M Y VERY DEAR BROTHER,—Grace, mercy, and peace be unto you.—I thought to have answered your two letters on this occasion, though I cannot say all that I would. Your timeous word, "not to delight in the cross, but in Him who sweeteneth it," came to me in due time. I find the consolation and off-fallings that follow the cross of Christ so sweet, that I almost forget myself. My desire and purpose is, when Christ's honeycombs drop, neither to refuse to receive and feed upon His comforts, nor yet to make joy my bastard-god, or my new-found heaven. But what shall I say? Christ very often in His sweet comforts cometh unsent for, and it were a sin to close the door upon Him. It is not unlawful to love and delight in Christ's apples, when I am not dotingly wooing, nor eagerly begging kisses; but when they come clean from the timber[398] (like kindness itself, that cometh of its own accord), then I cannot but laugh upon Him who laugheth upon me. If joy and comforts come single and alone, without Christ Himself, I think I would send them back again the gate they came, and not make them welcome; but, when the King's train cometh, and the King in the midst of the company, oh how I am overjoyed with floods of love! I fear not that too great spaits of love wash away the growing corn, and loose my plants at the roots. Christ doeth no skaith, where He cometh; but certainly, I would wish such spiritual wisdom, as to love the Bridegroom better than His gifts, His propines, or drink-money. I would be further in upon Christ than at His joys. They but stand in the outer side of Christ; I would wish to be in, as a seal upon His heart, in where His love and mercy lodgeth, beside His heart. My Well-beloved hath ravished me; but it is done with consent of both parties, and it is allowable enough. But, my dear brother, ere I part with this subject, I must tell you (that ye may lift up my King in praises with me), Christ hath been keeping something these fourteen years for me, that I have now gotten in my heavy days that I am in for His name's sake, even an opened coffer of perfumed comforts, and fresh joys, coming new, and green, and powerful, from the fairest face of Christ my Lord. Let the sour law, let crosses, let hell be cried down; love, love hath shamed me from my old ways. Whether I have a race to run, or some work to do, I see not; but I think Christ seemeth to leave heaven (to say so), and His court, and come down to laugh, and play, and sport with a daft bairn.
I am not thus plain with many I write to. It is possible I be misconstructed, and deemed to seek a name. But my witness above knoweth that I seek to have a good name raised upon Christ. I observe it to be our folly, to seek little from Christ, because our four-hours may not be our supper, nor our propines sent by the Bridegroom our tocher-good, nor our earnest our principal sum. But I trow that few of us know how much may be had of Christ for a four-hours, and a propine, and an earnest. We are like the young heir, who knoweth not the whole bounds of his own lordship. Certainly it is more than my part to say, "O sweetest Lord Jesus, what howbeit I were split and broken into five thousand shreds or bits of clay, so being that every shred had a heart to love Thee, and every one as many tongues as there are in heaven to sing praises to Thee, before men and angels for evermore!" Therefore, if my sufferings cry goodness, and praise, and honour upon Christ, my stipend is well paid. Each one knoweth not what a life Christ's love is. Scaur not at suffering for Christ; for Christ hath a chair, and a cushion, and sweet peace for a sufferer. Christ's trencher from the first mess of the high table is for a sinful witness. Oh, then, brother, who but Christ! who but Christ! Hold your tongue off lovers, where He cometh out. O all flesh, O dust and ashes, O angels, O glorified spirits, O all the shields of the world, be silent before Him! Come hither, and behold our Bridegroom; stand still and wonder for evermore at Him! Why cease we to love and wonder, to kiss and adore Him? It is a hard matter, that days lie betwixt Him and me, and hold us asunder. Oh, how long, how long! Oh, how many miles are there to my Bridegroom's dwelling-house! It is a pain to frist Christ's love any longer. But, it may be that a drunken man lose his feet, and miss a step. Ye write to me "Hall-binks are slippery." I do not think my dawting world will still[399] last, and that feasts will be my ordinary food. I would have humility, patience, and faith to set down both my feet, when I come to the north side of the cold and thorny hill. It is ill my common to be sweer to go an errand for Christ, and to take the wind upon my face for Him. Lord, let me never be a false witness, to deny that I saw Christ take the pen in His hand, and subscribe my writs.
