Editorial October 2, 1909 Issue

CAPACITY AND CONSECRATION

John B. Willis

The desire to be great may be said to distinguish the genus homo. However varied their ideas as to what constitutes greatness, this common factor of aspiration serves to distinguish men from all other creatures. With men the estimate of greatness allies itself very generally with the thought of what people have or have done, but Christ Jesus identified greatness with humility, unselfishness, spiritual aspiration, devotion to the ideal. This may be said to be the crowning thought of the parable of the ten talents. It was not what each one had, but what he was trying to do with what he had, that determined his ethical status. The Master measured worth not by capacity, but by the consecration of capacity; and with splendid insistence Mrs. Eddy has again pressed this teaching upon human thought.

The dissociation of talent and worth, ability and merit, is a fact of common observation, and human desire for the most part is constantly laying hold upon something to have rather than something to be. In the parable referred to, capacity, the number of talents, was a matter which the individual did not determine, since it was a gift or commission. All he had to answer for was the utilization of capacity, and respecting this he was judged. The parable further brings out the thought that consecration is causally related to the increase of capacity; that a right desire to do means a greater ability to do, and the philosophy of this fact is made clear in the teaching of Christian Science, that the faithful effort to be good contributes directly to that awakening to spiritual consciousness which is the true selfhood, and through which capacity is discovered and God made manifest to men.

The extent of the philanthropy of our times is phenomenal, and the bulk of it, perhaps, is prompted by unselfish purpose; nevertheless, to the thoughtful it can but be apparent that as a whole it is distinctly material. It builds colleges, libraries, homes, etc., and endows all kinds of enterprises which look to the lessening of human want and wretchedness. This is well and altogether praiseworthy, especially for those who can do no better; and yet Christ Jesus, the greatest of all philanthropists, did none of these things. He proved that the highest service, the service of Truth, is separate from all materiality. While he not only did not ignore the breaking of bread, but commended it, how little it had to do with his ministry to mankind, and how clearly he taught that every real betterment for the race is accomplished only through the coming of the divine idea to individual consciousness. The school, the library, the orphanage may supply a temporarily necessary condition to human advance, but the essential of this advance is the dawning of spiritual truth. Christian Science enables one to see, as never before, that the best way he can help in this work is to consent in every moment and every thing to the government and guidance of divine Love. He perceives that the measure of this consent is the measure of his capacity for good, and that he truly gives to God and to men in the consecration of capacity.

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