This complete book is available on the net , just log on to https://google.com and type o’ there ’ Gibran the prophet ’ and you get it !
This book is simply a collection of many prose-poems that have been knitted together by a small story . The book has chapters on love , marriage , children , giving , eating and drinking , work , joy and sorrow , houses , clothes , buying and selling , crime and punishment , laws , freedom , reason and passion , pain , self-knowledge , teaching , friendship , talking , time , good and evil , prayer , pleasure , beauty , religion and finally on death .
.These chapters normally run into 30 or at most 45 lines .. .The beauty of the book lies in the fact that all chapters can be read independently , and over and over again , .. infact the lines are so beautifully knitted together to complete the prose-poems , that I could not help but learnt by heart the chapters on children , work , pain , etc.. . Believe me ! , I have an infinite number of times ’’sung’’ to myself the lines :
’’Your Children are not your children , they are the sons and daughters of life’s longing for itself ;
they come through you but not from you and though they are with you ,
yet they belong not to you ,
you may give them your love but not your thoughts , for they have their own thoughts ,
you may house their bodies but not their souls , for their souls dwell in the houses of tomorrow which you cannot visit , not even in your dreams ...... ’’
Like an old teacher , Gibran holds you before his kind eyes comprehending you completely , he points out flaws in you , and he shows ways to correct them . He kindly ’’fills your cup to the brim’’ and quenches your deepest thirst .
Like the stern Saturn, Gibran’s words are full of wisdom , kind and soothing , that MUST be paid heed . Go ask a man born under Capricorn . Consider these lines from the chapter on work :
’’You have been told also life is darkness, and in your weariness you echo what was said by the weary.
And I say that life is indeed darkness save when there is urge,
And all urge is blind save when there is knowledge,
And all knowledge is vain save when there is work,
And all work is empty save when there is love;
And when you work with love you bind yourself to yourself, and to one another, and to God.’’
For those people who don’t look at a book written by a mystic and keep themselves miles away from mysticism , spirituality , etc . and yet are fascinated by it , this book could be their first step . This book can be understood by a 16 year old if he reads it over and over again.