This devoted servant of Christ, though worn with incessant labours, was
found actively engaged in his darling work when he was called to receive
his reward. On the 24th and 27th of January, he preached in Fifeshire,
and at Borrowstoness, on the 29th. The last night of the month, he
lodged with a friend in Edinburgh. On the morning of the 1st of
February, the house was beset with soldiers, in the employment of the
persecuting Council. When Renwick attempted to escape, he was arrested
near the Cowgate, and was carried by Graham the captain of the guard,
before a quorum of the Council, by whom he was committed to close
prison, and laid in irons. When he stood in the presence of those who
had issued against him fierce proclamations, and had sought his life,
they were surprised at his youthful appearance, and his comely
countenance, and one exclaimed, "Is this the boy Renwick, that the whole
nation was so troubled with," Renwick replied only with a quiet smile.
On the 3d of February, he was brought before the Council, and received
his indictment. In it, he was charged with casting off the fear of
God--disowning the king's authority--preaching in the fields--and
teaching the people to refuse to pay cess, and to carry arms in
self-defence. It is related of Renwick, when he became a prisoner, that,
though he had grace given willingly to offer his life to confirm his
testimony, he yet dreaded torture. Having in prayer freely surrendered
his life to God, he obtained in answer the assurance that enemies would
not have the power to inflict on him torture. This he afterwards told
his mother in prison, shortly before his execution, when she was
expressing concern about seeing his head and hands on the ports of the
city. He said he was persuaded that the persecutors would "not be
permitted to torture his body, nor touch one hair of his head farther."
He was so open and candid hi his answers that the members of the
Justiciary were to some extent favourably impressed, and this had
doubtless some influence in preventing him from being tortured. He
enjoyed so much of Divine presence from his entrance into prison, till
his execution, that to his mother he said, "he could hardly pray, being
so much taken up with praise, and ravished with the joy of the Lord."
When before the Justiciary, on the 14th February, he confessed to all in
the indictment, save the first article, charging him with having "cast
off all fear of God." He said, "It is because I feared to offend God,
and to violate His law, that I am here to-day, standing to be
condemned." When asked about disowning the king's authority, he answered
like a true Protestant and a heroic patriot--"I own all authority that
hath its prescriptives and limitations from the word of God; but I
cannot own this usurper as lawful king--seeing both by the word of God,
such a one is incapable to bear rule, and likewise by the ancient laws
of the kingdom, which admit none to the crown of Scotland until he swear
to defend the Protestant religion, which a man of his profession cannot
do."
At the close of his examination, when asked if he would subscribe his
Testimony, he did so, with protestation that he subscribed it as his
testimony, but not as recognizing the authority of his judges. When
condemned to be executed in the Grassmarket, on the Friday following, he
was asked by the Justice General if he desired a longer time, he
declared, "It was all one to him; if the time was protracted, it was
welcome; if it was shortened, it was welcome too;--his Master's time was
the best." Without his knowledge he was reprieved for ten days, till the
17th of February, as the persecutors were to some degree sated with
blood, and perhaps somewhat troubled in conscience by the demeanor of
the youthful confessor. After his condemnation was pronounced, many
attempts were made to shake his constancy. Several petitions were
written for him, but he refused resolutely to sign any of them. It was
at one time proposed to him, that his dropping a few drops of ink on
paper would be sufficient: this however, he promptly refused, alleging
that it would be so far an owning of wicked authority, and a
renunciation of his whole testimony.
His friends were denied access to him in prison; paper and ink were
removed from him, and also part of his dying testimony which he had
written. Others--persons in authority--prelates, curates, and popish
priests visited him. His Christian firmness resisted all their attempts
to make him swerve from his principles; while several of them were
struck and overawed by the power of his singular wisdom, gentleness, and
unaffected goodness. Viscount Tarbet, a man of intellect, but noted for
his lax accommodating principles, said of Renwick, after several times
visiting him, "He was the stiffest maintainer of his principles that
ever came before us. Others we used always to cause at one time or other
to waver; but him we could never move. We could never make him yield nor
vary in the least. He was of old Knox's principles."
