THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESENTED BY PROF. CHARLES A. KOFOID AND MRS. PRUDENCE W. KOFOID KOLOGY LIBRARY THE OLIVE LEAF. V THE OLIVE LEAF BY HUGH MACMILLAN, D.D.,LL.D.,F.R.S.E., AUTHOR OF "BIBLE TEACHINGS IN NATURE," "TWO WORLDS ARE OURS, " THE SABBATH OF THE FIELDS," ETC., ETC. MACMILLAN AND CO. 1886. All rights reserved. QHfl CONTENTS. LI CHAP. PAGE r I. THE OLIVE LEAF, . . . .. T- ^V \ I II. THE ONENESS OF THE TABERNACLE, . 15 III. THE HOSPITALITIES OF, NATURE, . . 39 POE TR Y THE A VALANCHE. IV. THE THIRST OF GOD, . .. .. _ . ... 60 V. A TUFT OF MOSS, . -.. . .. . '. 77 VI. THE STATUE AND THE STONE, . . 106 VII. THE SWALLOW? S NEST, -^ . . . 119 POETRY A NEST IN A HEATHER BUSH. VIII. THE STAFF AND THE SACRIFICE, . .136 IX. THE VERONICA, .* . . . . . . T 5 2 X. THE LOOKING-GLASS AND THE LAVER, . 169 POETRY THE SUPERGA. XI. THE AUTUMN CROCUS, 185 OETRYA CORN-FIELD IN GLENCROE. vi CONTENTS. CHAP. PAGE XII. THE AMARANTH, 202 POETRYTHE LAST DAISY. XIII. THE GATES OF PEARL, . '. . .219 XIV. THE CEDARS AND THE CANDLESTICKS, 241 POETRY THE CORN. XV. A POTTERY MOUND, . . . . .264 XVI. APPLES OF SODOM, . . . . . 280 XVII. THE STONES BURIED IN THE JORDAN, 301 POETRY THE TWO WRITINGS. XVIII. THE BUFFET-GAME, 3 J 5 XIX. THE BLOOD OF THE PASCHAL LAMB, . 330 XX. UNTO GAZA, WHICH IS DESERT, . . 343 POETRY " FATHER EVEREST." XXI. BEAUTY FOR ASHES, . . . '. . 358 POETRY THE CHRISTMAS ROSE. THE OLIVE LEAF. THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAPTER I. THE OLIVE LEAR " And lo ! in her mouth an olive leaf pluckt off." GENESIS viii. n. OWING to the wickedness of man, God brought back the earth to its primeval condition, when it was without form and void. The changes of the climates and zones, the order of the seasons, the varieties of the landscape, were all obliterated by the dreary uniformity of the flood. When the flood sub- sided, the original work of creation was, therefore, representatively, enacted over again in the growth of plants upon the new soil, in the descent of the animals from the ark, in the appearance of the rain- bow in the clouds, and in the establishment of the great world covenant, that seed-time and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, should never cease. At the first creation, the Spirit of God brooded over the face of the waters, like a dove with expanded wings, preparing the world to be the abode 2 THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP of vegetable, animal, and human life. At the second creation, the dove's wings hovered over the waters of the deluge, announcing the termination of the divine judgment, and the preparation of a new green world, that should emerge purified from its baptism and be to Noah what Eden had been to Adam. At the new creation of God, the Holy Spirit, in the form of a dove, appeared over the waters of our Lord's bap- tism, as a symbol of the better covenant which, under the Prince of Peace, should restore the order and harmony of the world, and terminate the evil and confusion which sin had made in human hearts and lives. i. Let us look at the profound, far-reaching sig- nificance of the green leaf in the mouth of the dove, as the first production of a new and regenerated world. In the first place, the green leaf is the great purifier of nature. This is one of the most important offices which it was created to fulfil. In the early ages of the earth, long before man came upon the scene, the atmosphere was foul with carbonic acid gases, so poisonous that a few inspirations of them would be sufficient to destroy life. These formed a dense covering which kept in the steaming warmth of the earth, and nourished a rank and luxuriant vegetation. Gigantic ferns, tree-mosses, and reeds grew with extraordinary rapidity and absorbed these noxious gases into their own structures, consoli- dating them into leaves, stems, and branches, which in the course of long ages grew and decayed, and by subtle chemical processes and mechanical arrangements were THE OLIVE LEAF. changed into coal-beds under the earth. In this wonderful way two great results were accomplished at the same time and by the same means ; the atmosphere was purified and made fit for the breathing of man, and animals useful to man, and vast stores of fuel were pre- pared to enable future generations to subdue the earth and spread over it the blessings of civilization. And what the green leaves of the early geological forests did for the primeval atmosphere of the world, the green leaves of our woods and fields are continually doing for our atmosphere still. They absorb the foul air caused by the processes of decay and combustion going on over the earth, and by the breathing of men and animals, and convert this noxious element into the useful and beauti- ful products of the vegetable kingdom. They preserve the air in a condition fit for human breathing. Without them, carbonic acid gas would soon accumulate to such an extent that animal life would be impossible. There would be no gaily- coloured blossoms to delight our senses and stimulate the poetical side of our nature ; for flowers are as pure breathers as man himself, and can- not exist in a foul atmosphere. We little think when we inhale the fresh air that its purity and healthfulness come to us by the beautiful mission of the green leaf. Nor have we only the green leaves of our own fields and woods to thank for this blessing; the air that we breathe has been purified for us, thousands of miles away, by the palms of the south and the pines of the north, by the birches of America, and the gum-trees of Australia. Nothing is more wonderful in nature than the balance which is THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. constantly kept up between the animals that contaminate the air and the plants that purify it ; the refuse of the one kingdom being the food of the other. Were even so small a proportion as ten per cent, of carbonic acid gas allowed to accumulate in the atmosphere, it would destroy every living animal that breathed it. And yet out of a much smaller proportion of this noxious sub- stance in the atmosphere, the green leaf builds up all the immense and varied mass of the vegetation that covers the surface of the earth ; while by the very same act it restores to man and the other animals the atmos- phere in healthy purity. These considerations will show us how significant it was, that the first object of the new world that was about to emerge from the flood should be a green leaf. It was a symbol, a token to Noah that the world would be purified from the pollution of those unnatural sins which had brought death and destruction upon it, and would once more be fitted to be the home of a peculiar people zealous of good works. What the green leaf is in nature, the leaves of the tree of life are in the spiritual sphere. The gospel of Jesus Christ which the Heavenly Dove carries to the homes and the hearts of men, is the great purifier of the world. The moral atmosphere is being constantly contaminated by the noxious exhal- ations of human sins and follies. Blessings are abused, and in their abuse turn into evils. It was necessary therefore that some counteraction should be provided. And He who has so wonderfully balanced the natural world by the ministry of the green leaf has also balanced, THE OLIVE LEAF. in a more wonderful way still, the moral world by the ministry of Him upon whom the dove descended at His baptism, and who bore our sins in His own body on the tree, and in so doing brought in an everlasting right- eousness. And not only does His salvation balance the evil of the world, convert baneful and noxious things to good and noble uses, change sinners into saints, and cause all things to work together for good to them that love God ; it does far more than produce a moral equilibrium. It is a victorious principle, and is destined in the end to overcome all the evils of the world, and to make of this sin-ruined creation a new heaven and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness. 2. In the second place, the green leaf is the source of all the life of the world. It is by its agency alone that inert inorganic matter is changed into organic matter, which furnishes the starting-point of all life. Nowhere else on the face of the earth does this most important process take place. Everything else consumes and destroys. The green leaf alone conserves and creates. It is the mediator between the world of death and the world of life. The crust of the earth was once like a burnt cinder ; and the reason why it has not continued so, why, unlike the moon which revolves round the earth a great lifeless desert of solid lava, it has been peopled with all kinds of living things, is owing to the ministry of the green leaf. It is because of this ministry that in a world once burnt up is found an abundant supply of combustible materials for all our wants. During the long geological periods the silent 6 THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. agency of the leaf has been slowly recovering combus- tible materials from the wrecks of the first conflagration that should enter anew into the great vortex of life and use and beauty. The quiet sunbeams, working by means of the most delicate of all structures, the cellu- lar tissue of the green leaf, and by a process the most subtle and wonderful in the whole range of chemistry, have partly undone the work of the fire ; and whatever now exists on the earth unburnt wood, coal, animal and vegetable tissue, the wondrous body of man him- self we owe to that simple agent, the green leaf. There is a mighty conflagration still going on con- tinually all over the earth, not with the roar and fury of a great fire consuming an extensive building, in which the elements rush into combination with an appalling force which no human power can resist ; but unseen, unheard, unknown to us, except when in the end we see the dreary results, reducing all things to decay, corruption, dust and ashes, burning every- thing that can be burnt, and converting the earth into a uniform lifeless desert. But there is a mightier force ceaselessly at work undoing all the destruction, giving beauty for ashes, and the rich variety of life for the dreary uniformity of death ; working not amid the con- vulsions of nature and the crash of the elements, but quietly, unseen, unknown, except when in the end we see the results of its beneficent labours ; and that force is the green leaf. Methinks the little leaf is the most wonderful thing in nature. I am not surprised that God should have chosen it in the burning bush as THE OLIVE LEAF. the medium of His revelation to Moses, or in the Cross of Calvary as the instrument of the salvation of the world. I never see a green leaf without ever- increasing wonder and admiration ; amazed at the apparent inefficiency of the means and the stupendous magnitude of the result In this light how suitable it was that an olive leaf freshly plucked should have been the first object brought to Noah in the ark ! For just as the green leaf is the means in the natural world of counteracting all the destructive forces that are reducing its objects to dust and ashes, and clothing its surface with vegetable and animal life, so the olive leaf in the mouth of the dove spoke to Noah of the undoing of the work of destruction caused by the flood, and of the raising up of a new and fairer creation out of the universal wreck. That olive leaf was the earnest of a mighty redemption, of the restitution of all things. It foretold the destruction of the death which had already destroyed the world, and the opening up of a new world beyond the wide drear wilderness and the floods of time, in which Eden itself would be forgotten in the transporting joy of heaven, and the tree of life would be restored in a grander multiplied form. And just as all this beautiful world of life and joy is the product of the work of the green leaf, so all that mankind has achieved and enjoyed since the flood the great results of civilization, and the still greater results of redemption arose out of the work of grace whose dawning the green leaf intimated, and whose operation it typified. For sin and grace are in constant 8 THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. antagonism like the force of the fire that burns every- thing to ashes, and the force of the green leaf that builds up life and beauty out of the ashes; and God has suffered sin to continue because He knows that grace can conquer it, strip its spoils, and convert its ruins into higher and nobler forms of life. 3. In the third place, the green leaf is the best con- ductor of electricity that most powerful and destruc- tive of all the forces of the earth. To guard our homes and public buildings from its destructive action we erect our lightning-rods whose sharp points quietly drain the clouds, or, failing to do this, receive the discharge and bear it harmlessly to the earth. But ages before Frank- lin pointed the first lightning-rod to the storm, God has surrounded the dwellings of man with a protection far more effectual than this; for since the creation of organic life every pointed leaf and blade of grass have been silently disarming the clouds of their destructive weapon. A twig covered with leaves, sharpened by nature's exquisite workmanship, is said to be three times as effectual as the metallic points of the best constructed rod. And when we reflect how many thousands of these vegetable points every large tree directs to the sky, and consider what must be the efficacy of a single forest with its innumerable leaves, or of a single meadow with its countless blades of grass, we see how abundant the protection from the storm is, and with what care Providence has guarded us from the destructive force. And was not that green leaf which came to Noah in the ark God's lightning conductor? THE OLIVE LEAF. Did it not bear down harmlessly the destructive power of heaven ? Did it not assure Noah that the wrath of God was appeased, that the storm was over, and that peace and safety could once more be enjoyed upon the earth? And is not He to whose salvation that leaf pointed who is Himself the "Branch" God's light- ning conductor to us? He bore the full force of the Father's wrath due to sin ; He endured the penalty which we deserved, and having smitten the shepherd, .the sheep for whom He laid down His life are scathless and unharmed. He is now our refuge from the storm ; and under His shadow we are safe from all evil. 4. In the fourth place, the green leaf is' the source of all the streams and rivers in the world. It is by the agency of the leaf that water circulates as the life-blood of the globe. In a leafless world there would be no rains and no streams. Destroy the woods, and you destroy the balance of nature ; you prevent the forma- tion of clouds, you dry up the rivers, and you produce an arid desert. Whereas, on the other hand, foster the growth of leaves, and they will alter the nature of the climate, and change the wilderness into a fruitful field. And how appropriately in this light did the green leaf come to Noah as the earnest and the instrument of the re-arrangement of a world which had been reduced to a desert by the punishment of man's sin ! That leaf assured him that the old rivers would flow again ; that the former fields would smile anew; that the forests would, as in previous times, cover the earth with their shadow; and that all the conditions of seed-time and io THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. harvest, and of a pleasant and useful home for man, would be present as of yore. And is not the Heavenly Dove bringing to us in the ark of our salvation a leaf of the tree of life, whose leaves are for the healing of the nations, as a token that beyond the destructive floods of earth, beyond the final conflagration in which all things shall be burned up, the river of life will flow again ; and amid the green fields of the paradise restored, the Lamb shall lead us to living fountains of waters, and God shall wipe away all tears from our eyes ? The chaos of this weary and disordered earth will be re-arranged and moulded into fairer forms and brighter hues, as a fit home for renewed and glorified humanity, by Him who will do what Noah failed to do ; comfort us concerning our work and toil of our hands, because of the ground which the Lord hath cursed. 5. In the fifth place, the green leaf is the type upon which the forms of all life are moulded. All the parts of a plant are but modifications of the leaf. The stem is a leaf rolled up tight; the blossom is a leaf trans- figured for a higher purpose ; the fruit is a leaf changed into a receptacle for the seed; and the seed itself is a leaf packed together in a case to protect it from unfavourable weather, and furnished with a sufficient amount of food for its unfolding and growth into a new plant in more favourable circumstances. Take a pea or a bean, and if you strip off its envelope or skin, you find that it consists of a short joint and a pair of leaves; as it grows in the ground, another joint with its pair of leaves is formed ; as it still grows in the I. THE OLIVE LEAF. TI air and sunshine, another joint with its pair of leaves is formed ; and then another joint with its pair of leaves is formed, and so on. The whole stem con- sists of a mere repetition of these single elements joints and leaves. And as all the vegetable kingdom is thus built up of leaves, so the animal kingdom is con- structed on the same model. All organisms, whether animal or vegetable, are similar in their elementary structure and form ; and the most complicated results are attained by the simplest conceivable means, and that without the slightest violation of the original plan of nature. The palm of the human hand and the back- bone of the human form are both constructed upon the model of the leaf. Thoreau has said that the whole earth is but a gigantic leaf, in which the rivers and streams resemble the veins, and