DISCOURAGEMENT
Once a big fat frog and a lively little frog were hopping along together when they
had the misfortune to jump straight into a pail of fresh milk. They swam for hours
and hours, hoping to get out somehow; but the sides of the pail were steep and
slippery, and death seemed certain.
When the big frog was exhausted he lost courage. There seemed no
hope of rescue. “Why keep struggling against the inevitable? I can’t swim any
longer,” he moaned. “Keep on! Keep on!” urged the little frog, who was still
circling the pail. So they went for a while. But the big frog decided it was no use.
“Little brother, we may as well give up,” he gasped, “I am going to quit
struggling.”
Now only the little frog was left. He thought to himself, “Well, to give up is
to be dead, so I will keep on swimming.” Two more hours passed and the tiny
legs of the determined little frog were almost paralyzed with exhaustion. It
seemed as if he could not keep moving for another minute. But then he thought
of his dead friend, and repeated, “To give up is to be meat for someone’s table,
so I’ll keep on paddling until I die, if death is to come but I will not cease
trying ‘while there is life, there is hope!’”
Intoxicated with determination, the little frog kept on, around and around
and around the pail, chopping the milk into white waves. After a while, just as he
felt completely numb and thought he was about to drown, he suddenly felt
something solid under him. To his astonishment, he saw that he was resting on a
lump of butter which he had churned by his incessant paddling! And so the
successful little frog leaped out of the milk pail to freedom.
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