Fruitful Affliction

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Dr. Thomas Goodwin, who was President of Magdalen College, lost half of his library, some five hundred pounds worth of his best books, in the terrible fire of London in 1666. His son remembers how his father lamented this, and said of it, that in taking away these precious possessions God had struck him in a very tender place. Later he said, “I loved my books too well, and God corrected this by affliction.” But of this sore trial came the volume, Patience and its Perfect Work, a work that has enabled thousands to say “God’s will be done.” Goodwin’s loss has been the Church’s gain and enriching through the centuries.

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