第118章 家里的同情
§1
第118章 家里的同情
§2
Chap.118 - Sympathy at Home
§3
亲爱的C弟兄和C姐妹：你们的情形已在异象中呈现在我面前。我观看你们的生活时，发现是一个可怕的错误。C弟兄啊，你没有一种快乐的性情。你自己既不快乐，就没能使别人快乐。你没有培养友爱、温柔和爱心。你妻子的婚后生活中一直缺乏同情。你们的婚姻生活就像荒漠，只有几片绿地让人感恩地怀念。其实不必这样。{1T 694.2}[1]
§4
Dear Brother and Sister C: Your cases have been brought before me in vision. As I viewed your lives, they appeared to be a terrible mistake. Brother C, you have not a happy temperament. And not being happy yourself, you fail to make others happy. You have not cultivated affection, tenderness, and love. Your wife has suffered all through her married life for sympathy. Your married life has been very much like a desert--but very few green spots to look back upon with grateful remembrance. It need not have been thus.{1T 694.2}[1]
§5
爱若不在外在的行为中表现出来就不能再存在，就象没有燃料就不能维持燃烧一样。C弟兄啊，你觉得藉着仁慈的行为表现温柔，伺机用温柔的语言和亲切的尊重向你的妻子示爱委屈你的尊严。你的感觉易变，而且颇受周围环境的影响。你一直没有感到全神贯注于世界，然后把属世的困惑为难带到家庭中，让仇敌进入你家中乃是错的，是令上帝不悦的。你很容易这样敞开门户，但你会发现关上就没那么容易了；一旦你把仇敌带进来，就很难赶他出去了。要在你离开业务时就离开你业务上的挂虑困惑和烦恼。应该带着愉快的面容，带着同情、温柔与爱心回到你的家里来。这样，较比花钱为你的妻子买药或请医生要好得多了。如此行，就必导致身体的健康和心灵的力量。你们过去的生活非常苦恼。这种局面的造成，你们双方都有责任。上帝并不乐于见到你们备尝痛苦，这是因为你们缺乏自制而招惹到自己身上来的。{1T 695.1}[2]
§6
Love can no more exist without revealing itself in outward acts than fire can be kept alive without fuel. You, Brother C, have felt that it was beneath your dignity to manifest tenderness by kindly acts, and to watch for an opportunity to evince affection for your wife by words of tenderness and kind regard. You are changeable in your feelings, and are very much affected by surrounding circumstances. You have not felt that it was wrong, displeasing to God, to allow your mind to be fully engrossed with the world, and then bring your worldly perplexities into your family, thus letting the adversary into your home. It is very easy for you thus to open the door, but you will find it not so easy to close; it will be very difficult to turn out the enemy when once you have brought him in. Leave your business cares and perplexities and annoyances when you leave your business. Come to your family with a cheerful countenance, with sympathy, tenderness, and love. This will be better than expending money for medicines or physicians for your wife. It will be health to the body and strength to the soul. Your lives have been very wretched. You have both acted a part in making them so. God is not pleased with your misery; you have brought it upon yourselves by want of self-control.{1T 695.1}[2]
§7
你让感觉左右自己。C弟兄啊，你认为表明爱心，亲切而充满深情地讲话委屈你的尊严。你认为这一切温柔的话语有娇嫩软弱之气，而且是不必要的，却代之以烦躁易怒的言语，不和、纷争及责难的话。难道你认为这就是男子气概，是高贵的吗？是展示你男性更严谨的美德吗？无论你可能怎么看这样的话语，上帝看它们是冒犯和伤害，并且在祂的案卷中记了下来。天使们也逃离了互说不和之言的住所，在那里人们心中几乎没有感恩，责难象黑弹一样从人们的口中蹦出，弄脏了衣服，污秽了基督徒的品格。{1T 695.2}[3]
§8
You let feelings bear sway. You think it beneath your dignity, Brother C, to manifest love, to speak kindly and affectionately. All these tender words, you think, savor of softness and weakness, and are unnecessary. But in their place come fretful words, words of discord, strife, and censure. Do you account these as manly and noble? as an exhibition of the sterner virtues of your sex? However you may consider them, God looks upon them with displeasure and marks them in His book. Angels flee from the dwelling where words of discord are exchanged, where gratitude is almost a stranger to the heart, and censure leaps like black balls to the lips, spotting the garments, defiling the Christian character.{1T 695.2}[3]
§9
当你和你的妻子结婚时，她是爱你的。她虽是非常敏感的，但是若有你的辛苦努力，再加上她的坚忍刚毅，她的健康原不会象现在这样。但你严厉的冷淡使你象一座冰山，冻结了爱情的管道。你的责难和挑剔一直象行荒凉毁坏的冰雹落在一棵敏感的植物上，冷冻并且几乎摧毁了它的生命。爱世界的心正在侵蚀你品格的良好特性。你妻子有不同的秉性而且更为慷慨大方。但是当她行出自己慷慨的天性，甚至是在小事上行出来时，你就感觉处于劣势并且责难她。你放纵小气吝啬的精神。你使自己的妻子觉得她是一个重负，一个担子，没有权利花你的钱实行她的慷慨。这一切的事都具有令人灰心泄气的性质，使她感觉既无望又无助，并且没有毅力支持她反对这种感觉，而是屈服于毁灭的势力。她的疾病乃是神经痛。要是她的婚姻生活是惬意的，她就会有很好的健康状况。但在你们的婚姻生活中，魔鬼一直是你们家中的宾客，因你们的悲惨不幸而欢喜雀跃。{1T 696.1}[4]
§10
