But the fall of a sparrow, or the loss of
a hair, they do not feel to be equally the result of his directing
agency. In consequence of this, Christian persons who aim at perfect
and cheerful submission to heavy afflictions, and who succeed to the
edification of all about them, are sometimes sadly deficient under
petty crosses. If a beloved child be laid in the grave, even if its
death resulted from the carelessness of a domestic or of a physician,
the eye is turned from the subordinate agent to the Supreme Guardian
of all; and to him they bow, without murmur or complaint. But if a
pudding be burnt, or a room badly swept, or an errand forgotten, then
vexation and complaint are allowed, just as if these events were not
appointed by Perfect Wisdom as much as the sorer chastisement.
A woman, therefore, needs to cultivate the _habitual_ feeling
that all the events of her nursery and kitchen are brought about by
the permission of our Heavenly Father, and that fretfulness or complaint
in regard to these is, in fact, complaining at the appointments of
God, and is really as sinful as unsubmissive murmurs amid the sorer
chastisements of his hand.
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