Page:The Parable of Creation.djvu/83

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The Elevation of Love and Faith.
79

which man passes in the regeneration. He is born merely natural and at first develops only his natural powers and mind. But it is also designed by his Creator that he shall become spiritual and develop his spiritual powers and mind. This development, always gradual and slow, is called in Scripture the regeneration.

At first, and before regeneration begins, we are in ignorance, or, at least, in non-acknowledgment of spiritual things. A little child knows nothing as to its spiritual nature. It may learn a little with regard to it, but what it learns it does not really understand. The adult, who takes no interest in anything but his worldly affairs and pleasures, and does not see anything in a spiritual idea when it is presented to him, has not gone many steps, in this, beyond the child. His mind may have developed largely on natural lines, but certainly not on spiritual. As, however, he takes more interest in things of higher import, and comes more and more under their influence, he makes steps of progress herein. This progress in the unfolding of the higher elements of his being is his regeneration. And as the Biblical narrative of the creation sets forth under the form of parable, and in the language of sacred symbolism, the history of man's regeneration, the seven days in which the progressive events of the earth's creation are related, symbolize the seven