The Straight Path

A minister of a great king, seated in his palan-
quin, was making for the palace, when he saw a
man, clad in ill-fitting garments and bearing him-
self as one of the poorest laborers of the king-
dom, digging a pit at the side of the road. The
minister called a halt to his carriers and said to
the digger of the pit: ''Why dost thou dig that
pit? Knowest thou not, thou fool, that a danger
it is to the passer-by, who seeing it not, may
stumble therein?"

The digger replied with a wise shake of his
head: ''A fool thou callest me; a fool indeed is he
who f alleth into my pit ! For, sir, he that walk-
eth in the straight path, cannot fall therein, and
he who f alleth therein is the man that maketh a
crooked path; for my pit is on the roadside^ and
not in the pathway/'

The minister, noting the wisdom of the retort,
ordered his servants to take the man into his
house, to clothe ^1*^^ feed him, house him until his
return. The next morning he called the laborer
to him and said: ''Thy reply of yesterday hath
interested me because of its wisdom. Wilt thou
remain in my house and give me more of thy coun-
sel when I shall have need of it?"

And so he that had seemed an ordinary laborer
bepame the counselor of the minister. And so wondraus was the wisdom and the counsels so
good he brought to state affairs, that in a short
time the minister became Prime Minister of the
King.

Now the people of the court began to wonder
at the new wisdom of the Minister, for he had ever
been known among them as one of not overmuch
brightness, but wearing ever on his brow the
semblance of wisdom, but not its true image. And
they began to pry into his private affairs and
look about for the cause of his enlightenment, un-
til one day, by the unfaithfulness of a menial, they
learned of the inmate of his house that was ever in
close companionship with the Minister, and quick
the talking spies acquainted the King of the source
of the Minister's wondrous wisdom.

When the Prime Minister heard that the world
was about to know how and where he came by his
wisdom, a great panic took hold of him, and he
forgot all but his desire to rid himself of the man
who had been his friend and counselor, but now
was his seeming rock ahead. So, after thinking
about it all night, he called to him the wise man,
v/ho, though he served the Minister at all other
times as a menial servant, was in reality one of
the greatest sages of his time, who preferred to
live unnoticed in the guise of a poor tramp and
laborer, happy within himself in the enjoyment
of the luxuries of the realm of thought and wis-
dom. Handing him a letter, he said: ''Take thou this letter unto him whose name is written Uiere-
on; see that thou thyself doth deliver it into his
own hands. A matter of great inqKxrt it contain-
eth, and Hfe or death dependeth on its delivery."
So spake the Knister; and the sage went forth
to deliver the letter to him for whom it was in-
tended.

It chanced that the yonng son of the Prime Min-
ister encoontered the sage on his way, and, with
beaming face and lighted eye, he said unto him:
"Wilt thon do something for me? My sweetheart
awaits me np yonder; my father awaits me at the
palace. Wilt thon not take this letter to her, the
sweetest lad^ in all the land, and bring back to me
her answer?"

The man looked at the bright, eager face of the
jronUi, then at the letter in his hand, and said: *'It
cannot be; a commission your father hath sent
me on that brooketh no deb^. See, yonder is the
house; thoe must I deliver this l^ter."
Iheyouth looked up and said: "Tis but a short
ffive me the letter, and I will deliver it
who is the state executioner, to whom it
and do thou go unto her, n^ mis-
, and bfing me back a reply within the hour. "
the sage paus^ then the youth
the ktter from his hand and put in its
) Ike love letter to his mistress.

laler the sage reappeared at the house
Ike Prime ICmster and inq[uired for the youth.


''What dost thou here?'' the Minister asked.
''Did I not send thee with a letter to him who
would not have sent thee back to me thus?'' The
sage replied: "Oh, sir, thy son insisted upon my
going with a letter to his mistress while he himself
took charge of the letter thou gavest me. See,
here is an answer from her whom he sent me to."

At this the Prime Minister uttered a wild shriek
and, falling on his face, cried: "What have I
done? Woe is to me, accursed am I forever and
ever! My son is dead, dead! Thou fool, that let-
ter was the death warrant of the person who de-
livered it unto the executioner to whom it was ad-
dressed. My poor son! With thine own hands
hast thou delivered thy death sentence."

' ' thou greater than fool ! Thou hast fallen into
my pit," cried the sage. "So long as thou didst
walk in the straight path, thou wert safe and pros-
pered, but when thou didst take the crooked road,
thou didst fall into the pit."