To be dejected is natural; but to be overcome by
dejection is madness, and folly, and unmanly weakness. You may grieve
and weep; but give not way to despondency, nor indulge in complaints.
Give thanks to God, who has taken your friend, that you have the
opportunity of honoring the departed one, and of dismissing him with
becoming obsequies. If you sink under depression, you withhold honor
from the departed, you displease God who has taken him, and you injure
yourself; but if you are grateful, you pay respect to him, you glorify
God, and you benefit yourself. Weep, as wept your Master over Lazarus,
observing the just limits of sorrow, which it is not proper to pass.
Thus also said Paul--"I would not have you to be ignorant concerning
them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not as others who have no hope.
Grieve," says he; "but not as the Greek, who has no hope of a
resurrection, who despairs of a future life."
Believe me, I am ashamed and blush to see unbecoming groups of women
pass along the mart, tearing their hair, cutting their arms and
cheeks--and all this under the eyes of the Greeks. For what will they
not say? What will they not declare concerning us? Are these the men who
reason about a resurrection? Indeed! How poorly their actions agree with
their opinions! In words, they reason about a resurrection: but they act
just like those who do not acknowledge a resurrection.
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