My dear brother, ye complain to me that ye cannot hold sight of me. But were I a footman, I would go at leisure; but sometimes the King taketh me into His coach, and draweth me, and then I outrun myself. But, alas! I am still a forlorn transgressor. Oh how unthankful! I will not put you off your sense of darkness; but let me say this, "Who gave you proctor-fee, to speak for the law, which can speak for itself better than ye can do?" I would not have you to bring your dittay in your own bosom with you to Christ. Let the "old man" and the "new man" be summoned before Christ's white throne, and let them be confronted before Christ, and let each of them speak for themselves. I hope, howbeit the new man complain of his lying among pots, which maketh the believer look black, yet he can also say, "I am comely as the tents of Kedar." Ye shall not have my advice not to bemoan your deadness; but I find by some experience (which ye knew before I knew Christ), that it suiteth not a ransomed man, of Christ's buying, to go and plea for the sour law, our old forcasten husband; for we are not now under the law (as a covenant), but under grace. Ye are in no man's common, but Christ's. I know that He bemoaneth you more than you do yourself. I say this, because I am wearied of complaining. I thought it had been humility to imagine that Christ was angry with me, both because of my dumb Sabbaths, and my hard heart; but I feel now nothing but aching wounds. My grief, whether I will or not, swelleth upon me. But let us die in grace's hall-floor, pleading before Christ. I deny nothing that the Mediator will challenge me of; but I turn it all back upon Himself. Let Him look His own old accounts, if He be angry; for He will get no more of me. When Christ saith, "I want repentance," I meet Him with this: "True, Lord, but Thou art made a King and a Prince to give me repentance" (Acts v. 34). When Christ bindeth a challenge upon us, we must bind a promise back upon Him. Be wo, and lay yourself in the dust before God (which is suitable), but withal let Christ take the payment in His own hand, and pay Himself off the first end of His own merits; else He will come behind for anything that we can do. I am every way in your case, as hard-hearted and dead as any man; but yet I speak to Christ through my sleep. Let us then proclaim a free market for Christ, and swear ourselves bare, and cry on Him to come without money and buy us, and take us home to our Ransom-payer's fireside, and let us be Christ's free-boarders. Because we dow not pay the old, we may not refuse to take on Christ's new debt of mercy; let us do our best, Christ will still be behind with us,[400] and many terms will run together. For my part, let me stand for evermore in His book, as a forlorn dyvour. I must desire to be thus far in His common of new, as to kiss His feet. I know not how to win to a heartsome fill and feast of Christ's love; for I dow neither buy, nor beg, nor borrow, and yet I cannot want it. I dow not want it! Oh, if I could praise Him! yea I would rest content with a heart submissive and dying of love for Him. And, howbeit I never win personally in at heaven's gates, oh, would to God I could send in my praises to my incomparable Well-beloved, or cast my love-songs of that matchless Lord Jesus over the walls, that they might light in His lap, before men and angels!
Now, grace, grace be with you. Remember my love to your wife and daughter, and brother John.
Yours, in his sweet Lord Jesus,
S. R.
Aberdeen, June 11, 1638.
W ORTHY, AND WELL-BELOVED IN CHRIST JESUS OUR LORD,—Grace, mercy, and peace be to you.—Your letters could not come to my hand in a greater throng of business that I am now pressed with at this time, when our kirk requireth the public help of us all. Yet I cannot but answer the heads of both your letters, with provision that ye choose, after this, a fitter time for writing. 1. I would not have you to pitch upon me, as the man able by letters to answer doubts of this kind, while there are in your bounds men of such great parts, most able for this work. I know that the best are unable; yet it pleaseth that Spirit of Jesus to blow His sweet wind through a piece of dry stick, that the empty reed may keep no glory to itself. But a minister can make no such wind as this to blow; he is scarce able to lend it a passage to blow through Him. 2. Know that the wind of this Spirit hath a time when it bloweth sharp, and pierceth so strongly, that it would blow through an iron door; and this is commonly rather under suffering for Christ than at any other time. Sick children get of Christ's pleasant things, to play them withal, because Jesus is most tender of the sufferer, for He was a sufferer Himself. Oh, if I had but the leavings and the drawing of the bye-board of a sufferer's table! But I leave this to answer yours.
I. Ye write, that God's vows are lying on you; and security, strong and sib to nature, stealing on you who are weak. I answer: 1. Till we be in heaven, the best have heavy heads, as is evident. Cant. v. 1; Ps. xxx. 6; Job xxix. 18; Matt. xxvi. 33. Nature is a sluggard, and loveth not the labour of religion; therefore, rest should not be taken, till we know that the disease is over, and in the way of turning, and that it is like a fever past the cool. And the quietness and the calms of the faith of victory over corruption should be entertained, in place of security; so that if I sleep, I should desire to sleep faith's sleep in Christ's bosom. 2. Know, also, that none who sleep sound can seriously complain of sleepiness. Sorrow for a slumbering soul is a token of some watchfulness of spirit. But this is soon turned into wantonness, as grace in us too often is abused; therefore, our waking must be watched over, else sleep will even grow out of watching, and there is as much need to watch over grace as to watch over sin. Full men will soon sleep, and sooner than hungry men. 3. For your weakness to keep off security, that like a thief stealeth upon you, I would say two things:—(1.) To "want complaints of weakness" is for heaven, and angels that never sinned, not for Christians in Christ's camp on earth. I think that our weakness maketh us the church of the redeemed ones, and Christ's field that the Mediator should labour in. If there were no diseases on earth, there need be no physicians on earth. If Christ had cried down weakness, He might have cried down His own calling; but weakness is our Mediator's world; sin is Christ's only, only fair and market. No man should rejoice at weakness and diseases; but I think that we may have a sort of gladness at boils and sores, because, without them, Christ's fingers (as a slain Lord) would never have touched our skin. I dare not thank myself, but I dare thank God's depth of wise providence, that I have an errand in me while I live, for Christ to come and visit me, and bring with Him His drugs and His balm. Oh, how sweet is it for a sinner to put his weakness into Christ's strengthening hand, and to father a sick soul upon such a Physician, and to lay weakness before Him to weep upon Him, and to plead and pray! Weakness can speak and cry, when we have not a tongue. "And when I passed by thee, and saw thee polluted in thine own blood, I said unto thee, when thou wast in thy blood, Live" (Ezek. xvi. 6). The kirk could not speak one word to Christ then: but blood and guiltiness out of measure spake, and drew out of Christ pity, and a word of life and love. (2.) As for weakness, we have it that we may employ Christ's strength because of our weakness. Weakness is to make us the strongest things; that is, when, having no strength of our own, we are carried upon Christ's shoulders, and walk as it were upon His legs. If our sinful weakness swell up to the clouds, Christ's strength will swell up to the sun, and far above the heaven of heavens.
