unending; we want something to steady our lives and satisfy the yearnings
of our souls forever: but we must not look for these things in the world,
for the world at best is passing away. There is no stability to human
things; the cloud and the storm swiftly follow the sunshine; we have not
here below a lasting habitation. Today we are sitting at the banquet of
pleasure, tomorrow we are draining the cup of sorrow; today we receive the
applause of men, tomorrow we may be the objects of their scorn; today we
put forth the tender leaves of hope, tomorrow there comes a killing frost
that ruins all our prospects.

Such, then, is the lot of man when considered in his relations to
creatures and to the world. It is a lot full of uncertainty, of
instability, of vicissitude; but this should not make us skeptical or
cynical; it affords no justification for pessimism. It is a condition
arising, on the one hand, from the very nature of limited beings, and on
the other, from the vast potentialities of our souls, which, while they
are limited in giving to others, cannot be appeased except by the God who
made them. There is a craving in the heart of man for something which the
world cannot give. He clutches for the things that are passing, he toils,
he labors, he struggles; he strives for money, for power, for place, for
honor, not that any of these things are in themselves what he desires, but
only because he conceives them as means and helps to the satisfaction, to
the stillness of mind, and peace of heart, and rest of soul and body for
which his nature longs. Peace and happiness and contentment of life are
the objects of all our dreams, of our persistent efforts, of our ambitions
and aims; but until we give up the hope of finding these things in the
world, in our fellow-mortals, in anything short of God, we shall never
know the blessedness for which we yearn. If we would ever attain to the
state which we covet, we must learn the lesson, even though it be through
tears and sorrow, that God alone, who made our souls with all their vast
desires, is able to comfort us and steady our lives amid the storms and
distresses of earth.

It is futile to trust in men, or "in the children of men, in whom there is
no salvation."(89) The peace and blessedness which we seek are "not as the
world giveth;"(90) and unless we turn away from the world and cease to
torture our lives with its vanities, our portion can never be other than
heartaches, secret