Year: 1877

all tuC VI liiC oiC W bO NiaooNO I'll
der one or other of these two heads-the
trial of having to do or to bear that which
you do not like TO do or to bear, and the
trial Of giviOg up what you wish to have
the trial of active pain, of positive suffer-
ing, aud that of passive negation and the
drtariness of disappointment. And in like
manner there are the two classes of people
to whom these trials of life are either toler-
able or intolerable-the active and energet-
ic, who are strong enough to do what they
do not like to do, but to whom it is worse
than death to give up what they want 10
have and the indolent and phlegma,ic
souls who will give up any hing in the
world-the most coveted object, the most
cherished desire-raiber than bend their
backs to bear troublesome burden, or
force themselves to do that which is un-
pl, a.ant. 1t ell depends on the nature Of
the individual to whom one or other of
these two classes of trial comes, whether it
is borne with patience or petulantly fretted
under, may be fretted under with such
agony and passionate despair as breaks
them to pieces and finishes the whole thing
out of hand, ending both life and sorrow
together. But no one can say that the one
trial is better than the other for universal
humanity, seeing that it is the nature of
the individual which makes the whole diff
ference between what is to one a tolerable
annoyance, and 10 another an intolerable
anguish-what one ban suffer and not faint
under, and another cannot bear any more
than the human frame can bear torture
without distress. I axe the most familiar
instance, that of the unhappy marriage
made and to be endured, and that of the
happy one promised, built on, coveted, but
which failed in it's fultiilment. Which is
worse to hear !? Who can tell2 Heats
break equally under both; and now one,
now the other is shown to be insupporta-
bic by the deliberate choice of death rather
than the suffering which it entails. There
ale people so consii uted that even an un-
happy marriage has its compeosations in
the station or security, the home or the
children that it gives; ard there are others
to whom the loes of the dearest creature
that ever lived is in time compensated for
by the liberty that celibacy contains, and
the absence of those domestic worries
which are inseparable from marriage, even
the happeat. And again there are Others
to whom the sun has lost his glory and
earth its Joy, to whom the love of children
counts for nothing, the pride Of station is
dream, il on the one hand they have to bear





any kind, or on the other have been balkt
of their wish and forced to give up what
they desired.


Yet disappointments are salutary. 1t is
one of the mysteries of life on this earth
that so many salutary things are disagree
able, and that thoee which are pleasant and
soft are tor the most part hurtful to the
more masculine virtues of the soul, or alb
solutely wrong. And disappointment fol-
lows the rule with the rett. 1t comes in
as one of the whips by which we are disci-
plined into patience, and also as one of the
spurs by which we are melted 10 endeavor.
II we could get all that we wished on the
first trial, we should not make a second
and the second generally goes beyond the
first in power. Again, If we could get all
that we want-if each of us had private
bit of pedu de chdgrin in his pocket-it lie
doubtful if we snCuld be much happier in
the long run than we are now. 1t is diff
cult, nay impossible, TO make the young
unders and this. 1t is only by the teachings
of experience that we CO me anywhere near
to real and not affected belief in this, even
in maturity; hat how often we zee that the
attainment of desire has been to our mis-
cry, and that the attainment Of desire has
been to misery, and that the disappointment
of a cherished wish has been q mercy in
disguise. We have to learn to give up as
we have to learn to bear pain, to see the
sun go down and day give place to night,
or any other memorable condition of nature
and human life. Love and fortune. happi-
ness and pleasure, success and attainment
of that object for which we have striven
long and wrought hard-all fail us, and we
are doomed to disappointment as Sisyphus
before us, that type of fruitless en-
deavor. But we must 60 on
There is no use in lying down at the foot
of the hill because we have slipped back
once, and more thsn once, IN our endeavor
TO climb to the top. The top has to be
reached in some cases, in others the blow
has TO be borne quietly but 10 us all disap-
pointment should come as lesson, not a
scourge-a trial whence we are to draw
spiritual good, not hurt which for its pain
jutties US in childish petulance of grief or
uumanly violence of despair London
Queen.