Page:Studies in the Scriptures - Series I - The Plan of the Ages (1909).djvu/198

 9 i The Plan of the Ages.

sorrow that yet prevail on account of sin, and pidnre before your mental vision the glory of the perfect earth. Not a stain of sia mars the harmony and peace of a perfect soci- ety; not a bitter thought, not an unkind look or word; love, welling up from every heart, meets a kindred response m every other heart, and benevolence marks every act* There sickness shall be no more j not an ache nor a pain, nor any evidence of decay not even the fear of such things* Think of all the piflures of comparative health and beauty of human form and feature that you have ever seen, and know that perfefi humanity will be of still surpassing love- liness. The inward purity and mental and moral perfection will stamp and glorify every radiant countenance. Such will earth's society be j and weeping bereaved ones will have their tears all wiped away, when thus they realize the resur* re<5lioa work complete. Rev. 21:4.

And this is the change in human society only. We call to mind also that the earth, which was "made to be inhab- ited" by such a race of beings, is to be a fit and pleasing abode for them, as represented in the Edenic paradise, in which the representative man was at first placed. Paradise shall be restored. The earth shall no mote bring forth thorns and briers, and require the sweat of man's face to yield his bread, but "the earth shall [easily and naturally] yield her increase." "The desert shall blossom as the rose;" the lower animal creation will be perfed, willing and obedient servants; nature with all its pleasing variety will call to man from every direction to seek and know the glory and power and love of God ; and mind and heart will rejoice in him. The restless desire for something new, that now prevails, is not a natural but an abnormal condi- tion, due to our imperfection, and to our present unsatis* factory surroundings. It is not God*like restlessly to crave something new. Most things are old to God, and he re-

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