the mountains and plains the green parts. And did not He who sent the dove with the olive leaf to Noah, thereby assure him that out of that leaf would be evolved the whole fair world of vegetable and animal life, which for a while had perished beneath the waters of the flood ; that it would be reconstructed upon the old type and developed according to the old pattern ? And did not He who developed this great world of life out of the single leaf, develop all the great scheme of grace, all the wondrous history of redemption, out of the first simple promise to our first parents after their fall ? Amid all the varying dispensations of His providence, He has been without variableness or shadow of turning, unfold- ing more and more the germinating fulness of the same I2 THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. glorious plan of grace. The kingdom of heaven, which was first small as a grain of mustard seed, has become a great tree filling the earth with its shadow, and satis- fying mankind with its fruit; and from first to last it is but the evolution of one great idea. And He has assured us that the things of the new heavens and the new earth will be the things of the old, only purified, and ennobled, and removed for ever beyond all risk of change and death. Of all the green leaves of the earth it was most fitting that the olive leaf should have been selected as the first product of the new restored world. The olive tree spreads over a large area of the earth ; it combines in itself the flora of the hills and the plains. It clothes with shade and beauty arid slopes where no other vegetation would grow. It extracts by a vegetable miracle nourishment and fatness from the driest air and the barest rock ; on it may be seen at the same time opening and full-blown blossoms, and green and perfectly ripe fruit. Each bough is laden with a wealth of promise and fulfilment ; beauty for the eye and bounty for the palate. No tree displays such a rich profusion and succession of flowers and fruits. It is the very picture of prosperity and abundance. Its very gleanings are more plentiful than the whole harvest of other trees. It strikingly illustrates, there- fore, the overflowing goodness of the Lord to whom belong the earth and the fulness thereof. While the twisted and distorted passion of its trunk and branches, like a vegetable Laocoon writhing in agony, strikingly THE OLIVE LEAF. pictures the labour and the groaning, and travailing together in pain of the earth, through which all its fair births and bright promises of abundance are pro- duced, it has also been universally regarded as an emblem of peace ; and when the dove was divinely guided to come with it in its bill to Noah when the waters were subsiding, God wished it to be understood as a token of peace and goodwill on earth. What the olive leaf began in Noah's case, was consummated under the olive trees of Gethsemane. He who destroyed the antediluvian sinners by the flood, endured the contradiction of greater and more aggravated sinners against Himself. He who sent the flood as a punishment of sin, now suffered it Him- self in a more terrible form as an atonement for sin. The olive leaf of Noah's dove showed that God's strange work was done, and that He had returned to the essential element of His nature, and love shone forth again. The olive leaves of Gethsemane that thrilled with the fear of the great agony that took place beneath them, tell us that God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that who- soever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. What sweeter message, what dearer hope could come to us in our sins and sorrows than this ! We read in classic authors that men used to study the flight of birds across the sky, and draw good or bad omens from the manner of their flight ; hence one of our English words, auspicious, means literally, be- holding the favourable flight of a bird. And another I4 THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. i. word, temple, meant originally a portion of the sky marked out by the rod of the diviners or augurs, in which the flight of birds was to be particularly observed. All this superstition is, perhaps, only a relic or survival of Noah's sending out the raven and the dove for indications of the state of the flood. Let us practise a higher divination. God has brought us into His temple and bade us consider the Heavenly Dove that has come on the auspicious errand of our salvation. Let us take Him in, and may the olive leaf of the gospel which He brings heal all the wounds and evils which sin has inflicted upon us, and impart to us the hope which maketh not ashamed of the inheritance, incorruptible and undenled, and that fadeth not away. CHAPTER II. THE ONENESS OF THE TABERNACLE. "And it shall be one tabernacle." EXODUS xxvi. 6. BEING a work, the tabernacle must, like every other work, have been designed as well as executed. Scripture presents to us this twofold view of it ; shows it to us in plan and in progress. We are taken up with Moses to the Mount, and there we see unfolded before us the pattern as it existed in the Divine mind. This architectural plan is a grand whole. Notwithstanding the many separate parts of which it is composed, it exhibits the most complete structural harmony the most perfect mutual consistency. It is to be one tabernacle not in the sense of singleness and uniqueness, as if God had forbidden more than one tabernacle to be constructed for His service but in the sense of a real and profound unity. By the golden taches or clasps binding together the curtains which covered it, the whole structure was made one tent or tabernacle, and all its parts and objects were united. Unity is the hall-mark which God stamps 15 j6 THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. upon all His works. It is His autograph written in the stars of heaven and in the flowers of the field, attesting that they all proceed from the same Mind. The universe is a great kaleidoscope which He is perpetually turning round, in which a few simple ele- ments are exhibited in endless diversity ; in which the variety is not more wonderful than the unity. i. In unfolding this sublime lesson, let us look, in the first place, at the illustration of it which the taber- nacle itself afforded. This remarkable structure was one in regard to its parts. It was divided into two rooms, the holy place and the most holy, by a veil that hung between them. Only one man was permitted to enter the inner apartment viz., the high priest; and he only once a year, on the great day of atonement. The outer sanctuary was daily frequented by the priests, who, there, barefooted and clothed in their linen gar- ments, accomplished their ordinary ministrations. But although thus separated, the two divisions were essen- tially one. The same boards of shittim wood enclosed them ; they rested on the same silver sockets ; the same curtains covered them, united by the golden taches ; the same pillar of cloud rested over them ; the same glory filled them. The ark in the holy of holies was the focus to which all the parts, objects and services, of the whole structure converged; the culminating point to which they led up. The cherubim which stood above the mercy-seat were embroidered on either side of the dividing veil, so that those who were in the outer sanctuary could form some idea of ir. THE ONENESS OF THE TABERNACLE. i; the mystery in the inner shrine. And the oneness of the tabernacle, which these mutual relations and the clasped curtains of the same common roof betokened, was in due time clearly proclaimed by the rending of the separating veil from the top to the bottom at the death of Christ, which threw the two apartments into one, and gave the worshipper in the holy place en- trance into the immediate presence of God. This truth of the oneness of the tabernacle was also taught by the intimate mutual relations that existed between all its objects and services. The first object we behold on entering the court of the tabernacle is the altar of burnt-offering. It stands at the threshold, indicating that only by an avenue of death can God be approached; that without shedding of blood there can be no remission of sins, no acceptable worship in His sight. Around this altar all the services of the tabernacle group themselves ; and from it they derive all their significance and efficacy; a fact strikingly indicated by its very size, which is such that all the other vessels of the sanctuary can be included within it. Between this altar and the door of the tabernacle we see the laver filled with water, at which the priests who minister in the holy place have to wash their hands and feet before going in. The altar of burnt- offering makes atonement for the guilt of their sins, the laver purifies them from the defilement of their sins ; so that while the one legally opens up the way of approach to God, the other morally qualifies for communion with Him. The door of the tabernacle 1 S THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. may now be entered, and the first object which we behold in the holy place is the altar of incense, which is the counterpart of the altar of burnt-offering without in the court. Both are intimately and inseparably linked together. It is an altar, and therefore has a reference to a sacrifice already presented ; and the holy fire which causes the sweet incense to ascend is that which had first consumed the victim on the altar of burnt-offering. The perpetual incense rising within the holy place thus forms an appropriate accompaniment to the burnt-offering perpetually presented in the court. One fire slowly consumes them both; and any fire employed to raise the cloud of incense in the sanctuary, except that which had been taken from the altar of burnt-offering, is strange fire, rendering the incense produced by it unhallowed, and exposing the profane worshipper to the penalty of death. Even the incense itself, it may be added, indicates the oneness of the service; for it is composed of various spices of like weight, so skilfully mingled together that no one in- gredient shall predominate over the other, but each shall harmoniously combine to make one exquisitely fragrant perfume before the Lord. The next object within the holy place is the seven- branched golden candlestick. With its seven stems proceeding from one, and its rich floral ornamentation, the most elaborate of all the holy vessels, it was beaten from one solid mass of gold by the hand of the artist, who must have had the pattern and the symmetry of the whole and of every part in his mind as he slowly and ii. THE ONENESS OF THE TABERNACLE. 19 carefully worked it out. The light shed by it, though proceeding from seven different lamps, is but one light ; the lamps being never said to send forth their lights, but only their light. The oil supplied to each is the same kind of oil, beaten, not squeezed, from the olive berries, that it may be more clear and pure. The candlestick is connected with the altar of incense by means of its tongs and snuff-dishes. These bring the fire by which the lamps are lighted, and trim and raise the wicks that they may burn more brightly. The fire of the altar becomes the light of the candlestick ; and this connection between the two sacred vessels shows the intimate relation between holiness and light, and teaches that only the pure can see God only those who are transfigured into the Divine likeness can shine as lights in the world. The next object we see is the table of shewbread, which is placed opposite the candlestick, in order that its light may shine upon it ; and it is connected with the altar of incense by means of the precious frankincense, which is put upon each row of the bread, " that it may be for a memorial, even an offering made by fire unto the Lord ; " and also by the golden spoons which are employed to carry away this frankincense. When, therefore, the high priest puts incense on the golden altar, he has to go to the table of shewbread to fetch the spoonful from thence. In this act he links these two vessels- the table and the altar together ; the sustenance of the soul with its purification. Passing into the inner shrine, we find that the sole object there is the ark, with its golden lid THE OLIVE LEAF. of the mercy-seat, of the same dimensions with itself, so as exactly to cover it ; both forming together one vessel of the sanctuary. Out of its two ends were beaten the cherubim, originally placed at the east end of the Gar- den of Eden to keep the way of the tree of life, one at each end, with their outstretched wings meeting and over-shadowing the mercy-seat ; associated, not with the flaming sword of vengeance, but with the symbol of the Divine grace. We have, therefore, to regard it always as a whole. It is the one vessel, as I have said, with reference to which all the ministrations and ritual of the tabernacle service are conducted. Over it the God to whom all the worship is paid, and from whose presence alone it derives its sanction and blessing, dwells in the Shechinah cloud, and manifests His glory. Before it the holy perfume of the incense altar yields its per- petual fragrance ; and on it the blood of the sin-offering of atonement is annually sprinkled. Thus we find, if we study carefully the description given of the different vessels of the tabernacle, that there was a clear and dis- tinct intention on the part of God to link them together into one great harmony of meaning and service. Each vessel has its own distinct use, and each can be viewed apart from the others ; and yet in every act of priestly service, all are joined together, and are in active opera- tion at the same time. It needs the combination of the whole to make a complete and perfect act of worship, just as it needs the harmonious action of all the mem- bers of the body to constitute the act of living. And just as the golden taches link the curtains of the taber- ii. THE ONENESS OF THE TABERNACLE. 2 i nacle together, and make of them one covering for one structure, so the smaller golden vessels attached to the golden candlestick, the altar of incense, and the shewbread table the tongs, snuff-dishes, spoons, and censer link together the different vessels of the sanc- tuary into one ministration, forming in this way one golden chain of service simultaneously carried on in the presence of God in behalf of Israel. 2. The words of the Lord to Moses have a wider reference than to the immediate object which called them forth. They may be applied to nature. It may be said that the tabernacle pointed back to the creation. It was a symbol of the great world of nature, as at once manifesting and concealing God. It was, indeed, as a Rosetta stone, to explain to man the spiritual hiero- glyphics in the typology of nature, which had become dark and insignificant to him when he sinned and fell, that God devised the clearer typology of the taber- nacle, and set the cherubim, which were the symbols of creation in connection with the redemption of man, above the mercy-seat in its holiest place, and em- broidered them on the veil that divided the outer from the inner sanctuary. There was no typical object or service in the tabernacle which might not have been seen in nature if man had not lost the key of interpreta- tion. The very rainbow, which was the illuminated initial letter of God's covenant of grace, painted on the first cloud after the deluge, might have been recog- nized in the varied colours of the veil, and of the wrappings that covered the sacred places when not in 22 THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. use. The world was only a larger tabernacle, with the same symbols, only darker and more mysterious ; prov- ing that they emanated from the same Being. Many of the most thoughtful minds among the covenant people were impressed with this wonderful unity. They saw in the darkness of night the pavilion of God ; they spoke of His having made a tabernacle for the sun, spread out His heavens as a curtain, and laid the beams of His chambers in the mighty waters. In God's creation the wise and good are guarded by the cherubim, and dwell in the secret place of the Most High, under the feathers of His wings. The psalms and hymns of Israel bear constant reference to this beautiful resemblance. And, as a crowning proof that this was no mere accident, discovered only by a poetical mind, but an intention of the Almighty, we find that the work of creation is de- scribed in precisely the same way as the construction of the tabernacle. We see the work of creation in plan and in progress, in design and execution. The first chapter of Genesis gives us the antecedent plan the pattern shown on the Mount, as it were of the making of the heavens and the earth, and of every plant of the field, before it was in the earth^ and of every herb of the field before it grew ; and in the narrative that follows we have the actual execution and unfolding of this ante- cedent plan of creation by the common operations of nature, by continuous physical action. If the creation be thus a greater tabernacle, in which all the objects are meant to show forth the praise of God, and to symbolize His work of grace, we should ii. THE ONENESS OF THE TABERNACLE. 