NO greater questions are presented to humanity than these: What is God? What is man? The answers are found in the Bible, and they satisfy the weary searchers after Truth who gain a spiritual apprehension of their meaning. The first chapter of Genesis presents a complete record of creation, or revelation. In the ascending account up to and including the twenty-seventh verse of the authorized version of the Bible, the record declares the revelation of six manifestations of God to the human sense. They are as follows: (1) light; (2) firmament; (3) water, land, and vegetation; (4) sun, moon, and stars; (5) the lesser manifestations of life which inhabit the waters and the air; (6) the higher orders of creature life, and finally spiritual man,—"the full representation of Mind" (Science and Health, p. 591). After this comes the seventh day, typical of rest, completeness, and perfection.
In the sixth period or division we find the climax of all creation or revelation, for in the twenty-sixth verse the word us appears for the first time,—"And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness." This is followed in the next verse by, "So God created man in his own image, . . . male and female created he them." In this creation, or revelation, completeness is expressed in spiritual man as representing the highest order of being in God's universe of good.
The record of this first chapter of Genesis declares for each of the lesser manifestations that it "was good." Finally, after the record is made complete in perfect man, God's image and likeness, it concludes in the last. verse: "And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good." This summary expresses an emphasized sense of good. "Very" was evidently used to mean that creation is not only good, but really perfect, wholly good. Verily, the great wonder of creation is found in the perfection of man as God's reflection.