When you married your wife, she loved you. She was extremely sensitive, yet with painstaking on your part, and fortitude on hers, her health need not have been what it is. But your stern coldness made you like an iceberg, freezing up the channel of love and affection. Your censure and faultfinding has been like desolating hail to a sensitive plant. It has chilled and nearly destroyed the life of the plant. Your love of the world is eating out the good traits of your character. Your wife is of a different turn and more generous. But when she has, even in small matters, exercised her generous instincts, you have felt a drawback in your feelings and have censured her. You indulge a close and grudging spirit. You make your wife feel that she is a tax, a burden, and that she has no right to exercise her generosity at your expense. All these things are of such a discouraging nature that she feels hopeless and helpless, and has not stamina to bear up against it, but bends to the force of the blast. Her disease is pain of the nerves. Were her married life agreeable, she would possess a good degree of health. But all through your married life the demon has been a guest in your family to exult over your misery.{1T 696.1}[4]
§11
希望落空使你们二人完全沮丧了。你们不会因所受的苦难得到任何的奖赏，因为是你们自己招来的。你们自己的言语对神经和大脑，对骨骼和肌肉一直象致命的毒药。你们收获了自己所种下的。你们不赏识彼此的感觉和痛苦。上帝不喜欢你所拥有的冷酷、无情、爱世界的精神。C弟兄啊，贪爱钱财的心乃是万恶之根。你爱了钱财，爱了世界；你看自己妻子的病是一个严重可怕的重负，而没有认识到正是你自己的过错在很大程度上使她生了病。你没有知足之心的特质。你经常注视着自己的烦恼，那只是幻想中未来的缺乏与穷困，却出现在你的面前；你觉得烦恼、困惑和痛苦；你的脑中犹如火焚，你的精神沮丧。你没有存着爱上帝的心，以及感谢你慈悲天父赐予你诸般福惠之心。你所见到的，只是人生各种不如意的事。你已为一种犹如黝黑的密云一般的世俗疯狂所笼罩。当平安与福乐在你掌握之中时，你却甘愿受苦，撒但便因而得意洋洋了。{1T 696.2}[5]
§12
Disappointed hopes have made you both completely wretched. You will have no reward for your suffering, for you have caused it yourselves. Your own words have been like deadly poison upon nerve and brain, upon bone and muscle. You reap that which you sow. You do not appreciate the feelings and sufferings of each other. God is displeased with the hard, unfeeling, world-loving spirit you possess. Brother C, the love of money is the root of all evil. You have loved money, loved the world; you have looked at the illness of your wife as a severe, a terrible, tax, not realizing that it is your fault in a great measure that she is sick. You have not the elements of a contented spirit. You dwell upon your troubles; imaginary want and poverty far ahead stare you in the face; you feel afflicted, distressed, agonized; your brain seems on fire, your spirits depressed. You do not cherish love to God and gratitude of heart for all the blessings which your kind heavenly Father has bestowed upon you. You see only the discomforts of life. A worldly insanity shuts you in like heavy clouds of thick darkness. Satan exults over you because you will have misery when peace and happiness are at your command.{1T 696.2}[5]
§13
你听了一堂道；真理感动了你，你心智的高贵能力被激起，要支配你的行动。你看出自己为上帝作出的牺牲是多么少，多么亲密地珍爱了自我，因真理的影响，你倾向正义了；但是当你经受了这种神圣的，使人圣洁的，抚慰人的感化力之后，你没有在自己的心里拥有它，不久就陷入了同样荒芜不快的感觉状态中。工作，工作，你必须工作；大脑、骨骼和肌肉都劳苦到了极限，为要获得你的想象力告诉你必须要得到否则缺乏和饥饿就会成为你们的命运的钱财。这是撒但的一个欺骗，是他一个狡猾的网罗，要引你们灭亡。“一天的难处一天当就够了”（太6:34）。但你提前给自己制造了一个艰难时期。{1T 697.1}[6]
§14
You listen to a discourse; the truth affects you, and the nobler powers of your mind arouse to control your actions. You see how little you have sacrificed for God, how closely self has been cherished, and you are swayed to the right by the influence of the truth; but when you pass from under this sacred, sanctifying, soothing influence, you do not possess it in your own heart, and you soon fall into the same barren, ungenial state of feeling. Work, work, you must work; brain, bone, and muscle are taxed to the utmost to get means which your imagination tells you must be obtained, or want and starvation will be your lot. This is a delusion of Satan, one of his wily snares to lead you to perdition. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. But you make for yourself a time of trouble beforehand.{1T 697.1}[6]
§15
你对上帝没有信心爱心和信任。你若有，就会倚赖祂。你忧虑自己在基督的膀臂之外，担心祂不会照顾你。健康被牺牲了。上帝没有在你本属祂的身子和心灵上得到荣耀。没有一种甜美愉快的家庭感化力来抚慰并抵消你本性中突出的邪恶。你心智的高尚高贵能力被较低的器官制服了；你品格的邪恶特性得到了发展。{1T 697.2}[7]
§16
