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قراءة كتاب The Story of an Ostrich: An Allegory and Humorous Satire in Rhyme.
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The Story of an Ostrich: An Allegory and Humorous Satire in Rhyme.
erects its head to encompass the state in its death-constricting coils.
Even the old lady, who is wont to knit her stockings in peace by a hardwood fire, or by the glowing coals of an open grate, in city or town, alike, peaceful and content, and without consideration of the vexing problems of supply and demand, awakens suddenly to the fact that even a comfortable competence is no surety against want and cold, when the serpent has dragged himself into the garden and garner house of God.
The farmer is aroused and indignant, but when he makes his protest, the serpent flies pursuit, and with a changing policy under the guise of a great, foolish bird and a well assumed air of innocence, buries its small and crafty head for a season in the sand.
VI.
Really, it seems ridiculous that this incessant warfare of man against man should go on,—the head casting aspersions upon the feet, and the feet kicking against their own head, to the mutual affliction of themselves and the great body that holds them together in the firm compact of common life.... This is not God's law, but man's supreme selfishness,—his disobedience and his curse. After all, kid shoes and silk stockings are not elective privileges; and poorer humanity, turning under its cross and chains, appeals to Heaven, not in vain, if we read aright the signs of the times. The air resounds with optimistic teachings and words of love and cheer that, as yet, have no guarantee in actual deeds. In contra-distinction to the Christian creed, "we must look out for ourselves," is the rasping gospel of our latter-day faith. But there are those who work as well as preach, and to such may yet be recorded the service of universal peace.
Annoy me by constantly scratching the gravel,
And trench on my courtesy, when I decline,
For reasons sufficient, to treat them as mine;
Please notice, your honors, their mode of attack,—
I hold they've no grievance and shouldn't kick back!"
His feet, from their pecking still sore, grew uneasy;
Unfitted by nature to talk, they, by grace,
In eloquent silence presented their case.
To next take account of how much they had learned;
The peacock, as chairman, assuming dominion,
Invited from each a judicial opinion;
Whereupon, in his turn, each his own views expressed,
Then sat down and looked around, wise, at the rest.
To announce that his own mind was made up complete;
To clear of a cloud of ill-got defamation
Alleging that he had habitually crept
Round henroosts, at midnight, when honest folk slept;
Which libel had darkened his whole life's existence,
And made it much harder to gain a subsistence;
He thought it a shame that a poor tempted sinner,
Like him, should thus suffer for getting his dinner.
Upon the slim neck of the peacock presiding,
Which ruffled its feathers and spread out its tail,
Though feeling itself round the gills growing pale.
By the peacock presiding, the toad gruffly croaked
His belief that beneath stillest tongue there lay hid,
Most often, the softest and tenderest quid;
For his part, he thought that the ostrich inclined
To lay too much stress on his power of mind;
VII.
In solemn convocation met, stand the mighty men of our realm, with the policy of the bull, of the bear, of the wolf and of the fox, each animal, according to the nature of its disposition, awaiting the opportunity of power and spoliation, by which he may grasp and hold to himself, as his own personal increment, all that can be wrested from the state and humanity at large. The state, itself, in principle wise, majestic and supreme, petitions peace of the leering devil, who constantly juggles with the tape of human selfishness, as waiting angels record the devious courses that nations and individuals take.
Behold, how pressed on all sides is the man of the hour in the grasp of the huge, overbrooding, material powers of self-interest.
VIII.
Confusion still reigns, but labor has risen from the cross and comes to legislation. He dreams of conquests that are chimerical, where the shadowy knight of honor contests the field with the disgruntled spirit of melancholy, who pessimistically broods the unhatched egg of arbitration. Agitators and agitations still hold sway, while Satan in their midst dominates the human idea of progress and reform with the accursed principle of Self, that is in itself Self-destroying.
IX.
When, now, the monster spirit of protest begins to show its gigantic figure, high, low, and middle classes are alarmed. Prices fluctuate, business goes down, work and bread are scarce. Behold, in the heavens appear the gruesome phantoms of war. But so far, in every crisis, messengers from worlds beyond have sanctified the impending woe to the world's welfare.
The tides of progress are in the hands of the Infinite, who measures from cycle to cycle their ebb and flow; while the ever rising tide-mark signifies the ultimate inundation of the millenium. How great is God! How small is man in his own councils!
To strive after learning and try to construe it,
But an ostrich's presumption is, clearly, mere shoddy,
His head is too small for the size of his body."
His opinion, in words he could scarcely pronounce;
He spake without grace and his voice was not strong,
While his sentences dragged themselves slowly along;
"An estredge," he said, "is er monstrus big