The Biography of Robert Murray MCheyne | Page 7

brother David, who used to speak of the ministry as the most blessed work on earth, and often expressed the greatest delight in the hope that his younger brother might one day become a minister of Christ. And now, with altered views,--with an eye that could gaze on heaven and hell, and a heart that felt the love of a reconciled God,--he sought to become a herald of salvation.
He had begun to keep a register of his studies, and the manner in which his time slipped away, some months before his brother's death. For a considerable time this register contains almost nothing but the bare incidents of the diary, and on Sabbaths the texts of the sermons he had heard. There is one gleam of serious thought--but it is the only one--during that period. On occasion of Dr. Andrew Thomson's funeral, he records the deep and universal grief that pervaded the town, and then subjoins: "Pleasing to see so much public feeling excited on the decease of so worthy a man. How much are the times changed within these eighteen centuries, since the time when Joseph besought the body in secret, and when he and Nicodemus were the only ones found to bear the body to the tomb!"
It is in the end of the year that evidences of a change appear. From that period and ever onward his dry register of every-day incidents is varied with such passages as the following:--
"Nov. 12.--Reading H. Martyn's Memoirs. Would I could imitate him, giving up father, mother, country, house, health, life, all--for Christ. And yet, what hinders? Lord, purify me, and give me strength to dedicate myself, my all, to Thee!"
"Dec. 4.--Reading Legh Richmond's Life. Poetentia profunda, non sine lacrymis. Nunquam me ipsum, tam vilem, tam inutilem, tam pauperim, et pr?cipue tam ingratum, adhuc vidi. Sint lacrym? dedicationis me? pignora!'" ["Deep penitence, not unmixed with tears. I never before saw myself so vile, so useless, so poor, and, above all, so ungrateful. May these tears be the pledges of my self-dedication!"] There is frequently at this period a sentence in Latin occurring like the above in the midst of other matter, apparently with the view of giving freer expression to his feelings regarding himself.
"Dec. 9.--Heard a street-preacher: foreign voice. Seems really in earnest. He quoted the striking passage, 'The Spirit and the bride say, Come, and let him that heareth say, Come!' From this he seems to derive his authority. Let me learn from this man to be in earnest for the truth, and to despise the scoffing of the world."
Dec. 18.--After spending an evening too lightly, he writes: "My heart must break off from all these things. What right have I to steal and abuse my Master's time? 'Redeem it,' He is crying to me."
"Dec. 25.--My mind not yet calmly fixed on the Rock of Ages."
"Jan. 12, 1832.--Cor non pacem habet. Quare? Peccatum apud fores manet." ["My heart has not peace. Why? Sin lieth at my door."]
"Jan. 25.--A lovely day. Eighty-four cases of cholera at Musselburgh, How it creeps nearer and nearer like a snake! Who will be the first victim here? Let thine everlasting arms be around us, and we shall be safe."
"Jan. 29, Sabbath.--Afternoon heard Mr. Bruce (then minister of the New North Church, Edinburgh) on Malachi 1:1-6. It constitutes the very gravamen of the charge against the unrenewed man, that he has affection for his earthly parent, and reverence for his earthly master, but none for God! Most noble discourse."
"Feb. 2.--Not a trait worth remembering! And yet these four-and-twenty hours must be accounted for."
Feb. 5, Sabbath.--In the afternoon, having heard the late Mr. Martin of St. George's,[1] he writes, on returning home: "O quam humilem, sed quam diligentissimum; quam dejectum, sed quam vigilem, quam die noctuque precantem, decet me esse quum tales viros aspicio. Juva, Pater, Fili, et Spiritus!" ["Oh! how humble, yet how diligent, how lowly, yet how watchful, how prayerful night and day it becomes me to be, when I see such men. Help, Father, Son, and Spirit!"]
[1] He says of him on another occasion, June 8, 1834: "A man greatly beloved of whom the world was not worthy." "An apostolic man." His own calm deep holiness, resembled in many respects Mr. Martin's daily walk.
From this date he seems to have sat, along with his friend Mr. Somerville, almost entirely under Mr. Bruce's ministry. He took copious notes of his lectures and sermons, which still remain among his papers.
"Feb. 28.--Sober conversation. Fain would I turn to the most interesting of all subjects. Cowardly backwardness: 'For whosoever is ashamed of me and my words,'" etc.
At this time, hearing, concerning a friend of the family, that she had said, "That she was determined to keep by the world," he penned the following lines on her melancholy decision:--
She has chosen