| The Hidden Life |
Chapter 2 |
Page 4 |
This is the meaning of the promises of peace which are found so frequently in the Bible. We have no assurance of a life without strife, trial, trouble, earthly pain, and loss; but we are assured that we may have unbroken peace within, while the outer life is thus beset. “In the world ye shall have tribulation.” “In me ye shall have peace.” The blessing of such a life in this world is incalculable. It becomes a source of strength, of shelter, of comfort, of hope, to many other lives. Susan Coolidge writes of one whose heart is kindest, and whose life is a perpetual benediction: —
“O heart beloved, O kindest heart!
Balming like summer and like sun
The sting of tears, the ache of sorrow,
The shy, cold hurts which sting and smart,
The frets and cares which under-run
The dull day and the dreaded morrow—
How when thou comest all turns fair!
Hard things seem possible to bear,
Dark things less dark, if thou art there.
Thou keepest a climate of thine own
‘Mid earth’s wild weather and gray skies,
A soft, still air for human healing,
A genial, all-embracing zone
Where frosts smite not, nor winds arise;
And past the tempest-storm of feeling
Each grieved and weak and weary thing,
Each bird with numbed and frozen wing,
May sink to rest and learn to sing.”
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