Editorial November 4, 1911 Issue

THE MORE ABUNDANT LIFE

John B. Willis

Readers of the text-book of Christian Science wonder sometimes why its author should have laid such stress upon the teaching that there is no life in matter, but those who have come to realize how this mortal belief wields its debasing influence in every realm of thought, have no trouble in discerning the sufficient reason for her reiterations. Multitudes of intelligent people still think of Spirit, God, as having been expressed or embodied in Spirit's opposite—Truth in error, perfection in imperfection, light in darkness! and the rule of this belief explains that tragic human struggle which has been as persistent as history.

Thus associated in thought with the things which are transitory and unideal, human life becomes identifies with their fate, the sport of non-intelligence, dawning in mystery and dying in the dark! St. Paul crowds the annals of this mortal sense into a single trenchant phrase when he says, "In Adam all die;" and it was in compassionate regard for the victims of its sway that Christ Jesus made his supreme statement, "I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly." How sadly do men need now, as in the early days of Christianity, to enlarge their thought of life and to separate it forever from dependence upon matter. The attainment of a larger life imperatively demands first the attainment of a nobler sense of life.

In the symbolism of the Old Testament life is often referred to as a pure river of water, and St. John speaks of it as "proceeding out of the throne of God." Thought is thus directed to God as the immediate source of all being and all good, and this is the sufficient explanation both why and how Christian Science brings health and happiness to men. It teaches us that Mind and Life are one, and a right sense of the abundance of our possible life will therefore be gained as we acquire the habit of thinking of it as the manifestation of this infinite intelligence. Thought begins to move in a larger curve when we remember that intelligence is always expressed in action. We can no more conceive of an inactive mind than of a dead life. "Mind produces all action;" "We tread on forces. Withdraw them, and creation must collapse. Human knowledge calls them forces of matter; but divine Science declares that they belong wholly to divine Mind" (Science and Health, pp. 419, 124).

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