The earl of Cassilis and some other friends of Wishart had appointed to meet him at Leith, and as that town is very near Edinburgh, they had advised him not to show himself until their arrival. After awaiting them for a day or two he fell into a deep melancholy. ‘What differ I from a dead man,’ said he, ‘except that I eat and drink? To this time God has used my labors to the disclosing of darkness, and now I lurk as a man that was ashamed and durst not show himself before men.’--‘You know,’ said his friends, ‘the danger wherein ye stand.’ ‘Let my God,’ he replied, ‘provide for me as best pleases him.’ On the following Sunday, fifteen days before Christmas, he preached on the parable of the sower.[337] From Leith he went to Brownston, Langniddrie and Ormiston, and preached on the Sunday both morning and afternoon at Inveresk to a large concourse of people. Two Franciscan friars came and stood by the church door, and whispered something to those who were going in to turn them back. Wishart observing this said to some who were near the pulpit, ‘I heartily pray you to make room to these two men; it may be that they be come to learn.’ Then addressing the monks he said, ‘Come near, for I assure you ye shall hear the word of verity, which shall either seal unto you this same day your salvation or your condemnation.’ He continued his discourse, but the two friars, who had taken up their places, did not cease whispering right and left, and troubling all that stood near them. Wishart turned sharply to them and said--‘O sergeants of Satan, and deceivers of the souls of men, will ye neither hear God’s truth nor suffer others to hear it? Depart, and take this for your portion; God shall shortly confound and disclose your hypocrisy within this realm; ye shall be abominable unto men, and your places and habitations shall be desolate.’ He then resumed his sermon, and preached with so much power that Sir George Douglas, brother of the earl of Angus, who was present at the meeting, said publicly after the sermon, ‘I know that my lord governor and my lord cardinal shall hear that I have been at this preaching (for they were then in Edinburgh). Say unto them that I will avow it, and will not only maintain the doctrine that I have heard, but also the person of the teacher to the uttermost of my power.’ Those who were present greatly rejoiced at these words, spoken by so influential a man. As for Wishart, it was enough for him to know that God keeps his own people for the end to which he calls them.[338] He preached in other places to large numbers, and with all the more fervor for his persuasion and assertion that the day of his death was at hand.