Published in Offor's 1861 edition of "Bunyan's Works."
OF AFFLICTION.
Nothing can render affliction so insupportable as the load of
sin; would you, therefore, be fitted for afflictions, be sure to get the burden of
your sins laid aside, and then what afflictions soever you may meet with will be
very easy to you.
If thou canst hear and bear the rod of affliction which God shall
lay upon thee, remember this lesson--thou art beaten that thou mayest be better.
The Lord useth his flail of tribulation to separate the chaff
from the wheat.
The school of the cross is the school of light; it discovers the
world's vanity, baseness, and wickedness, and lets us see more of God's mind. Out
of dark affliction comes a spiritual light.
In times of affliction we commonly meet with the sweetest experiences
of the love of God.
Did we heartily renounce the pleasures of this world, we should
be very little troubled for our afflictions; that which renders an afflicted state
so insupportable to many, is because they are too much addicted to the pleasures
of this life, and so cannot endure that which makes a separation between them.
