They have done their work; one
is warmed and enlivened; one can sit still, feeding one's fancy on
the lapsing embers, just as one saw pictures in the fire as an
eager child long ago. That high-hearted excitement and that
curiosity have faded. Life is very different from what we expected,
more wholesome, more marvellous, more brief, more inconclusive; but
there is an intenser, if quieter and more patient, curiosity to
wait and see what God is doing for us; and the orange stain and
green glow of the sunset, though colder and less jocund, is yet a
far more mysterious, tender, and beautiful thing than the steady
glow of the noonday sun, when the shining flies darted hither and
thither, and the roses sent out their rich fragrance. There is
fragrance still, the fragrance of the evening flowers, where the
western windows look across the misty fields to the thickening
shadows of the tall trees. But there is something that speaks in
the gathering gloom, in the darkening sky with its flush of crimson
fire, that did not speak in the sun-warmed garden and the dancing
leaves; and what speaks is the mysterious love of God, a thing
sweeter and more remote than the urgent bliss of the fiery noon,
full of delicate mysteries and appealing echoes.
Pages:
377
378
379
380
381
382
383
384
385
386
387
388
389
390
391
392
393
394
395
396
397
398
399
400
401