Page:The Parable of Creation.djvu/97

Rh It is positively incapable of definition. Yet if we have love toward others, we know how our hearts warm to them, how we long for their presence, how we are willing to drop all selfish considerations for their sakes, what sacrifices we are ready to make to render them happy, how willing we are to do and dare, to work, to surrender, to live for them. Love is gentle, kind, disinterested, diligent, constant, and these in all things, to the person loved. This, of course, is its highest type; but all not thoroughly brutalized have experienced it in some degree. One of the most tender types of this love is that of a mother to her child. One of the broadest is that of love of country, in whose behalf thousands have no hesitation in laying down their lives.

Let us now apply this to the Lord. Let us think of Him as the embodiment of all that is lovely and wise, of all that is true and good. In any such sense as we approach our earthly friends, we cannot see Him, we cannot hear Him, we cannot touch Him; nor can we have that kind of sense of personal devotion to Him which we have toward those who meet us on our own plane of life. But we can think of God as our glorified Christ; we can hold Him before our mental vision as an infinitely lovely Divine man; we can send our hearts forth to Him as the one good and true, from whom all that is good and true comes down.