study, he was called to preach, and quickly af ter was settled in a congregation in the West of Scotland, and did shine in that place, till a few months before his death, that he was driven away by the persecution in 1665. In this place he laboured with great diligence, and with no less success, as himself owned to the Lord's praise, when he said that there was hardly any under his charge but were brought to make a fair profession of godliness, and had the worship of God in their families and it was well known that many of them were sincere, and not a few of them eminent christians. The love he had to his people made him stifly refuse all calls and invitations to Glasgow, or Edinburgh, or Stirling, where his own cousin, grave Mr. James Guthrie, was minister (afterwards Christ's faithful martyr, whom I saw die in and for the Lord, at Edinburgh, June 1st, 1661,) and pleaded much in a general assembly, that he might have his ministry in that city which was malignant and profane at that time; but all to no purpose. In this place, though an obscure one, but by his ministry, he spent all his few days. I have heard several judicious ministers and christians observe this of him, that whereas many worthy ministers have out-lived their zeal, the vigour of their gifts, and their acceptance with the godly, this blessed man rather increased in all these to the last.

His stature was tall and slender, his aspect grave. His natural temper was cheerful, witty, and facetious, yet tempered with gravity becoming a minister of Christ. I have seen somewhat

of this rare mixture in him myself, and have heard from many who had a great intimacy with him, that they have admired this in him, that immediately after his recreations, and singular sallies of wit and innocent mirth, when called to pray, he would speak to God with that holy awe, and faith, and love, and life, as if he had come down from the mount.

His gifts were great, strong natural parts, a clear head, and a sound heart. His voice was of the best sort; loud, and yet managed with charming cadencies and elevations. His oratory singular, and by it he was master of the passions of his hearers. His action in preaching was more than ordinary; yet was it all decent and taking in him. I have oft thought him in this the likest to the famous Mr. John Rogers, of Dedham, in Essex, by the character I had of him by many; and especially from his kinsman, Mr. William Jenkyn, who died Christ's prisoner, in Newgate, 1684.

In preaching, praying, dealing with distressed consciences, and in pleading for the cause of God in the assemblies of ministers, he was eminent, and generally so esteemed in his day, which I do well remember.

I have heard many passages of God's presence with him, and of his blessing of his labours, which I forbear to mention; both because it is unfit to give a long preface to a short book, and because I am not without hope that some will think it fit to make this great man better known,

The main humbling thing that attended him (next to the apostasy in the land, and cruel per

secution of the church of Christ in it,) was a crazy body, afflicted much with the stone, and at last with an ulcer in his kidneys, which brought him to his grave, in 1665, when he had lived little above forty-two years.

This was the man that the rulers in Scotland could not then bear: but though the love and esteem that most of the neighbouring nobility and gentry bare to him did prevail, for a year or two, to preserve him in his place, after many of his brethren were cast out; yet at length a party of the king's guards was sent to turn him out, and to put a stranger in his place. Unto which violence he gave way; and went on a visit to his friends, where he was quickly seized with a fit of his distemper, and died, in 1665, in Angus. I have oft seen him, conversed with him, and have heard him preach; and if my youth then did make me an unfit judge of his real great worth, yet his name was so famous, his ministry so followed, especially in his last two or three years, by many ejected ministers, and so many desolate congregations (and both were multiplied in fatal 1662,) that I do but declare what was then the common sense of thousands in Scotland, that Mr. Guthrie was every way an eminent gospel minister. I had also a special advantage for knowing the spirit of this great man. My own honoured father and he, kept, for many years a constant weekly correspondence by letters; many of which from Mr. Guthrie to my father I did peruse, and several of them I have still by me, writ by his own hand.

F

This was the great man, the author of this small book, and it is all that he ever published. Some small scraps of some of his sermons I have seen in print, published many years after his death by some honest but injudicious hand, that declare little of the true spirit of the author. This much I have said at a slender desire of the re-printer of the book, as judging it both my duty and my honour to declare what I have seen and heard of this excellent person. And if any think strange that I, who am none of the oldest of men, can so freely give a character of a person who hath been near forty years dead, I can tell them, that besides the commonness of this same judgment of him with thousands in the West of Scotland to this day (of whom many will censure this account as very lame and defective,) I have on record by me in writing, for several years, some singular things concerning him, which I forbear to publish. RO. TRAIL.

London, Jan. 30, 1704–5.

TO THE READER.

CHRISTIAN READER,

WHILE the generality of men, especially in these days, by their eager pursuit after low and base interests, have proclaimed, as upon the house tops, how much they have forgotten to make choice of that better part, which, if chosen, should never be taken from them; I have made an essay, such as it is, in the following treatise, to take thee off from this unprofitable, though painful pursuit, by proposing the chiefest of interests, even, The Christian's Great Interest, to be seriously pondered, and constantly pursued by thee. Thou mayest think it strange to see any thing in print from my pen, as it is indeed a surprise to myself: but necessity hath made me for this once to offer so much violence to my own inclination, in regard that some, without my knowledge, have lately published some imperfect notes of a few of my sermons, most confusedly cast together, prefixing withal this vain title, as displeasing to myself as the publishing of the thing, A clear attractive warming beam, &c. Upon this occasion was I prevailed with to publish this little piece, wherein I have purposely used a most homely and plain style, lest otherwise (though when I have stretched myself to the utmost, I am below the judi