A Meditation Upon a Mote in the Eye by William Spurstowe (ca. 1666)   Of what a strange temper is the eye, which a small mote can so extremely trouble, and a wide world cannot satisfy?  And what a strange vanity is the world, a single dust of which is more powerful to afflict and torment, than an entire confluence of all its pleasures can be to give ease, or to delight?  For were the globe of the whole earth turned into a delicious paradise, that the eye might behold nothing but a perpetual spring of beauty, and that every sense might be continually feasted with the choicest objects that such a garden could produce; yet alas a corn of its sand, an atom of its dust put or lodged accidentally in the eye, would create such violent shootings, such keen prickings and burnings, as would soon force a man to send forth complaints that his anguish is far above his pleasure, and that he had much rather forgo the one, than undergo constantly the other.  Oh, what a weak and empty bubble is all worldly happiness, which breaks and vanisheth into nothing, by the power of a small dust!  And what a matchless difference is there between heavenly and earthly comforts, when a drop of the one can sweeten a briny sea of sorrow, and a world of the other cannot assuage the anguish which ariseth from a single mote!  Lord therefore let not me be among the number of those that receive their good things in this life, I ask only a pittance for my passage, but not an abundance for my portion in them; yea though thou shouldst give me no bounty to make merry with, yet will I not murmur at the bounty to prodigals, if thou wilt say, “Son, all that is laid up is thine,” though thou hast little or nothing of what is laid out; but I will pray, “Turn Lord mine eyes from beholding, and my heart from affecting earthly vanities, and fix all my desires upon heaven, that I may look and long for it, in which there is nothing that can offend; but everything that will delight and satisfy to Eternity.”  -----------------------  This article is taken from:  Spurstowe, William.  The Spiritual Chymist: or, Six Decads of Divine Meditations on Several Subjects. London: Philip Chetwind, 1666.  A PDF file of this book can be downloaded, free of charge, at http://www.ClassicChristianLibrary.com