INTRODUCTION
In the same year, and on the same day of the same month, that his
Sacred Majesty King George, the third of the name, came to his crown and
kingdom, I was placed and settled as the minister of Dalmailing. {1}
When about a week thereafter this was known in the parish, it was thought
a wonderful thing, and everybody spoke of me and the new king as united
in our trusts and temporalities, marvelling how the same should come to
pass, and thinking the hand of Providence was in it, and that surely we
were preordained to fade and flourish in fellowship together; which has
really been the case: for in the same season that his Most Excellent
Majesty, as he was very properly styled in the proclamations for the
general fasts and thanksgivings, was set by as a precious vessel which had
received a crack or a flaw, and could only be serviceable in the way of an
ornament, I was obliged, by reason of age and the growing infirmities of
my recollection, to consent to the earnest entreaties of the Session, and to
accept of Mr Amos to be my helper. I was long reluctant to do so; but the
great respect that my people had for me, and the love that I bore towards
them, over and above the sign that was given to me in the removal of the
royal candle-stick from its place, worked upon my heart and
understanding, and I could not stand out. So, on the last Sabbath of the
year 1810, I preached my last sermon, and it was a moving discourse.
There were few dry eyes in the kirk that day; for I had been with the aged
from the beginning--the young considered me as their natural pastor--and
my bidding them all farewell was, as when of old among the heathen, an
idol was taken away by the hands of the enemy.