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MISTRESS,—Grace, mercy, and peace be to you.—My soul longeth once again to be amongst you, and to behold that beauty of the Lord, that I would see in His house; but I know not if He, in whose hands are all our ways, seeth it expedient for His glory. I owe my Lord, I know, submission of the spirit, suppose He would turn me into a stone, or pillar of salt. Oh that I were he in whom my Lord could be glorified! suppose my little heaven were forfeited, to buy glory to Him before men and angels; suppose my want of His presence, and separation from Christ, were a pillar as high as ten heavens for Christ's glory to stand upon, above all the world. What am I to Him? How little am I (though my feathers stood out as broad as the morning light) to such a high, to such a lofty, to such a never-enough-admired and glorious Lord! My trials are heavy, because of my sad Sabbaths; but I know that they are less than my high provocations. I seek no more than that Christ may be the gainer, and I the loser; that He may be raised and heightened, and I cried down, and my worth made dust before His glory. Oh that Scotland, all with one shout, would cry up Christ, and that His name were high in the land! I find the very utmost borders of Christ's high excellency and deep sweetness, heaven and earth's wonder. Oh, what is He? If I could but win in to see His inner side! Oh, I am run dry of loving, and wondering, and adoring of that greatest and most admirable One! Wo, wo is me, I have not half love for Him! Alas, what can my drop do to His great sea! What gain is it to Christ, that I have casten my little sparkle into His great fire! What can I give to Him? Oh that I had love to fill a thousand worlds, that I might empty my soul of it all upon Christ! I think I have just reason to quit my part of any hope or love that I have to this scum (and the refuse of the dross of God's workmanship), this vain earth. I owe to this stormy world (whose kindness and heart to me have been made of iron, or a piece of wild sea-island that never a creature of God lodged in) not a look: I owe it no love, no hope; and, therefore, oh, if my love were dead to it, and my soul dead to it! What am I obliged to this house of my pilgrimage? A straw for all that God hath made, to my soul's liking, except God, and that lovelyOne, Jesus Christ! Seeing I am not this world's debtor, I desire that I may be stripped of all confidence in anything but my Lord, that He may be for me, and I for my only, only, only Lord! that He may be the morning and evening tide, the top and the root of my joys, and the heart and flower and yolk of all my soul's delights! Oh, let me never lodge any creature in my heart and confidence! Let the house be for Him. I rejoice, that sad days cut off a piece of the lease of my short life; and that my shadow, even while I suffer, weareth long, and my evening hasteneth on. I have cause to love home with all my heart, and to take the opportunity of the day to hasten to the end of my journey, before the night come on, wherein a man cannot see to walk or work; that once, after my falls, I may at night fall in, weary and tired as I am, into Christ's bosom, and betwixt His breasts. Our prison cannot be our best country. This world looketh not like heaven and the happiness that our tired souls would be at; and, therefore, it were good to seek about for the wind, and hoist up our sails towards our New Jerusalem, for that is our Christ. Remember a prisoner to Christ. Grace, grace be with you.
Yours, in his only Lord and Master,
S. R.
Aberdeen, 1637.
