Page:The Parable of Creation.djvu/148

144 spirit, prune his bad habits, train into upward growth his vines of desire and thought, and water every heart plant with the truths of God's own Word. Yet he knows, and the more he progresses the more certainly he feels, and in the end he fully realizes, that it was the Lord by his shedding forth of light and love upon the mind, that it was the Lord by the softening influences of the rains and dews of his gentle Spirit, who really wrought the wondrous change. Yes; it it is the Lord above who has really lifted the man up, from the voidness and darkness of his merely natural state, into this condition of living, loving, God-like manhood, which is the very image of Himself.

This elevated state may be far above the place whereon we stand. Our conceptions of it may be dreamy and dim. To our consciousness, it may seem more like a fairy land of imagination than a state we can veritably realize and enjoy. The mists of a worldly life may hide or render hazy and obscured its mountain tops. Yet it is well to look up. It is well to have even indistinct visions of lovely things. He who aims low hits no higher than the level of his mark. Even a dim dream of more elevated things is better than to rest in the sensuous valleys of worldly life, unconscious of a higher hope. A dream of wakeful hours is a thought idealized. It is at least a quickening sign. And that dream, by