THE SACRED HEART.

New Zealand Tablet, 2 March 1877, Page 17

THE SACRED HEART.

Thi Sacred Heart, therefore, is adorable, because it is the heart of a Divine Person. It is more than this — it is at once the flymbol and the home of infinite charity that the Eternal Father in Heaven brought from all eternity to the Son ; that the Son returned from all eternity to the Father; that took personal form, if I may use the word, in the Holy Ghost, the Third Person of the Blessed Trinity ; that infinite love found its home in the heart of Jesus Christ, God made man. What wonder, therefore, that we should find that Sacred Heart the most susceptible that ever throbbed in a human bosom to all that was gentle, and at the same time strong ! Oh, ho* gentle, yet how strong, was that Divine Heart of my Lord i The sacred writer tells us He was moved — not only touched, but moved and agitated — with His pity and compassion for the woman who came to wash His sacred feet with penitential tears, and to wipe away her sins at that divine fountain of mercy ; and not only was He moved with pity and compassion, but also with a manly desire to defend this woman from those who would sneer upon her and in the hour of her glory cast upon her the imputation of her past 6in. Another is brought before Him covered with her shame — yet impenitent, but with eyes cast down, not daring to look upon the face of man, for she had been caught in her sin— and even here the Sacred Heart is moved with pity. " Oh, woman ! If no one else condemns thee, I surely will not condemn thee." Yet how strong is this Heart that is so gentle j oh, how strong to act and to suffer ! Think, when the multitude was famishing in the desert, how that Heart so gentle was yet so strong — the Heart of the Omnipotent God— as to cause the five little loaves to be multiplied into food for four thousand men. That Heart was moved to gentleness and compassion when the widow was weeping for her Bon; but immediately gave forth the omnipotent voice of God : " I say to thee, oh, dead man, arise j" and he that was dead arose: He took him and gave him to his mother. That gentle Heart was moved, until from the fountain of its compassion welled up the tears that fell from the divine eyes of God made man upon the head of Mary, as she stood bowed down, breaking her heart in her sorrow by the grave of her brother ; but presently the awful voice is heard • " Lazarus, I say to the, come forth," and he that was dead and rotting in his grave rose up and came forth at the voice of God.

Father Burke.

At a time Russia plays bug»bear in Europe, it may not be inopportune to glance at her available power as a combatant. The times have changed since Inkermann and Balaclava, and great as has been our own advance, it is doubted whether our Northern contemporary has not kept eq\ial pace with the necessities of the time. It has been estimated by a writer in the ' Echo ' that with fair opportunity Russia could produce an army of 535,000 infantry ana 93,000 cavalry, with 1,600 field guns. y