Answer

May not your unsubmissive bearing under the rod provoke God to hide his face from you? Pray consider it well — nothing is more probable than this as the cause of God's withdrawal from you. If you could in meekness and quietness receive the cup your Father has given you to drink, accept the punishment of your iniquities, and say: Good is the word of the Lord; it is the Lord, let him do what he will — you would soon find your case altered. But the comforting Spirit finds no delight or rest in a turbulent and troubled heart.

And thus I have answered the most considerable pleas urged in justification of our excesses.