3 6 UNDER THE TREES. 



forever; the brief, fierce, fruitless strife for self is 

 succeeded by an unquestioning trust in that uni 

 versal good, above and beyond all thought, for 

 which the universe stands. Who shall despair 

 while the fields of earth are sown with flowers and 

 the fields of heaven blossom with stars ? The 

 open heart knows, in a revelation which comes to 

 it with every dawn and sunset, that life does not 

 mock its children when it holds this cup of peace 

 to their anguished lips, and that into this tideless 

 sea of rest and beauty every breathless and turbu 

 lent streamlet flows at last. 



In the silence of night how real and divine the 

 universe becomes ! Doubt and unbelief retreat be 

 fore the awful voices that were silenced by the din 

 of the day, but now that the little world of man is 

 hushed, seem to have blended all sounds into them 

 selves. Beyond the circle of trees, through which 

 a broken vision of stars comes and goes with 

 the evening wind, the broad earth lies hushed and 

 hidden. Along the familiar road a new and mys 

 terious charm is spread like a net that entangles 

 the feet of every traveler and keeps him loitering 

 on where he would have passed in unobservant 

 haste by day. The great elms murmur in low, in 

 articulate tones, and the shadows at their feet hide 

 themselves from the moon, moving noiselessly 

 through all the summer night. The woods in the 

 distance stand motionless in the wealth of their 

 massed foliage, keeping guard over the unbroken 