II. Ye tell me, that there is need of counsel for strengthening of new beginners. I can say little to that, who am not well begun myself: but I know that honest beginnings are nourished by Him, even by lovely Jesus, who never yet put out a poor man's dim candle that is wrestling betwixt light and darkness. I am sure, that if new beginners would urge themselves upon Christ, and press their souls upon Him, and importune Him for a draught of His sweet love, they could not come wrong to Christ. Come once in upon the right nick and step of His lovely love, and I defy you to get free of Him again. If any beginners fall off Christ again, and miss Him, they never lighted upon Christ as Christ: it was but an idol, like Jesus, which they took for Him.
III. Whereas ye complain of a dead ministry in your bounds; ye are to remember that the Bible among you is the contract of marriage; and the manner of Christ's conveying His love to your heart is not so absolutely dependent upon even lively preaching, as that there is no conversion at all, no life of God, but that which is tied to a man's lips. The daughters of Jerusalem have done often that which the watchman could not do. Make Christ your minister. He can woo a soul at a dykeside in the field. He needeth not us, howbeit the flock be obliged to seek Him in the shepherds' tents. Hunger, of Christ's making, may thrive even under stewards who mind not the feeding of the flock. O blessed soul, that can leap over a man, and look above a pulpit up to Christ, who can preach home to the heart, howbeit we were all dead and rotten.
IV. So to complain of yourselves, as to justify God, is right; providing ye justify His Spirit in yourselves. For men seldom advocate against Satan's work and sin in themselves, but against God's work in themselves. Some of the people of God slander God's grace in their souls; as some wretches used to do, who complain and murmur of want ("I have nothing," say they; "all is gone, the ground yieldeth but weeds and windlestraws"), whenas their fat harvest, and their money in bank, maketh them liars. But for myself, alas! I think it is not my sin; I have scarce wit to sin this sin. But I advise you to speak good of Christ, for His beauty and sweetness, and speak good of Him for His grace to yourselves.
V. Light remaineth, ye say, but ye cannot attain to painfulness. See if this complaint be not booked in the New Testament; and the place is like this, "To will is present with me, but how to perform that which is good I know not" (Rom. vii. 18). But every one hath not Paul's spirit in complaining: for often, in us, complaining is but an humble backbiting and traducing of Christ's new work in the soul. But for the matter of the complaint; I would say, that the light of glory is perfectly obeyed in loving, and praising, and rejoicing, and resting in a seen and known Lord; but that light is not hereaway in any clay body. For while we are here, light is (in the most) broader and longer than our narrow and feckless obedience. But if there be light, with a fair train and a great back (I mean, armies) of challenging thoughts, and sorrow for coming short of performance in what we know and see ought to be performed, then that sorrow for not doing is accepted of our Lord for doing. Our honest sorrow and sincere aims, together with Christ's intercession, pleading that God would welcome that which we have, and forgive what we have not, must be our life, till we be over the bound-road, and in the other country, where the law will get a perfect soul.
VI. In Christ's absence, there is, as ye write, a willingness to use means, but heaviness after the use of them, because of formal and slight performance. In Christ's absence, I confess, the work lieth behind. But if ye mean absence of comfort, and absence of sense of His sweet presence, I think that absence is Christ's trying of us, not simply our sin against Him. Therefore, howbeit our obedience be not sugared and sweetened with joy (which is the sweetmeat bairns would still be at), yet the less sense, and the more willingness in obeying, the less formality in our obedience. Howbeit, we think not so; for I believe that many think obedience formal and lifeless, except the wind be fair in the west, and sails filled with joy and sense, till souls, like a ship fair before the wind, can spread no more sail. But I am not of their mind, who think so. But if ye mean, by absence of Christ, the withdrawing of His working grace, I see not how willingness to use means can be at all, under such an absence. Therefore, be humbled for heaviness in that obedience, and thankful for willingness; for the Bridegroom is busking His spouse oftentimes, while she is half sleeping; and your Lord is working and helping more than ye see. Also, I recommend to you heaviness for formality, and for lifeless deadness in obedience. Be casten down, as much as ye will or can, for deadness; and challenge that dull and slow carcase of sin, that will neither lead nor drive, in your spiritual obedience. Oh, how sweet to lovely Jesus are bills and grievances, given in against corruption and the body of sin! I would have Christ, in such a case, fashed (if I may speak so), and deaved with our cries, as ye see the Apostle doeth, "Oh, wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death?" (Rom. vii. 24). Protestations against the law of sin in you are law-grounds why sin can have no law against you. Seek to have your protestation discussed and judged, and then shall ye find Christ on your side of it.
