He insisted, as soon as he was restored, in going in to wish good-bye to the man, which he accomplished with great difficulty.
But I have already digressed too far, and must return to the main issue.
I am not aware that he ever attempted any theoretical explanation of the intrusion of sin and disorder into the world.

He certainly regarded them as emanating practically, in some way that he did not comprehend, from God.
"I can not for a moment believe that these apparent disorders, physical suffering, and the deeper diseases of the will are the manifestation of some inimical power, and not under God's direct control.

I have had so much experience of even the immediate blessing of suffering, that I am content to take the rest on trust.

If I thought there was some ghastly enemy at work all the time, I should go mad.

The power displayed is so calm, so far-reaching, and so divine, that I should feel that even if some of us were finally emancipated from it by the working of some superior power, the contest would be so long and terrible and the issues so dire, that the limited human mind could not possibly contemplate it, that hope would be practically eliminated by despair." In the same connection, he wrote a letter to a friend whose wild and wayward life had injured his health, and wrote in the greatest agony of mind: "Words are such wretched things, my dear friend, in crises like this.
I can only beg of you, with all my heart, to resolutely set your face against thinking what might have been.