thou art
there also.'

That every one of those little black spots should have in it LIFE--
What is life? How did it get into that black spot? or, to speak
more carefully, is the life IN the black spot at all? Is not the
life in the Spirit of God, who is working on that spot, as I
believe? How has that black spot the power of GROWING, and of
growing on a certain and fixed plan, merely by the quickening power
of the sun's heat, and then of feeding itself, and of changing its
shape, as you all know, again and again, till--and if that is not
wonderful, what is?--it turns into a frog, exactly like its parent,
utterly unlike the black dot at which it began? Is that no miracle?
Is it no miracle that not one of those black spots ever turns into
anything save a frog? Why should not some of them turn into toads
or efts? Why not even into fishes or serpents? Why not? The eggs
of all those animals, in their first and earliest stages are exactly
alike; the microscope shows no difference. Ay, even the mere animal
and the human being, strange and awful as it may be, SEEM, under the
microscope, to have the same beginning. And yet one becomes a mere
animal, and the other a member of Christ, a child of God, and an
inheritor of the kingdom of heaven. What causes this but the power
of God, making of the same clay one vessel to honour and another to
dishonour? And yet people will not believe in miracles! Why does
each kind turn into its kind? Answer that. Because it is a law of
nature? Not so! There are no laws OF nature. God is a law TO
nature. It is his WILL that things so should be; and when it is his
will they will not be so, but otherwise.

Not LAWS of nature, but the SPIRIT of God, as the Psalms truly say,
gives life and breath to all things. Of him and by him is all. As
the greatest chemist of our time says, 'Causes are the acts of God--
creation is the will of God.'

And he that is wise and strong enough to create frogs in one way in
every ditch at this moment, is he not wise and strong enough to
create frogs by some other way, if he should choose, whether in
Egypt of old, or now, here, this very day?

Whatsoever means, or no means at all, God used to produce those
vermin, the miracle remains the same. He sent them to do a work,
and they did it. He sent them to teach Egyptian and Israelite alike
that he was the Maker, and Lord, and Ruler of the world, and all
that therein is; that he would have his way,