There are other tendencies of sorrow akin to this, upon which I might dwell, and which show the explanation that it receives in the Christian light. The humbling effect that it has upon the proud and hard-hearted; the equalizing result which it works, making the rich and poor, the obscure and the great, stand upon the level of the common humanity,--the common liability and dependence. I might, expanding the topic already touched upon, speak of the influence which sorrow sheds abroad, chastening the light, at tempering the draught of joy, and thus keeping our hearts better balanced than otherwise. But I have sufficiently illustrated its mission. I have shown its use, even its beauty, in the Christian view. I have shown why Christianity, as the universal religion, is rightly styled the "religion of sorrow," and why Christ, as the perfect teacher and example, was "a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief." Let us all, then, recognize the fact that life itself is a discipline. That for each of us sorrow is mingled with joy in order that this discipline may be accomplished. No one reaches the noon of life without some grief, some disappointment, some sharp trial, which assures him, if he will but heed it, that life is already declining, and that his spirit should train itself for a higher and more permanent state. In the failure of mortal excellence let him recognize the proof of an immortal good, and from the bitterness that mingles with these earthly waters, turn to drink of the celestial fountain. Of all things, let us not receive sorrow indifferently, or without reflection. Its mission is for discipline, but we feel it to be discipline only by recognizing its source and its meaning; "it yieldeth the peaceable fruits of righteousness" only "to them that are exercised thereby." Otherwise, it may come and go as the storm that rends the oak, or the drenching tempest that glides off as it falls. It may startle us for a moment,--it may hurt us with a sense of pain and loss,--it may awe us with its mystery; but unless it rouses us to solemn thought upon the meaning of life, to self-communion and prayer, to higher and holier action, it availeth little. It should not smite the heart's chords to wring from them a mere shriek of distress, but to inspire it with a deeper and more elevated tone, and by the element of sadness which it infuses make a more liquid and exquisite melody.