23 expect to find in it the same unity, the same oneness of design and harmony of all parts, that we see in the Jewish tabernacle ; and this is what we actually find. This is the great lesson which modern science has taught us so effectually. It has brought forward in- numerable striking illustrations to impress it more deeply upon our minds. It is finding out more and more in this marvellous structure of the visible creation that all the joints are well fitted, that the adaptations are mutual and universal. Instead of looking at things separately, it views them as parts of one great, articulate, concatinated whole, and members one of another. In- deed, science may be defined, in the w r ords of a French philosopher, as "the incessant effort of the human spirit after rest," a rest which can only be attained by the reduction of all things to a unity. The forces of nature are mutually convertible. The forms of nature have mutual likenesses. The whole mineral kingdom is seen in the structure of a grain of sand ; the whole vegetable kingdom in the form of a single leaf; the whole animal world in the construction of a single rib. Flowers are transfigured sunbeams; and colour, heat, and sound are but modes of molecular motion. That which we find in the whole we find over again in every part. The climates, zones, seasons, and products of the whole earth we find epitomized on a single tropical snow mountain ; and the whole earth is like two great mountains, set base to base at the equator, with their tops at either end covered with the arctic and antarctic snows. The climates and seasons, with their 2 4 THE OLIVE LEAF. CIIAI-. vegetable and animal productions, were distributed in geological time, as we find them distributed in geo- graphical space. Each element has counterparts of every other element. The sea repeats the mountains and valleys of the earth in its waves, the rivers in its currents, and the trees and flowers in its ocean gardens. Animals resemble plants ; plants possess analogies with animals. The globule of blood and the rolling planet are one. BufTon said that there was but one animal ; and Faraday expressed his conviction that in the end there will be found but one element with two polarities. Owing to the imperfection and limitation of our powers, we are obliged to deal with fragments of the universe, and to exaggerate their differences. But the more pro- found and varied our study of the objects of nature, the more remarkable do we find their resemblances. And we cannot occupy ourselves with the smallest province of science without speedily becoming sensible of its intercommunication with all other provinces. The snowflake leads us to the sun. The study of a lichen or moss becomes a key that opens up the great temple of organic life. If we could understand, as Tennyson pro- foundly says, what a little flower growing in the crevice of a wayside wall is, root and all, and all in all, we should know what God and man are. And the same unbroken gradation or continuity which we trace throughout all the parts and objects of our own world, pervades and embraces the whole physical universe so far, at least, as our knowledge of it at present extends. By the wonderful discoveries of spectrum analysis, we find the ii. THE ONENESS OF THE TABERNACLE. 25 same substances in sun, moon, and stars which compose our own earth. The imagination of the poet is conversant with the whole, and sees truth in universal relations. He attains by insight the goal to which all other know- ledge is finding its way step by step. And the Christian poet and philosopher, whose eye has been opened, not partially, by the clay of nature's materials worked upon by human thought so that he sees men as trees walking, but fully and perfectly, by washing in the fountain opened for sin and uncleanness, whose pure heart sees God in everything, and in God's light sees light he stands at the shining point where all things converge to one. Wherever he turns his inquiring gaze, he finds " shade unperceived so softening into shade, and all so forming one harmonious whole," that not a link is want- ing in the chain which unites and reproduces all, from atom to mountain, from microscopic moss to banyan tree, from monad up to man. And if the unity of the tabernacle proved it to be the work of one designing Mind, surely the unity of this greater tabernacle, this vast cosmos, with its myriads of parts and complications, proves it to be no strange jumbling of chance, no incoherent freak of fortuity, but the work of one intelli- gent Mind having one glorious object in view. " The whole round world is every way Bound with gold chains about the feet of God." 3. But not only did the tabernacle repeat in minia- ture the whole creation as God's dwelling-place, it also more especially typified the new creation the Church of 2 6 THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. God. In fact, this is the aspect in which it is commonly regarded. The Epistle to the Hebrews is the key which interprets the relation of the Levitical institutions and rites to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and explains their fulfilment in the Christian economy. And so looking at the Church of God, we find that the same characteristic of oneness belongs to it too. Under all the varying dispensations of His grace, God's Church has been one. The Jews were in the outer court be- cause the way into the holiest was not yet made manifest. Gentiles, by the new and living way opened up through the rent veil of Christ's flesh, have entered into the inner shrine. But Jews and Gentiles alike are now united in one communion and fellowship in Christ. The Saviour the Jews looked forward to in rites and sacrifices, we look back to in the ordinances of the Gospel. The religion that was veiled to them has been unveiled to us. They saw the types and shadows ; we behold the living and glorious realities. Over all is the tabernacling of the same God ; and the Church of Jews and Gentiles is "built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief corner-stone, in whom all the building, fitly framed together, groweth into an holy temple in the Lord." In this way, those who were far off as well as those who were nigh have been made members of the one household of faith. And still, notwithstanding the many diversities of circumstance, creed, and experience ; notwithstanding the multiplication of sects and denom- ii. THE ONENESS OF THE TABERNACLE. 2 ; inations, each marked out by well-defined lines of doc- trine and discipline, each clearly and sharply dis- tinguished from its neighbour, there is in reality but " one body, one Spirit, and one hope of our calling ; one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in all." Amid accidental diversities there is substantial unity unity in all that is truly essential beneath. These diversities, arising from different temperaments, habits, and culture, are necessary to the development of the truth, and of the freedom and power of the spiritual life. Each bears witness to some essential part of the Divine counsel ; each holds forth prominently some truth which has been suffered by others to fall into the back- ground; each is indebted to the other for "supple- mental influences which make its faith and life grander and wider than it could have shaped out for itself unaided." The same process by which physical life advances, through diversity of organs and functions to a higher unity, and society is developed from its rudimentary condition, takes place in the Church. The lowest organism possesses in a single cell all the organs neces- sary for the preservation and perpetuation of life ; but as life advances in the animal or vegetable scale the organism divides itself into many cells, some being specially set apart for nutrition, and others for repro- duction ; and the wonderful unity of the human body, which is at the top of the scale, is secured by the com- plex and harmonious operations of numerous parts and 28 THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. organs that have eacli a particular purpose to serve. So with society. In its primitive condition each man per- forms for himself all the arts of life. But in proportion as society advances, in the same proportion does specialization of social functions advance, until in the perfectly organized society each man has his own busi- ness to carry on, and his own contribution to make to the well-being of the whole. So, too, in the Church, specialization of function, differentiation, is the law of development. Each Church knows in part, and prophe- sies in part ; turns the ray of heavenly light into its own characteristic hue. And it needs that all the Churches should be gathered together by that charity which is the bond of perfectness, supreme love to God, and fervent love to one another, in order that the one perfect Church of Christ should be formed. It needs that all the hues should be combined to make the one pure white beam of truth. Not in their separate state, but " with all saints," can the different Churches go on to comprehend what is the length and breadth and height and depth of the love that passeth knowledge, and to be filled with all the fulness of God. While Christ has many folds in which He is educating His people in dif- ferent circumstances, by variations of character and cul- ture, He has only one flock who are led in the same way to the everlasting fold. The Saviour's intercessory prayer that all the dispersed of Israel may be gathered into one, that all the disciples of every name may be one, as God and Christ are one, is being fulfilled more and more in proportion as men of all Christian creeds ii. THE O A" EN ESS OF THE TABERNACLE. 