Article October 30, 1902 Issue

Balance your Account

MRS. L. M. EARLE

FEELING sometimes almost discouraged over the manifold subtle attacks of error, as well as the more open and aggressive ones, the questions arise: Am I growing in the understanding and progressing in the spirit of Truth? Am I more often the victor or the vanquished? Strong in the strength which God supplies, or weak in the false beliefs and claims of mortal mind and its so-called laws, general and specific?

While querying thus on a recent occasion I opened my Bible [Revised Version] to the Epistle of James, second paragraph, and there I read, "Count it all joy, my brethren, when ye fall into manifold temptations; knowing that the proof of your faith worketh patience. And let patience have its perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, lacking in nothing." And further on in the same epistle: "Blessed is the man that endureth temptation: for when he hath been approved, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord promised to them that love him. Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God : for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempteth no man : but each man is tempted when he is drawn away by his own lust, and enticed."

I now recognized that these attacks of error are but temptations from evil to weaken our faith in Truth, and to strengthen our beliefs in the reality and power of matter, and sense testimony. Then thought went back over the period of years since the light of Truth first dawned in my consciousness, to sum up the profit and loss, and to balance the account. On one side were numerous physical ailments of greater or less severity which had yielded their claim of power and reality to the truth which I had realized of their nothingness; a tendency to hasty, sarcastic, angry speech, that had been overcome; an impulsive, impetuous, wilful nature, that had been considerably subdued; envy, hatred, and malice, that had been softened to something more akin to love; morbid, bitter, and unhappy thoughts, that had given place to those more natural to the real man; selfishness in varied forms that had grown more considerate, thoughtful, and yielding to others, and less exacting; fear in many phases, that had been destroyed; I had gained ability to endure and accomplish that which would formerly have been impossible; and, grandest of all, an illumined Bible and a love for it which was given through the teachings of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures." This enumerates but a small part of all that was found on that side and its value is inestimable.

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