He gave his lady divers times openly an honourable and ample testimony of holiness, goodness and respective kindness to him, and earnestly craved her forgiveness wherein he had offended her, and desired her to make the Lord her comforter, and said, He was but gone before, and it was but fifteen or sixteen years up or down[59].
He spoke to all the boys of the house, the butler, cook, &c. omitting none, saying, Learn to serve and fear the Lord, and use carefully the means of your salvation. I know what is ordinarily your religion, ye go to kirk, and when ye hear the devil or hell named in the preaching, ye sigh and make a noise, and it is forgot by you before you come home, and then ye are holy enough. But I can tell you, the kingdom of heaven is not got so easily. Use the means yourself, and win to some sense of God, and pray as you can, morning and evening. If you be ignorant of the way to salvation, God forgive you, for I have discharged myself in that point towards you, and appointed a man to teach you, your blood be upon yourselves. He took an oath of his servants, that they should follow his advice, and said to them severally, If I have been tough to or offended you, I pray you for God's sake to forgive me; and amongst others one to whom he had been rough said, Your lordship never did me wrong, I will never get such a master again. Yet he urged the boy to say, My lord, I forgive you; howbeit the boy was hardly brought to utter these words. He said to all the beholders about him, Sirs, behold, how low the Lord hath brought me.
To a gentleman burthened in his estate he said, "Sir, I counsel you to cast your burthen upon the Lord your God."——A religious gentleman of his own name coming to visit him four days before his death, when he beheld him he said, Robert, come to me and leave me not till I die. Being much comforted with his speeches, he said, Robert, you are a friend to me both in soul and body.—The gentleman asked him, What comfort he had in his love towards the saints?—He answered, I rejoice at it.—Then he asked him, What comfort he had in bringing the minister who attended him from Galloway? He answered, God knoweth that I rejoice, that ever he put it in my heart so to do, and now because I aimed at God's glory in it, the Lord hath made me find comfort to my soul in the end; the ministers of Galloway murdered my father's soul, and if this man had not come they had murdered mine also.
Before his sister lady Herries, who was a papist, he testified his willingness to leave the world, That papists may see, said he, that those who die in this religion, both see and know whither they go, for the hope of our father's house. When letters were brought him from friends, he caused deliver them to his lady, saying, "I have nothing to do with them. I had rather hear of news from heaven concerning my eternal salvation." It was observed that when any came to him anent any worldly business, before they were out of doors he was returned to his spiritual exercises, and was exceeding short in dispatching all needful writes. He recommended the poor's case to his friends. Upon coming out of a fainting fit, into which his weakness had thrown him, he said with a smiling countenance to all about him, "I would not exchange my life with you all: I feel the smell of the place where I am going."
Upon Friday morning, the day of his departure from this life, he said, "This night must I sup with Jesus Christ in paradise." The minister read to him 2 Cor. v. Rev. xxii. and some observations on such places as concerned his state. After prayer, he said, "I conceive good hopes that God looketh upon me when he granteth such liberty to pray for me. Is it possible that Jesus Christ can lose his grip of me? neither can my soul get itself plucked from Jesus Christ." He earnestly desired a sense of God's presence; and the minister said, What, my lord, if that be suspended, till you come to your own home, and be before the throne clothed in white, and get your harp in your hand, to sing salvation to the Lamb, and to him that sitteth on the throne, for that is heaven; and who dare promise it to you upon earth? There is a piece of nature in desiring a sense of God's love, it being an apple that the Lord's children delight to play with. But, my Lord, if you would have it only as a pledge of your salvation, we shall seek it from the Lord for you, and you may lawfully pray for it.—Earnest prayers were made for him, and he testified that he was filled with the sense of the Lord's love. Being asked, What he thought of the world? he answered, "It is more bitter than gall or wormwood." And being demanded, if he now feared death, he answered, I have tasted death, now it is more welcome, the messenger of Jesus Christ, &c.
The minister said, There is a process betwixt the Lord and your father's house, but your name is taken out of it. How dear was heaven bought for you by Jesus Christ? he frequently said, "I know there is wrath against it, but I shall get my soul for a prey."——Oftimes he said, "It is a sweet word God saith, As I live, I delight not in the death of a sinner. I will not let go the hold I have got of Jesus Christ; though he should slay me, yet will I trust in him."
In deep meditation on his change, he put this question, What will Christ be like when he cometh? It was answered, Altogether lovely. Before he died, he was heard praying very fervently, and said to the doctor, "I thought to have been dissolved ere now."—The minister said, Weary not of the Lord's yoke, Jesus Christ is posting fast to be at you, he is within a few miles.—He answered, This is my infirmity. I will wait on, he is worth the onwaiting, though he be long in coming, yet I dare say he is coming, leaping over the mountains and skipping over the hills.——The minister said, Some have gotten their fill of Christ in this life, howbeit he is often under a mask to his own. Even his best saints, Job, David, Jeremiah, &c. were under desertions.—My lord said, But what are these examples to me? I am not in holiness near to them. The minister said, It is true you cannot take so wide steps as they did, but you are in the same way with them. A young child followeth his father at the back, though he cannot take such wide steps as he.—My lord, your hunger overcometh your faith, only but believe his word;—you are longing for Christ, only believe he is faithful, and will come quickly. To which he answered, "I think it is time—Lord Jesus, come."
Then the minister said, My lord, our nature is anxious for our own deliverance, whereas God seeketh first to be glorified in our faith, patience and hope. He answered, Good reason to be first served. Lord, give me to wait on; only, Lord, turn me not to dross.
Another said, Cast back your eyes, my lord, on what you have received, and be thankful.—At the hearing of which he brake forth in praising of God, and finding himself now weak, and his speech failing more than an hour before his death, he desired the minister to pray. After prayer, the minister cried in his ear, "My lord, may you now sunder with Christ?" To which he answered nothing, nor was it expected that he would speak any more.—Yet in a little the minister asked, Have you any sense of the Lord's love?—He answered, I have. The minister said, Do you now enjoy?—He answered, I do enjoy. Thereafter he asked him, Will ye not sunder with Christ?——He answered, By no means:—This was his last word, not being able to speak any more. The minister asked if he should pray, and he turned his eyes towards him. In the time of the last prayer he was observed joyfully smiling and looking upward. He departed this life about sun setting, September 12, 1634. aged 35 years. It was observed, that he died at the same instant that the minister concluded his prayer.
Mr. Rutherford in one of his letters to the viscountess of Kenmuir a little after the death of her husband, to comfort her, among other things lets fall this expression, "In this late visitation that hath befallen your ladyship, ye have seen God's love and care in such a measure, that I thought our Lord brake the sharp point of the cross, and made us and your ladyship see Christ take possession and infestment upon earth, of him who is now reigning and triumphing with the hundred and forty and four thousand who stand with the Lamb on mount Zion, &c."