New-York tribune., 1873-04-12
R1HTER.


Perhaps there is no religious anniversary the
meaning of which is as well understood by the
mass of unthinking people as Easter. Good
Friday suggests a spectacle OF such terrible
awe and sOemnity that we are apt to put the
thought away from us, or keep whatever feel
ing we have about it strictly to ourselves. The
death of Christ is not topic, the most trivial
man feels, to be dragged into daily debate on
business or gossip. Christmas, too, is so mixed
in the minds of most of us with trees for the
little folks, Kriss Kringle, and turkey and
plum pudding, that much of its more sacred
and deeper meaning is smothered out OF sight.
But Easter has no gloom to repel nor especial
social observance to distract attention from
itself Not only the devOut church-gOer who
has followed the history of Jesus through His
fasting temptation and descent into the realms
of death, is kindled into fervor by the glory
of His resurrection, but the most indifferent
passer-by on the streets tomorrow compre-
hends something of its hidden meaning. The
sunlight, the warm breath of the infant
Spring, after the dreary Winter, the
pealing triumphant music of the churches, the
flowers which for days past have filled the
streets in preparation for the solemn festival,
of our neighbor the broker or banker (whO
never by any chance enters church door, the
exact circumstances of Christ's rising from the
dead. His idea may have been Of the vaguest,
that by some act of that divine teacher of
Bethlehem, whom he never names, the immor-
tality of every man was made assured. But
we question if, when the scent of the violets
ON Easter morn reaches him, or he catches a
glimpse of the heaped lilies, he has rot
sudden vision of the day when he, stout and
wel-to do, shall lie down in q close wooden
prison, and the clothes that now guard him
from the cold, and the flesh that hides him
from himself, shall crumble away. Well for
him if, while shivering in that cold blast of
death, the breath of the sunshine and flowers
say to him, as on no other day, Thou shalt
"rise again." There, to secular eyes, are the
uses of Easter. In the hurry of buying and
selling, of news from Europe and Wall Street,
of housekeeping, of marrying, of rearing chill
dren, of nursing our pet reform, death itself
and the blank OF life beyond grow hackneyed
and indifferent. Shall we call the music or
crosses of lilies and azaleas, with which our
church going friends delight themselves on this
holy day, trivial and childish follies if they
help us but for a moment to see beyond mar
kets and reforms and news-telling and hearing
our own dead body and living sOulf
There seems to us special significance too,
though it may have been accidental, in the
choice of this season for the celebration of
the feast of the resurrection. The leaf burst
ing from its sheath, root and stem from their
hard husk are world-old types of the living
spirit leaving the worn-out shell behind it
in the ground. But there is q deeper symbol
ism than this One can hardly consider it
fancy to suppose that to all Of Gods creation
was given an assurance of renewed life, ex-
cept to man. The tree waits bare and un-
slightly, through the snow and storm, for its
day of LEAKAGE and blossom Rock crumbles into
river; the worn-out forest decays patiently
without dumb sign of rebellion against the
decree of death. The beast, dying, has no
griefs at parting with wife or children. The
mother bird makes no plan for the establish
ment of daughters or safe conduct of sons.
Life, with its eternal sequence of sleep and
death, and the awakening from each and sub
siding into it again, goes on. "No Haste, no
"Rest.n For them, there is no doubt, no
fearful looking forward to annihlation.
Nothing of the eternal currents of order in
Gods just universe is lost, nothing finds place,
from grain of dust 10 the morning star, which
does not accomplish its work steadily, without
discomfort and finding heart and time to be
beautiful withal But as for us mon
whether il be tho old Chaldean