| The Every Day of Life |
Chapter 4 |
Page 4 |
The love of Christ in the heart makes one like Christ himself, and he is quiet. He was never flustered. He never fumed nor fretted, was never worried. He never spoke hastily on the street. There was a calmness in his soul that showed itself in every word he spoke, in every look of his eye, in all his hearing.
It is well that we learn the lesson of quietness. It is a secret of power. It will save us from outbursts of temper and from saying the rash and hasty words, which one-hour afterward we should be sorry for having said, and which if spoken would make so much bitterness and trouble for us. It will enable us to be cheerful and patient amid the cares and vexations of life.
There is a blessing in being still and quiet in the time of suffering. “Does it hurt you severely?” One asked of a friend who lay with a broken arm. “Not when I keep it still,” was the answer. This is the secret of much of the victoriousness we seek in rejoicing Christians. They conquer the pain and the bitterness by keeping still. They do not ask questions, nor demand to know why they have trials. They believe in God, and are so sure of his love and wisdom, that no doubt, no fear, and no uncertainty pain them. Peace is their pillow, because they have learned just to be still. Their quietness robs trial of its sharpness, sorrow of its bitterness, death of its sting, and the grave of its victory.
Quietness is a blessed secret for the wives and mothers in the home. It is impossible for any gentlewoman, though her household life be even ideally Christian and happy, to avoid having many experiences that try her sensitive spirit. Probably the most perfect earthly marriage has its times, especially in its earliest years, its harsh incidents and its rude contacts, which tend to disturb the wife’s heart and give her pain. It is hard, or at least it takes time, for the average man to learn to be so gentle that no word, touch, act, habit, or disposition of his shall ever hurt the heart of the woman he loves even most tenderly and truly. Nothing but the love on her part that is provoked, that doth not behave itself unseemly, that can be silent and sweet – not silent and sullen, but silent and sweet -in any circumstances, can make even holiest wedded life what it should be. Blessed is the wife who has learned this lesson.
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