LAST DAYS OF JOHN KNOX.

MR. FROUDE, in his "History of England," thus sketches the last days of the great Scottish Reformer, and exhibits his view of that rugged and forcible character :

"Shortly after Knox's last sermon, a paralytic stroke prostrated his remaining strength; he became unable to read, and for a day or two his mind was wandering. He recovered his senses, but only to know that the end was not far off; and still thinking of his country, and of his country's present trials, he sent for the elders of the Kirk to charge them for the last time to be constant. His next anxiety was for Grange. Grange who, as a boy, had shared in that forlorn enterprise at St. Andrew's when Beton went to his account, was a person whom Knox had long loved and prized. In the last years, by some fatality he had been led by Maitland into the ways of foolishness; beyond and beside the spiritual aspects of the matter, none knew better than Knox in which way the long obstinacy of the defenders of the castle would end at last, and he made a final effort to save his old friend from destroying himself. 'Go,' he said to David Lindsay, a minister who came to his bedside, 'Go to yon man of the castle. Tell him I warn him in the name of God to leave that evil cause, and give over the castle. If not, he shall be brought down over the walls with shame, and hung against the sun.' Lindsay went as he was bidden and saw Grange, and ' somewhat moved him.' But he talked to Maitland, and Maitland turned the warning into ridicule. Go, tell Mr. Knox,' he said at last in answer, that he is but a drytting prophet.' 'Well, well,' said Knox, when the words were brought back to him, I have been earnest with my God anent they twa men. For the one, I am sorry that sa should befall him; yet God assures me there is mercy for his soul. For the other, I have na warrant that ever he shall be well'

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He went over the

On the 17th of November the elders of the congregation came to his bed to receive his last instructions. chief incidents of the last year with them.

'He had done his

best to instruct them,' he said, and if at any time he had spoken hardly, it was not from passion or ill will, but only to overcome their faults. Now that he was going away, he could but charge them to remain true-to make no compromise with evil-espe

LAST DAYS OF JOHN KNOX.

cially to yield in nothing to the castle-rather to fly with David to the mountains than remain at home in the company of the wicked.'

Two days later, the 19th, Morton came, and Ruthven and Glencairn; and to them he spoke at length, though what passed none ever knew. Afterward some fine lady came to praise him,' to flatter him in a foolish way for the great things which he had done. " Hush, hush!' he said; flesh is over proud, and needs no means to esteem the self.'

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He was rapidly going. On the 23rd he told the people who were about him that he had been meditating through the night on the troubles of the Kirk. He had been earnest in prayer with God for it. He had wrestled with Satan, and had prevailed. He repeated the Apostles' Creed and the Lord's Prayer, pausing after the first petition to say,' Who can pronounce so holy words!' It was the day on which a fast had been appointed by Convention for special meditation upon the massacre. After sermon, many eager persons came to his bedside, and, though his breath was coming thick and slow, he continued to speak in broken

sentences.

He was

The next morning the end was evidently close. restless, rose, half-dressed himself, and then, finding himself too weak to stand, sank back upon his bed. He was asked if he was in pain. He said, 'It was no painful pain, but such as would end the battle.' Mrs. Knox read to him St. Paul's words on death. Unto Thy hand, O Lord,' he cried, for the last time, I commend my soul, spirit and body.' At his own request she then read to him the seventeenth chapter of St. John's Gospel, where he told them he first cast anchor.

As night fell he seemed to sleep. The family assembled in his room for their ordinary evening prayers, and were the longer because they thought he was resting.' He moved as they ended. Sir, heard ye the prayers?' said one. I would to God,' he answered, that ye and all men heard them as I have heard them, and I praise God of the heavenly sound.' Then, with a long sigh, he said, 'Now it is come.' The shadow was creeping over him, and death was at hand. Bannatyne, his secretary, sprang to his side.

Now, Sir,' he said, the time ye have long asked for-to wit, an end of your battle is come; and, seeing all natural power fails, remember the promise which oftentimes ye have shown me of

A FEW WORDS ABOUT ROME.

our Saviour Jesus Christ, and that we may understand ye hear us make us some sign.'

The dying man gently raised his head, and 'incontinent thereof, rendered up his spirit."

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'There lies one,' said Morton, as two days later, he stood to watch the coffin lowered into the grave, there lies one who never feared the face of mortal man." Morton spoke only of what he knew; the full measure of Knox's greatness neither he nor any man could then estimate. It is as we look back over that stormy time, and weigh the actors in it one against the other, that he stands out in his full proportions. No grander figure can be found, in the entire history of the Reformation in this island, than that of Knox. Cromwell and Burghley rank beside him for the work which they effected, but, as politicians and statesmen, they had to labour with instruments which they soiled their hands in touching. In purity, in uprightness, in courage, truth, and stainless honour, the Regent Murray and our English Latimer were perhaps his equals; but Murray was intellectually far below him, and the sphere of Latimer's influence was on a smaller scale. The time has come when English history may do justice to one but for whom the Reformation would have been overthrown among ourselves; for the spirit which Knox created saved Scotland; and if Scotland had been Catholic again, neither the wisdom of Elizabeth's ministers, nor the teaching of her bishops, nor her own chicaneries, would have preserved England from revolution. His was the voice which taught the peasant of the Lothians that he was a free man, the equal in the sight of God with the proudest peer or prelate that had trampled on his forefathers. He was the one antagonist whom Mary Stuart could not soften nor Maitland deceive; he it was that raised the poor Commons of his country into a stern and rugged people, who might be hard, narrow, superstitious, and fanatical, but who, nevertheless, where men whom neither king, noble, nor priest, could force again to submit to tyranny."

A FEW WORDS ABOUT ROME.

But here is the Rome of to-day-a city of two hundred thousand people, with its walls thirty-two miles in circumference, and massive gates shut every night at ten o'clock, forbidding ingress or egress after that hour; its high buildings, narrow streets without