Edited from the Original MSS., with Illustrative Notes, By the Late Rev. Wm. Taylor, M.A., Stirling.
(Continued from vol. xxiii., page 390.)
“THE second thing I remarked with respect to this distressful exercise is, that whereas there are several young people at this time under my ministry, and under my particular inspection and care, though few of them are of this poor parish, who are in great distress of soul under a deep law-work and spirit of bondage, as some of them have been for a year or two; and though they are daily on my heart at a throne of grace in my poor way, and though I have visited several of them at their distant habitations, and spent many hours in conference and prayer with them in my house; yet as it is now a very long time since my soul was in the case of their souls, I thought, and I still think, that my fellow-feeling and sympathy with their sore and agonizing distress and soul-anguish was not, and is not, so very tender and affectionate as it ought to be: and therefore I thought that the Lord saw it meet to hold this bitter cup for two or three nights and days to my mouth, to give me a new taste of the wormwood and the gall of their anguish and distress, which I long since experienced; to awaken in my soul more tender and deep sympathy towards them, and more fervent prayers for them than ever.—This I hope is, and will be, one of the happy effects of my sore exercise. . . . O how loudly am I called now from my late experience to be more concerned for them than I have ever been! Lord Jesus, hear the sighs and groans of these precious prisoners of hope, and turn them to songs of praise and joy! Amen.
“12th.—From morn till eve there were here with me one after another a number of exercised souls, some of them in great soul-distress, but under a most promising work, which I believe on solid grounds will terminate happily in glory to God and the Redeemer, and eternal salvation to them! This resort of exercised souls to my house, seeking Jesus who was crucified, I take for my delightful New-year’s gift from my infinitely liberal Master; and glory to His name, some such inestimable New-year’s gift He was pleased to give me for some years past. Glory to His name! Amen.
“17th, Sabbath Eve.—The Lord was singularly kind to-day, especially in the second exercise. Sweet, satisfying, and glorious were the views I had of the mystery of redemption through Christ, and great was the liberty I had in declaring to the great congregation the views I then had of Christ and of God in Christ, and the great and solacing truths of the gospel. I observed several of my auditory as much affected as I was, and some of the g—y* bathed in tears. Lord, follow with a remarkable blessing! Amen.
“1768, February 3rd.—Would wish to be retired to-day. Many are my calls, great are my errands to a throne of grace, outward troubles and inward distress, without are fightings, within are fears, afflicted, tossed with tempests and not comforted, the knell of death ringing in my ears, and the Comforter that should relieve my soul at a distance; mourning without the sun. O my God; my soul is cast down in me; depth calleth unto depth, Thy waves and billows going over me. Nevertheless, I trust that the Lord will command His loving-kindness in the day, and that yet His song will be with me in the night, as it sometimes has been, and my prayer to the God of my life. Why art thou cast down, O my soul? Hope thou in God, for I trust I shall yet praise Him! Amen! Besides, I have a great and solemn work in view, and the time drawing nigh. Let me be helped, O Lord, by thy blessed Spirit this day, to plead and wrestle at a throne of grace for thy most gracious countenance, and most favourable and special presence on that occasion, if I am spared to set about it.
“Six o’clock afternoon.—Adored for ever be the Lord for His marvellous loving-kindness shown to my poor distressed soul to-day! It well becomes me to say and sing with the psalmist, ‘I was brought low and he helped me.’ He brought me out of a horrible pit and out of the miry clay, and established my feet on a rock, and put a new song in my mouth, even praises to my God and Redeemer. O! let heaven and earth praise Him; for I cannot do it enough. It is now some years since I had such near access, such humble confidence, and such holy joy in the Lord as He vouchsafed me this day. He helped me to read clearly His special paternal love in a long train of merciful dispensations, signal interpositions, gracious vouchsafements, seasonable chastisements, remarkable deliverances, wonderful manifestations, sweet satisfying consolations and sealings of the Spirit, surprising assistances in duties—out of weakness bringing strength, and His frequent and merciful acceptance of my poor oblations in and through Christ, and giving many answers to my poor prayers, and many, many a time turning my heaviest groans into the sweetest songs. And shall I not now say and cry out with humble joy, ‘My Father, my Father, thou hast been the guide of my youth, and the strength of my age?’ I then was led to see what an undutiful, untowardly, prodigal, disobedient child I was; which I was made to bewail bitterly before Him for some time, with vows and resolutions, in the strength of grace, of a more filial temper and conduct for the future. As to some sore external trials, I was likewise eased by being helped to plead His fatherly power, wisdom, love, and faithfulness, as to their having a happy issue—plead likewise as to the other points, and specially the solemnity in view: and I hope, unworthy as I am, for an answer of peace in due time, for the sake of our adorable Jesus, to whom, with the Father and Spirit, be eternal praise and glory. Amen! Amen!”
