Image provided by: University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries, Lincoln, NE
About Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922 | View Entire Issue (April 5, 1908)
0 7 r 0 s 7 2 1 th 1908 o n oj Afitf ; M .HV.mX' - X .W IVVw-'A HtX-W - s.v ing expression in poetic imagery, . ( h. Mr X' lISS '9 jTmWf I kU and the world above as well as the r y f - f iM vMul 1M f f - , , Wld beneath was peopled .with I'M J ot Drams mat ' wl X ' tf:Wi-'M2 lit 1 MWim ml f Vtf fanciful creations felt but did not'unaerstand, the divisions of the year were recognized, and with thefyernal Equinox camo ' a season of rejoicing. It was a new birth, and man felt the inspi ration of the season, and rejoiced that spring had come again. And as his intelligence advanced, and Jiis knowledge of natural ; conditions increased, he gave still more of reverential awe to the great mystery of the Spring time. Those old astronomers, who watched the stars from housetops, and in the desert, and whose unaided eyes pierced the veil that Nature hangs over the night, giving names to stars that still serve to designate .them, revered the forces they could not comprehend, and in their wonderment at the inscrutable ways of the great mechanism of the universe, ascribed to the beneficence of the deity they worshiped the same wisdom and provident watch fulness as that believed in by the most devout of enlightened Christians. Some of them went even further, and with a fine faith that takes on most poetic expression, made the Vernal Equinox the supreme event of the year, and arranged their calen dars coincide, so that the new year begins with the sun's crossing the line in the Spring time. Today the Tersians continue in this, and celebrate the day of the Equi nox in March as the New Yqar. Science has done little for man in this matter, save to enable him to more closely calculate the passage of the sun and the consequent pro cession of the seasons. The fact itself is as old as Time, and the feast that accom panies it is as old as man's understanding. The value of Easter to the Christian church lies in its symbolism. Just as the return of Spring time promises to the world a new birth and another season of bud and blossom and fruitage, so does Easter fore tell to the devout the fulfillment of a glorious promise of the resurrection and the life everlasting. Its association with the agony and the persecution, death and burial of the Nazarene, and his triumph over the tomb is fraught with all the tender mystery that surrounds the whole question of Life, and holds the hope that has been upper most in man's mind at all times. It is the support of the faifh that looks beyond the grave, and the bulwark of the trust that leads mankind through, the Valley of the Shadow. Therefore, the Church of Christ glories in its Easter festival as in no other. It is the evidence of that on which the foundation of the Church rests, and without and tinkling cymbals. "w And in the n 11 iv u j v-.--i "o ' w Spring time of the year Nature takes on a new garb. The browns of Autumn and the grays of "Winter give way to the softer tints of green, and in the earlier days of the season all creation comes forth with new and brighter garb. The Easter festival is a proper time for the display of appropriate rai- . 1 i 1 11 1 , . .1 !n 4 r rav rum ment, ana 10 ue wen uiefeu ia uui w .-v, deference to the opinion of one's. fe,llowmen, but it is also a duty one owes to oneself. nil""'