Rev. E. Anderson
The story is taken from a book compiled by the late Rev. Gerald Chamberlain, a great children’s story teller and a person who inspired and influenced many young people. With kind permission from his son Paul.
NIL DESPERADUM
Text: “Trust int eh Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths” – Proverbs 3: 5, 6.
A short time ago a scientist wanted to know how clever a mouse was. He thought if he could find out something out about the minds of mice he would know something about the minds of all animals, and perhaps could come to understand the minds of men and women and boys and girls.
So he built for his tame mouse a little house.
Inside the house were winding passages, all sorts of baffling corridors; but from only ONE OF THESE WAS THERE A WAY INTO THE TINY GARDEN which lay around the mouse’s house. Then the scientist placed the mouse inside the building he had made for it, and left it to find its way about this house, and perhaps discover the LITTLE DOORWAY INTO THE GARDEN BEYOND.
For a long time the mouse explored its house, running many times up and down its winding passages. But at last it found the one single way out, and afterwards, many times a day, the little creature would thread the twisting passages and stairways, always choosing the right ones, and would pass through the tiny doorway into the garden that lay beyond.
Then, some time later, the scientist built up this one single doorway so that the entrance to the garden was closed, and, instead, he made nother doorway into the garden from an altogether different passage in a different part of the mouse’s house. When this was done, he placed the little creature once more in its house and waited to watch results. Soon th little animal rushed along the passages which had before led to the garden, making for the well-known doorway. When it found no doorway there it looked puzzled, and, after sniffing around a few moments, it ran back to the centre of the house and started all over again. Time and time again it ran along the same passages to the same remembered doorway, and, baffled turned back to the centre of the house to begin the journey all over again.
At last it seemed to understand that things had changed. Then it started to explore the whole house and passages and stairways, bit by bit, peering and sniffing at every turn. For a long time the search went on, until at last the mouse found the new doorway and got into the garden. This once found, it made no further mistakes. It had found the new ay . . . .
NIL DESPERADUM means NEVER GIVE UP . . . . . TRUST IN THE LORD WITH ALL YOUR HEART
