It is not that we are absolutely forbidden to complain under great sufferings of body or mind, or under great losses. Job, the mirror of the patient, uttered many complaints, yet without prejudice to that virtue which made him so highly esteemed by God, and renders him famous in all ages. It would not only be unwise, but possibly a sin, so to conceal bodily suffering--under the pretext of being resolved not to complain--as to refuse to have recourse to either physician or remedies, and thereby to risk bringing ourselves down to the gates of the grave. Even God, the All-Perfect, does not refrain from pouring forth His complaints against sinners, as we know from many parts of Holy Scripture. We must then in this matter preserve a just medium, and although it behoves us sometimes to suffer in silence, yet at other times we must make known our sufferings, since _that suffering is truly the most wretched which, amid torments, has no voice_.[4] The Son of God, the pattern of all perfection, wept and cried aloud at the grave of Lazarus and on the Cross, showing that He pities our sufferings and shares our griefs. The measure of our complainings must be fixed by discretion, which St. Anthony calls the regent and ruler of the kingdom of virtues, appointed to guard it from the encroachments of sin, ever striving to gain dominion there. Our Blessed Father gives us the following lesson on the subject: "We must," he says, "abstain from a but little noticed, yet most hurtful imperfection, against which few people guard themselves. This is, that when we are compelled to blame our neighbour or to complain of his conduct, which should be as seldom as possible, we never seem to get done with the matter, but go on perpetually repeating our complaints and lamentations; a sure sign of irritation and peevishness and of a heart as yet destitute of true charity. Great and powerful minds only make mourning about great matters, and even these they dismiss as quickly as possible, never giving way to passion or fretfulness." [Footnote 1: Part iii. chap. vii.] [Footnote 2: Eccles. xxxviii. 1, 12.] [Footnote 3: Part iii. chap. 3.] [Footnote 4: Virgil, Æneid I.] BLESSED FRANCIS' CALMNESS IN TRIBULATION. The similitude of the nest of the halcyon or kingfisher, supposed to float on the sea, which our Saint describes so well and applies so exquisitely in one of his letters, was the true picture of his own heart. The great stoic, Seneca, says that it is easy to guide a vessel on a smooth sea and aided by favourable winds, but that it is in the midst of tempests and hurricanes that the skill of the pilot is shown.[1] So it is with the soul, whose fidelity and loyalty towards the Divine Lover is well tested by sufferings and sorrows.