To dye thy sick leaves to a healthier hue,
Till the scant years of youth’s once ample dower
Requicken with late fruitage rare to view;
Yea, He must shape thee by thine own heart’s power,
And fashion all this ruined life anew.
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CHRIST THE LAMB
The figure of a lamb slain dominates the whole aspect of the religion of redemption. Nature and grace seem to blend in harmonious echoes of this ideal presentation.
High up on the old German church of Werden is carved the image of a lamb, concerning which the villagers tell this story. Many years ago, a mason was at work on the portion of wall where now this figure stands, when the cord by which his plank seat was suspended snapt, and he was hurled down to what seemed instant death, for masses of rough stone lay thick on the ground below, the building being under repair. He arose unhurt, for there among the stone-heaps a little lamb had been nibbling at scanty tufts of herbage, and on this animal he had fallen safe and softly, while the lamb lay crusht to death. The man so strangely saved had the monument erected in grateful, lasting memory of his deliverance from a cruel death, and of the innocent creature to whom he owed it. (Text.)
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