When Sorrow Walked With Me

I walked a mile with Pleasure,
She chattered all the way;
But left me none the wiser
For all she had to say.

I walked a mile with Sorrow,
And ne'er a word said she;
But, oh! the things I learned from her
When Sorrow walked with me.
-Robert Browning Hamilton
Selected: Streams in the Desert

It is better to go to the house of mourning, than to go to the house of feasting: for that is the end of all men; and the living will lay it to his heart. --Ecclesiastes 7:2