[CCXVI.—Mr. Hugh Mackail of Irvine.]
(ADVANTAGES OF OUR WANTS AND DISTEMPERS—CHRIST UNSPEAKABLE.)
R EVEREND AND DEAR BROTHER,—Grace, mercy, and peace be to you.—I received your letter. I bless you for it.
My dry root would take more dew and summer's-rain than it getteth, were it not that Christ will have dryness and deadness in us to work upon. If there were no timber to work upon, art would die, and never be seen. I see that grace hath a field, to play upon and to course up and down, in our wants; so that I am often thanking God, not for guiltiness, but for guiltiness for Christ to whet and sharpen His grace upon. I am half content to have boils for the sake of the plasters of my Lord Jesus. Sickness hath this advantage, that it draweth our sweet Physician's hand, and His holy and soft fingers, to touch our withered and leper skins. It is a blessed fever that fetcheth Christ to the bedside. I think my Lord's "How doest thou with it, sick body?" is worth all my pained nights. Surely, I have no more for Christ than emptiness and want; take or leave, He will get me no otherwise. I must sell myself and my wants to Him; but I have no price to give for Him. If He would put a fair and real seal upon His love to me, and bestow upon me a larger share of Christ's love (which I would fainest be in hands with of anything; I except not heaven itself), I should go on sighing and singing under His cross. But the worst is, many take me for somebody, because the wind bloweth upon a withered prisoner; but the truth is, that I am both lean and thin in that, wherein many believe I abound. I would, if bartering were in my power, niffer joy with Christ's love and faith, and instead of the hot sunshine, be content to walk under a cloudy shadow with more grief and sadness, to have more faith, and a fair occasion of setting forth and commending Christ, and to make that lovely One, that fair One, that sweetest and dearest Lord Jesus, market-sweet for many ears and hearts in Scotland. And, if it were in my power, to roup Christ to the three kingdoms, and withal persuade buyers to come, and to take such sweet wares as Christ, I would think to have many sweet bargains betwixt Christ and the sons of men. I would that I could be humble and go with a low sail; I would that I had desires with wings, and running upon wheels, swift, and active, and speedy, in longing for Christ's honour. But I know that my Lord is as wise here as I dow be thirsty; and infinitely more zealous of His honour than I can be hungry for the manifestation of it to men and angels. But, oh that my Lord would take my desires off my hand, and a thousand-fold more unto them, and sow spiritual inclinations upon them, for the coming of Christ's kingdom to the sons of men, that they might be higher, and deeper, and longer, and broader! For my longest measures are too short for Christ, my depth is ebb, and the breadth of my affections to Christ narrowed and pinched. Oh for an ingine and a wit, to prescribe ways to men how Christ might be all, in all the world! Wit is here behind affection, and affection behind obligation. Oh, how little dow I give to Christ, and how much hath He given me! Oh that I could sing grace's praises, and love's praises! seeing that I was like a fool soliciting the Law, and making moyen to the Law's court for mercy, and found challenges that way. But now I deny that judge's power; for I am Grace's man. I hold not worth a drink of water, the Law, or any lord but Jesus:—and till I bethought me of this, I was slain with doubtings, and fears, and terrors. I praise the new court, and the new landlord, and the new salvation, purchased in the name of Jesus and at His instance. Let the Old Man, if he please, go make his moan to the Law, and seek acquaintance thereaway, because he is condemned in that court; I hope that the New Man (I and Christ together) will not be heard;[331] and this is the more soft and the more easy way for me and for my cross together. Seeing that Christ singeth my welcome home, and taketh me in, and maketh short accounts and short work of reckoning betwixt me and my Judge, I must be Christ's man, and His tenant, and subject to His court. I am sure that suffering for Christ could not be borne otherwise; but I give my hand and my faith to all who would suffer for Christ, that they shall be well handled, and fare well in the same way, that I have found the cross easy and light.
Grace be with you.
Yours, in his sweet Lord Jesus,
S. R.
Aberdeen, July 8, 1637.