of
reflections which had first manifested itself to his consciousness at
Ehingen once more appeared on the surface of his thoughts. "Not the
hard drudgery of hands," said he to himself, "is the punishment of sin;
but, because mankind have once tasted of the tree of knowledge, they
are now condemned everlastingly to seek it, without ever enjoying it to
repletion. In the sweat of their brows they seek food for their minds:
the dry rustling leaves of books are the foliage under which the fruit
of knowledge is supposed to be concealed. Happy he to whom the
Christmas-tree, with its tapers lighted by unseen hands, has proved
this better tree of knowledge. Labor, Labor! Only the beast lives
without labor: it goes forth to seek its food without preparing it:
man, on the contrary, mingles his powers with the generative forces of
mother earth, lends his aid to the activity of the universe, and thus
the blessings of labor, rest, and peace of soul, fall to his share.
Blind Roman, how vapid was your motto, that life is warfare! how tawdry
the triumphs you held over subjugated brethren! Life is labor. True,
even that is a strife with the silent forces of nature; but it is a
strife of freedom, of love, which renovates the world. The stone's
obduracy yields to the chisel's industry, and helps to form the shelter
of the homestead. And more than all let me praise thee, tiller of the
soil! Into the furrowed wounds of the earth thou strewest sevenfold
life. The heart glows, the spirit moves, in thee. And as we subjugate
the earth and make it serve us, so also we learn to govern and guide
the earthly portion of our own natures; and as we wait for rain and
sunshine from above to make our work take root and flourish, so it is
thy will, O God, to pour out thy grace over us, to make the seed sown
in our spirits to thrive and sanctify our bodies. Give me, O Lord, a
little speck of earth, and I will plough it seven times over, so that
its hidden juices may sprout forth in blades which bow their heads
before the breath of thy mouth: I will raise the warts of my hands
aloft to praise thee, until thou shalt draw me up into thy kingdom."

"I should like well enough," he once said to himself, "to be a parson
on Sunday; but to spend a whole week occupied with nothing but the Lord
and the nothing we know about him,--to be as much at home in the church
as in one's bedroom,--why, that is to have no church and no Sunday at
all. Oh, heavens! how happy was