Dear Reader,I

If you have ever felt the world’s glitter grow thin, or sensed that some beauty greater than all its painted shows still waits to be known, then this sonnet is offered to you. It does not claim to exhaust the theme, only to point toward the One in whom beauty is not borrowed but original—the masterpiece Himself, whose radiance is traced in the works of His hands and in every benefit that flows from His grace.

May it serve, however faintly, to turn the eye from what fades to Him who does not fade, and to fill the heart, the soul, and the mind with that ceaseless beauty which alone can satisfy.—The Poet

One who hath gazed upon the Christ, and known
The radiance that burns beyond all art,
Finds every lesser glory overthrown,
And turns from every counterfeit of heart.

The world may spread her glittering array—
Her fleeting honours, pleasures, painted shows—
Yet none of these can hold the soul that may
Behold the beauty whence all light doth flow.

What once seemed fair grows pale beneath His eye;
What once seemed sweet turns bitter to the taste.
Heart, soul, and mind receive the gift most high—
The ceaseless beauty that His hand hath graced.

Thus Christ, the masterpiece, in all we see—
In nature, benefits, and majesty.

**To God be the glory always and only.