Article January 13, 1906 Issue

Holding our Own

LOUISE C. PEELAR.

Solomon's wise counsel, "Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding," turns thought away from the smallness of human effort to the greatness of God's work, to the spiritual man and the spiritual universe, which we must understand in order to be perfect,—to have that mind "which was also in Christ Jesus." Realizing God's perfection and man's relation to Him, which is kindred to that of the ray of sunshine to the sun, we lose our fear of failure and can believe in success.

Our trust, which begins in weakness, increases as we learn more of God. We trust Him more because we know Him better. How can we be thankful enough for our Leader's teaching upon this infinite theme? How small was our understanding of God, before we were given our text-book, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures." Before Christian Science awakened a more understanding faith in God, the belief in human intelligence drove us from one error to another. Error is vacillating, but there is no uncertainty in Truth. God's law was thundered from Mount Sinai in no uncertain tone. Jesus' words come to us with all the majesty of Truth after nineteen centuries.

Satisfaction with the imperfect is a foe to progress in Christian Science. Self-righteousness would cling fast to iniquity, calling that good which is unfit to be contemplated. Self-justification betrays the weakness of human character. The false self is often hurt when its defects are brought to light, and a friend takes on the appearance of an enemy when a straightforward exposure of error is made. If, however, we acquire the habit of looking upon error as impersonal, this sensitiveness will disappear. Mortal mind is arrogant, and would make one think that he is better quipped mentally, or is more spiritual than another, but we can always meet the conceit of mortal mind with a more determined effort to hold all that mentally belongs to us,—not in a greedy sense of getting everything for ourselves, but with the right thought of our duty to God and to ourselves. There is, in reality, no mortal mind to interfere with man's reflection of all the intelligence there is, all the good there is. There is no robbery in Christian Science, and Christian Science must govern us.

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