m
MUCH HONOURED AND WORTHY SIR,—Your letter, full of complaints, bemoaning your guiltiness, hath humbled me. But give me leave to say that ye seem to be too far upon the law's side. Ye will not gain much to be the law's advocate. I thought ye had not been the law's but grace's man; nevertheless, I am sure that ye desire to take God's part against yourself. Whatever your guiltiness be, yet, when it falleth into the sea of God's mercy, it is but like a drop of blood fallen into the great ocean. There is nothing here to be done, but to let Christ's doom light on "the old man," and let him bear his condemnation, seeing in Christ he was condemned; for the law hath but power over your worst half. Let the blame, therefore, lie where the blame should be; and let the new man be sure to say, "I am comely as the tents of Kedar, howbeit I be black and sunburnt, by sitting neighbour beside abody of sin." I seek no more here than room for grace's defence, and Christ's white throne, whereto a sinner, condemned by the law, may appeal. But the use that I make of it is, I am sorry that I am not so tender and thin-skinned;[368]though I am sure that Christ may find employment for His calling in me, if in any living, seeing, from my youth upward, I have been making up the blackest process that any minister in the world, or any other, can answer to. And, when I had done this, I painted a providence of my own, and wrote ease for myself, and a peaceable ministry, and the sun shining on me, till I should be in at heaven's gates; such green and raw thoughts had I of God! I thought also of a sleeping devil, that would pass by the like of me, lying in muirs and outfields; so I bigged the gowk's nest and dreamed of dying at ease, and living in a fool's paradise. But since I came hither, I am often so as they would have much rhetoric that could persuade me, that Christ hath not written wrath on my dumb and silent Sabbaths; which is a persecution of the latest edition, being used against none in this land, that I can learn of, besides me. And often I lie under a non-entry, and would gladly sell all my joys to be confirmed free tenant of the King Jesus, and to have sealed assurances: but I see often blank papers. And my greatest desires are these two:—1. That Christ would take me in hand to cure me, and undertake for a sick man. I know that I should not die under His hand. And yet in this, while I still doubt, I believe through a cloud that sorrow (which hath no eyes) hath but put a vail on Christ's love. 2. It pleaseth Him often, since I came hither, to come with some short blinks of His sweet love. And then, because I have none to help me to praise His love, and can do Him no service in my own person (as I once thought I did in His temple), I die with wishes and desires to take up house and dwell at the well-side, and to have Him praised and set on high. But, alas! what can the like of me do, to get a good name raised upon my well-beloved Lord Jesus, suppose I could desire to be suspended for ever of my part of heaven, for His glory? I am sure, if I could get my will of Christ's love, and could once be over head and ears in the believed, apprehended, and seen love of the Son of God, it were the fulfilling of the desires of the only happiness I would be at. But the truth is, I hinder my communion with Him, because of the want of both faith and repentance, and because I will makean idol of Christ's kisses. I will neither lead nor drive,[369]except I see Christ's love run in my channel; and when I wait and look for Him the upper way, I see His wisdom is pleased to play me a slip, and come the lower way. So that I have not the right art of guiding Christ; for there is art and wisdom required in guiding of Christ's love aright when we have gotten it. Oh, how far are His ways above mine? Oh, how little of Him do I see! And when I am as dry as a burnt heath in a drouthy summer, and when my root is withered, howbeit I think then that I would drink a sea-full of Christ's love, ere ever I would let the cup go from my head, yet I get nothing but delays, as if He would make hunger my daily food. I think myself also hungered of hunger. The rich Lord Jesus satisfy a famished man. Grace be with you.
Your own, in his sweet Lord Jesus,
S. R.
Aberdeen,Sept. 10, 1637.
H
HONOURABLE AND CHRISTIAN LADY,—Grace, mercy, and peace be to you.—I cannot but write to your Ladyship of the sweet and glorious terms I am in with the most joyful King that ever was, under this well-thriving and prosperous cross. It is my Lord's salvation, wrought by His own right hand, that the water doth not suffocate the breath of hope, and joyful courage, in the Lord Jesus; for His own person is still in the camp with His poor soldier. I see that the cross is tied, with Christ's hand, to the end of an honest profession. We are but fools to endeavour to loose Christ's knot. When I consider the comforts of God, I durst not consent to sell or wadset my short liferent of the cross of the Lord Jesus. I know that Christ bought with His own blood a right to sanctified and blessed crosses, in so far as they blow me over the water to my long-desired home: and it were not good that Christ should be the buyer and I the seller. I know that time and death shall take sufferings fairly off my hand. I hope we shall have an honest parting at night, when this cold and frosty afternoon-tide of my evil and rough day shall be over. Well is my soul of either sweet or sour, that Christ hath any part or portion in: if He be at the one end of it, it shall be well with me. I shalldie ere I libel faults against Christ's cross. It shall have my testimonial under my hand, as an honest and saving mean of Christ for mortification and faith's growth. I have a stronger assurance, since I came over the Forth,[370]of the excellency of Jesus, than I had before. I am rather about Him than in Him, while I am absent from Him in this house of clay. But I would be in heaven, for no other cause than to essay and try what boundless joy it must be to be over head and ears in my well-beloved Christ's love. Oh that fair One hath my heart for evermore! But alas, it is over-little for Him! Oh, if it were better and more worthy for His sake! Oh, if I might meet with Him, face to face, on this side of eternity, and might have leave to plead with Him, that I am so hungered and famished here with the niggardly portion of His love that He giveth me! Oh that I might be carver and steward myself, at mine own will, of Christ's love (if I may lawfully wish this!); then would I enlarge my vessel (alas! a narrow and ebb soul), and take in a sea of His love. My hunger for it is hungry and lean, in believing that ever I shall be satisfied with that love: so fain would I have what I know I cannot hold. O Lord Jesus, delightest Thou, delightest Thou, to pine and torment poor souls with the want of Thy incomparable love? Oh, if I durst call Thy dispensation cruel! I know that Thou Thyself art mercy, without either brim or bottom; I know that Thou art a God bank-full of mercy and love; but, oh, alas! little of it cometh my way. I die to look afar off to that love, because I can get but little of it. But hope saith, "This Providence shall ere long look more favourably upon poor bodies," and on me also. Grace be with your Ladyship's spirit.
