Those  who  trace  its  beginning  and  its  growth,  recognize
the  subtle,  the  invisible  influences  of  nature,  as  in  the  well
known  sonnet  to  the  Avon  :

"In  thy  green  lap  was  Nature's  darling  laid."

But  in  what  "  green  lap  "  of  natiire  was  cradled  the  spirit
of  the  young  Hebrew  ?  He  was  not  the  darling  of  natiu'e
or  of  fortune.  He  was  not  bom  on  the  banks  of  the  Avon,
but  among  the  rugged  Galilean  hills.
No  doubt,  there  is  a  wide  difference  in  the  constitutions


128  THE    "education"    OF   JESUS.
of  men.  Tliere  are  natures  so  delicately  sensitive  to  spii'it-
ual  influences,  that  they  catch  insjiiration  from  the  common
ail*  ■which  others  breathe,  but  which  in  them  works  to  no
such  fine  issues.  "  What  time  the  South  T\-ind  blows,  the
violets  open  their  petals  to  the  sun,"  and  so  there  ai'e  cer-
tain influences  which  come  from  the  very  elements,  which
touch  the  human  sovd  and  quicken  it  to  life.  Such  influ-
ences, the  modem  school  of  naturalists  will  have  it,  touched
and  kindled  the  imagination  of  the  child  Jesus,  dimly  con-
scious of  his  transcendent  powers,  yet  having  nothing  to
converse  with  but  natui'e.  ("  He  always  kept  close  to
nature,"  says  Renan.)  It  is  easy  to  picture  the  "  mar-
vellous boy  "  climbing  the  heights  around  Nazareth,  and
looking  with  his  great  eyes  upon  what  seemed  to  him  the
boundless  plain  below,  bej^ond  which  lay  Jenisalem,  the
capital  of  his  country  and  his  faith  ;  and  off"  to  the  Sea
which  rolled  upon  the  horizon,  the  emblem  of  immensity,
of  infinity,  and  etemitj.  And  so  in  silence  and  commvm-
ion  with  nature,  his  soul  grew  to  its  immeasurable  great-
ness.
