62 PKOSEKPINA. 



ning round about his plants. Under his branches did al] 

 the beasts of the field bring forth their young ; and under 

 his shadow dwelt all great nations." 



31. Now hear what follows. " The cedars in the Gar- 

 den of God could not hide him. The fir trees were not 

 like his boughs, and the chestnut trees were not like his 

 branches ; nor any tree in the Garden of God was like 

 unto him in bStaty." 



So that you see, whenever a nation rises into consistent, 

 vital, and, through many generations, enduring power, 

 there is still the Garden of God ; still it is the water of 

 life which feeds the roots of it ; and still the succession of 

 its people is imaged by the perennial leafage of trees of 

 Paradise. Could this be said of Assyria, and shall it not 

 be said of England ? How much more, of lives such as 

 ours should be, just, laborious, united in aim, benet 

 ficent in fulfilment, may the image be used of the leaves 

 of the trees of Eden ! Other symbols have been given 

 often to show the evanescence and slightness of our lives 

 the foam upon the water, the grass on the housetop, 

 the vapour that vanishes away ; yet none of these are 

 images of true human life. That life, when it is real, is 

 not evanescent ; is not slight ; does not vanish away. 

 Every noble life leaves the fibre of it interwoven for ever 

 in the work of the world ; by so much, evermore, the 

 strength of the human race has gained ; more stubborn in 

 the root, higher towards heaven in the branch ; and, " as 

 a teil tree, and as an oak, whose substance is in them 



