Because God is infinite Life, He must include within Himself all right activity. Man, therefore, as His image and likeness must be the expression of all such activity. To contemplate this mighty truth at once presents to consciousness an unending possibility of right endeavor, and one longs to start on the way to such accomplishment. What can bring a more joyous sense than that which holds within itself the opportunity of glorious achievement? To be doing something worth while gives to men the only satisfaction which is worthy of the name; and what could be of so great importance as the exaltation of the Christ to human consciousness?

Men have glimpsed this truth in a thousand ways, but have again and again failed to lay hold of all its possibilities. Christian Science shows men how this lifting up of the Christ is to be done, and that all good is thereby open to those who will accept the teachings of Christian Science, lay hold of its method, and practice its precepts with unfaltering faithfulness. It explains the Christ as exemplified in Jesus' life in such a way that men need no longer be deceived by the speciouse claims of imperfection; instead they may mold their living in conformity with the one who never failed, who always succeeded in accomplishing whatever he undertook.

Mrs. Eddy says in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 248), "We must form perfect models in thought and look at them continually, or we shall never carve them out in grand and noble lives." Jesus always held the perfect model before his gaze. The Christ, the image and likeness of God, was what he perpetually lifted up in his consciousness. All who would follow in his footsteps and win the triumphs he won must do the same. Error is ever presenting its counterfeit patterns, and the world had failed to understand how to discern between the false and the true. With the light of Christian Science all such difficulty is removed. Now lifting up the Christ is really a simple thing to do. Its very simplicity is that against which the human mind revolts, for it tries to say that for anything to be intelligence, to be power, it must be abstruse, difficult to understand, complex. But how simple the truth is! Just to see, as Christian Science reveals, that every time a true thought is recognized, accepted, lived; every time one clings to good, in spite of evil's claim to rage; is honest in the midst of seeming dishonesty; loves when another hates,—this is to see the Christ, Truth, as the one altogether lovely, the allsatisfying, the alone-to-be-desired; this is to lift up the Christ. Surely Jesus proved all of this and more when he demonstrated its complete power over every falsity, over all evil, over sin, disease, death. It was this simplicity of being true to Truth which enabled Jesus to accomplish all the wonders of his work. There is only one way out of evil for anyone, and that is through similar demonstration.

Emerson once said: "The only path of escape known in all the worlds of God is through performance. You must do your work." Since all will admit that perfection is the goal before all men, that before all men is the absolute necessity of demonstrating their unity with this Christ, Truth, what gratitude must be felt that in Christian Science we have the method so clearly defined that through obedience thereto all may measure every thought, word, and deed by the Christ.

Manifold arguments of evil suggestion would strive to turn one aside from this precious simplicty of method. But if the Christ is ever held before one, if it is adored and understood, it will be demonstrated in like degree. The alert Christian Scientist will be on guard against the temptation to look away from the Christ and set up in its stead some human pattern; against the temptation to mold himself after some fellow mortal's concept of things, or to have some one else mold himself after his concept; in other words, against losing sight of the Christ and seeing only personalities. The Christ has nothing of materiality in it, nothing of self-seeking, self-love, or any of the qualities of the carnal, mortal mind. It is Godlike in every particular.

Jesus never for a moment failed to lift up the Christ. He never allowed anything less than the Christ-mind to govern him. He knew the Christ as the image and likeness of God, as man's real selfhood; and he refused to entertain any other sense of himself or of others. If we are to follow him we must do the same. John says, "Beloved, now are we the sons of God." Then it is every one's necessity to deny any selfhood except that which is the image and likeness of God. We, therefore, must refuse to honor or entertain or express anything which is unlike the Christ.

One will lose the sense of fear as he thus perseveres unflinchingly in his God-inspired determination to lift up the Christ, for he will quickly discern that the Christ is always safe "in the bosom of the Father." He will see how impossible it is for any harm to come either to the Christ or to himself in his own unity therewith; for it is the infinite manifestation of God. The Christ is therefore what every one really longs for, and is the alone valuable. One thus persevering will win the understanding which can speak with authority to every claim of sickness and sin so that they shall vanish into their native nothingness, because he will achieve the vanquishment of a false selfhood with its beliefs in limitation, and he will have the unspeakable joy of fulfilling the promise of Christ Jesus, "If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you."

Ella W. Hoag.