his conception was
embodied in the words of Christ, when He said, 'I am the Alpha and the
Omega, the beginning and the end'. Man is the sum of Creation, and the
Perfect Man is the expression of the complete thought of the Creator--the
Word of God.

Consider the world of created beings, how varied and diverse they are in
species, yet with one sole origin. All the differences that appear are
those of outward form and colour. This diversity of type is apparent
throughout the whole of nature.

Behold a beautiful garden full of flowers, shrubs, and trees. Each flower
has a different charm, a peculiar beauty, its own delicious perfume and
beautiful colour. The trees too, how varied are they in size, in growth,
in foliage--and what different fruits they bear! Yet all these flowers,
shrubs and trees spring from the self-same earth, the same sun shines upon
them and the same clouds give them rain.

So it is with humanity. It is made up of many races, and its peoples are
of different colour, white, black, yellow, brown and red--but they all come
from the same God, and all are servants to Him. This diversity among the
children of men has unhappily not the same effect as it has among the
vegetable creation, where the spirit shown is more harmonious. Among men
exists the diversity of animosity, and it is this that causes war and
hatred among the different nations of the world.

Differences which are only those of blood also cause them to destroy and
kill one another. Alas! that this should still be so. Let us look rather
at the beauty in diversity, the beauty of harmony, and learn a lesson from
the vegetable creation. If you beheld a garden in which all the plants
were the same as to form, colour and perfume, it would not seem beautiful
to you at all, but, rather, monotonous and dull. The garden which is
pleasing to the eye and which makes the heart glad, is the garden in which
are growing side by side flowers of every hue, form and perfume, and the
joyous contrast of colour is what makes for charm and beauty. So is it
with trees. An orchard full of fruit trees is a delight; so is a
plantation planted with many species of shrubs. It is just the diversity
and variety that constitutes its charm; each flower, each tree, each
fruit, beside being beautiful in itself, brings out by contrast the
qualities of the others, and shows to advantage the special loveliness of
each and all.

Thus should it be among the children of men! The div