You have not faith and love and confidence in God. If you had, you would trust in Him. You worry yourself out of the arms of Christ, fearing that He will not care for you. Health is sacrificed. God is not glorified in your body and spirit, which are His. There is not a sweet, cheering home influence to soothe and counteract the evil which is predominant in your nature. The high, noble powers of your mind are overpowered by the lower organs; the evil traits of your character are developed. {1T 697.2}[7]
§17
你是自私苛求、傲慢专横的。你不该这样。你的得救依赖于你根据原则行事——根据原则侍奉上帝，而不是根据感觉，不是根据冲动。在你感到需要帮助并且决心开始下工夫，全心信赖上帝时，上帝必帮助你。你常常没有足够的理由就灰心泄气。你放纵了与仇恨类似的情绪。你的喜好与嫌恶是很强的，这是你必须予以约束的。要勒住舌头。“若有人在话语上没有过失，他就是完全人，也能勒住自己的全身”（雅3:2）。救助之力已经加在那位大能的主身上。祂必作你的力量和支持，你的前卫和后盾。{1T 698.1}[8]
§18
You are selfish, exacting, and overbearing. This ought not to be. Your salvation depends on your acting from principle--serving God from principle, not from feeling, not from impulse. God will help you when you feel your need of help and set about the work with resolution, trusting in Him with all your heart. You are often discouraged without sufficient reason. You indulge feelings akin to hatred. Your likes and dislikes are strong. These you must restrain. Control the tongue. If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man, and able also to bridle the whole body. Help has been laid upon One that is mighty. He will be your strength and support, your front guard and rearward.{1T 698.1}[8]
§19
你为来生做什么准备呢？撒但使你以为你一切的能力都必须化在这世界上。你在为今生的前途恐惧战兢，同时却在忽视永恒的来生。你哪里有为永生忧虑、恳切、热心，免得在这事上失败并且承受无限的损失呢？损失今生的一点利益对你来说就象一场可怕的灾难，会要了你的命。但想到丧失天国却不会使你表现出半点恐惧。你既用心努力要保全今生，就有丧失永生的危险。你担不起丧失天国，丧失永生，丧失极重无比永远的荣耀。你担不起丧失这一切的财富，这极宝贵的、不可估量的福乐。你为何不行事象一个神智清醒的人，并且恳切、热心、恒切地为更好的来生不朽的冠冕、永恒不灭的财宝努力，象你为可怜悲惨的今生和这些卑劣、易朽的世间财宝努力一样呢？{1T 698.2}[9]
§20
What preparation are you making for the better life? It is Satan who makes you think that all your powers must be exercised to get along in this world. You are fearing and trembling for the future of this life, while you are neglecting the future, eternal life. Where is the anxiety, the earnestness, the zeal, lest you make a failure there and sustain an immense loss? To lose a little of this world seems to you a terrible calamity which would cost your life. But the thought of losing heaven does not cause half the fears to be manifested. Through your careful efforts to save this life, you are in danger of losing eternal life. You cannot afford to lose heaven, lose eternal life, lose the eternal weight of glory. You cannot afford to lose all these riches, this exceedingly precious, immeasurable happiness. Why do you not act like a sane man, and be as earnest, as zealous, and as persevering in your efforts for the better life, the immortal crown, the eternal, imperishable treasure, as you are for this poor, miserable life and these poor perishable, earthly treasures?{1T 698.2}[9]
§21
你的心是在你世间的财宝上，所以你是没有心思在属天财宝上的。你眼所见的这些卑劣的事——属地的事——蒙蔽了天上的荣耀。你的财宝在哪里，你的心也在那里。你的语言会透露，你的行动会说明你的财宝在哪里。你的财宝若在这世界，地上的那点儿利得，你的忧虑就会表现在那方面。你若是在用与不朽产业之价值相称的恳切、精力和热心争取不朽的产业，你就可作永生的公平候选人，承受荣耀。你每天都需要新鲜悔改归正。天天向自我死，用嚼环勒住你的舌头，控制你的言语，停止你的牢骚和报怨，不让一句责难的话从你口中脱出来。若是这需要极大的努力，就付出极大的努力；你这么做必会得到报答。{1T 698.3}[10]
§22
Your heart is on your earthly treasures, therefore you have no heart for the heavenly. These poor things which are seen --the earthly--eclipse the glory of the heavenly. Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. Your words will declare, your acts will show, where your treasure is. If it is in this world, the little gain of earth, your anxieties will be manifested in that direction. If you are striving for the immortal inheritance with an earnestness, energy, and zeal proportionate to its value, then can you be a fair candidate for everlasting life, and heir of glory. You need a fresh conversion every day. Die daily to self, keep your tongue as with a bridle, control your words, cease your murmurings and complaints, let not one word of censure escape your lips. If this requires a great effort, make it; you will be repaid in so doing.{1T 698.3}[10]
§23
