cil, for the present, do
declare the said place to be vacant, and ordain and command him to
confine himself within the city of Edinburgh, and not to depart from
thence until farther orders."--When his sentence was intimate to him, he
told them, He was sorry they had condemned a person without hearing him,
whom they could not charge with the breach of any law. In September
following, bishop Sharp got the charge and privileges of that office;
which shews that he had some reason for pushing Mr. Wood from that
place.

Upon the 30th of the same month, Mr. Wood presented a petition to the
council, shewing----That his father was extremely sick, that he had
several necessary affairs at St. Andrews, and desired liberty to go
there for that effect. Which petition being read, with a certificate of
his father's infirmity, the council granted licence to the petitioner to
go to St. Andrews, to visit his father, and perform his other necessary
affairs; always returning when he should be called by the council.

Thus he continued, till toward the beginning of the year 1664, when he
took sickness, whereof he died; and tho' he suffered not in his body, as
several of his brethren did, yet the arch-bishop, it appears, was
resolved to ruin his name and reputation after his death, if not sooner,
in order to which the primate saw good, once or twice, to give him a
visit, when on his death-bed in St. Andrews. He was now extremely low in
his body, and spoke very little to Mr. Sharp, and nothing at all about
the changes made in the state of public affairs; however the consequence
of these visits was,----The primate spread a rumour, That Mr. Wood,
being now under the views of death and eternity, professed himself very
indifferent as to church-government, and declared himself as much for
episcopacy as for presbytery: and in all companies Sharp talked, that
Mr. Wood had declared to himself, Presbyterian government to be
indifferent and alterable at the pleasure of the magistrate, and other
falsehoods; yea, he had the impudence (says the historian[135]) to write
up an account of this to court, even before Mr. Wood's death.--Which
reports coming to the ears of this good man, they added grief unto his
former sorrow, and he could have no rest till he vindicated himself from
such a false calumny, by a solemn testimony, which he dictated himself,
and subscribed upon the 2d of March before two witnesses and a public
notary; which testimony, being burnt by