Another home picture and the next in order is the coming of a new being,--the first symbol of the kingdom of heaven--a third immortal, into the home, consecrating it to new sanctities and adding to its picture the rosy hues of childhood and the mellow warmth of parental love. Earth has no other scene so tinged with the softened tints of heavenly light, at once so tender, so solemn, so full of immortal possibilities. The past and future meet here and blend their realities together. The illusions of fancy are gone. Stern reality colors and characterizes the picture. The joy, the fear, the responsibility of sacred trust, the hope which arches over the little being an auroral bow, all mingle in the strong sentiment of this picture, which no words can make equal in poetic reality to its actual experience.

What a wonder is a baby, especially the first! What marvels of sweet surprise are its dreamy eyes, its tiny hands, its chubby feet, its rosy lips, its hair of silk and down, its whole little human make-up! Practically considered it seems to be a little good-for-nothing, so helpless and useless is it, and yet in the estimate of those into whose hands it has come, it is worth many times its weight in gold. It brings with it a subtle power by which it changes these young parents into new beings, makes their home a new place, sets before them new objects of life, and transforms the world about them into a new world. Nothing is with them as it was before. They see with new eyes, they work with new hands, they feel with new hearts, and think with new minds. They pass through another stage of development and learn more of what is within them, and what they are made to be and made for. They are married again. A new strand is put into the marital cord that binds them together. In this little baby, which they call theirs by a title of ownership written in its body and soul, they feel themselves blended into an indissoluble oneness. This actual union no divorce can dissolve, no infidelity can destroy. To this, marriage points. This is the fulfillment of its intention. It is this, in part, which makes it so serious and sacred. It is this which involves in such real responsibilities and fills it with such sublime importance. Marriage deals with creative power, allies man in partnership of creation with God and puts upon him the responsibilities involved in a new immortality of being. Under this view, how grandly serious, as well as joyful and important, is marriage! And how mysteriously and closely it allies the great Creator of us all with His children in the continuance of His creative work and links Him and them in a union impossible of severance. In a sense He is in them and they live in Him. "We live and move and have our being in Him." Not far away, therefore, is He whom we are taught to call "Our Father." And these first institutions of men, marriage and home, are quickened and magnified by His presence in them. When men shall marry and dwell in their homes, in the consciousness of dwelling with God and of conforming to His will and law in these great institutes, how much better will marriage and home be, and how much more fidelity, and unselfishness, and burden-bearing and helpfulness will there be in this too thoughtless and selfish world! ::Read Marriage Part I::