Forty Years in the Church of Christ

PREFACE

I had no thought of writing this book till the meeting of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church of Canada, in 1889 I was then on the eve of celebrating my eightieth birthday, and on the motion of the Rev. Dr. MacVicar, Principal of the Presbyterian College, Montreal, and Rev. Dr. Warden, Secretary-Treasurer of the Board of French Evangelization, the Assembly passed a vote of congratulation as a public expression of Christian esteem towards me. At the same time, a resolution was unanimously adopted to invite me to write a new book under the name of "Thirty Years in the Church of Christ," as a sequel to my last book, "Fifty Years in the Church of Rome."

I could not but yield to that request, for I felt that it would not be doing justice to my God and to myself to write of my half-century of bondage under Rome, and not give an account of my glorious liberty under Christ; so I have taken steps to prepare a book containing some of the most striking incidents and events since I came into the possession of the full and blessed light of the Gospel, covering now nearly forty years.

During this last period of my life, which has been very eventful, I have traveled in many countries and visited different continents, and I have given thousands of sermons and lectures, and thus in spreading the Gospel I have had the opportunity of seeing human nature in its varied aspects. As these experiences of mine illustrate the saying, "truth is sometimes stranger than fiction," I feel that what I have to say in this work is adapted to interest as well as to impart very useful knowledge.

The Christian readers of this book will wish to know at

first some of the ways through which our merciful God has brought me from the feet of the Pope to those of the Lamb who has made me free and pure with His blood. In the first part of this work I aim to satisfy such a reasonable desire.

As history is philosophy teaching by example, I endeavour to give in the book, as a whole, facts which suggest and teach lessons, and stir up greater activity on the part of Protestants to resist the aggressions of Romanism, and to spread the truth among the benighted dupes and slaves of the Pope.

In an important sense, I have written this book because I could not help it. The truth I have is not my own-it belongs to my heavenly Father, and the treasure in the earthen vessel I am bound to give to others as far as I can.

With this feeling and purpose, I send forth this volume on its mission, hoping that it will be doing good after I am gone, and thus, though dead, I still may speak to others.

Books