Page:The Parable of Creation.djvu/139

Rh thing has pointed. For this purpose every thing else has been made. As this is true of the progress of earth, so it is true of the advance of the human mind. Every preparatory stage of regeneration has been for the sake of the one beyond. Each and all have been for the sake of the final outcome. Whatever has taken place, little as at the time it has seemed so to the person, has been a step to lead still further upward toward the summit life. All that has happened through a long and eventful life, each trivial incident, each, even the most obscure, of its surroundings, each changing state, was nothing in and of itself. It was valuable only in its bearings on that which was to come. All knowledge, all study, all discipline, was worthless, except so far as it led, directly or indirectly, to that. The Lord's call to each and every human being that was ever born is, Be a MAN.

Now we know very well what this, in ordinary parlance, means. Be courageous! be earnest! be faithful! be honest! But in the Lord's view a MAN is much more than this. It is the Lord alone, who, in the highest signification of the term, may properly be called MAN. He only, in the most eminent perfection, embodies all that is human. He is perfect Wisdom, perfect Love, perfect Truth, perfect Goodness. He alone possesses, in consummate and limitless measure, will and understanding, affection