Source: Mystagogy Resource Center
February 15, 2025
The goodness of God, sisters, is so rich in graces that it seeks a reason to have mercy on man. The grace of God is ready at any moment to reflect in the heart of man and to give him learning, to give him grace and mercy, but it wants to be given a reason. They say that Emperor Napoleon once went to a forest to rest, to take in its air, to enjoy there the beauty of nature. There he saw a beautiful tree, but it was a panorama: tall, cool, shady, its bark gleamed like a mirror. The emperor liked that tree so much, it aroused his admiration and curiosity so much, that he sat down opposite the tree and looked at it and admired it. Inside, his heart was filled with the beauty of the tree.
All the emperor’s soldiers and the whole world had learned this and everyone appreciated the emperor’s tree and kept it with great care. After a while the emperor died, and on the same day the tree also withered. Then they all thought it good to cut down the tree and with its wood to make the emperor’s coffin, since he loved it so much. Indeed, they cut down the tree, and when they went to cut it down they saw the emperor’s face in the wood like a photograph. It was so successful that the best camera could not have achieved it as well.
Thus everyone was amazed and wondered how this strange thing could have happened. Apparently at that time when the emperor first saw the tree and liked it so much and sat down and observed it, a certain reflection occurred, something like magnetism occurred. Just as the camera draws with electricity and prints what it sees in front of it, so the sap of the tree electrified and magnetized through the rays of the sun the form of the emperor, received it like a camera and engraved it on the wood so beautifully.
… Read the rest at Mystagogy Resource Center.
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