The Elk advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Elk Co., Pa.) 186?-1868, 1867-12-26
The First Christmas Ere.

forgotten 1t, and see 1t now as plainly as |
when it was first laid before us, 1t rep
resented Joseph and the Virgin Mary
at the stable. door of Bethlehem on the
night of that mysterious birth which
was to give new direction to human
thought and to revoutionize the world |
The carpenter of Nazareth and his es~
poused wife, so soon to be mother,
have had weary journey from their
distant home, aud have climbed, at
nightfall, the steep ridge upon which
the town Of Bethlehem stands. They
seek at once the shelter OF the caravan
serai or inn. But the city is full there
is no room. Their need is great and
urgent. With anxiety and manly ten.
derness in every feature of his face, Jo
seph leads his almost faintlng partner
to the stable of the inn. The Virgins
head has fallen upon his shoulder for
very weakness her right arm is linked
in his while with languid grasp she
holds in her left her swaddling. clothes.
The face, dropping with fatigue and
with the sweet sorrow that harbingers
the Joy that ga man is born into the
world" is full of thoughtfulness, as be-
comes that Mary who "kept all these
things and pondered them in her heart"
The sombre towers of the city rise coldly
against the clear December sky, in
which the Star of Bethlehem has we'll
nigh reached its zenith. And thus, or
somewhat thus, it was on the First
Christmas Eve" And this, or some.
thing like this, was the origin Of the
greatest event which, take what view we
may of life and all life's ends, has ever
happened III the history Of mankind.-
The stable.door Of Bethlehem was the
portal of an empire over the hearts and
hopes of wise and simple, to which even
Imperial Rome was made to bow the
head. Small are the beginnings of
greatness, or the greatness, growing
common, would else be none at all. If
we see only that which is lofty, it grad
ually becomes less to the sight, just as
The ample proposition that hope makes
Fails in the promised largeness.
Could we trace back the Nile to its
sources, and solve, as others have at
length done, the riddle which the
sphinxes on its banks, petrified and
cmotionless with the secrets of the long
centuries, had seemed to lock for ever
in their keeping, we should come upon
some silent lake, uufurrowed by any
keel and all unconscious of its mighty
offspring's destiny. And on that night
the eve of the great birth-while the
t sky looked coldly down, and Bethlehem
: lay in stiffness and repose, if haply some
belated passenger had met this wondrous
pair as they so slowly and wearily sought
u their humble resting-place, little would
e he have deemed that he had cast his
r eyes upon one who at that moment was
r the central object of interest to eartf
and heaven. Thus, though in less de
> gree, it often is that we unconsciously
: are present at the birth of events, which
d seem but casual and commonplace, bu
10 in their issues have the widest influence
upon the destinies of the world. Th'
g time was when the conqueror, destined
/ to sweep through the world upon tn
r wings of victory, lay mewling in hi
r nurses arms, and more helpless thai
h anything except humanity can be. Sc
too, the poets first utterances, whe
borh into the world OF men whom he
l. 10 instruct and charm, have been bu
al the wall of mindless infsncy; and tn
e atable and manger of Bethlehem wer
,t but the natural and not uniting pre-
ludes of the universal dominion of Hit
; whom on that night of feebleness frs
'e came as Mary's son. Full of thought
rt the face Of Mary. The dying, in Gel
D. tain stages OF their disease, see at on
20 glance the whole of their former live
- projected upon their brain drownin
% men, ere all is over, see the picture {
S. the past in sharpeSt outline and in fu
ID lest detail while the intuition of geniu
C. living and prescicnt, looks forward an
q comprehends instinctively the plan
y" the future. Mary, at the stable doc
~ as she is represented in the engravin
IS, had, perchauce, but dim vision of q
ly the coming glory, but yet saw enoug
d to make her woman's heart siuk dow
be more deeply still with awe. Cast fort
" from the hostelry, she could wander
no spirit into the far distance of the ages
re come, and there, conld her mental ga
he have fixed the misty outlines of the !
full ter days, might she have beheld b
"A imagied self adored by mothers, me
~ and maidens; and shrine and alta
%, spire and tower, church and cathedr
of basilica and dome, upreared to honor t
or name of her for whom, On this FIJI
ION Christmas Eve," there was no room.
leQ II is rathar Amusing To see II