Wesley Corpus

It is the pain of hunger which makes food so relishing; the pain of weariness that renders sleep so refreshing. And as for the blessings of love and friendship, among neighbours and kindred, do they not often produce as much vexationassatisfaction; not, indeed, of themselves, but by reason of the endless humours and follies, errors and passions, of mankind?” (Page 373.) “Again: Do not the very pleasures of the body prove the ruin of ten thousand souls? They may be used with innocence and wisdom; but the unruly appetites and passions of men continually turn into a curse what God originally designed for a blessing.” (Page 374.) “Think again how short and transient are the pleasures of life in comparison of the pains of it! How vanishing the sweetest sensations of delight! But, in many persons and families, how many are the days, the months, the years, of fatigue, or pain, or bitter sorrow ! What pleasure of the animal frame is either as lasting, or as intense, as the pain of the gout or stone? How small is the proportion of sensible pleasure to that of pain, or trouble, or uneasiness! And how far is it over-balanced by the maladies or miseries, the fears or sorrows, of the greatest part of mankind | “As for intellectual pleasures, how few are there in the world who have any capacity for them ! and among those few, how many differences and contentions! How many crossing objections, bewildered inquiries, and unhappy mistakes, are mingled with the enjoyment so that ‘He who increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow,” saith the wisest of men; and upon the whole computation, he writes on this also, “Vanity and vexation of spirit.” “To talk, then, of real happiness to be enjoyed in this life, (abstracted from the foretaste of another,) is contrary to all the common sense and experience of everythinking man. Without this ‘taste of the powers of the world to come,” I know not what wise man would willingly come into these scenes of mortality, or go through them with any patience.” (Pages 376, 377.) “What, to be trained up from infancy under so many una voidable follies, prejudices, and wretched delusions, through the power of flesh and sense! to be sunk into such gross ignorance both of our souls, our better selves, and of the glorious Being that made us!