THE FLAG OF CHRISTMAS.

Evening Star, Issue 13002, 22 December 1906, Page 2

THE FLAG OF CHRISTMAS.

i-. singular how the same objects Trill r.different minds. Here is a flower, i Wordsworth it will carry “ thoughts do lie too deep for tears.” To a Peter

A primrose by the river's brim A yellow primrose is to him, And it is nothing more. Hero is an acorn. To one it is a small, round, brown mass of earthy matter; to another it is instinct with life. Out of this, he ears, will grow a tree —great, massive, and magnificent; Birds will sing on its branches, lovers will whieper beneath its shade. It will bo built into ships that will sail (he deep, and bear the flag of freedom to far-off peoples. It will weave itself into human history, and help the fnrce« that are working forward to that creat time when “peace shall bo universal, and Han shall be liker imin, through all

“ the cycle of the golden year.” How absurd all this would sound to him who never has heard of the possibilities of an oak. An Italian goat-herd wanders careless and stolid over hills and plains that to the scholar are steeped In deathless memories. The dweller beside some landscape or seascape thinks- ot them only as soil to grow his bread, dr water to give him iish. To the artist or poet this is of no consequence. They are touched.only with a sensd of a thing they call beauty, lint which they cannot prove to one who docs not perceive it. They feel a presence that disturbs them with tho joy of elevated thought. They look through the vis to and behold a world where all roads have vanished save the great elemental highways of the Eternal—tho sweep of storm-filled pines and the meted lines where waters flow. There is the International Exhibition at Christchurch. To one it will be a great visit e panorama —a vast collection of machines and inventions ;■ to another, the real will be tho invisible. The wonder will bo how all this vast collection is but the product ot thought—of how the seen and the tangible arc but ideas dressed up in wood and iron, in pigments, and in oil. They will prolong their gaze into tho future. They will think of tho not distant time when all tlii.s shall have passed into the Eternal silence —when a new race shall ucad tho earth who will smile at our crude contrivances; a new race —strong, alert, unlocking of lime-woven subtleties and high tribunals of a phantom world. To ono the Exhibition will ho all material, to another it will ho all mental and spiritual. And who are right!? They who see only what the ontnr eye reports, or they who eeo only what imagination, reports?—the man of sight and sense, .or the man of faith and spirit? Both are right Both see. and see correctly. But the visions .of the latter arc vastly superior to those of the former.

Jvinetccn hundred years ago a little child slipped into the world. It was born in a litllb village, in a rude stable, “for there was no room for tliem in the inn.” Gazers came to look at it. What did they tec? Just what wc have been saying that eyes sec about us to-day. Some beheld nothing but a baby—a little bundle of pink flesh wrapped in swaddling clothes, a simple mother, a rude stone building steaming with the breaths of asses and oxen. To them that was all. But others came, and to them it was different. They saw a wondrous mystery. WiS© men from the East, shepherds from the near-by hills came bending lowly and saluting this to ordinary eyes ordinary child. In tho ever: of this one there appeared nothing to distinguish the infant from the thousand others who saw the light on that tame day. But in the eyes of that other there was. The future unrolled itself in a strange vriion. Out of this new life, he said in effect, should come a new world. From this babe should if*mc a uword that should pierce tho mother’s breast. Into it had converged, as into a sea. the rivers, the hop.e of Israel. The. prophecies of'history had at last found their fulfilment. At tin's child's namo Roman power should totter. It should become the touchstone of humanity itself. Tho little hands that now toy with the mother’s should ono day be nailed to the Cross. And ycl the Cross—-r-o hated a symbol —should be transformed I hereby. And when the child grew to uhood the same diverse visions were seen • livers© eyes. To some Ho was a mere mi. poor, toil-worn, and at hist deceiver, y pot-rite, a.ml b'aspbeincr. To others He was the Son of God, radiant, divine. He was hnng on a. crocs, as the prophecy forc'd. To His comrade, on the leftof Him, Tie is a. dreamer, a fanatic, suffering the due reward of His deeds. To His comrade on the right His crucified hands hold tho keys of Paradise, and can give him entrance there. Veiy curious aio these diverse views of one and the same being, as child and man.

And which are right ? What test shall wc onnlv to determine that ? There is one infallible test. It is tho old man.with the scythe and tho hour-ghiss. Time settles all prophecies, proves all premises; lets us seo which are facts and which are fables. And what has Time to say regarding Him whose birth the Christian world is about to celebrate? It is safe to affirm now that that birth is the water l shod between the Old World and the New-. Shepherds may or may hot have heard the angels’ tong in the sky, and the wise mein front the East may or may not have recognised the Divine. Kingship of the child whose star has guided them to His cradle. But of one thing the Subsequent Centuries have made us sure^—the world was tumCd into a new light When “ Christ was born at Bethlehem.” It would be impossible to show this in . detail. But we need only look at one point to see the immensity of the change. Christmas is the festival of the child; and it is this because of the sanctity which Christ has imparted to it. We Wily need to glance at countries where He is hot known to see the place which childhood occupies. Wc need only look back info the age in which He appeared to see how vast is the distance that wc have travelled. In that ancient world there was n6 place for tho child. To this day a Bedouin

