No Tears | AdventAI

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Nov 26, 1885

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 11, No. 45.

No Tears.

PERHAPS not more than one newspaper had the story. It was headed, "A little boy of seven run over by a street-car and badly mangled." Perhaps scarcely one of the readers of that one paper paused to think about this trifle, in the busy rush and whirl of holiday time; and yet how much it meant to one small household! How their hearts ached when the poor little fellow was brought in and laid on his little bed!

His mother's eyes were so full of tears she could scarcely see to tend him; but she kept back from her quivering lips the cry that would have hurt his ears, and if her hands trembled, they were yet firm enough to do what was needed.

But the most wonderful thing of all was the bravery and patience of the boy himself, so crushed and wounded that it broke other people's hearts to see him, and yet so gentle and uncomplaining that it made his elders ashamed of every complaint they had ever uttered over lesser pains.

The doctor, though used to beds of pain, grew very pitiful when he found, after two operations had been performed under the influence of ether, that still another was necessary.

"I do hate to use so much ether," he said, "and yet it's too much to expect him to bear the operation without." The poor mite himself caught the words, and understood them, and his sweet, childish voice, conquering with his sweetness fear and pain alike, said, earnestly, "I'll hold still, oh, so still, and not cry once, if mamma will sing a song, and if she won't let the tears come into her eyes."

And then the mother sang—and only the pitying Father in Heaven who helped her knew how she kept back the springing tears—sang and sang, and the boy listened with his patient eyes fixed upon her face; and, meanwhile, the doctor took out piece after piece of bone from the poor mangled hand, and never one cry or groan came from the childish lips.

Ah, what a lesson it was for grown-up people, who cry out in their pain, and are not willing to bear the probing hand of the great Physician! Said one of the old saints, "There are no tears in the eyes of God!" No, because he knows the end from the beginning, and wounds us but to heal.—Sel.