304 NATURE MYTHS AND ALLEGORIES 



For years he lived as one of the plants, 



Eemembering nought of his inorganic state so different ; 



And when he passed from the vegetive to the animal state, 



He had no remembrance of his life as a plant, 



Except the inclination he felt to the world of plants, 



Especially at the time of spring and sweet flowers ; 



Like the inclination of infants towfcrd their mothers, 



Which know not the cause of their inclination to the breast. 



Again, the great Creator, as you know, 



Drew man out of the animal into the human state. 



Thus man passed from one order of nature to another, 



Till he became wise and knowing and strong as he is now. 



Of his first souls he has now no remembrance, 



And he will be again changed from his present soul. 



Jalalu 'd Din conceived evolution in a different way from 

 ours. But he arrived at the clear and logical conclusion that 

 man, having emerged from elements and plants and animals, 

 retains a sympathy with them, loves and admires and uses 

 them because they are the stock from which he sprang. 



IV 



Unless we reject what is implied in the evolutionary theory 

 of the Origin of Man, we are forced to concede that the old 

 Hellenic religion a religion which has survived in all imagina- 

 tive minds contained a truth neglected and down -trodden 

 by Christian theology. It rested on the following proposi- 

 tions. Not only man, but all things in the world, are full of 

 soul. Soul can communicate with soul, not only in its human 

 form, but also in nature ; man's soul with the soul of forces 

 that control his life, and with the soul of dimly sentient 

 things beneath him in the scale of being. Our contemplation 

 of the external universe is therefore not the mere inspection 

 of matter alien to ourselves, but a communion with that from 

 which we came and into which we go, itself penetrated with 

 the thought that constitutes our essence. Only, in the rhythm 

 of the universal life, it would appear that the creatures of each 

 stage, while in that stage, cannot overleap the barriers of their 

 defined personality, cannot mingle freely by sympathy and 



