The Psyche

It was now the only thing alive where once great thoughts, happy dreams, and love for the arts had been, and where hope for eternity had lived. The lizard played, then disappeared. The skull crumbled to dust.

Centuries passed, but the bright morning star still shone, big and clear, as it had for thousands of years, and the dawn clouds were still as fresh as roses, as red as blood.

A stately convent now occupied the site of the ruined temple on the little narrow street. It happened that a young nun, one of the inmates of this convent, died, and at early dawn her grave was dug in the garden. Suddenly the spade struck against what seemed to be a stone, and a dazzling whiteness gleamed through the dirt - it was white marble rounded into the perfect form of a shoulder. The spade was guided with tender care, until the head of a woman was uncovered, then butterfly wings. From the grave in which the young nun was to be buried there was lifted into the rosy light of dawn the form of lovely Psyche, chiseled from white marble. "How beautiful, how perfect it is!" people cried. "It is the work of some great master!" But whose work could it have been? No one could say; no one knew anything about it save the morning star that had twinkled for so many thousands of years; it alone had witnessed the sculptor's earthly life, his sufferings, and his weakness.

The sculptor's body had long since returned to dust, but the work in which God's gracious gift to him had found expression - the masterpiece on which he had lavished the treasures of heart and soul - remained, lived still, to be known, admired, and loved by people who never heard his name.

And in the rose-colored sky the bright morning star twinkled down upon Psyche, upon the innocent smile parting her lips, and upon the admiring eyes of the crowd gathered around to gaze on that glorious symbol of the immortal soul.

What is earthly will crumble and be forgotten; only the eternal star will remember it. What is heavenly will shine through ages to come.