Letter 50. To M. De Rochefort

ON THE DEATH OF HIS SON.

Dear Sir, Jan, 20, 1614.

Judging of your grief by my own feelings, I know how deeply you are mourning. I remember the delight with which you spoke to me about your son, and I was deeply moved at the thought of your exceeding sorrow at his death. At first I was not sure if the tidings were true, and now it seems late to speak words of consolation, when I believe that your heart will already have conquered the first bitter grief of this loss. I know that you will have felt that this dear son was more God^s property than yours, to whom he was but lent by a Divine bounty; and if God saw that the time for recalling His loan had come, you could not doubt that it was for His child's gain; and a father's heart accepts such gain to his son patiently. This world is not so charming that we need greatly pity those who lay down its burthen; and for his own sake, meseems, your son is the gainer by quitting it almost before he has really entered upon it. We shrink at the word death, as we use it — saying, ** Your dear father or your son is dead " — ^but Christians should rather say, ‘‘ Yom father or your son is gone to his Home and yours, and, in order to reach it, he must needs pass through death, but he did not stop there." In our better judgment we cannot prize ova home in this life very greatly, when we compare it with the Heavenly Home in which we hope to dwell eternally. We are journeying thither, and we are more certain that we shall find there the dear ones gone before, than we can be of enjoying the presence of those yet among us, for they await us, and we are going to them; whereas the others we leave behind, and they may linger yet

If you are still sorrowing over the departure of that gentle soul, cast your heart down before our Crucified Lord, and ask His aid: He will assuredly give it, and will fill you with the desire and firm resolution to prepare for the time when you too must make the dreaded journey, and arrive jo)rfully there, where we believe our happy one to be already.

[3x3.1 LII.