A Similitude

Imagine a tree expostulating with an orchardist, and saying, "Why is this oft-coming of the knife? Is it not the nature of a tree to grow? I am shooting out branches on every side, end upwards, according to the law of nature; and wherefore am I thus pruned continually?" Symmetry is in the mind of the man that trains the tree, and it must grow for that very sake, and must be cut back for that very sake, though symmetry is not in the thought of the tree. And to symmetry is added something higher yet—fruit, though that is not in the thought of the tree, but only of the orchardist. He nurtures his trees for these ends, but blind nature knows nothing about them.

If you consider only this life, it would seem as if suffering ought not to have been a part of the course of nature; it would seem as if, God having ordained the body with all its functions and faculties, the natural process of growth would be an easy and progressive evolution by such arrangements as should be devoid of suffering. But actual human experience shows exactly the reverse. If anything can be shown by the indications and facts of nature, it is that man never grows to a full man's estate without the ministration of suffering, and that suffering is a part of nature, or it could not be universal.— Beecher.