“Feb. 15, 1835.—­To-morrow I undergo my trials before the Presbytery.  May God give me courage in the hour of need.  What should I fear?  If God see meet to put me into the ministry, who shall keep me back?  If I be not meet, why should I be thrust forward?  To thy service I desire to dedicate myself over and over again.”

“March 1.—­Bodily service.  What change is there in the heart!  Wild, earthly affections there are here; strong, coarse passions; bands both of iron and silk.  But I thank Thee, O my God, that they make me cry, ‘Oh wretched man!’ Bodily weakness, too, depresses me.”

“March 29.—­College finished on Friday last.  My last appearance there.  Life itself is vanishing fast.  Make haste for eternity.”

In such records as these, we read God’s dealings with his soul up to the time when he was licensed to preach the gospel.  His preparatory discipline, both of heart and of intellect, had been directed by the Great Head of the Church in a way that remarkably qualified him for the work he was to perform in the vineyard.

His soul was prepared for the awful work of the ministry by much prayer, and much study of the word of God; by affliction in his person; by inward trials and sore temptations; by experience of the depth of corruption in his own heart, and by discoveries of the Saviour’s fulness of grace.  He learned experimentally to ask, “Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God!” I John 5:5.  During the four years that followed his awakening, he was oftentimes under the many waters, but was ever raised again by the same divine hand that had drawn him out at the first; till at length, though still often violently tossed, the vessel was able steadily to keep the summit of the wave.  It appears that he learned the way of salvation experimentally, ere he knew it accurately by theory and system; and thus no doubt it was that his whole ministry was little else than a giving out of his own inward life.

The Visiting Society noticed above was much blessed to the culture of his soul, and not less so the Missionary Association and the Prayer Meeting connected with it.  None were more regular at the hour of prayer than he, and none more frequently led up our praises to the throne.  He was for some time Secretary to the Association, and interested himself deeply in details of missionary labors.  Indeed, to the last day of his life, his thoughts often turned to foreign lands; and one of the last notes he wrote was to the Secretary of the Association in Edinburgh, expressing his unabated interest in their prosperity.