The testimony of Renwick contained in the "CLOUD OF WITNESSES," was
written the night before he suffered, and in near anticipation of his
martyrdom. His mother and sisters were allowed to be with him for a
short time, on the morning of the day of his execution: In giving thanks
at food in their presence, he said--"Lord! Thou hast brought me within
two hours of eternity, and this is no matter of terror to me, more than
if I rose to go to lie down on a bed of roses. Nay, through grace, to
thy praise, I may say, I had never the fear of death since I came within
this prison; but from the place I was taken in, I could have gone very
composedly to the scaffold." Again, he said, "Let us be glad and
rejoice, for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and His wife hath made
herself ready. Could I ever have thought that the fear of suffering and
death could be so taken from me? What shall I say of it? It is the doing
of the Lord and marvellous in our eyes." He asked, "I have many times
counted the cost of following Christ, but never expected it would have
been so easy. Now, who knows the honour and happiness of that--'He that
confesseth me before men, him will I confess before my Father!' Several
times, he said, _"Now that I am so near the end of time, I desire to
bless the Lord: it is inexpressibly sweet and satisfying peace to me,
that He has kept me in the least from complying with enemies."_ On the
morning of his execution, he wrote his last letter to his most attached
friend, Sir Robert Hamilton, who was then an exile in Holland, for the
sacred cause for which Renwick suffered. Every part of this brief
epistle is calm and thoughtful, and bespeaks the joyful serenity of the
martyr's spirit. "This," he writes, "being my last day on earth, I
thought it my duty to send you this, my last salutation. The Lord has
been wonderfully gracious to me since I came to prison. He has assured
me of His salvation, helped me to give a testimony for Him, and to say
before his enemies all that I have taught, and strengthened me to resist
and repel many temptations and assaults." He closes, with these simple,
solemn, and affecting words--"But I must break off, I go to your God and
my God. _Death is to me as a bed to the weary._"
When the drums beat for his execution, he exclaimed, "Yonder is my
welcome call to the marriage. The Bridegroom is coming. I am ready." On
the scaffold, he sung the first part of the 3d Psalm, read the 19th
chapter of Revelations, and prayed. When he was rudely interrupted, he
said, "I shall soon be above these clouds. Then shall I enjoy Thee and
glorify Thee, O my Father, without intermission and interruption for
ever." In the few sentences that he was permitted to speak to the
spectators from the scaffold, after commending the Lord's special mercy
to him, in washing away his sins, and honouring him to suffer for His
name's sake, he declared he laid down his life mainly for three things:
1. For disavowing the usurpation and tyranny of James, Duke of York. 2.
Preaching that it is unlawful to pay cess, expressly exacted for bearing
down the gospel, and 3. Teaching that it is lawful for people to carry
arms for defending themselves in their meetings for persecuted gospel
ordinances." At the close, he said, "I leave my testimony against
Popery, Prelacy, and Erastianism, and against all profanity, and every
thing contrary to sound doctrine, and the power of godliness;
particularly against all usurpations and encroachments made upon
Christ's rights, who alone must bear the glory of ruling His own
kingdom, the Church; and in particular, against this absolute power,
usurped by this usurper, that belongs to no mortal; but is the
incommunicable property of Jehovah; and against this toleration flowing
from this absolute power." Here he was compelled to leave off speaking,
and to go up the ladder. He then prayed again, and said, "Lord! I die in
the faith that Thou wilt not leave Scotland, but that Thou will make the
blood of thy witnesses to be the seed of the Church, and will return
again and be glorious in our land. And now, Lord, I am ready; the Bride,
the Lamb's wife, hath made herself ready." When the napkin was tied
about his face, he uttered a few affectionate words to the single friend
who was permitted to attend him on the scaffold; his last counsels then
spoken to the suffering remnant, show how much his heart was with them,
and the cause of truth in their hands. "As to the remnant I leave, I
have committed them to God. Tell them from me, not to weary, nor be
discouraged in maintaining their testimony. Let them not quit or forego
one of these despised truths. Let them keep their ground; and the Lord
will provide them churches and ministers. And _when He comes, He will
make these despised truths glorious in the earth._"
In the close of his testimony, written in prison, the day before his
execution, there are those sublime and affecting expressions, which were
designed to be his last words from the scaffold--"Farewell, beloved
sufferers, and followers of the Lamb. Farewell, Christian and
comfortable mother and sisters. Farewell, sweet societies and desirable
general meetings. Farewell! night wanderings in all seasons for Christ,
and all sublunary things. Farewell! conflicts with a body of sin and
death. Welcome, scaffold, for precious Christ. Welcome, heavenly
Jerusalem. Welcome, innumerable company of angels. Welcome, crown of
glory. Welcome, above all, O Thou blessed Trinity and one God. O Eternal
One, I commit my soul into thy eternal rest."
