He was one of the greatest musical
composers that ever lived. His great, his sole delight was in music. It
was the passion of his life. When all his time and all his mind were given
to music, he suddenly became deaf, perfectly deaf; so that he never more
heard one single note from the loudest orchestra. While crowds were moved
and delighted with his compositions, it was all silence to him." Hugh said
nothing.

4. "Now do you think," asked his mother--and Hugh saw that a mild and
gentle smile beamed from her countenance--"do you think that these people
were without a Heavenly Parent?"

"O no! but were they patient?" asked Hugh.

"Yes, in their different ways and degrees. Would you suppose that they
were hardly treated? Or would you not rather suppose that their Father
gave them something better to do than they had planned for themselves?"

5. "He must know best, of course; but it does seem very hard that that
very thing should happen to them. Huber would not have so much minded
being deaf, perhaps; or that musical man, being blind.

"No doubt their hearts often swelled within them at their disappointments;
but I fully believe that they very soon found God's will to be wiser than
their wishes. They found, if they bore their trial well, that there was
work for their hearts to do far nobler than any the head could do through
the eye or the ear. And they soon felt a new and delicious pleasure which
none but the bitterly disappointed can feel."

"What is that?"

6. "The pleasure of rousing the soul to bear pain, and of agreeing with
God silently, when nobody knows what is in the breast. There is no
pleasure like that of exercising one's soul in bearing pain, and of
finding one's heart glow with the hope that one is pleasing God."

"Shall I feel that pleasure?"

"Often and often, I have no doubt; every time you can willingly give up
your wish to be a soldier or a sailor, or anything else you have set your
mind upon, you will feel that pleasure. But I do not expect it of you yet.
I dare say it was long a bitter thing to Beethoven to see hundreds of
people in raptures with his music, when he could not hear a note of it."

7. "But did he ever smile again?" asked Hugh.

"If he did, he was happier than all the fine music in the world could have
made him," replied his mother.

"I wonder, oh, I wonder, if I shall ever feel so!"

"We will pray to God that you may. Shall we ask him now?" Hugh clasped his
hands. His moth