VII. Ye hold, that Christ must either have hearty service, or no service at all. If ye mean that He will not have half a heart, or have feigned service, such as the hypocrites give Him, I grant you that; Christ must have honesty or nothing. But if ye mean, He will have no service at all where the heart draweth back in any measure, I would not that were true for my part of heaven, and all that I am worth in the world. If ye mind to walk to heaven without a cramp or a crook,[402] I fear that ye must go your lone. He knoweth our dross and defects; and sweet Jesus pitieth us, when weakness and deadness in our obedience is our cross, and not our darling.
VIII. The Liar (John viii. 44), as ye write, challengeth the work as formal; yet ye bless your Cautioner for the ground-work He hath laid, and dare not say but ye have assurance in some measure. To this I say: 1. It shall be no fault to save Satan's labour, and challenge it yourselves,[403] or at least examine and censure; but beware of Satan's ends in challenging, for he mindeth to put Christ and you at odds. 2. Welcome home faith in Jesus, who washeth still, when we have defiled our souls and made ourselves loathsome; and seek still the blood of atonement for faults little or meikle. Know the gate to the well, and lie about it. 3. Make meikle of assurance, for it keepeth your anchor fixed.
IX. Outbreakings, ye say, discourage you, so that ye know not if ever ye shall win again to such overjoying consolations of the Spirit in this life, as formerly ye had; and, therefore, a question may be, If, after assurance and mortification, the children of God be ordinarily fed with sense and joy? I answer: I see no inconvenience to think it is enough, in a race, to see the goal at the starting-place, howbeit the runners never get a view of it till they come to the rink's end; and that our wise Lord thinketh it fittest that we should not always be fingering and playing with Christ's apples. Our Well-beloved, I know, will sport and play with His bride, as much as He thinketh will allure her to the rink's end. Yet I judge it not unlawful to seek renewed consolations, providing, 1. The heart be submissive, and content to leave the measure and timing of them to Him. 2. Providing they be sought to excite us to praise, and strengthen our assurance, and sharpen our desires after Himself. 3. Let them be sought, not for our humours or swellings of nature, but as the earnest of heaven. And I think many do attain to greater consolations after mortification, than ever they had formerly. But I know that our Lord walketh here still by a sovereign latitude, and keepeth not the same way, as to one hair-breadth, without a miss, toward all His children. As for the Lord's people with you, I am not the man fit to speak to them. I rejoice exceedingly that Christ is engaging souls amongst you; but I know that, in conversion, all the winning is in the first buying, as we used to say. For many lay false and bastard foundations, and take up conversion at their foot, and get Christ for as good as half-nothing, and had never a sick night for sin; and this maketh loose work. I pray you to dig deep. Christ's palace-work, and His new dwelling, laid upon hell felt and feared, is most firm: and heaven, grounded and laid upon such a hell, is surest work, and will not wash away with winter storms. It were good that professors were not like young heirs, that come to their rich estate long ere they come to their wit; and so is seen on it. The tavern, and the cards, and the harlots steal their riches[404] from them, ere ever they be aware what they are doing. I know that a Christ bought with strokes is sweetest. 4. I recommend to you conference and prayer at private meetings; for warrant whereof, see Isa. ii. 3; Jer. l. 4, 5; Hos. ii. 1, 2; Zech. viii. 20-23; Mal. iii. 16; Luke xxiv. 13-17; John xx. 19; Acts xii. 12; Col. iii. 16, and iv. 6; Ephes. iv. 29; 1 Pet. iv. 10; 1 Thess. v. 14; Heb. iii. 13, and x. 25. Many coals make a good fire, and that is a part of the communion of saints.
I must entreat you, and your Christian acquaintance in the parish, to remember me to God in your prayers, and my flock and ministry, and my transportation[405] and removal from this place, which I fear at this Assembly,[406] and be earnest with God for our mother-kirk. For want of time, I have put you all in one letter. The rich grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all.
Yours, in his sweet Lord Jesus,
S. R.
Anwoth, Aug. 5, 1639.
M ADAM,—Grace, mercy, and peace be to you.—I know that ye are near many comforters, and that the promised Comforter is near at hand also. Yet, because I found your Ladyship comfortable to myself in my sad days, which are not yet over my head, it is my part and more, in many respects (howbeit I can do little, God knoweth, in that kind), to speak to you in your wilderness lot.
I know, dear and noble Lady, that this loss of your dear child[407] came upon you, one piece and part of it after another; and that ye were looking for it, and that now the Almighty hath brought on you that which ye feared; and that your Lord gave you lawful warning. And I hope that for His sake who brewed and masked this cup in heaven, ye will gladly drink, and salute and welcome the cross. I am sure, that it is not your Lord's mind to feed you with judgment and wormwood, and to give you waters of gall to drink (Ezek. xxxiv. 16; Jer. ix. 15). I know that your cup is sugared with mercy; and that the withering of the bloom, the flower, even the white and red of worldly joys, is for no other end than to buy out at the ground the reversion of your heart and love.
