The Story of Snuffle the Hedgehog

Once upon a time, in a great green forest, there lived a little hedgehog named Snuffle. Snuffle was a very curious and lively hedgehog, but he had one particular habit: he loved pointing out other people's flaws.

One morning Snuffle came out onto a clearing and saw Longear the Bunny, who had tripped and spilled a basket of carrots. "Oh, you clumsy thing!" Snuffle snorted. "You can't even carry carrots without dropping them!"

Longear the Bunny blushed and quickly began gathering the carrots.

Then Snuffle met Ginger the Squirrel, who had dropped a nut. "What a butterfingers!" Snuffle remarked again. "Dropping nuts, are we!"

Ginger the Squirrel sighed and went to fetch a new nut.

And so it went, all day long. Snuffle wandered the forest making remarks to everyone: to Bruno the Bear Cub, that he roared too loudly; to Rusty the Fox Cub, that his tail wasn't as fluffy as everyone else's.

By evening, tired but pleased with his own "sharp eye," Snuffle was heading home. Suddenly he heard quiet weeping. On a tree stump sat old Hoo the Wise Owl, crying.

"Wise Hoo, what's wrong?" Snuffle asked, surprised. "Did someone upset you? I'll go give them a piece of my mind right now!"

Wise Hoo looked at Snuffle with her big eyes and said, "Oh, Snuffle, I'm not crying because of anyone else. I'm crying about myself. You see, I've lived so long, I've seen so much, I've learned so much — and still, sometimes I don't act as wisely as I'd like. Just today, for instance, I wanted to help a little bird that had fallen from its nest, but I was in such a hurry that I nearly fell off the branch myself."

Snuffle grew thoughtful. He had never once thought about his own mistakes. It had always seemed to him that he did everything right.

"And you, Snuffle," Wise Hoo went on, "spent the whole day today wandering the forest, pointing out everyone's mistakes. You noticed how Longear the Bunny spilled his carrots, how Ginger the Squirrel dropped her nut. But tell me — have you noticed how many sharp quills you have on your own back?"

Snuffle looked at his quills in surprise. He'd always had them; he was so used to them that he never paid them any attention.

"Those quills," Wise Hoo said gently, "can sometimes prick others, even when you don't mean them to. And before looking for a speck in someone else's eye, it's worth searching for the log in your own. In other words — before judging others for their small mistakes, it's important to see and correct your own, far greater ones. Because each of us has our own 'quills' or 'logs' that we need to work on.

Snuffle felt deeply ashamed. He realized he had been unfair to his friends. He'd been so caught up in other people's flaws that he'd completely forgotten about his own. After all, he himself wasn't always graceful — he sometimes snorted for no reason, or was too lazy to gather mushrooms.

The next morning, the first thing Snuffle did was go to Longear the Bunny and apologize. Then he found Ginger the Squirrel and asked her forgiveness too. He apologized to Bruno and Rusty. He tried not to judge others anymore, and instead thought about how to become better himself: kinder, more attentive, and not to prick others with needless remarks.

And the forest grew much more friendly once Snuffle the Hedgehog learned to look at his own quills first.

The moral of the story (inspired by Abba Dorotheos's parable on not judging one's neighbor):

This story teaches what the Holy Fathers spoke of: before judging others for their mistakes and flaws (seeing "the speck in your brother's eye"), we must turn our attention to our own, far greater failings and imperfections (the "log in our own eye"). When we begin working on ourselves and our own shortcomings, we're left with less time and less desire to judge others. It's important to be lenient toward the mistakes of those around us, and strict with ourselves, striving for kindness and understanding.