270 THE CHAIN OF LIFE. 



Divine revelation carries us a step farther, and teaches us to 

 recognise in Jesus of Nazareth God manifest in the flesh, the 

 Divine Logos dwelling among men. But though this is a doc- 

 trine of revelation and not of science, it is in perfect harmony 

 with the plan of progress which we have been sketching. It is 

 the natural outcome of a process leading to the introduction 

 of a rational and accountable being, understanding some- 

 thing of the works and ways of God, that to him God should 

 reveal Himself, and that the Divine Logos, by whom were 

 " constituted the ages " ^ of the world's geological history, 

 should preside also over its future consummation, when all 

 the degradation that has sprung from the aberrations of fallen 

 and imperfect humanity shall be removed, and man himself 

 shall become fully a partaker of the Divine nature. 



The world we live in is thus not necessarily a finished world, 

 and it is now marred by the sins of man. What it may be in 

 the future, we can perhaps as little guess as an intelligence 

 studying the Palaeozoic world could have understood that of 

 the present time. But it is a glorious truth to know that our 

 Maker has revealed Himself to us also as a Saviour, and that 

 as individuals we shall not perish, to be replaced by an im- 

 proved species in the future, but that we ourselves, as sons of 

 God, may enter into and possess the new earth and new 

 heavens of future aeons of the universe. Thus it would seem 

 that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is that which was wanting 

 to complete and justify the history of nature by bringing to 

 light the final " restitution of all things," and our own union to 

 God in a happy immortality. 



^ The true meaning of Hebrews i. 2 and xi. 3. 