father, in enumerating his children, never counts his daughters. And we know how, even in Roman law, the child had only the dignity of a chattel. We have changed all that, however. Many of lis think that Mr Seddon’s highest title to fame will rest on his perception of the honor of full cradles, and the sanctity and preservation of infant life. “Blessed be Childhood” (says a great French writer), “ which brings ‘.Mowii something of heaven into the ri raidst of our rough earthliness. There sc “many births, of which statistics tell ns, “represent as it were an effusion of ifl- “ nocenoe and freshness, struggling no) “only against the death of the soul, but “ against human corruption .and the nni- “ versa! gangrene of sin Bnp- “ press the life-giving dew, and human so- “ ciety would bo scorched add devastated “by human passions.” If it ever is suppressed, it will be because men and women forget the mystery .and the honor with which Christ's birth and teaching envelop the child.

-One Of the finest pictures of modern times is Edwin Long's ‘ Anno Domini.’' A great procession pours out froth the precincts of a majestic temple. By the hierogylphics bn the walls, as well as by the shadowy heights of the Pyramids and the gleam of river waters, we know that, it is Egypt. Across tire whole canvas streams this vast procession. Men in gayest dress, -musicians, dancers, priests carrying images of Egyptian gods, choristers, horsemen, soldiers in gleaming armor; tho hard sheen softened here and there by ladies in white dresses dreaming among the lotus-flowers. The suit is fast going down in the west, and his slanting rays fling a golden splendor over this gorgeous pageant. Hi the forefront of this moving mass of color and pomp a little group ol three going in the opposite direction arrests attention. The man is old and travel-stained. Grave-faced, and with solemn tread, he walks behind an ass, on which is seated a womaii—a quiet, simple figure, but with a face of exquisite beauty. On her knee sits a child. About its head is a nimbus, and on its face a wistful, far-away gaze. It is the only figure that looks out Straight from the canvas at the spectator. There is a subtle, dreamy haze about the eyes that seem to half reveal and half conceal mysterious depths behind. But that is al*. Koine negroes arc offering little Egyptian gods for sale to the woman on the ass, but she docs not seem to notice them. Her gaze is turned on a mother sitting by the roadside with a dying child upon her knees. And so they meet and pass. Tills moving pageant of pomp and power going one way: this little group of three unheeded ainid that great . t lifting moving tho other way. It is in this that tho artist’s imagination Ims caught the spirit of prophecy. It is the prophecy of tli© downfall of all pomp and power that are heedless of the presence and principles of tho child. Their faces are set towards tho west. They arc Inarching to tho sunset, but the little group, in which the child is central, aro heading towards the east—towards the dawn and the dav.

Surely that is true. Of two of the things at least embodied in the symbolism of that great picture wc call' have no doubt. We can have no doubt that the home and the nation that care supremely for their children, that make them central in their thought and life —tho future is with them, it is not the pomp and circumstance of royalty and war that are an empire’s security. It is the atmosphere of its homes and the education and character of its children. This is what Christmas calls on us to remember. It calls us

From the sharpness of the arid conflict into wliieh w© get absorbed, and forces us to own that, be our Success or our failure what it may, lliere is something far better than all wealth or position to be secured to us in tho expression of heart, in the simpleness of kinship, in the innoconchof human joys, and in the laughter of happy children —good things these, worth all our toil, good arid wholesome, sane and sound. Here spring the living .fountains of water in tho wilderness; here are the running brooks at which wo Inay drink and lift hp our heads. Here are the juices and saps that work up into our wasted lives from out the rich soil of dear Mother Earth. There are two things among us that mili - tate seriously against the realisation of this. One is the season of the year. It is a pity that Christinas falls llere at midsummer. It is the season when home has the slightest hold upon us, for it is the time when everybody wants to got away from home. It might bo wi.se, if it were possible, to shift tire Christmas festival to midwinter, when tlie ancient songs and joys and customs would not I>© so incongruous. The other thing that works against the Christinas spirit is tho threatened break up of home life altogether; Young people feel tlie growing irksomeness of its restraints. Tho life outside, with its push and sensations, calls to them, and they vield. Homo is only a sort of place where yon stay as little as you can. The plav, tho club, the concert, the ball —llvese one must have: otherwise you become as dull as a hermit People would rather pay “to be Ixired outside than be amused grdi- “ tuitouslv at home.” Tho true Christmas spirit antagonises all these. It lifts agaiii the standard of the child and the home, and it calls us to rally to ■ these as the true springs of happiness, and the enduring qualities of natural life. And so wc may make Our own the passionate words of Charles Wagner, who feels deeply for his oWn Fathferland—France-wtho danger of all wo have been writing; ■Mv God! devontlv I *Uh that all children should have beautiful Christmases, and that in this cold world. . . . Those who are called the grownriip should be able to find, back in the depth Of their childhood, soul and lumnjous ‘refuge —warm, radiant with love . and With hope. c ’