In our celebrations of the Christian festival of Christmas emphasis is placed upon the advent of the Child—the boy who be-! ame the personification of godlike qualities, whose life and teachings as a man have been the most: potent force of the ages. We need not enter into a theological discussion as to the divinity of Christ. Those of us who accept it as a fact by reason of faith, and those of us who believe He was divine puly 2s we all are spiritually divine, can and do unite in observing with re ference the birthday of the most perfect exponent of the principles of love whom the world has yet known.
We would do well, however, to pause for a moment in our busy preparations for giving cheer at this season, to consider Christmas from another angle, namely from that of the mother. No great man has ever lived who did not have great mother—great in some one or many qualities. His greatness was due partly to the physical elements which his mother gave of her body, and partly to the elusive, intangible yet vital influence which she exerted chiefly in his early days. The source of this influence is motherliness, the manifestation of the maternal instinct.
Tue Worsuie or MoruerHoop.
It seems almost as futile and as uncalled for to speak of motherhood as it is to sing epics of the sea. Both are natural, elemental} forces, unfathomed, mysterious, powerful. Who can set bounds to othe influence of that gift of woman which is the life of the race, the; haven of the child, and the hap-Piness of man? As the sea surges, motherliness gives, sacrifices, cherishes. No custom of ancient times has so successfully survived the changing ideas of time as_ the! religious worship of motherhood. While ideas have changed as the purpose of education, the importance of training by the mother Persists.
Motherhood is far from being: confined to the processes of physical creation. The great poet.9f the north, Bjornstjerne - Bjornson, has said that "all creating is of mother origin." And it is. Think for a moment of all the qualities which a child needs in its mother, and you have the quali which any work needs in its creator. Speaking in these terms, man may have his "motherliness" the same as woman. What Ellen Key cal "the well of maternal tenderness: is the productive force behind al! new creations, whether physical or
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.