4umi Khalil Gibran : The Forerunner / Knowledge and Half-knowledge

Knowledge and Half-knowledge

Four frogs sat upon a log that lay floating on the edge of a river. Suddenly the log was caught by the current and swept slowly down the stream. The frogs were delighted and absorbed, for never before had they sailed.
At length the first frog spoke, and said, “This is indeed a most marvellous log. It moves as if alive. No such log was ever known before.”
Then the second frog spoke, and said, “Nay, my friend, the log is like other logs, and does not move. It is the river that is walking to the sea, and carries us and the log with it.”
And the third frog spoke, and said, “It is neither the log nor the river that moves. The moving is in our thinking. For without thought nothing moves.”
And the three frogs began to wrangle about what was really moving. The quarrel grew hotter and louder, but they could not agree.

Then they turned to the fourth frog, who up to this time had been listening attentively but holding his peace, and they asked his opinion.
And the fourth frog said, “Each of you is right, and none of you is wrong. The moving is in the log and the water and our thinking also.”
And the three frogs became very angry, for none of them was willing to admit that his was not the whole truth, and that the other two were not wholly wrong.

Then a strange thing happened. The three frogs got together and pushed the fourth frog off the log into the river.

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 Khalil Gibran Introductory biography Spirits Rebellious The Broken Wings A Tear and a Smile The Madman The Forerunner The Forerunner God's Fool Love The King-Hermit The Lion's Daughter Tyranny The Saint The Plutocrat The Greater Self War and the Small Nations Critics Poets The Weather-cock The King of Aradus Out of My Deeper Heart Dynasties Knowledge and Half-knowledge 'Said a Sheet of Snow-White Paper...' The Scholar and the Poet Values Other Seas Repentance The Dying Man and the Vulture Beyond My Solitude The Last Watch The Prophet The New Frontier Sand and Foam Jesus, The Son Of Man The Earth Gods The Wanderer Al-Nay The Garden of the Prophet Lazarus and His Beloved Satan My Countrymen I Believe In You Your Thought And Mine You Have Your Lebanon History and the Nation The Vision Visual art