Short story: An apple tree pricked John's conscience, but not enough, to make a difference to him in his greed

Tweet

John Jones had a neighbour with a large apple tree in his front yard. All of the school kids going past his yard, would of course help themselves to an apple, or two, as they tasted very nice. John also had tasted these apples, as the neighbour would give him a bag of them sometimes, as the tree beared fruit bountifully in season. One day, there was a fire at John's neighbour's house, and it was burnt to the ground, but, fortunately, the old apple tree survived the fire, and even though, the neighbour had to find other lodgings, until his house could be rebuilt, he told John than he could help himself to the apples on his tree, as wanted. John picked all of the apples next season, and he opened a stall, at his local church market, and he made a nice profit from his selling of these fine apples. John had taken advantage of the situation, but it bugged his conscience a bit, that he had denied the local school-kids their opportunistic taking of apples too. And his neighbour had hinted to him to only take the apples as needed, for his own use too. He felt some pangs of guilt about his greedy act in selling all of the apples on the tree, for his own profiting. He let that thought, and the next one, go quickly though, as the kids were really just petty pilferers, stealing apples, without permission, from the tree, and he needed the money. When we listen to our heart, instead of our mind, our conscience is not placated away like this. John died that very next year, and so it was, that the year after that, the apple tree was full of apples, once more again, and the kids had their fill of them then again too. We can never take back recommendations from our conscience, that we have not taken, at the right time, to take them. Photo Credit: The photo used in this article was sourced from the free media site, pixabay.com Never doubt your conscience, nor your guilt at not following it.