96 DISCOURSES OF FATHER HYACINTHE. 



far as we follow tlic ways which lead to it. The Author 

 of peace — we have just been celebrating the festival of 

 his birth — we Christians, and perhaps you, rationalists, 

 may have done the same, in the involuntary recollec- 

 tion of your childish days, and the magic of the songs 

 of the Christmas night. "Unto us a child is born,-' 

 cries Isaiah, "and the government shall be upon his 

 shoulder, and his name shall be called the Prince of 

 Peace.''* Under his reign, the nations shall break their 

 swords, and beat them into ploughshares ; the garment 

 rolled in blood shall be for burning and fuel of fire. 

 Ah, Gentlemen, the proi-)het gives no promise that these 

 wonders shall be wrought by the old humanity. On 

 the contrary, they are promised through this new-born 

 child, young as that eternity frorii whence he comes, 

 and as that future whither he goes. " The Father of 

 the Age to come," which shall be far other than the 

 ages past, over his cradle the angels shall sing, " Glory 

 to God in the highest, peace on earth to men of good 

 will."f And over his oj^ened sepulchre, in the splendor 

 of his resurrection, himself, victor over death, the world, 

 and hell, shall say to his disciples, " Be not afraid ; my 

 peace I leave with you." 



Part Secoxd. — The Nature and Effects of War, 



[The nature of war being under consideration, Father H3M- 

 cinthe estahlishes, at the outset, a new application of that m3's- 

 tcrious dualism which governs the created world, and especially 

 the world as flxllen. There are two sorts of war, pagan war and 

 Christian war. Pagan war is force in the service of passion, from 

 the transports of revenge to the calculations of ambition. Chris- 

 tian war is force in the service of right, whether in protection of 

 one's own rights, or in the way of intervention in behalf of the 

 rights of others.] 

 ♦ Isaiah, ix. 6. t Luke, ii. 11. Viil^jatc, " pax houiiiiibus bontu voluulatiB." 



