NEAR AND FAR.

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 114, 6 January 1932, Page 4

NEAR AND FAR.

Christmas at Sea. Decorations on the' stairways and other parts of the mail steamer Monowai when she berthed at Wellington last week testified to the fact that althongh circumstances caused her passengers to spend Christmas at sea, the observance of the festive season was no less in accordance with custom than is usual ashore. It was perhaps unfortunate that Christmas Day should fall on the ship's first day out from Sydney, and many of the passengers were consequently unable to do justice to the seasonal spread, but at least the spirit was as willrng as ever. Not the Messiah. With the possible exception of Mrs. Basant, everybody will admire Krishi amurti for the candid way he has admitted that he is not the Messiah after all. Krishnamurti is fortunate to live in an age renowned for broadminded indulgcnce. Had our friend been born in ehrlier and more narrowminded times assuredly he would have ended his life at. the stake. In the year 1222 a man who claimed to he the Messiah and a woman who claimed to be his mother came to an untimely end hy hurning. William Hacket, * who personated the Saviour in 1591 was executed for blasphemy. A fe^ years before that' the son of a Ghent waterman, by name George David, styled himself the Son of God sent into the world to adopt children. After gathering a large body of followers he met a mysterious end at Basle. With his last words he' promised to return in three years — but he never came.