In His Image

by William Jennings Bryan

Sometimes I go into a community and find a young man who has come in from the country and obtained a smattering of knowledge; then his head swells and he begins to swagger around and say that an intelligent man like himself cannot afford to have anything to do with anything that he cannot understand. Poor boy, he will be surprised to find out how few things he will be able to deal with if he adopts that rule. I feel like suggesting to him that the next time he goes home to show himself off to his parents on the farm he address himself to the first mystery that ever came under his observation, and has not yet been solved, notwithstanding the wonderful progress made by our agricultural colleges. Let him find out, if he can, why it is that a black cow can eat green grass and then give white milk with yellow butter in it? Will the mystery disturb him? No. He will enjoy the milk and the butter without worrying about the mystery in them.

And so we might take any vegetable or fruit. The blush upon the peach is in striking contrast to the serried walls of the seed within; who will explain the mystery of the apple, the queen of the orchard, or the nut with its meat, its shell, and its outer covering? Who taught the tomato vine to fling its flaming many-mansioned fruit before the gaze of the passer-by, while the potato modestly conceals its priceless gifts within the bosom of the earth?

I learned years ago that it is the mystery in the miracle that makes it a stumbling block in the way of many. If you will analyze the miracle you will find just two questions in it: Can God perform a miracle? And, would He want to? The first question is easily answered. A God who can make a world can do anything He wants to with it. We cannot deny that God can perform a miracle, without denying that God is God. But, would God want to perform a miracle? That is the question that has given the trouble, but it has only troubled those, mark you, who are unwilling to admit that the infinite mind of God may have reasons that the finite mind of man does not comprehend. If, for any reason, God desires to do so, can He not, with His infinite strength, temporarily suspend the operation of any of His laws, as man with his feeble arm overcomes the law of gravitation when he lifts a stone?

If among my readers any one has been presumptuous enough to attempt to confine the power and purpose of God by man's puny understanding, let me persuade him to abandon this absurd position by the use of an illustration which I once found in a watermelon. I was passing through Columbus, Ohio, some years ago and stopped to eat in the restaurant in the depot. My attention was called to a slice of watermelon, and I ordered it and ate it. I was so pleased with the melon that I asked the waiter to dry some of the seeds that I might take them home and plant them in my garden. That night a thought came into my mind—I would use that watermelon as an illustration. So, the next morning when I reached Chicago, I had enough seeds weighed to learn that it would take about five thousand watermelon seeds to weigh a pound, and I estimated that the watermelon weighed about forty pounds. Then I applied mathematics to the watermelon. A few weeks before some one, I knew not who, had planted a little watermelon seed in the ground. Under the influence of sunshine and shower that little seed had taken off its coat and gone to work; it had gathered from somewhere two hundred thousand times its own weight, and forced that enormous weight through a tiny stem and built a watermelon. On the outside it had put a covering of green, within that a rind of white and within the white a core of red, and then it had scattered through the red core little seeds, each one capable of doing the same work over again. What architect drew the plan? Where did that little watermelon seed get its tremendous strength? Where did it find its flavouring extract and its colouring matter? How did it build a watermelon? Until you can explain a watermelon, do not be too sure that you can set limits to the power of the Almighty, or tell just what He would do, or how He would do it. The most learned man in the world cannot explain a watermelon, but the most ignorant man can eat a watermelon, and enjoy it. God has given us the things that we need, and He has given us the knowledge necessary to use those things: the truth that He has revealed to us is infinitely more important for our welfare than it would be to understand the mysteries that He has seen fit to conceal from us. So it is with religion. If you ask me whether I understand everything in the Bible, I frankly answer, No. I understand some things to-day that I did not understand ten years ago and, if I live ten years longer, I trust that some things will be clear that are now obscure. But there is something more important than understanding everything in the Bible; it is this: If we will embody in our lives that which we do understand we will be kept so busy doing good that we will not have time to worry about the things that we do not understand.

In "The Grave Digger," written by Fred Emerson Brooks, there is one stanza which is in point here:

"If chance could fashion but a little flower,
With perfume for each tiny thief,
And furnish it with sunshine and with shower,
Then chance would be creator, with the power
To build a world for unbelief."

But chance cannot fashion even a little flower; chance cannot create a single thing that grows. Every living thing bears testimony to a living God and, if there be a God, then every human life is a part of that God's plan. And, if this be true, then the highest duty of man, as it should be his greatest pleasure, is to try to find out God's will concerning himself and to do it. When Job was asked, "Canst thou by searching find out God?" a negative answer was implied, but we can see manifestations of God's power everywhere; in the suns and planets that, revolving, whirl through space, held in position by forces centripetal and centrifugal; we see it in the mountains rent asunder and upturned by a force not only superhuman but beyond the power of man to conceive. Captain Crawford, the poet-scout, in describing the mountains of the West has used a phrase which often comes into my mind: "Where the hand of God is seen."

We see manifestation of God's power in the ebb and flow of the tides; in the mighty "shoreless rivers of the ocean"; in the suspended water in the clouds—billions of tons, seemingly defying the law of gravitation while they await the command that sends them down in showers of blessings. We behold it in the lightning's flash and the thunder's roar, and in the invisible germ of life that contains within itself the power to gather its nourishment from the earth and air, fulfill its mission and propagate its kind.

We see all about us, also, conclusive proofs of the infinite intelligence and fathomless love of the Heavenly Father. On lofty mountain summits He builds His mighty reservoirs and piles high the winter snows, which, melting, furnish the water for singing brooks, for the hidden veins, and for the springs that pour out their refreshing flood through the smitten rocks. At His touch the same element that furnishes ice to cool the fevered brow furnishes also the steam to move man's commerce on sea and land. He imprisons in roaring cataracts exhaustless energy for the service of man: He stores away in the bowels of the earth beds of coal and rivers of oil; He studs the canyon's frowning walls with precious metals and priceless gems; He extends His magic wand, and the soil becomes rich with fertility; the early and the latter rains supply the needed moisture, and the sun, with its marvellous alchemy, transmutes base clay into golden grain. He gives us in infinite variety the fruits of the orchard, the vegetables of the garden and the, berries of the woods. He gives us the sturdy oak, the fruitful nut-tree and the graceful palm.

In compassion He makes the horse to bear our burdens and the cow to supply the dairy; and He gives us the faithful hen. He makes the fishes to scour the sea for food and then yield themselves up to the table; He sends the bee forth to gather sweets for man and birds to sing his cares away. He paints the skies with the gray of the morning and the glow of the sunset; He sets His radiant bow in the clouds and copies its colours in myriad flowers. He gives to the babe a mother's love, to the child a father's care, to parents the joy of children, to brothers and sisters the sweet association of the fireside, and He gives to all the friend. Well may the Psalmist exclaim, "The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament showeth his handywork. Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night sheweth knowledge." Surely everything that hath breath should praise the Lord.