A dead brother to his living sister

My sister, you evoke me little. This does not prevent me from coming to see you every day. I know your troubles; your life is painful, I know it well, but it matters that one bear a lot that is not always joyful. Nevertheless, there is at times a relief in sorrows. He, for example, who does good at the cost of his own happiness, can, for himself and for others, ward off the rigor of many trials.

In this world it is rare to see good done with such abnegation; it is certainly difficult, but not impossible, and those who have this sublime virtue are, in truth, the elect of the Lord. If we fully accounted for this poor pilgrimage on Earth, we would understand it. But it is not so: men cling to possessions, as if they were to remain forever in their exile. Meanwhile, the most ordinary common sense, the simplest logic demonstrate, daily, that here we are nothing but birds of passage and those who have the fewest feathers on their wings are those who arrive most quickly. My good sister, of what use to the rich man is all that luxury, all that superfluity? Tomorrow he will be stripped of all those vain trappings in order to descend into the tomb, into which he will take nothing. It is true that he made a fine journey; nothing was lacking to him, he no longer knew what to desire and he exhausted the delights of life. It is also true that, in his delirium, he sometimes cast, smiling, alms into the hands of his brother; but did he, on that account, take anything from his own mouth? No, for he deprived himself of not a single pleasure, of not a single whim. Yet that brother is a son of God, our common father, to whom all things belong. You understand, my sister, that a good father does not disinherit one of his children in order to make the other richer? This is why he will recompense the one who was deprived of his share in this life. Thus, then, those who believe themselves disinherited, abandoned, and forgotten, will soon reach the blessed shore, where justice and happiness reign. But woe to those who made bad use of the possessions that our Father entrusted to them! Woe, also, to the man favored with the so precious gift of intelligence, if he abused it! Believe me, Maria, when one believes in God there is nothing on Earth that one can envy, except the grace of practicing his laws.

Your Brother, Wilhelm.