"For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us. For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God. For the creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him who hath subjected the same in hope. Because the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now."—Rom. viii. 18-22.
In the belief of days gone by, I used to understand the meaning of "travail of soul" to be the same as almost everybody outside of Christian Science considers it today; i. e., the conviction of sin that leads to the reformation from a belief of sinfulness to a belief of piety—in other words, that leads to a change from bad ways and worldliness to the orthodoxy of some religion.
I imagine that St. Paul, in looking back, saw in many incidents of his life the travail of soul that led him to Christ. So also I may say of other men; for, in the limitation of the belief of human life, "three-score-years-and-ten," ample time is given for repeated birth-throes—each bringing one nearer and nearer the knowledge that God and His creation are spiritual; hence perfect, holy, pure and eternal.
