Indeed there are men whom I have known who are never kind or
sympathetic till they are in some wearing trouble of their own; when
they are prosperous and cheerful, they are frankly intolerable, because
their mirth turns to derision and insolence.
But one of the reasons why the heavenly life is apt to appear in
prospect so wearisome a thing is, because we are brought up to feel that
the whole character is flattened out and charged with a serene kind of
priggishness, which takes all the salt out of life. The word "saintly,"
so terribly misapplied on earth, grows to mean, to many of us, an
irritating sort of kindness, which treats the interests and animated
elements of life with a painful condescension, and a sympathy of which
the basis is duty rather than love. The true sanctification, which I
came to perceive something of later, is the result of a process of
endless patience and infinite delay, and the attainment of it implies a
humility, seven times refined in the fires of self-contempt, in which
there remains no smallest touch of superiority or aloofness. How utterly
depressing is the feigned interest of the imperfect human saint in
matters of mundane concern! How it takes at once both the joy out of
holiness and the spirit out of human effort! It is as dreary as the
professional sympathy of the secluded student for the news of athletic
contests, as the tolerance of the shrewd man of science for the feminine
logic of religious sentiment!
But I found to my great content that whatever change had passed over the
spirits of my companions, they had at least lost no fibre of their
individuality.
Pages:
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161