And poor
C. quotes to me, ‘Do not mourn like those that have no hope.’ It astonishes me,
the way we are invited to apply to ourselves words so obviously addressed to
our betters. What St. Paul says can comfort only those who love God better than
the dead, and the dead better than themselves. If a mother is mourning not for
what she has lost but for what her dead child has lost, it is a comfort to
believe that the child has not lost the end for which it was created. And it is
a comfort to believe that she herself, in losing...
