"How pleasant it is to live for an end, and for an end so worthy of our life ! that 'whether we live, we live unto the Lord; or whether we die, we die unto the Lord; so that living or dying, we are the Lord's,' And in the meantime, what great lessons He is teaching us even the knowledge of Himself; and He is disciplining us, not only for our place in the Church below, but for the place in the kingdom for which He designs us in futurity. When the mother of Zebedee's children asked Him for the place on His right hand and left in His kingdom, He answers, 'Are ye able to drink of My cup, and to be baptized with My baptism?' as much as to say,- ' The path of sorrow, and that path alone, Leads to the land where sorrow is unknown.'

We have taken up our cross to follow the crucified One. We are to count the cost. To expect any thing else is unbelief. …..Our capacity of enjoyment, because the proper condition of a creature, consists, not in liberty, but in learning dependence and submission. If we knew it, it is happiness we are called to, in being required to be dependent one upon another. It will be so hereafter. We are called to nothing but what would be happiness could we submit to it. Pride is our misery, our greatest enemy. Blessed be His name ! He promises to resist it. Dependence and submission seemed a new happiness obtained by our blessed Master as a man. Not only did He submit to His Father, but see how He leaned on His brethren. 'He looked for some to have pity upon Him.' 'What, could ye not watch with Me one hour?' 'He came to His own, and His own received Him not.' 'I am as a sparrow alone upon the house-top.' 'I looked on the right hand, and there was none; and on the left, no man cared for me.' 'Refuge failed me. Then said I unto the Lord, Thou art my refuge and my portion.' Having to rule and reign with Christ, we must come to the same school to learn to govern. He was educated in our necessities. Whence comes all the sympathy we experience day by day, but because He suffered, being tempted ? Oh, yes! let us have patience. 'Let patience have her perfect work, . . . wanting nothing;' for 'the coming of the Lord draweth nigh.' I do not know if you will care for this, but I think you ought to care for all that concerns the glory of our beloved Lord. We need large hearts,- not only large enough to hold your small house, or your parish even, but to hold, not only the universe, but all the kingdom of heaven,-to hold God, and with Him all dear to Him. What a largeness !-all dear to Him who so loved the world as to give His only begotten Son, etc. ! Do you ever pray for me ? I pray for you. It is so pleasant, so profitable, to talk to the Lord about our friends. We send them sweet messages of love, by a faithful messenger. We do not know its sweetness till we try it. It is time well spent, to talk to Him of them, to talk to them of Him. We deprive ourselves of much real happiness by not living in heaven. Believers should be but as variegated lamps, hung out to lighten the feet of passengers from the kingdom of darkness. Our kingdom is not from hence. We should be looking at earth as from heaven, instead of looking at heaven from earth; as though present things were already past, and future things already present:and so they soon will be, for 'the fashion of this world passeth away.' "-(From Letters and Papers of Viscountess Powerscourt!)