Page:The Faith as Unfolded by Many Prophets.djvu/155

 are avoided, the flower shall surely blossom to his wish. Thus surely shall many virtues adorn the mind of the child to the parent's wish, if his young days are tended by watchful and enlightened care, so that no evil is permitted to lay waste the fair promise he puts forth.

If I thought like Aza, said Havilah, I should be like the ostrich of the desert, who leaves her eggs in the sand, unguarded by her care, and uncherished by the warmth of her breast. Whether her young have perished, she returns not to see: if she meets them abroad, she knows them not for her own, and they pass her by as a stranger, and leave her alone. Wiser is the stork, who shelters his young in the high cedar. When the tree is bowed before the storm, he spreads his wings over the nest: he takes his young abroad in the morning sunshine, and leads them home when the thunder is in the sky. When he is old, his children forsake him not. They gather food for him, and bear him on their wings, and guard him as he guarded them in the days of his strength. Though God cares for all, though he supplies warmth to the young ostrich from the sun, as to the stork from the breast of his parent, the