УТЕШЕНИЕ

When God sees that the soul is tired, He [God] delights it with pleasant things. This happens to us too. It often happens that a person, returning from work, burdened with thousands of sorrows, dejected by often difficult impressions, exhausted by severe disasters and deprivations, finds consolation at home in a child, and a tender feeling eases the burden of work. Since when he is out of spirit, neither his wife can approach him with consolation, since her consolation is inappropriate, nor the servant dares to console him, then God represents an innocent being who deserves mercy for his ignorance, and through him eases and calms the soul depressed by hardships. If a servant laughs, it may seem that he is laughing at the misfortunes of his master; if a wife laughs, it may seem that she does not sympathize with grief; the caress of a child cannot be suspected due to the innocence of his nature. And it often happens that what friends cannot do with their advice, or sages with their instructions, a child can do with his laughter alone - namely, dispel any feeling of sorrow. And so, at the highest moment of sadness, a person sees a child, at first he pushes away and rejects the untimely consolation, but gives in to persistence and, turning his gaze several times, is carried away, then takes the child, forgets the sadness and says: “This is whoever God gives me, and I don’t care about others!” Do you see how God gives consolation to the soul even with insignificant things? And so, since Adam was alone in paradise, had no friend, no loved one, no relative, God brought animals to him for entertainment. And now, for example, there are animals that have the ability to imitate - some imitate actions, others imitate voices, as, for example, a monkey and similar animals imitate human actions, and a parrot and other birds imitate voices. So, Adam received entertainment from animals, some of which gave pleasure with their voices, others with service (5). You might be interested in: