“My dear, dear friend, it is the privilege of friendship, and it is the enjoined duty of Christians, to weep with those that weep:—Juxon is right—you are unhappy—some secret sorrow is devouring your inward peace—reveal it to me.”
“Nay, Katharine, urge me not:—every heart knoweth its own bitterness—to every one is appointed some inward cross, which is better borne in silence.”
“Yet the sympathy of a friend is as a balm to the wounded spirit—a balm, Jane, which you have often poured gently and sweetly into mine, to the refreshment of my soul and the comfort of my aching heart;—besides, Jane, we must not let our private and inward griefs prey upon and consume our vital strength at a period like the present:—great trials are coming upon us, and severe duties will soon demand all our energies.”
“I know it, beloved Katharine,—and by your side I can meet them all. You are to me, all things: I have nothing on earth but you to whom I can cling: the stream of my heart would run to waste if it might not flow forth on you.”
“Hush! beloved,—hush!—these words are vain,”—and pointing to the blue sky and the fleecy clouds above them, Katharine silently conveyed to Jane her soft reproof and gentle admonition.
“I know all that you would say to me,” answered the mournful girl; “but, when all is said, how much of our present being must ever remain a mystery—sunbeams shine upon our heads, and violets spring beneath our feet—and yet, Kate, the world which this God of love hath created is a scene of misery—you know it is. What have you ever done that your brow should be clouded with sorrow, and your cheek blanched by care——”
“Stop, Jane; for your life, not another word like this:—‘they build too low who build below the sky:’—a curse is on this earth—a recorded curse—we may not, must not, cannot make a heaven of it:—it is our school, our place of discipline—the infancy of our existence:—what have any of us done, or what can any of us do, that so many countless blessings should be poured upon us? that we should be invited and taught to acquaint ourselves with that Holy One, by whom came truth, pardon, and peace—through whom we may win an entrance to that heavenly city, where ‘all tears shall be wiped from all faces?’”
A light of hope beamed in her serious eyes as thus she spoke, and Jane beheld it with reverence. The friends walked slowly back towards the house—there was a long pause in their discourse. It was broken by Jane asking, “You surely admit, dear cousin, that there is a vast difference in the fortunes and the trials of mankind?”
“The seeming difference is vast, but not perhaps the real:—we see only the outward aspect of suffering and of prosperity—but the cup of life is mixed.”
“Surely to many, who are prosperous and happy, few trials are appointed:—they are pleasant in their lives, and honoured in their deaths; they appear even upon earth to be the favourites of Heaven.”