你现今的生活很惨，满有不祥的预感。眼前所出现的是阴郁的景象；黑暗不信之念已把你困住。谈论疑惑不信方面的事，使你越来越黑暗，你一直满足于思想那些不快的题目。若是别人想谈论一些乐观的事，你便以各种更恳切与更严重的话，扑灭他们乐观的盼望。你的磨难与痛苦，一直摆在妻子面前，因为她有病你便认为她是一个负担，这乃是一种折磨心灵的思想。你若是喜爱黑暗与失望，谈论它们，思想它们，并尽一切所能地用想象来磨折自己的心灵，那就会使自己埋怨家人及上帝，并使自己的心象一块经过火烧的田地，毁坏了一切青翠的植物，留下的只是一片干燥，焦黑，及开裂的焦土而已。{1T 699.1}[11]
§24
Your life is now miserable, full of evil forebodings. Gloomy pictures loom up before you; dark unbelief has enclosed you. By talking on the side of unbelief you have grown darker and darker; you take satisfaction in dwelling upon unpleasant themes. If others try to talk hopefully, you crush out in them every hopeful feeling by talking all the more earnestly and severely. Your trials and afflictions are ever keeping before your wife the soul-harrowing thought that you consider her a burden because of her illness. If you love darkness and despair, talk of them, dwell upon them, and harrow up your soul by conjuring up in your imagination everything you can to cause you to murmur against your family and against God, and make your own heart like a field which the fire has passed over, destroying all verdure, and leaving it dry, blackened, and crisped.{1T 699.1}[11]
§25
你有病态的想象力而且值得同情。可是没有人能帮助你象你自助一样。你若想有信心，就谈论信心；要充满希望地、愉快地谈论。愿上帝帮助你看到自己行为的罪恶。在这事上你需要帮助，就是你女儿和你妻子的帮助。你若容让撒但控制你的思想，就如你已做过的一样，就会变成他特别利用的对象，并且会毁灭你自己的灵魂和你家人的幸福。你女儿有一种何等可怕的影响啊！做母亲的既没有得到你的爱与同情，就把她的爱集中在女儿身上，并且把她偶像化了。因着不明智的慈爱，她已成了一个被宠爱、被娇纵、几乎被惯坏了的孩子。她的教育一直被可悲的忽视了。要是她曾在家务上受教，负起她在家庭中的那份责任，她现在就会更健康更快乐了。每一位母亲的责任乃是教导自己的儿女尽人生的本分，分担她的重担，不要做无用的机器。{1T 699.2}[12]
§26
You have a diseased imagination and deserve pity. Yet no one can help you as well as yourself. If you want faith, talk faith; talk hopefully, cheerfully. May God help you to see the sinfulness of your course. You need help in this matter, the help of your daughter and your wife. If you suffer Satan to control your thoughts as you have done, you will become a special subject for him to use and will ruin your own soul and the happiness of your family. What a terrible influence has your daughter had! The mother, not receiving love and sympathy from you, has centered her affections upon the daughter and has idolized her. She has been a petted, indulged, and nearly spoiled child through the exercise of injudicious affection. Her education has been sadly neglected. Had she been instructed in household duties, taught to bear her share of the family burdens, she would now be more healthy and happy. It is the duty of every mother to teach her children to act their part in life, to share her burdens, and not be useless machines.{1T 699.2}[12]
§27
你女儿若曾受教参加体力劳动，她的健康原会更好。她的肌肉和神经都是软弱、松驰、无力的。她既很少使用自己的肌肉和神经，结果也就只能这样了。这个孩子只有一点点耐力。少量的体力劳动就会使她疲倦并且危害她的健康。她的肌肉和神经没有弹性。她的体能已那么久静止不动，以致她的生命几乎成了无用的。错误的母亲啊！岂不知你给自己的女儿那么多特权学习知识学问，而不教她作有用的人和做家务，乃是对她极大的伤害吗？这种操练原会强健她的体质，增进她的健康。这种温情证明不是一种祝福，而是一种可怕的咒诅。要是女儿分担了家务，母亲原不会过于劳累，原可使自己免受许多痛苦并且一直使女儿受益。她现在虽不应突然开始操劳，负一个人在她这个年纪能负的担子，但她可以训练自己比她在以前的生活中曾做过的多做一点儿体力劳动。{1T 700.1}[13]
§28
Your daughters health would have been better had she been educated to physical labor. Her muscles and nerves are weak, lax, and feeble. How can they be otherwise when they have so little use? This child has but little power of endurance. A small amount of physical exercise wearies her and endangers health. There is not elasticity in muscles and nerves. Her physical powers have so long lain dormant that her life is nearly useless. Mistaken mother! know you not that in giving your daughter so many privileges of learning the sciences, and not educating her to usefulness and household labor, you do her a great injury? This exercise would have hardened, or confirmed, her constitution and improved her health. Instead of this tenderness proving a blessing, it will prove a terrible curse. Had the family burdens been shared with the daughter, the mother would not have overdone, and might have saved herself much suffering and benefited the daughter all the time. She should not now commence to labor all at once and bear the burdens which one at her age could bear, but she can educate herself to perform physical labor to a much greater extent than she has ever done in her life.{1T 700.1}[13]
§29