Madam, subscribe to the Almighty's will; put your hand to the pen, and let the cross of your Lord Jesus have your submissive and resolute Amen. If ye ask and try whose this cross is, I dare say that it is not all your own, the best half of it is Christ's. Then your cross is no born-bastard, but lawfully begotten; it sprang not out of the dust (Job v. 6). If Christ and ye be halvers of this suffering, and He say, "Half mine," what should ail you? And I am sure that I am here right upon the style of the word of God: "The fellowship of Christ's sufferings" (Phil. iii. 10); "The remnant of the afflictions of Christ" (Col. i. 24); "The reproach of Christ" (Heb. ii. 6). It were but to shift the comforts of God, to say, "Christ had never such a cross as mine: He had never a dead child, and so this is not His cross; neither can He, in that meaning, be the owner of this cross." But I hope that Christ, when he married you, married you and all the crosses and wo hearts that follow you. And the word maketh no exception. "In all their afflictions He was afflicted" (Isa. lxiii. 9). Then Christ bore the first stroke of this cross; it rebounded off Him upon you, and ye get it at the second hand, and ye and He are halvers in it. And I shall believe, for my part, that He mindeth to distil heaven out of this loss, and all others the like; for wisdom devised it, and love laid it on, and Christ owneth it as His own, and putteth your shoulder beneath only a piece of it. Take it with joy, as no bastard cross, but as a visitation of God, well-born; and spend the rest of your appointed time, till your change come, in the work of believing. And let faith, that never yet made a lie to you, speak for God's part of it, "He will not, He doth not, make you a sea or a whale-fish, that He keepeth you in ward" (Job vii. 12). It may be, that ye think not many of the children of God in such a hard case as yourself; but what would ye think of some, who would exchange afflictions? and give you to the boot? But I know that yours must be your own alone, and Christ's together.
I confess it seemed strange to me, that your Lord should have done that which seemed to ding out the bottom of your worldly comforts; but we see not the ground of the Almighty's sovereignty. "He goeth by on our right hand, and on our left hand, and we see Him not." We see but pieces of the broken links of the chains of His providence; and He coggeth the wheels of His own providence, that we see not. Oh, let the Former work His own clay into what frame He pleaseth! "Shall any teach the Almighty knowledge?" If He pursue the dry stubble, who dare say, "What doest Thou?" Do not wonder to see the Judge of the world weave, into one web, your mercies and the judgments of the house of Kenmure. He can make one web of contraries.
But my weak advice (with reverence and correction), were, for you, dear and worthy Lady, to see how far mortification goeth on, and what scum the Lord's fire casteth out of you. I know that ye see your knottiness, since our Lord whiteth, and heweth, and plaineth you. And the glancing of the furnace[408] is to let you see what scum or refuse ye must want, and what froth is in nature, that must be boiled out and taken off in the fire of your trials. I do not say that heavier afflictions prophesy heavier guiltiness; a cross is often but a false prophet in this kind. But I am sure that our Lord would have the tin and the bastard metal in you removed, lest the Lord say, "The bellows are burnt, the lead is consumed in the fire, the Founder melteth in vain" (Jer. vi. 29). And I shall hope that grief will not so far smother your light, as not to practise this so necessary a duty, to concur with Him in this blessed design.
I would gladly plead for the Comforter's part of it, not against you, Madam (for I am sure ye are not his party[409]), but against your grief, which will have its own violent incursions in your soul: and I think it be not in your power to help it. But I must say, there are comforts allowed upon you; and, therefore, want them not. When ye have gotten a running-over soul with joy now, that joy will never be missed out of the infinite ocean of delight, which is not diminished by drinking at it, or drawing out of it. It is a Christian art to comfort yourself in the Lord; to say, "I was obliged to render back again this child to the Giver: and if I have had four years' loan of him, and Christ eternity's possession of him, the Lord hath kept condition with me. If my Lord would not have him and me to tryst both in one hour at death's door-threshold together, it is His wisdom so to do; I am satisfied. My tryst is suspended, not broken off, nor given up." Madam, I would that I could divide sorrow with you, for your ease. But I am but a beholder: it is easy to me to speak; the God of comfort speak to you, and allure you with His feasts of love.
My removal from my flock is so heavy to me, that it maketh my life a burden to me; I had never such a longing for death. The Lord help and hold up sad clay. I fear that ye sin in drawing Mr. William Dalgleish from this country, where the labourers are few, and the harvest great.
Madam, desire my Lord Argyle to see for provision to a pastor for his poor people. Grace be with you.
Your Ladyship's at all obedience in Christ,
S. R.
Kirkcudbright, Oct. 1, 1639.
M UCH HONOURED, REVEREND, AND DEARLY BELOVED IN OUR LORD,—Grace, mercy, and peace be to you all.—I know that there are many in this nation more able than I to speak to the sufferers for, and witnesses of, Jesus Christ; yet pardon me to speak a little to you, who are called in question for the Gospel once committed to you.
