The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1877-11-02
M i S @ liza n Q O u g.
An Autumn Ilomily.
BY ID. l.. G.

Once more in the procession of seasons,
imperial Autumn has come and nature ar
rays herself in loveliest garnture to give
her greeting. In half-sadness we have
seen Summer, with her tropical iervor and
voluptuous ripeness, depart, her ruddy
arms laden with sheaves of bearded wheat,
and her sandals white with dust The
sunlight has been DINNER since, the winds
pipe fitfully; the swallows and the sing
ing birds follow their patriarchs to sum
mcr chimes; the frost rhine whitens the late
blooming flowers in the sedgy heath the
partridge whistles, and the brown pleas
ant drums from the copse; the acorns slip
from their cups, and the chestnuts burst
their spiny bolls.
"Octobers touch paints all the maple leaves
With brilliant crimson and his golden kiss
Lies on the clustered h0zcls; scarlet glows
The sturdy oak, and copper-hucd the beech
A russell glory fingers on the elm;
The pensilc birch is following apacc,
And many-tinted show the woodlands all,
With Autumn's dying splendors."
Infinite Truth reports himself to them
that have eyes to see, in "the things that
do appear The unconscious world with
out has been so made, as strangely and
solemnly to speak to the conscious world
within. The poetry OF nature is the reli-
gion of Christ. 1t is full of symbols and
parallels, sparkling jewels in the ephod of
the Lord. He who babe the crimson lii
les step forth as the gentle satirists of
earthly pomp, and the ravens and sparrows
as eloquent preachers of an evangely of
trust in God, has concentrated the years
fading time as the reveator of human
morality. The heart receives its message
as truth of feeling. There is q miserere
in the winds litany in the falling leaves;
supplication in the waters the blue
mists float upward, as smoke from burial
urns. The earth is girt with briliance, but
it is the hectic brilliance of decay:
"This pomp that Autumn beareth
A funeral seems, where every guest
A wedding garment weareth."
eve all do fade as q leaf" To be sure.
we witness no general decay to which the
fall of the faded leaves is q true parallel.
They have their slime to and fall wither at
the North winds BREATH but to every peri
cd of human life decay is common. The au-
tumn fading rests on some when their days
should be yet redolent of spring. 1t is not
alone protracted years that dry up the
heart and wither to its "sere and yellow
leaf' the strength of man-their work is
anticipated by sin, and labor, and disease.
Some at the meridian of their years have
left their prime in the past the grape is
rounded, but its purple dust is rubbed
away the cup is full, but the bead is dead
upon the ripened wine. In infancy. or
youth, or prime, or age, we are subject to
the call that wrenches us from our trail
supports, and sends us shivering to the
grave. There is no apparent change in the
conditions of life about us, but its indiyid
uals ever change; and how brief lapse
Of years suilices to consign whole genera
ton to the dust. o, brother mortals, let
us hear the threnody of the departing
year as it hastens with gigantic footsteps
to its wintry grave. "Man dieth and
wasteth away; yea, he giveth up the ghost,
and where is he 2"
CATER awhile--a vanished face
An empty seat-a vacant place.
After while-a name forgot
A crumbled INSTRUMENTATION spot"
And yet the Autumn is not sad season,
nor need mortality be a sad lesson. The
gladness that perishes by any truth is a
gladness that ought to perish. A oy put
to flight by reminders of the tomb, is scarce
worth having in such world as this.
The fall of foliage is the Shedding away
of old, out worn forms. They lived for
the higher life they embodied, they droop.
ed and died because their substance pass.
ed into the trees enduring fibre; their
beauty is lost, but found again in a nobler
way, in the russell nut and golden fruit
or in the majestic timber, that by theil
ministry has gotten power to clo,he itsell
in new foliage for an hundred Summers to
come. And so, their mission ended, the
leaves fade, and fading spread joy-banners
over hill and dale, and fall down musically
as if in praise If man makes of home, so.
ciety, business, possessions, honors, his
senses, and the things that minister to sense
the all of life, then when they decay and
pass, his very existence seems to expire
| Life is utter loss; eternity vast inane.-