poor and despised servants of God to be consoled, because they shall be exalted hereafter. Shown by similes. Christians, who are content with the will of God, although you are poor, desolate, despised, humiliated! Your trials shall last only for a time, and a very short time; and on the last day everything shall be changed, just as it is in a mirror. Look at yourselves for once in the glass; not for the sake of gratifying your vanity, in which useless occupation much precious time is often lost, but for the sake of learning a salutary lesson for the good of your souls. You will see your person represented therein as you stand, but with this difference: that your right hand shall be on the left side in the mirror, and your left hand on the right side; then think to yourselves: here in this life I am on the left hand, rejected, looked on as not worth anything, nay, hardly looked at at all, while others and even the wicked are held in high esteem. Thy will be done, O God! I can wait till Thy great day comes, when Thou shalt exhibit our lives to the whole world as in a glass; then we shall find our places changed. “They are lifted up for a little while,” says the Prophet Job of the wicked who are raised above others in this life: but only for a little while; “and they shall not stand, and shall be brought down, and as the tops of the ears of corn they shall be broken.”[1] Consider the ears of corn in a field; what do you see? Nothing but a long stem of straw whose top is covered with something like hair. Nothing more? No. And where is the corn? The wheat for the sake of which alone the land has been tilled, cannot be seen as yet; it is hidden and covered up. But wait till the time comes for threshing, and what happens? The straw that lifted itself up so proudly before is bruised by the flail and trodden under foot, but the corn falls out and can be plainly seen; it is then most carefully gathered up, cleansed, winnowed, and put into the barn, while the straw is thrown into the stable under the cattle. So it is with us mortals during this life. Poor, pious souls! you are now in your humility concealed, hidden from the eyes of the world. The proud sinners are lifted up and honored like the straw in the field; but be not disturbed at this; console yourselves till the harvest time comes, till that day on which the straw shall be threshed out and the wheat separated from the chaff, as Our Lord says; then “as the tops of the ears of corn they shall be broken,” then shall they be humbled, and like the straw lie under your feet; but you, like the corn, shall be
- ↑ Elevati sunt ad modicum, et non subsistent; et humiliabuntur, et sicut summitates spicarum conterentur.—Job xxiv. 24.