I hope that ye are not ignorant that, as peace was left to you in Christ's testament, so the other half of the testament was a legacy of Christ's sufferings. "These things have I spoken, that in Me ye might have peace; in the world ye shall have trouble" (John xvi. 33). Because, then, ye are made assignees and heirs to a liferent of Christ's cross, think that fiery trial no strange thing; for the Lord Jesus shall be no loser by purging the dross and tin out of His church in Ireland. His wine-press is but squeezing out the dregs, the scum, the froth, and refuse of that church. I had once the proof of the sweet smell, and the honest and honourable peace, of that slandered thing, the cross of our Lord Jesus. But though, alas! these golden days that then I had be now in a great part gone, yet I dare say, that the issue and outgate of your sufferings shall be the advantage, the golden reign and dominion of the Gospel, and the high glory of the never-enough-praised Prince of the kings of the earth; and the changing of the brass of the Lord's temple among you into gold, and the iron into silver, and the wood into brass. Your officers shall yet be peace, and your exactors righteousness (Isa. lx. 17, 18). Your old, fallen walls shall get a new name, and the gates of your Jerusalem shall get a new style. They shall call your walls Salvation, and your gates Praise. I know that Deputy,[411] prelates, Papists, temporizing lords, and proud mockers of our Lord, crucifiers of Christ for His coat, and all your enemies, have neither fingers nor instruments of war to pick out one stone out of your wall; for each stone of your wall is "Salvation." I dare give you my royal and princely Master's word for it, that Ireland shall be a fair bride to Jesus, and Christ will build on her a palace of silver (Cant. viii. 9). Therefore, weep not as if there were no hope; fear not, put on strength, put on your beautiful garments (Isa. lii. 1). Your foundation shall be sapphires, your windows and gates precious stones (Isa. liv. 11, 12). Look over the water, and behold and see who is on the dry land waiting for your landing. Your deliverance is concluded, subscribed, and sealed in heaven. Your goods, that are taken from you for Christ and His truth's sake, are but arrested and laid in pawn, and not taken away. There is much laid up for you in His storehouse, whose the earth and the fulness thereof is. Your garments are spun, and your flocks are feeding in the fields, your bread is laid up for you, your drink is brewn, your gold and silver is at the bank, and the interest goeth on and groweth: and yet I hear that your taskmasters do rob and spoil you, and fine you. Your prisons, my brethren, have two keys. The Deputy, prelates, and officers keep but the iron keys of the prison wherein they put you; but He that hath created the smith, hath other keys in heaven; therefore ye shall not die in the prison. Other men's ploughs are labouring for your bread; your enemies are gathering in your rents. He that is kissing His bride on this side of the sea, in Scotland, is beating her beyond the sea in Ireland, and feeding her with the bread of adversity and the water of affliction; and yet He is the same Lord to both.
Alas! I fear that Scotland be undone and slain with this great mercy of reformation, because there is not here that life of religion, answerable to the huge greatness of the work that dazzleth our eyes. For the Lord is rejoicing over us in this land, as the bridegroom rejoiceth over the bride: and the Lord hath changed the name of Scotland. They call us now no more "Forsaken," nor "Desolate;" but our land is called "Hephzibah" and "Beulah" (Isa. lxii. 4). For the Lord delighteth in us, and this land is married to Himself. There is now an highway made through our Zion, and it is called the "Way of holiness;" the unclean shall not pass over it; the wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err in it. The wilderness doth rejoice and blossom as the rose; "The ransomed of the Lord are returned back unto Zion, with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads" (Isa. xxxv. 10); the Canaanite is put out of our Lord's house: there is not a beast left to do hurt (at least, professedly) in all the holy mountain of the Lord. Our Lord is fallen to wrestle with His enemies, and hath brought us out of Egypt; we have "the strength of an unicorn" (Num. xxiii. 22). The Lord hath eaten up the sons of Babel; He hath broken their bones, and hath pierced them through with His arrows. We take them captives whose captives we were, and we rule over our oppressors (Isa. xiv. 2). It is not brick, nor clay, nor Babel's cursed timber and stones, that is in our second temple; but our princely King Jesus is building His house all palace-work and carved stones. It is the habitation of the Lord.
We do welcome Ireland and England to our Well-beloved. We invite you, O daughters of Jerusalem, to come down to our Lord's garden, and seek our Well-beloved with us; for His love will suffice both you and us. We do send you love-letters over the sea, to request you to come and to marry our King, and to take part of our bed. And we trust our Lord is fetching a blow upon the Beast, and the scarlet-coloured Whore, to the end that He may bring in His ancient widow-wife, our dear sister, the church of the Jews. Oh, what a heavenly heaven were it to see them come in by this mean, and suck the breasts of their little sister, and renew their old love with their first Husband, Christ our Lord! They are booked in God's word, as a bride contracted unto Jesus! Oh for a sight, in this flesh of mine, of the prophesied marriage between Christ and them! The kings of Tarshish, and of the isles, must bring presents to our Lord Jesus (Ps. lxxii. 10). And Britain is one of the chiefest isles; why then but we may believe that our kings of this island shall come in, and bring their glory to the New Jerusalem, wherein Christ shall dwell in the latter days? It is our part to pray, "That the kingdoms of the earth may become Christ's."
