Editorial October 4, 1913 Issue

From the Passing to the Permanent

John B. Willis

No thoughtful observer of the marvelously varied tints with which the hedges and hillsides are reporting autumn's advance, these days, can fail to understand the saying of one that he could never look upon the fading of nature's beauty, whether in the heart of a flower or in the face of a child, without a sense of sadness. The lapse of anything chaste and sweet and pure does seem entirely out of keeping, and must bring pain to all who, while sensitive to the integrity of the ideal, fail to distinguish between God's universe and the universe of matter. This pain, moreover, is likely to be greatly intensified as one is compelled to look upon the unseemliness and decay which attend the passing of all material things. An opening rose, which so delights the senses with its form, fragrance, and color, may seem "divine," but tomorrow this same blossom may nourish a ravenous sensuality, and prove an offense to both sight and smell in its hastening decay.

In the order of mortal belief there is no escape from the shock of such an experience, since it insists that the law of death is no less legitimate than the law of life whose manifestations it is ever waiting to fasten upon and destroy. Those, therefore, who are dependent upon and limited to mortal sight for the satisfaction of their love of the beautiful, must accept a full cup of regret with every sip of pleasure. They can indeed treasure the indefinite remembrance of past delights, and this enforced resort to the mental realm may awaken thought to the possibility of possessing that spiritual sense by which St. Paul was manifestly profiting when he said to the Corinthians, "We look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal."

The great apostle never made a statement which more clearly reveals his apprehension of the Science of being. He had not yet fully worked out his problem, was not "already perfect," as he frankly conceded to the Philippians, but his attention was supremely devoted to the minding of spiritual things. His gaze was fixed on the eternal. He was maintaining that mental attitude described by Mrs. Eddy when she says, "Hold thought steadfastly to the enduring, the good, and the true, and you will bring these into your experience proportionably to their occupancy of your thoughts" (Science and Health, p. 261).

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