THE GARDEN OF EDEN.

ONE day little Alice hung about her mother’s neck covering her cheeks with kisses, and saying in her pretty, childish way,

“I love you, you nice, sweet mother!  You are good—­so good!” But her mother answered earnestly,

“Dear child, God is good; if I have any good it is from Him; He has given it to me; it is not mine.”

Then the little one unclasped her caressing arms, and putting back her hair with both hands gazed with a look of surprise into her mother’s face.

Presently she said—­“But if He has given it to you, it is yours.”

“No, darling,” replied the lady, “you do not quite understand.  Listen.  Suppose your dear father had a great garden full of all most beautiful things that ever grew in gardens, and he should say to you—­’Come and live in my garden; you shall have as much ground as you are able to cultivate, and I will give you seeds of all fruits and flowers you love best, as many as you want.  Here no evil thing can ever come to harm you, but every day you will grow happier and stronger, and then I will give you more ground and more seeds, and you shall live with me for ever!’ Suppose you were so glad to hear this that you lost no time, but went in, at once, and began to plant the seeds in your little plot, close by the gate—­you know it would be a tiny little plot at first, because you are small and weak; and soon your flowers were to grow up and bloom, so tall, and so beautiful, and your trees hang heavy with such delightful fruit that every one passing by would exclaim,

“’Oh, what a beautiful garden!  Are these flowers and fruit trees yours?’

“Would you not say—­

“Oh, no! they are not mine; they are all my father’s.  This is his beautiful garden, but he said if I were willing I might stay here always, and I have come to live with him because he is good.  Nothing at all here belongs to me, though my father likes me to give away the fruits and flowers that grow in my plot to all who ask for them.  I am a great deal happier, all the time, when I think that even the wild flowers in this grass, and the small berries, and the little birds that eat them, belong to him, than I could be if they were mine, and I had no one to love for them.’

“Should you not feel, dearest, as though you were telling a wicked story, and almost as though you were stealing something, if you said, ‘Yes, they are all mine,’ so that the people would not even know you had a father?”

“Oh, yes! that would be very naughty indeed.  I would give the people some of the fruit and flowers, and say they grew on my father’s trees, and then they would love him too; but tell me more about the garden.”

“I will tell you all I think you can understand, and you must be attentive, for I want you to remember it all your life.  Did you ever hear of the Garden of Eden?”

“Yes; that is where Adam and Eve lived.”