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Show THE WIND; SILENCE AND TiOVE. Hi' By Fiona McLcod. I know one who, asked by a friend desiring more intimate knowledge as to what influences above all other influences had shaped her inward H life, answered at once, with that sudden vision of insight which reveals more than the vision of thought, "The Wind, Silence nad Love." The answer was characteristic, for, with her Hh who made it, the influences that shape have al- Hji ways seemed more significant than the things that are shapen. None can know for another the 1 mysteries of spiritual companionship. What is an abstraction to one is a reality to another; what to one has the proved, familiar face, to another is illusion. I can well understand the one of whom I write. With most of us the shaping influences are the common, sweet influences of motherhood and fatherhood, the. airs of home, the place and man-ner man-ner of childhood. But these are not for all, and may be adverse and in some degree absent. Even when a child is fortunate in love and home, it may be spiritually alien from these; it may dimly dis-pern dis-pern love as a mystery dwelling in sunlight and moonlight, or the light that lies on quiet mead-ows, mead-ows, woods, quiet shores; may find a more inti-mate inti-mate sound of home in the wind whispering in the grass, or when a sighing travels through the wil-derness wil-derness of leaves, or when an unseen wave moans in the pine. , When we consider, could any influences be deeper than these three elemental powers, for-ever for-ever young, yet older than age, beautiful immoral immor-al talities that whisper continually against our mor-tal mor-tal ear.- The Wind, Silence and Love; yes, I B think of them as good comrades, nobly ministrant, B priests of the hidden way. To go into solitary places, or among trees which await dusk and storm, or by a dark shore; to be a nerve there, to listen to, inwardly to hear, to Be at one with, to be as grass filled with, as reeds shaken by, as a wave lifted before the wind; this is to know what cannot otherwise be known; to hear the intimate, dread voice; to listen to what long, long ago went away, and to what now is going go-ing and coming, coming and going, and to what august airs of sorrow prevail in that dim empire of shadow where the falling leaf rests unfallen, where Sound, of all else forgotten and forgetting, lives in the pale hyacinth, the moonwhite pansy, the cloudy amaranth that gathers dew. And in the wood; by the grey stone on the hill; where the heron waits; where the plover wails; on the pillow; in the room filled with flame-warmed flame-warmed twilight; is there any comrade that is as Silence is? Can she not whisper the white secrecies se-crecies that words discolor? Can she not say, when we would forget, "Forget?" when we would remember, "Remember?" Is it not she also who says, "Come unto me all ye who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest?" Is it not she who has a lute into which all loveliness of sound has passed, so that when she breathes upon it life is audible? Is it not she who will close many doors, and shut away cries and tumults, and will lead you to a green garden and a fountain in it and say, "This is your heart and that is your soul; listen." The third one, is he a Spirit, alone, uncom-panioned? uncom-panioned? I think sometimes that these three are one, and that Silence is his inward voice, and the Wind the sound of his unwearying feet. Does he not come in wind, whether his footfall be on the wild rose or on the bitter wave, or in the tempest tem-pest shaken with noises and rains that are cries and tears, sighs and prayers and tears? He has many ways, many hopes, many faces. 1.; .r:-. .t ,, ., -i mi h it ; M-r.r, ,r. "- ... rl.i-fap.gif He bends above those who meet in twilight, above the cradle, above the dwellers by the hearth, above the sorrowful, above the joyous children of the sun, above the grave. Must not he be divine, who is worshiped of all men? Does not the wild dove take the rainbow on its breast because of him, and the salmon leave the sea for inland pools, and the creeping thing become winged and radiant? ' The Wind, Silence and Love; if one can not learn of these, is there any comradeship that can tell us more, that can more comfort us, that can so inhabit with living light what is waste and barren? And in the hidden Hour, one will stoop, and kiss us upon the brow, when our sudden stillness will, for others, already be memory. And another will be as an open road, with morning breaking. , And the third will meet us with light of joy in his eyes; but we shall not see him at first because of j the sun-blaze, or hear his words because in that summer air the birds will be multitude. c Meanwhile they are near and intimate. Their life uplifts us. We cannot forget wholly, nor cease to dream, nor be left unhoping, nor be without rest, nor go darkly without torches and songs, if these accompany us, or we them, for they go one way. The Mirror. |