The relentless persecutors of our Presbyterian forefathers were not
content with removing this eminent servant of God, by a violent death;
as if to throw upon him the utmost indignity, his body was buried in the
common grave of felons, at the lower entrance of the Greyfriars
Church-yard, a plain slab of stone erected over the spot, stating that
the dust of the Rev. James Renwick lies interred with that of eight
other martyrs, and with the remains of a hundred common felons. The
emblem and inscription on the stone point, however, to the glory
reserved for faithful servants of Christ, when the sufferings of the
Church shall have been completed, and antichristian power shall have
been overthrown. The emblem is an open Bible, with the words in
Revelation vi. 9, 10, 11, inserted underneath.
Though enemies thus did their utmost to pour dishonour on the name and
memory of Renwick, and to extinguish the cause for which he suffered,
yet the Redeemer whom he intensely loved, and faithfully served, has in
his providence, vindicated the one, as He has preserved, and will yet
more extensively and gloriously display the other. Not only have eminent
historians and other distinguished writers, in recent times, done
justice to the character and labours of Renwick, and the contendings of
the Society people; but within the last few years, by several public
Commemorative services in Scotland, the spirit and testimony of the
later Scottish martyrs, have been held forth as worthy of the grateful
regard of posterity, and commended to their imitation and adoption. The
Bicentenary of the SANQUHAR DECLARATION was commemorated with
appropriate services,--upwards of 4000 persons of different religious
denominations convening at the ancient burgh of Sanquhar for this
purpose. The addresses delivered on the occasion by ministers and
others, ably displayed and vindicated the position assumed by Richard
Cameron, and his followers, and commended to public approval their
testimony. Some three years ago, a like public commemoration of
Renwick's birth and martyrdom was celebrated, at the place of his
nativity near MONIAIVE, in the south of Scotland,--ministers and people
of the Free, United, and Reformed Presbyterian Churches manifesting the
deepest interest in the proceedings. Besides the ministers and large
concourse of people--many of them gathered from great distances, that
met in the open air, near the place of Renwick's birth,--numerous
congregations assembled in different houses of worship, observed the
solemn occasion with solemn devotional exercises. The addresses
delivered were a suitable tribute to the spirit and conduct of the
covenanted martyrs; and various articles of their special testimony were
clearly displayed and ably vindicated. An admirable sermon was preached
at this commemoration by Rev. WILLIAM ANDERSON of Loanhead, which has
since been published under the title of "_the Voice of Renwick_," and
extensively circulated. It contains a condensed, yet lucid sketch of the
life, labours and sufferings of Renwick, a faithful portraiture of his
character, and an able exposition and defence of the great principles of
the testimony of the Scottish martyrs. There has been published in
modern times no juster or more appropriate tribute to the character,
principles, and heroic deeds of these faithful confessors, than is
contained in this discourse. On this account, as well as for the weighty
practical lessons which it enforces, it is of no local or ephemeral
interest, but deserves to be transmitted along with the testimonies of
the Presbyterian martyrs to future generations. These movements indicate
the gracious design of Zion's King to put lasting and increasing honour
upon those who cheerfully suffered the loss of all things in maintaining
his cause, and of yet reviving the principles for which they nobly
contended. Though the day may be distant when these nations shall
voluntarily and generally return to allegiance to Prince Messiah, yet,
as the dimness of the hour is the sure precursor of the perfect day, and
the cloud like a man's hand betokened "abundance of rain," so these
grateful reminiscences of the covenanted martyrs and their distinctive
testimony, point to a day of deliverance and brightness approaching,
when Antichristian error and idolatry shall be overthrown, and the reign
of righteousness and truth shall be universally established.