The conduct of our Reformer at this period affords a striking display of the unextinguishable ardour of his mind. Previous to the breaking out of the late disturbances, he had given up attendance on church courts. He never went abroad except on Sabbath‑days, to preach in the forenoon. He was so debilitated as to be unable to go to the pulpit without {187} assistance.[232] He had weaned his heart from the world, and expressed his resolution to take no more part in public affairs. In answer to a letter of his esteemed friend, Sir William Douglas of Lochleven, who had informed him of an intended attempt on the castle of St Andrews by archbishop Hamilton, and requested his good offices for certain preachers, we find him, on the 31st of March, 1570, writing as follows:――“How such troublers may be stayed in their enterprises, I commit to God, to whose counsels I commit you in that and all other causes worldly, for I have taken my good‑night of it; and therefore bear with me, good sir, albeit I write not to the superintendent of Fife in the action that ye desire.”[233] But whenever he saw the church and commonwealth seriously in danger, he forgot his infirmities and his resolutions, and entered into the cause with all the keenness of his more vigorous days. Whether the public proceedings of the nation, or his own conduct, were arraigned,――whether the attacks upon them were open or clandestine, he stood prepared to repel them, and convinced the adversaries, that they could not accomplish their designs without opposition, as long as he was able to move or speak.[234]