Impressions 



When knowledge replaces ignorance we are less 

 guests and more companions. If we cultivated 

 earth-knowledge as we do artificiality, and 

 spent with weeds and rocks the time that is 

 given to vain speculation concerning the un- 

 knowable, Dame Nature and "Homo sapiens" 

 would be better friends. Man has been on the 

 earth for many thousands of years, but has not 

 yet reached to the years of discretion concern- 

 ing this planet. 



When we think of the pebble that obstructs 

 our step as but an obstacle to easy going, and 

 toss it contemptuously aside, we are not walk- 

 ing to good purposes; but if the pebble com- 

 mands our attention, if we see it as a fragment 

 of a great bed of rock, if we see that it has been 

 rounded by water action, rolling for ages in 

 the bed of a stream, then we are walking, and 

 the mere movement of the lower limbs is the 

 least part of it. Walking calls for our head as 

 well as our heels. 



I remember that when a child and sent upon 

 an errand, I was told not to loiter. But I did. 

 I learned to loiter as I learned to walk, and re- 

 joice now that parental instruction was not fol- 



23 



