"LET THERE BE LIGHT."

MARY WHEELER

While Christian Science was still new to the writer, there came to her for decision a moral question which she at first attempted to settle by the old method of mental debate and the balancing of reasons. Failing in this, she remembered that the solution of all problems is to be gained through Christian Science. Putting aside, therefore, all effort of her own, and realizing that in divine Mind there reposes all wisdom and truth, and that she as a child of God had access to it, she awaited in quiet confidence the influx into her consciousness of that guiding perception of which she stood in need. In due time the message came. The undoubting conviction took possession of her that a certain course of action was the right course to pursue, and following this course without fear or hesitancy, the event justified the decision.

This experience brought with it a sense of awe and marvel, which was augmented by the fact that after the conviction the answer to prayer came, unaided by any reasoning on her part; reasons presented themselves to the understanding, arguments in favor of this course which had not occurred to her while debating the matter. First came the spiritual illumination, then the human intellect was enlightened. When the word of God was known, then human reason was satisfied. It is to be seen that such a process is by no means marvelous, but supremely natural and scientific. "God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth." All truth is in and of God, Spirit, and the activities of Spirit must be spiritual. Man, the image and likeness of God, is a spiritual being; hence, it must be through spiritual perception primarily that the truth is to be apprehended. God is also Mind, intelligence; therefore He is to be intellectually apprehended also. Truth is one. Truth cannot be both true and not true. If it be true to spiritual perception, it must also be true to the understanding, to reason.

Spiritual perception, or revelation, does not contravene law or science. In the last analysis it is their only basis, and for the reason that there can be no sure process of reasoning or demonstration which does not start from some self-evident (or revealed) fact or basic truth. God is Principle, the source of all truth and of its every manifestation; hence, there can be no process of revelation which is not in accordance with Principle and its law, and that does not satisfy every demand of man's nature for that which is scientific or demonstrable. Indeed, it is the final test of anything which claims to be truth, that it shall show itself true to revelation, to reason, and to demonstration.

It is because Christian Science meets unequivocally this three-fold test that it is entitled to the name which its discoverer has given it, and for this reason it could not be more fitly named. Mrs. Eddy refers repeatedly to her discovery as a revelation. Nevertheless, she also says, and reenforces it throughout all her teachings, "I won my way to absolute conclusions through divine revelation, reason, and demonstration" (Science and Health, p. 109); and every Christian Scientist knows that only by humble and sincere endeavor along the same lines is it possible to gain the import of these teachings.

Throughout the centuries great truths have been intuitively perceived by prophets and saints before they were laboriously reasoned out or demonstrated by men of intellect and science. By "lowly listening" Emerson became a messenger of spiritual truths to an unspiritual age. Jesus, who in such surpassing measure demonstrated good to mortals, did so by first "going to the Father." Moreover, the demonstrations which are made to-day in Christian Science by little children and persons of humble intellectual development are a rebuke to all mere pride of human culture. It is, then, for this spiritual understanding—the heavenly vision, the Christ-revelation—that we as Christian Scientists should strive, first and foremost. This ought we to do, and not to leave the other undone. This is not the world's method; rather, it is because of this aim that the world knoweth us not. Yet it is only thus that we may attain the complete assurance of Immanuel, God-with-us. It is by thus seeking "first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness," that all else "shall be added unto" us.

God said, "Let there be light." In the unfolding to mortal apprehension of infinite reality, there must first be the shining of the light. Then, and then only, can the ever-existent creation be perceived in its true nature, its perfect proportions, its relations to absolute good.

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