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Many centuries before Jesus was born, Abraham longed to see His day; he saw it and was glad. The other princes of the old dispensation also saw Him in vision, as a bright ray of the eternal Light; a column of smoke and a burning flame; as the flower of the field and the spotless lily of the valley. They saw Him from afar and hailed Him the Desired of Nations. The New Born is The New Born is preeminently the object in which God is well pleased; for He is beautiful beyond measure; so pleasing is He in the sight of God that He wills to save every one who is like to Jesus. The Nativity is beautiful because of the beauty of Him Who is born; it is a sovereign archetype of beauty.

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But we should not stop here. Jesus is the Saviour, and His birth the birth of man's salvation. Hence, to appreciate the beauty of the Nativity it is necessary to understand the beauty of man's salvation in its purpose, its fitness, and accommodations to the world where man's salvation was to be accomplished. A fitness that must be considered first, in regard to God; secondly, in regard to man; thirdly, in regard to its effect, and fourthly, in regard to the Force that accomplished so great a result.

The purpose of man's salvation was to reestablish order in the soul, both according to nature and according to grace; between God, spirit, and matter, which order is founded upon relationship, and necessarily carries with it a dependence of existence. Spirits are, from their nature, dependent on God, and matter by its nature is dependent on spirit; for it is the general law of being that the more perfect should sustain the less perfect.

This law should, also, practically work itself out in the free movement of spirits, in their judgment, in their will and in their work. If the intellect of man in its judgments places itself above, or even makes itself equal to, God, or loves itself

more than God, or even as much as God, false will be its judgments and sinful the disorder in its will.

This order is most beautiful, because it represents the victory of God over spirit, of spirit over matter. It represents, in other words, God impressing His image on the spirit, and the spirit placing its imprint upon matter. It is a victory which does not oppress, but elevates; the spirit with which God rules becomes Divine, and matter, under the dominion of spirit, is spiritualized. Certainly there is nothing fairer in nature than a body governed by a beautiful soul; nor, in the spiritual order, is there anything more beautiful than a soul in thorough harmony with Truth and Beauty. This is the principle which inspires the fine arts.

If we consider the perfection of the mode by which man's salvation was accomplished, it is also seen to be best and most beautiful. Granting that there were many possible ways for God to restore the human race, surely a mode more consonant with God's goodness than that Jesus should become man can not be conceived. Truly there could be no higher manifestation of the Divine goodness than the Incarnation of the Word. In it the Infinite Person of the Son of God becomes united to human nature to sustain it in being, and yet suffering no loss to His own greatness, becomes man. A more splendid manifestation of God's perfection there could not be than the Incarnation of the Word.

Likewise in respect to man, there is not nor could there be a way to establish order more suitable than the advent of Jesus. We have a pressing and continual need of God. Without God the soul is entirely disturbed, and finds itself in miserable want. Yet God is invisible in Himself, and, in His natural effects, appears in a manner vague and obscure, even as light appears in darkness; whence arises a fitness, as it were, a

necessity, for the Incarnation of the Word of God. Because in His Incarnation He adapts Himself to our senses; and, by the things of sense, to our intellect. We were not born to the sonship of God until the Son of God was made man. Without Him the human race could not well be raised to good nor delivered from evil. And, indeed, to illumine the mind of man, to inflame his heart, to cheer the downcast, to humble the proud, who had made themselves like to God in their presumption, to conquer the body, to provide us with a model, to vanquish the powers of darkness, to raise the sinner, to reconcile man with God-for this there is no mode more suitable than the birth of the Godman. All, therefore, that makes for grace or proportion between Jesus Incarnate and man's salvation, constitutes the beauty of the Nativity.

What a wondrous proportion, what adjustment, what order and wisdom is manifested in the humility, the suffering, the obedience of Jesus, and the singular and wonderful exaltation of His body, and the glory of His name. Although the soul of Jesus, united to the Word as though by nature, was full of grace and glory, nevertheless it was just that He should win for Himself at the price of His humiliation and obedience this glory of His body and exaltation of His name.

And, now, finally, we must consider at once the greatness of the Power which can produce such an effect, and the imperfect and helpless appearance in which this Force manifests itself to us. The Power which was to save the world appeared, as it were, impotent, for this mystery of humility required it. This Power did not possess the prestige of the old religions of Egypt and Chaldea, nor the power of the Graeco-Roman religion. It seemed a force rejected and condemned by the very people for whom, and in whose midst, it was born. And within us, in the feeling of each one of

us, it is born again and ever seeks for recognition. Nevertheless, it is as the proverbial grain of mustard-insignificant in appearance, and yet it holds within itself the restorative virtue of the reign of God on earth and in heaven; it is the virtue of Him Who brings existence from nothing; and, like Him, it can from the least produce the greatest.

