"Be not righteous over much; neither make thyself over wise: why shouldst thou destroy thyself? (Ec. vii. 17,) said Baruch to himself, and was silent.
When they arrived at the Rabbi's house he reminded his scholars impressively that the morrow would be the 6th of Ijar. They separated, each to his own home, to change their garments and hasten to the synagogue.
The corn-seed falls on open ground, a sod crumbles and covers it, and no one considers how it sprouts and strikes root, thus hidden from human eyes. Well may the life of man be likened to such hidden growth: its laws are still less revealed; only the result can be modified, not the process; examination but reveals more and more interruptions in this growth.
Again, no fruit grows to perfection except thus: the seed-corn must renew the changes of its life; must bud and sprout, become stem, foliage, and tree, to give seven and a hundred fold of the fruit that nourishes life anew.
