In 1638 Heermann's health became so much worse that he was obliged to relinquish his charge at Köben altogether, and the last nine years of his life were spent in extreme distress from an affection resembling incessant catarrh and low fever of a very severe character. But he had a kind nurse in his second wife; whenever he rallied, study and writing were his recreations, and he published successively a number of devotional works. Another severe trial befell him during this period of sickness: his eldest son, a young man of much promise, fell under the influence of the Jesuits at Breslau, and was on the point of openly joining the Roman Catholic Church. 200 The remonstrances and arguments of his father, however, recalled him to the evangelical faith in which he had been brought up; but his health gave way, and he died in 1643 of a slow fever, which was commonly supposed to be the effect of a powder given him by the Jesuits when he quitted them. At last, in 1647, Heermann himself died, after many weeks of the greatest prostration, which he bore with unwearied patience. It was in the course of this last illness that he wrote a large number of verses and short poems, from which we choose the following "Sighs" and "Lament," as he himself calls them:--