of the world; make only fresh motives of ambition and cupidity; always engrossed either by their fears or by their hopes; always uneasy either for the present or for the future; never tranquil, all struggling for quiet, yet every moment removing themselves farther and farther from it.
O man! why art thou so ingenious in rendering thyself miserable? Such is, then, the reflection of the believing soul. That happiness thou seekest is more easily attained. It is necessary neither to traverse seas nor to conquer kingdoms. Depart not from thyself, and thou wilt be happy.
How sweet do the sorrows of virtue then appear to the godly man, when he compares them with the cruel chagrins and the endless agitations of sinners! How transported to have at last found a place of rest and of safety, while he sees the lovers of the world still sadly tossed about, at the mercy of the passions and of human hopes! Thus the Israelites, formerly escaped from the danger of the Red Sea, seeing from afar Pharaoh and all the nobility of Egypt still at the mercy of the waters, felt all the luxury of their own safety, thought the barren paths of the desert delightful, and were insensible to every hardship of their journey; and comparing their lot with that of the Egyptians, far from giving vent to a complaint or a murmur, they sung with Moses that divine hymn of praise and of thanksgiving, in which are celebrated, with such magnificence, the wonders and the tender mercies of the Lord.
Secondly. The injustice of the world, so humbling to those who love it, when they see themselves forgotten, neglected, and sacrificed to unworthy rivals, is also a fund of soothing reflections to a soul who despises it and fears only the Lord. For, what resource is left to a sinner who, after having sacrificed his ease, his conscience, his wealth, his youth, and his health, to the world and to his masters; after having submitted in silence to every circumstance the most mortifying to the mind, sees at once, and without knowing why, the gates of favour and advancement for ever shut against him; sees places snatched from him to which he was entitled by his services, and of which he thought himself already certain; threatened, should he dare to murmur, with the loss of those he still enjoys; forced to crouch to more fortunate rivals, and to be at the beck of those whom, only a little before, he had deemed unworthy of even receiving his orders? Shall he retire far from the world, to evaporate, in continual invectives against it, the spleen and the rancour of his heart, and thus revenge himself of the injustice of men? But of what avail will be his retirement? It will afford only more leisure for retrospection, and fewer relaxations from chagrin. Shall he try to console himself with similar examples? But our misfortunes never, as we think, resemble those of others; and, besides, what consolation can it be to have our sorrows renewed by seeing their image reflected from others? Shall he entrench himself in strength of mind, and in a vain philosophy? But, in solitude, reason soon descends from its pride; we may be philosophers for the public, but we are only men with ourselves.
