Muscatine weekly journal. [volume] (Muscatine, Iowa) 185?-1890, 1864-07-29
THE JOURNAL.


RAIN is sentinel that warns us of
danger. And therefore it stands upon
the Outposts of the citadel, the body; for
pain is keenest on the surface. Now,
be it granted, that pain does us some
harm but it saves us from worse harm.
If fire did not pain us, it might burn us
up. If cold did not pain us, it might
freeze us to death. If disease did not
pain us, we might die before we knew
we were sick. If contacts, of all sorts,
with surrounding objects-the wood
mans ak, the carpenters saw, the far
mer's harrow-did not hurt us, they
might cut and tear us all to pieces.
Think of it. A knife held in q careless
hand approaches us; it touches the skin;
we start back. Why, because there is
pain. But for this, it might have en-
tered the body, and cut some vital organ;
An old Greek verse says: Thegods sell
us the blessings they bestow."
These are the best terms for US: They
make us careful and prudent. Uncon-
ditional giving might lead to reckless
squandering. Pain, then, is teacher OF
prudence, of self-care. Nay, and II hap
piness alone were considered, IL mlght
be argued that an occasional bitter drop
gives zest to the cup of enjoyment;
as hunger does to the feast, or sharp cold
tons the argument is still stronger.
Here is a human soul clothed with a
body, to be trained to virtue, to self
command, to spiritual strength and no
bleness. Would perpetual ease and
pleasure, aperpetual luxury ofsensatlon,
best do that? We know that 1t would
not. Every wise and thoughtful man at
least knows that some pain, some SICK
ness, some rebuke of the senses, is good
for him. Such man often feels, In
long continued states of ease and com
fort, that it is time something should
come to try, to discipline, to inure ana
ennoble his nature. He is afraid of UNI
interrupted enjoyment.
Pain, patiently and nobly endured,
peculiarly strengthens and splrltuallzes
the soul. Heinrich Heine says; only
the man who has known bodily suffer-
ing is truly a man" The loftiest states
of mind, and compared with merely
sensual indulgence, the happiest, are
those of courageous endurance, and the
martyr is often happier than the volup-
tuary. Cicero says, speaking of the sac
rifice of Regulus, and after describing
his happy fortunes-he had carried on
great wars, had been twice Consul, had
triumphal honors decreed to him-"nOth-
ing was so great as his death :" when to
fulfill his word, be went back to Garth
age to suffer all that could be inflicted
on him. 'To us, hearing of it," says
Cicero, sit is sad; to him, suffering it. it
it was joy; it was "a pleasures" erdt
vo1uptorius. For he adds, mot the
light and gay in their jollity nor their
wantonness, nor theiralaughter and jest
ing-companiOns of dissoluteness-bu
the serious and resolved, in their endur-
is the general statement to be made with
regard to pain. 1t is general, indeed,
and does not propose to cover every
case
But now, it may be asked, how could
not the same end be gained, the same
nObleness, the same cOnstancy have been
achieved, without pain? Which is, 1
think, as if one should ask, whether the
wood could have been cut into shape
without the ak, or the marble without
the chisel, or the gold purified without
the furnace. But let us answer; and we
say, not in any way that we can con-
ceive of. 1t may have been absolutely
inevitable in the nature of things, that a
frame sensitive to pleasure should be
liable to pain. This may be the eXpla-
nation of that long continued and severe
pain, which presents the hardest prob
AOlII5 III Jul ply SlCol AliC. NAti1 sum
causes foregoing, such train of infiu-
ences, neutral, moral or physical, as pro-
duced this terrible suffering, it may have
been impossible, without miracle, to
prevent it.
Ordinarily, indeed, such pain is not
long continued. 1t destroys life, or life
destroys it. 81 gravis, breuis 81 lOngus,
leuis. "If severe, brief-if long, light"
is the old adage: and it is true. But if
it fail, and the terrible case of protracted
anguish is before us, we may be obliged
to leave it under some great law of the
human constitution, which makes pre-
vention impossible. l may be told that
such pain does no good; that it breaks
down mind and body together: that it
cannot, in any way ,sbe useful. But we
do not know that. In the great cycle
of eternity all may come right. How
much happier thesufferer maybeforever,
for this present pain, we knownot. All
experience, all known analogies, favor
the idea of that immense remuneration.
From Dr.. Dewey's Problem of Human
Destiny.