Tuning an Instrument

“If we cotild learn to frame our minds to otcr estates, as the sJdlfcl musician lettcth down the striitgs a peg lower when the tune requireth it, we should pass to heaven 7nore comfortably T Yes, we are as a rule pitched too high. We look for more in this life than it will ever yield us. If we could be satisfied with less we should be less dissatisfied. It is a great pity when men try to live above their means, for it often ends in their hardly having the means to live at all. Probably there is as much happiness in one station of life as in another if it is suitable to us, and we are able to fill it: the misery of life must be when a man has a little less than he needs and a great deal less than he aspires to. Contentment is the crown jewel of a happy life. We shall have enough, for the promise guarantees us our portion; why need we fret after more? “Here little and hereafter much,” as Bunyan says, is best for us.

O Lord, grant me grace to live above this world; and wherein I must live upon it, and think about it, help me to have few desires and no cares. Tune my nature so that without fail my life may make music to thy praise.