Editorial June 10, 1916 Issue

Doing and Becoming

John B. Willis

In denial of the claims of evil, Mrs. Eddy declares on page 428 of Science and Health that there is "no inaction, diseased action, overaction, nor reaction," and this thought is reaffirmed on page 419 in connection with the asserted relapse of sickness. On page 109, however, she quotes approvingly Jesus' saying, "If any man will do his [God's] will, he shall know of the doctrine," thus making clear the teaching of Christian Science that while the seeming action and reaction of evil are without basis or warrant, the incidental effects of the activities of good, of Life, Truth, and Love, belong to the verities of being and are of the highest significance to spiritual growth.

Christian believers very generally accept the sequences of evil as natural, and inviolable as the sequences of good; nevertheless it must be seen that the destruction of sin's law and order is involved in every instance of spiritual healing, or true forgiveness, and that it is thus proved they have no authority and no right to be, and hence merit no respect. On the other hand, through the reaction of Truth's activities in human consciousness, the doing of good always means the gain of good to one's self. We gather as we give, and this fact realized, opens up the Christlike way of working out one's own salvation. It focuses right impulse and molds Christian living. We begin to grow as we begin to know the truth, and we truly know when we do. This is the heart of the teaching of Christ Jesus, it is the gist of St. James' discussion on faith and works, and it is constantly pressed upon the reader's attention in our Leader's writings.

One of the most interesting things about a dynamo serves well to illustrate this law and order. The essential of an electric generator is a magnet, a piece of steel which has a power of attraction. When the generator is still, this power, which is technically known as residual magnetism, is slight, but the moment the armature begins to move, the magnet begins to be energized, and its strength is speedily intensified a thousandfold as a result of the flow of the incited current through innumerable coils of wire which enwrap it. The doing of the generator is its continuous becoming, and while unable to explain the "why-so" of this fact, the physicist's ability to transmit energy in any of its forms to distant homes and factories is wholly dependent upon his recognition and utilization of it. What is thus true of the dynamo is peculiarly true of every Christian life, and this is illuminatingly revealed in Christian Science. Here as elsewhere laboratory work is a doing that one may know or become. This is the inevitable effect of spiritual demonstration. It involves the activity of whatever residuum of faith we may have and insures its continuous increase. Faith is thus transformed into spiritual understanding, confidence and hope into demonstrable knowledge. An unexercised capacity means depleted capacity, a truth clearly taught by Jesus in the parable of the talents.

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