Your Ladyship's, in his sweet Lord Jesus,
S. R.
Aberdeen,Sept. 10, 1637.
R
RIGHT HONOURABLE,—Grace, mercy, and peace be to your Lordship.—I rejoice exceedingly to hear that your Lordship hath a good mind to Christ, and His now borne-down truth. My very dear Lord, go on, in the strength of the Lord, to carry your honours and worldly glory to the New Jerusalem. For this cause your Lordshipreceived these of the Lord. This is a sure way for the establishment of your house, if ye be of those who are willing, in your place, to build Zion's old waste places in Scotland. Your Lordship wanteth not God's and man's law both, now to come to the streets for Christ: and suppose the bastard laws of man were against you, it is an honest and zealous[371]error, if here you slip against a point or punctilio of standing policy. When your foot slippeth in such known ground, as is the royal prerogative of our high and most truly dread Sovereign (who hath many crowns on His head), and the liberties of His house, He will hold you up. Blessed shall they be who take Babel's little ones, and dash their heads against the stones. I wish your Lordship may have a share of that blessing, with other worthy nobles in our land.
It is true that it is now accounted wisdom for men to be partners in pulling up the stakes, and loosing the cords, of the tent of Christ. But I am persuaded, that that wisdom is cried down in heaven, and shall never pass for true wisdom with the Lord, whose word crieth shame upon wit against Christ and truth; and, accordingly, it shall prove shame and confusion of face in the end. Our Lord hath given your Lordship light of a better stamp, and learning also, wherein ye are not behind the disputer and the scribe. Oh what a blessed thing is it to see nobility, learning, and sanctification, all concur in one! For these ye owe yourself to Christ and His kingdom. God hath bewildered and bemisted the wit and the learning of the scribes and disputers of this time; they look asquint to the Bible. This blinding and bemisting world blindfoldeth men's light, that they are afraid to see straight out before them; nay, their very light playeth the knave, or worse, to truth. Your Lordship knoweth that, within a little while, policy against truth shall blush, and the works of men shall be burned up, even their spider's-web who spin out many hundred ells and webs of indifference in the Lord's worship; more than ever Moses, who would have[372]a hoof material (Exod. x. 26), and Daniel, who would have a look out at a window a matter of life and death, than ever, I say, these men of God dreamed of. Alas! that men dare to shape, carve, cut, and clip our King's princely testament in length and breadth, and in all dimensions, answerable to the conception of such policy, as a head-of-wit thinketh a safe and trim way of serving God! How have men forgotten the Lord, that they dare to go against even that truth which once they preached themselves, howbeit their sermonsnow be as thin sown as strawberries in a wood or wilderness! Certainly the sweetest and safest course is, for this short time of the afternoon of this old and declining world, to stand for Jesus. He hath said it, and it is our part to believe it, that ere it be long, "Time shall be no more, and the heaven shall wax old, as a garment." Do we not see it already an old holie and threadbare garment. Doth not cripple and lame nature tell us, that the Lord will fold up the old garment, and lay it aside; and that the heavens shall be folded together as a scroll, and this pesthouse shall be burnt with fire, and that both plenishing and walls shall melt with fervent heat? For at the Lord's coming, He will do with this earth, as men do with a leper-house; He will burn the walls with fire, and the plenishing of the house also (2 Pet. iii. 10, 12). My very dear Lord, how will ye rejoice in that day, to have Christ, angels, heaven, and your own conscience to smile upon you? I am persuaded that one sick night, through the terrors of the Almighty, would make men, whose conscience hath such a wide throat that an image like a cathedral church, would go down it, have other thoughts of Christ and His worship, than now they please themselves with. The scarcity of faith in the earth saith, "We are hard upon the last nick of time:" blessed are those who keep their garments clean against the Bridegroom's coming. There shall be spotted clothes, and many defiled garments, at His last Coming; and, therefore, few found worthy to walk with Him in white.
