527 / 674
DISC.
IX.]
NO
PAIN AMONG THE BLESSED.
507
christ
would
force the
servants
of God,
and
the followers
of
the
Lamb,
into
sinful compliances with
their
idolatry;
or
a
desertion
of
their
post
of
duty
:
But the
Spirit
of.
God
has
supported
his
children
to
bear
a
glorious testi-
mony
to
pure
and undefiled
-
religion
;
and they have
seemed to mock the rage
of their
tormentors,
to defy
all
the
stings
of
pain,
and triumphed over
all
their
vain
at-
tempts, to compel them
to sin
against their God.
Oné
would sometimes
be
ready
to
wonder,
that
a God
of
infinite. mercy and compassion
should
suffer his own
dear
children
to
be
tried
in
so
terrible
a
manner'
as
this;
but
utisearchable
wisdom
is
with him,
and
he
does
not
give
an
account
to men
of
all the
reasons and the rules
of
his
conduct. This
has
been
his
method
of
providence
with
his
saints
at
special
seasons,
under
the
Jewish and
the..christian dispensations, and perhaps under
all
the
dispensations
of God
to
men, from the days
of
Cain. and
Abel to
the
present hour. Our
blessed
Lord
has given
us many warnings
of
it
in
his
word
by
his
own mouth,
and
by all his
three apostles, Paul,
Peter,
and
John
:
"
They
that
will
live godly in
Christ
Jesus
shall suffer
persecu-
tion
;
". 2
Tim. iii.
12.
"
Think
it not
strange
therefore
concerning
the
fiery
trial
;"
1
Pet.
iv. 12.
"
The
devil,
by his
wicked agents, shall cast some
of
you
into
prison,
that
ye may
be
tried
;
and
ye shall
have
tribulation ten
days,
but
fear none
of
the things
which
thou
shalt
suffer
:
Be thou
faithful
unto
death,
and
I
will give
thee
a
crown
of
life
;"
Rev.
ii. 10.
But
blessed be
God,
that
this world
is
the only state
of
such trials.
As soon as
the
state of probation
is
finished,
the,
state of recompence
begins. Such
hard and
painful exercises
to
try the virtues
of
the saints, have no
place
in
that
world
which
was
not
made for a
stage
of
trial
and
conflict,
but
a
palace
of
glorious reward.
Heaven
is
the
place where' crowns and prizes
are
dis-
tributed
to all
those blessed ones
who
have
endured
temptation," and who have
been
faithful
to
the death.
These sharp and dreadful
combats
with
pain, have no
place among
conquerors,
who
have finished
their
war-
fare, and have begun
their triumph.
4.-
"
Pain
is
sent
us by
the hand
of
providence to
teach
us
many a lesson both
of truth
and duty, which
perhaps
we
should never have learned
so well
without it."