The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1942-04-03
EASTER REALLY BEGINNING OF
ANOTHER YEAR

upon as natures spring-opening
day! Fresh flowers, new hats, light
clothing are its accompaniment
weather permitting. There is an old
custom of always wearing something
new, which is responsible, suppose
for the householder's principal ex-
pense, the Easter hat for the lady
who makes home of the house!
And if something new, which will
add to the charm of the day, really
has to be worn, where could it be
set to better advantage than above
milady's fair face?
1t is right enough this inclination
toward newness on Easter day. Be-
cause Easter so often came about
March Is, just the vernal equinox,
England made that her New Years
day down to 1851. William the Con-
queror made it a law that January
1, his coronation day, should begin
the year. But even that doughty
warrior could not make English
people change their custom. "The
Observer" writes in the Montreal
Family Herald 1t seemed so natural
to follow natures clock, and begin
the year with her, when spring went
round with her resurrection touch
and told flowers and heritage in their
winter stiffness that it was time to
get UP, and begin another seasons
blooming. In fact it was distinct
sign of the growth of science
true science that takes no account
of sentiment or pious imagination,
but aims only to unfold truth
when Christianity gave heed to the
astronomers and agreed upon Janu-
airy as the nearest approach to an
actual New Years Day, as had Jul
ius Caesar centuries before. Eng
land was, I think, the last of all the
countries, to agree to that change.
Perhaps it is very human, but it
may mark a considerable change in
public opinion and appreciation, that
Christmas is made of much more i'm
portance, as holiday, than Easter.
1t was not so at first, you remember.
The fact that One had risen from the
dead as He had promised, thereby
proving Himself to be as He had
claimed, God the Son, was the main
feature of the teaching of the
church in it's earliest, most success
full days. Death is such an appalling
fact! Human nature instinctively
breads and rebels against it. 1t is
something imported into humanity,
which after all these years still
comes as a shock to it. We were not
intended, not designed to meet that
shock! None can escape it. Death
comes to every one as a stop to all
worldly activities. That One had ac-
tually overcome death, and proved
that it was for the future to be
gate to another, larger, compensat-
ing life, and no longer prison gate
swinging open only one way, in
wards, because of sin, was amazing
news to the world. Only the Creator
of man, and his Judge, could have
accomplished change like that! The
man who accepted the well-attest-
ed historical fact of the Easter
Resurrection, accepted with it the
belief, the fact, that Jesus of MAJ
areth was God as we'll as man, and
professed Himself to be Christian
Easter was in short the festival of
the Almighty Godhead of Jesus
Christ, as Christmas was the ami
versary of His miraculous birth as
Son of Man. 1t was festival of the
deepest joy. The earliest Christians
made the Resurrection on the first
day of the week to be a weekly fes-
tival, by transferring their rest day
from the seventh, which recalled the
Creation and the exodus from
Egypt to the first day of every week,
under the guidance of course of
the Holy Ghost. As we'll, Easter
day was by far the greatest festival
Of the year in the first centuries of
our era.
1t really makes no difference to
an intelligent world whether the
calendar year begins at Easter or in
January. Calendars do not consti-
tute season or the weather, though
an acquaintance rather given to fol-
low astrology stopped me in the
street few days ago to tell me of
wonderful almanac published in
another country which foretold
exactly what the weather was to be.
I did not know that there was a
single man living outside of luna
tic asylum who believes in weather
almanacs these days, though I fancy
can remember when good many
believed in their money-catching
guesses. But it is admirably befit-
ting that Easter, with its certain
hope of the resurrection life of man,
which came to us out of the grave in
a Jerusalem garden at the season
when earth is showing signs of re-
newed, arisen life, should be cele-
brated just at this time of year. It
is good to be reminded by the lovely
growths that come from wintering
graves in gardens, fields and woods
that I'VE shall be changed, when
the cleaning Easter "Sun of Right
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