“Christ is to me as life on earth, and death to me is gain,
Because I trust through Him alone salvation to obtain;
So brittle is the state of man, so soon it doth decay,
So all the glory of this world must pass and fade away.
THE above lines are inscribed in old English lettering on a border of brass round the tombstone of Robert Pursglove, in the parish church of the picturesque and noted village of Tideswell, in the Peak of Derbyshire. Pursglove died over three hundred years ago, in the year 1579. A man of much learning, he became the head of Gisburn Priory, being the prior there at the time of its suppression in 1540, and of whom it is recorded that “the prior lived in the most sumptuous style, being served at table by gentlemen only." After the suppression of Gisburn he was appointed provost—and, as it proved, the last one—of the "College of Jesus," at Rotherham, founded in the previous century by Thomas Scot de Rotherham, Archbishop of York. Pursglove witnessed the dissolution also of that seat of learning in 1550, and was then made a bishop in Yorkshire. Yet a third time, after another ten years, was he deprived of high ecclesiastical position and authority by reason of political changes; for we are told that with many others he lost his preferment rather than take the Oath of Supremacy to Queen Elizabeth in 1560.
And now he retires from his busy public life, with all its varied calls to a man of such position and influence—with all its privileges and responsibilities its vanities and vexations—and betakes himself to the quietude of his native village in the Derbyshire Peak. Here, unhindered by the ceremonious ritual of his previous positions, he was able to cultivate the personal religion of a soul in communion with its Redeemer, and to realize what it was to trust in the atoning sacrifice of the Lord Jesus; for the same Scriptures which teach us the way of salvation today, enabled Robert Pursglove by grace to learn " through Him alone salvation to obtain," over three hundred years ago. All the knowledge he had obtained—which enabled him to hold the position of provost of such a seat of piety and learning as Archbishop Scot's College at Rotherham then was—could not show him any other way of salvation; for had he not found out that Christ Jesus Himself had said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life; no man cometh unto the Father, but by Me." (John 14:6.) Having filled such high and dignified positions in the ecclesiastical world, and found out how very unstable and unreliable they all were, the words on his tomb-stone—
“So brittle is the state of man, so soon it doth decay,
So all the glory of this world must pass and fade away,"
show us that he had not only proved, but also admitted the truth of the apostle Peter's statement in the twenty-fourth verse of the first chapter of his first epistle: " For all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away." He was evidently also prepared to believe what Peter further says: “But the word of the Lord endureth for ever. And this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you "; for there and there only, in the enduring word of the Lord, could Pursglove learn, as his epitaph has it, to” trust through Him alone salvation to obtain."
And the desire of the writer in drawing the reader's attention to this little bit of history is to emphasize the grand fact implied in the quaint lettering on that old tombstone that the soul's salvation is alone obtainable by faith in Christ Jesus. “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through Him might be saved." (John 3:16, 7.) And the apostle Peter pressed home upon his hearers this truth of salvation " through Him alone " when accounting to the authorities for the miracle wrought upon the poor lame man at the Beautiful gate of the temple-the man who, lame from his birth, Peter took by the hand, saying, " In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk," which he at once was enabled to do, going with the apostles into the temple, " walking, and leaping, and praising God." (See Acts 3.) And when Peter was questioned by those in authority about the matter, he told them it was by the power of the name of Jesus, and added, " Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved." (Acts 4:12) And by "none other name" have any of the ransomed saints in glory found entrance there; "through Him alone," on whom Robert Pursglove placed his reliance, have they obtained eternal salvation.
And how is it with the reader of these lines? Do you realize what it is to trust in Jesus, to know redemption, and to be in the enjoyment of the possession of eternal life. For the one you need to do as one of Adam's fallen race, and the other you may know and have now. Then why delay? Why reap the wages of sin—death—when you may have the free gift of God—eternal life? “Behold, now is the accepted time; now is the day of salvation "; and salvation is of the Lord.” Neither is there salvation in any other." May you learn from reading this, by the Holy Spirit, how "salvation to obtain "; then you will have good cause to remember the lines on the old monumental brass on the tombstone of Robert Pursglove, the last provost of Rotherham College. And, when you visit the Peak of Derbyshire, one of the chief points of interest to you will be this inscription in the village church of Tideswell:—
"Christ is to me as life on earth, and death to me is gain,
Because I trust through Him alone salvation to obtain;
So brittle is the state of man, so soon it doth decay,
So all the glory of this world must pass and fade away."
H. W. P.