"Which is best? Which is most to be loved and admired?" said the old
Man. "The wild, fierce, brilliant tempest, or the quiet rain that
restores the image of life and beauty which the tempest has
destroyed? See! The gentle breezes are beginning to move over the
fields, and, hand in hand with the uplifting sunlight, to raise the
rain that has been trodden beneath the crushing heel of the tempest,
whose false sublimity you so much admired. There is nothing
startling and brilliant in this work; but it is a good and a great
work, and it will go on silently and efficiently until not a trace
of the desolating storm can be found. In the still atmosphere,
unseen, but all-potent, lies a power ever busy in the work of
creating and restoring; or, in other words, in the commonplace work
of doing good. Which office would you like best to assume--which is
the most noble--the office of the destroyer or the restorer?"

I lifted my eyes again, and saw men busily engaged in blotting out
the traces of the storm, and in restoring all to its former use and
beauty.

Builders were at work upon the house which had been struck by
lightning, and men engaged in repairing fences, barns, and other
objects upon which had been spent the fury of the excited elements.
Soon every vestige of the destroyer was gone.

"Commonplace work, that of nailing on boards and shingles," said the
old man; "of repairing broken fences; of filling up the deep
foot-prints of the passing storm; but is it not a noble work? Yes;
for it is ennobled by its end. Far nobler than the work of the
brilliant tempest, which moved but to destroy."