Page:The Parable of Creation.djvu/135

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The Image of God.
131

centre of the being. Our desires, thoughts and acts, are then saturated with his Spirit and his presence. But this spirit is wonderfully altruistic, not egoistic. It wanders forth to others and forgets self, except as our well being and advance is necessary to the great good in view. This state of mind is the end for which we were born. And we have not attained the symmetry of true manhood, do not bring forth fruits of a fully regenerate life, are not, in the strict sense, men until it has come to this pass with us. But before proceeding further on this line of thought, let us consider, in the order in which they occur, the words of the parable concerning the sixth day.

"And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind, and it was so. And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good.

As we had occasion to see in our last lecture, the fifth day of creation represented that stage of regeneration where, under the influence of a deep faith in the Lord and an earnest love for Him, the beginnings of a truly spiritual life are made. The earth was said to bring forth the living soul as a symbol of the mind making, in a spiritual sense, its first