Now I exhort you, in the Lord Jesus, not to be dismayed nor afraid for the two tails of these smoking firebrands, the fierce anger of the Deputy with civil power, and of the bastard prelates with the power of the Beast; for they shall be cut off. They may well eat you and drink you, but they shall be forced to vomit you out again alive. If two things were firmly believed, sufferings would have no weight. If the fellowship of Christ's sufferings were well known, who would not gladly take part with Jesus? For Christ and we are halvers and joint-owners of one and the same cross: and, therefore, he that knew well what sufferings were, as he esteemed all things but loss for Christ, and did judge them but dung, so did he also judge of them, "that he might know the fellowship of His sufferings" (Phil. iii. 10). Oh, how sweet a sight is it, to see a cross betwixt Christ and us, to hear our Redeemer say, at every sigh, and every blow, and every loss of a believer, "Half mine!" So they are called "The sufferings of Christ," and "the reproach of Christ" (Col. i. 24; Heb. xi. 26). As, when two are partners and owners of a ship, the half of the gain and half of the loss belong to each of the two; so Christ in our sufferings is half-gainer and half-loser with us. Yea, the heaviest end of the black tree of the cross lieth on your Lord: it falleth first upon Him, and it but reboundeth off Him upon you: "The reproaches of them that reproached thee are fallen upon Me" (Ps. lxix. 9). Your sufferings are your treasure, and are greater riches than the treasures of Egypt (Heb. xi. 26). And if your cross come through Christ's fingers ere it come to you, it receiveth a fair lustre from Him; it getteth a taste and relish of the King's spikenard, and of heaven's perfume. And the half of the gain, when Christ's shipful of gold cometh home, shall be yours. It is an augmenting of your treasure to be rich in suffering, "to be in labours abundant, in stripes above measure" (2 Cor. xi. 23); and to have the sufferings of Christ abounding in you (2 Cor. i. 5) is a part of heaven's stock. Your goods are not lost which they have plucked from you, for your Lord hath them in keeping; they are but arrested and seized upon. He shall loose the arrest. Ye shall be fed with the heritage of Jacob, your father; for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it (Isa. lviii. 14).
Till I shall be on the hall-floor of the highest palace, and get a draught of glory out of Christ's hand, above and beyond time and beyond death, I shall never (it is like) see fairer days than I saw under that blessed tree of my Lord's cross. His kisses then were king's kisses. Those kisses were sweet and soul-reviving; one of them, at that time, was worth two and a half (if I may speak so) of Christ's week-day kisses. Oh, sweet, sweet for evermore, to see a rose of heaven growing in as ill ground as hell! and to see Christ's love, His embracements, His dinners and suppers of joy, peace, faith, goodness, long-suffering, and patience, growing and springing like the flowers of God's garden, out of such stony and cursed ground as the hatred of the prelates, and the malice of their High Commission, and the Antichrist's bloody hand and heart! Is not here art and wisdom? Is not here heaven indented in hell (if I may say so), like a jewel set with skill in a ring with the enamel of Christ's cross? The ruby and riches of glory, that grow up out of the cross, are beyond telling. Now, the blackest and hottest wrath, and most fiery and all-devouring indignation of the Judge of men and angels, shall come upon them who deny our sweet Lord Jesus, and put their hand to that oath of wickedness now pressed. The Lord's coal at their heart shall burn them up both root and branch. The estates of great men that have done so, if they do not repent, shall consume away, and the ravens shall dwell in their houses, and their glory shall be shame. Oh, for the Lord's sake! keep fast by Christ, and fear not man that shall die and wither as the grass. The Deputy's bloom shall fall, and the prelates shall cast their flower, and the east wind of the Lord, of "the Lord strong and mighty," shall blast and break them; therefore, fear them not. They are but idols, that can neither do evil nor good. Walk not in the way of those people that slander the footsteps of our royal and princely anointed King Jesus, now riding upon His white horse in Scotland. Let Jehovah be your fear. That decree of Zion's deliverance, passed and sealed up before the throne, is now ripe and shall bring forth a child, even the ruin and fall of the prelates' black kingdom, and the Antichrist's throne, in these kingdoms. The Lord hath begun, and He shall make an end. Who did ever hear the like of this? Before Scotland travailed, she brought forth; and before her pain came, she was delivered of a man-child (Isa. lxvi. 7, 8).
