r
lest you hurt your own peace and usefulness in not praising God enough
for the operation of his hands." To another: "I have told you that you
needed trial, and now it is come. May you be exercised thereby, and
come to that happy 'afterwards' of which the apostle speaks," To the
same again "Remember the necessity of your own soul, and do not grow
slack or lean in feeding others. 'Mine own vineyard have I not kept.'
Ah, take heed of that!" And in a similar tone of faithfulness at an
after period: "Remember the case of your own soul. 'What will it
profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his own soul?' Remember
how often Paul appeals to his holy, just, unblameable life. Oh that we
may be able always to do the same!" "Remember the priming-knife," he
says to another, "and do not let your vine run to wood." And after a
visit to Mr. Thornton of Milnathort, in whose parish there had been an
awakening, he asks a brother, "Mr. Thornton is willing that others be
blessed more than himself; do you think that you have that grace? I
find that I am never so successful as when I can lie at Christ's feet,
willing to be used or not as seemeth good in his sight. Do you
remember David? 'If the Lord say, I have no delight in thee; behold,
here am I; let Him do to me as seemeth good unto Him.'"

In his familiar letters, as in his life, there was the manifestation
of a bright, cheerful soul, without the least tendency to levity. When
his medical attendant had, on one occasion, declined any remuneration,
Mr. M'Cheyne peremptorily opposed his purpose; and to overcome his
reluctance, returned the inclosure in a letter, in which he used his
poetical gifts with most pleasant humor.

To many it was a subject of wonder that he found time to write
letters that always breathed the name of Jesus, amid his innumerable
engagements. But the truth was, his letters cost him no expenditure of
time; they were ever the fresh thoughts and feelings of his soul at
the moment he took up the pen; his habitual frame of soul is what
appears in them all; the calm, holy, tenderly affectionate style of
his letters reminds us of Samuel Rutherford, whose works he delighted
to read,--excepting only that his joy never seems to have risen to
ecstasies. The selection of his letters which I have made for
publication, may exhibit somewhat of his holy skill in dropping a word
for his Master on all occasions. But what impressed many yet more, was
his manner of introducing