Page:Life in the Old World - Vol. II.djvu/120

130 and in the human ability to understand the revealed word of God by this light. Will she long continue what she now is—the greater portion of the Christian Church? May she be so, until the Protestant Church shall have advanced to a higher consciousness, to a more spiritual life, till she have regained and interpreted in a higher light many of the ever-preserved treasures of the Catholic Church. Then perhaps will this church acknowledge that which the younger sister has won, and understand what it is which she desires; and then both may go on to their transformation, ascend to a new life, a church, a kingdom in spirit and in truth, such as our Lord and Master desires it to be!

I have faith in the eternal power of life, have faith in the ascending metamorphosis, of which the Roman monuments preach. And as certain flowers, beloved by the sun, develop a metamorphosis, more than the others, so ought this soil, warm with the life of beauty and the blood of martyrs, become a sun-flower, which shall represent the transfiguration of the Christian church into a holy and glorious kingdom of God. May it be so! But, as yet, the time is far distant!

The New Year has entered our quiet, little northern home, on the noisy Corso, with an occurrence which has made a new year in the life of my young friend, and has gladdened me with the sight of the power of pure love and gratitude in the female heart.

For my young Swiss sister also, as I learn from a letter just received, has the New Year brought with it