Article September 11, 1915 Issue

Gratitude

MARY FLOWERS MARBLE

One of the tendencies of human sense is to demand the material signs of divine plenty before giving thanks. Mortals, reversing all things, ask for physical well-being, material prosperity, harmonious relations with family and friends, congenial employment, and right environment, before expressing gratitude. Christian Science comes to us usually in the very midst of our most pressing troubles. Harassed without and within by a multitude of distresses, we hear the first faint sounds of its glad song of Spirit, and we turn for a moment from the crash of discord to listen to its notes of purity. In these moments of turning, the miracle is being wrought, for the illusive cause of human misery is fading away. It is being gradually displaced by a higher sense of life, which inevitably expresses itself in happier effects. The song of spiritual joy is always pouring itself into the consciousness of every willing listener, and in proportion to our spontaneous turning from discord we may follow every cadence of its melody.

Centuries ago a Chinese thinker, Lao-Tze, designated the material world as the "ten thousand things." He knew, as do we, that one thing only is worthy of our persistent and patient seeking, namely, spiritual reality. The effects of Spirit are spiritual: "love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance." If these mental qualities are present in human consciousness, the "ten thousand things" of the world will automatically disappear. True gratitude, then, need not wait for outward signs of comfort; it should follow freely the least discernment of the omnipotence and omnipresence of Truth and Love.

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