SELECTIONS | AdventAI

Publishing Committee · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jul 8, 1858

SELECTIONS.

The Bible is a History of Compensation,

The prophecies of the new covenant were uttered in seasons of depression—at the fall of Adam, the separation of Abraham, the bondage of Israel, and the giving of the law by Moses, the captivity of Babylon. Cloud and rainbow appear together. There is wisdom

in the saying of Feltham, that the whole creation is kept in order by discord, and that vicissitude maintains the world. Many evils bring many blessings. Manna drops in the wilderness—corn grows in Canaan. Rarely two afflictions, or two trials, console or trouble us at the same time. Human life is the prophet's declaration drawn out into examples,—"God stayeth his rough wind in the day of his east wind."

And one curious and beautiful feature of the divine scheme of compensation is seen in its changing our sorrows into instruments and channels of joy and comfort. The curtained chamber of sickness sows the barren field with flowers. A sick man seated in his garden, or tottering down a green lane for a few minutes, might suppose himself transported into the morning and sunlight of creation:

The common air, the earth the skies, To him are opening Paradise.

Plato relates that Socrates, on the day of his death being in the company of his disciples, began to rub his leg, which had been galled by the chain, and mentioned the pleasurable sensation in the released member. The Greek prison represents the world; the philosopher, the christian; the fetters, the calamities of life. When one of these is loosened, the soul experiences a feeling of delight. It is the leg of Socrates unchained. The iron enters into the soul, and afterward the wound is healed. St. Paul told the Corinthians, that when he came to Macedonia, his flesh had no rest; without, were fightings; within were fears; but God comforted him by "the coming of Titus." So it is ever.—Sel.