Skip to main content

The Prophet Gibran, Kahlil. Ch 4 On Children

 

 

Chapter 4 
On Children


 AND a woman who held a babe against her bosom said, Speak to us of Children. And he said: Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself. They come through you but not from you, And though they are with you yet they belong not to you. You may give them your love but not your thoughts, For they have their own thoughts. You may house their bodies but not their souls, For their souls dwell in the house of to-morrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams. You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you. For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday. You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth. The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far. Let your bending in the Archer’s hand be for gladness; For even as He loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that is stable.

Popular posts from this blog

The Prophet Gibran Kahlil. Ch 12 On Crime & Punishment

  Chapter 12 On Crime & Punishment  THEN one of the judges of the city stood forth and said, Speak to us of Crime and Punishment . And he answered, saying: It is when your spirit goes wandering upon the wind, That you, alone and unguarded, commit a wrong unto others and therefore unto yourself. And for that wrong committed must you knock and wait a while unheeded at the gate of the blessed. Like the ocean is your god-self ; It remains for ever undefiled. And like the ether it lifts but the winged. Even like the sun is your god-self; It knows not the ways of the mole nor seeks it the holes of the serpent. But your god-self dwells not alone in your being. Much in you is still man, and much in you is not yet man, But a shapeless pigmy that walks asleep in the mist searching for its own awakening. And of the man in you would I now speak. For it is he and not your god-self nor the pigmy in the mist that knows crime and the punishment of crime. Oftentimes have I heard you speak...

The Prophet Gibran Kahlil. Ch 10 On Clothes

Chapter 10  On Clothes  AND the weaver said, Speak to us of Clothes. And he answered: Your clothes conceal much of your beauty, yet they hide not the unbeautiful. And though you seek in garments the freedom of privacy you may find in them a harness and a chain. Would that you could meet the sun and the wind with more of your skin and less of your raiment. For the breath of life is in the sunlight and the hand of life is in the wind. Some of you say, “It is the north wind who has woven the clothes we wear.” And I say, Aye, it was the north wind, But shame was his loom, and the softening of the sinews was his thread. And when his work was done he laughed in the forest. Forget not that modesty is for a shield against the eye of the unclean. And when the unclean shall be no more, what were modesty but a fetter and a fouling of the mind? And forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair.  

A PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS

COLLAGE OF BLAST FROM THE PAST