' Brother Lawrence, The PraeUee of the Presence of Ood, 25.
' R. Rothe, Still Hmtrs, 91. * James Vaughan.
GENESIS I. I 15
2. His Power. — " God created : " does anything so lead up our thoughts to the almightiness of God as this ? For think of the untold vastness of creation, with its two infinities, of great and small; universe beyond universe, in ever-expanding circles of magnificence, as we press our researches without, and universe within universe, in ever-refining delicacy of minute texture, as we pry into the secrets of the infinitely little — think of all this, and then think that it came into being at His word: "He spake, and it was done; he commanded, and it stood fast" (Ps. xxxiii. 9).
^ Observe, as an element of creation, the presence of that mysterious gift, so intimately present to each one of us, in its essence so entirely beyond our power of analysis, which we call life. We know life by its symptoms : by growth and movement, by feeling and gesture ; and in its higher forms, by speech and expression. What is life ? It is growth in the vegetable ; it is feeling and movement in the animal; it is thought, reflection, resolve in man, as these manifest themselves in speech and look and action. But what is it in itself, in its essence, this gift of life ? Science, the unraveller of so many secrets, is silent here : as silent as when she had not yet begun to inquire and to teach. She can define the conditions, the accompaniments, the surround- ings, the phenomena of life ; but its essence she knows not. It is a mystery which eludes her in her laboratories and her museimis ; each of her most accomplished votaries carries it perpetually with him, and understands it as little as does the peasant or the child. Oh, marvellous gift of life ! true ray of the Creator's Beauty, in thy lowest as in thy highest forms ! We men can foster it ; we can stint it ; we can, by a profound natural mystery, as parents, yet in obedience to inviolable laws, transmit it as a sacred deposit to beings which have it not; we can crush it out by violence into death. But we cannot create it.
^ When Mr. Simeon, of Cambridge, was dying, he looked round with one of his beaming smiles, and said, " What do you think specially gives me comfort now ? The Creation ! Did Jehovah create the world, or did I ? I think He did. Now if He made the world, He can sufi&ciently take care of me."
0 Master of the Beautiful, Creating us from hour to hour, Give me this vision to the full To see in lightest things Thy power-
i6 THE CREATION AND THE CREATOR
This vision give, no heaven afar, No throne, and yet I will rejoice, Knowing beneath my feet a star, Thy word in every wandering voice.*
ii. What other works follow from Creation ?
Belief in the creation of the universe by God out of nothing naturally leads to belief in God's continuous Providence, and Providence in turn, considering the depth of man's moral misery, suggests Eedemption. No such anticipation would be reasonable, if we could suppose that the world emanated from a passive God, or that, per impossibile, it had existed side by side with Him from everlasting. But if He had created it in His freedom, the question will inevitably be asked, Why did He create it ? Could it add anything to His Infinite Blessedness and Glory ? could it make Him more powerful, more happy, more wise ? Kevelation answers the question by ascribing creation to that attribute of God which leads Him to communicate His life ; that generous attribute which is goodness in its relation to the irrational and inanimate universe, and love in its relation to personal beings. "I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee."
^ The sower is justly held responsible for the due care and cultivation of the growing plant. To neglect it, to allow it to wither and die for lack of proper attention, is felt to be a wrong and almost a cruelty. The father and the mother are, still more justly and still more severely, held responsible for the mainten- ance, education, and tenderest nurture of their children. And why ? Because they are their pro-creators ; that is, under God, their creators. Nature itself teaches us the rights of creation. And can we think for a moment, that the Creator is forgetful of, is insensible to, those rights? Let our Saviour's familiar argument be the reply to the question : " If ye, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children ; how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him ? " The Creator, t?ie Father, must be infinitely more righteous and faithful than all subordinate and secondary creators and fathers. He will not forsake — He will have a desire to— the work of His own hands.*
» " A. E." ' D. J. Vaughan.
GENESIS I. I 17
1. Providence. — If God created the world He will also rule it. God does not create worlds in order that meaner spirits may control them. Creation means providence, and providence means redemption, and redemption means heaven, and heaven is a term which no lexicographer can fitly define.