And when all is done, suppose there were no sweetness in our Lord's cross, yet it is sweet for His sake, for that lovely One, Jesus Christ, whose crown and royal supremacy is the question this day in Great Britain, betwixt us and our adversaries. And who would not think Him worthy of the suffering for? What is burning quick, what is drinking of our own heart's blood, and what is a draught of melted lead, for His glory? Less than a draught of cold water to a thirsty man, if the right price and due value were put on that worthy, worthy Prince, Jesus! Oh, who can weigh Him! Ten thousand thousand heavens would not be one scale, or the half of the scale, of the balance to lay Him in. O black angels, in comparison of Him! O dim, and dark, and lightless sun, in regard of that fair Sun of righteousness! O feckless and worthless heaven of heavens, when they stand beside my worthy, and lofty, and high, and excellent Well-beloved! O weak and infirm clay-kings! O soft and feeble mountains of brass, and weak created strength, in regard of our mighty and strong Lord of armies! O foolish wisdom of men and angels, when it is laid in the balance beside that spotless, substantial Wisdom of the Father! If heaven and earth, and ten thousand heavens even (round about these heavens that now are), were all in one garden of paradise, decked with all the fairest roses, flowers, and trees that can come forth from the art of the Almighty Himself; yet set but our one Flower that groweth out of the root of Jesse beside that orchard of pleasure, one look of Him, one view, one taste, one smell of His sweet Godhead would infinitely exceed and go beyond the smell, colour, beauty, and loveliness of that paradise. Oh to be with child of His love! and to be suffocated (if that could be) with the smell of His sweetness were a sweet fill and a lovely pain. O worthy, worthy, worthy loveliness! Oh, less of the creatures, and more of Thee! Oh, open the passage of the well of love and glory on us, dry pits and withered trees! Oh, that Jewel and Flower of heaven! If our Beloved were not mistaken by us, and unknown to us, He would have no scarcity of wooers and suitors. He would make heaven and earth both see that they cannot quench His love, for His love is a sea. Oh to be a thousand fathoms deep in this sea of love! He, He Himself is more excellent than heaven; for heaven, as it cometh into the souls and spirits of the glorified, is but a creature; and He is something (and a great something) more than a creature. Oh, what a life were it to sit beside this Well of love, and drink and sing, and sing and drink! and then to have desires and soul-faculties stretched and extended out, many thousand fathoms in length and breadth, to take in seas and rivers of love!
I earnestly desire to recommend this love to you, that this love may cause you to keep His commandments, and to keep clean fingers, and make clean feet, that ye may walk as the redeemed of the Lord. Wo, wo be to them who put on His name, and shame this love of Christ, with a loose and profane life! Their feet, tongue, and hands, and eyes, give a shameless lie to the holy Gospel, which they profess. I beseech you in the Lord, to keep Christ and walk with Him: let not His fairness be spotted and stained by godless living. Oh, who can find in their heart to sin against love? and such a love as the glorified in heaven shall delight to dive into, and drink of for ever? For they are evermore drinking in love, and the cup is still at their head; and yet without loathing, for they still drink, and still desire to drink for ever and ever. Is not this a long-lasting supper?
Now, if any of our country people, professing Christ Jesus, have brought themselves under the stroke and wrath of the Almighty, by yielding to Antichrist in an hair-breadth, but especially by swearing and subscribing that blasphemous oath (which is the Church of Ireland's black hour of temptation), I would entreat them, by the mercies of God at their last summons, to repent, and openly confess before the world to the glory of the Lord their denial of Christ. Or otherwise, if either man or woman will stand and abide by that oath, then, in the name and authority of the Lord Jesus, I let them see that they forfeit their part of heaven! And let them look for no less than a back-burden of the pure, unmixed wrath of God, and the plague of apostates and deniers of our Lord Jesus.
Let not me, a stranger to you, who never saw your face in the flesh, be thought bold in writing to you: for the hope I have of a glorious church in that land, and the love of Christ, constraineth me. I know that the worthy servants of Christ, who once laboured among you, cease not to write to you also; and I shall desire to be excused that I do join with them.
Pray for your sister-church in Scotland; and let me entreat you for the aid of your prayers for myself, and flock, and ministry, and my fear of a transportation from this place of the Lord's vineyard.[412] Now the very God of peace sanctify you throughout. Grace be with you all.
Your brother and companion, in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ,
S. R.
Anwoth, 1639.
[Dr. Alexander Leighton was descended of an ancient family in Forfarshire, whose chief seat was Ulys-haven, or Usen, near Montrose. Besides studying for the Christian ministry, he qualified himself as a physician, and, during the reign of James I., and the commencement of that of Charles I., practised medicine in London, as well as exercised his ministry there; but whether he had any fixed charge we are not informed. In his zeal for Presbyterian principles, and against the innovations of Laud, he published a work entitled "An Appeal to the Parliament; or, Zion's Plea against the Prelacy." For this work he was arrested in 1629, and thrown into an abominable cell in Newgate. After lying there sixteen weeks in great misery, he was served with an information of the crimes of which he was accused, and charged to appear before the Star Chamber. He was then unable to attend, being under severe distress that had brought skin and hair almost wholly off his body; but the Star Chamber condemned the afflicted and aged divine to be degraded as a minister, to have one of his ears cut off, and one side of his nose slit, to be branded on the face with a red-hot iron, to stand in the pillory, to be whipped at a post, to pay a fine of £1000, and to suffer imprisonment till the fine was paid. When this inhuman sentence was pronounced, Laud took off his hat, and holding up his hands, gave thanks to God, who had given the church victory over her enemies! The sentence was executed without mercy; and Leighton lay in prison until the meeting of the Long Parliament, that is, upwards of ten years. When liberated, he could hardly walk, see, or hear. He died in 1649. He was the father of the celebrated Robert Leighton, Archbishop of Glasgow. When this letter was written to him by Rutherford, he had languished many years in prison.]