TO take care of one who is really sick is always a sacred duty.
Sacred, because your God appoints it so, that not you, but your sick one lies upon the sick-bed; and that your sick one, on the other hand, lies helpless and cannot manage himself without your help. So the Lord casts down one upon the sick-bed and leaves the other in health, that both together might be an exhibition of His divine ordinance.
But this caring for our sick is also sacred for Christ’s sake.
Our human nature is no more left to itself. Christ has assumed it. Everything human stands thereby related to His Mediator-heart. And as once upon the cross He took our sicknesses upon Himself, so this day He sees in every sick person a silhouette of His own suffering. And so He set it as a rule: “Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto Me. In them I was sick, and when you then surrounded them with your love, that love applied unto Me” (S. Matt. 25, 40).
What glow of love by this single word Jesus has made to burst into flame, cannot be told in words. That one word has done wonders. And when through all these twenty centuries, among all sorts of people and nations, there have ever been thousands upon thousands, who laid down sick and helpless, and in their helplessness undergone tender nursing, nursing in which spake the language of the heart, they owed it all to this one word of Jesus.
That one saying: “Inasmuch as ye have done this unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto Me,” has operated like an electric spark, leaping from heart to heart.
The eye, more yet, the compassionate heart, has opened to what for the amelioration of suffering human love could provide. By tender nursing to take part of the suffering from the sick upon oneself, has become a sacred art, wherein one vies with the other.
Especially woman’s heart has herewith revealed its inventiveness and its inexhaustible elasticity.
And this whole movement, which in hospitals, in Sisters of Charity, in the Red Cross, in the White Cross, and what not else, exhibits its glittering afterglow, from what else has it borrowed its motive, and in what else has it found its never dulling stimulus, except in that one, deeply mystical word of Jesus: “I was sick, and ye visited Me.”
AND yet, though the broad stream of compassion with our sick, which since that royal word has gone out into the world, is one in origin, there is in that care for our sick a twofold direction, which must carefully be distinguished.
One is domestic; the other more public.
So there may be two young women, one of whom by day and by night, unbeknown to the world, and herself not fathoming the depth of her devotion, cares for an aged, sick grandmother or an incurable sick little brother; while the other in uniform walks the street, attends meetings, goes from house to house, and is known to the public as a neighborhood or hospital nurse.
The first direction is more along the Protestant line; the other, as soon as it becomes predominant, inclines more to the Romish type.
This does not mean, to dissuade the sisters among us who do nursing outside from their calling, for very surely public nurses also are highly necessary. Neither that we deem, that in Romish families there is not also sometimes very tender care bestowed upon the sick; we would not even rob the Jew of this honor.
We only mean, that our Protestants incline more readily, to make also this glorious side of the Christian religion to glisten more brightly in the ordinary domestic circle, while Rome inclines more to set a domain apart also for this utterance of life.
In all Romish countries hospitals and asylums are therefore also far more extensive than with us. The several orders of Sisters of Mercy, of every name and title, are altogether of Romish origin. And it is difficult to deny, that the meritoriousness of care for the sick among them was always a strong stimulus.
SO it was not among us, at least not in the palmy days of the Church of the Reformation, and except in sporadic cases the need of outside nursing was not felt.
Love among the members of the family mutually was then at a far higher level, and especially the mother held very high rank.
For however plain the quiet housemother seemed in her doings and non-doings, and however little she might be developed in literary respect, she stood high in the knowledge of what belonged to life “within doors.” To make the bed soft; to arrange pillows in such a way as to afford most comfort; to provide covering that was warm and yet not too heavy; to temper the light in the sick-room; to care for pure, fresh air; tenderly to prepare suitable food and drink for the invalid’s tray; and with it all to be gently voiced, tender and sympathetic in her manner; O, all this applied as a sort of family tradition to the sick-bed, which was handed on among our housemothers from generation to generation.
There was little going out; more time was spent in the inner room, than in sitting at the window; and so the eye and the mind and the question of the heart turned inward; to the inside of domestic life; and led it up in this respect to such high perfectness; a degree of perfection the more glorious, because there was no temptation of seeking self in it.
Such a quiet housemother scarcely remembered, that Jesus had said: “Inasmuch as ye did this to the least of these my brethren, ye did it unto Me.”
She did it without much thought about it.
From inward urge of commiseration and sense of duty.
And therefore she could belong to the many, whom Jesus refers to as saying: “When saw we Thee sick, and came unto Thee?”
For they are indeed the very noblest of our race, who lead a beautiful life of love, without themselves knowing how high they stand, and by this very not knowing are spared much spiritual sin.
YET let no one be unreasonable.
For they who do outside nursing, have also in turn something, in which they can stand spiritually higher.
For mother at home never nurses any one except her own husband, or the child that she has carried under her heart, or a father who lives with her. So here love germinates, which must do wonders at the sick-bed, from the blood relationship, from the love that was already present in the heart. Natural love and love for Christ’s sake here flow in one.
But such is not the case with those who nurse outside.
There we face a sick person who is strange to us; who neither as blood relative nor as friend can lay a claim to our heart; and whom now we are to care for in his sickness; because we have devoted ourselves to this service of love, joined ourselves to a house of mercy, and by those who direct this house, have been sent to this sick person, whether in hospital or in a private house.
That one seeks out such a needy patient, and of one’s own volition cares for him, also occurs, but yet most seldom. Almost always one is sent to this or that sick one.
It is not a matter here of money; for when payment is made, that money goes into the treasury of the house.
The nurse herself has but a small part of it and spends her life in watching, in assisting and in caring for the sick.
And now it speaks for itself, that an entirely other stimulus must operate in the heart, with such an one who is altogether a stranger, often sick with a repulsive disease, sometimes in a hovel, in which every convenience is wanting, in the midst of poverty, for which there is no help, and with almost no appliances at hand, to quiet pain and ameliorate distress.
With all this a far greater straining of love is required, therefore, than with the housemother in her own family.
If only we may have an eye for it, that that very higher demand brings also a spiritual danger of its own.
Every one knows it of us; we know it so well of ourselves; in all this work of love there is so much that shows on the outside; and from this springs for our guileful heart so often a false stimulus.
OF course the glorious promise of Jesus applies only to that care for the sick, which in its impulse and incentive remained pure.
To be able to plead this glorious promise, you must nurse your sick from love; from nothing but love; from that love which suffers along with the patient; and from compassion tries to take that suffering upon yourself and to ameliorate it.
Every secondary aim does injury to the sacred character of this compassion among people.
There must be no ambition to be over-active, no seeking of self-honor, no imagination of one’s own excellency, else it all remains the tinkling cymbal of I Corinthians 13.
And therefore let one be on guard.
To go out nursing among strangers is in many cases necessary, and may God strengthen such as devote themselves to this ministry of mercy.
But let no one be taken to the hospital who can be cared for at home.
And then, let every young woman examine herself, whether she would be equally ready, equally patient and equally regular in nursing the sick in her own home as she is willing to do this among strangers.
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