Editorial January 16, 1904 Issue

True Comfort

"Comfort ye my people, saith your God." The great calamity which has recently visited a progressive and prosperous city, has called forth much tenderness and compassion for the afflicted. This is well, and the heart is hard indeed which is not touched by another's woe, even though it can do no more than "weep with them that weep". But while human sympathy may seem a balm for many wounds, a surer remedy is needed to heal them, so that our lives may go on unhurt and even enriched by our hardest lessons.

Humanity in its hours of sorrow is constantly repeating the question of Job: "If a man die, shall he live again?" and in this it often expresses a large measure of doubt. Who is there that can give such a reply as will bid doubt and uncertainty depart forever? who light anew the way to immortality? There was one whose words so assured as to leave no room for such a query. He said, "If a man keep my saying he shall never see death." We have faith in this statement of the Master, because he so understood life as to be able to prove its continuity and reality, — to awaken from the dream of death them that had "fallen asleep."

There have been many speculations as to the experiences of those awakened by Christ Jesus, but on this point the Gospels are silent. John tells of a feast in Bethany at which were present the Master and one who had lain in the tomb for four days. We need not wonder that many came from Jerusalem to see Lazarus and the one who called him back from the grave, but no word of his experience is given. We are told, however, that Jesus constantly emphasized his mission to bring life to the world, and declared, "The Father which sent me, he gave me a commandment, what I should say, and what I should speak. And I know that his commandment is life everlasting." In the parable rich man and the beggar he lifts the curtain, if but momentarily, on what is called the future life. It tells of a man who had lived only for self and materiality. Luxury and pride had held him fast, but in his new conditions he humbly asks for aid from the beggar who had lain at his gate, and whose name he had not forgotten. Perhaps the most touching lesson of this parable is found in Dives' affection for his brethren, which was expressed in his desire for their salvation. Death had not lessened his sense of human love, but seemed rather to have quickened it. If this were true of a bad man. should we not expect that those who were tender and loving while here must have a deeper sense of the permanence of love when they learn that they have never died, and that the experience called death does not quench life and love, nor destroy a single quality of Mind? If we do not put love, hope, or faith into the grave, then where are they? Has all that made life beautiful been suddenly extinguished? Impossible! all that expresses the idea of Life is deathless, and must ever rise above the stormy waves of mortal experience, however dark,

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