The Nativity is, indeed, beautiful; beautiful in itself; beautiful in its scope; beautiful in the method of its accomplishment; beautiful in its effects and beautiful in the efficacy that produced them. It is a sublime manifestation of the Divine art of man's redemption. Three glories show forth in this art: the society of the just; Jesus, their Ruler, shines in it; in it we see God the allpowerful, the all-wise, and the infinitely loving Maker. It is, in a sense, an aggregation of the elect of the world; a circle of heavenly light and Divine love.

Before this beauty of the Nativity the senses are powerless, for it is a spiritual glory of supernatural faith. The man of faith, who views it under the Divine light,

receives from it a beneficent influence that elevates the mind, purifies and strengthens the will, and invigorates the spirit; it is a force both powerful, instructive, and educative..

CONCLUSION.

And now, from what we have said, it must be concluded that the lesson of the Nativity would be lost to us if Jesus be not born in our hearts. Hence, we ought to excite in ourselves a true sense of the sublime, a true yearning for heaven, which is incontestably the first of all man's needs. We must spurn pomp, despise riches, repress our passions, cast from us everything that hampers the spirit and is inimical to it. So may we enter into the freedom of the sons of God, and humbly approach our Infant Saviour in the manger at Bethlehem.

T

O my dear friends, greeting! May the New Year be good to all of us! He finds some changes here and there. Where, when his predecessor was born, were two, he meets but one; where was level turf on the green hillside, he sees many narrow ridges; where was silence in hearts and homes, now beats the pulse of young life. Innumerable are the changes that have crept over, or burst upon, us; but whether our voices have learned higher notes of joy or deeper tones of sadness since last we listened to the pealing of those old bells, still, as of yore, we stand on the threshold and breathe the dear wish:

Be good, New Year, to those that we love and those that love us; and those that love those that we love and those that love those that love us!

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As the angel of time stands before us to-night and demands what we have done during the past year, we are abashed, regretful, repentant. As in retrospection we go over the days that have been gathered up by the past, as the harvester gathers up his bound sheaves, and remember the possibilities which we disregarded, the blessings we threw away, we realize the bitter truth of the poet's words:

"The lost days of my life until to-day, What were they, could I see them on the street

Lie as they fell? Would they be ears of wheat

Sown once for food but trodden into clay?

Or golden coins, squandered and still to pay?

Or drops of blood, dabbling the guilty feet? Or such spilt waters as in dreams must cheat The undying throats of hell, athirst alway? I do not see them here; but after death

God knows I know the faces I shall see, Each one a murdered self, with low, last breath,

'I am thyself-what hast thou done to me?" ‘And I—and I-thyself,' (lo! each one saith,) 'And thou thyself to all eternity!'"

That is the deepest depths of the misery-those ill-spent days are as much of the soul as the beneficent ones. We cannot remove one act, one word, one thought from the past. They are there for eternity! Nevertheless, we close the door on the past and turn our faces toward the future. We will begin over again! "Man's life is a warfare." Yet we love the struggle; there is a joy we would not miss in overcoming our enemies, whether these are material conditions or spiritual temptations. If there is one among you discouraged, as he thinks to-night of his failure in the conflict, I would say to that soul: "Friend, take up your sword again! Get into your old place in the fighting line! Do not be ashamed because you failed once, twice, yea, even unto the seventy times seven. If you lift your eyes, you will find none but kindly glances, for ah! you may not know how often those seasoned warriors whom you perchance envy, have cast down their weapons, too, how frequently they still find them all but fallen from their hands; neither can you tell how many are held in the ranks solely by the courage of their comrades; for the heart that has never had its moments of weakness, its feelings of despair, is more, or less, than human. Up again, brave heart! 'Fight till you fall, and fighting, die!'"

Last year we made a number of resolutions; suppose this year we make but one, and that one To Be Good to Our Own?

As a

But you say that this would be easy enough if they were in truth your "own," these people among whom your lot is cast; they are not, however, and though bound to you by the cords of family, they are aliens; your "own" you have not met, or if you did meet them it was only for the pain of separation. Your parents do not understand you, your sisters and brothers are at the antipodes from you, and whatever sympathy, encouragement, and appreciation you have received in your life came from the outside world, never from the home circle. This is a sorrowful condition, and, unhappily, not an uncommon one. condition, I ask you to meet it; and ignoring it is not meeting it, my dear friend. Has it ever occurred to you that in the beginning you helped to dig this gulf between yourself and your family, or allowed one always existing to widen, instead of trying to fill it up, or at least bridge it? If you were older or in any way superior, did you not drift into dictatorialness or selfishness, either of which course of conduct will drive off, rather than attract love? Did you not accustom yourself to think, in your young vanity, that your parents could. not or would not follow you into the realm of thought by the new road you were traveling, and, in consequence, you withdrew your mind from theirs, until finally all mutual interests were hopelessly severed? Now, as you grow older and begin to realize what you have missed in this home affection, you are unhappy.