I am persuaded, my Lord, that this poor travailing Woman, our pained church, is with child of victory, and shall bring forth a Man-child all lovely and glorious, that shall be caught up to God and to His throne, howbeit the dragon, in his followers, be attending the childbirth pain, as an Egyptian midwife, to receive the birth and strangle it. But they shall be disappointed who thirst for the destruction of Zion. "They shall be as when a hungry man dreameth that he eateth, but, behold, he awaketh, and his soul is empty; or when a thirsty man dreameth that he drinketh, but, behold, he awaketh, and is faint, and his soul is not satisfied: so shall it be," I say, "with the multitude of all the nations that fight against Mount Zion" (Isa. xxix. 8). Therefore, the weak and feeble, those that are "as signs and wonders in Israel," have chosen the best side, even the side that victory is upon. And I think this is no evil policy.
Verily, for myself, I am so well pleased with Christ, and His noble and honest-borne cross, this cross that is come of Christ'shouse and is of kin to Himself, that I should weep if it should come to niffering and bartering of lots and condition with those that are "at ease in Zion." I hold still my choice, and bless myself in it. I see and I believe that there is salvation in this way, which is everywhere spoken against. I hope to go to eternity, and to venture on the last evil to the saints (even upon death), fully persuaded that this only, even this, is the saving way for racked consciences, and for weary and laden sinners to find ease and peace for evermore in. And, indeed, it is not for any worldly respect that I speak so of it. The weather is not so hot that I have great cause to startle in my prison, or to boast of that entertainment that my good friends, the prelates, intend for me (which is, banishment), if they shall obtain their desire, and effectuate what they design. But let it come; I rue not that I made Christ my wale and my choice; I think Him aye the longer the better.
My Lord, it shall be good service to God, to hold your noble friend and chief[373]upon a good course for the truth of Christ. Now the very God of peace establish your Lordship in Christ Jesus unto the end.
Your Lordship's, in his sweet Lord Jesus,
S. R.
Aberdeen,Sept. 10, 1637.
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REVEREND AND WELL-BELOVED BROTHER IN THE LORD,—I bless the Lord, who hath so wonderfully stopped the ongoing of that lawless process against you.[374]The Lord reigneth, and has a saving eye upon you and your ministry; and, therefore, fear not what men can do. I bless the Lord, that the Irish ministers find employment, and the professors comfort of their ministry. Believe me, I durst not, as I am now disposed, hold an honest brother out of the pulpit. I trust that the Lord will guard you, and hide you in the shadow of His hand. I am not pleased with any that are against you in that.
I see this, that, in prosperity, men's conscience will not startat small sins; but if some had been where I have been since I came from you, a little more would have caused their eyes to water, and trouble their peace. Oh how ready are we to incline to the world's hand! Our arguments, being well examined, are often drawn from our skin; the whole skin, and a peaceable tabernacle, is a topic-maxim in great request in our logic.
I find a little brairding of God's seed in this town, for the which the doctors have told me their mind, that they cannot bear with it, and have examined and threatened the people that haunt my company. I fear I get not leave to winter here; and whither I go I know not; I am ready at the Lord's call. I would I could make acquaintance with Christ's cross, for I find comforts lie to, and follow upon, the cross. I suffer in my name, by them; but I take it as a part of the crucifying of the old man. Let them cut the throat of my credit, and do as they like best with it. When the wind of their calumnies hath blown away my good name from me, in the way to heaven, I know that Christ will take my name out of the mire, and wash it, and restore it to me again. I would have a mind (if the Lord would be pleased to give me it) to be a fool for Christ's sake. Sometimes, while I have Christ in my arms, I fall asleep in the sweetness of His presence, and He, in my sleep, stealeth away out of my arms; and when I awake, I miss Him.
I am much comforted with my Lady Pitsligo, a good woman, and acquainted with God's ways.
Grace be with you.
Yours, in his sweet Lord Jesus,
S. R.
Aberdeen,Sept. 11, 1637.
