Article August 10, 1918 Issue

Friendship in War Time

GUSTAVUS S. PAINE

In spite of all that has been written sentimentally on the subject, the fact remains that true friendship is founded wholly on Principle. Principle is itself the one sure friend of man, because it is always present, always the same, and available for every need. To be alone with God, divine intelligence, is to be alone with all there really is. Principle is the "friend that sticketh closer than a brother." We can then rejoice evermore in the possession of unlimited, actual friendship, safe in the infinity of divine Love.

Those who have been able to see beyond the depressing incongruities of mortal experience to the unchanging harmony of Spirit must always be content with this one joyous friendship. Even human friendships are preserved properly in proportion as human beings recognize the spiritual relationship of Mind and its manifestation. The fact that two or more people know something of Principle is the only fact, in the last analysis, which can give them a common meeting ground. No matter how much this fact may seem to be obscured, it is eternal; for the understanding of divine metaphysics is one and indestructible with all concerned. Thus as Mrs. Eddy says on page 131 of "The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany," "Where God is we can meet, and where God is we can never part."

No one saw more clearly than Mrs. Eddy the imminent fulfillment of prophecy through the unfoldment of Principle. When human thought struggles against the unfolding activity of divine intelligence, that which is called warfare, whether seemingly subjective or objective, takes place, and this conflict in the carnal mind continues just so long as the mortal mind seems to continue. Fortunately, however, the divine Mind is all the while the only real Mind, and is all that is really active. One sitting in the cab of an engine would see always ahead of him the rails converging in the distance, but even while this illusion appeared to the material senses, the very onrush of the engine along the ever equidistant rails would be proving irresistibly the nothingness of the sense evidence. So all who are familiar with the operation of divine Principle have realized the nothingness of any suppositional opposite, no matter the appearance might be. Christ Jesus was therefore able to declare, "When ye shall hear of wars and commotions, be not terrified," and again, "Ye shall be betrayed both by parents, and brethren, and kinsfolks, and friends ... but there shall not an hair of your head perish." To-day these things are coming to pass, and the very purpose of commotion in the supposititious mortal mind is to shake the material sense of things to the utmost. If meanwhile we but look up, and lift up our heads, we see clearly that divine intelligence is all that is producing alert activity.

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