Democratic Sentinel, Volume 22, Number 14, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 9 April 1898 — FLOWER THAT TYPIFIES EASTER [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

FLOWER THAT TYPIFIES EASTER

Religious and Poetic Associations tliat Cluster Around the Lily.

| HE flower that typic .les Easter to all nations and to all peoples is the lovely as- ; cension lily, which blooms in fragrant abundance in time for the festival of ; the spring. Every florist’s window is 1 a domed with its ! beauty; every pri- . vate dwelling is perJ meated with its /sweetness; it elus- ■ ters around altar and shrine, and \ wafts its penetrating | odor through the Llim aisles of vast cathedrals. It lies like

a star on the coat lapel, of the man of fashion, and rests contentedly pinned to the waist of the Easter costume of the belle of the season. As white is the color of the resurrection, any kind of a spotless blossom can be appropriately used for Easter decoration, but the lily is the symbol sanctioned for Easter service by tlip annual repetition of centuries. From the time of that faraway morning, when the angel rolled back Ihe stone from the sepulcher and told thesorrowing Mary to seek elsewhere for her risen Savior, the lily in art, in religion, in fashion, has typified the spirit of the resurrection. The lily was the popular blossom of Palestine. Over and over again its beauty is extolled in the Bible, anil the story ■of its loveliness is continued from page to page, and the scent of its fragrance steals faintly through the ages that separate the nineteenth century from the centuries that were chronicled before modern time began. “Consider the lilies of the field,” said the wisest man that ever lived. “They toil not, neither do they spin, and yet t say to you that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.” The beauty of the Easter blossom is as noticeable to-day as in the days of the /reign of the sage king of Jerusalem; and all the glory of the yearly Easter raiment, which fashion and beauty together fender so enticing, fades into insignificance before the lovely purity of the perfect starshaped flowers. What is properly the Easter lily with its long waxen petals and fragrant heart, is often called by other names, but the delightful odor that Juliet attached to the rose called by whatsoever title, is indeli.ibly associated with the glory of the spring festival. It promises Easter when March snow and wind are unpleasantly dragging •out winter’s life, and presages warmth and sunshine with the advent of April. The calla lily is a colder blossom than •the Easter (lower; deathlike rather than suggestive of a new birth, but its purity •of whiteness makes it appropriately seasonable. The modest valley lily with its string of tiny colorless bells, shares also the Easter privilege of paying floral tribute to the joy of the resurrection. After the lily the symbolic emblem of Easter is the egg. Formerly they were inown as Pasch eggs, and stained with dye woods and herbs, were presented as gifts to friends and acquaintances. Sometimes they were eaten and sometimes kept as amulets, and frequently games were played by striking shell against shell. In some moorland portions of Scotland it was fort’ rly the custom for bands of men and girls to goeout rtirly on the morning of Easter and Search for the eggs of wild fowl to be used at breakfast, and the finder considered himself blessed for the coming year by the god of fortune. The original use of the egg at Easter simply typified the revivification of nature at that season of the year. The Jews used eggs at the festival of the Passover, and the Persians in their celebrations of the solar new year, which occurred in March, mutually presented each other with colored eggs. Christianity retained the ancient symbol, but changed its significance into new birth and the risen life of the resurrection. Many of the popular Easter observances date backward to the times of the pagan ascendancy. The goddess Ostara. or Easter, was the personification of the east,

or morning, and also of spring, or the budding year. The Anglo-Saxon * name of April was Estormonatb, and Germany still recognizes it ns Ostermonath. The worship of the spring divinity was deeply imbedded in the superstitions of northern Germany and was carried to England by the Saxons. Even to the beginning of the present century Ostermonath was celebrated in Prussia by ceremonial rites and bonfires. Like the May jubilees in England, it was mainly a festival of joy; joy at the rising of the long-hidden sun and at the awakening of nature after her drowsy winter’s rest. But the church turned natural rejoicing into spiritual joy, and substituted the sun of righteousness for the material sun, and the resurrection of Christ for the birth of nature, while Ihe bonfire is typified in the huge Paschal candle of Easter Saturday.