Matt. xxvi. 67, and xxvii. 26; and many others, as that Abraham's seed should be strangers in a strange land four hundred years, and being brought to Canaan, and its accomplishment in the days of Joseph, Moses, and Joshua. Q. Seeing the Scriptures are proven to be a revelation of God to His creatures, am not I indispensably bound to believe and obey them? A. Yes. Q. Am I equally bound to obey all the laws delivered to Moses upon Mount Sinai ? A. No; the laws delivered to Moses are of three kinds: first, the Moral Law, which is of eternal and indispensable obligation on all ages and nations; secondly, the law of Sacrifices and Ordinances were only ordinances in which were couched types and shadows of things to come, and when that dispensation was at an end, this law ended with them, for Christ is the end of the law for righteousness; thirdly, laws that respected the Jewish Commonwealth can neither be binding on us, who are not of that Commonwealth, nor on the Jews, because their Commonwealth is at an end. Q. If the Moral Law be of indispensable obligation, I become bound to perfect and perpetual obedience, of which I am incapable, and on that account cannot hope to be justified and accepted with God. A. The Moral Law, as a rule of life, must be of indispensable obligation, but it is the glory of the Christian religion, that, if we be upright in our endeavours to follow it, and sincere in our repentance, upon our failing or shortening, we shall be accepted according to what we have, and shall increase in our strength, by the assistance of the Spirit of God co-operating with our honest endeavours. Q. Seeing the assistance of the Spirit of God is absolutely necessary for salvation, hath not God clearly revealed by what means we may obtain this great blessing? A. Yes; the Scriptures tell us that the Spirit of God is the purchase of Christ's mediatorial office; and through faith in Him, and our humble prayers to God through Christ, we shall receive such measures thereof as shall answer our wants. Q. What do you understand by Faith? A. Faith is a firm persuasion of the Divine mission of our Lord Jesus Christ, and that He is made unto us of God, wisdom, righteousness, and complete redemption; or as He is represented to us under the notion of a root, and we the branches, deriving all from Him; or as the head, and we the members of His body: intimating to us that this is the way or channel through which God conveys His blessings to us, and we are not to expect them but in God's own way. It is therefore a matter of consequence to us and therefore we ought with diligence to search the Scriptures, and the extent of His commission, or what they declare Him to be, and to receive Him accordingly, and to acquiesce in God's plan of our salvation. Q. By what shall I know that Jesus Christ is really the person that was prophesied of in the Old Testament; or that He was that seed of the woman that was to destroy the kingdom of sin? A. Besides the Scripture fore-cited, which fully prove Him to be that blessed person, Christ did many miracles; He healed the sick, gave sight to the blind, made the lame to walk, raised the dead, and fed thousands with a few loaves, etc. He foretold His own death and resurrection, and the wonderful progress of His religion, in spite of all the power of the Roman Empire-and that by means of His disciples, a few illiterate fishermen. Q. You speak of repentance as absolutely necessary to salvation-I would like to know what you mean by repentance? A. I not only mean a sorrowing for sin, but a labouring to see the malignant nature of it; as setting nature at variance with herself, by placing the animal part before the rational, and thereby putting ourselves on a level with the brute beasts, the consequence of which will be an intestine war in the human frame, until the rational part be entirely weakened, which is spiritual death, and which in the nature of the thing renders us unfit for the society of God's spiritual kingdom, and to see the beauty of holiness. On the contrary, setting the rational part above the animal, though it promote a war in the human frame, every conflict and victory affords us grateful reflection, and tends to compose the mind more and more, not to the utter destruction of the animal part, but to the real and true enjoyment of both, by placing Nature in the order that its Creator designed it, which, in the natural consequences of the thing, promotes Spiritual Life, and renders us more and more fit for Christ's spiritual kingdom; and not only so, but gives to animal life pleasure and joy that we never could have had without it. Q. I should be glad to hear you at large upon religion giving pleasure to animal life; for it is represented as taking up our cross and following Christ. A. Our Lord honestly told His disciples of their danger, and what they were to expect by being His followers, that the world would hate them, and for this reason, because they were not of the world, even as He also was not of the world; but He gives them sufficient comfort, showing that He had overcome the world; as if He had said, "You must arm yourself with a resolution to fight, for if you be resolved to be My disciples, you expose the world, by setting their folly in its true light, and therefore every one who is not brought over by your example, will hate and oppose you as it hath Me; but as it hath had no advantage against Me, and I have overcome it, if you continue the conflict, you, by My strength, shall overcome likewise;" so that this declaration of our Lord cannot damp the pleasures of life when rightly considered, but rather enlarges them. The same revelation tells us, that a religious life hath the promise of the life that now is, and that which is to come; and not only by the well regulated mind described in my last answer, as tending to give pleasure and quiet, but by a firm trust in the providence of God, and by the help of an honest calling industriously pursued, we shall receive such a portion of the comfortable