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MUCH HONOURED SIR,—Howbeit I should have been glad to have seen you; yet, seeing that our Lord hath been pleased to break the snare of our adversaries, I heartily bless our Lord on your behalf. Our crosses for Christ are not made of iron; they are softer and of more gentle metal. It is easy for God to make a fool of the devil, the father of all fools. As for me, I but breathe out what my Lord breatheth in. The scum and froth of my letters I father upon my own unbelieving heart. I know that your Lordhath something to do with you, because Satan and malice have shot sore at you; but your bow abideth in its strength. Ye shall not, by my advice, be a halver with Christ, to divide the glory of your deliverance betwixt yourself and Him, or any other second mean whatsoever. Let Christ (as it setteth Him well) have all the glory and triumph His lone. The Lord set Himself on high in you.
1. I see that Christ can borrow a cross for some hours, and set His servants beside it, rather than under it, and win the plea too; yea, and make glory to Himself, and shame to His enemies, and comfort to His children out of it. But whether Christ buy or borrow crosses, He is King of crosses, and King of devils, and King over hell, and King over malice. When He was in the grave, He came out, and brought the keys with Him. He is Lord Jailor; nay, what say I? He is Captain of the castle, and He hath the keys of death and hell. And what are our troubles but little deaths? and He who commandeth the great castle commandeth the little also.
2. I see that a hardened face, and two skins upon our brows against the winter hail and stormy wind, is meetest for a poor traveller, in a winter journey to heaven. Oh, what art is it to learn to endure hardness, and to learn to go barefooted either through the devil's fiery coals, or his frozen waters!
3. I am persuaded that a sea-venture with Christ maketh great riches: is not the ship of our King Jesus coming home, and shall not we get part of the gold? Alas! we fools miscount our gain when we seem losers. Believe me, I have no challenges against this well-borne cross: for it is come of Christ's house, and is honourable, and is His propine. "To you it is given to suffer."—Oh, what fools are we, to undervalue His gifts, and to lightly that which is true honour! For if we could be faithful, our tackling shall not loose, or our mast break, or our sails blow into the sea. The bastard crosses, the kinless and base-born crosses of worldings for evil-doing, must be heavy and grievous; but our afflictions are light and momentary.
4. I think myself happy that I have lost credit with Christ, and that in this bargain I am Christ's sworn dyvour,[375]to whom He will lippen nothing, no, not one pin in the work of my salvation. Let me stand in black and white in the dyvour-book, before Christ. I am happy that my salvation is concredited[376]toChrist's mediation. Christ oweth no faith to me, to lippen anything to me; but oh what faith and credit I owe to Him! Let my name fall, and let Christ's name stand in honour with men and angels. Alas! I have no room to spread out my affection before God's people; and I see not how I can shout out and cry out the loveliness, the high honour, and the glory of my fairest Lord Jesus. Oh that He would let me have a bed to lie on, to be delivered of my birth, that I might paint Him out in His beauty to men, as I dow.
5. I wondered once at providence, and called white providence black and unjust, that I should be smothered in a town where no soul will take Christ off my hand. But providence hath another lustre with God than with my bleared eyes. I proclaim myself a blind body, who knoweth not black and white, in the unco course of God's providence. Suppose that Christ should set hell where heaven is, and devils up in glory beside the elect angels (which yet cannot be), I would I had a heart to acquiesce in His way, without further dispute. I see that infinite wisdom is the mother of His judgments, and that His ways pass finding out.
6. I cannot learn, but I desire to learn, to bring my thoughts, will, and lusts, in-under Christ's feet, that He may trample upon them. But, alas! I am still upon Christ's wrong side.
Grace be with you.
Yours, in his sweet Lord Jesus,
S. R.
Aberdeen,Sept. 12, 1637.
