The morning star and Catholic messenger. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1868-1881, 1874-06-21

ioutJ mere hlk-Wultc with naTDle, JDeT
breast-plated with gold, its piunacles of gold
its halfGreek, halfRoman architecture ca
priciously and fancfully varied by the ornat
genius of the Asatic builders whom Herod tn
ldum@an had employed, were of character t.
arrest the least curious eye, and to fill tn
most stupid aud Indifferent spectator will
astonishment and admiration. And yet THU
was but the second temple-how inferior to
how different fom, the frst
The Ho1y der s. hiT +. fair s.J
And And higher y. Tho Glorious temple reared
asr PILE: fsr9 ,1n appearing Ike mount
This was Mount Moriah, the hill Of Gotl.-On
the left, as the Roman general gazed, facing
westward, was Mount Zion, the city of David
now the palace of Herod the tetrarch, encom-
passed by the mansions of Hebrew mobiles.
Here / stand at last" thought Paulus,
"after SO many oheckered fortunes, looking
down upon the most beautiful, tho most daz-
cling, and the most mysterious of cities To
see Rome thus may be the lot of an eagle as it
scars over it, but has rever been granted to
human eyes. Aud even could Rome be viewed
in this way, it would want the unity, the
whiteness, All strange city! Wondrous
Mount Of Zion wondrous Hill of Moriah {!
wonderful temple Not temple of Jupiter, or
of Venus, or of Janus, or of tLis or that mon
ster or hero, but Temple, say they, of God
The Temple of God What a sound the words
have! What q sound; Homer's Had from
beginning to end, Is not so sublime as this one
phrase, this tremendous and dread appellation.
And there it stands, flaming against the morn
ing sun, in green marble below, in white mar
bio above, in breast-plates and pinnacles of
gold; too proud to receive even light without
repayment and flinging floods of 1t back. And
this is the land of the prophets whom l have
at last read; yonder, beyond the wall, north
is Jeremiah's grottol This, too, is the age, the
time, the day, the hour, TO which they al point,
when tho God of whom they speak, aud of
whom the sibyls also sang, is to come down
into visibly ruined and corrupted world, and
to perform that which to do is in itself surely
God-like. A,
But one thing is dark even in the asooms
OF mystery. How can u God sutfsiR-be
thwarted, be overcome. at least apparently 80,
by his own creatures, and these the very worst
OF themf What can these cries of grief and
horror which the prophets utter meant"
As Panlus thus unused, half prououncing
now and then in words the thoughts we have
sketched, and hundreds upon hundreds of SIM
liar thoughts, which we spare to record, some
one passed him, going down the Mount of
Olives, and in passing looked at him and
until Paulus died he never ceased to see that
glance, and in dying he saw it yet, and with
smile thanked his Maker that he saw it then
also-especally then.
The person who thus passed our hero was
more than six feet in height He was fair in
complexion. His hair was light auburn, and
large locks of it fell with natural wave and
return upon his neck. His head was bare
His dress was the long flowing robe of the
Jews, girdled at the waist, and as Paulus
afterward fancied, the color of it was red. He
was in the bloom OF life. Oar hero could sce
as this person passed, that he was the very
perfection of health, beauty, vigor, elegance,
aud of all the faculties of physical humanity
and even tho odd, and strange, and wild, and
somewhat mysterious thought flashed through
Paulus's mind:
my God,' thought he, "if there were a
new Adam to be created to be the natural or
rather the supernatural, king of the human
race, would not his appearance surely be as
the appearance and the bearing of this per-
sonf"
And the person who passed was moreover
thin, and a little emaciated. Aud he would
have seemed wan, only that the most delicate,
faint blood color mantled in his cheeks. And
he looked at the hero Paulus with the look of
him out of whose hand mono hath power to
take those whom he picks from n vast con-
COurse and elects. And Paulus felt glad and
calm, and without anxiety for the future, and
free from all bitterness for the past, and firm,
yet grave; aud, when his mind " ent actually |
forth to look upon the things that were around
1t, he saw nothing but the face and the glance
And now come to the straugest particular
OF all. Paulus felt that this beautiful and |
vigorous new Adam, Fl to be the natural and |
even the supernatural king of the world, was
one who reVer could have laughed, and prob
IDLY had never smiled. But no smile was so
sweet as his gravity. And Paulus remembered
mother extraordinary and unparalleled cir.
'Omstance: it was this-those beautiful and
oenignant eyes were so full of terror that it
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