The power of the understanding differs in degree in the various
kingdoms of creation. The mineral, vegetable, and animal realms are each
incapable of understanding any creation beyond their own. The mineral cannot
imagine the growing power of the plant. The tree cannot understand the power of
movement in the animal, neither can it comprehend what it would mean to possess
sight, hearing or the sense of smell. These all belong to the physical
creation.
Man also shares in this creation; but it is not possible for
either of the lower kingdoms to understand that which takes place in the mind
of man. The animal cannot realize the intelligence of a human being, he only
knows that which is perceived by his animal senses, he cannot imagine anything
in the abstract. An animal could not learn that the world is round, that the
earth revolves round the sun, or the construction of the electric telegraph.
These things are only possible to man. Man is the highest work of creation, the
nearest to God of all creatures.
All superior kingdoms are incomprehensible to the inferior;
how therefore could it be possible that the creature, man, should understand
the almighty Creator of all?
That which we imagine, is not the Reality of God; He, the
Unknowable, the Unthinkable, is far beyond the highest conception of man. (‘Abdu’l-Baha,
from a talk, Paris, October 20, 1911, ‘Paris Talks’)
