A future artist may immortalize himself by his treatment of the theme. A lasting fame awaits the artist competent to handle such a splendid subject. Sin soon enters. Disobedience brings suspicion and fear and death in its ghastly train. Paradise Lost! Well might the angels veil their faces, and universal blackness hail the coming doom. The fall of man has been written in his sin and slavery, and misery in all the ages since. "Alas! poor man quoth the pitying spirit, THE SPLENDID MENTAL AND MORAL ENDOWMENT BUT there is also another side to this question. It is the moral and spiritual. The Dignity of man is not only shown in the vigor and endurance of his physical nature, his splendid personality; but inexpressibly more so in the nature of that Soul, breathed into him by his Creator. The first and most fundamental element which introduces itself into our consciousness is the conscience with which the first man is endowed, his sense of right and wrong, his liberty to do as he pleases. "And God said to Adam; Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat; but of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil thou shall not eat; for in the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die", Genesis 2:16. Notice the personal and positive command, "thou shalt die". Eve's share in the transaction does not excuse Adam. He disobeys and dies. He breaks the law and suffers the consequences. He uses his liberty to do as he pleases; but whether he pleases or not, he suffers for it. In his creation God has endowed man with the liberty and power to do as he pleases. God Himself will not interfere with this vested liberty and power. There is therefore no power in the universe, in earth, or hell to compel a man to do anything he does not prefer to do, or to do otherwise than as he chooses. God can kill a man but He will not compel him to do anything against his will or nature. This is written into man's constitution, in his creation, and it is still there; and will be eternally. This is the Kingly crown placed on the brow of every man. This constitutes the transcendent dignity of Humanity. These are princely endowments, royal prerogatives, inalienable rights, fundamental laws of the human constitution. Talk of the upward trend of the race! Its evolution skyward! The trend has been downwards for thousands of years. Instead of elevation it has been depression. The tyrannies of Babylonia, Egypt, Persia, Rome and the so-called Christian nations of Medieval Europe completed the "Paradise lost"; and established an Inferno upon our beautiful world. The royal prerogatives, inalienable rights of Manhood, may be briefly defined as follows: First; Individual Independence to do pleases. Second: as he Direct Individual Responsibility to God for his choices and their results. The human soul is independent of all forces in the Universe. There is no power in the Universe to compel him to do otherwise than as he pleases, prefers or chooses. This constitutes every human being an Independent Sovereign before God. How low humanity has fallen! Will Paradise ever be Regained? Sometimes he chooses lust, appetite, passion, ambition, war and murder. The furies are let loose and earth becomes a Pandemonium. Sometimes on the other hand he chooses patience, temperance, righteousness and love. This is an effort to regain the "lost Paradise". Sometimes he is generations ahead of his time and he is tortured, hanged or burnt by a narrow, bigoted, infernal tyranny. Liberty to do as he thinks best. Freedom of conscience is engraved upon the human constitution by the hand of the Creator. It is an inalienable right and at all hazards should be maintained. William the Silent of the Netherlands adopted this motto: "I will maintain". This is a royal prerogative. A Divine honor and responsibility. No man has a right to abdicate his manhood. He is branding himself as a slave, a tool, a thing. He has lost his manhood, sold his birthright for a mess of pottage. He deserves the scorn and detestation of mankind. He has not even the respectability of a decent snow shovel. The shovel accomplishes its mission, that for which it was designed. He abdicates his prerogative, that which distinguishes him from all other animal life; and in so doing falls below the lowest animal life and he becomes a menace to his race because he voluntarily becomes the willing tool of Tyrants both political and ecclesiastical to enslave his race. When he sells his birthright, that which constitutes him a man in the sight of God, he becomes a menace to his family, his country, and to all good people everywhere. He should be ostracised, driven out of decent society to dwell with beasts of the field where he belongs, except that he is a meaner beast than any of them, more cunning and cold blooded. Alas! there are so many human beasts. So many vultures, wolves, etc; but the human wolf is the meanest and most dangerous of any. So many historians, poets, orators and soldiers have eulogized liberty as the most glorious prize of Men. And so far they are right, but the majority fail to emphasize it as a constitutional and inalienable right and prerogative of Manhood, without which he fails in the most essential element of his being, a God given, Divine right which if he fails to maintain he sinks himself below the level of the beast and deserves only the indignation of the Almighty, and the pity or contempt of mankind. |