Editorial January 12, 1918 Issue

Grandeur of Man's Nature

William D. McCrackan

Humanity is first awakened by its glimpse of man's true nature. Prevalent religious belief has so long harped upon the theme of the miserable sinner, that the teaching of man's perfection as the son of God seems persumptuous. The best of people are tempted to recoil before the spiritual fact. Even John's immortal declaration, "Beloved, now are we the sons of God," was placed upon the shelf of scholastic theology until Christian Science returned it to its rightful place in the Sunday service. Christian Scientists have learned the necessity and privilege of identifying man with the image and likeness of God. They recognize that no words in any material language can do full credit to the nobility, symmetry, beauty, power, loveliness, and grandeur of man's nature. Mrs. Eddy writes on page 269 of Science and Health: "Human philosophy has made God manlike. Christian Science makes man Godlike."

The Christ nature is the grandeur of man's nature. Restored to its noble consciousness if the grandeur of that nature in which man sees his image as God's likeness. Pending the jurisdiction of mortal mind, mortal man is hedged about by the bristling, prickling points of critical admonitions as pointedly given as the porcupine's needles. Says the one who is trying to work out another's problem, If that other one were not so and so, certain things beneficial would happen; yet, if this very adviser and counselor were placed in the same position, there would no doubt be as big a battle to be fought,—perhaps a greater one, for self-righteousness might be heaped upon the situation. Jesus uttered a warning which reads: "Whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire." We read elsewhere in Scripture, "The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God." Evidently the quality which produces this class of persons belongs to the accuser who does not leave the regeneration of his fellow men to God. Therefore the one condemned may disappoint the self-righteous one by proving himself to have a greater nature. Mrs. Eddy writes on page 103 of Miscellany: "Infinite perfection is unfolded as man attains the stature of man in Christ Jesus by means of the Science which Jesus taught and practised. Alluding to this divine method, the Psalmist said: 'Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing?'"

More love and more forgiveness and patience are required. As a result of his choosing God the righteous man is lifted into a higher realm whither the sinister motives of his unrepentant fellow man cannot reach, and God places on his brow the diadem of safety, the sovereignty of the sacred, secret place of divine Science. This Science foretells the eternal harmony and joy of everlasting bliss, refutes the argument that man ever fell from his high estate, and proves that the argument about fallen man is simply the false concept about the serpent. By putting the adroit idea of the real serpent back into the garden of Eden, man becomes unfallen and the apple is displaced by the fruit of the Spirit, with an uncursed man and woman forever with God in the eternal Paradise of the spiritual riches of heaven. Of this fulfillment Mrs. Eddy writes (Science and Health, p. 171): "Through discernment of the spiritual opposite of materiality, even the way through Christ, Truth, man will reopenwith the key of divine Science the gates of Paradise which human beliefs have closed, and will find himself unfallen, upright, pure, and free, not needing to consult almanace for the probabilities either of his life or of the weather, not needing to study brainology to learn how much of a man he is."

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