Page:SermonsFromTheLatins.djvu/82

 motherhood. Aye, women,  mothers  themselves, came to  their  doors  and  looked  and  answered,  no! Ah! when the  tramp  of  Herod's  soldiers  and  the  clash of their  arms  are  heard  in  the  streets  of  Bethlehem — when the  innocents  are  torn  from  their  mothers' arms and  slaughtered  before  their  eyes — let  these mothers not  wonder  if  the  pale,  beseeching  face  of  a would-be  lodger  flit  across  their  remembrance. Poor Mary! in a  vain  attempt  to  retrace  her  steps  to  Jerusalem, she  sinks  down  by  the  way,  and  then,  assisted by her  husband,  by  one  last  effort  she  totters  to  a cave  where  cattle  and  sheep  are  stalled. How natural it all  is,  and  how  pitiful! The young  wife  utterly  exhausted and  alone;  her  husband  gone  to  fetch  a  cup of water  and  assistance;  one  instant  of  semi-conscious ecstasy,  and  she  clasps  to  her  breast  her  newborn babe — born  without  the  pains  of  child-birth — as miraculously  born  as  was  the  newly  risen  Saviour transferred when  He  appeared  in  the  midst  of  His Apostles, the  doors  being  closed. There, then,  in  the crib before  us  is  the  group,  Jesus,  Mary,  Joseph. Who does  not  love  to  ponder  on  that  picture  of  which the utter  simplicity  is  the  chief  est  charm? The scanty swaddling-clothes, the  stable,  the  manger,  His  dire poverty — these do  not  repel,  but  rather  seem  most fitting, for  round  Him  earthly  splendor  would  be  as tawdry  tinsel,  while  these  are  like  the  clothing  of  the lily that  rivals  Solomon's  garb. No fear  that  in  the contemplation of  the  intensely  human  in  Christ  we lose  sight  of  His  divinity,  for  already  outside  the  cave the night  is  all  aglow  and  the  air  filled  with  heavenly