ressions, he said,
"I see Christ standing over death's head, saying, Deal warily with my
servant, loose thou this pin, then that pin, for his tabernacle must be
set up again."

The day before his death, the members of the presbytery of Irvine made
him a visit, whom he exhorted to be faithful to Christ and his cause,
and to oppose the service-book (then pressed upon the church). "The
bishop," said he, "hath taken my ministry from me, and I may say, my
life also, for my ministry is dearer to me than my life." A little
before his departure, his wife sitting by his bed-side with his hand in
hers, he did by prayer recommend the whole church of Ireland, the parish
of Holywood, his suffering brethren in the ministry, and his children to
God, and withal added, "Lord, I recommend this gentlewoman to thee, who
is no more my wife:"--and with that he softly loosed his hand from hers,
and thrust it a little from him, at which she and several of the company
fell a-weeping, he endeavoured to comfort them with several gracious
expressions, and with the Lord's servant of old, mentioned, Acts xiii.
36. _Having served his own generation by the will of God, he fell on
sleep_, March 27. 1637.

Mr. Cunningham was a man mostly under deep exercises of mind, and
although in public preaching he was to his own sense sometimes not so
assisted as ordinarily, yet even then the matter he treated of was
edifying and refreshful, being still carried through with a full gale,
using more piercing expressions than many others. For meekness he was
Moses-like, and in patience another Job,--"to my discerning (says one of
our Scots worthies[60]) he was the man, who most resembled the meekness
of Jesus Christ in all his carriage, that ever I saw, and was so far
reverenced of all, even by the wicked, that he was often troubled with
that scripture, _Wo to you when all men speak well of you._"

_The Life of Mr. JAMES MITCHEL._

He was son to James Mitchel of Dykes in the parish of Ardrossan, and was
born about the year 1621. His father, being factor to the earl of
Eglinton and a very religious man himself, gave his son a most liberal
and religious education.----For, being sent to the university of St.
Andrews, when very young, he profited to such a degree, that by the time
that he was eighteen years of age he was made master of arts.

After this he returned home to his father's house, where he studied for
near two years and a half, the Lord in a good