The New York herald., 1869-03-29

OlEEl.
Tho Churchss Yesterday and the kasser
Feseival.
Nature and religion harmoniously united
yesterday in making Easter q day Of joy. The
poets welcome to this queen Of festivals was
never more appropriate than at early sun
rise:-
The day OF life Is dawning the gate of glory stands
opened VIDE Tor the OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES os ms
The eastern skies are brilliant with hood Of GRIM
The morning bursts triumphant from the letters OF
And all cression's anthem joins the chorus from
'Christ has rsen-He is risen " tits the festa song
Of love.
All the churches were thronged. Many of
them were gayly decorated with flowers.
Scattered rays of the splendor which filed St.
Peters, at Rome, illuminated even the bare
walls of meeting houses of those denominations
which have most completely discarded the i'm
posing ritual of the Catholic Church. The full
and minute account which we elsewhere pub
lish of the services and discourses Of yester-
day shows how universally the ancient festival
of Easter is now celebrated in this country.
According to Bede its English name is derived
from goddess called Eostre, whose feast was
celebrated early in spring. But more proba-
bly, the word may, says DR.. Eadie, be traced,
like the corresponding German Ostern, to the
old Teutonic form Of ''Auferstehi," "Aufer
stehung," D. g., resurrection. The Greek
term Pascha, from the Hebrew word for Pass
over, has been used as synonymous with
Easter. Here in New York, in this latter half
of the nineteenth century, the Jews, with their
Passover, and the Christians, with their
Easter, are simultaneously commemorating,
although from different points of view, essen
TALLY the same religious idea. The hard
boiled and fanoifully- eggs with which
boys in both the Old World and New will hold
their cracking contests to-day illustrate the
tenacity and unanimity with which generation
after generation, dating, moreover, far back Of
the Christian era, cling to custom growing
out of the natural tendency Of the human mind
| towards symbolism. The egg at Easter, the
festival Of our Lords resurrection, Is an en-
blem Of the rising up out Of the grave. as the
chick, entombed as it were in the egg, is in
due time brought to life. AS an emblem Of
the universe, the work Of the Supreme
Divinity, Cosmos rising up out Of chaos, the
egg had place in the theology and philosophy
Of the Egyptians, Persians, Greeks, Romans
and Gauls.
Among the early Christians it was the GUS
tom Of the neophytes, or newly baptized, to
wear for several days the new white garments
which were given them at their baptism on
+, Easter day, or on the evening before it. Hence
perhaps the custom alluded to in poor Robin -
AT Easter let your clothes be new,
Or else be sure you will 1t rue
| And the Dorset poet, Barnes, has 1t in mind
when he says:-
Easter. Easter, put on my blue
Frock cuoat. the vust time, vler new;
WI yellow buttons aal o. brass,
That glittered In the zun like glass:
Bekiaze 'twer Zunday.
That this notion of the duty of every person
to have at least some portion Of the dress new
on Easter Sunday is by no means extinct at
present was abundantly manifest in every New
York congregation yesterday. The lady de-
votees Of fashion Rocked 20 the churches to
make very mundane display of the latest
styles which have tempted them at the recent
''opening days" Of our milliners and dress
makers. They cannot have remembered that
wearing new clothes" at Easter originated in
the fresh white robes of neophytes in early
Christian days, or they would have hardly
wandered so very far from the original sim
plioity Of the fashions Of that period. AS It
was, they exhibited chignons of which Du
Chaillu's African princesses would have been
proud; court plasters, or ''beauty spots, which
a belle in the reign Of Louis XIV. might have
unfortunately been obliged to wear; ''French
heels" that promote alike corns, bunions and
the Grecian bend; poisonous dyed hair, such
as blondes Of the burlesque stage have brought
into vogue, and we know not what other FASH
ionable abomination. By way of compensa-
tion, it must be conceded that our New York
church-going bellies have quick sense of har-
mony as well as variety in colors, and their
varo-colored dresses on Easter Sunday made
every church bloom like flower garden.
STILL ANOTHER INDIAN PoLIoY.-A West
ern paper states that General Grant is reported
to have said, concerning the prospects of an
| Indian war in Alaska, that II one breaks out
there he twill withdraw the troops, and then
there won't be anything there for the Indians
to fight" The same policy would operate
very well in other places beside Alaska II
plundering Indian traders and land specula-
| tors were withdrawn at the same time
A CRUSHING IDEA.-The Louisville Courier
Journal, commenting upon the remark that
the mantle Of Thad Stevens had fallen upon
Ben Butler, wishes it had been Thad's mantel-
piece. What crushing idea2 How long will
1t be ere the democratic Courier-Journdl