There are, however, several of his sayings which, perhaps, cannot be vindicated upon these principles, and which he himself seems to have rested upon different grounds.[327] Of this kind are the assurances which he expressed, from the beginning of the Scottish troubles, that the cause of the congregation would ultimately prevail; his confident hope of again preaching in his native country and at St Andrews, avowed by him during his imprisonment on board the French galleys, and frequently repeated during his exile; with the intimations which he gave respecting the death of Thomas Maitland, and Kircaldy of Grange. It cannot be denied that his contemporaries considered these as proceeding from a prophetic spirit, and have attested that they received an exact accomplishment. Without entering on a particular examination of these instances, or venturing to give a decisive opinion respecting any of them, I shall confine myself to a few general observations. The most easy way of getting rid of this delicate subject is to dismiss it at once, and summarily to pronounce that all pretensions to extraordinary premonitions, since the completing of the canon of inspiration, are unwarranted, and that they ought, without examination, to be discarded and treated as fanciful and visionary. Nor would this fix any {265} peculiar imputation on the character or talents of our Reformer, when it is considered that the most learned persons of that age were under the influence of a still greater weakness, and strongly addicted to the belief of judicial astrology. But I doubt much if this method of determining the question would be doing justice to the subject. _Est periculum, ne, aut neglectis his impia fraude, aut susceptis, anili superstitione, obligemur._[328] On the one hand, the disposition which mankind discover to pry into the secrets of futurity, has been always accompanied with much credulity and superstition; and it cannot be denied, that the age in which Knox lived was prone to credit the marvellous, especially as to the infliction of divine judgments on individuals. A judicious person, who is aware of this, will not be disposed to acknowledge as preternatural whatever was formerly regarded in this light, and will be on his guard against the illusions of imagination as to impressions which may be made on his own mind.