After leading one of his many battles Napoleon Bonaparte stood and analyzed the battlefield; what he saw stayed with him for the rest of his life. A battle-hardened soldier from his early 20′s, Napoleon was moved by witnessing the loyalty of a dog to one of his fallen soldiers.
He wrote:
“This soldier, I realized, must have had friends at home and in his regiment; yet he lay there deserted by all except his dog. I looked on, unmoved, at battles which decided the future of nations. Tearless, I had given orders which brought death to thousands. Yet here I was stirred, profoundly stirred, stirred to tears. And by what? By the grief of one dog.”
Our pets often teach us the meaning of true loyalty and faithfulness. When everyone else is gone they tend to stay by our sides in life and even in death.
It is more than just a connection to the one who has provided food for them. It is the sense of comfort they felt by our attention that is reciprocated.
Many of us can remember times when we have been very sick and it was our animals that seemed to have a deep sense of empathy and stayed by our side though they could do nothing medically to treat us. But, they did what they could, and they stayed with us as guardians and companions.
I often think that if Jesus had a dog with Him in the Garden of Gethsemane He would not have been alone while the ones He had asked to watch and pray with Him fell asleep. I also believe that when all abandoned Jesus on the cross, His pet would have been there if only to be with its companion.
The scriptures tell us, “For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made,” (Romans 1:20) One of those wonderful attributes is loyalty, modeled to us by our faithful pets.
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