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Today's reading was edited and adapted from The Royal Path of Life by T.L. Haynes and L.W. Yegy, published in 1882.

Gratitude is rightly said to be the mother of most virtues, because from this one fountain so many rivulets arise,

such as reverence, friendship, love, charity, and self-sacrifice.

I am reminded of this in the old story about a poor and aged man, who while busy planting and grafting an apple tree,

was interrupted by a young passerby who said,

Why do you plant trees when you can't even hope to eat their fruit?

The old man raised himself up, and leaning upon his spade, replied,

Someone planted trees for me before I was born, and I have eaten their fruit. I now plant for

others, so that a memorial of my gratitude may exist when I am dead and gone.

Nothing tenders the heart, and opens the gushing fountain of love, more than the exercise

of gratitude, like the showers of spring that cause the flowers to rise from seeds that have long-laying dormant,

tears of gratitude awaken pleasurable sensations, unknown to those who have never been forced from the sunshine of prosperity into the cold shade of adversity, where no warmth is felt but that of kindness,

no light enjoyed but that of charity. The Greek poet Hesiod tells us that the miseries of all

humankind were included in a great box, and that Pandora took off the lid, allowing them all to

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