29 and communions are ready to draw and act together, and to regard the differences that divide them, not as hindrances to loving intercourse, but as helps to the widening of each other's spiritual vision, and to the rendering of a fuller manifestation of the mind of God to the world. Bringing all the tithes of what they have gained by their separate training and discipline into one common storehouse, they will prove the Lord there- with until He pour down a blessing so great that there will not be room to receive it ; and through this unity and community the world will believe at length that Christ came forth from God. But the Church on earth is only part of God's great Church. The author of the Epistle to the Hebrews speaks of the outer division of the tabernacle as the type of the Church on earth, and of the inner part of the sanctuary as a type of heaven, where the true High Priest is now pleading with His own blood for us. Between the Church below and the Church above, the veil of death seems to intervene; and there seems to be no connection between those who worship in the earthly sanctuary, and those who serve God day and night in His heavenly temple. But this veil has been rent in twain by the death, resurrection, and ascension of our Lord ; and the two divisions of God's house have been thrown into one. The powers of the world to come have entered into and transfigured the vain show of this pass- ing and perishing world. The life which we live on earth is part of the life which the angels and spirits of just men made perfect live before the throne. Our 3 o THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. citizenship is even now in heaven ; we are come even here to Mount Zion, the city of the living God. Of one Lord the whole family, the one family, in heaven and earth is named. Living and dead believers make but one communion, constitute the body of Christ, the ful- ness of Him that filleth all in all. We are under the narrow, sensible horizon of time ; they are under the great rational horizon of eternity, which comprehends ours as the great sky comprehends the tent that is erected beneath it. We have here on earth, in the beauties of nature, and in the joys of life, types and shadows of brighter substances and more satisfying joys in heaven. We have golden taches and foretastes and antepasts of 'the things unseen and eternal, connecting this life with the next. The glories of the inmost shrine are embroidered upon the veil that falls between us and the full realization. In our more immediate approaches to the God who fills both worlds with His presence, we stand on the same ground with the redeemed in glory ; we feel that this is none other than the house of God and the gate of heaven. If we worship God in spirit and in truth, the substance of that worship, whether in the body or out of the body, is the same. In purely spiritual exercises the wall of partition is thrown down, and heaven and earth are one. And while we believe and continue in the communion of saints, and partake of the same celestial food, we are not altogether parted from them. Between the spirits of just men made per- fect and believers remaining on the earth there is a unity far more intimate than we commonly suppose. ii. THE ONENESS OF THE TABERNACLE. 3I The author of the Epistle to the Hebrews, in remark- able words, whose full meaning we are not able to gauge, says, " that they without us should not be made perfect." They are indeed made perfect in holiness and in Divine rest, but there is a perfection still before them. They form a great cloud of witnesses, watching with keen and unflagging interest the fortunes of the Church on earth ; and just as that which is behind in the suffer- ings of Christ will not be filled up until He Himself has wiped away all tears from the eyes of His people, so the perfection of the saints will not be complete till the whole Church has entered into everlasting bliss. 4. The tabernacle was the Bible of the Israelites. God taught them by its object-lessons in their child- hood and pupilage in the wilderness. But that age of shadows and symbols has disappeared ; man has passed from the childhood's stage of education into the higher school. We have been trained for a clearer perception and a fuller possession of the truth. God has given to us His own written Word, in which His thoughts are woven with man's thoughts, making of the whole Book the speech to the world of Immanuel, God with us. Its record extends over a period of more than four thousand years. It was written by men belonging to different ages and civilizations, possessed of the most varied temperaments and tastes, and living in widely different ranks and circumstances. It contains almost all the forms of human composition, is characterized by the utmost variety of subject and treatment, and is adapted to all kinds of experiences. 3 2 THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. But amid this extraordinary diversity, the most con- spicuous as well as the grandest feature of the Book is its unity. There are a thousand golden taches linking together all the parts of the fabric ; and, from Genesis to Revelation, we have the gradual unfolding of only one scheme of grace, the slow manifestation of the same kingdom of heaven. The great thoughts which the latest books contain had their roots at the very gate of the Garden of Eden, in the earliest book. The promise of the seed of the woman given at the beginning develops more and more of its germinant fulness as the ages and generations pass on, until at last it flowers and fruits in the life and death of Christ, in the formation of the Christian Church, and in the organization of a perfected Christian society. The Gospel is cast into the mould of the law ; the New Testament is the complement and explanation of the Old ; and in the book of Revelation the circle of sacred doctrine and history is rounded and completed, the latest developments of grace coal- escing with the earliest dealings of God with man, and the paradise lost is restored. It is this wonderful unity that constitutes the grandest evidence of its inspiration. Like the artists employed in the manu- facture of the Gobelins tapestry, who work behind the upright loom and do not see the pattern which they are producing, the sacred writers themselves could not have had before their minds the complete plan of the Divine operation which they were partially working out. They inquired diligently, indeed, what ii. THE ONENESS OF THE TABERNACLE. 33 the Spirit which was working within them did signify; but while they felt that there was more in their words than they could master, they could not grasp with their understanding the relations of their own share of the work to the whole. Behind the particular scope and purpose of each book, we discern the great plan which rules the whole revelation, the great pattern to which God works, the inspiration of the one Mind that is uttering its thoughts through manifold forms and independent organs. The construction of the Book is like that of a perfect plant, whose growth is according to unity of plan, and whose parts are modifications of one fundamental typical form, so that they may be compared with one another and with the whole. We find stamped upon it the same impress of unity which we see in all God's works. He who throughout all the realms of nature acts upon the great principle of unity of type with variety of development, modifying by successive steps the first embodiment of the vertebrate idea, as it appeared in the lowest and oldest fishes, until at length it became arrayed in the glorious garb of the human form, has acted upon the same principle in the different dispensations of His grace, which were but successive disclosures, clearer and fuller as time went on, of the same primitive dispensation. Through- out all God's gracious dealings with man, we can trace a wonderful sameness and continuity, akin to that which science reveals to us in the constitution and arrangements of the earth and of the stars. And c 34 THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. what an overwhelming idea does this thought give us of the unchangeableness, the all-comprehensive intelligence, and foreknowledge of God ! The wonder- ful manifoldness of Scripture, the infinitely varied experiences of which it is the utterance and to which it addresses itself, are but the unfolding of the kingdom of redeemed humanity from its root in the promise made to our first parents in Eden ; just as the infinite diversity of nature is but the manifestation of the original conception contained in the first strokes of the Great Artist's pencil in the first creative fiat, "Let there be light." And between the revelation of nature and the revelation of the Bible there is a continuity of relationship which proves that the one is the complement and fulfilment of the other, and that they are both the work of one Mind. For He who commanded the light at first to shine out of darkness, and so wrought out all the forces and forms of creation, hath shined into our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of His glory in the face of Jesus Christ, and so hath wrought out all the forces and forms of the new creation. 