Bridegroom's eye, are of great worth. Step over this hand-breadth of world's glory into our Lord's new world of grace, and ye will laugh at the feathers that children are chasing in the air. I verily judge, that this inn, which men are building their nest in, is not worth a drink of cold water. It is a rainy and smoky house: best we come out of it, lest we be choked with the smoke thereof. Oh that my adversaries knew how sweet my sighs for Christ are, and what it is for a sinner to lay his head between Christ's breasts, and to be over head and ears in Christ's love! Alas, I cannot cause paper to speak the height, and breadth, and depth of it! I have not a balance to weigh the worth of my Lord Jesus. Heaven, ten heavens, would not be the beam of a balance to weigh Him in. I must give over praising Him. Angels see but little of Him. Oh, if that fair one would take the mask off His fair face, that I might see Him! A kiss of Him through His mask is half a heaven. O day, dawn! O time, run fast! O Bridegroom, post, post fast, that we may meet! O heavens, cleave in two, that that bright face and head may set itself through the clouds! Oh that the corn were ripe, and this world prepared for His hook! Sir, be pleased to remember a prisoner's bonds. Grace be with you.

[338] "Ere I could be induced to forsake what concerns His honour, I
must be made to suffer something far more and worse than death."

Yours, in his sweet Lord Jesus,

S. R.

ABERDEEN, _July 10, 1637_.

CCXXV.--_To his Parishioners._

(_PROTESTATION OF CARE FOR THEIR SOULS AND GLORY OF GOD--DELIGHT
IN HIS MINISTRY, AND IN HIS LORD--EFFORTS FOR THEIR
SOULS--WARNING AGAINST ERRORS OF THE DAY--AWFUL WORDS TO THE
BACKSLIDER--INTENSE ADMIRATION OF CHRIST--A LOUD CALL TO ALL._)

DEARLY BELOVED AND LONGED-FOR IN THE LORD, my crown and my joy in the day of Christ,--Grace be to you, and peace from God our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.

I long exceedingly to know if the oft-spoken-of match betwixt you and Christ holdeth, and if ye follow on to know the Lord. My day-thoughts and my night-thoughts are of you: while ye sleep I am afraid of your souls, that they be off the rock. Next to my Lord Jesus and this fallen kirk, ye have the greatest share of my sorrow, and also of my joy; ye are the matter of the tears, care, fear, and daily prayers of an oppressed prisoner of Christ. As I am in bonds for my high and lofty One, my royal and princely Master, my Lord Jesus; so I am in bonds for you. For I should have slept in my warm nest, and kept the fat world in my arms, and the cords of my tabernacle should have been fastened more strongly; I might have sung an evangel of ease to my soul and you for a time, with my brethren, the sons of my mother, that were angry at me, and have thrust me out of the vineyard; if I would have been broken, and drawn on to mire you, the Lord's flock, and to cause you to eat pastures trodden upon with men's feet, and to drink foul and muddy waters. But truly the Almighty was a terror to me, and His fear made me afraid. O my Lord, judge if my ministry be not dear to me, but not so dear by many degrees as Christ my Lord! God knoweth the sad and heavy Sabbaths I have had, since I laid down at my Master's feet my two shepherd's staves. I have been often saying, as it is written, "My enemies chased me sore like a bird, without cause: they have cut off my life in the dungeon, and cast a stone upon me" (Lam. iii. 52, 53). For, next to Christ, I had but one joy, the apple of the eye of my delights, to preach Christ my Lord; and they have violently plucked that away from me. It was to me like the poor man's one eye; and they have put out that eye, and quenched my light in the inheritance of the Lord. But my eye is toward the Lord: I know that I shall see the salvation of God, and that my hope shall not always be forgotten. And my sorrow shall want nothing to complete it, and to make me say, "What availeth it me to live?" if ye follow the voice of a stranger, of one that cometh into the sheep-fold not by Christ the door, but climbeth up another way. If the man build his hay and stubble upon the golden foundation, Christ Jesus (already laid among you), and ye follow him, I assure you, the man's work shall burn and never bide God's fire: and ye and he both shall be in danger of everlasting burning except ye repent. Oh, if any pain, any sorrow, any loss that I can suffer for Christ, and for you, were laid in pledge to buy Christ's love to you! and that I could lay my dearest joys, next to Christ my Lord, in the gap betwixt you and eternal destruction! O if I had paper as broad as heaven and earth, and ink as the sea and all the rivers and fountains of the earth, and were able to write the love, the worth, the excellency, the sweetness, and due praises of our dearest and fairest Well-beloved! and then if ye could read and understand it! What could I want, if my ministry among you should make a marriage between the little bride in those bounds and the Bridegroom? Oh, how rich a prisoner were I, if I could obtain of my Lord (before whom I stand for you) the salvation of you all! Oh, what a prey had I gotten, to have you catched in Christ's net! Oh, then I had cast out my Lord's lines and His net with a rich gain! Oh then, well-wared pained breast, and sore back, and crazed body, in speaking early and late to you! My witness is above; your heaven would be two heavens to me, and the salvation of you all as two salvations to me. I would subscribe a suspension, and a fristing of my heaven for many hundred years (according to God's good pleasure), if ye were sure in the upper lodging, in our Father's house, before me. I take to witness heaven and earth against you, I take instruments in the hands of that sun and daylight that beheld us, and in the hands of the timber and walls of that kirk, if I drew not up a fair contract of marriage betwixt you and Christ, if I went not with offers betwixt the Bridegroom and you, and your conscience did bear you witness, your mouths confessed, that there were many fair trysts and meetings drawn on betwixt Christ and you at communion feasts, and other occasions? There were bracelets, jewels, rings, and love-letters, sent to you by the Bridegroom. It was told you what a fair dowry ye should have, and what a house your Husband and ye should dwell in, and what was the Bridegroom's excellency, sweetness, might, power, the eternity and glory of His kingdom, the exceeding deepness of His love, who sought His black wife through pain, fires, shame, death, and the grave, and swimmed the salt sea for her, undergoing the curse of the law, and then[339] was made a curse for you; and ye then consented, and said, "Even so I take Him." I counsel you to beware of the new and strange leaven of men's inventions, beside and against the word of God, contrary to the oath of this kirk, now coming among you. I instructed you of the superstition and idolatry in kneeling in the instant of receiving the Lord's Supper, and of crossing in baptism, and of the observing of men's days, without any warrant of Christ our perfect Lawgiver. Countenance not the surplice, the attire of the mass-priest, the garment of Baal's priests. The abominable bowing to altars of tree (wood) is coming upon you. Hate, and keep yourselves from idols. Forbear in any case to hear the reading of the new fatherless Service-Book,[340] full of gross heresies, popish and superstitious errors, without any warrant of Christ, tending to the overthrow of preaching. You owe no obedience to the bastard canons; they are unlawful, blasphemous, and superstitious. All the ceremonies that lie in Antichrist's foul womb, the wares of that great mother of fornications, the kirk of Rome, are to be refused. Ye see whither they lead you. Continue still in the doctrine which ye have received. Ye heard of me the whole counsel of God. Sew no clouts upon Christ's robe. Take Christ, in His rags and losses, and as persecuted by men, and be content to sigh and pant up the mountain, with Christ's cross on your back. Let me be reputed a false prophet (and your conscience once said the contrary), if your Lord Jesus will not stand by you and maintain you, and maintain your cause against your enemies.

