Page:A Christmas Faggot (1884, Gurney).djvu/90

 ago : '" Bethlehem Gate " is the name of a lovely little pictured parable. On the left we see the massacre of innocents, representing the world, in whose cruel habitations the same outrage is ever being enacted, since all sin is in truth the sin of blood-guiltiness, bringing life into jeopardy. On the right the Heavenly Dove is seen leading forth (God's elect children, the Holy Family, the infant Church, to the land of righteousness. The Maiden-Mother, with the Divine Innocent enthroned on her bosom, attended and protected by a backward-looking and a forward-looking angel, and escorted by S. Joseph, passes the gate of the City of David. Egypt beneath her feet becomes the holy land. Thus with all fitting ceremonial is the Church's pilgrimage through the world, through the ages, inaugurated.'

'The Word became Flesh and tabernacled among us'—that is the supreme and august Verity which dominates all the thoughts of the children of the Kingdom. Their eyes are fixed on the Life that the Scripture-record contains rather than on the record itself.