lity in man, in contrast
with the downward bending and looking of other animals. Man is the
only creature that bears this erect form. It is a part of the image of
God upon him. It indicates heavenly aspiration, hunger for God, desire
for pure and lofty things, capacity for immortal blessedness. It tells
of man's hope and home above the earth, beyond the stars. Says an old
writer, "God gave to man a face directed upwards, and bade him look at
the heavens, and raise his uplifted countenance toward the stars." The
Greek word for "man" meant the upward looking. The bending of the form
and face downward, toward the earth, has always been the symbol of a
soul turned unworthily toward lower things, forgetful of its true home.
Milton has this thought in describing Mammon:--

"Mammon, the least erected spirit that fell
From heaven; for even in heaven his looks and thoughts
Were always downward bent."

The look of a man's eyes tells where his heart is, whither his desires
are reaching and tending, how his life is growing.

There are a great many bent people in the world. Physical bending may
be caused by accident or disease, and is no mark of spiritual
curvature. Many a deformed body is the home of a noble and holy soul,
with eyes and aspirations turned upward toward God. I remember a woman
in my first parish who then for fourteen years had sat in her chair,
unable to lift hand or foot, every joint drawn, her wasted body
frightfully bent. Yet she had a transfigured face, telling of a
beautiful soul within. Joy and peace shone out through that poor
tortured body. Disease may drag down the erect form, until all its
beauty is gone, and the inner life meanwhile may be erect as an angel,
with its eyes and aspirations turned upward toward God.

But there are crooked souls--souls that are bent down. This may be the
case even while the body is straight as an arrow. There are men and
women whose forms are admired for their erectness, their graceful
proportions, their lithe movements, their lovely features, yet whose
souls are debased, whose desires are grovelling, whose characters are
sadly misshapen and deformed.

Sin always bends the soul. Many a young man comes out from a holy home
in the beauty and strength of youth, wearing the unsullied robes of
innocence, with eye clear and uplifted, with aspirations for noble
things, with hopes that are exalted; but a few years later he appears a
debased and ruined man,