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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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ancient presence , and words of transient breath , but still and ever teaU But are any thus innocent ? Was there ever human love unwithered by crime , —by crimes of which no law takes cognizance but the unwritten ^ everlasting laws of the affections ? Many will call me thus innocent : many
will 6 peak of consolation springing from the past : the departed breathed out thanks and blessing , and 1 felt them not then as reproaches . If , indeed , I am only as others , shame , shame on the impurity of human affections 1 Or rather , alas for the infirmity of the human heart ! for I know not that I could love more than I have loved . —Since the love itself is
wrecked , let me gather up its relics and guard them more tenderly , more steadily , more gratefully . This seems to open glimpses of peace . O grant me power to retain them all , —the light and music of emotion , the flow of domestic wisdom and chastened mirth , the life-long watchfulness of benevolence , the solemn utterance of prayer , the thousand thoughts Are these gone in their reality ? Must I forget them as all others forget ?
Just now I longed for sound , and it comes all too soon . The twittering swallows are up to see the first sunbeam touch the steeple . The beacon revolves no longer : it goes out and the sun is come . What a flood of crimson light ! It mocks me , for there is no one to look on it with me . If it were any day but this , I should see life in the fields . Yesterday at this hour the mower was beneath the window ; and as he whetted his scythe , the
echoes gave back the sound cheerily to the watcher and the watched after dreary hours , which yet were bright compared with this . To-morrow I shall see the haymakers in the field ; but now the hi g h grass is undisturbed by scythe or breeze . The morning breezes seem to Be subject to the Sabbath . The gossamer shines , but does not gleam . I will look no more , for all is too bright for the desolate of heart .
Was it thus witfi the mourners who went out towards dawn on the first day of the week ? Not knowing what that day should bring forth , did the golden sunrise of Judea strike into them a prophetic joy , or spread a heavy fall upon their hopes ? How eloquent is the silence of that tale respecting the feelings of the mourners , and their transmutation into opposite feelings ! The dreary Sabbath is passed over without notice ; but how wretched must have been its uncertainty , —the utter irreconcileableness of the past with the present , the war between devoted affections and disappointed hopes , between
the imperishable conviction of the fidelity of the departed , and the inexplicable failure of all expectations connected with him ! The Sabbath rites must have been cold and dry , and all a blank where Jesus was not . Yet not wholly a blank ; for they could mourn with one another , and search together for some interpretation of the promises of God which should restore their shaken trust . —Then , the next day , what shame that their trust had been shaken ; what a bright recognition of design ; what knowledge , what
wisdom to have gained in a day !—Yet I have sometimes thought that we are more privileged in looking back on that day , —the brightest star in the firmament of time—than they in seeing it arise out of the chaos of their emotions . We have a clearer understanding of the whole event , a less tumultuous strife of passions ; we are capable of a calmer exercise of faith ; we have a knowledge of the results ; so that , if we loved Jesus , as they loved him but we do not thus love him : the love is of a different kind :
and if I were to see my departed one , —that insensible , wasted form—standing before me as it has been wont to stand , with whom would I exchange my joy ? Strange ! that I never understood the story of the Resurrection till now .
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dtfO Sabbath Musings .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), June 2, 1831, page 370, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2598/page/10/
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