“I am sure it is a great mistake always to know enough to go in when it rains. One may keep snug and dry by such knowledge, but one misses a world of loveliness.”
It is probably not so big as
when it rested luxuriously upon the water, but it is wake-robin, still,
and it does more than summon the birds: it calls each of us back to
Nature, bidding us keep our hearts and souls alive to see, with each
renewing of springtime, and to love afresh, the miracles of Nature’s
redemptive force.
[Illustration: ❦]
The beauty of springtime, like the beauty of childhood, is always new.
All about me the things of Nature are still in the mystical, subtile
tenderness of their young, green growth. The golden days of autumn are
full of their own beauty. The grey days of winter’s mist and fog have
theirs, but there is something in the tender blue days of the rainy
springtime that sets the heart apraise, and ☙ brings out as nothing else
can, the meanings of leaf and bud, of flower and tree. It is raining,
now. Up above me, on the road, several picnickers who have been caught
in this April shower are hurrying to shelter ❧ They look down curiously
at me, here under the willow, and I have some misgiving as to whether
they are not setting an example that I should follow ❦ But I am sure
that it is a great mistake always to know enough to go in when it rains.
One may keep snug and dry by such knowledge, but one misses a world of
loveliness. There is, after all, a certain selective wisdom that sees
the desirability of taking the showers as they come.
There is something peculiarly tender and loving about an April shower.
One is so fully conscious, even while the drops are falling, that the
sun is shining behind the light clouds. And the drops themselves come
down so gently, tentatively offering themselves, as it were, to the
welcoming earth—pattering lightly on the leaves, and softly rippling the
surface of the little pool under the willows. That is a wonderful sort
of comparison the Hebrew poet gives us when he likens the teaching of
truth to the small rain upon the tender herb: the showers upon the green
grass ☙
The young colt in the stall, yonder, thrusts an eager head over the
half-door, and with soft black muzzle in the air, stands with open mouth
to catch the delicious trickle. The cattle on the hills seem glad of the
wetting. Even the birds have not sought shelter, and why should I? ☘ I
love to watch the leaves of the trees and plants, in the rain.
