Life and diary of Lieut. Col. J. Blackader

LIFE OF COL. BLACKADER. CHAP. XX.
grievances still, but these, I hope, shall be redressed
in due and short time. But though we may have
some cause to complain, yet, blessed be God, our
church is not in danger, and, I trust, never shall be,
under the happy government of our good King, and
his Protestant successors.
This speech was not well taken by some, and I
observed, by those especially who have most need to
be warned and put upon their guard against divisions.
It was the sore heel that cannot be touched. But I
have exonered my conscience in giving my testimony
against heats and discord.
May 16. The Assembly closed with singing the
122d Psalm. I returned in safety home to Stirling.
The remainder of this year furnishes few or no in-
cidents in his life worthy of particular notice. His
time was divided chiefly between the cares of his own
family, and the calls of friendships or charity which
were occasionally made upon him.
June 16. I was sent for in the morning up to the
Castle, to do a good office to a gentleman, a prisoner
there, who had been taken in the Rebellion. I did it
heartily, for as to matters of civility, we should heap
kindness like coals of fire upon their head. We may
shew zeal against their cause, and at the same time
tenderness and humanity to their persons.
Next year he was nominated Deputy-Governor of
Stirling Castle, an appointment which he did not
solicit, and which was procured, in consideration for
his services in the late Rebellion, solely by the in-
terest of those noble friends with whom he had lately
lived on terms of familiar intimacy.
(1717,) March 2. This day I got my commission