find it easy. For my yoke is easy, works easily, sits right upon
the shoulders, and THEREFORE My burden is light."

There is no suggestion here that religion will absolve any man from
bearing burdens. That would be to absolve him from living, since
it is life itself that is the burden. What Christianity does
propose is to make it tolerable.

Christ's yoke

is simply His secret for the alleviation of human life, His prescription
for the best and happiest method of living. Men harness themselves
to the work and stress of the world in clumsy and unnatural ways.
The harness they put on is antiquated. A rough, ill-fitted collar
at best, they make its strain and friction past enduring, by
placing it where the neck is most sensitive; and by mere continuous
irritation this sensitiveness increases until the whole nature is
quick and sore.

This is the origin, among other things, of a disease called
"touchiness"--a disease which, in spite of its innocent name, is one
of the gravest sources of restlessness in the world. Touchiness,
when it becomes chronic, is a morbid condition of the inward
disposition. It is self-love inflamed to the acute point; conceit,
WITH A HAIR-TRIGGER. The cure is to shift the yoke to some other
place; to let men and things touch us through some new and perhaps
as yet unused part of our nature; to become meek and lowly in heart
while the old sensitiveness is becoming numb from want of use.

It is the beautiful work of Christianity everywhere to adjust the