Page:Life of the martyr, John Brown, of Priesthill, in the parish of Muirkirk, Ayrshire (3).pdf/20

20 ears, saying, I will be a husband to the widow, and a father to the fatherless? No wonder though ye are overcome and astonished at his doings" This salutation aroused and strengthened the widow. She remembered the words of Mr. Peden, and she arose from the ground to search out the linen, he liad warned her lo prepare. About this time David Steel and William Steel, with his wife, arrived and assisted Isabell to bring in and wrap up the precious dust. All was done, while the silence of death reigned over the household. After breakfast, David Steel took the Bible, and, in the ordinary course of the family, began the worship of God by singing part of the consolatory psalm that remained unsung in the morning :-and followed also the footsteps of his friend by reading the xviith chapter of John. Isabell received with composure her visitors, many of whom came at the risk of their lives to condole with her. As was said of the protomartyr Stephen, devout men carried him to his burial in like manier was John Brown, for literally God's hidden ones carried him forth, and laid him in his grave, on the very spot where he fell. And as the disciples, after they had seen the Lord ascend, returned unto Jerusalem rejoicing, in like manner did the company at Priesthill rejoice, and had their ' song in the night.' Every writer of that are, among the sufferers, bears witness how wonderfully they who suffered were borne up, as on eagle's wings, above the world's scorn and hatred. Ask all the letters written by Rutherlard and others, down to those written by Sir R. Hamilton. Ask the dring testimonies, from Argyle and Guthrie to Renwick. They would fill volumes, and establish the truth, that one like unto the Son of God walked with them in the fiery furnace of affliction. Renwick writes, on one occasion, to Sir R. Hamilton, alter a field- preaching, that 'if ever God could be tied to any