[Extracts from a letter, from one who for over six months has been lying in a hospital.]

" The Lord has been gracious to me in my affliction. Suffering is not pleasant, but it brings close to the Lord, and that is really what God intends. How often, when we are well and strong, we neglect God and His things. He created man to enjoy Himself-to find his joy in God; and God purposed to find His joy in man. So He ever seeks to keep us close to Himself that we might learn of Him. He has far more for us in store than we ever get here; and He has a place for us, but He would fit us for that place. It seems that suffering is His way of fitting us to bring forth the precious fruits of the Spirit in us.

" Suffering also enables to bear heavenly comfort to others who suffer. This is made plain in 2 Cor. 1:3-6. God Himself is the source of all comfort, but it flows mostly through human channels. The Holy Spirit is the Comforter, but He operates through human instrumentality. It is indeed a blessed privilege to be able to touch with the hand of love and sympathy some suffering member of the Body of Christ, and to pour the holy balm of comfort into some crushed and grief-stricken heart. But for this we ourselves must be comforted of God.

"Still the highest end and greatest purpose is fitness and enlarged capacity for the enjoyment of fellowship with God in what He is in the excellency of His Person. He is the God of all grace.

"The entrance of sin into the world has provided an opportunity for the display of His attributes and character in the wonderful work of redemption through Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory. Angels who have never sinned, and never knew what suffering is, do not know experimentally what grace and comfort are. No tears of penitence have flowed from their eyes, and they know not the sweetness of God's forgiving love. They serve God in the vigor of their perpetual youth and purity; they art His ministers of grace and mercy displayed to others, and praise Him who does all things well ; but the sinner who washed the feet of Jesus with her tears, and the disciple who leaned on His bosom on that night of sorrow, with all who through grace are made heirs of God, know God and have fellowship with Him, are embraced in the arms of His affection and enjoy the secret of His love. May we not say that the chief end of all our discipline down here is to form and enlarge the human vessel for the eternal display of the grace and glory of God ?

"I hear dear F- gave her heart to the Lord Jesus. Good it is to be brought to Him early in life. Often I regret that I did not come sooner. When I think of all the time I spent in rebellion against that blessed One, who loved me to the extent that He was willing to suffer the cross and the agony in the garden, where He sweat great drops of blood, that a poor worm like me might be saved, it makes me shudder. But when I think of the patience, love, and grace that bore with me, it makes me worship and adore.

" I trust this finds you happy in Him. May His grace keep and comfort you. Affectionately your brother in Christ, T. W. C.