arance in the
debates at Westminster astonished those who knew him best, and won for
him a name second to none of the oldest and ablest statesmen and scholars
who sat in that famous house. 'That noble youth,' Baillie is continually
exclaiming, after each new display of Gillespie's learning and power of
argument; 'That singular ornament of our Church'; 'He is one of the best
wits of this isle,' and so on. And good John Livingstone, in his wise
and sober _Characteristics_, says that, being sent as a Commissioner from
the Church of Scotland to the Assembly of Divines at Westminster,
Gillespie, 'promoted much the work of reformation, and attained to a gift
of clear, strong, pressing, and calm debating above any man of his time.'

Many stories were told in Scotland of the debating powers of young
Gillespie as seen on the floor of the Westminster Assembly. Selden was
one of the greatest lawyers in England, and he had made a speech one day
that both friend and foe felt was unanswerable. One after another of the
Constitutional and Evangelical party tried to reply to Selden's speech,
but failed. 'Rise, George, man,' said Rutherford to Gillespie, who was
sitting with his pencil and note-book beside him. 'Rise, George, man,
and defend the Church which Christ hath purchased with His own blood.'
George rose, and when he had sat down, Selden is reported to have said to
some one who was sitting beside him, 'That young man has swept away the
learning and labour of ten years of my life.' Gillespie's Scottish
brethren seized upon his note-book to preserve and send home at least the
heads of his magnificent speech, but all they found in his little book
were these three words: _Da lucem_, _Domine_; Give light, O Lord.
Rutherford had foreseen all this from the days when Gillespie and he
talked over Aquinas and Calvin and Hooker and Amesius and Zanchius as
they took their evening walks together on the sands of the Solway Firth.
It is told also that when the Committee of Assembly was engaged on the
composition of the Shorter Catechism, and had come to the question, What
is God? like the able men they were, they all shrank from attempting an
answer to such an unfathomable question. In their perplexity they asked
Gillespie to offer prayer for help, when he began his prayer with these
words: 'O God, Thou art a Spirit, infinite, eternal, and unchangeable in
Thy being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth.' As
soon as he s