A handful of clay...
By Henry van Dyke.
There was a handful of clay in the bank of a river. It was only common clay, coarse and heavy; but it had high thoughts of its own value and wonderful dreams of the great place which it was to fill in the world, when the time came for its virtues to be discovered.
Overhead, in the spring sunshine, the trees whispered together of the glory which descended upon them when their delicate blossoms and leaves had expanded. The forest was aglow with fair, clear colors, as if the dust of thousands of rubies and emeralds were hanging in soft clouds above the earth.
The flowers, surprised with the joy of beauty, bent their heads to one another as the wind caressed them. "Sisters, how lovely you have become!" they said. "You make the day bright."
The river, glad of new strength and rejoicing in the unison of all its waters, murmured to the shores in music. Its song told of its release from icy fetters, its swift flight from the snow-clad mountains, and the grandeur of the mighty sea to which it was hurrying.
Waiting blindly in its bed, the clay comforted itself with lofty hopes. "My time will come," it said. "I was not made to be hidden forever. Glory and beauty and honor are coming to me in due season."
One day the clay felt itself being taken from the place where it had waited so long. A flat blade of iron passed beneath it, lifted it, and tossed it into a cart with other lumps of clay; and it was carried far away, as it seemed, over a rough and stony road. But the clay was not afraid or discouraged, for it said to itself, "This is necessary. The path to glory is always rugged. Now I am on my way to play a great part in the world."
But the hard journey was nothing compared with the tribulation and distress that came afterward. The clay was put into a trough and was mixed, beaten, stirred, and trampled. This treatment seemed almost unbearable. But there was consolation in the though that something very fine and noble was certainly coming out of all this trouble. They clay felt sure that if it could only wait long enough, a wonderful reward was in store for it.
Then the clay was put upon a swiftly turning wheel and was whirled around until it felt that it would fly into a thousand pieces. A strange power pressed and molded the clay as it revolved, and through all the dizziness and pain, it felt that it was taking a new form.
Then an unknown hand put it into an oven, and fires were kindled about it - fierce and penetrating fires, hotter than all the heats of summer that had ever brooded upon the bank of the river. But through it all, the clay held itself together and endured its trials, in the confidence of a great future. "Surely," it thought, "I am intended for something very splendid, since such pains are taken with me. Perhaps I am being fashioned for the ornament of a temple, or into a precious vase for the table of a king."
At last the baking was finished. The clay was taken from the furnace and set down upon a board in the cool air, under the blue sky. The tribulation was past. The reward was at hand.
Close beside the board was a pool of water, not very deep or very clear, but calm enough to reflect, with impartial truth, every image that fell upon it. There for the first time the clay saw its new shape - the reward of all its patience and pain, the consummation of all its hopes.
But what a disappointment! The clay was not a beautiful ornament at all. It was only a common flowerpot, straight and stiff, red and ugly. And at last it felt certain that it was destined neither for a king's house nor for a palace of art, because it was made without glory or beauty. Therefore the clay murmured bitterly against the unknown maker, saying, "Why have you made me thus?"
Many days it passed in sullen discontent. Then it was filled with earth, and something - it knew not what, but something rough and brown and dead-looking - was thrust into the middle of the earth and covered over. The clay rebelled at this new disgrace. "This is the worst of all that has happened to me yet, to be filled with dirt and rubbish in this manner. Surely I am a failure."
But presently it was set in a greenhouse, where the sunlight fell warm upon it and water was sprinkled over it. Day by day, as it waited, a change began to come to it, a certain sense of peace and rightness, a felling that even here, not all was lost. Something was stirring within it, a new hope. Still it was ignorant, and knew not what it all meant.
One day the clay was again lifted from its place and carried into a great palace. Its dream was finally coming true; it would have a part to play in the world after all. Soon the clay found itself surrounded with flowers. But still it could not understand. So it whispered to another vessel of clay like itself, which had been placed beside it, "Why have they set me here? Why do all the people look toward us?"
The other vessel answered, "Do you not know? You are carrying a royal bouquet of lilies. Their petals are white as snow, and the heart of them is as pure gold. The people look toward you because that flower is among the rarest in the world. And the root of it is in your heart."
Then the clay was truly content and silently thanked its maker. For though it was an earthen vessel, the clay held a treasure so great that it was beyond price.
