d's boundless bosom, the fount of life, we came; through
selfish, stormy youth, and contrite tears--just not too late; through
manhood, not altogether useless; through slow and chill old age, we
return whence we came, to the bosom of God once more--to go forth again,
it may be, with fresh knowledge and fresh powers, to nobler work. Amen.

_The Air Mothers_. 1869.

SAINTS' DAYS, FASTS, & FESTIVALS.

DECEMBER 21.
St. Thomas, Apostle and Martyr.

The spirits of just men made perfect, freed from the fetters of the gross
animal body, and now somewhere in that boundless universe in which this
earth is but a tiny speck, doing God's will as they longed to do it on
earth, with clearer light, fuller faith, deeper love, mightier powers of
usefulness! Ah, that we were like unto them!

_All Saints' Day and other Sermons_.

DECEMBER 25.
Christmas Day.

Thank God, that One was born, at this same time,
Who did our work for us: we'll talk of Him:
We shall go mad with thinking of ourselves--
We'll talk of Him, and of that new-made star,
Which, as He stooped into the Virgin's side,
From off His finger, like a signet-gem,
He dropped in the empyrean for a sign.
But the first tear He shed at this His birth-hour,
When He crept weeping forth to see our woe,
Fled up to Heaven in mist, and hid for ever
Our sins, our works, and that same new-made star.

_Saint's Tragedy_, Act iv. Scene iv.

DECEMBER 26.
St. Stephen, the Martyr.

These are the holy ones--the heroes of mankind, the elect, the
aristocracy of grace. They are those who carry the palm branch of
triumph, who have come out of great tribulation, who have dared and
fought and suffered for God and truth and right; who have resisted unto
blood, striving against sin. What should easy-going folk like you and me
do but place ourselves with all humility, if but for an hour, where we
can look afar off upon our betters, and see what they are like and what
they do.

_All Saints' Day and other Sermons_.

DECEMBER 27.
St. John, Apostle and Evangelist.

And what do they do, these blessed beings? They longed for, toiled for,
it may be died for, the true, the beautiful, and the good; they entered
while on earth into the mystery and glory of self-sacrifice, and now they
find their bliss in gazing on the one perfect and eternal sacrifice, and
rejoicing in the thought that it is the cause and ground of the whole
universe, even the Lamb slain before the found