Parables from Nature by Margaret Gatty is read slowly across AO Years 1-3. It is definitely a challenging book – probably the most challenging in these Years, but it is also a very beautiful book rich in ideas. I was reading it aloud today to Michelle and came across this little gem, spoken in a stormy forest by an Owl to a group of trees utterly convinced that the End of All Things had come:
"And as he spoke there streamed once more from out of the clouds that type of peace that passeth not away – the moon that shone in Paradise. Oh, what a silver mantle she let fall upon the disrobed branches of those trees! Wet as they were with rain-drops, and waving in the gale, it seemed as if they shone in robes of starlight glory. What gracious promises seemed streaming down with that sweet light!
'Lift up your heads, ye forest trees, once more!' so sang the mild-eyed Bird of Night. 'Fury is short-lived – love alone enduring. All that destroys is transitory, but order is everlasting. The unbridled powers of cruelty may rage – it is but for a time! And ye may darken over the blue heavens, ye vapoury masses in the sky. It matters not! Beyond the blackness of those clouds, there shines, unaltered and serene, the moon that shone in Paradise.'"
~Margaret Gatty, "A Lesson of Hope", Parables from Nature
Wise words to remember the next time a Storm passes by here.
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