He put before them another parable: "The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed that someone took and sowed in his field; it is ...the smallest of all the seeds, but when it has grown it is the greatest of shrubs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and make nests in its branches."LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The spring is here, young and beautiful as ever, and absolutely shocking in its display of reckless maternity; but the Judas tree ...will bloom for you on the Bosphorus if you get there in time. No one ever loved the dog-wood and Judas tree as I have done, and it is my one crown of life to be sure that I am going to take them with me to heaven to enjoy real happiness with the Virgin and them.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
My long two-pointed ladder's sticking through a tree Toward heaven still,... And there's a barrel that I didn't fill Beside it, and there may be two or three Apples I didn't pick upon some bough. But I am done with apple-picking now.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
And though in tinsel chain and popcorn rope My tree, a captive in your window bay,... Has lost its footing on my mountain slope And lost the stars of heaven, may, oh, may The symbol star it lifts against your ceiling Help me accept its fate with Christmas feeling.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
A good word is as a good tree-- its roots are firm,... and its branches are in heaven; it gives its produce every season by the leave of its Lord.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
It is not their bones or hide or tallow that I love most. It is the living spirit of the tree, not its spirit of turpentine, with ...which I sympathize, and which heals my cuts. It is as immortal as I am, and perchance will go to as high a heaven, there to tower above me still.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The brave man is the elder son of creation who has stepped buoyantly into his inheritance, while the coward, who is the younger, w...aiteth patiently for his decease. He rides as wide of this earth's gravity as a star, and by yielding incessantly to all impulses of the soul is drawn upward and becomes a fixed star. His bravery consists not so much in resolute action as healthy and assured rest. Its palmy state is a staying at home, compelling alliance in all directions. So stands his life to heaven as some fair sunlit tree against the western horizon, and by sunrise is planted on some eastern hill to glisten in the first rays of the dawn.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The very simplicity and nakedness of man's life in the primitive ages imply this advantage, at least, that they left him still but... a sojourner in nature. When he was refreshed with food and sleep, he contemplated his journey again. He dwelt, as it were, in a tent in this world, and was either threading the valleys, or crossing the plains, or climbing the mountain-tops. But lo! men have become the tools of their tools. The man who independently plucked the fruits when he was hungry is become a farmer; and he stood under a tree for shelter, a housekeeper. We no longer camp as for a night, but have settled down on earth and forgotten heaven.... The best works of art are the expression of man's struggle to free himself from this condition, but the effect of our art is merely to make this low state comfortable and that higher state to be forgotten.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »