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species; as the spectators in the Roman circus outdid in ferocity the lions that licked the feet of the martyrs. Men, too, like Dantesque trees, deeply rooted in the soil, thorny to prick the passer-by, and fruitless as the fig-tree cursed of God. According to God's original design man is an inverted tree, his branches directed earthward, his roots — the head — turned to God. But sinners reverse in themselves God's design: their inner man turns from God and buries himself — his head, his heart, his soul, firmly and deeply in the earth. Oh, if God would grant us to see men as God sees them, what a desert wilderness, what a preposterous spectacle the world would afford! The blind man, when Jesus touched his eyes, exclaimed : " Lord, I see men like trees, walking." Touch our eyes, O Lord, and grant us to see and correct the woeful aspect of Thy fair creation, ere John's threat be fulfilled and the axe of Thy wrath be laid to the root of the tree. No wonder the god of day, that rises so bright and cheery of mornings, sets at eve blushing rosy red at the enormities he beholds; no wonder Nature at even-time rains down her dewy tears, and dons the mourning garb of night, sending the indulgent moon to shade away monstrosities or else to gild and beautify. In this vale of woe it was, our Nature fell and lay half dead, but hope revived at the voice of John proclaiming the advent of the good Samaritan— the Saviour. O blessed desert of solitude — a wilderness to the wicked, but virtue fills up the valley and straightens the crooked ways, calls down the