“Friday, January 25th (1765).—My alarming bodily ailment again recurred.
“Wednesday, February 6th.—Some time set apart this day to set heart and house in order, as I know not how soon I may be called hence: the Lord’s time is the best. As to the first, the heart, alas! how ill is it to set in order, and to keep in order. Mine is a wretched heart with a witness; but it pleased the Lord to afford some pleasant blinks: blessed be His name for ever! But oh! I need more and more, and more still. . . . As to the last, the house, did nothing but renew my latter will in a few minutes. My part of the world is very small, but it is enough. Blessed be His name, I never wanted for anything, though I deserve nothing. In all my straits, Jehovah-Jireh sent seasonable supplies, often from unexpected sources, and by ways and means that filled me with wonder and praise. I have avoided all extravagance and unnecessary expense as to table, dress, etc., etc.; yet, in order to do justice to my children in their education, was obliged to borrow several sums of money, to the extent of £100 stg. and odds, which I could not with a good conscience have taken in loan had I not funds more than sufficient to do full justice to all my creditors; and in order to do them justice, I have demanded £100 stg. of the money I have in K——k’s hands, which he promised to give me soon. This will save my credit; and blessed be the Lord, such is my confidence in His favour, His love, His covenant, and providence, that I have no incumbrance, no disturbance—no, not so much as one uneasy thought about the affairs of this puny passing world; nor ever had since that blessed day in which I got a view of Christ, the heir of all things, as my husband, and of God in Christ, as my God and Father, and the lot of my inheritance. Since that happy era to my soul, I’ve often sung—and were it not for my cursed unbelief and folly, I would have daily sung—with the psalmist, ‘The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.’ ‘The Lord is the portion of mine inheritance and of my cup; thou maintainest my lot: the lines are fallen to me in pleasant places; yea I have a goodly heritage.’ Amen!
“Sabbath Eve, 10th.—About one or two o’clock this Sabbath morning I was seized with the same alarming stitch or pain in my right side which had brought me very low six or seven years agone, and which is judged to be an inflammation of the liver. My pain and distress was so great that I had little or no hope of being able in any case to preach—yea, had some ground to think that I should never more go up to the house of God on earth, and was looking up for the Lord’s most gracious presence to conduct me through the darkness and conflicts of the last scene while passing through the valley of the shadow of death; yet desiring with submission, if it was His will, to do some few things for Him before my departure. In the morning I attempted to rise and dress for the public. For an hour after I got up the pain continued, and then began to abate gradually till the last bell rang, when I had strength to go to the pulpit to preach an hour in Erse (Gaelic), and half an hour in English, with great ease, liberty, and delight; and I left my pains there, and was easy since. Glory, glory and praise to my Physician! Amen.
“Thursday Morning, 21st.—This day, if the Lord will, I mean to be retired, for f—g, h—n, and p—r: my calls to this many and great—my M—r, my p—h, my f—y, and afflicted f—s*—and particularly the case of my soul—that I may attain, through grace, to the true and happy posture and way of living to purpose, and dying with peace—of bringing forth abundant fruit on earth, and, through the boundless merits of Christ, of finding an abundant entrance to heaven. After all the pains the Lord has been at with me, alas! what a novice—what a child am I as yet in religion—what a drone in the service—what a snail in the ways of God. O for clearer views, deeper impressions—a more vital, sacred, transforming sense of the things of God and Christ, and religion and eternity, than ever I had! For these ends pour out this day abundantly of Thy blessed promised Spirit on this poor, dark, dead, dry, parched, slumbering, languishing soul of mine, for the sake of the great, the adorable God-man, Thy only-begotten Son in our nature! Amen.
* We leave these initials and finals as in the MS. in order to illustrate the delicacy of the man, and his dread of display even before the eyes of his children, whom he expected to read his diary after his death. The passage, with the words filled up, reads, “I mean to be retired, for fasting, humiliation, and prayer: my calls to this many and great—my Mother [the Church], my parish, my family, and afflicted friends,” etc.
“Nine o’clock at Eve.—Blessed for ever be the Lord for His most gracious vouchsafements this day to my poor indigent soul. The comfort and establishment He afforded me by His Word and Spirit this day I would not barter for all the treasures and pleasures and glories of the whole world—the particulars of which I can’t write down here. O may they be engraven indelibly on the table of my heart! Ezek. xxxvi. 25, 26, 27 was wonderfully unfolded and greatly blessed to me. Next to the Lord’s blessed days, these days of retirement and prayer, etc., have been by far the happiest of my poor life—which made me often recommend such exercises to . . . [blank in MS.] Glory be to His name! Amen.
“Monday, 25th.—Sweet conference this morning with a pious friend. The subjects of our conversation were—Christ, immortality, and our pious departed friends now in glory.
“March 10th.—After sermon, was called to speak to a young person of this parish, lately awakened to a sense of sin, and still under a law work. Lord Jesus, keep Thy strong and tender hand about this poor young creature who is asking the way to Zion. ‘Thou wilt not break the bruised reed, nor quench the smoking flax.’ Amen!
“Tuesday, 12th.—A diet of examination at G——y: one of the most delightful I ever held. . . . My dear flock seem to attend these diets with growing seriousness, attention, and delight. For my part I find this branch of my office—that of catechizing my people—growing more and more pleasant and delightful in every revolving year; so that I now long every year for the return of the time and season of catechizing. Though it is a cold and tempestuous season of the year, and though the roads are exceeding bad in the winter season, and though I am turned old and feeble and gray-headed, yet the exalted pleasure I find in this exercise, and the comfort and edification it imparts to the Lord’s flock, make me quite insensible of the coldness of the season, the badness of the roads, and the toil of travelling and of speaking for three or four hours on these most sacred and delightful subjects. And no thanks to poor worthless me for all this alacrity; since I find usually a sweet powerful gale of divine influences breathing along with the sacred and important truths I am handling and opening to my people; and since I often discern the same sacred gale diffusing itself over all the auditory. In short, the new beauties and glories, and treasures, and pleasures I find every year in this sacred magazine of our excellent Catechism* will make the business of catechizing ever dear and sacred and delightful to me, while it shall please the Lord to afford me any measure of health and strength to set about it. And if it shall please the Lord God of my fathers and my God to honour any of my dear boys so far as to place them in the sacred office of the ministry, and if they shall happen to glance over these little memorandums of their father, because they are his, let me earnestly advise them to observe a diligent and regular course of catechizing those who may be under their charge.
* The Shorter Catechism, so generally used in Scotland.
“Thursday, 14th.—A diet of examination at C——, where I had the pleasure to meet with a number of very young creatures—boys and girls of five, six, and seven years old—carefully instructed and considerably advanced in the knowledge of the principles of our holy religion.†
† District “Examinations” or “Catechizings” in the Northern Highlands used to embrace all non-communicants, old as well as young; the communicants also being generally present. Sabbath-schools did not exist in those days; but the entry above given shows how far the religious training of the young was from being neglected.
“Friday, 22nd.—Was called to speak to one of my people who had a desire to attend our monthly meetings for Christian conference. Had some difficulty to admit the person so soon, as not being, so far as I could understand, thoroughly awakened to a sense of sin and the great things of God and another world. Yet far from discouraging the first faint essays in the ways of religion, spent a full hour in tendering to this beginner the best instructions, directions, exhortations, and encouragements I could think of. May the Lord follow them with His effectual blessing!
(To be continued.)