4 EVERYTHING IS MADE

fulfil the designs of God, and attain the end
of their existence. Man has good and evil
placed before him, and he may choose which
he pleases: it is God’s will that man should
choose the good, and thus be happy: but
still, having made us free, he leaves us to
choose-evil and suffer sorrow, if we will.

While God, therefore, guides the birds
and fishes and insects and four-footed beasts,
by their instincts, to happiness, He has left
us to our own choice. Jt-is for us to decide
whether we will be happy or not. God has
given us reason in the place of instinct, and
if we will obey that reason wisely, and follow
the paths which it points out, happiness is
ours, not only for this world, but for that
which is to come. —

Now we do not send animals to school,
and give them books, for God is their
teacher: their instincts are all they need.
But human beings are to be educated, m-
structed, and by a gradual progress, elevated
to that high destiny for which they are qua-
lified. Instruction is the means by which
we are to be taught our duty, and by which
we may accomplish the end for which we
were created.