“FOOLISH NED.”
So they call him. I have seen many persons who thought themselves quite in their senses, more foolish and less useful than Ned. Ned does an errand very correctly; he brings home the marketing as promptly as you could do it. He flies a kite for little Sam Snow till its tail is lost in the clouds, and the boys are lost in astonishment; he makes little boats for the school-children to sail in the pond; he carves wooden whistles; nobody can make a better horsewhip out of common materials; he picks up all the runaway babies in the neighborhood and carries them safely home to their mothers; he leads the gray horse to water, and rubs his glossy coat as well as any groom. I do not think he can read, at least not as you and I were taught to read; he sees the blue sky, and the green grass, and the flowers; he stops short and listens when a little bird sings; he looks up into the tall trees, and watches the shifting sunbeams light up their leaves; he lies under the tree-shadows and gazes, well pleased, at the soft white clouds. Who shall say that in their graceful flight they drop no message from their Maker (unheard by us) to “Foolish Ned?”
When Ned’s hat and coat are old, it does not fret him; when a bank fails, Ned laughs all the same; he likes Winter; he likes Summer; he likes Spring; he makes garlands of the Autumn leaves, and glides with nimble foot over the ice-bound brook. He stands at the church porch, and bows his head, as the grand old organ sends out on the summer air its holy anthem-peal. And yet, they who with careless foot cross its sacred threshold, call him “Foolish Ned!”
Unto whom much is given; of him (only) shall God require much.