the usurpation and tyranny of James, Duke of York. 2.  Preaching that it is unlawful to pay cess, expressly exacted for bearing down the gospel, and 3.  Teaching that it is lawful for people to carry arms for defending themselves in their meetings for persecuted gospel ordinances.”  At the close, he said, “I leave my testimony against Popery, Prelacy, and Erastianism, and against all profanity, and every thing contrary to sound doctrine, and the power of godliness; particularly against all usurpations and encroachments made upon Christ’s rights, who alone must bear the glory of ruling His own kingdom, the Church; and in particular, against this absolute power, usurped by this usurper, that belongs to no mortal; but is the incommunicable property of Jehovah; and against this toleration flowing from this absolute power.”  Here he was compelled to leave off speaking, and to go up the ladder.  He then prayed again, and said, “Lord!  I die in the faith that Thou wilt not leave Scotland, but that Thou will make the blood of thy witnesses to be the seed of the Church, and will return again and be glorious in our land.  And now, Lord, I am ready; the Bride, the Lamb’s wife, hath made herself ready.”  When the napkin was tied about his face, he uttered a few affectionate words to the single friend who was permitted to attend him on the scaffold; his last counsels then spoken to the suffering remnant, show how much his heart was with them, and the cause of truth in their hands.  “As to the remnant I leave, I have committed them to God.  Tell them from me, not to weary, nor be discouraged in maintaining their testimony.  Let them not quit or forego one of these despised truths.  Let them keep their ground; and the Lord will provide them churches and ministers.  And when He comes, He will make these despised truths glorious in the earth.”

In the close of his testimony, written in prison, the day before his execution, there are those sublime and affecting expressions, which were designed to be his last words from the scaffold—­“Farewell, beloved sufferers, and followers of the Lamb.  Farewell, Christian and comfortable mother and sisters.  Farewell, sweet societies and desirable general meetings.  Farewell! night wanderings in all seasons for Christ, and all sublunary things.  Farewell! conflicts with a body of sin and death.  Welcome, scaffold, for precious Christ.  Welcome, heavenly Jerusalem.  Welcome, innumerable company of angels.  Welcome, crown of glory.  Welcome, above all, O Thou blessed Trinity and one God.  O Eternal One, I commit my soul into thy eternal rest.”

The relentless persecutors of our Presbyterian forefathers were not content with removing this eminent servant of God, by a violent death; as if to throw upon him the utmost indignity, his body was buried in the common grave of felons, at the lower entrance of the Greyfriars Church-yard, a plain slab of stone erected over the spot, stating that the dust of the Rev. James Renwick lies interred with that of eight other martyrs, and with the remains of a hundred common felons.  The emblem and inscription on the stone point, however, to the glory reserved for faithful servants of Christ, when the sufferings of the Church shall have been completed, and antichristian power shall have been overthrown.  The emblem is an open Bible, with the words in Revelation vi. 9, 10, 11, inserted underneath.