C姐妹也有一种病态的想象力。她把自己关在室内，直到无法忍受了才出来。她房间的温度对健康很有害。她的血液循环受了压制。她在热空气中生活了那么久，以致若不实行一番改变，她就不能出门。她健康很差的部分原因是缺乏空气。她已变得那么娇弱以致出门就生病。她若继续放纵这种病态的想象力，就会连一点微风都受不了。她房间的窗户应该整天开着，好使空气流通。上帝对她不悦，因为她这是在自杀。这是不必要的。她是因着放纵病态的心思才变成这样敏感。她需要空气，她必须得着空气。她不仅在摧毁自己的活力，也在摧毁她丈夫和女儿及凡来探望她之人的活力。她房间的空气明显是不洁净而且死气沉沉的；使自己习惯了这种空气的人没有一个能拥有健康。她在这事上娇养自己，直到她若出门探访自己的弟兄们就会伤风感冒。为她自己也为了她周围的人，她必须改变这一切；她应该使自己习惯通风，每天增加一点儿，直到她能呼吸纯净、使人有生机的空气而不受到伤害。她皮肤的表面几乎要死了，因为没有空气可以呼吸。皮肤上的百万小孔被关闭了，因为它们被身体系统的污物堵住了，也因为缺少空气。若是让户外的空气立刻自由地吹进来，全天都吹着，乃是冒昧放肆。要让它逐渐进来；逐渐改变。一周后她才能把窗户打开两到三英寸，日夜开着。{1T 700.2}[14]
§30
Sister C has a diseased imagination. She has secluded herself from the air until she cannot endure it without inconvenience. The heat of her room is very injurious to health. Her circulation is depressed. She has lived in the hot air so much that she cannot endure the exposure of a ride out of doors without realizing a change. Her poor health is owing somewhat to the exclusion of air, and she has become so tender that she cannot have air without making her sick. If she continues to indulge this diseased imagination, she will be able to bear scarcely a breath of air. She ought to have the windows lowered in her room all through the day, that there may be a circulation of air. God is not pleased with her for thus murdering herself. It is unnecessary. She has become thus sensitive through indulging a diseased mind. Air she needs, air she must have. She is destroying not only her own vitality, but that of her husband and daughter, and of all who visit her. The air in her room is decidedly impure and dead; none can have health who accustom themselves to such an atmosphere. She has petted herself in this matter until she cannot visit the houses of her brethren without taking cold. For her own sake and for the sake of those around her, she must change this; she should accustom herself to the air, increasing it a little every day, until she can breathe the pure, vitalizing air without injury. The surface of the skin is nearly dead, because it has no air to breathe. Its million little mouths are closed, because they are clogged by the impurities of the system, and for want of air. It would be presumption to let in a free draft of air at once from out of doors, all through the day. Let it in by degrees; change gradually. In a week she can have the windows down two or three inches day and night.{1T 700.2}[14]
§31
她的肺和肝都患了病，因为她剥夺了自己生命所必需的空气。空气乃是上天免费的福惠，适于给整个身体系统充电。如果没有空气，身体系统就会充满疾病，变得不活跃，软弱无力。可是你们却都多年生活在很少量的空气里。这样，你妻子就把别人和她自己一同拉到了同样有害的空气里。在呼吸有害的空气时，你们谁也不会有清晰明朗的头脑。C姐妹害怕走出门外去任何地方，因为她在空气中必会感到变化并且伤风。她若是正确地对待自己，仍能获得更好的健康状况。她应该一周全身沐浴两次，水要感觉舒适凉爽，每次更凉一点儿，直到皮肤强健起来。{1T 701.1}[15]
§32
Lungs and liver are diseased because she deprives herself of vital air. Air is the free blessing of heaven, calculated to electrify the whole system. Without it the system will be filled with disease and become dormant, languid, feeble. Yet you have all been for years living with a very limited amount of air. In thus doing, your wife drags others into the same poisonous atmosphere with herself. None of you can possess clear, unclouded brains while breathing a poisonous atmosphere. Sister C dreads to stir out to go anywhere because she must feel the change in the atmosphere and take cold. She can yet be brought into a much better condition of health if she rightly treats herself. Twice a week she should take a general bath, as cool as will be agreeable, a little cooler every time, until the skin is toned up.{1T 701.1}[15]
§33
她不必象现在这样拖延下去，总是患病，只要你们全家人听从主所赐下的指示。“人若爱生命，愿享美福，须要禁止舌头不出恶言，嘴唇不说诡诈的话；也要离恶行善；寻求和睦，一心追赶。因为，主的眼看顾义人；主的耳听他们的祈祷。惟有行恶的人，主向他们变脸”（彼前3:10-12）。知足的心和愉快的精神使人身体健康和心灵有力。再没有什么比沮丧、郁闷和悲伤更使人多病的了。精神抑郁是可怕的。你们都受了它的害。女儿是烦躁的，与父亲的精神有份；又热又压抑的空气，缺乏活力，麻木了敏感的大脑。肺部感染了，肝脏也失去了活性。{1T 702.1}[16]
§34
