Mistress,—Grace, mercy, and peace be to you. I long to hear how your soul prospereth. I exhort you to go on in your journey; your day is short, and your afternoon’s sun will soon go down; make an end of your accounts with your Lord; for death and judgment are tides that bide no man.
Salvation is supposed to be at the door, and Christianity is thought to be an easy task, but I find it hard, and the way strait and narrow, were it not that my guide is content to wait on me, and to care for a tired traveler.
Hurt not your conscience with any known sin; let your children be as so many flowers borrowed from God; if the flowers die or wither, thank God for a summer’s loan of them, and keep good neighborhood to borrow and lend with him. Set your heart upon heaven, and trouble not your spirit with this clay idol of the world, which is but vanity, and hath but the luster of the rainbow in the air, which cometh and goeth with a flying March shower....
My Lord hath been pleased to make many unknown faces laugh upon me, and hath made me well content of a borrowed fireside, and a borrowed bed. I am feasted with the joys of the Holy Ghost, and my royal King beareth my charges honorably....
The great messenger of the covenant, the Son of God, establish you on your rock, and keep you to the day of his coming.
Yours in his sweet Lord Jesus,
Samuel Rutherford,
Aberdeen, 7 March 1637