“So we believe,” said I.
After another brief silence, he remarked:
“Man did not begin his life upon this planet in perfection.”
At this moment we passed a beautiful garden, in which there was an infinite profusion of flowers in infinite variety.
“Look at those roses!” he exclaimed; “God planted the species, a crude and simple plant, and turned it over to man to do what he might with it; and in the same way he placed man himself here,—to perfect himself if he would. I am not jealous of God, nor envious of you; but just why He should have arranged to spare you all this labor, and commanded us to work out our own salvation, I cannot comprehend.”
It struck me as a remarkable coincidence that he should have used the very words of one of our own greatest logicians.
A longer silence followed. The Master walked with his head inclined, in the attitude of profound thought. At last he drew a deep breath and looked up, relaxing his brows.
“It may be prodigiously presumptuous,” he said, “but I am inclined to think there has been a mistake somewhere.”
“How, a mistake?” I asked.