Page:Biographical sketch of the life and labours of that eminent minister of the Gospel of Jesus Christ; the Rev. James Hall D. D. of the United Secession Church, Broughton-Place meeting-house, Edinburgh.pdf/15

 the Rev. John Brown, (who had succeeded him in Rose-street.) when at least two-thirds of the vast multitude that appeared solicitous to hear it, were incapable of gaining admission into the house; but which being now published must amply gratify the serious reader, by the excellence of its matter, the able delineation it contains of the doctors character, and such interesting specimens of his death-bed exercises as are exhibited in the following extracts:—

“On Tuesday morning, eight days before he died, he summoned his family to his bed-side, and prayed. The members of his family, with his brother and sister, he committed by name to the protection of God; but the burden of his supplication was the session and congregation of Broughton-place, for whom he prayed, that they might individually be blessed, and that the Holy Ghost might be poured out upon them, and that God would, in due time, give them a pastor, taught by his spirit, who should preach the Gospel in purity and be well acquainted with his Bible.

“On Wednesday evening, when informed of the solicitude and dejection of some friends on account of his affliction, and of his elders' meetings for prayer on his behalf, he remarked, ‘Aye—I live in the hearts of my friends and my people, and they live in mine.’

“Early on Thursday morning, while stretched back in his sick-chair and labouring under severe pain, he made the following remarks at intervals: ‘I find that the same spiritual processes, the same processes of spiritual reasoning, and the same hopes which go on and animate us in health, when we are well, go on when we are ill; and encourage, support, and delight us more abundantly in the hour of sickness, and in the prospect of death.’ During the uttering of this sentence, he was more than once interrupted by excessive difficulty of breathing. After a little interval, with his eyes bent upwards, he