THE
LIFE AND PROPHECIES
OF
ALEXANDER PEDEN.
That most excellent minister of the gospel, and faithful defender of the Presbyterian Religion, Mr. Alexander Peden, was born in the parish of Sorn, near Ayr. After his course at the College, he was sometime school-master, precentor, and session-clerk to Mr. John Guthrie, minister of the gospel at Tarbolton. When he was about to enter on the ministry, a young woman fell with child, in adultery, to a servant in the house where she stayed; when she found herself to be so, she told the father thereof, who said, I’ll run for it, and go to Ireland, father it upon Mr. Peden, he has more to help you to bring it up (he having a small heritage) than I have. The same day that he was to get his licence, she came in before the Presbytery and said, I hear you are to licence Mr. Peden, to be a minister; but do it not, for I am with child to him. He being without at the time, was called in by the moderator; and being questioned about it, he said, I am utterly surprised, I cannot speak; but let none entertain an ill thought of me, for I am utterly free of it, and God will vindicate me in his own time and way. He went home, and walked at a water-side upwards of 24 hours, and would neither eat nor drink, but said, I have got what I was seeking, and I will be vindicated, and that poor unhappy lass will pay dear for it in her life, and will make a dismal end; and for this surfeit of grief that she hath given me, there shall never one of her sex come into my bosom; and, accordingly he never married. There are various reports of the way that he was vindicated; some say, the time she was in child-birth, Mr. Guthrie charged her to give account who was the father of that child, and discharged the women to be helpful to her, until she did it: some say, that she confessed: others, that she remained obstinate. Some of the people when I made enquiry about it in that country-side, affirmed, that the Presbytery had been at all pains about it, and could get no satisfaction, they appointed Mr. Guthrie to give a full relation of the whole before the congregation, which he did; and the same day the father of the child being present, when he heard Mr. Guthrie begin to speak, he stood up, and desired him to halt, and said, I am the father of that child, and I desired her to father it on Mr. Peden, which has been a great trouble of conscience to me; and I could not get rest till I came home to declare it. However it is certain, that after she was married, every thing went cross to them; and they went from place to place, and were reduced to great poverty. At last she came to that same spot of ground where he stayed upwards of 24 hours, and made away with herself!
2. After this he was three years settled minister at New Glenluce in Galloway; and when he was obliged, by the violence and tyranny of that time, to leave that parish, he lectured upon Acts xx. 17. to the end, and preached upon the 31st. verse in the forenoon, ‘Therefore watch, and remember that for the space of three years I ceased not to warn every one, night and day, with tears:’ Asserting that he had declared the whole counsel of God, and had kept nothing back and protested that he was free of the blood of all souls. And, in the afternoon he preached on the 32d verse, ‘And now, brethren, I commend you to God, and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up, and to give you an inheritance among all them that are sanctified.’ Which was a weeping day in that kirk; the greatest part could not contain themselves. He many times requested them to be silent; but they sorrowed most of all when he told them that they should never see his face in that pulpit again. He continued until night; and when he closed the pulpit-door he knocked hard upon it three times with his Bible, saying three times over, I arrest in my Master’s name, that never one enter there, but such as come in by the door, as I did. Accordingly, neither curate nor indulged minister ever entered that pulpit, until after the revolution, that a Presbyterian minister opened it.
3. After this he joined with that honest and zealous handful in the year 1666, that was broken at Pentland-hills, and came the length of Clyde with them, where he had a melancholy view of their end, and parted with them there. James Cubison, of Paluchbeaties, my informer, to whom he told this, he said to him, ‘Sir, you did well that parted with them, seeing you was persuaded they would fall and flee before the enemy.—Glory glory to God, that he sent me not to hell immediately! for I should have stayed with them though I should have been cut all in pieces.’
4. That night the Lord’s people fell, and fled before the enemy at Pentland-hills, he was in a friend’s house in Carrick, sixty miles from Edinburgh; his landlord seeing him mightily troubled enquired how it was with him; he said, ‘To-morrow I will speak with you,’ and desired some candle. That night he went to bed. The next morning calling early to his landlord, said, ‘I have sad news to tell you, our friends that were together in arms, appearing for Christ’s interest, are now broken, killed, taken, and fled every man.’—the truth of which was fully verified in about 48 hours thereafter.