Always, when I hear such plaints, I think of what Emerson says on accepting our places in life and those with whom our lots are cast as the will of the great God towards us, and making that will ours. And how is this done? By

withdrawing yourself from the family circle of an evening, which, in our industrial age, is the only time it meets in completion, to give yourself to other friends or intellectual pursuits? By taking no interest in the concerns of the other members of the family, or refusing to share yourself with them? The State would quickly disintegrate if the bond of mutual interests were thus snapped, and you can not expect the family, which is the State in miniature, to remain solid under such circumstances. And though you are godly, and give of your possessions to the poor (and these possessions need not necessarily be worldly goods, nor the poor those lacking material things; for of our talents and intellectual gains we can give largely, and the poor of mind whom these can help often are most deserving objects of benevolence), is not that work which Christ declared supreme-doing the will of the Father-undone? Would you not find more happiness in your life and its work if home were your refuge, your place of sweet rest and peace? And though your work be high and far-reaching in its influence, is it entire when, in the little spot where that influence should be most deeply and sweetly felt, a stranger is more of a power? But, you may say, my family is most antagonistic on the subject that is as dear to me as life. The only way I can avoid inharmony, is to avoid them. There is a snag in the river; because of it, does the pilot refrain from sailing his craft, with its rich cargo, down the stream? No, he watches for the hidden snag, and steers his boat clear of it. In domestic life there are many such snags, and daily we see precious human happiness being hurried against them for destruction. Suppose this year you make one resolution-to be good for, and to, your own?

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love our neighbors as ourself, and the parable of the man who fell into the hands of the Jericho robbers, show that we should not be so narrow as to recognize only the line drawn around the family as the circumference of our goodness. If the rich were not so good to their own, the Christ-spirit would prevail more powerfully on earth to-day. Did you ever consider what a marked change there would be in this sorrowing old world if the members of all the families on earth would make and keep the resolution to be good to their own? The father would do nothing to bring a pang to the heart of his wife, the wife would keep strong and true her early love and comradeship for her husband; neither parent would conflict with the happiness and interests of the children, who, in return, would brighten the lives. of their parents instead of blasting them, as many children do. Do you imagine that the inhabitants of such a realm of love could ever be numbered among the world's robbers, its scribes, pharisees and hypocrites, its stoners of sinners, hirelings and Judases, its crucifiers of right, justice, and holiness? And if the State stood on such homes-ah! you say, that is Utopia! We could not have even such a foreshadowing of the ideal community if it did not first exist in the idea, and what is possible in thought is not impossible in actuality. Suppose you begin now to do your little part toward hastening that happy time by being good to your own? Suppose you bestow on the small world of home your sweet smiles and pleasant words and keep for the outside world your frowns. and cruel bickerings? Such a line of action would cost you your popularity, your position, ruin you. Though you search the world over, you will not find such priceless wealth as is yours within. the four walls of home-yet you risk its loss, and ultimately destroy it, by methods you would not use in dealing

with the unfeeling stranger! But (I have heard this said) you must smile and be pleasant all day, no matter what are your feelings, and the charm of home is that it is a place where deception need not be practiced. So you relieve an overworked brain, overwrought nerves, by words that pierce like dagger-points, and loving souls draw into themselves as the sensitive plant closes up its leaves at a touch. And some day or night an hour strikes; and then from out the silence that no soul clothed in the humanity hath ever penetrated, you will hear the soft tread of the Black Camel's feet drawing near and nearer, until he kneels at the door of your dwelling; and then-when you sit alone in the void of one drawn up by God, you will find those arrows flying back into your own heart, poisontipped.

As for the selfish tendency of this resolution I suggest, recall one who is really good to his own, and must you not admit that he is also good to others? The man who speaks pleasantly to his wife at all times is not going to snarl at his stenographer; the father that treats his own children with courtesy is not tyrannical with the office boy; the sister and brother who are kind and loving to each other at home, are kind and gentle in their intercourse with their classmates or co-workers. They carry the atmosphere of their happy home with them,

and all who fall under its influence are benefited.

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