I promised to translate more of Julian of Norwich from the original Middle English.

About this time I had a great longing and desire of God’s gift to be delivered from this world and this life. For many times I beheld the woe that is here and the goodness and blessed being that is there. And if there had been no other pain in this life but the absence of our Lord, it seemed to me sometimes more than I could bear. This made me mourn and yearn busily, as did also my own wretchedness, slowness and weariness, so that I did not want to live and trachle, as it fell to me to do.

And to all this our courteous Lord answered for comfort and patience, saying these words:

Suddenly you will be taken from all your pain, from all your sickness, and from all your woe. And you shall come up above and have me for your reward; and you shall be filled with joy and delight. And you shall nevermore have any kind of pain, sickness, uneasiness, no lack of will, but always endless joy and delight. Should it then grieve you at all, since it is my will and my honour?

And In this word, suddenly you will be taken, I saw that God rewarded mortals for the patience they have in waiting upon his will and his time. Mortals extend their patience over the time of their living, for they do not know the time of their dying. This is a great profit, for if they knew the date of their dying, they would not have patience over that time. God wills that while the soul is in the body, it should seem to it that it is always at the point of being taken. For all this life and this longing that we have here is but a point, and we when we shall be suddenly taken out of pain into delight, then pain shall be nothing.

It is more of a blessing, that mortals shall be taken from pain, than that pain should be taken from them. For if pain be taken from us, it may come again. Therefore, this is a sovereign comfort and a blessed vision for a longing soul, that we shall be taken from pain.