It would be interesting to trace out, were it now possible, the life-histories of the most remarkable of the numerous converts who were given to Mr. Calder as seals of his ministry. His own three sons were among the chief of them: the Diary is full of references to their spiritual exercises, and of expressions of the high esteem in which their father held them, as well as of proofs of the single-heartedness and hopefulness with which he devoted them to the ministry of the gospel. John, the eldest, evidently a fine thinker as well as an earnest Christian, died comparatively young as minister of Rosskeen. There has been preserved* a curious and romantic correspondence, in which we find his father helping to conduct his courtship with a young lady near Croy, while he himself resided at a distance. The enthusiastic and almost boyish glee with which the father enters into the spirit of his commission throws a genial light over a character of which the Christian and ministerial consistency is all the while never violated, and commands all the more that true and deep religion which dwelt in him. The second son, Hugh, succeeded his father in Croy. He also bore a good Christian name, though his labours were much hindered by almost constant illness. Charles, the youngest and evidently the favourite, held a place of high eminence as minister of Ferintosh in Ross-shire until his death in 1812. A certain “heavenly Miss B—ie,” of whom there is frequent mention in the Diary, was, we doubt not, Miss Brodie, who after Mr. James Calder’s death became Charles’ wife, and who bore a name for consistent piety until her death in 1820.* We doubt not that many others of the converts whose cases he refers to could be traced through consistent lives to blessed ends (though we are not surprised to find him recording that a few, of whom he had hoped well, subsequently disappointed him).
In describing the experience of some of the converts, recollections are awakened of his own early spiritual history; as in the following:—
“March 10th.—I remember well, and will remember while I live, that I was once, on the first view I ever had of the ever-blessed Emmanuel, that infinitely Just One, that infinitely Fair One, in the very same case as . . . [a young woman he mentions], struck dumb with wonder and admiration, with an overpowering flow of celestial love and joy for some time; and the first words I spoke when I recovered speech were the same she uttered, ‘Stay me with flagons, comfort me with apples, for I am sick of love;’ and I wished, perhaps too rashly, that I might die immediately of this heavenly sickness of love. [Then again, on the evening of 28th August, which he notes as the Communion at Contin, he says:—] This, I believe, was a great and a happy day in this place. I am sure it was so to my soul, the sweetest and best communion Sabbath I had for years past; the views and feelings I had of the dying, redeeming love of my adorable Emmanuel were inexpressibly sweet and satisfying, sanctifying and sealing to my thrice-happy soul. I had some experience this day of the blessed frame of my dear child in Christ, E—M—, on that memorable communion Sabbath, 21st of February last, and which is recorded in these memorandums: but as she was then in the love of her espousals, she had much more of these heavenly feelings than I had now; though in my first blessed interviews with my adorable Jesus near forty years since I was much in the same swoonings and faintings of love as she was in February last; and on this blessed day at Contin I was helped to sing in some measure as in the days of my spiritual youth, when the Lord first brought me up from Egypt.”
The following is an interesting family reminiscence of perhaps the most famous worthy of the Highlands:—
“March 15th.—Mr. Thomas Hog* said to my grandmother, ‘If there was a drawn sword pointed to my breast and Christ at the other end of it, if I had no other way to be at Him and with Him, I would run myself upon it to be at Him and with Him for ever: for He is my life, my heaven, and my all.’
“April 17th.—Lectured and preached at the Leys as usual in the open fields to an exceeding numerous congregation, among whom I saw in time of preaching many of the most eminent Christians in this corner of our Lord’s vineyard. Their fervent prayers of faith brought down from heaven the powerful and benign gales of the divine Spirit on the poor, weak, unworthy speaker, and I hope on many of the hearers, who seemed to be deeply concerned and affected. Lord, follow this day’s work with a most remarkable blessing to saints and sinners! Amen!