To the Lady Earlston — Letter 33

Mistress.

Grace, mercy, and peace be to you. I long to hear how your soul prospers. I exhort you to go on in your journey: your day is short, and your afternoon sun will soon go down. Make an end of your accounts with your Lord, for death and judgment are tides that wait for no man. Salvation is supposed to be at the door, and Christianity is thought an easy task, but I find it hard, and the way straight 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 has but the luster of the rainbow in the air, which comes and goes with a flying March shower. Clay is the idol of those who are not God's children, not the inheritance of the children. My Lord has been pleased to make many unknown faces smile upon me, and has made me well content with a borrowed fireside and a borrowed bed. I am feasted with the joys of the Holy Spirit, and my royal King bears my charges honorably. I love the fragrance of Christ's sweet breath better than the world's gold. I wish I had help to praise him. The great Messenger of the Covenant, the Son of God, establish you on your rock, and keep you to the day of his coming.

Aberdeen, March 7, 1637. Yours in his sweet Lord Jesus, S. R.