When his own father was well on in years this,
his son, wrote thus about him to a friend :

We have been getting famous discourses from the clear-
eyed vehement old man, full of rich, convincing truth, and



THE AUTHOR OF "RAB AND HIS FRIENDS" 209

arguments heated and softened and made irresistible by
holy passion. Give a man an absolutely right principle
and he can hardly be extravagant. The other day, at the
close of a most beautiful and informing sermon about
Mary, Lazarus' sister, anointing the feet of Jesus, he read
in his most impressive style the second psalm, "Why do
the heathen rage?" etc., and then suddenly he pushed up
his spectacles on. his forehead, and in his own old way
Hung himself at the people with these words: "Where is
Jesus, and where is Lazarus now? And where are those
priests and rulers of the people now? Jesus has gone up
and sits forever on the throne of the universe, and Lazarus
Is with him seeing him as he is. Where those others are,
in heaven or in hell, I know not; but this I do know-
wherever they be, they are and shall forever be at or under
his feet!" And thus the great old preacher ended.