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MISTRESS,—Grace, mercy, and peace be to you.—I received your letter. I am heartily content, that ye love and own this oppressed and wronged cause of Christ; and that now, when so many have miscarried, ye are in any measure taken with the love of Jesus. Weary not, but come in and see if there be not more in Christ than the tongue of men and angels can express. If ye seek a gate to heaven, the way is in Him, or He is it. What ye want is treasured up in Jesus; and He saith, all His are yours. Even His kingdom, He is content to divide it betwixt Him and you:yea, His throne and His glory (Luke xxii. 29, 30; John xvii. 21; Rev. iii. 21). And, therefore, take pains to climb up to that besieged house to Christ; for devils, men, and armies of temptations are lying about the house, to hold out all that are out, and it is taken with violence. It is not a smooth and easy way, neither will your weather be fair and pleasant; but whosoever hath seen the invisible God, and the fair City, makes no reckoning of losses or crosses.Inye must be, cost you what it will. Stand not for a price, and for all that ye have, to win the castle. The rights to it are won to you, and it is disponed to you in the testament of your Lord Jesus (and see what a fair legacy your dying Friend, Christ, hath left you!), and there wanteth nothing but possession. Then get up in the strength of the Lord; get over the water to possess that good land. It is better than a land of olives and wine-trees; for the Tree of Life, that beareth twelve manner of fruits every month, is there before you; and a pure river of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb, is there. Your time is short; therefore lose no time. Gracious and faithful is He who hath called you to His kingdom and glory. The city is yours by free conquest, and by promise; and, therefore, let no unco lord-idol put you from your own. The devil hath cheated the simple heir of his paradise, and, by enticing us to taste of the forbidden fruit, hath as it were, bought us out of our kindly heritage. But our Lord Christ Jesus hath done more than bought the devil by;[377]for He hath redeemed the wadset, and made the poor heir free to the inheritance. If we knew the glory of our Elder Brother in heaven, we would long to be there to see Him, and to get our fill of heaven. We children think the earth a fair garden; but it is but God's outfield, and wild, cold, barren ground. All things are fading that are here. It is our happiness to make sure of Christ to ourselves.
Thus remembering my love to your husband, and wishing to him what I write to you, I commit you to God's tender mercy.
Yours, in his sweet Lord Jesus,
S. R.
Aberdeen,Sept. 13, 1637.
w2
WORTHY AND DEAR BROTHER,—I forget you not in my bonds. I know that you are looking to Christ; and I beseech you to follow your look. I can say more of Christ now by experience (though He be infinitely above and beyond all that can be said of Him), than when I saw you. I am drowned over head and ears in His love. Sell, sell, sell all things for Christ. If this whole world were the balk of a balance, it would not be able to bear the weight of Christ's love; men and angels have short arms to fathom it. Set your feet upon this piece of blue and base clay of an over-gilded and fair plastered world. An hour's kissing of Christ's is worth a world of worlds.
Sir, make sure work of your salvation: build not upon sand; lay the foundation upon the rock of Zion. Strive to be dead to this world, and to your will and lusts; let Christ have a commanding power and a king's throne in you. Walk with Christ, howbeit the world should take the hide off your face: I promise you that Christ will win the field. Your pastors cause you to err. Except you see Christ's word, go not one foot with them. Countenance not the reading of that Romish service-book. Keep your garments clean, as ye would walk with the Lamb clothed in white. The wrongs which I suffer are upon record in heaven. Our great Master and Judge will be upon us all, and bring us before the sun in our blacks and whites: blessed are they who watch and keep themselves in God's love. Learn to discern the Bridegroom's tongue, and to give yourself to prayer and reading. Ye were often a hearer of me. I would put my heart's blood on the doctrine which I taught, as the only way to salvation: go not from it, my dear brother. What I write to you, I write to your wife also. Mind heaven and Christ, and keep the spunk of the love of Christ which you have gotten. Christ will blow on it if ye entertain it; and your end shall be peace. There is a fire in our Zion, but our Lord is but seeking a new bride, refined and purified, out of the furnace. I assure you, howbeit we be nicknamed Puritans, that all the powers of the world shall not prevail against us. Remember, though a sinful man write it to you, that those people shall be in Scotland as a green olive-tree, and a field blessed of the Lord; and thatit shall be proclaimed, "Up, up with Christ, and down, down with all contrary powers."
Sir, pray forme(I nameyouto the Lord), for further evil is determined against me.
Remember my love to Christian Murray and her daughter. I desire her, in the edge of her evening, to wait a little; the King is coming, and He hath something that she never saw with Him. Heaven is no dream. "Come and see" will teach her best. Grace, grace be with you.
Yours, in his sweet Lord Jesus,
S. R.
Aberdeen,Sept. 13, 1637.
