Satisfaction For Suffering

In the hope of ease to come,
Let's endure one martyrdom.

Afflictions bring us joy in times to come,
When sins, by stripes, to us grow wearisome.

We merit all we suffer, and by far
More stripes than God lays on the sufferer.

God suffers not His saints and servants dear
To have continual pain or pleasure here;
But look how night succeeds the day, so He
Gives them by turns their grief and jollity.

Afflictions they most profitable are
To the beholder and the sufferer:
Bettering them both, but by a double strain,
The first by patience, and the last by pain.

Abundant plagues I late have had,
Yet none of these have made me sad:
For why? My Saviour with the sense
Of suff'ring gives me patience.