The Spirit in the Animal World

“These wait all upon Thee... Thou sendest forth Thy Spirit, they are created.” — Ps. civ. 27, 30.

refnwpliO are the “all” here spoken of? ¥V,4 They are the living creatures of the whole earth, What! you say, the - creatures of the animal world! can these be said to be in possession of God’s Spirit? I can understand very well how man should be thus privileged. I can understand why a being of such nobleness as the human soul should lay claim to a distinctive pre-eminence. But is it not a bold thing to say that the human soul is in contact with the beast of the field? Is it not a degradation of my nature to affirm that the same Spirit which created me created also the tenants of the deep? No, my brother; if you shall find in God’s Spirit the missing link between yourself and the animal world you will reach a Darwinism where there is nothing to degrade. You are not come from them, but you and they together are the offspring of God. Would you

THE SPIRIT IN THE ANIMAL WORLD, St

have preferred to have had no such link between you? It is your forgetfulness of that link that has made you cruel to the creatures below. You do not oppress your brother man, because you know him to be your brother; but you think the beast of the field has no contact with the sympathy of your soul. It has a contact, an irrefragable, indestructible contact. You are bound together by one Spirit of creation; you sit at one communion table of nature; you are members of one body of natural life. The glory of being united to thy Father is that in Him thou shalt be united to everything. Thou shalt be allied not only to the highest but to the lowest, thou shalt be able not only to go up but to go down. Thou shalt have the power that thy Lord had — the power to empty thyself to the lowermost, to the uttermost. Thou shalt feel that thou owest all things thy sympathy when thou hast recognised this relationshiz through the same divine Spirit.