She need not linger along as she does, always sick, if you will all as a family heed the instructions given of the Lord. He that will love life, and see good days, let him refrain his tongue from evil, and his lips that they speak no guile: let him eschew evil, and do good; let him seek peace, and ensue it. For the eyes of the Lord are over the righteous, and His ears are open unto their prayers: but the face of the Lord is against them that do evil. A contented mind, a cheerful spirit, is health to the body and strength to the soul. Nothing is so fruitful a cause of disease as depression, gloominess, and sadness. Mental depression is terrible. You all suffer from it. The daughter is fretful, partaking of the spirit of the father; and then the heated, oppressed atmosphere, deprived of vitality, benumbs the sensitive brain. The lungs contract, the liver is inactive.{1T 702.1}[16]
§35
空气，空气，这一人人可得的上天宝贵的恩惠，必用其使人精力充沛的影响祝福你们，只要你们不拒绝它进来。要欢迎它，培养对它的爱心，它就会证明是是宝贵的神经安抚剂。空气必须不断流通以保持纯洁。纯洁新鲜之空气的影响乃是使血液健康地循环全身。它更新身体，使之强壮健康，同时它也明显地影响人的心思，使人有一定程度的沉着平静。它激发人的食欲，使食物的消化更完全，导致安稳甜美的睡眠。{1T 702.2}[17]
§36
Air, air, the precious boon of heaven which all may have, will bless you with its invigorating influence if you will not refuse it entrance. Welcome it, cultivate a love for it, and it will prove a precious soother of the nerves. Air must be in constant circulation to be kept pure. The influence of pure, fresh air is to cause the blood to circulate healthfully through the system. It refreshes the body and tends to render it strong and healthy, while at the same time its influence is decidedly felt upon the mind, imparting a degree of composure and serenity. It excites the appetite, and renders the digestion of food more perfect, and induces sound and sweet sleep.{1T 702.2}[17]
§37
生活在通风很差的封闭房间里所产生的影响乃是：身体系统变得软弱不健康，循环受到压制，血液流经身体系统很缓慢，因为它没有被纯净而赐人活力的空气净化激活。心思变得沮丧郁闷，整个身体系统都衰弱无力；易生发烧和其它急性病。你们小心地排斥户外的空气，害怕自由通风，这使你们呼吸那些住在这些房间之人肺部呼出的混浊、不健康，而且有毒害，不适于维持生命的空气。身体变得松懈了，皮肤变成菜色了，消化变得迟钝了，身体系统对寒冷的影响变得特别敏感。稍微暴露一点儿就会生重病。在疲倦或出汗时，应该极其小心，不可坐在有穿堂风或寒冷的房间里。你们应该使自己十分习惯于空气，以致你们不必使温度高于华氏65度（摄氏18.3度）。{1T 702.3}[18]
§38
The effects produced by living in close, ill-ventilated rooms are these: The system becomes weak and unhealthy, the circulation is depressed, the blood moves sluggishly through the system because it is not purified and vitalized by the pure, invigorating air of heaven. The mind becomes depressed and gloomy, while the whole system is enervated; and fevers and other acute diseases are liable to be generated. Your careful exclusion of external air and fear of free ventilation leave you to breathe the corrupt, unwholesome air which is exhaled from the lungs of those staying in these rooms, and which is poisonous, unfit for the support of life. The body becomes relaxed, the skin becomes sallow, digestion is retarded, and the system is peculiarly sensitive to the influence of cold. A slight exposure produces serious diseases. Great care should be exercised not to sit in a draft or in a cold room when weary, or when in a perspiration. You should so accustom yourself to the air that you will not be under the necessity of having the mercury higher than sixty-five degrees.{1T 702.3}[18]
§39
你们可以成为一个幸福的家庭，只要你们愿意照上帝的吩咐而行，遵祂的命令去履行责任。但是主不会为你们做祂已留给你们去做的事。C弟兄值得同情。他已那么久感到不快乐，以致生活对他来说成了一个重担。其实不必如此。他的想象力呈病态，他已那么久使自己注目于黑暗的景象，以致若遭遇逆境或失望，他就想象一切都要完了，不久就要遭遇贫乏，事事不顺，和任何一个人都极难相处；这样，就使他的人生困苦可怜了。他越这样思想，就越发使自己的生活和他周围之人的生活痛苦难过。他没有理由作这样的感想；这一切都是撒但的作为。他不必容让仇敌这样控制他的心智。他应该转离黑暗阴郁的景象，转向亲爱的救主，天国的荣耀，和丰富的基业，就是为一切谦卑顺从，并且对上帝的应许有感恩的心和持久信心之人所预备的。这会使他付上一番努力，一场挣扎；但这工夫必须做成。你现在的幸福和你将来永远的福乐依赖于你将心意专注在愉快的事上，转脸不看黑暗的画面，那是假想的，要看上帝所布置在你路上的福惠，并且超越这些，看到那看不见的和永恒的事物。{1T 703.1}[19]
§40
You can be a happy family if you will do what God has given you to do and has enjoined upon you as a duty. But the Lord will not do for you that which He has left for you to do. Brother C deserves pity. He has so long felt unhappy that life has become a burden to him. It need not be thus. His imagination is diseased, and he has so long kept his eyes on the dark picture that if he meets with adversity or disappointment, he imagines that everything is going to ruin, that he will come to want, that everything is against him, that he has the hardest time of anyone; and thus his life is made wretched. The more he thinks thus, the more miserable he makes his life and