Two Voices of Nature
Lyman Abbott, D. D. Psalm 8:3-4 When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have ordained;… The poet first looks out upon nature, and feels his littleness; then he thinks further, and sees his greatness. He knew very little of the universe compared with what we know. We look upon the earth, these rivers, these mountains, this ocean, we look back historically upon the tremendous forces which have pushed these continents up, and are pushing them, so that it is estimated that within the last five years Scandinavia has been pushed up over three hundred feet into the air from the ocean bed; we look upon the starry firmament with these immensities of space, and it will be very strange if we are not inclined to say, "What are we? Insects on a globe of sand; the world an ant hill, and we but ants upon it." "Who am I, that I should think the Creator of these blazing orbs, the forth-putter of this tremendous power, the wisdom that has planned and keeps in order this marvellous mechanism — that He should count the hairs of my head, or think of me as His son?" Yet, if we think deeply, we shall come also to the thought of the Psalmist, and see in the very grandeur of nature a testimony to the grandeur of man. If we have learned something which the Psalmist never knew respecting the greatness of nature, we have learned something also which the Psalmist never knew concerning the greatness of man, for whom the world has been made. Not only has this wonderful world been given to us, not only has this wonderful world been mastered by us, but it has been given to us to find the way to the mastery of it ourselves. If you consider that this world is a university. All its powers are hidden from us until by our own energy we have discovered them, mastering us until by our own supremacy we have dominion over them; if you consider that all this has been given to us to make "character" — does it seem so strange that this world should be also the theatre of a more Divine redemption, the place whereon a greater service to character has been wrought than can be wrought by cloud, or tree, or mountain stream, or ocean? This world is not an ant hill. It is God's house; it is man's house; God-given for man's use and man's supremacy. (Lyman Abbott, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; WEB: When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have ordained;