1.01.06. Book 1: Chapter 6
6
SNOWY slopes; a few brave pines trying to go as high as they can; a great curtain of sky so closely drawn, except quite low down where it is raised a little, that it seems to be covering something; a peak that shines out white and clear and triumphant-of what is this the figure, 0 Lord, my God? Is it that which surely shall be, the coming of the conquering light? Is that peak the last step up from what we call time, to what we call Eternity, with its vision, liberty, revelation, powers and great delights? All that the words mean: "We shall be like Him for we shall see Him as He is. And His servants shall serve Him: and they shall see His face; and His name shall be in their foreheads"-is that foreshadowed there?
Beyond that curtain does the first of those many mansions stand, which the wise tell us are not simply fixed abodes in some spiritual city, but rather stations along the highways of some vast realm, the Country of our Father? Is this, the unimaginable (for it passes the furthest frontiers of our thought), part of the True that is shown in a Figure by this pure peak?
Then, 0 my heart, welcome all that is sent to prepare and to brace thee for so generous a To-morrow. Wel- come bareness, snow and frost, limitations, frustrations, the strain of uncertainty, steep ways, dull days (but look up on such days, to that which is higher than earth). Welcome these things as the purposed preparation for something made ready for thee before the foundations of the world. And if the mysteries of the Unexplained close round thee in the evening, or, far more truly, as the dawn draws near when thou shalt "waken in His splendour beyond the hurt of night"; if thy mind pushes ahead of thy body, and thy longing to do for thy beloved crushes thee, and the love that is in thee shatters thee, for it seems too mighty, too expanding, to be contained in the vessel of the human soul, so that love itself is turned to sheer passion of pain-even so, set thy will to welcome all. Let thyself be broken. Let thyself be rent. Lay those keen yearnings in the Hands that were wounded for thee. Let another gird thee and carry thee whither thou wouldst not. The hour hasteneth when it will be said, And the angels carried him far above the peak, beyond the curtain, to that which is eternal in the heavens. For it is soon cut off -that silken thread that holds us down, and we fly away. The Lord looses the fettered ones, * and sets them free to serve.
* Psalms 140:7, LXX. And if, as I know well is true, thou wouldst die a hundred deaths if only the nations might be delivered out of their heavy oppressions, and all cruel handling of our fellow-creatures who cannot complain, but must endure, could by one stroke be ended, then stay thyself upon the word that once spoken can never be annulled: Thou, Lord, shalt save both man and beast-My covenant will I not break, nor alter the thing that is gone out of My lips: I have sworn once by My holiness that I will not fail David. The Lord sitteth above the water-flood; and the Lord remaineth a King for ever. The Lord shall give strength unto His people: the Lord shall give His people the blessing of peace. Is not this strong consolation? Be consoled, therefore. In the end the Creator of the earth will justify His creation of a world, which He foreknew would sin and suffer from generation to generation-else were a demon, not a God, upon the throne. Fear not to dare to think such thoughts. There was one who drank of the cup that is filled to the brim with anguish, and he said, and was not rebuked for saying, "Will the Lord cast off for ever: and will He be favourable no more? Is His mercy clean gone for ever? Doth His promise fail for evermore? Hath God forgotten to be gracious? Hath He in anger shut up His tender mercies?" But he did not tarry in that place of terrific questions: "And I said, This is my infirmity; but I will remember the years of the right hand of the most High." For the Lord is King, be the people never so impatient: He sitteth between the cherubims, be the earth never so unquiet.
Let the winds blow, let the waves thunder, they cannot uproot the rock. The wickedness of the wicked must come to an end, or God would not be God. If they did not consume away like a snail, so that a man shall say, "Verily there is a reward for the righteous: doubtless there is a God that judgeth the earth," there would be no God for man to worship. But God IS. The coming of the Lord is as certain as the morning. The night will never return, with its brooding shadows of cruelty and wrong. Light, not darkness, is the ultimate Conqueror. Not always shall our hearts cry out, Lord, how long wilt Thou look upon this? for sorrow and sighing shall flee away and the travail of the ages shall cease.
Cast not away, therefore, your confidence, which hath great recompense of reward; He must reign. Great voices shall yet declare, Out of Sion hath God appeared in perfect beauty. And He shall be as the light of the morning, when the sun riseth, even a morning without clouds, and the glorious majesty of the Lord shall endure for ever. This assurance is among the things that cannot be shaken; so also is the peace that passeth all understanding, the peace of which He who is the Light and thy Salvation spoke long ago: "Peace I leave with you, My peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid."