Man as Overlord by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Mar 24, 1914

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 41, No. 11.

Man as Overlord

By Editor

AN editorial writer in the New York Independent, in speaking of Bergson and his "creative evolution," says:

"During the present generation chemistry and biology have passed from the descriptive to the creative stage. Man is becoming the overlord of the mineral, vegetable, and animal kingdoms. He is learning to make gems and perfumes, drugs and foods, to suit his tastes, instead of depending upon the chance bounty of nature. He is beginning consciously to adapt means to ends and to plan for the future even in the field of politics. He has opened up the atom, and finds in it a microcosm more complex than the solar system. He beholds the elements melting with fervent heat, and he turns their rays to the healing of his sores. He drives the lightning through the air, and with the product feeds his crops. He makes the desert to blossom as the rose, and out of the sea he draws forth dry land. He treats the earth as his habitation, remodeling it in accordance with his ever-varying desires. . . . The idea of eternal recurrence does not frighten him as it did Nietzsche, for he feels it to be impossible."

Human achievements in the field of science are truly marvelous. What man has done within the last century is even greater than the dreams of fiction of those who lived before. But when we come to acknowledging man in this sinful state as the "overlord" of creation, we are making a very fatal mistake. When man stops to think of some of his achievements, he is tempted to feel very much like an "overlord"; but when he stands in the presence of one of the little convulsions of nature that will create an earthquake or a volcano, or when he is confronted with a whirling tornado, he finds that his claims of overlordship are very childish.

We are in the midst of the great convulsions of this old earth during its dying agonies of sin. God has said that the earth shall wax old like a garment. He has told us that it shall reel to and fro because of the heavy transgressions upon it. And we will find that disturbances and irregular conditions in nature will become more and more pronounced, and men will be absolutely powerless in the presence of them. It is a great mistake for man in his pride to seek to make of himself an equal with the mighty God, the great Creator.