Yea, the very pleasures of human life men
acquire by difficulties, not those only which fall upon us unlooked
for, and against our wills, but even by self-chosen, and
pleasure-seeking trouble. Eating and drinking have no pleasure, unless
there precede the pinching of hunger and thirst. Men, given to
drink, eat certain salt meats, to procure a troublesome heat, which
the drink allaying, causes pleasure. It is also ordered that the
affianced bride should not at once be given, lest as a husband he
should hold cheap whom, as betrothed, he sighed not after.
This law holds in foul and accursed joy; this in permitted and
lawful joy; this in the very purest perfection of friendship; this, in
him who was dead, and lived again; had been lost and was found.
Every where the greater joy is ushered in by the greater pain. What
means this, O Lord my God, whereas Thou art everlastingly joy to
Thyself, and some things around Thee evermore rejoice in Thee? What
means this, that this portion of things thus ebbs and flows
alternately displeased and reconciled? Is this their allotted measure?
Is this all Thou hast assigned to them, whereas from the highest
heavens to the lowest earth, from the beginning of the world to the
end of ages, from the angel to the worm, from the first motion to
the last, Thou settest each in its place, and realisest each in
their season, every thing good after its kind? Woe is me! how high art
Thou in the highest, and how deep in the deepest! and Thou never
departest, and we scarcely return to Thee.
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