Man stands at the very summit of creation.  He is at the head of all that creep and swim and walk and fly.  Preparatory to his dominion he begins with the lowest and runs the whole gamut of experience of all living things below him.  And hope alone can save him as he journeys upward through all the intermediate stages on his way to his throne and his God.  Big with destiny, he is saved by hope.  Not to-day and not yesterday can suffice.  The present offers only standing room—­four-and-twenty hours.  Memory is a bin banked with snowdrifts, not the waving harvest-fields.  Man’s life is all in front of him.  His large endowment asks for an extended period of time, asks seventy years for skill toward his body; asks an immortal destiny for mind and heart.  He is saved by hope and futurity.

Consider the scope and functions of hope and aspiration.  Man is governed from above and within; while rocks, birds, beasts are governed from below and without.  Gravity holds the bowlder in its place.  The channel saith to the river:  “Thus far and no farther.”  The fawn that is struck, the lion that strikes, the eagle dwelling above both, are controlled by fear.  The charioteer drives his steeds from behind and controls by rein and scourge.  But man is controlled from within and in front.  God does not scourge his children forward through whips of fear.  Hopes moving on before him lure him onward.  The Italian artist shows us the child passing near the precipice.  Then drew near a gentle guardian spirit.  The unseen friend rolled along the pathway apples of Paradise and the child, following after with shouts of glee, was lured from danger.  To the beauty of the artist’s thought Homer’s story adds elements of instruction.  When the Grecian boy was pursued by a giant whose breath was fire, whose hand held a huge club, two invisible beings lent help.  One took the boy’s hand and lifted him forward, the other casting an invisible cord over him flew before him until his speed was doubled and the palace gates gave shelter.  Oh, beautiful story of God’s gentle rule o’er men!  When troubles sweep over the world like sheeted storms, when men fear exceedingly and strong men cower and shrink and little ones believe the next step to be the precipice, then God smiles.  Striking some sweet bell he sends forth messengers to lure men forward; they hang stars in man’s night; they whisper that the twilight is nothing, since it is morning twilight; that fears are bats and owls hooting at the dawn; that hope is a lark singing the new day; that God reigns and all is well.  Then depart all fears and superstitions.  The courage of the future comes; the columns begin a forward march.  These upward movements of society are the yearnings of God’s heart lifting his children forward by hope.