5. Man's body is a tabernacle the greatest of all temples. It is fearfully and wonderfully made, the very highest possible form of organization, the master- piece of creation. It, too, is one in the fullest sense of the word, being indeed the most complete and vital unity in the material universe. It is the finished result of all the strivings and tentative efforts which make up the history of the creature, and contains in its ii. THE ONENESS OF THE TABERNACLE. 35 structure clear traces of all the stages through which it has passed, and by which it has been perfected, linking its vesture with that which clothed in succession of development the inferior animals from the lowest forms. The rudimentary organs that are useless in the lower animals in which they occur acquire use and significance in man's body; while the structures that exist as dwarfed survivals in him are eminently useful in the lower creatures in which they are found. In both cases they are the golden taches linking them together into one grand tabernacle. Man's body sums up in itself all the forms, forces, and substances of the world furnishes the key to the whole order of nature, being a microcosm, or "in little all the sphere." It builds out of the common dust of the ground a shrine on whose altar the fire of conscious life is ever burning, and the sacrifice of one part of its substance for the maintenance of the rest is being constantly offered; through which pass communications alike from the lower and the higher spheres matter being stamped with its lofty impress and linked with the world of mind and spirit. But that which gives the body its wonderful unity, which builds up its parts, and compacts them into one grand vital whole, and makes of it a temple, is the human soul that pervades and possesses it. Body and soul constitute together man's personality. Neither is complete without the other. We are apt to separate between them, and to cast the things of the body into an unkindly and unnatural shade, while we 36 THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. unduly exalt all that refers to the soul. But the Gospel in its wholeness includes them both, and insists upon our being complete not only in our spiritual but also in our bodily nature ; for each element of our complex being has its own distinct use and function, and the true human completeness is the sanctification of body, soul, and spirit. By the unity of body and spirit we have always a sense of our own personal identity, and realize the intellectual and moral continuity of our lives. And our Christian belief in the resurrection of the body is but the logical consequence the last and highest expression of our intense belief in the indestructible unity of man ; for we believe that this unity would be mutilated, if at death the body, which is as necessary as the soul to constitute man's personality, were to perish altogether. Reason and revelation alike assure us that man's unity, in its unimpaired completeness, will be preserved through all the changes of life and death, and when this mortal shall have put on immortality. Man is the high-priest of God, in whom the world is conscious of its own harmony, and who is to exhibit that harmony in its highest form in the order of his life, and in this way to show forth consciously and willingly the praise of God which the inferior creation is showing forth without either consciousness or will. For his sake the wonderful unity of the universe, the unity of the tabernacle, the unity of the Church, the unity of the Bible exists. They have been thus constructed and ordained that by the teaching and training they afford he might grow up into an holy and harmonious habita- THE ONENESS OF THE TABERNACLE. 37 tion of God through the Spirit. But through the exercise of his unique gift of liberty, sin has introduced disorder into his person and life. He broke away from the law of his being, from the gravitation of God, and lost the cohesion of his nature, which henceforth be- came disintegrated and corrupt. The flesh now lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh. There is a law in the members warring against the law of the mind. We have broken up our life into little fragments ; we contrast secular and sacred, assign- ing this part to the world and that to God living exclusively for heaven or exclusively for earth ; wholly carnal or wholly spiritual. There is a ceaseless struggle within us, and a ceaseless strife without us. We are the centre of a whirlpool of contending and discordant forces which we ourselves have set in motion. Our wheels and those of nature are out of gear, and therefore continually clash. We are homeless and restless in a world where all other creatures are at home and at rest All the scenes and objects of creation witness that we only are changed, that we only have introduced disorder into God's works. Of this strife the noblest spirits are the most conscious. But God has not left man to be thus the only discord in the music of His works. He has sent His own Son to tabernacle in our world and in our nature, and so establish the balance between all the parts of our being, and restore the lost harmony between man and nature. By His atoning death our Lord made an end of that sin which caused the discord and confusion. By His 3 8 THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. n. perfect life He consecrated alike all the parts and offices of life. And by taking up with Him into heaven at His ascension the results of His thirty years of obscure physical labour, as well as the three years of His spiritual ministry, and transfiguring them both, He has abolished the distinction between secular and sacred, and restored a real unity to human existence. Order, beauty, harmony, life, joy, are all brought back by Him. What a wonderful grandeur of meaning do the revelations of science in regard to the chain of life, from the lowest monad up to man, give to the old words which we usually read with so little apprehension of their significance : " A body hast thou prepared for me !" Looking back from the incarnation through the long dim vista of the world's development, we see how God was slowly and gradually preparing a tabernacle in which creation and the Creator should meet, not in semblance but in reality. " In Him all things con- sist;" or, as the idea contained in the Greek word thus translated might be conveyed, He is the key- stone that binds together and rounds to perfection the glorious arch of the universe. "For it hath pleased the Father that in Him should all fulness dwell," the fulness of the creature and the fulness of the Godhead; " and having made peace through the blood of His cross, by Him to reconcile all things unto Himself; by Him, I say, whether they be things in earth or things in heaven." CHAPTER III. THE HOSPITALITIES OF NATURE. " As for the stork, the fir-trees are her house." PSALM civ. 17. VERY remarkable was the feeling with which the ancient poets of Israel regarded the cedars of Lebanon ; a feeling which has survived in the worship which the Maronite priests celebrate annually under their shade during the Feast of the Transfiguration. For long ages these venerable trees clothed the slopes and valleys of the great Syrian range ; and with their roots planted in old glacial moraines, they bore witness regarding the amazing luxuriance and abundance of the pines of the far-off Miocene world, and still car- ried out their important uses in the economy of nature. The Psalmist, whose keen eye even for the humblest objects is strikingly seen in the great hymn of nature set to the music of the spheres the io4th Psalm was struck with the wide hospitality which they afforded. The grove of belated cedars the last survivors of a most hospitable old race in its retired nook on the north-western slope of Lebanon attracted the mi- 39 4 o THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. gratory birds ; and in the quiet retreat, in the fragrant shade, protected from the wild storms that raged over the snowy plateaus outside, they built their nests and reared their young in safety. There could not be a greater contrast than between the wind-swept desola- tion around and the oasis of life created in the midst of it by these magnificent trees. Outside is the stillness of death ; within, nature is never silent. All day the shrill sound of the grasshopper is heard, and the grove re- sounds with the short, clear notes of little birds. Eze- kiel gathers all animal life around these cedars, for there, he says, " All the fowls of heaven made their nests in his boughs, and under his branches did all the beasts of the field bring forth their young." The Psalmist also shows the fitness of the fir-trees of the lower heights of Lebanon for the nests of the stork, these being better adapted for their habitation than the roofs of the houses, which they frequent in Europe ; for in the East such situations are too frequently made use of in domestic economy to suit the quiet and retiring habits of the bird. And he goes on to notice the beautiful adaptation that exists between the timid marmot or coney and the clefts of the inaccessible rocks to which it flees in danger; and between the chamois or wild goat of Syria and the snow-clad haunts over which it freely ranges, secure from the pursuit of man or beast of prey. The relation between birds and particular trees is especially interesting. It would seem, indeed, as if some trees grew dense, and matted together their in. THE HOSPITALITIES OF NATURE. 