this ought not
to be. The question as to the emotions turned off in the workings of the
human mind is one of fact. It is not how the machine ought to work, but
how the machine does work. And as with the anticipation of suffering, so
with its retrospect. The great grief which is past, even though its
consequences no longer directly press upon us, casts its shadow over
after-years. There are, indeed, some hardships and trials upon which it
is possible that we may look back with satisfaction. The contrast with
them enhances the enjoyment of better days. But these trials, it seems
to me, must be such as come through the direct intervention of
Providence; and they must be clear of the elements of human cruelty or
injustice. I do not believe that a man who was a weakly and timid boy
can ever look back with pleasure upon the ill-usage of the brutal bully
of his school-days, or upon the injustice of his teacher in cheating him
out of some well-earned prize. There are kinds of great suffering which
can never be thought of without present suffering, so long as human
nature continues what it is. And I believe that past sorrows are a great
reality in our present life, and exert a great influence over our
present life, whether for good or ill. As you may see in the trembling
knees of some poor horse, in its drooping head, and spiritless paces,
that it was overwrought when young: so, if the human soul were a thing
that could be seen, you might discern the scars where the iron entered
into it long ago,--you might trace not merely the enduring remembrance,
but the enduring results, of the incapacity and dishonesty of teachers,
the heartlessness of companions, and the idiotic folly and cruelty of
parents. No, it will not do to tell us that past sufferings have ceased
to exist, while their remembrance continues so vivid, and their results
so great. You are not done with the bitter frosts of last winter, though
it be summer now, if your blighted evergreens remain as their result and
memorial. And the man who was brought up in an unhappy home in childhood
will never feel that that unhappy home has ceased to be a present
reality, if he knows that its whole discipline fostered in him a spirit
of distrust in his kind which is not yet entirely got over, and made him
set himself to the work of life with a heart somewhat soured and
prematurely old. The past is a great reality. We are here the living
embodiment of all we have seen and felt through