Editorial September 9, 1916 Issue

"Comfort Ye"

Annie M. Knott

No one who is acquainted with the fortieth chapter of Isaiah need wonder that its inspiring phrases have been woven into the oratorio of the "Messiah," especially the opening lines, "Comfort ye my people, saith your God." The whole of the chapter indeed brings the truest comfort, yet it sweeps away from the panorama of human experience what Mrs. Eddy calls "the fading forms of matter, the mortal body and material earth" (Science and Health, p. 263); but in so doing it only reveals the imperishable realities of the spiritual universe, and the man who neither sins, suffers, nor dies. This is surely "good tidings," even while we read in no uncertain terms that mere fleshliness, although it may vaunt itself as youthful strength, shall "faint and be weary." Why then should any cling to this mortal belief when those who wait upon the Lord "shall mount up with wings as eagles," their strength renewed in understanding the one who never faints nor fails.

The whole of Christ Jesus' earthly ministry may very properly be characterized as a ministry of comfort, and that he himself regarded it as a direct fulfilment of Isaiah's prophecy is evident when we find him providing for its continuance in the work of "the Spirit of truth," named by him "the Comforter." All Christian denominations agree that this did not mean the coming to the world of a person, but a spiritual and divine influence, rebuking sin and establishing righteousness, as we read in the sixteenth chapter of John's gospel. This Comforter is also called the Holy Ghost, and on page 588 of Science and Health we find this manifestation of infinite Mind defined as "Divine Science." Paul speaks of "the God of all comfort," and he adds, "That we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God."

All through the gospels we find the Master bringing the surest comfort to sufferers by healing them, and to the bereaved by restoring to them the dear ones who to mortal sense were dead. He did not, moreover, forget the needs of the sinful, for we find him lifting up a fallen woman and bidding her "sin no more," also giving the same counsel to the paralytic man at the pool of Bethesda after he had healed him. The application of the truth which blessed these two is, however, greatly extended in the parable of the prodigal. Here is a picture of one who had exhausted all that material sense had to offer and proved its nothingness. Then he had to prove what Whittier calls "the eternal goodness." This poet also says,—

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