| Sweet are the uses of adversity, |
| Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous, |
| Wears yet a precious jewel in his head. |
Trials teach mortals not to lean on an earthly staff, — a broken reed, which pierces the heart. We do not half Salutary sorrow. remember this in the sunshine of joy and prosperity. Sorrow is salutary. Through great tribulation we enter into the kingdom. Trials are proofs of God's care. Spiritual development germinates not from seed sown in the soil of earthly hopes; but when these decay, Soul propagates anew the higher joys of Spirit, which have no taint of earth. Each successive stage of experience unfolds new views of divine goodness and love.
Amidst gratitude for conjugal felicity, it is well to remember how fleeting are human joys. Amidst conjugal infelicity, it is well to hope, and wait patiently on the Lord.
Husbands and wives should never separate, if there is no Christian demand for it. It is better to await the Xantippe. logic of events, than for a wife precipitately to leave her husband, or a husband his wife. If one is better than the other, as must always be the case, the other pre-eminently needs good company. Socrates considered patience salutary under such circumstances, making his Xantippe a discipline for his philosophy.
Sorrow has its reward. It never leaves us where it found us. The furnace separates the gold from the The gold and dross. dross, that the precious metal may be graven with the image of God. The cup our Father hath given, shall we not drink it, and learn the lessons He teaches?
