xx. UNTO GAZA, WHICH IS DESERT. 355 



common sights and hear only the common sounds of 

 the world. In the background we see the sights and 

 hear the sounds of heaven. In the foreground we are 

 buying and selling, spending and toiling, sorrowing and 

 enjoying, amid things that perish in the using ; in the 

 background we are brought into contact with the 

 eternal archetypes of the passing things of time. And 

 as the dull common earth becomes to us from this view- 

 point the purple distance of a celestial land, so the 

 vision works in us a wonderful transfiguration. Even 

 in our ordinary speech how great is the difference 

 between the quiet, low speech of the rural solitude and 

 the sharp shrill dialect of the busy urban crowd. City- 

 life, with its hard pavements and noisy carriages and 

 Babel sounds, sharpens the pronunciation and gives an 

 upward tendency to the vowels; while country-life in its 

 grassy fields and mossy woodlands, hushing all noises, 

 operates upon the phonetic system of the language and 

 lowers the pitch of the voice to a gentle tone. 



If we refuse to go voluntarily unto " Gaza, which is 

 desert," God will providentially compel us. He will 

 make a desert around us, so that under its bitter 

 juniper-tree we may learn the true lessons of life, and 

 realize the tenderness of the " Brother born for ad- 

 versities." Many a closed lip and deaf ear have been 

 cured by Jesus in the way "unto Gaza, which is desert." 

 Many a short-sighted mortal, in his banishment, has 

 seen a door opened in heaven, and beheld visions like 

 the apocalypse of St. John in Patmos. Many a restless, 

 fiery disposition has felt the infinite calmness of the 



