Littleness and Greatness. 233 eye can see are less than a speck in infinite space?" Those who charge the Bible with narrowness pervert the splendour of God into a plea that He is too great to love mankind. The Being whom they profess to hallow is made less wise, less good, less wonderful, by the assertion that He cannot and will not visit us. Why should our reason be less firm in structure, or analogy concerning this be entitled to less confidence, than when we consider smaller things? If the incalculable multiplication of worlds, and the necessities of a rule that is infinite, hinder not the fashioning of a moth's wing so that it possess a very firmament of beauty; why should not the All-good and Holy devise a plan for rendering us good and holy, in a manner far exceeding human thought as the claborate many-chambered houses for tiny and invisible life transcend our comprehension ? The philosopher delights to show that a grain of sand on the shore of a sea, and a thought in the mind of a child, are bound by a law which cannot be broken, with a past that is infinite and a future that is eternal. The Christian rejoices to know that God has a plan for every man-that the provision for a soul's salvation is infinite, connected with worlds and times, transactions and interests, surpassing knowledge. To God, in a human sense, is no such thing as absolute size; relative greatness and smallness-nothing more. To us things appear small when scarcely seen by the naked eye; very small when a powerful microscope barely suffices to render them visible; and the space between us and a fixed star is enormous as compared with that between the earth and sun; but there is absolutely nothing to show that a portion of matter, which even in our most powerful microscopes is hopelessly minute for investigation, may not be complex as the stars that exceed our sun in magnitude. Continue and enlarge the thought. The whole truth, whether as to great or small, is transcendental. The universe in grandeur, in extent, in variety of mighty orbs circling mightier suns; those suns themselves glittering attendants of other centres, stupendously wonderful, whose circuit it may be that no created intelligenee is able to measure; leads to the conclusion-confirmed by astronomy-that the spectacle revealed by the telescope, though too vast for human conception, is but a sparklet of the whole that infinity and eternity contain. A similar exercise of scientific imagination, but intensified, reveals worlds of life within a rain-drop sphere; discerns existences to which the needle-point is a vast plain; and these, again, are lords of worlds extending inward for ever and for ever. Such intellectual recreations prove, to minds capable of them, that an invisible point may present infinite internal capacities for Divine operation; and that on every such point, throughout all space, may be arranged worlds and worlds of mystery and skill not less wonderful than those which demand infinitude of space for their display; for, indeed, it is true that God can make the small to be great, and the great to be small. Our own littleness contains very wonderful greatness though we have put away the arrogant notion that human existence is the central era of time, as we have laid aside the error that our solar system is central within the universe. There seems no centre, nor are there limits; rather, the centre is everywhere, the circumference nowhere; and the human period is scarcely a ripple on the ocean of time. God, nevertheless, has so elaborated our thought that we think as if He thought but of us, and made our destiny His only care. This is not, on our part, wholly erroneous; for, to us, we and our world are indeed a centre whence radiates infinity. By creation, and more wonderfully by the Plan of Salvation, we are connected with a system that, materially and spiritually, arrays around it height and depth, length and breadth, the infinite past and the infinite future. Actual discoveries of science make possible, if not probable, all that comes within the compass of analogy. We only look at the dial-plate of Nature the forms and semblances of things; but even our present faculties enlarged would be able to inspect the wheelwork and springs; hence belief is warranted that the seed of power within us, our intuitions-which already somewhat penetrate mysteries seeming impenetrable-may be capable of enjoying vastly more of the Infinite (1 Cor. ii. 9-15). If so, our earth is a centre of wonders, and on the hinge of life Our Own Greatness. 235 revolves a surpassing destiny. The universe is all aglow with the lamp-light and hearth-light of our Father's House. Life seems to many as the bubble of a solitary pool come up to look at the sun,-bubble clothed about with tender fibre of mortal hue, to float over the glowing ripple, hither and thither, who knows? But the bubble bursts; it has come in contact with some weed or spray, and the crystal sparklet flies. Whither? We say " To be re-formed, to be enlarged, to become a glorious sphere, filled with new life from God through Jesus Christ our Lord." Believe "That nothing walks with aimless feet; That not one life shall be destroy'd Or cast as rubbish to the void, "That not a worm is cloven in vain ; That not a moth with vain desire Is shrivel'd in a fruitless fire, Or but subserves another's again." Tennyson, In Memoriam, liv. Στενὴ ἡ πύλη οὐχ ἡ πόλις. Via longa et arcta, sed urbs ampla. STUDY XIII. DAY V.-FISHES, REPTILES, BIRDS. "The natural and moral constitution and government of the world are so connected as to make up together but one scheme: and it is highly probable, that the first is formed and carried on merely in subordination to the latter, as the vegetable world is for the animal, and organised bodies for minds."-BUTLER'S Analogy. If we stood in space, far off from the solar system, we should see the worlds as a distant gleam. If then, standing not so far off, we beheld the light and motion of the planets and satellites, we might think that all matter was alike, all motion of one kind, and that both existed according to some simple mechanical and chemical laws. On nearer approach, seeing the world's living things, we might conclude, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, that some law of invariable causation was absolutely universal. Alighting on the earth, among men, we should discover that Nature spoke to all, and separately to each; that what every man heard he set down in feeling and thought, so that the symbols of his own experience represented the order, arrangement, fulness, reality in Nature, even as a page of algebraic figures can be read off into thoughts concerning the variety and splendour of light. If to this personal equation, to these qualities for physical and metaphysical research, bringing tidings that the circle of the known is surrounded by an ocean from whose depths arise. other lands of beauty, were added a greeting of the spirit encouraging contemplation of the Unknown-the Great Cause of all our conclusion would be that infinite space existed for matter, much less than space; that matter existed for life, much less than matter; that life existed for mind, least of all, yet greater than all-ruler of all. Regard this world of matter, of life, of mind, as a mechanism driven by blind energy; such energy, unless continually Beginning by the Great Unknown. 237 restrained by mind giving it law, would break up the universe. We can think this out. The transfer of energy into things necessary for the existence of life, and to effect physical changes in the universe, "is on the whole a passing from higher to lower forms; and, therefore, the possibility of transformation is becoming smaller and smaller; so that after the lapse of sufficient time, all higher forms of energy must have passed from the physical universe; and we can imagine nothing as remaining, except those lower forms which are incapable, so far as we yet know, of any further transformation. The low form to which all transformations with which we are at present acquainted seem inevitably to tend, is that of uniformly diffused heat. . . . Now, when all the energy of the universe has taken the final form of universally diffused heat, it will obviously be impossible to make use of this heat for further transformation."1 The worlds will be dark-dead-cold. This process, leading to chaos, enables us distinctly to say "That the present order of things has not been evolved during the infinite past by the agency of laws now at work, but must have had a distinctive beginning." 2 This beginning must have been by other than the now visibly acting causes. The only way out of the difficulty is to regard mind, matter, energy, as alike real existences. We know of mind by organism, does organism generate mind? The reply is-Organism does not even generate life, life certainly generates organism; organism therefore cannot generate mind which is the highest attribute of life; consequently, we regard all physical, vital, mental phenomena, as transformations of energy from the Unknown -the Eternal Source of energy, of life, of mind. The vitality of plant, of fish, of reptile, of bird, may seem no great thing; but if we consider that every little part of these organisms has its own store of energy constantly emptied and replenished; that the internal and external sources draw upon, and are drawn upon, by the whole arrangement of the world for harmonious working; the mechanism becomes very wonderful. Nor is that all-every 2 "Recent Advances in Physical Science," p. 20: P. G. Tait, M.A. * Ibid. p. 22. |