the lives of all around him. He has no reason to feel as he does; it is all the work of Satan. He must not suffer the enemy thus to control his mind. He should turn away from the dark and gloomy picture to that of the loving Saviour, the glory of heaven, and the rich inheritance prepared for all who are humble and obedient, and who possess grateful hearts and abiding faith in the promises of God. This will cost him an effort, a struggle; but it must be done. Your present happiness and your future, eternal happiness depend upon your fixing your mind upon cheerful things, looking away from the dark picture, which is imaginary, to the benefits which God has strewn in your pathway, and beyond these, to the unseen and eternal.{1T 703.1}[19]
§41
你属于这一种人，心思不十分平衡，忧郁而沮丧，受环境的影响，容易被人影响。除非你培养一种高兴，快乐，感恩的心境，撒但就必终于迷惑你，成为他随心所欲的俘掳。如果你肯顺从主的教导，不受感情的驱使，而只受原理的管制，你就会成为你所居之处的教会的一大帮助，一大力量。切切不可让责难的话出口，它对你周围的人，有如破坏性的冰雹。但愿从你口所说出的，尽是高兴，快乐，仁爱的话。{1T 704.1}[20]
§42
You belong to a family who possess minds not well balanced, gloomy and depressed, affected by surroundings, and susceptible to influences. Unless you cultivate a cheerful, happy, grateful frame of mind, Satan will eventually lead you captive at his will. You can be a help, a strength to the church where you reside, if you will obey the instructions of the Lord and not move by feeling, but be controlled by principle. Never allow censure to escape your lips, for it is like desolating hail to those around you. Let cheerful, happy, loving words fall from your lips.{1T 704.1}[20]
§43
C弟兄啊，你的机会对你的灵性进步来说并不是最好的，可是上帝的恩典可以大有作为，纠正你品格的缺陷，加给你力量，更完全地发展你那些现今软弱需要力量的心智能力。这样，就会使你开始控制那些已制服了高级品性的低级品性。你象一个感觉已变得麻木的人。你需要有真理持住你，并且在你的生活中下一番彻底改革的工夫。“不要效法这个世界，只要心意更新而变化，叫你们察验何为上帝的善良、纯全、可喜悦的旨意”（罗12:2）。这就是你所需要的，也是你所必须经验的——藉真理成圣会为你实现的转变。{1T 704.2}[21]
§44
Brother C, your organism is not the best for your spiritual advancement, yet the grace of God can do much to correct the defects in your character and strengthen and more perfectly develop those powers of mind which are now weak and need force. In so doing you will bring into control those lower qualities which have overpowered the higher. You are like a man whose sensibilities are benumbed. You need to have the truth take hold of you and work a thorough reformation in your life. Be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God. This is what you need, and what you must experience--the transformation which a sanctification through the truth will effect for you.{1T 704.2}[21]
§45
你是否相信万物的结局近了，这世界历史最后几幕即将上演了呢？若然，就用你的行为将自己的信心表明出来。人必定显明他全部的信心。有人认为自己有不少的信心，其实他们即或有一点信心，也是已经死了的，因为没有行为支持。“这样，信心若没有行为，就是死的”（雅2:17）。很少人有那生发仁爱并且洁净心灵的真信心。可是凡被算为配得享永生的人，必须获得道德上的资格方可。“亲爱的弟兄啊，我们现在是上帝的儿女，将来如何，还未显明；但我们知道主若显现，我们必要象祂，因为必得见祂的真体。凡向祂有这指望的人，就洁净自己，象祂洁净一样”（约壹3:2,3）。这乃是你当前的工作，而且你若全心做这工作，就决没有太多时间。{1T 704.3}[22]
§46
Do you believe that the end of all things is at hand, that the scenes of this earths history are fast closing? If so, show your faith by your works. A man will show all the faith he has. Some think they have a good degree of faith, when if they have any, it is dead, for it is not sustained by works. Faith if it hath not works, is dead, being alone. Few have that genuine faith which works by love and purifies the soul. But all who are accounted worthy of everlasting life must obtain a moral fitness for the same. Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is. And every man that hath this hope in Him purifieth himself, even as He is pure. This is the work before you, and you have none too much time if you engage in the work with all your soul.{1T 704.3}[22]
§47
你必须经历向自己死，还必须向上帝活。“所以你们若真与基督一同复活，就当求在上面的事，那里有基督坐在上帝的右边”（西3:1）。不可求问自我。骄傲、利己、自私、爱财、贪婪、爱世界、怨恨、怀疑、忌妒、恶意的猜测，都必须克胜而永远地牺牲掉。基督显现之时，决不会先纠正这些邪恶然后赐予迎接祂复临的道德资格。这样的预备必须在祂复临之前完全告成。这应作为思考、研究和诚恳察究的题旨。我们当怎样行才能得救呢？我们的行为该当如何才能蒙上帝的嘉许呢？{1T 705.1}[23]
§48
