Religious life is a life of burden-bearing. Fret not against your crosses, and they will be light. The yoke sits easiest on the neck of the patient ox. He feels his chain the lightest who does not drag but carry it.
Bow before your trials, as I have read travelers do when overtaken in the desert by the dreadful Simoom. The Simoom! When that cry arises, striking terror into the boldest hearts, and the purple haze sweeps on, which to breath is death, they make no attempt to fly—the swiftest Arab scours not the desert like the wing of this scourge—but, instantly, they throw themselves on the ground, every head is muffled; and there, low in the dust, trembling, dumb, in awful silence they lie, and let the poisonous wind blow over them.
“Hide thee in the dust, hide thee in the dust!’’ is the voice of God in our life calamities; and the lower we lie before Him, we shall suffer the less when darkness comes. —GUTHRIE.