Page:The Doctrines of the New Church Briefly Explained.djvu/188

182 there not be? Variety is observable everywhere throughout the universe—visibly stamped on all created things. We see it alike in the stars above and in the earth beneath; alike in beasts and birds, forests and fields, mountains and clouds, fishes and flowers. And the writings of the New Church teach us to expect that there will ever be a like variety in the church of God—a variety in doctrine and ritual as well as in the kinds and degrees of goodness, corresponding to the variety among the organs of the human body. Such variety exists in the angelic heavens. Yet, with an endless diversity in character and in degrees of illumination there, the angels, by virtue of their kindred ruling purpose and their common union with the one true and living Head, are all bound as lovingly to each other, and work as freely and harmoniously together, as the various members of the human body. And we should expect that something like this will exist among men on earth when the life of God descends into the churches with power and fulness, or when the Father's will shall be done on earth as it is done in heaven.

The great Apostle clearly justifies such expectation when he says: "The body is not one member but many;" and that the members ought to have "the same care one of another." A beautiful illustration of variety in unity! For what is more various in form and function than the