5. After this, in June 1673, he was taken by Major Cockburn, in the house of Hugh Ferguson, of Knockdow, in Carrick, who constrained him to tarry all night. Mr. Peden told him that it would be a dear night to them both. Accordingly they were both carried prisoners to Edinburgh, Hugh Ferguson was fined in a thousand merks, for resetting, harbouring, and conversing with him. The Council ordered fifty pounds sterling to be paid to the Major out of the fines, and ordained him to divide twenty-five pounds sterling among the party that apprehended him. Some time after examination he was sent prisoner to the Bass, where, and at Edinburgh, he remained until December, 1668, that he was banished.
6. While prisoner in the Bass, one Sabbath-morning being about the public worship of God, a young lass, about 13 or 14 years of age, came to the chamber-door mocking with loud laughter: He said, ‘Poor thing, thou mocks and laughs at the worship of God, but ere long God shall write such a sudden, surprising judgment on thee, that shall stay thy laughing, and thou shalt not escape it.’ Very shortly after, she was walking upon the rock, and there came a blast of wind and sweeped her into the sea, where she perished. While prisoner there, one day walking upon the rock, some soldiers passing by him, one of them said, Devil take him. He said, ‘Fy, fy, poor man, thou knowest not what thou art saying; but thou wilt repent that.’—At which word the soldier stood astonished, and went to the guard distracted, crying aloud for Mr. Peden, saying, the devil would immediately take him away. He came to him again, and found him in his right mind under deep convictions of great guilt. The guard being to change, they desired him to go to his arms; he refused, and said, he would lift no arms against Jesus Christ his cause, and persecute his people, he had done that too long. The governor threatened him with death, to-morrow about ten of the clock; he confidently said, three times, though he should tear all his body in pieces, he should never lift arms that way. About three days after, the governor put him out of the garrison, setting him ashore. He having a wife and children, took a house in East Lothian, where he became a singular Christian. Mr. Peden told these astonishing passages to the foresaid John Cubison and others, who informed me.
7. When brought from the Bass to Edinburgh and sentence of banishment passed upon him, in Dec. 1678. and sixty more fellow-prisoners, for the same cause, to go to America, never to be seen in Scotland again, under the pain of death; after this sentence was past, he several times said, that the ship was not yet built that should take him and these prisoners to Virginia; or any other of the English plantations in America.—One James Kay, a solid and grave Christian, being one of them, who lives in or about the Water of Leith, told me, that Mr. Peden said to him, ‘James, when your wife comes in, let me see her;’ which he did.—After some discourse, he called for a drink, and when he sought a blessing, he said. ‘Good Lord, let not James Kay’s wife miss her husband, till thou return him to her in peace and safety; which we are sure will be sooner than either he or she is looking for.’ Accordingly, the same day-month that he parted with her at Leith, he came home to her at the Water of Leith.
8. When they were on shipboard at the Water of Leith, there was a report that the enemies were to send down thumbkins to keep them from rebelling; at the report of this, they were discouraged: Mr. Peden came above the deck and said, ‘Why are ye discouraged? You need not fear, there will neither thumbkins nor bootkins come here: lift up your hearts and heads, for the day of your redemption draweth near; if we were once at London, we will be set at liberty.’—And when sailing on the voyage, praying publicly, he said, ‘Lord, such is the enemies hatred at thee and malice at us for thy sake, that they will not let us stay in thy land of Scotland, to serve thee, though some of us have nothing but the canopy of thy heavens above us, and the earth to tread upon; but, Lord, we bless thy name, that will cut short our voyage, and frustrate thy enemies of their wicked design, that they will not get us where they intend; and some of us shall go richer home than we came from home.’ James Pride, who lived in Fife, an honest man, being one of them, he said many times, he could assert the truth of this, for he came safely home; and beside other things, he bought two cows: and before that, he never had one. I had these accounts both from the foresaid James Kay and Robert Punton, a known public man, worthy of all credit, who was also under the same sentence, and lived in the parish of Dalmeny, near Queensferry.