Evening star., 1909-06-27
OUR LOST VISIONS

vaguest part of the hymn becomes solid
and inspiring with this quiet assumption.
that what we began with we may by
Gods good grace end with, no matter
how long and dreary the tract that lies
between. There was an early comrade OF
Newmans, who afterward went another
way, who has told us that through
q stormy and often disappointing career
saying to himself In season and out of
season that that which man desireth
In his youth he shall in his age see as
much of as he WILL"
The doubt as to whether we shall see
lost friends again is slight as compared
with the doubt whether we, who have
lost SO much Of fineness and sensitive
ness, can ever see ourselves again as
We used to appear in the hopes which
we loved long since and lost awhile. Re-
ideals. and possibilities Of which we often
hardly have the heart to think. is the
reunion to which the hymn alludes, and
with 1t every other recovery seems both
possible and sure.
How differently Christ deals with the
hardened and sophisticated life from the
way we ordinarily choose! For we
think that if such life RECEIVERS it will
be through something quite different
from that which moved 1t first, and SO
something more keenly sophisticated than
itself But Christ taught that 1t was by
something childlike coming over them
again that these disenchanted lives
would find all they had lost. That
earlier touch whose remembrance often
makes our despair has a might in which
Christ put all his trust. He has no
other way but to use 1t again. His
little child" is the description that Is
given OF the cure of Naaman, and that
Is the best description OF what happens
to the spirit. To believe just as Christ
come master in Israel. Nicodemus was
just simply man who was afraid that
the angel faces could never smile again.
He believed that things might perhaps
be improved little. and that Jesus
Jesus answered the old mans wish rath-
er than his words. and he was startled.
He knew that he was hungry to begin
all over again. but no one had ever
| suggested to him that Ii was possible
And then shortly the old scholastic found
unexpected flashes of courage leaping out
OF his life such as he had not known
| since the glow Of his youth. And some-
| thing like q morn began to brighten on
| one who had expected little more than
that he might not be quite vanquished
! by the night.
! 1t is In the things that come again that
life takes on its finest glow and power.
The purpose that Is given back to US come
As stronger purpose than the one with
which we began. and we learn something
OF how different a divine purpose is from
all that we have called by that name. With
US 1t was something fitful and but half ap-
preciated; with God it was something per-
sisted in through the dark In which we
nearly lost 1t altogether. And as gra-
ciously as the hymn calls the light the
Kindly Light II also calls the second ad-
vent OF our highest hopes and ideals an
influence that does not come chiding us
for lost years. but one that smiles again.
The hymn is full of pictures. and 1t is
full Of thought: but what makes the glory
OF 1t. after all. is the quiet assumption
that all these things will be granted just
because the soul now knows what II
needs. 1t has sometimes been prescribed
in Newman's own communion because OF
It's non-evangelical character. Yet in the
very way 1t takes for granted that God
will give It all back and give it better
than before there is something that is
evangeiicaily thoroughbred. There is no
struggle, no hint OF penance. no delving
deeply into motives. no effort to prove the
Intensity OF ones yearEings. no telling
God how nearly impossible this will be.
but Just q reassertion Of the earliest creed
which God has taught us; that He desires
US back and smiles upon our return.