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In the months before Presbyterian minister and poet Samuel Jones Cassels passed away in Savannah, Georgia at the age of 47, probably of tuberculosis, he was very busy with his pen, writing a number of articles for the Southern Presbyterian Review, including one which was published posthumously.
The editors of SPR published a bit of his correspondence after his death which tells us something of the sufferings of this saint, and his longing for heaven. In a letter dated April 20, 1853, Cassels wrote:
Rev. and Dear Brother, — I am gratified that there is prospect of having another article published. Not that I desire to appear so often before the public, but because I am so shut out of life by infirmity. Ah, my Brother, few know my daily sufferings. As the Apostle said, “I die daily." The pen is the almost only means of a little diversion from bodily pain. Whenever I can be so absorbed in thought as to forget the body, I have ease, sometimes exhilaration. But, for the most part, I only struggle and struggle with the decays of my frail tabernacle. But I should not thus speak, lest I seem to murmur, — for I can feebly testify, that in all my afflictions, no good word of God has failed. For the past week, I have been much afflicted; and yesterday, — fell sick, and is very sick to-day. Oh, how such things should make us value that good Land, where thorns and thistles grow not, tears are not shed, and sin has no existence!
You will find the article hastily written , and of course disfigured by bad-spelling , bad punctuation, and bad grammar, it may be. — Anything of this kind you may see, please correct, as if it were your own. I have had to erase much for the same reason. Please see that the proofs are correct.
Yours in the Gospel, and in the hope of a blessed immortality.
S.J. Cassels
On June 15, 1853, Cassels entered into that Good Land, and all his bodily sufferings came to an end. No more thorns and thistles! Only blessed peace and immortality in the presence of his beloved Savior.
