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power to sanctify, which they could not have before, and endowed with arguments of peace.
See too what the blessing is: how very much is contained in it. "For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory."[1] It is not merely that if we will suffer them, and not thwart the gracious purposes of our heavenly Father, who doth not willingly afflict or grieve us: it is not merely that they would result in our advantage here, our moral or spiritual improvement in this life; but they advance us to a fitness for degrees of glory hereafter, that we can but faintly conceive of until they are bestowed. For "it is a faithful saying," "if we suffer we shall also reign with Him." And not we only, but all those who yet look for His appearing, or are gone before us to be with Him; while it is possible, nay likely, that the separations we grieve over may be the mode adopted in the far seeing mercy of our Father, to render our eternal union more blessed and secure.
Let us then accept this almost universal law of suffering, sanctified and solaced as it is by the example and blessing of our Lord: let us acquiesce in the wisdom of our Father whensoever He shall see fit to bow any of us under it: that so it may bring forth its fruit in due season. And then, at length, when the warfare of life and the discipline
- ↑ 2 Cor. iv. 17.
