Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-11-08
HOURS OF SICKNESS
Do Not Pass Swiftly, So Patients Have
Lots Of Time to Think.
SOME DIFFERENCE IN THINKING.
Tho Rev. George Hodges Prescribes Four
Spiritual Medicines.
HOW TROUBLE OFTEN ENDS IN GOOD
WRITTEN FOR THE p1spArcH.l

who knows how to be sick. It 10 . great
thing to know how to be sick.
The sickroom is battlefield, and the fight
that is fought there is not only q physical
one; it is q spiritual combat also. And
battles go, for the most part, to the best
prepared contestant. It has again and again
been found that readiness counts for more
than numbers The Germans beat the
French in their last war because they had
general who planned out all the battles be-
forehand, and had every detail looked after
and was perfectly ready.
If we are all going to be sick, let us learn
how to be sick And the best time to learn
that is now while we are well. There is
not much use preaching to sick people. 1t
is great deal better to preach to the sick
people before they begin to get sick.
Leisure Is q Lost Art.
Now, sickness gives almost everybody q
chance to think Somehow . good many
people are so busy in this hurrying life that
they seem to get no time for thought. There
is not half an hour in the whole day when
there is not something to be done, and done
right off The whole attention is taken up
hold duties. Our modern life is lived on
perpetual run. Never had any people SO
many time saving appliances as we have,
and never has any people had less leisure
time. We spend all that we save. Leisure
is word for whose meaning we consult the
dictionary. We read about it with curios-
ity in old books, It is one Of the lost arts.
There is plenty of thinking, but it is ap-
piled almost entirely to the visl Bile and the
temporary. There is little opportunity to
consider the great truths of the human life
What are we here for? Where are we 60
ing? We hardly stop to ask. And if we
sometimes question with old PLATE, what
is truth? the chances are that We follow
Pilates example, and stay not for an
answer. We have hardly time to say our
prayers.
Spiritual Value of Sickness.
Now, in the midst Of this unending hustle
and hustle, in the midst of this noisy life,
comes the angel of sickness, and we are led
away out of it all, away from the sight and
hearing of it, into quiet room where we
can think. And what shall we think about?
The spiritual value of our sickness depends
upon the answer to that question. We may
60 out of our sick room as we would 60 out
of prison, hating every remembrance of it,
counting our confinement as just so many
weeks stolen from us out of our life. Or
we NAV go out as q victorious soldier goes
from the field of triumph, wounded and
broken, and weak and weary. but with his
heart glad in the consciousness of . good
fight bravely and successfully fought; or as
a devout soul departs from the still sane
tuary, with the glow in his face reflected
from the face Of God, and who goes out
now in the,strength of that blessed meeting,
helped and uplifted, to uplift and help his
brother men.
The difference is very largely difference
in thinking. Meditation is the souls medi-
cine. If we take no medicine, or if we take
the wrong kind of medicine the soul will
suffer for it, like the body. It is of i'm
mense Importance to know the right thoughts
to think when one is sick.
-Four Spiritual Medicines.
would prescribe four kinds of spiritual
medicine meditation upon the love of God,
and upon the sympathy of Christ, and upon
the fact of sin, and npon the fact of the
sbortness and uncertainty of human life.
God loves us. Sometimes it is pretty
hard to believe that in the midst of pain.
But the great spiritual heroes, and saints,
and doctors of the old time, who were closer
to God than we are, and knew God better
than we do, declared that suffering was
even sign of the great love Of God. 1t is
not necessary, I think, to emphasize the
authority of Peter, and John and Paul It
is plain enough to see that they were mas
ters in that realm of knowledge where mas
tery depends on spiritual sympathy and
appreciation and character, where spiritual
things are spiritually discerned, and where
one cannot see at all unless he first be born
from above. They knew as much about
pain as we do, they had sufficient exper-
ience of it in their hard lives, and they
knew !, 900 times more about God than we
do. And they said that human pain has
somehow a close relation to the divine
fatherhood. 'My son, despise not thou the
chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou
art rebuked of him; for whom the Lord
son whom He receiveth. If ye endure
chastening God dealeth with you as with
sons.
Understanding the Father.
In different words and different ways,
they all taught that. And unless we know
more about the heavenly Father, and are
closer to him and understand him better
than they, we will do best, it seems to me
simple to accent that.
"Lord, he whom Thou lowest is sick"
That message, which is forever being car
ded by word, or letter, or telegram, hither
and thither among the sons of men bringing
CONSERVATION and foreboding with it, came
once 70 Ghrlt:
he whom thou lowest Is SICK: AND we
~ Know tnat Hnllst was al tne Time meaning
the sick. Wouid ne suner II, then, tnat ms
pest 1rleno snould be SICK! would ne not
hasten at once and neal MN! Instead OF
that, ne stayed on where ne was; and Lazarus
got worst ana worse DAY after day, and
finally died. And yet Lazarus was so dear