Selected Excerpt- Meditation on Stones

Transcription from original: (pp. 70-73)

For some weeks past my occupation consisted in clearing the fields of our farms of stones, so that the plough could go smoothily [sic] enough through the soil. Curious as my mind is generally, wanting ever to find out the whys of everything, I became very much interested to solve the problem as to the existence and usefulness of large and small stones which form the greatest inembrances [sic] to farming success in Rhode Island. How is it that they exist in vast numbers in one place more than another? Well, I answer this question by another question. Why does the Community of the Cistercian Order exist in the parish of Valley Falls and not in Massachusetts or New York? The answer to the latter will meet the objections of the former. God has willed it so. He gave us his rational creatures, the grace to join each other's company and so to form a religious body. It was in His eternal decrees marked out that this monastery should exist and be the home of holiness where many of His elect should faithfully work out their salvation. 

But God, you may say, had a motive in creating us. Assuredly he had. His one chief wish was, is, and ever shall be, that now whom He made to His own image and likeness, should, after his sojourn on earth, unite his voice with those of the angels in everlasting songs of love and praise in heaven.

But surely no motive can have existed in creating these stones unless it were that the Creator sought the sweat of labor from the husbandman as a punishment for Adam’s transgression. Do you think so? Then, you consider your judgment and mental calibre [sic] superior, at least, in one respect, to God’s. 

Wisdom never acts unwisely, that is, without a reason; and God, the infinite source of wisdom and understanding has not brought these stones into existence without,  at the same time knowing that they can be rendered serviceable in some way or other that have not yet fallen within the limited knowledge of the human mind. 

History tells us that for centuries nations were accustomed to build their houses with clods [sic] and wood. We have become conversant with the nature of many species of stone and have applied our knowledge to the beautifying and adorning our cities and homes. The common stone, the hardest of the genus, which is regarded to-day as a nuisance and an eyesore to every farmer and gardener- no one has as yet discovered any other use for it except for the laying the foundation of buildings and the repaving of roads. What is, however, so general and what we all ardently wish to get rid of, may one day, be found out to be most valuable and, on account of the great strides science is making, may become the richest boon that has been conferred on farmers. This statement may be true. Our scientific knowledge of mineralogy has not yet, remember well, cast aside its infantine raiments; although one would believe so judging from the loud trumpet tones of a few university professors who, because they have learnt a little of the earth’s surface, want the world to think that they have penetrated into all the secrets of nature. Yes: stones have been created for a definite purpose by our beneficent Creator, but the whole of this purpose man has not yet divined and probably will never divine.

When God created the earth, these stones came into existence. They existed, therefore, before man. They have lain embedded in the fields thousands of years before our birth. They point out the almighty hand that shaped them as unnervingly as do the fragrant flowers and the shady trees, and with all the other works of creation demand that man to whom they are all subservient, should render acts of thanksgiving to God for the great boon of existence.