Article November 9, 1918 Issue

Discouragement Defeated

JEANIE F. GIBB

As the student of Christian Science continues to climb the upward path, learning each day a little more of truth, many hindrances seem to come in his way. Among them there is none more insidious, and more fatal if yielded to, than a sense of discouragement. Wearing as it often does the disguise of a virtue, namely, humility, it is one of error's most powerful weapons, and one most commonly met with. One sometimes hears the complaint: I do not seem to make any progress; the spiritual uplift that others have does not come to me. Now this is a regrettable state of thought, yet it may be a more hopeful one than that of resting content with uncertain progress. Discouragement is sometimes called a matter of temperament, and is looked upon as induced by a trait of one's mental make-up which can never be wholly eradicated; but the teachings of Christian Science shed an entirely different light upon it. It is seen to be quite as much a diseased condition as a crooked spine or affected lungs; quite as unreal as these are, and therefore within the scope of healing. The sure and only remedy for every ill is the truth. For the false belief about self the right idea must be substituted, and when that has taken place the healing is done.

A sense of discouragement is rooted in the belief in a selfhood separated from God. The remedy is to turn away completely from this false view of self, and learn from the study of the Bible and the Christian Science textbook that in reality man has no separate existence from God, no fallen estate, no incompleteness, no limitation; that his true and only selfhood is the reflection of that infinite Mind which Mrs. Eddy, on page 16 of "Miscellaneous Writings," so beautifully describes as "all-pervading intelligence and Love." In the reflection of divine Mind can there possibly be any sense of discouragement, any fear of not being able to "know the truth"? There certainly cannot be; so it is evident that such thoughts must be looked upon as suggestions of error, and nothing more,—an attempt of "the evil one" to hinder the student's progress,—and the most fitting and helpful reply the Christian Scientist can make to it is, "Get thee behind me, Satan."

The coexistence of God and man is one of the leading facts taught by Christian Science. On page 471 of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" Mrs. Eddy says: "The evidence that God and man coexist is fully sustained by spiritual sense. Man is, and forever has been, God's reflection," and there are many other passages of a like nature. In God "we live, and move, and have our being" is Paul's way of expressing the same truth, and this thought realized and held to will wipe out any sense of discouragement, no matter how long one may have yielded to it in the past. To coexist with the Father-Mother God is to be conscious only of the nature and things of God,—the harmony, joy, peace, of Love, Truth, Life. A poor, discouraged mortal is not man. He is only a human misconception of man's selfhood, and the apostle John declares, "Now are we the sons of God."

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