The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1909-04-09

Text: For we know not what we shall
be. But we know that when He shall APP
pear lwhen death comes), we shall be like
Him. "
All the critical hours of life are
full of pathos and mystery. No
strong man can look upon the youth
starting out to make his fortune, upon
the girl going toward her bridal al
tar, upon an old man holding little
babe upon his knees, like spring sit
ting in the lap of winter, without
J tears and a catch in the throat. But
full also of pathos and mystery and
hope is that hour when an old man
forecasts the end and prepares for.
the great adventure
"Of what are you thinking?"
friend asked Edmund Burke just be.
fore the statesman died.
II was thinking of the first five
minutes after DEATH
All eloquence through grafton, or
psalm or song, means a full heart,
means emotion surging through the
soul with all the majesty of sum
mer's storm. In his hour of vision
and of hope, therefore, Tennyson's
spirit rose to unwonted heights. Then
he wrote his poem of Immortality,
and expressed the deepest thing with
in him when he said: Il hope to meet
my pilot face to face when / have
crossed the bar"
Mans Greatest Hope.
1t is the glory of Christ that lie
wrought mans most joyful Sun
day Easter-out OF earth's black
est event-dying and death. Jesus
found death altogether terrible. For
His generation the grave was horror,
blackness and the uttermost of an
guish. Death flung a black shadow
over the sun Itself Death sent an
eclipse over every joy But if He
found death black cloud He left it
a golden gateway, behind which rose
the battlements of eternal sunshine
in the City of Cod. He found death
standing for dirge-He left it
paean of hope and victory. He found
deaths one color. black; He left the
grave covered with Easter lilies that
were white and gold. He found men
ting leaf; He left the soul in death
sailing away midst a perfumed sum-
mer sea, calling back, Il still live!"
to those who stood on the earthly
shores and signalled midst their tears
that soon they would follow after.
What men had hoped, Jesus turned
to light and certainty He taught
men that Gods latest and best gift
was the gift, of death and dying.
Therefore, these disciples braved the
stones, the scourge, the stocks, the
martyrs chariot of fire, because iy-
ing meant home-going, and death
ushered men into the Fathers house.
The old Roman views of the sepul-
chre dripping with horrors and en-
blems named the skull and the cross
bones. differ from the beauty of
Christ's hope-the many mansions.
the eternal youth and beauty and the
Fathers house-as frozen clods diff
Ter from the purple clusters of sum
mer, as white snowf1akes are unlike
red roses In June, as the arctics are
separated from the warmth and fer
tility of the tropics The immortal
hope of Christ alone justifies a thou
sand times the triumphant progress
OF Christianity during the last nine
teen centuries.
The Meaning of Easter to the Nation.
No poet, no orator and no philoso-
pher can ever fully set forth the i'm
portance of Easter for the people Of
the Republic. Human life is a sol
emn and pathetic march. But that
golden gateway named birth and the
cradle is not less wonderful than this
gateway of death, whose rich drap-