O Holy Mother, pierced with awful grief,
Oppressed with agonizing, nameless fears, Beyond all human power of relief Are these thy tears.
Thy tender, spotless, holy Babe lies there —
Is He unconscious of thine agony ? Doth He not even now thy burden share, Thy sorrow see ?
His Body sleeps ; but ah ! that sacred Heart Is to His loved one's anguish still awake; He only consolation can impart To hearts that break.
The holy Babe awakes ! In mute surprise
(As He would say — "Mine hour is not yet come") He gazes in His blessed Mother's eyes In pity dumb.
And once again her heart doth magnify
Eejoicingly, her Saviour and her Lord: Yea ! e'en before her tearful cheeks are dry Is He adored!
Almighty Father, Thou hast veiled our sight,
The future Thou hast hidden from our eyes. Great is Thy mercy ! Lead us in Thy light To willing sacrifice I^
* W. M. Mackay, Bible Types of Modern Women, 325.
* M. Hitchin-Kemp, The Ideal of Sympathy, 19.
76 A TOUCHSTONE OF CHARACTER
4. The pierced soul is at length healed. That is the thought Titian so beautifully renders in his glorious " Assumption of the Madonna " in the great Venetian Gallery. The framework of the picture is but legend ; its truth is eternal. It depicts the soul of Mary as it passes, after life's sorrows, into the presence of God. The artist has painted her upturned face as it first catches sight of her Lord. It is a face of exquisite sweetness and beauty. And it is the face of the first Mary, the Mary of the Magnificat. Perfect faith is there, perfect joy, unsullied gladness. The piercing of the sword is now for ever past. But what most of all shines out from it is its sweet adoring love — the love no more of a mother for her child, but of a ransomed soul for its Saviour. The lips, as they open in rapture, seem to be framing the words sung long ago, but now uttered with a deeper, richer melody than was possible to her then : " My spirit doth rejoice in God my Saviour."
0 Lady Mary, thy bright crown
Is no mere crown of majesty; For with the reflex of His own
Eesplendent thorns Christ circled thee.
The red rose of this passion tide
Doth take a deeper hue from thee, In the five Wounds of Jesus dyed,
And in Thy bleeding thoughts, Mary,
The soldier struck a triple stroke
That smote thy Jesus on the tree; He broke the Heart of hearts, and broke
The Saint's and Mother's hearts in thea
Thy Son went up the Angels' ways,
His passion ended ; but, ah me ! Thou found'st the road of further days
A longer way of Calvary.
On the hard cross of hopes deferred
Thou hung'st in loving agony, Until the mortal dreaded word,
Which chills our mirth, spake mirth to thee.
ST. LUKE II. 34, 35 77
The Angel Death from this cold tomb
Of life did roll the stone away ; And He thou barest in thy womb
Caught thee at last into the day — Before the living throne of whom
The lights of heaven burning pray.^
IV.
A Eevelation of the Heart.
"That thoughts out of many hearts may be revealed.**
1. Men's inner life cannot be hid in Christ's presence. By their treatment of Christ Himself, men will show what they are. The veil will be stripped off them — such is the figure — by their own language and their own conduct towards Christ. By their estimate of His character, by their appreciation or disparagement of His holy life and mighty works and Divine doctrine — by their acceptance or rejection of Him whose appeal was ever to the conscience of man, as in the sight of a heart-searching God — men will disclose their true disposition ; will show whether they love the world, whether they echo its lying voice, whether they desire darkness lest their deeds should be reproved, or whether, on the other hand, they are brave to see, and bold to confess the truth, whether they have an ear to hear the voice of God, and a will to follow Him whithersoever He goeth.
^ The artist Eossetti has a picture in the foreground of which is a modest Oriental house, Jesus sitting in its room, His face just visible through a window. Along the street in which it stands is merrily hurrying that other Mary. I mean the Magdalene. She is arrayed in loosely-flowing garments, and her hair hangs dis- hevelled about her shoulders. With her is a troop of rollicking and revelling companions. The picture has all the suggestion of complete abandonment. But, just as she is to rush past, the woman's eye meets — what? Through the window the eye of Christ, clear as crystal, and cutting as any knife. It holds her, and tortures her. On her face is graven blank horror and dismay. The harlot is filled with self-loathing and self- contempt. Through Jesus the thoughts of her heart are revealed in their
* Francis Thompson.
y2. A TOUCHSTONE OF CHARACTER
hideous and revolting shape. " She trembles like a guilty thing surprised." ^
2. Christ comes to heal as well as to reveal. His coming to men in His humanity, as Jesus of Nazareth, or coming to men in a preached Gospel, as the Living Saviour, is the one great test of men's moral condition, of their attitude towards God. He is the revealer of all hearts; and, for the most part, the revelation is humbling — it would be hopelessly humbling were it not that the revealer is also the Eedeemer ; and He reveals and humbles only as a necessary preparatory condition to redeeming. The sterner side of Christ's work is necessary ; but the necessity arises from His persistently carrying out the purposes of Divine love. A man must be brought to " know himself," as only Christ can show him himself, before he will even care to know what Christ can be, and would be, to him. Blessed are all they who have stood in the testing light of Christ and been shown up to themselves. He who falls in presence of Christ is surely raised up by the hand of Christ. He who probes also heals.