D
DEAREST IN OUR LORD JESUS,—Count it your honour, that Christ hath begun at you to refine you first. "Fear not," saith the Amen, the True and Faithful Witness. I write to you, as my Master liveth, upon the word of my royal King, continue in prayer and in watching, and your glorious deliverance is coming! Christ is not far off. A fig, a straw, for all the bits of clay that are risen against us! Ye shall thresh the mountains, and fan them like chaff (Isa. xli. 15, 16). If ye slack your hands at your meetings, and your watching to prayer, then it would seem that our Rock hath sold us; but be diligent, and be not discouraged. I charge you in Christ, to rejoice, give thanks, believe, be strong in the Lord. That burning bush in Galloway and Kirkcudbright shall not be burnt to ashes, for the Lord is in the bush. Be not discouraged that banishment is to be procured, by the King's warrant to the Council, against me: the earth is my Lord's. I am filled with His sweet love, and running over. I rejoice to hear that ye are on your journey. Such news as I hear, of all your faith and love, rejoice my sad heart.
Pray for me, for they seek my hurt; but I give myself to prayer. The blessing of my Lord, and the blessing of a prisoner of Christ be with you. O chosen and greatly beloved woman, faint not. Fy, fy; if ye faint now, ye lose a good cause. Double your meetings; cease not for Zion's sake, and hold not your peace till He make Jerusalem a praise in the earth.
Yours, in Christ Jesus his Lord,
S. R.
Aberdeen, 1637.
D
DEAR FRIEND,—I forget you not. It will be my joy that ye follow after Christ till ye find Him. My conscience is a feast of joy to me, that I fought in singleness of heart, for Christ's love, to put you upon the King's highway to our Bridegroom, and our Father's house. Thrice blessed are ye, my dear brother, if ye hold the way.
I believe that ye and Christ once met; I hope ye will not sunder with Him. Follow the counsel of the man of God, Mr. William Dalgleish. If ye depart from what I taught you in a hair-breadth, for fear or favour of men, or desire of ease in this world, I take heaven and earth to witness that ill shall come upon you in the end. Build not your nest here. This world is a hard, ill-made bed; no rest is in it for your soul. Awake, awake, and make haste to seek that Pearl, Christ, that this world seeth not. Your night and your Master Christ will be upon you within a clap; your hand-breadth of time will not bide you. Take Christ, howbeit a storm follow Him. Howbeit this day be not yours and Christ's, the morrow will be yours and His. I would not exchange the joy of my bonds and imprisonment for Christ, with all the joy of this dirty and foul-skinned world. I have a love-bed with Christ, and am filled with His love.
I desire your wife to do what I write to you. Let her remember how dear Christ will be to her, when her breath turneth cold, and the eye-strings shall break. Oh, how joyful should my soul be, to know that I had brought on a marriage betwixt Christ and that people, few or many! If it be not so, I shall be wo to be a witness against them. Use prayer: love not the world: be humble, and esteem little of yourself. Love your enemies, and pray for them. Make conscience of speaking truth, when none knoweth but God. I never eat, but I pray for you all. Pray for me. Ye and I shall see one another up in our Father's house. I rejoice to hear that your eye is upon Christ. Follow on, hing on, and quit Him not. The Lord Jesus be with your spirit.
Your affectionate brother, in our Lord Jesus,
S. R.
Aberdeen, 1637.
[George Dunbarwas minister of Ayr. Adhering with zeal to Presbytery, he was summoned before the High Commission Court in the beginning of the year 1622. On appearing, he gave in a paper declining its authority; but the Court passed sentence of deprivation upon him, and condemned him to be confined within Dumfries. He was ejected from this charge also. When the messenger of the Court came to his house on this last occasion, either to summon him or to intimate his sentence, a young daughter of his said, "And Pharaoh's heart is still hardened!" while all that Dunbar said was to bid his wife "prepare her creels again;" for, on the former occasion, the children, being young, behoved to be carried away on horseback in creels (Livingstone's "Characteristics"). He was for a long time prisoner at Blackness; but at length, being banished by the Privy Council, he removed to Ireland. He first preached at Carrickfergus, and ultimately settled at Larne, where he discharged his ministry with diligence and success. On being deposed by the Bishop of Down, in 1634, for nonconformity, he came over to Scotland, and after the triumph of Presbytery, in 1638, became minister of the parish of Calder, in Lothian, where he died.]
