THE ACORN AND THE MUSHROOM.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLVIII, Issue 3004, 27 February 1926, Page 4

THE ACORN AND THE MUSHROOM.

A PARABLE OF PROGRESS

A. young mushroom which peeped forth in the morning saw lying near a single acorn. “Villiat a dead thing it is to be sure.” exclaimed the mushroom. “Here am I absorbing the.pleasant heat of this early morn and my growth is rapid. Life courses through me. I mount upward and leave this stupid dull and inert acorn far behind.” The acorn returned no reply. It is doubtful if it even heard what the mushroom said, or whether it would pay any attention if it did hear. “Progress and swift change” were the vernal notes of the mushroom’s song —for all the Universe sings. Yet, “Progress” had a widely different meaning to the acorn than what was held by the revolutionary mushroom. The sun of day mounted in the heavens and the of its rays sucked up the dew which lay upon the earth, and which had been to the baby mushroom its first bath —likewise, also, its last. Swift in proportion as the flow of a rapid river the mushroom changed in form and stature. The acorn still in seeming idleness lay silently thinking. What were its thoughts? Not surely those of a vain thing that flashes upon time and anon has passed into oblivion. It dreamt of life as a steady growth extending over many clays, many moons and many years. Dead as it seems by appearance it yet bears within itself the heritage of great ancestry.

Its forefathers the giant oaks had flung their arms in sheer delight of living to higher heaven. They braved it through seeming eons of of time in sun and storm, holding their heads high through the gales of adversity and the calm peaceful days of ease and comfort. Where they towered aloft they were unmindful of any mushroom at their feet. It was to them a mere speck in (he infinite.

Still the conceited mushroom gloried in its revolutionary progress. Was it not the very embodiment of swift'change and development and what more was wanted in “ife. The sun grew hotter upon it as the day passed on. It had reached its meridian of growth. Another change is coming, alas, all too swiftly upon it. As the day wans it is found that the mushroom has drooped. It is reaching the stage when it withers and dies after a

-.wift but, oh, so narrow existence. Meantime the acorn sleeps on. flie winds of heaven blow the leaves and loose soil upon it until it is covered up as one buried who had never lived. But in tiie seeming si'ence of death the laws of life arc in operation. With the effluxion of time a tiny oak shows itself above the ground. It is slow in growth as the mushroom minds counts time but one (lav, having passed through many trails and vicissitudes, the acorn which was, has become the giant oak that is. In its maturity it tells to its fellows in the sighing if the winds its version of what progress means.

It is not a tale of rapid uprising and as rapid a descent into nothingness. Rather does it speak >f many wonderful experiences and associations. Time is as if it were :iot for the great tree. It has made progress unto life and each passing /ear adds but fresh life and merit to what lias gone before. The mushroom lived but as the shadow of a dream its existence was so evanescent. The oak lives on as one that has real progress, having its roots deep in the past and reachbig out into the future. The one is ilie emblem of stability and (lie other but a trifling incident.

For this reason men rejoice in I he glory of the oak whilst they forget the mushroom lias ever been. Moral. Well, is any moral necessary 1 ? Swift revolutionary change, of which many are enamoured today, carries with it the fate of as swift decay. It is not real progress for the movement is advancement only unto death. Without the element of stability there can be no progress to the higher life. This is the lesson for man individually or in association as community, nation, Empire. (Contributed by the New Zealand

Welfare League)