For Remembrance (ed. Repplier, 1901)/Epilogue to Madame Elizabeth of France. Glances Upward

Epilogue to Madame Elizabeth of France.
Glances Upward.
Delivered by Miss Alice Schoettle, Class of 1901.

ADIES: Before the Sacred Heart yesterday, in the greatest act of Catholic worship, we were all united,—Pontiff, priests, religious, pupils, guests, the children of this house in the past and in the present; and the House of God resounded with the Magnificat. Again, in spirit at least, we are united before the pictured vision of that Sacred Heart. It is in the thought of Its Divine Presence that our final word is spoken; and, since it is spoken in the name of Eden Hall, it represents more than it can utter. You, the former pupils of this beloved home, are here to stand for all the past generations that learned to bless the names of those guides and Mothers who founded and sustained God's work. The religious and the pupils of nineteen hundred would be faithless to the claims of gratitude, and cold to the most sacred appeals, if no voice to-day named Mother Elizabeth Tucker, who still keeps her sentinel's post yonder in the earthly Eden, as she holds her suppliant office in the heavenly Paradise. By her side, your eyes and your affections place that gentle spirit who aided her to make this a house of peace and faith, and who ruled it in the very sweetness of Charity,—Mother Charlotte McNally. Mother Boudreau's maternal goodness created for her in a few brief years that wealth of filial love which followed her to a distant mission, and lingers over her grave by Australian seas. Like a genial ray of sunshine across the years beams the memory of Mother Dunne,—of her bright smile, her ready hand, her great heart. But we may not name all the beloved ones whom your minds seek, to-day, where only they can be found,—with God. And as to the living,—for them there must be silence, because they would prohibit speech. If the crown of the order is bright with such names, not less lovely is the chaplet we could weave this hour out of the names of the children of Eden Hall. They are of the living and of the dead,—of nuns, of wives, of mothers, of saints! Daughters who gladden the fireside and bring God's light across the hearthstone; wives who, in sharing life's burden, glorify it by faith and patience; mothers whose hands blessed their children while they lived, and whose memories bless their children's children to the second and third generations; devoted nuns of every order, whether of teaching or of ministering, of heroic expiation or of perpetual adoration. For fifty-three years Eden has sent them forth to do the work of Christ, and after three and fifty years their names are laid by Christ's angels, as a garland of beauty on the brow of their Alma Mater. Numerous, but not countless,—for they are all counted,—are those who have passed to God,—religious and children; and the Church's sweetest prayer shall to-morrow repeat: "Requiescant in corde Jesu!" They rest in God, and therefore they live to us. We invoke their presence, and we know that to our tenderest blessing on them, respond their holiest blessings on us.

Ladies, yesterday was a day of thanksgivings. To-day there is an hour for memories. And, while you, who are at once the guests and the daughters of Eden, are looking back with love, we, the children to whom life is still a mystery, are looking onward with hope. We give to you the message that Eden has put into our hand, but its meaning is clearer to you than to us: "Children of the Sacred Heart, this is forever your home! Children of Eden, its word is always Welcome; never Farewell!"