ANWOTH, _Aug. 5, 1639_.
[405] My being transferred to another part of the land.
[406] About this time Rutherford (who, it will be observed from the
place whence this letter is dated, was now relieved from confinement
at Aberdeen) had received two separate calls, one from Edinburgh, to
become one of the city ministers, and the other from St. Andrews, to
the theological chair in that University. These competing calls were
to come before the Assembly.
CCLXXXVII.--_To the_ VISCOUNTESS OF KENMURE.
(_ON THE DEATH OF HER CHILD--CHRIST SHARES IN HIS PEOPLE'S SORROWS._)
MADAM,--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.
[407] John, second Viscount Kenmure who died in 1639.
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.
[408] The brightness of glowing heat.
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.
[409] An opposing party to him.
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,