Note 482 — Chapter IV

‘Mr. William Trail, minister at ****, tells me that his father, Mr. William Trail, minister at Borthwick, used every morning, when he had publick work on his hand, to hear three knocks at his chamber dore; and if, throu wearynes, or heaviness, he did sitt these, ther wer ordinarily three knocks at his bed-head, which he never durst sitt, but gott up to his work. This was ordinarily about three in the morning. This, at first, in his youth, frighted him; but at lenth it turned easy to him, and he believed these knocks and awaknings proceed from a good art. That these never failed him on Sabbaths and at Communions, when he was obliged to rise early: That when he turned old and infirm, towards the close of his dayes, they intirely ceased and left him.’ Wodrow's Analecta, vol. ii. p. 307. This work, in four quarto volumes, is invaluable for the history of the Scotch mind; being a vast repertory of the opinions and traditions of the clergy, during the seventeenth, and early part of the eighteenth, century. Wodrow was a man of ability, certainly above the average; his honesty is unimpeachable, as the jealous scrutiny which the episcopalians have made of his great work on the History of the Church of Scotland, decisively proves; and he was in the constant habit of personal and epistolary communication with the leading characters of his age. I have, therefore, freely used his Analecta; also his Collections upon the Lives of Ministers, which is likewise in four quarto volumes; and his Correspondence, in three thick octavo volumes. It would be difficult to find a more competent witness respecting the sentiments of his ecclesiastical brethren. It would be impossible to find a more candid one.