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There you have a romance and a tragedy summed up in a single verse. You only need a little imagination to fill in the details, and lo! you have a book of human life, with its prides and humblings, its grandeurs, and its shames. The writer tells you in the same breath of this man's glory and of his awful cross. "But!" Ah, if we could only get rid of that little word, how happy we should be! Alas! it is always popping in to disturb our self-congratulating reflections, It drops into human speech at every turn. It is found at every stage of human experience. I hear it every day in the common talk of the people about me. I catch my own lips dropping it unawares times without number. There is always something to qualify our congratulations, praises, and thanksgivings. Fortune has dealt well with you, but! You have had a smooth and prosperous career, but! Your husband is almost perfection, but! Your children are doing well, but! That friend of yours has many admirable qualities, but! Your employer is generous and considerate, but! Your partner is honest and capable, but! Your church is orthodox and peaceable, and pre-eminently respectable, but! Your minister is a wonderful preacher, but! There is always that little or big cloud athwart your sunlight, always the wasp in the honey-cup, always the seamy side to your bliss, always the dull leaden background to the shield whose face is all gold. Mercy and judgment meet, and the darkness and the light make up one picture in every human lot. Naaman was a great man, and honourable, but he was a leper. Now sometimes we forget this other side in our thoughts of others, and frequently we make too much of it in thoughts of ourselves. And if the other side relates to character, we reverse the process, making too much of it in others and overlooking it in ourselves.

I. REMEMBER THAT EVERY NAAMAN HAS HIS CROSS. The side of the shield which he shows to the world is perhaps polished gold, but he who walks behind it sees the heavy iron casing. How foolish we are to envy the great their greatness, the rich their riches, the honourable their honours, and the wise their wisdom, and to fancy that because they have more of these things than we they are necessarily happier and more contented. And how blind we are to overlook our own blessings and joys, and repine because others seem more fortunate than we. Uneasy is the head that wears any sort of crown. Where Fortune drops its choicest honours, it imposes its heaviest burdens, and the path which is lined with roses has most of the prickly thorns of care. The more brilliant the sunlight, the darker the shadows. The more a man gets his own way, the more he frets when he cannot get his own way. You cannot climb high to pluck the choicest fruit and flowers without getting many a prick and bruise. The man who wears purple and fine linen before the world has often underneath, if you could see it, rough sackcloth and chafing cords; and there is a cloud of cares weighing like midnight on many a heart in which outward fortune seems constantly to smile. In the old ballad the queen tides by on her gallant palfrey, with cloth of gold and glittering jewels, and splendid array of attendants, and the village maiden, looking out of her lattice window, sighs, "Oh! to be a queen!" while the queen, looking up, sighs far more deeply, and whispers to her heart, "Oh! to be free from all this burden, and like that happy careless maiden!" Yes; there are cold blasts on the heights which those below never feel. And many a time, when all the things of the world go well with a man, his inner life is any. thing but right with God. The leprosy of doubt, or the leprosy of sin has crept over all his thoughts, and corrupted his human affections, and put a withering blight upon his world, and he knows nothing of the peace and gladness in which your simple faith walks continually.

II. YOU ARE NOT LIKELY TO FORGET YOUR OWN CROSS. No; but do not make too much of it. No doubt there is a seamy side to your life. It is not all sunlight. But it is not well to keep the seamy side always uppermost and talk as if tears and cares and worries were your meat and drink continually. Why cannot we let our cheerful thoughts have free course sometimes without stopping them with that everlasting "but"? "Yes; I have many things to be grateful for, but I" That word often expresses the concentrated essence of ingratitude. It is a volume of murmurings and fretfulness bound up in three letters. Do not make too much, I repeat, of that other side. Your house is not so large as you desire. No; but maybe there is far more love and happiness in it than in many a bigger house. Your children are not all shaping as you would wish. No; but some of them, let us hope, bring brightness to your homes and put music into your hearts continually. Your business prospects are not brilliant maybe. No; but you have never lacked a sufficiency of comforts, and your way has always so far been made clear. We should be far happier and far more generous-hearted men if we did not make so much of that "but" in thinking of and discussing those who love us and whom we love. They please us in many things, but! Ah, well, magnify the many things, and let that other side go by.

(J. Greenhough, M. A.)

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KJV: Now Naaman, captain of the host of the king of Syria, was a great man with his master, and honourable, because by him the LORD had given deliverance unto Syria: he was also a mighty man in valour, but he was a leper.

WEB: Now Naaman, captain of the army of the king of Syria, was a great man with his master, and honorable, because by him Yahweh had given victory to Syria: he was also a mighty man of valor, [but he was] a leper.