And it is well for us to close the book with these chapters for the world view only helps us to appreciate the inland beauty more, and the valleys with their restricted vision only prepare us in return for the world enterprises again.
THE OLIVE IN BIBLICAL HISTORY
In the Old Testament times the olive was recognized as the "fruit of fruits." But during the hurry and rush of Western progress a gross oversight has been committed, especially on the part of the American people, in failing to fully appreciate its value; and as a result the olive has not as yet gained its true leadership here among the elect of the trees, composed of the orange, pear, apple, pomegranate, fig, and date.
But the oversight has been discovered by the pioneers of the olive industry in America, and the signs of the time indicate that the olive will be known here as it was in the Holy Land. And, with the unprecedented developments in the ripe olive industry, it has an opportunity of becoming even more favorably known than ever before.
By a careful study, recall the place that the olive held in the old Promised Land and you will get a faint idea of what we mean by the rediscovery of the olive in this new Promised Land situated here on the coast of our Western empire.
Where the olive originated, we do not know. Some think in Syria. Others are not afraid to say that it is as old as man himself. For not only did it grow previous to the flood, as is indicated by the dove bringing an olive leaf to the ark. But some actually maintain that it was one of the trees that grew in the Garden of Eden, wherever that may have been. And whether such an assertion is far-fetched or not, there is absolutely no reason why this wonderfully fruitful tree should not have been one of the very first trees appearing on the globe for the sustenance of human life.
But wherever it came from, of this Bible students are absolutely certain—that it was the most popular tree in the Promised Land. Indeed, it seems to have been one of the inducements that led the children of Israel escaping from Egyptian captivity to move toward Canaan, the Land of Promise with an irresistible expectancy. For the Promised Land that they were to enter is described—a description which would most accurately apply to our own California—vividly in the Bible as follows:
"For the Lord thy God bringeth them into a good land, a land of brooks and water, of fountains and depths that spring out of valleys and hills. A land of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, of olive and honey."
And not only were these freemen from Egypt encouraged by the fact that they would find the olive with other trees flourishing in the Promised Land; but they were also commanded, according to the author of Deuteronomy, to recognize its superior importance and cultivate it everywhere, in these clearly put words: "Thou shalt have olive trees through all thy coasts." And today the very names of different localities in Palestine, such as the Mount of Olives and Gethsemane—that is, Gath-Semen, which means the "oil press"—indicates the love of those people for the beautiful olive groves, which gently nodded at each other across roads and lanes when wooed by the winds, even as they do in California, this newer Land of Promise.