48 THE IMMORTALITY OF ANIMALS 



might trace the reflected wisdom and goodness of 

 God. 



The murmuring streams and gentle breeze whis- 

 pered God's name; the birds floating in the air, . 

 the cattle grazing in the fields, the sagacity of the 

 elephant and the dog, the human-Kke cunning of 

 the monkey, the beautiful plumage of the peacock, 

 all bespoke His goodness and wisdom; and the 

 heavens above and the earth beneath all portrayed 

 His power and love. "Would that we could stop 

 here, and draw a curtain over the dismal future 

 and hide historical facts. The imagination faints 

 beneath its own conception of the great and awful 

 transformation which follows. This change is the 

 saddest epoch in man's history. 



"While man was surrounded with the law of na- 

 ture which was impressed on his mind by the 

 design and beauty of what he observed, God had 

 given him a positive law, under penalty of death 

 in case he should violate it ; and as the result man, 

 the most dignified of the whole creation, was the 

 first to derange this grand cosmical system by break- 

 ing the law and entailing on himself and on the 

 lower animals death and every form of misery, sin, 

 and sorrow with which we are to-day surrounded. 



