Editorial October 12, 1912 Issue

ORDER AND SOVEREIGNTY

John B. Willis

UPON the material plane there can be no pearl without an oyster; the little jelly-like animal seems absolutely necessary to the production of this gently-lighted gem. And yet even the deist who declared for the divine approval and support of this order could not say that God is incapable of forming a pearl without the oyster, and one big enough to serve as the gate of the city of St. John's wondrous vision.

The divine agent determines the order of manifestation, and not the order the agent. This is a leading thought in Christian Science, and its truth would no doubt be conceded even by those Christian believers who have been educated to think that there can be no variation from the order of material experience, and who thus deny the lordship of spiritual truth. Christ Jesus' way of providing bread for five thousand and more had in it no recognition of or dependence upon the material. Though it satisfied a physical want, his act was certainly indifferent to "the established order," and thus proved that the material aspects and limitations of production are quite apart from God and in no sense necessary to His creation. Matter and its modus being thus shown to be unrelated to the divine activity, it must so remain today, and consequently it must be regarded as not of God.

Christian Science brings home the fact of the vital significance of this line of thought to the fulfilment of our Lord's command to heal the sick. So long as we regard a given order as expressing the direction and limitations of the divine activity, all effort to modify or interfere with it must be felt to be out of keeping by every reverent sense, since we manifestly cannot be working together with God in the doing of that which sets aside and thus defeats His plan of operation; in other words, if the law of God were against us, in our aspiration and effort to escape from sickness and death, it would be manifest folly to continue the struggle.

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