XII. THE BEST BED-MAKER.

WHEN a good man is ill at ease, God promiseth to make all his bed in his sickness. [Psalm xli. 3.] Pillow, bolster, head, feet, sides, all his bed. Surely that God who made him knows so well his measure and temper, as to make his bed to please him. Herein his art is excellent, not fitting the bed to the person, but the person to the bed, infusing patience into him.

But O, how shall God make my bed, who have no bed of mine own to make? Thou fool, he can make thy not having a bed to be a bed unto thee. When Jacob slept on the ground, who would not have had his hard lodging, therewithal to have his heavenly dream? [Gen. xxviii. 12.] Yea, the poor woman in Jersey,²¹²¹Fox’s Martyrs, vol. 3. which, in the reign of Queen Mary, was delivered of a child as she 116was to be burnt at the stake, may be said to be brought to bed in the fire. Why not? if God’s justice threatened to cast Jezebel into a bed of fire, [Rev. ii. 22.] why might not his mercy make the very flames a soft bed to that his patient martyr?