place of your rest: “Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the earth.”[1]
In heaven infinite goods and joys are prepared for us. Oh, if we had a true and lively faith in the greatness of the goods and joys that await us in heaven, we should not need such exhortations, but should feel drawn thither of ourselves. In olden times, as Julius Cæsar writes, the Swiss, hearing that Gaul was a fruitful country, had such a great desire to get possession of it that they not only left their homes, but even burnt them to ashes, so that having no hope of returning, they might be compelled to live in the beautiful land they were so anxious to get hold of. “Glorious things are said of thee, O city of God!”[2] What wonderful things we have already heard of thee! And what a superabundance of goods and pleasures faith tells us we shall find in thee, and that too forever! Shouldst thou not then form the object of our most eager desires? And yet we long so little for thee, we think of thee so seldom!
So that God may well be indignant with us for thinking so little of it. Christians! must it not be a just cause of indignation to the Almighty to see that we have such little desire, that we think so rarely of the eternal reward that He has prepared for us? Sometimes a father says in play to his child: to-morrow you shall come with me to hunt the hare; and the child’s only wish is that the morning should come; he dreams of the promised pleasure; there is no fear of his forgetting it; and early in the morning he is awake and up to remind his father of his promise. And our heavenly Father has pledged His own infallible, divine word, that if we only love Him, in a short time we shall enter into His kingdom, and be and live forever with Him in all imaginable joys of body and soul. Now, if we rarely rejoice at the thought of this promise, feel but little desire for its fulfilment, and seldom think of it, that is a clear sign that we either do not quite believe in the divine promise, or else that we care but little for the heavenly goods that await us. In either case the Almighty has just cause for indignation; especially since He has built the palace of heaven more on our account than on His own. God was not in need of heaven; He was as happy during a long eternity before heaven was as He is now; He has created it for His dear creatures that they may have a dwelling-place in which they can share in His infinite happiness. Therefore I say again: since He means so well with us, it must annoy Him to
