Page:Return to Nature!.djvu/15

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
— xi —

PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION.

I publish my book in celebration of the opening of the Jungborn.

The vernal sun is again shining in the sky, the gloomy Winter is gone. Snow and ice have yielded to the warm, bright sun, new life is sprouting in field and meadow, in wood and glen, the Easter bells are tolling, the festival of the resurrection has come.

I wish at the same time to add a friendly Easter greeting to all those who have already emerged from darkness to light, to all those whom my book may happily lead out of gloomy, dark, desolate, frosty paths into bright, sunny cheerfulness, to all my friends far and near.

AD. JUST.

Jungborn, Stapelburg in the Harz,
Easter, 1896.

PREFACE TO THE FOURTH EDITION.

When I had finished the first edition of this book, and sent it as a message of glad tidings into a world full of disease and suffering, full of worry and restlessness, full of misery and unhappiness, the earth was putting forth its first green, and resurrection songs filled the air.

Three years have passed since then, men have not despised the glad tidings, but received them with joy and enthusiasm. The Jungborn, which is the heart and main artery of the enterprise, already blooms and prospers.

But in the meantime it has become necessary to expand and perfect my book in important respects.

While I am engaged on this fourth and enlarged edition, nature appears in her brightest colors. Solemnly and joyously the bells are announcing the festival of Pentecost. The spirit of Pentecost is about to descend.

During the past three years my cause has become widely known all over the world. But the cause is nothing without the