The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1895-07-13

| be praised Tor these VINO, no longer
able to bear the strain of battle,
kneel in behalf of the great work
that is going on.
But there are many other hearts
that are troubled from causes less
worthy. These are the foolish whose
trouble is their disposition to borrow
trouble. 1t is not exaggeration to
say that one half the trouble in the
world is imaginary-most of the evils
apprehended never occur. Yet how
real to some people is the dread of
things that never come! The cause
of such trouble is mainly bodily
weakness. Nervous depression has
these moral symptoms. Dyspepsia,
a torpid liver, and other bodily all
ments are attended by similar symp-
toms. A sweet song may soothe such
trouble, and prayer or a religious
service may quiet the heart for lit
tie time, but attention must be given
to questions of health. Experience
teaches that the hearts ease ministra
ton of religion can be greatly as
sisted by such means as will restore
the shattered nerves to health. The
relations of body and soul are so in
innate that the religious care for
the one must go hand in hand with
hygienic treatment of the other.
This is one great lesson of the heal
ing miracles of the Lord. He was
ever surrounded with the sick. Not
OILY were his sympathies touched by
physical suffering, but he sought to
touch the soul through improved
physical conditions which his healing
power produced. Thus he gave to
all the Christian ages the impressive
lesson, that care for the soul must go
hand in hand with care for the body.
Wild delirium has now and then
swept over the Christian world in
which the idea prevailed that the less
one cared for health and comfort of
the body the brighter and stronger
the soul would become. This delir-
ium was called Asceticism and was
carried to great excess, in some cases
quite disgusting, while great masses
of the Christian population were
more or less affected with the insane
idea.
1t is hopeful sign that in these
days questions of health are consid
cred by those who would do the best
religious work. The purely imagin,
airy troubles-terribly real in most
cases-are to be first helped by by
gienic rather than religious treatment.
Heart's ease will come with returning
health, and then religious instruction
can be intelligently received. The
compassion of Heaven is tender to-
ward ell these borrowers of trouble.
The cause is known and all nature
unites with religion to remedy the
trouble. We have learned to call
nature motherly because of the heal
ing tendency. A wound heals, a
broken bone knits, force of recovery
is ever operating in the body that is
diseased. And when the recovery is
impossible, the body sooner or later
finds rest in death and death is pro-
vided for. Endless suffering is un-
known to nature. We say nature,
and we speak of the laws of nature,
but it is God, and the laws of nature
are God in action. All the motherly
ministration is His gracious doing.
He is around us and within us every
moment; we are never out of His
sight, never out of his mind. In this
world and in every other, the Father
is with his family, helping, blessing
and uplifting. Christ is one with
God. The miracles of Christ, So
called, show the divine mastery over
what we call nature, or in other
words, show Gods action in the ply
steal world. He is gracious always
and everywhere. The healing of
human sorrow, the soothing of
troubled hearts is the divine work of
God our Father, as He is revealed in
the life of the blessed Lord-the
Christ of God-the Saviour of the
world. Nature and the Bible are one
in spirit and are related as primary
lessons are related to higher educa-
ton.
There is much theological trouble
in the world-many hearts troubled
with fears of terrible evils in the
world to come. We have sometimes
thought nervous dyspepsia has some
thing to do in making the trouble.
Certainly person with good liver
and good digestion does not, in these
days, lay awake nights for fear of an
endless hell either for himself or his