41 branches, that they might thus afford a secure asylum for little birds. This would appear to be the final cause of the lime tree to give a single example which, instead of spreading out its boughs and branches widely like other trees, crowds them together, and so fills up the vacant spaces with slender little twigs that the whole centre of the tree forms an impervious laby- rinth of brushwood, within which the little bird is safe from the pursuit of its foes. Some objects are repellent and exclusive. They give no shelter or support to any created thing. They suffice for themselves, and stand out clearly defined in their distinct and independent existence. The surface of the snow is barren ; the chilly glacier has no com- munion with the mountain glen through which it passes. The clear, sharp-cut crystal harbours no stain from earth or sky to show its sympathy with the materials out of which it sprang. The marble rock, like the snow, does not invite the green things of the soil around to share its existence with it, and give to and take from it an element of picturesqueness and beauty. And yet, as in human society, when social laws over- bear private plans, and the social design is fulfilled in spite of selfish opposition, so in nature the substances that seek to exclude others are made to contribute to the general harmony and the beautiful balancing of creation. The very snow is made to be friendly and hospitable, for it nourishes on its stainless bosom a simple, one-celled plant which grows with such rapidity and in such marvellous profusion that it gives to whole 4 2 THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. fields of polar and alpine snow a deep crimson hue, as if a creature's blood had dyed them. In the shallow parts of water melted on the surface of the glacier by the hot noon-day sun may be seen jelly-like masses of vegetation ; while under the stones which the rocks around hurl down upon it, as if in anger at its hostility, may be found lively colonies of the small black glacier flea. Nature will not allow this cold, frigid substance to maintain a separate existence j for besides boulders from the rocks, she persists in soiling its surface with dirt-bands and masses of debris from the crumbling mountain-side, so that a line of demarcation between ice and earth cannot be drawn, and the glacier blends with the rest of the mountain ; while the sky claims kindred with the deep cerulean blue that shines in the crevasses. Marble, too, takes on the warm, golden tint of the sunset, and is stained by time with a russet hue that brings it into partnership with the common rocks, with which all things make friends the mosses, lichens, vines, and birds. Even the hardest crystals and preci- ous stones have occasional cavities filled with fluids, which indicate their origin. Nay, so anxious is nature to assimilate every object, that on the thatch of man's lowly cottages she plants her tufted mosses ; on the slates of his statelier roofs she paints her frescoes of golden lichens ; and even on his windows she produces not only the iridescence of age, but also a growth of curious, minute algae. On his dark unsightly cinder- walks, which seem like spots of ink disfiguring nature's fair page, she makes her dandelions to open their sun- THE HOSPITALITIES OF NA TURE. 43 shine ; and on the raw new walls which he builds around his possessions, to separate them from nature's wastes, she spreads her hoary nebulae of vegetation. Man's works are thus made kindred to the earth and the elements : and nature, by her hospitalities, makes them at home in every situation. Some objects are more hospitable than others. The beech, of all trees, is perhaps the most self-contained. It fills out its trunk so thoroughly ; its bark is so hard and stuffed and rounded with its wood, that it has not a rift nor a crevice in which any living thing might find refuge. No moss forms a green tuft upon it ; no leafy or shrubby lichen finds a foot-hold on its smooth bark. And even the crustaceous species that consist of a mere film of grey matter grow thinner on its hard repel- lent surface than on the rock itself. They cling so closely that they cannot be separated. No botanist would go to the beech expecting to find on its trunk the wealth of lowly plants in which he delights. To the entomologist it is equally uninteresting, the number of insects that frequent it being exceedingly few. Nor is it chosen usually by birds to build their nests on its boughs. Darwin mentions that worms hardly ever make their curious castings under its shade. The ground beneath it nourishes no green grasses, and only its brown mast and polished three-cornered nuts carpet the soil. Why is the beech so inhospitable ? Why does it thus stand alone, apart from the rest of creation, and proudly maintain its own self-sufficient existence? It 44 THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. is indeed one of the grandest of our forest trees. No- thing can be lovelier than its translucent foliage in spring, making, as Coleridge says, " the level sunshine glimmer with green light" Nothing can be more splendid than its blaze of amber tints lighting up the whole woodland in autumn like a pillar of fire. Its shade is ample ; its leaves are sweet and tender ; its nuts pleasant and nutritious. And yet all creatures, with the exception of the pig, which feeds upon its nuts, seem to shun it ; and hardly any moss or lichen ornaments its trunk and arms with its quaint jewellery. It stands in the natural world of pictures around us as a type of a thoroughly selfish and unsocial nature. Only the lover seeks it to carve upon its smooth, hard bark the name of the beloved one, fondly hoping that it may long retain, clear and sharp as if cut in stone, the cherished inscription. But even this tender secret it refuses to keep ; its trunk swells, and the letters be- come dilated and distorted, and in a few years a new growth smooths out and obliterates the name, without leaving a trace on its callous wood. Perhaps this smoothness and hardness of the bark and wood, as well as the dryness of its shade for no other woods are so free from damp and so pleasant to walk in as beech woods may be the reason why it shelters so little dependent life. Even the rain-drops refuse to linger about it, and though the sunbeams may play through the green meshes of its transparent foliage and tremble on the lines of silky hairs that project from the margins of its young leaves " like eyelashes from the in. THE HOSPITALITIES OF NATURE. 45 margin of the eyelid," yet without moisture the light can favour no growth of fern or moss or lichen, which loves a damp atmosphere ; and without these lowly plants no insect or bird-life can flourish. Another inhospitable tree is the pine. Its degree of selfishness varies with the species, some being much more tolerant of alien life than others ; the common larch and the cedar being, perhaps, the least exclusive, and the aurucaria the most. The trunk and branches of the larch are covered from head to foot with tufts and rosettes of hoary lichens, which cling specially to this tree and give it a most venerable appearance ; but the aurucaria surrounds itself with an impenetrable armour of spears and daggers, within whose formidable circle no living thing dare intrude. I once saw a squirrel skipping along a lawn and, suddenly stopping at the foot of a tall, wide-spreading aurucaria, it looked up at the bristling trunk and branches with evident astonishment, as if it had never seen anything of the kind before ; and with an expression of disappointment and fear that was almost human, and certainly was exceedingly comical, it turned away and climbed up a more propitious-looking species of pine near at hand. But whatever may be the case in regard to individual trees, the pine-tribe in its social character is decidedly inhospitable. A pine wood is one of the loneliest scenes in nature, not merely as regards the intrusion of man, but as regards the intrusion of any other living thing. Nothing breaks up its uniformity and monotony. It has none of the rich variety of. life that characterizes 46 THE OLIVE LEAF. CHAP. other woods. The seasons themselves make no im- pression upon it, for it is dressed in perennial green,