The belief in the miraculous increase of certain products, especially oil and wheat, is prevalent in Syria. In almost every community stories of such occurrences are told. Godly men and women, largely of the past, are said to have {385} seen such wonders, and to have spoken of them to many before their death. Such blessings are supposed to come especially on the blessed night of Epiphany.[8] In the locality where I was brought up, the miracle of "increase" was said to happen in this wise: In some holy hour the cover of the jar of oil is thrown off by some unseen power and the oil begins to flow out of the mouth of the jar. The person who is fortunate enough to see such a sight must show neither fear nor surprise, but in the spirit of deepest prayer he must bring empty vessels and receive into them the increase. If he should fear or manifest surprise, the blessed flow would immediately cease, but if he receives the blessing in a spirit of gratitude and prayer the flow continues until all the vessels that can be brought are filled. But only godly men and women can see such a sight. Among the noble traditions of our clan is the story of one godly man of the Rihbany stock who witnessed the "miracle of increase" in his own storehouse. The flow of {386} the blessing stopped, however, when his wife, who went into the storehouse to see why he was there so long, came in and threw up her hands in surprise at the strange occurrence. From childhood I heard this enchanting story, but I never felt deeply curious to investigate it until after I had gone to the American mission school in my native land. Then I sought the son of the "godly man" and begged him to tell me all that he knew about it. He assured me of his firm conviction that the miracle did happen in their storehouse when he was too young to see such wonders, and that his father and mother both saw it and spoke of it on occasions. At the time I became interested in the study of the origins of such narratives, both those good parents were dead. But why allow shallow curiosity to weaken one's faith in the great spiritual principle which underlies all such beliefs? Attach all such pious tales to the Oriental's foundation belief that all good comes from God, and they become intelligible and acceptable. His intellectual {387} explanations are faint attempts to grasp the great mystery of divine providence, to explain the ways of the Great Giver. If you do not attempt to make an infallible creed of these spiritual imaginings, they will serve as well as any intellectual devices to urge upon the mind the truth that ultimately "every good and every perfect gift cometh from above." Whether the resources were a few loaves and fishes, or thousands of loaves and fishes, it was God who fed the "five thousand," and it is he who feeds all the millions of his children through the annual miracle of increase in all the fields and vineyards of the world.