The Home Circle | AdventAI

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Aug 12, 1889

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 15, No. 31.

The Home Circle.

MOULDING THE CLAY.

WITHIN their tiny hands my children hold A ball of yielding clay, And, as they try some dainty form to mould, I hear them softly say, “What shall we make? an apple or a vase? Some marbles, or a fan?” One little boy, a smile upon his face, Says, “I shall make a man.”

Straightway, with lengthened face, he at his task Begins, and ‘neath the hands Unskillful, weak, and yet too proud to ask For aid, a form expands, Crude, and yet not too poor to show the man Hid in the maker's thought,— How different yet if some skilled artisan The ball of clay had wrought.

To-day within my hands my children lie, I shape them as I will, And seek for aid from Him that is on high, That he may with his skill Teach my weak, willing hands to rightly mould The clay that I have sought, That in true forms of beauty may unfold The Maker's highest thought. —Transcript.