look at it."
July 18, 1889 (from the letters).—All our sorrows have one root, and, strange as it sounds, they all not only can, but ought, to be a blessing.... God grant that we may believe in the possibility of it—that is one thing; and the other is that we may not return in thought to our sorrow, in our imagination changing the conditions in which our sorrow has occurred and correcting our actions. "If we had done this or that this would not have happened." God preserve
us from this mistake, with its painful consequences. What has been is, and what is was bound to have been, and all our vital force ought to be directed to the present, to bearing our cross in the best way possible.
December, 1889 (from the letters).—The cross is given according to the strength.... I believe that, and cannot but believe it, because I know by experience that the harder my sufferings have been, if only I have succeeded in taking them in a Christian spirit ... the fuller, more vivid, more joyful and full of meaning life has become. It is so often insincerely repeated that sufferings are good for us and are sent by God, that we have ceased to believe it, and yet it is the simplest, clearest and most indubitable truth. Suffering—what is called suffering—is the condition of spiritual growth. Without suffering growth is impossible, the widening of life is impossible. For this reason sufferings also always accompany death. If a man had no suffering he would be in a bad way; that is why they say among the people that those whom God loves He visits by misfortunes. I understand that a man may be sad and apprehensive when misfortunes have not visited him for a long time. There is no movement, no growth of life. Suffering is only
suffering for the heathen, for the man who has not the light of the truth, and for us in the measure in which we have not the light; but sufferings cease to be such for the Christian—they become birth-pangs, even as Christ promised to deliver us from evil. And all this is not rhetoric, but is for me as undoubtedly in accordance with reason and experience as that it is now winter.
1892-3 (from the letters).—Nothing, I imagine, sets a man free from dependence on others and brings him near, or rather may bring him near, to God so much as your position. One only leans upon Him when men compel one to. God help you to bear your cross patiently, submissively, so as to get from it all the good which external suffering gives and can give. Or it will be mortifying that there has been suffering, but struggling with it, indignant and despairing, you did not get from it all that it is capable of giving.
May 17, 1893 (from the letters).—I am forced to live without personal, legitimate joys such as you have: labour, associations with animals, nature; without association (not poisoned by their corruption) with children; without the encouragement of public opinion. What has happened to me is not exactly that the praise of men has
destroyed for me the attractiveness of their praise, but their praise has been tainted, has become poisoned. I cannot now desire the praise of men, fame among the crowd, because I have it and know how double-faced it is; if there are some who praise, there are others who revile; that praise of men which you have, the good opinion of estimable men for a good life, at least consistent with your convictions I cannot have. And on the top of all that this praise of men—the way they write abroad and the opinion is current, that I lead a modest, laborious life in poverty—that praise arraigns me every second as a liar, a scoundrel living in luxury, making money out of the sale of his books. If I think of the praise of men it is like a thief who is every minute afraid that he will be caught, so that I have not only to live without the stimulus of lawful joys, and not only without the praise of men, but even with the perpetual consciousness of the shamefulness of life; I have to live by that which I consider men can and ought to live by; that is, by the consciousness of fulfilling the will of Him who sent us. And I see that I am still far from being ready for that, and am still only learning, and life is teaching me. And I ought to rejoice, and I do rejoice.
February 28, 1894 (from the letters).—The
longer I live and the nearer I am to death, the more certain to me is the injustice of our wealthy mode of life, and I cannot help suffering by it.