Chapter 10. The Third Thing. Why God Permits His Friends To Suffer So Much (A Little Book of Eternal Wisdom) (Suso, Henry)

Temporal Suffering

The Servant. Another thing, Lord, I have at my heart: may I venture to tell it You? May I indeed venture to dispute with You like holy Jeremias?

Gentle Lord, people say as follows: that how sweet soever Your love may be,

You do yet allow it to prove very harsh to Your friends in the many severe trials which You send them, such as worldly scorn and much adversity, both inwardly and outwardly. Scarcely is any one, say they, admitted to Your friendship, but he has forthwith to gather up his courage for suffering.

Lord, by Your goodness! what sweetness can they have in all this? Or how can You permit it in Your friends? Or are You pleased not to know anything about it?

Eternal Wisdom. Even as My Father loves Me, so do I love My friends. I do to My friends now as I have done from the beginning of the world.

The Servant. This is what they complain of; and therefore, say they,

You have so few friends because You allowest them to prosper in this world so very sorrily. Lord, on this account there are also indeed many who, when they gain Your friendship, and ought to prove constant in suffering, fall off from You; and (woe is me! that I must say it in sorrow of heart, and with bitter tears) relapse to that state which, through You, they had forsaken.

O my Lord, what have You to say to this?

Eternal Wisdom. This is the complaint of persons of a sick faith and of small works, of a lukewarm life, and undisciplined spirit. But you, beloved soul, up with your mind out of the slime and deep slough of carnal delights! Unlock your interior sense, open your spiritual eyes and see. Mark well what you are, where you are, and whither you do belong; for then will you understand that I do the very best for My friends. According to your natural essence you are a mirror of the Divinity, you are an image of the Trinity, and a copy of eternity; for as I, in My eternal uncreated entity, am the good which is infinite, so are you according to your desires, fathomless, and as little as a small drop can yield in the vast depth of the sea, just so little can all that this world is able to afford contribute to the fulfillment of your desires. Thus, then, are you in this wretched valley of tears, where joy and sorrow, laughing and weeping, mirth and sadness, are mingled together; where no heart ever obtained perfect happiness; for it is false and deceitful, more than I will tell you. It promises much and performs little; it is short, uncertain, and changeable; today much joy, tomorrow a heart full of woe. Behold, such is the disport of this scene of time!