ning photographs the world anew, is a more useful invention and
in its day was a great wonder. Still farther back, hidden in the mists
of antiquity, lies the invention of the alphabet that is even more
useful and marvelous. It is when we get back to the oldest tools, the
hammer and plough and loom, that we come to inventions of the greatest
fundamental utility, and we could better afford to give up all our
modern magic machines than to part with these.

The oldest literature is ever the ripest, richest and best, and Homer
and Shakespeare overtop all our modern writers as the Alps overshadow
the hills lying around their feet. What modern preacher can compare in
eloquence and power with Paul and Isaiah? Nature is ever full of new
wonders, and yet the grass was as green and the mountains as grand and
the golden nets and silver fringes of the clouds were as resplendent in
the days of Abraham as they are to-day. We are the heirs of the ages,
but wonder and wisdom were not born with us, and with us they will not
die.

Where must we go to find the greatest wonder? Not to the scientist's
discoveries and the inventor's cunning devices: the greatest marvel is
not material but spiritual; and to find it we must not look into the
present or future, but go back to the first Christmas morning. On that
morning the Judean shepherds had a story to tell which all they that
heard it wondered at and which is still the wonder and song of the
world. The birth of Jesus is absolutely the greatest event of all time.
Whatever view is taken of him he has become the Master of the world.
Christ has created Christendom, silently lifting its moral level as
mountains are heaved up against the sky from beneath. The coming of such
a unique and powerful personality into the world is an infinitely
greater wonder than the discovery of a new continent or the blazing out
of a new star in the sky.

II. Preparation for the Event

Near events may have remote causes. The river that sweeps by us cannot
be explained without going far back to hidden springs in distant hills.
The huge wave that breaks upon the ocean shore may have had its origin
in a submarine upheaval five thousand miles away.

A wide circle of causes converged towards this birth; all the spokes of
the ancient world ran into this hub. When Abraham started west as an
emigrant out of Babylonia, "not knowing whither he went," he was
unconsciously traveling towards Bethlehem. Jewish history