“IF HE SLEEP, HE SHALL DO WELL”
Oh! thou best comforter of that sad heart
Whom Fortune’s spite assails; come, gentle sleep,
The weary mourner soothe.
MRS. TIGHE.
We believe in a ruling Principle of Order in the Universe, in
accordance with which everything lives and moves—planets, plants, and
man.
We call this “God,” “the Spirit,” the “Nature of Things,” or by some
other name, but we find that, in crystal, vegetable, or animal, it
always works: and we see that it tends forever toward a more harmonious
arrangement and better relations of the whole system.
There are seeming lapses, where we cannot yet see, in this instance or
in that, how it will work out; but in the arrangement of the stars,
the growth of knowledge through experience, and in the history of
man, we see in the broad view that it does so work out well. Probably
Mary, certainly the disciples, thought at the time that the death of
Jesus was a horrible mistake and misfortune. Now we see that it was
“needful that this one man should die for all the people” and that to
him, even then, it was no misfortune. The sacrifice of one for many
is a great principle of life. The development of the earth from chaos
to fruitfulness, the development of man from brutality to the rule of
mind, the development of ourselves from single selfishness to the wider
love, shows that there is a beneficent Force and that “all things work
together for good.” If each of us considers himself alone, as having
separate interests, this truth will be obscured; but when we recognize
that each of us is a part of the whole, as the tongue is a part of the
body, we see that no part can be favored without injuring the entire
system.
If we unduly gratify the taste, the tongue is the very first to show
that the stomach is “out of order,” and this disharmony is felt in the
whole body.
Sometimes we have done wrong, or have seen others do wrong apparently
with profit; but the wider view will always show that the way of the
transgressor is as hard as his heart, that the wicked man is in truth
the fool. We know that any attempt that man makes to disturb the right
order for the sake of any separate interest must react upon himself,
destroying his own happiness as well as the happiness of those about
him.
Similarly we see that the prophet, the cultivator, the inventor, the
martyr, the benevolent man, each doing what he is inspired to do, is
working just as much for all mankind as for himself, that he cannot
reap the benefit except as others share it. For our good, we are joined
together in one connected whole, so that no man liveth, or so much as
dieth, to himself.
We see how the Spirit makes “even the wrath of men to praise him” that
the tyranny of a king was necessary to drive out colonists to proclaim
liberty, and the fierce rivalry of nations in armament is needed to
usher in a Court of International Peace. Since that is so, since we
know that in great or universal affairs the eternal purposes cannot be
interfered with, why should we think that it fails to work in our own
little interests?
We see beautiful, symmetrical shells and well-adapted organs in
creatures so small that we know of their existence only through
high-power microscopes. In them we find the same rule of law, the same
adaptation to supreme ends that we find in the measureless suns and in
the measureless souls of men.
Accordingly, when what seems evil “happens,” as we say, to us, upon
what principle can we conclude that this is an exception, that in this
case something has occurred that ought not to have occurred? If one
thing went wrong in the divine intent, it would show a limit to the
rule of Good. We know that there can be no such limit.
It is not fatalism to believe that the same holy order rules over us,
for each of us and each of our efforts is a part of the divine plan,
and a means of carrying it out. We should strive for those things that
seem to us desirable and good; although we may not have success, as
we call it, so kind is the constitution of things that the effort to
direct things right dulls the pain of finding that the event shapes
itself in a way that we do not like.
We are threatened, perhaps, with what seems a horrible disaster: why,
the very derivation of the word disaster refers to the influence which
the stars are supposed to have upon our destinies. Some power there is
that controls those destinies, in spite of our human limitations of
time and space. Who would take the job, though he had the power, of
controlling even the material world, arranging the growth of plants,
the rise and fall of nations, the birth and waning of the stars?
Yet we do wish to assume just such Omnipotence and Omniscience in our
personal affairs; to say that this possession must not, shall not slip
from me, this one must not die. And, if this that is so dear does go
away, then in that one instance, because it concerns us, we refuse to
admit that that instance is no exception to the rule of Love, or to
recognize the kind watchfulness of Him that, keeping Israel, slumbers
not nor sleeps.
And yet the loss hurts, and the fear of it hurts still more, with a
pain that seems past endurance—it hurts, and for ages long it has been
necessary that we should have just such pain in order that we may make
the efforts that contribute our part to the progress of the world.
But some of us do not in our hearts believe in a beneficent Order of
the Universe. We think that some persons may seize what they want,
regardless of others, and yet no evil come to them. Even if that be
so, still it is wise to act so as to gain the most happiness and,
therefore, to accommodate ourselves to the Nature of Things.
If we could but leave out the unreasonable self-pity and get into our
hearts, as knowledge that is a part of ourselves, this understanding
of the goodness and the loving kindness of God, we should be as gods
ourselves, seeing the end from the beginning and recognizing that,
success or failure, loss or gain, life or death, the times are in his
hands, and it is all very good. And our hearts should not be troubled,
nor our rest disturbed.