[George Dunbarwas minister of Ayr. Adhering with zeal to Presbytery, he was summoned before the High Commission Court in the beginning of the year 1622. On appearing, he gave in a paper declining its authority; but the Court passed sentence of deprivation upon him, and condemned him to be confined within Dumfries. He was ejected from this charge also. When the messenger of the Court came to his house on this last occasion, either to summon him or to intimate his sentence, a young daughter of his said, "And Pharaoh's heart is still hardened!" while all that Dunbar said was to bid his wife "prepare her creels again;" for, on the former occasion, the children, being young, behoved to be carried away on horseback in creels (Livingstone's "Characteristics"). He was for a long time prisoner at Blackness; but at length, being banished by the Privy Council, he removed to Ireland. He first preached at Carrickfergus, and ultimately settled at Larne, where he discharged his ministry with diligence and success. On being deposed by the Bishop of Down, in 1634, for nonconformity, he came over to Scotland, and after the triumph of Presbytery, in 1638, became minister of the parish of Calder, in Lothian, where he died.]
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REVEREND AND DEARLY BELOVED IN THE LORD,—Grace, mercy, and peace be to you.—Because your words have strengthened many, I was silent, expecting some lines from you in my bonds; and this is the cause why I wrote not to you. But now I am forced to break off and speak. I never believed, till now, that there was so much to be found in Christ on this side of death and of heaven. Oh, the ravishments of heavenly joy that may be had here, in the small gleanings of comforts that fall from Christ! What fools are we who know not, and consider not the weight and the telling that is in the very earnest-penny, and the first-fruits of our hoped-for harvest! How sweet, how sweet is our infeftment! oh, what then must personal possession be! I find that my Lord Jesus hath not miscooked or spilled this sweet cross; He hath an eye on the fire and the melting gold, to separate the metal and the dross. Oh how much time would it take me to read my obligations to Jesus my Lord, who will neither have the faith of His own to be burnt to ashes, nor yet will have a poor believer in the fire to be half raw, like Ephraim's unturned cake! This is the wisdom of Him who hath His fire in Zion, and furnace in Jerusalem. I need not either bud or flatter temptations and crosses, nor strive to buy the devil or this malicious world by, or redeem their kindness with half a hair-breadth of truth. He who is surety for His servant for good doth powerfully overrule all that. I see my prison hath neitherlock nor door: I am free in my bonds, and my chains are made of rotten straw; they shall not bide one pull of faith. I am sure that there are those in hell who would exchange their torments with our crosses, suppose they should never be delivered, and give twenty thousand years' torment to boot, to be in our bonds for ever. And, therefore, we wrong Christ who sigh, and fear, and doubt, and despond in them. Our sufferings are washen in Christ's blood, as well as our souls; for Christ's merits brought a blessing to the crosses of the sons of God. And Jesus hath a back-bond of all our temptations, that the free-warders shall come out by law and justice, in respect of the infinite and great sum that the Redeemer paid. Our troubles owe us a free passage through them. Devils, and men, and crosses, are our debtors, death and all storms are our debtors, to blow our poor tossed bark over the water fraught-free, and to set the travellers on their own known ground. Therefore we shall die, and yet live. We are over the water some way already. We are married, and our tocher-good is paid. We are already more than conquerors. If the devil and the world knew how the court with our Lord shall go, I am sure they would hire death to take us off their hand. Our sufferings are only the wreck and ruin of the black kingdom; and yet a little, and the Antichrist must play himself with bones and slain bodies of the Lamb's followers; but withal we stand with the hundred forty and four thousand, who are with the Lamb, upon the top of Mount Zion. Antichrist and his followers are down in the valley ground: we have the advantage of the hill; our temptations are always beneath. Our waters are beneath our breath:[378]"as dying, and behold we live." I never heard before of a living death, or a quick death, but ours: our death is not like the common death. Christ's skill, His handywork, and a new cast of Christ's admirable art, may be seen in our quick death. I bless the Lord, that all our troubles come through Christ's fingers, and that He casteth sugar among them, and casteth in some ounce-weights of heaven, and of the Spirit of glory that resteth on suffering believers, into our cup, in which there is no taste of hell. My dear brother, ye know all these better than I. I send water to the sea, to speak of these things to you; but it easeth me to desire you to help me to pay my tribute of praise to Jesus. Oh what praises I owe Him! I would I were in my free heritage, that I might begin to pay my debtsto Jesus. I entreat for your prayers and praises. I forget not you.
Your brother and fellow-sufferer in and for Christ,
S. R.
Aberdeen,Sept. 17, 1637.