them.  But he who understands that he is building for eternity can build with all the care and all the deliberation that is needed for so vast a work.  There is no haste if we select those things which have eternal value.  We can undertake the development of the Christian qualities of character with entire hopefulness.  The very conception of the beauty and perfectness of the fruits of the Spirit might discourage us if our time were limited.  But if we feel that the work we have done on them, however elementary and fragmentary, as long as it is honest and heartfelt, will not be lost when death comes, then we can go securely on.  We can go on in any spiritual work we have undertaken without that sense of feverish haste lest death overtake us and put an end to our labour which so affects men in purely secular things.  To us death is not an interruption.  Death does not destroy our human personality, nor does it destroy our interest in anything that like us is permanent.  We feel perfectly secure when we have identified ourselves with the business of the Kingdom of God.  Then we almost feel the throb of our immortality; the power of an endless life is now ours.  We have not to wait for death and resurrection to endue us with that power because it is the gift of God to us here, that gift of enternal life which our Lord came to bestow upon us.  Only the gift which we realise imperfectly or not at all at its bestowal we come to understand in something of its real power; and henceforth we live in the possession and fruition of it, growing up “into Him in all things, which is the Head, even Christ.”

     Hail, thou brightest Star of Ocean;
     Hail, thou Mother of our God;
     Hail, thou Ever-sinless Virgin,
     Gateway of the blest abode. 
     Ave; ’tis an angel’s greeting—­
     Thou didst hear his music sound,
     Changing thus the name of Eva—­
     Shed the gifts of peace around. 
     Burst the sinner’s bonds in sunder;
     Pour the day on darkling eyes;
     Chase our ills; invoke upon us
     All the blessings of the skies. 
     Show thyself a watchful Mother;
     And may He our pleadings hear,
     Who for us a helpless Infant
     Owned thee for His mother dear. 
     Maid, above all maids excelling,
     Maid, above all maidens mild,
     Freed from sin, oh, make our bosoms
     Sweetly meek and undefiled. 
     Keep our lives all pure and stainless,
     Guide us on our heavenly way,
     ’Till we see the face of Jesus,
     And exult in endless day. 
     Glory to the Eternal Father;
     Glory to the Eternal Son;
     Glory to the Eternal Spirit: 
     Blest for ever, Three in One.

PART TWO

CHAPTER XXI

THE FORTY DAYS

     To whom also he showed himself alive after his passion by
     many infallible proofs, being seen of them forty days, and
     speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God.