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Untitled Article
quality . It was very effective with two middle aged gentlewomen , who had sat opposite , and had looked somewhat opposed to each other before this reconciliatory sermon ; they now nodded and bobbed to one another most good-naturedly , at the same time shutting their eyes upon all past grievances . Fortunately there was the religion that lurked about and around , and spoke out from the living stone , that could
satisfy us for the want of it in the dead preacher . Again and again the eye wandered over the world of carved work , from the mimic and varied faces upon the near pulpit , to the remote pillars , the tops of which uprose in the distance . The various escutcheons carved upon the walls were next scanned , and the eye rested , amongst them all , upon a forest bugle that hung in bold relief above the stalls on the left of the choir . In one moment the whole cathedral had vanished . Instead of
the lofty pillars , trees of a thousand years uprose in giant majesty , their wide arms spreading in stately arches , their multitudinous leaves mingling overhead in forest fretwork . Mossy banks spread out beneath their feet , where late had been the carved oaken stalls . The drowsy murmur of the preacher melted into the music of a brook , that went on its cheering way leaping and laughing at the pebbles that threw themselves across its path . The sound of the organ was lost in the myriad united voices of the mighty winds , swelling forth
hymns oi praise amongst the lofty tree-tops ; the voices 01 the choristers were mute in the up-springing of a thousand woodland throats fraught with sweet unbolight thanksgiving ; while a universal voice seemed to utter forth , " He dwelleth not in temples made with hands . " And then the forest became peopled ; there was a vast multitude of worshippers , and one among them was their preacher , and he was clothed in a
" garment of camel ' s hair , " and his food was " locusts and wild honey , " and he cried unto those around him , " Prepare ye a way for the l ^ ord . " And he passed and gave place to another , whereon whose face was written love—" perfect love that casteth out fear "—yet power with love , the image of divine perfection . And his voice was as balm " for the healing of the nations , " and it bade them take no anxious " thought for the
morrow / but look around them at the flowers " that toiled not , nor spun , " yet wore arrayed more gloriously than the princes of the earth— -at the birds that fell not to the ground unheeded by the heavenly Father , who cared equally for all —that beneficent Spirit " of whom , and through whom , and to whom are all thintrs . "—" And the peace of God which
pasBeth all understanding keep your hearts and minds in the love of ( xod , and in the knowledge of his son , Christ Jesus , " &c . &c . —and then the charm wan broken—the forest vanished— - and there was the general rustling of bodies released from a state
Untitled Article
40 York Minster and the Forest Bugle *
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Jan. 2, 1836, page 40, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2653/page/40/
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