Editorial April 26, 1913 Issue

ASCENDING MAN

John B. Willis.

Human sense makes such frequent exhibitions of its consent if not attachment to the unideal, impulses which are unquestionably opposed to Spirit are so frequently in evidence, that aspiring hearts sometimes experience a sense of great discouragement. The stamp of evil seems so inerasable, the impress of good so evanescent, that the struggle is apparently unequal and hopeless. On the other hand, this same human sense not infrequently discloses a perception of and love for good, a capacity to be unselfish and heroic, which supplies a confidence and strength that is adequate, as we are wont to think at the time, to the demands of any issue or situation, and the shift from one side to the other of this consciousness of self often leads the introspective to wonder if Stevenson was not portraying his thought of the human as a whole, in his famous story of a dual nature, rather than outlining a preposterously unique personality.

Despite this confusion of consciousness, however, the innate instinct for the square deal, the recognition of right which becomes an inflexible law of conduct for all men, in some of their life relations, is emphatically manifest in present-day progressive thought. In our political and economic agitations even the most radical and revolutionary in the arena of party contention are declaring ever for "the rights of man." It is true that selfishness is always deceived and deceiving, it is ever assuming the garb and accent of righteousness that it may fool the gullible, but that the evil-minded should thus clothe themselves with pretense speaks volumes for the rule and authority of right among the many. Moreover, no one who is well acquainted with himself will question the genuineness of that nobler though perchance momentary sense which the thought of his mother or the story of some brave deed has brought him. There are best moments for all of us, when we are "caught up," lifted above the mean, the petty, the commonplace, and catch something of the poet's vision, the seer's sense of beauty and goodness and truth.

This ineradicable divine factor, this constantly reappearing man, is becoming more assertive and more authoritative every day, and Christian Scientists can give an explanation of this fact which is of the highest moment. They have come to realize in some degree that the least right idea in human consciousness is buttressed and supported by omnipotence; that God is behind all good, while evil has neither foundation nor force. The significance of the real and the unreal has related itself, for them, to every phase and phenomenon of human experience, and their apprehension and declaration of truth is reaching and affecting every earth plane and problem, in keeping with the psalmist's words: "Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night showeth knowledge. ... Their line is gone out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world." Speaking of this wireless radiation of right ideas, Mrs. Eddy has said, "The 'still small voice' of scientific thought reaches ... the globe's remotest bound. The inaudible voice of Truth is, to the human mind, 'as when a lion roareth.' It is heard in the desert and in the dark places of fear. ... Then is the power of Truth demonstrated,—made manifest in the destruction of error" (Science and Health, p. 559).

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