You must experience a death to self, and must live unto God. If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Self is not to be consulted. Pride, self-love, selfishness, avarice, covetousness, love of the world, hatred, suspicion, jealousy, evil surmisings, must all be subdued and sacrificed forever. When Christ shall appear, it will not be to correct these evils and then give a moral fitness for His coming. This preparation must all be made before He comes. It should be a subject of thought, of study, and earnest inquiry, What shall we do to be saved? What shall be our conduct that we may show ourselves approved unto God?{1T 705.1}[23]
§49
你在受了试探发怨言，责难，任性恼怒时，既伤害四围的人，也因而害及自己的心灵，唉！要从自己心灵的深处诚恳焦急的自问：我能否无瑕无疵的站在上帝的宝座前？唯有无瑕疵的人才会站在那里。没有人心中还充满着属世的垃圾而能被接升天。务须事先纠正道德上的缺点，每一个污点也必须经基督那洁净的血洗掉，一切令人厌恶、不可爱的品格特性都必须克胜。{1T 705.2}[24]
§50
When tempted to murmur, censure, and indulge in fretfulness, wounding those around you, and in so doing wounding your own soul, oh! let the deep, earnest, anxious inquiry come from your soul, Shall I stand without fault before the throne of God? Only the faultless will be there. None will be translated to heaven while their hearts are filled with the rubbish of earth. Every defect in the moral character must first be remedied, every stain removed by the cleansing blood of Christ, and all the unlovely, unlovable traits of character overcome.{1T 705.2}[24]
§51
你计划用多长时间预备，好在荣耀中被介绍到天使们中间呢？在你和你家人目前的状况中，若是被介绍到那里，整个天庭都会受损。你的工作必须在此世完成。这个世界乃是准备之所。你没有片刻的光阴可以浪费。在天上一切都是和谐、平安、仁爱的。那里没有不和，没有纷争，没有责难，没有无爱心的话语，没有紧锁的眉头，没有刺耳的声音；这些成分如此破坏和平与幸福，以致任何一个有这些成分的人都不会被介绍到那里。要研究在在好事上富足，甘心施舍，乐意供给人，为自己积成美好的根基，预备将来，使你可以持定永生。{1T 705.3}[25]
§52
How long a time are you designing to take to prepare to be introduced into the society of heavenly angels in glory? In the state which you and your family are in at present, all heaven would be marred should you be introduced therein. The work for you must be done here. This earth is the fitting-up place. You have not one moment to lose. All is harmony, peace, and love in heaven. No discord, no strife, no censuring, no unloving words, no clouded brows, no jars there; and no one will be introduced there who possesses any of these elements so destructive to peace and happiness. Study to be rich in good works, ready to distribute, willing to communicate, laying up for yourselves a good foundation against the time to come, that you may lay hold on everlasting life.{1T 705.3}[25]
§53
要永远停止你对这可怜今生的抱怨，而要让这成为你心灵的负担：如何获得比今生更好的来生，有资格住在为那些真诚而且忠心到底之人预备的住处。你若在这里犯了错误，就一切都完了。你若终生致力于获得地上的财宝，而丧失天上的财宝，就必发现自己犯了一个可怕的错误。你不能拥有两个世界。“人若赚得全世界，赔上自己的生命，有什么益处呢？人还能拿什么换生命呢”（太16:26）？受默示的保罗说：“我们这至暂至轻的苦楚，要为我们成就极重无比、永远的荣耀。原来我们不是顾念所见的，乃是顾念所不见的；因为所见的是暂时的，所不见的是永远的”（林后4:17,18）。{1T 706.1}[26]
§54
Forever cease your murmurings in regard to this poor life, but let your souls burden be, how to secure the better life than this, a title to the mansions prepared for those who are true and faithful to the end. If you make a mistake here, everything is lost. If you devote your lifetime to securing earthly treasures, and lose the heavenly, you will find that you have made a terrible mistake. You cannot have both worlds. What shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul? Says the inspired Paul: For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory; while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.{1T 706.1}[26]
§55
人生的磨难乃是上帝的工匠，要从我们的品格中除掉杂质，弱点和粗糙之处，使我们适合在荣耀中的纯洁天使的社会。但是当我们经历这些磨难时，当苦难的火烧在我们身上时，我们务必不可注目于可见的火焰，而要让信心的眼睛专注在看不见的事，永恒的基业，不朽的生命，极重无比永远的荣耀上；而当我们这么做时，那火就不会消灭我们，而只是除掉渣滓，我们出来时就会被炼净七次，带有上帝的印记。1868年3月7日写于密歇根州格林维尔。{1T 706.2}[27]
§56
These trials of life are Gods workmen to remove the impurities, infirmities, and roughness from our characters, and fit us for the society of pure, heavenly angels in glory. But as we pass through these trials, as the fires of affliction kindle upon us, we must not keep the eye on the fire which is seen, but let the eye of faith fasten upon the things unseen, the eternal inheritance, the immortal life, the eternal weight of glory; and while we do this the fire will not consume us, but only remove the dross, and we shall come forth seven times purified, bearing the impress of the Divine. --Greenville, Michigan, March 7, 1868.{1T 706.2}[27]