Article October 21, 1911 Issue

SPIRIT KNOWS NO CASTE

JANE L. VILAS

Some years ago, an employee of the English government, stationed at Bombay, being of a somewhat philanthropic turn of mind, conceived the idea of making use of his vacation by a journey to the plague-stricken district of Cashmere, with the hope of bringing succor to the afflicted ones. In making the trip, his native servants, who had some caste, forsook him one by one, fearing contamination, and he finally found himself at his destination with but one, a representative of the lowest caste, who thought he had nothing to lose. Accompanied by this faithful one, however, he pressed on from hut to hut in a deserted quarter, finding here and there poor creatures who had passed beyond human aid. At last in one desolate abode he discovered one who was still alive, but who had been abandoned to die by his own people. The Englishman stayed by him, and gave him tender care and attention till he seemed on the highroad to recovery, after which he went his way. Weeks passed, and he was again in his office, when one day the door opened and a native entered with the usual salaam. In response to an inquiry as to his business, the reply came, with the florid address of the Orient, "Woe is me, for I am an outcast among my people ! I was left to die, and through the instrumentality of the sahib I am brought back to life, and am now contaminated, and my people will not receive me till I buy back my caste. The sahib knows I am poor, and he is responsible for my life, and he must either support it or buy me back my caste."

Though this incident happened a number of years ago, and in far-off India, where indeed like conditions prevail to some extent at the present time, it has been brought freshly to mind while pondering the many cases in which here in our own midst unnumbered people are not only left to die, but condemned to death daily, because this drug or that drug, this system of hygienic treatment or some other method of manipulation (all the outgrowth of accepted theories of life and power in matter), fails to restore them. Then when Christian Science comes "with healing in his wings," the so-called mind of mortals argues thus to itself : "My way is the only way. I refuse to recognize any other." Christian Science brings a kindly and compassionate message to the afflicted. It administers of the potency of Spirit. It teaches of the one eternal good, universal and allinclusive; one Mind, and that all harmonious; one Life, and that indestructible. But mortal mind, the pretender to the throne of omnipresence, omniscience, and omnipotence, holds up its hands in horror and refuses to submit to Truth.

He who has overcome his self-will, his self-righteousness, his belief in a mind apart from the one Mind, and is thereby healed, is full of a new consciousness of life and health, and in the very nature of things he longs to share it with his brother. He hastens to him joyously, holding out to him the good which has been disclosed to him. What then happens? In too many instances, alas, comes the response, "This was not done by our method ; and we will not accept it." Then comes seeming antagonism, a period when error separates itself from Truth by refusing to affiliate with it or even to recognize it. Then is the Master's prophecy fulfilled : "The brother shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the child : and the children shall rise up against their parents, and cause them to be put to death." Then error may say, "Behold how Christian Science separates families ! Have nothing to do with it."

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