[339] Thus.

[340] See Letter CLXI. The Service-Book, which has no author's name.

I have heard, and my soul is grieved for it, that since my departure from you, many among you are turned back from the good old way, to the dog's vomit again. Let me speak to these men. It was not without God's special direction, that the first sentence that ever my month uttered to you was that, "And Jesus said, For judgment I am come into this world, that they which see not might see; and that they which see might be made blind" (John ix. 39). Is it possible that my first meeting and yours may be when we shall both stand before the dreadful Judge of the world; and in the name and authority of the Son of God, my great King and Master, I write, by these presents, summonses to those men. I arrest their souls and bodies to the day of our compearance. Their eternal damnation standeth subscribed, and sealed in heaven, by the hand-writing of the great Judge of quick and dead; and I am ready to stand up, as a preaching witness against such to their face, on that day, and to say "Amen" to their condemnation, except they repent. The vengeance of the Gospel is heavier than the vengeance of the Law; the Mediator's malediction and vengeance is twice vengeance; and that vengeance is the due portion of such men. And there I leave them as bond men, aye and whill they repent and amend.

Ye were witnesses how the Lord's day was spent while I was among you. O sacrilegious robber of God's day, what wilt thou answer the Almighty when He seeketh so many Sabbaths back again from thee? What will the curser, swearer, and blasphemer do, when his tongue shall be roasted in that broad and burning lake of fire and brimstone? And what will the drunkard do, when tongue, lungs, and liver, bones, and all, shall boil and shall fry in a torturing fire? He shall be far from his barrels of strong drink then; and there is not a cold well of water for him in hell. What shall be the case of the wretch, the covetous man, the oppressor, the deceiver, the earth-worm, who can never get his wombful of clay (Ps. xvii. 14), when, in the day of Christ, gold and silver must lie burnt in ashes, and he must compear and answer his Judge, and quit his clayey and noughty heaven? Wo, wo, for evermore, be to the time-turning atheist, who hath one god and one religion for summer, and another god and another religion for winter, and the day of fanning, when Christ fanneth all that is in His barn-floor: who hath a conscience for every fair and market, and the soul of him runneth upon these oiled wheels, time, custom, the world, and command of men. Oh, if the careless atheist, and sleeping man, who edgeth by all with, "God forgive our pastors if they lead us wrong, we must do as they command," and layeth down his head upon time's bosom, and giveth his conscience to a deputy, and sleepeth so, whill the smoke of hell-fire fly up in his throat, and cause him to start out of his doleful bed! Oh, if such a man would awake! Many woes are for the over-gilded and gold-plastered hypocrite. A heavy doom is for the liar and white-tongued flatterer; and the flying book of God's fearful vengeance, twenty cubits long, and ten cubits broad, that goeth out from the face of God, shall enter into the house, and in upon the soul of him that stealeth, and sweareth falsely by God's name (Zech. v. 2, 3). I denounce eternal burning, hotter than Sodom's flames, upon the men that boil in filthy lusts of fornication, adultery, incest, and the like wickedness. No room, no, not a foot-breadth, for such vile dogs within the clean Jerusalem. Many of you put off all with this, "God forgive us, we know no better." I renew my old answer: the Judge is coming in flaming fire, with all His mighty angels, to render vengeance to all those that know not God, and believe not (2 Thess. i. 8). I have often told you that security will slay you. All men say they have faith: as many men and women now, as many saints in heaven. And all believe (say ye); so that every foul dog is clean enough, and good enough, for the clean and new Jerusalem above. Every man hath conversion and the new birth; but it is not leal come. They had never a sick night for sin; conversion came to them in a night-dream. In a word, hell will be empty at the day of judgment, and heaven pang full! Alas! it is neither easy nor ordinary to believe and to be saved. Many must stand, in the end, at heaven's gates (Luke xiii. 25). When they go to take out their faith, they take out a fair nothing, or (as ye use to speak) a blaflum. Oh, lamentable disappointment! I pray you, I charge you in the name of Christ, make fast work of Christ and salvation.