Each great European cathedral has its regular corps of repairers—architects, engineers, masons, carpenters, every man a master of his craft. The work of renovation goes on at all seasons; crumbling stones must be replaced, fresh cement supplied, broken parts mended; there is always something needing to be done. The inexperienced traveler is at first much annoyed by the sight of the stagings and scaffoldings from which cathedral walls seem never wholly free. “When,” he exclaims, “shall I at last find a façade which is not in the process of repair?” But with larger knowledge and more careful thought his feelings change.
The flimsy, unsightly framework clinging to the ancient gray stone no longer seems a blemish, but a true adornment, since it eloquently tells of the reverent, affectionate care which faithfully preserves for the future these “poems in stone” handed down from the mighty past.—“Monday Club, Sermons on the International Sunday-school Lessons for 1904.”
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RENUNCIATION
Dr. R. F. Horton, in the Christian Endeavor World, tells this incident concerning a wedding where he officiated:
A very little man had brought to the altar a very big bride, who, moreover, was attired in purple, and certainly bore a formidable aspect.
Whether the situation affected the bridegroom, or in a dreamy reminiscence his mind wandered back to childhood and the catechism when, on the mention of the world and the flesh and the devil, he promised to have nothing to do with them, I can not say. But sure enough, when I put to him the crucial question, “Wilt thou have this woman to be thy wedded wife?” the answer came, low but clear, “I renounce them all!” It was with some compunction that I said to him, “You must say, ‘I will.’”
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RENUNCIATION, COMPLETE