things of this life as shall be fittest for promoting our eternal interest, and that under the direction of infinite wisdom and goodness; and that we shall overcome all our difficulties by being under the protection of infinite power. These considerations cannot fail to give a relish to all the pleasures of life. Besides the very nature of the thing giving pleasure to a mind so regular as I have already described, it must exalt the mind above those irregular passions that jar and are contrary one to another, and distract the mind by contrary pursuits, which is described by the apostle with more strength in his Epistle to the Romans (chap. i., from 26 to the end) than any words I am capable of framing; especially if we take our Lord's explanation of the parable of the tares in the field as an improvement of these doctrines, as it is in Matt. xiii., from the 37th to the 44th verse; and Rev. xx., from verse 11 to the end. If these Scriptures, seriously considered, can suffer any man to be easy, judge ye, and they will remain truth, whether believed or not. Whereas, on a mind regular, and having the animal part under subjection to the rational, in the very nature of the thing gives uniformity of pursuits. The desires, rectified by the Word of God, must give clearness of judgment, soundness of mind, regular affections, whence will flow peace of conscience, good hope, through grace, that all our interests are under the care of our Heavenly Father. This gives a relish to animal life itself, this joy that no man intermeddleth with, and which is peculiar to a Christian or holy life; and its comforts and blessings the whole Scripture is a comment upon, especially our Lord's sermon upon the Mount, Matt. v. 1-13, and its progress in the parable of the Sower in the thirteenth of Matthew.1 1 The "Manual" bears that it was transcribed for William Burnes by John Murdoch, the Poet's teacher; but, judging from one or two extant letters penned by William Burnes, it would appear in the preparation of the "Manual" Murdoch's part was more than that of mere transcriber. It was probably the outcome of religious discussion and agreement between the thoughtful, anxious parent and the clever young schoolmaster who, as we have seen, took a keen interest in the instruction of the Poet. APPENDIX C. BURNS AND FREEMASONRY. WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO THE ST. JAMES'S, SHORTLY before he repaired to Irvine on his flax-dressing scheme, the Poet was entered, 4th July 1781, an apprentice Mason of the St. David's, Tarbolton, Lodge. On 1st October 1781, he travelled from Irvine to Tarbolton (twelve miles) to be passed, and raised to full masonic brotherhood. Formerly, there were in Tarbolton two lodges-the St. Davids, 174, and the St. James's, 178; but these had united, as the St. David's, in June 1781. A year afterwards, however, this union was departed from, through Burns and others seceding, and reconstituting the St. James's Lodge, whose original charter had been granted by the ancient mother Kilwinning Lodge. It is in connection with the reorganised St. James's that the Poet appears most prominently as a Mason. What keen and regular interest Burns manifested in the meetings and affairs of the brotherhood is abundantly manifest from the St. James's minute-book—a volume which the lodge has carefully preserved, and which it values highly, as containing a record of its history, and, most of all, for the fact that the book holds three minutes entirely in the Bard's own handwriting, and as many as thirty minutes signed by him as Master-Depute. The rules of the lodge are interesting reading. follows: One is as "Whereas always a lodge means a company of men, worthy and circumspect, athered together in order to promote charity, friendship, civility, and good neighbourhood; it is enacted that no member of this lodge shall speak slightingly, detractingly, or calumniously of any of his brethren behind their backs, so as to damage them in their professions or reputations, without any certain grounds; and any member committing such an offence must humble himself by asking "on his knees the pardon of such person or persons as his folly or malice hath aggrieved." Obstinate refusal to comply with the finding of the brethren assembled shall be met by expulsion "from the lodge, with every mark of ignominy and disgrace that is consistent with justice and Freemasonry." Other regulations, dealing with such offences as the breaking of dram-glasses, attending the lodge in a state of intoxication, and so on, are very suggestive of the largely convivial nature of the meetings. Besides this precious minute-book, the Tarbolton St. James's Lodge possesses various interesting relics of Brother Robert Burns, amongst which we notice the chair and footstool, and the miniature Mason's mallet, so often used by the Poet when presiding over the lodge, the silver badge referred to in his "Farewell to the Brethren of St. James's Lodge, Tarbolton ;"1 the lodge Bible, dated 1775, and referred to in the minutes as "a new Bible, per Brother Burns, 13s.;" and (carefully framed) his letter from Edinburgh, 23rd August 1787, on the business of the lodge : MEN AND BRETHREN,-I am truly sorry it is not in my power to be at your quarterly meeting. If I must be absent in body, believe me I shall be present in spirit. I suppose those who owe us moneys, by bill or otherwise, will appear-I mean those we summoned. If you please, I wish you would delay prosecuting defaulters till I come home. The Court is up, and I will be home before it sits down. In the meantime, to take a note of 1 The "Farewell," penned by Burns when he was meditating emigration to Jamaica, he thus closes : "And you, farewell! whose merits claim, Justly that highest badge to wear! A last request permit me here, One round-I ask it with a tear, To him, the Bard that's far awa'." William Wallace, Sheriff of Ayrshire, and at that time Grand Master, is referred to in the above, as well fitted to wear the highest badge of office. |