The CMP Review — Week of January 9

January 9, 2023

I love this beautiful book of Psalms entitled The Psalms of David. It was illustrated by James S. Freemantle over a span of 30 years in the early 1900s as a testament to his love for his wife. The pages are decorated with scenes of wildlife, flora, and fauna from India and surrounding areas where the illustrator lived and traveled to over his life. C. S. Lewis wrote that the Psalms “must be read as poems if they are to be understood.” This illuminated edition enhances the beauty of God’s Word and may help you encounter the Psalms in a new and deeper way.

@tessakeath

January 10, 2023

With each new-to-me Parents’ Review article, I’m struck by just how similar the challenges parents face today are to those of parents a hundred years ago. In today’s article, a mother of three guides us in a balanced approach for children under six—a time when we might be tempted to either begin formal lessons or embrace a philosophy that doesn’t even allow a child to learn his alphabet.
Read or listen to “Children Under Six.”

@rbaburina

January 11, 2023

We heard the honk of Canadian Geese yesterday!

They were always a harbinger of spring when we lived in Massachusetts. While they’re year-long residents in Tennessee, in winter they move from Eastern Tennessee (where we live now) to the lakes in the middle and western parts of the state so hearing them brought the same excitement and cheer.

Do you observe them in your state or province?

@rbaburina

Photo courtesy of @aolander

January 12, 2023

“Now ma’am, don’t make me explain again,” wrote Charlotte Mason to Henrietta Franklin in 1911. She was writing to her close friend about her journal entitled The Parents’ Review, the “P. R.”

“Now P.R. has a distinguished literary character to maintain,” she reminded her colleague. “It is quite unique in all languages and in all times as an educational magazine of literary character … When you and I are gone, the P.R. will be long quoted and made much of in the annals of Education.”

The Charlotte Mason team and all our dedicated volunteers are working hard every day to make Mason’s prediction come true. We make much of the Parents’ Review because we agree with Mason’s assessment. It is unique.

Only a few libraries in the world possess these cherished volumes. Thankfully, I possess a library card and a phone. My friends and I have photographed page after page so you don’t have to get a plane ticket to find the premier educational magazine of literary character.

We type, record, introduce, and highlight the articles. There’s only one thing you need to do: subscribe. Did you hear that we have a new email subscription system? Don’t take the risk of missing a single gem. If you haven’t signed up already, register your email address here.

@artmiddlekauff

January 13, 2023

Have you ever seen this fine-feathered friend or his female counterpart?

This is our first winter in our new house and the first time we’ve seen these amazing red-bellied woodpeckers!

We have at least one pair (or maybe more) of them visiting our feeders regularly.

We love woodpeckers!

We’ve had a longer friendship with those of the downy variety, but we’re so pleased to become acquainted with our new red-bellied friends.

@antonella.f.greco

January 14, 2023

The wind is blowing the prairie grasses that are peeking out through the snow. And the grasses are actually leaving their prints in the snow!!!

We have never seen this before. It is pretty amazing!

@antonella.f.greco

“Once again,” writes C. S. Lewis, “the best image is in a Psalm, the 19th. I take this to be the greatest poem in the Psalter and one of the greatest lyrics in the world.”

Building on Lewis’s lofty assessment, J. Clinton Mccann Jr. writes: “As remarkable as the lyrical quality of Psalm 19, however, is its extraordinary theological claim. In essence, Psalm 19 affirms that love is the basic reality. According to the psalmist, the God whose sovereignty is proclaimed by cosmic voices is the God who has addressed a personal word to humankind—God’s torah.”

In what some consider to be the greatest poem of all time, King David praises the perfect law of God. But how do we imperfect beings face the perfect law? “Cleanse me from secret faults,” David pleads. “Keep back Your servant also from presumptuous sins!”

In her poem on a poem, Charlotte Mason echoes David’s prayer. “How dare I go,” she cries, “exalting my poor wisdom over His”? The title of the poem is her plea, our plea — “Keep back thy servant from presumptuous sin.” Read or hear Mason’s poem here. And may it incline your heart to appreciate David’s’ poem anew.

@artmiddlekauff