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There is one, arising from the very circumstances that produce the evils we have adverted to. In exclusion and banishment, amidst dreariness and despondence, when heart and flesh are failing, the soul obtains a new, and a more profound conviction than it ever had before, of the highest truths. How does it then begin to apprehend as a reality the great presence of God! He was near in happier scenes and hours, as He is in these. But many other objects were interposed, which turned the thoughts from Him, or attracted to themselves what should have been His alone. In the captivity which has torn it away from them, it is restored to Him. God becomes to the soul then a refuge and solace, when the idols it had suffered to supplant Him have been all destroyed.

There are few situations in which man feels his relation to God and his dependence on the Divine mercy more sensibly, than in the solitude created by a hopeless disease. The stillness necessary to the shattered frame is propitious to the holiest thoughts and

emotions. The humiliations which are attendant upon infirmity and pain bring low, even into the dust before him, whatever exalteth itself against God. The helplessness, that knows not what to do nor where to look for relief, carries us to Him who is able to supply all our need. Ah! with

what emphasis might a sick and dying man reiterate the exclamation, "I have heard of Thee with the hearing of the ear, but now mine eye seeth Thee!"

With its new sense of God, the afflicted and humbled spirit attains also a better knowledge of itself. The essential worth of a human soul is effectually taught by the process which takes all its dross away. Life in the sick room is existence stripped of its factitious adornments, from which all pomp and pride and festal shows, the glory of man, have departed. Whatever had been fuel to vanity is consumed in that furnace; all that was beautiful to the eye of a fond self-esteem is marred there; but beneath these is disclosed what outvies them by an infinite value. It is when man has seen

all distinctions but moral ones reduced to nothing, and has learned how unavailing are riches and titles and pleasures to meet life's sorest exigence, and prepare for death's severing blow, that he begins to know in what his own worth consists. And in the penitent endeavor to repair what by the frailty of his nature and his own sinfulness has been lost of that true worth, he has a consolation which beguiles him of all that is bitter in the thought of other losses, which he wants power to make good again.

To the better knowledge of himself, and more intimate communion with God, the discipline of his peculiar lot will add, for the invalid's solace, a more adequate appreciation of his fellow-beings. They who minister to his wants, give him the daily blessing of their sympathy, and lavish their affection upon him, are understood now and valued as they deserve. His dependence upon their assistance and care for the alleviations which his suffering state admits, makes him feel how little he deserves in comparison with the much which he re

ceives.

Their sacrifices of rest and ease and enjoyment for his sake, teach him the disinterestedness which he requires to have constantly in exercise, if he would not sink from wretchedness to self-contempt and despair. How the voices penetrate us, which "whisper of peace" to our sick hearts! What a beauty is there in the smile that beams within our close apartment! How we welcome the kind ones, who come to break the long stillness of our solitary room with their pleasant words! Then are love's divinest offices made known to the soul. And to the help of our purer purposes and humbler efforts to improve the fruit of the sharp teachings of pain, comes the strong impulse which is imparted by the virtues in others which have so redounded to our good.

Yet another element in the spiritual process which is going on amidst the sorrows of sickness, is the deeper conviction obtained through them of the value of our Christian faith and hope. It is when the night of life's direst experience has fallen upon us,

when the true light pours down upon a mind bewildered and fainting in an untried, unimagined way, that the Gospel proves itself divine. "He that believeth hath," then, "the witness in himself." The conviction produced in life's best and happiest hours, cherished amidst every vicissitude, having borne the soul onward in peace "through all time of its prosperity and all time of its tribulation," remains to cheer and strengthen it in the season of desolation, decay, and death. In the methods which God employs to deepen and secure such a faith in Himself, in the Redeemer, and in immortality, the lingering agony which belongs to an invalid's experience has its place. The endurance is more than compensated by the unutterable feeling of the preciousness of those promises and hopes, which is obtained by the fiery trial.

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