Charles Kingsley - Out of the Deep: Words for the Sorrowful стр 3.

If we believe that God is educating men, the when, the where, and the how, are not only unimportant, but considering Who is the teacher, unfathomable to us; and it is enough to be able to believe that the Lord of all things is influencing us through all things.

Provided we attain at last to the truly heroic and divine life, which is the life of virtue, it will matter little to us by what strange and weary ways, or through what painful and humiliating processes, we have arrived thither.  If God has loved us, if God will receive us, then let us submit loyally and humbly to His lawWhom the Lord loveth He chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom He receiveth.

I believe that the wisest plan of bearing sorrow is sometimes not to try to bear itas long as one is not crippled for ones every-day dutiesbut to give way to sorrow, utterly and freely.  Perhaps sorrow is sent that we may give way to it, and, in drinking the cup to the dregs, find some medicine in it itself which we should not find if we began doctoring ourselves, or letting others doctor us.  If we say simply, I am wretched, I ought to be wretched; then we shall perhaps hear a voice, Who made thee wretched but God?  Then what can He mean but thy good?  And if the heart answers impatiently, My good?  I dont want it, I want my love! perhaps the voice may answer, Then thou shalt have both in time.

After all, the problem of life is not a difficult one, for it solves itselfso very soon at bestby death.  Do what is right, the best way you can, and wait to the end to know. . . .

If, in spite of wars, and fevers, and accidents, and the strokes of chance, this world be green and fair, what must the coming world be like?  Let us comfort ourselves as St. Paul did (in infinitely worse times), that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed.  It is not fair to quote one text about the creation groaning and travailing without the other, that it will not groan and travail long.  Would the mother who has groaned and travailed and brought forth childrenwould she give up those children for the sake of not having had that pain?  Then believe that the day will come when the world, and every human being in it who has really groaned and travailed, would not give up its past pangs for the sake of its then present perfection, but will look back on this life, as the mother does on past pain, with glory and joy.

I write to you because every expression of human sympathy brings some little comfort, if it be only to remind such as you that you are not alone in the world.  I know nothing can make up for such a loss as yours. 1  But you will still have love on earth all round you; and his love is not dead.  It lives still in the next world for you, and perhaps with you.  For why should not those who are gone, if they are gone to their Lord, be actually nearer us, not further from us, in the heavenly world, praying for us, and it may be, influencing and guiding us in a hundred ways, of which we in our prison-house of mortality cannot dream?

Yes, do not be afraid to believe that he whom you have loved is still near you, and you near him, and both of you near God, who died on the Cross for you.  That is all I can say.  But what comfort there is in it, if one can give up ones heart to believe it!

. . .  All that I can say about the text, Matt. xxii. 30 [of Marriage in the world to come], is that it has nought to do with me and my wife.  I know that if immortality is to include in my case identity of person, I shall feel for her for ever what I feel now.  That feeling may be developed in ways which I do not expect; it may have provided for it forms of expression very different from any which are among the holiest sacraments of life.  Of that I take no care.  The union I believe to be eternal as my own soul, and I leave all in the hands of a good God.

Is not marriage the mere approximation to a unity that shall be perfect in heaven?  And shall we not be reunited in heaven by that still deeper tie?  Surely if on earth Christ the Lord has lovedsome more than others;why should not we do the same in heaven, and yet love all?

Do I thus seem to undervalue earthly bliss?  No! I enhance it when I make it the sacrament of a higher union!  Will not this thought give more exquisite delight; will it not tear off the thorn from every rose; and sweeten every nectar cup to perfect security of blessedness in this life, to feel that there is more in store for usthat all expressions of love here, are but dim shadows of a union which will be perfect if we but work here, so as to work out our own salvation?

That is an awful feeling of having the roots which connect one with the last generation seemingly torn up, and having to say, Now I am the root, I stand self-supported, with no other older stature to rest on. 2  But this one must believe that God is the God of Abraham, and that all live to Him, and that we are no more isolated and self-supported than when we were children on our mothers bosom.

Believe that those who are gone are nearer us than ever; and that if, as I surely believe, they do sorrow over the mishaps and misdeeds of those whom they leave behind, they do not sorrow in vain.  Their sympathy is a further education for them, and a pledge, too, of help, and, I believe, of final deliverance for those on whom they look down in love.

Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord; for they rest from their labours, and their works do follow them.

They rest from their labours.  All their struggles, disappointments, failures, backslidings, which made them unhappy here, because they could not perfectly do the will of God, are past and over for ever.  But their works follow them.  The good which they did on earththat is not past and over.  It cannot die.  It lives and grows for ever, following on in their path long after they are dead, and bearing fruit unto everlasting life, not only in them, but in men whom they never saw, and in generations yet unborn.

A little while and ye shall not see me, and again a little while and ye shall see me, because I go to the Father, said our Lord when speaking of His own death to His sorrowing disciples.  And if it be so with Christ, then is it so with those who are Christs, with those whom we love.  They are the partakers of His death, therefore they are the partakers of His resurrection.  Let us believe that blessed news in all its fulness, and be at peace.  A little while and we see them, and again a little while and we do not see them.  But why?  Because they are gone to the Fatherto the source and fount of all life and power, all light and love, that they may gain life from His life, power from His power, light from His light, love from His loveand surely not for nought.  Surely not for nought.  For, if they were like Christ on earth, and did not use their powers for themselves alone, if they are to be like Christ when they shall see Him as He is, the more surely will they not use their powers for themselves, but as Christ uses His, for those they love?  Surely, like Christ they may come and go even now unseen.  Like Christ they may breathe upon our restless hearts and say, Peace be unto you.  And not in vainfor what they did for us when they were yet on earth they can do more fully now that they are in heaven.