Article March 1, 1919 Issue

When Loss Is Gain

CARL WALTER GEHRING

"For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also," said Jesus. Every man, woman, and child is living in hourly proof of the truth of this utterance, and the only difference in the demonstration lies in the variety of the treasure. Yet, like many truisms, it may mean nothing to a man unless he has begun to seek guidance in the wisdom of the Way-shower, for he will then have taken under consideration another great truth, also voiced in the Bible, to the effect that as a man "thinketh in his heart, so is he."

Now the student of Christian Science has set about the task of bettering himself in all things. knowing that the thoughts in his heart are the causes which bring either harmonious or discordant effects into his life, he realizes the necessity for purifying those thoughts. To get his heart right is the problem; so taking as an axiom the Master's statement quoted above, he must begin to examine his treasures with the purpose of discarding those the possession of which would gratify only selfish desires. He must do this because, as Mrs. Eddy has told us in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 205), "selfishness tips the beam of human existence towards the side of error, not towards Truth." Selfish treasures are, therefore, evil treasures and indicate a heart of evil thoughts, and evil thoughts produce an evil existence, which no man desires; and so it is clear that the loss of selfish, unprofitable treasures can only be reckoned as gain.

A demonstration of the foregoing truth was furnished the writer by the experience of a man who, in recent years, was confronted with the destruction of a part of his fortune through the sweep of the prohibition reform. On attaining his majority this man had invested a part of his inheritance in brewery stocks and bonds. These securities then enjoyed a popularity on the stock exchange and were rated in banking circles as a good investment with a ready market. The ethics of the transaction claimed no investigation at the moment. He regarded brewing as a proper business; he had a taste for beer himself and had concluded that opposition to the industry came only from a minority filled with fanatical prejudice. In due time he found the value of his securities greatly depreciated, due to growing agitation for prohibition. Resentment against the agitators filled his thoughts; he seemed to be the victim of injustice; and this state of mind continued even after he became interested in Christian Science. His search for Truth, however, was not in vain, and he began to see that there was only one way out if he was to be a consistent Christian Scientist. To deny appetite was the easiest step, and so alcoholics were relegated to the scrap pile where tea, coffee, and tobacco had already been dumped. Resentment and the sense of injustice made a desperate resistance, and personal sense beclouded the issue. Just causes often suffer from narrowness and self-will in some of their supporters, with the result that those who would do right are embittered. So from a church pulpit he heard himself connected with the liquor traffic and condemned as vile beyond description. Anger thereupon swayed him, until the calm facts of Christian Science again came to the rescue.

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