November Twenty-Fourth
John Knox died 1572.
Baron Spinoza born 1632.
Grace Darling born 1815.
Frances Hodgson Burnett born 1849.
I waited long until the sky
Should give me of its blue
To weave and wear, and share, and weave
The very stars into.
The days they went, the years they went,
And left my hands instead
Another thing for wonderment,
The mending and the bread.
Ah me, and one must set a hand
To burnish up the task,
And hush and hush the old demand
A wakeful heart will ask.
But with a star’s clear eye on me,
O, I can hear it said,
“What souls there be that only see
The mending and the bread!”
—Josephine P. Peabody.
The riches of a commonwealth
Are free, strong minds and hearts of health.
And more to her than gold or grain,
The cunning hand and cultured brain.
—John G. Whittier.
For the life is more than the food, and the body than the raiment.
—Luke 12. 23.
My Father, I pray that thou wilt help me, that I may not consume my life in preparing clothes and food for my body. Amen.