Book Title: Des menschen begin, midden en einde : vertoonende het kinderlyk bedryf en aanwasch in eenenvyftig konstige figuuren, met goddelyke spreuken en stichtelyke verzen / door Joannes Luiken ; met het leven van den autheur

Author: Luiken, Jan, 1649-1712

Image Title: The Kite

Scripture Reference:

• Job 20 (further images / scripture text)

Description: Outside the city with a windmill in the background, a youth runs against the wind, while holding the string attached to his kite. Two children point excitedly to the kite up in the air and two men comment on this scene. The Dutch artist and poet Jan Luiken (1649-1712) was responsible for drawing and etching this emblem and for the brief poem that accompanies it (below). The attendant Scripture texts are Job 20:4-9; Proverbs 16:5, 8, 18, 19; and Isa 2:11-12.

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Motto:
If thou dost hold the Kite by the little string,
Thou wilt needlessly burden thyself.

Poem:
As the Kite in the air,
Delights the childish desire:
So all small minds hold,
The wind-catcher, all Vanity,
That tears and wears like paper,
With great diligence in their hands.

(Translation by Josephine V. Brown, with editorial assistance from William G. Stryker)

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