378 THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. 



create the rose with its green foliage and crimson blos- 

 soms complete from its own ashes, but without the 

 bloom and fragrance a delicate apparition like the 

 ghostly downy head of the dandelion that springs up 

 where the golden sun of the flower had set. But a 

 more cunning Alchemist will restore from the ashes of 

 our beloved dead the old human form in all its human 

 perfection, the self-same being with whom on earth 

 and in time we took sweet counsel, transfigured, glori- 

 fied, but still unchanged in all essential elements ; the 

 glorious influences of heaven only quickening within 

 the heart the dear familiar memories of earth. In the 

 highest and fullest sense shall beauty then be given for 

 ashes ; and the revelation of a glory that eye hath not 

 seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived, shall 

 be seen in the " little dust that here we over-weep." 

 Very specially at the close of the year are we 

 reminded of the substitution of beauty for ashes, in the 

 history of the world, in the experience of man. The 

 anniversary then comes round of the birth of Him who 

 came into our world and into our nature for the very 

 purpose of giving beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for 

 mourning, and the garment of praise for the spirit of 

 heaviness. He Himself proclaimed in the synagogue 

 of Capernaum that this was the great object of His 

 mission. He came into our nature to make us new 

 creatures ; He came into our world to make all its 

 old, sinful, miserable things new. He set agoing, by 

 His life and death, a redemptive process, which has 

 been going on ever since, developing more and more of 



