Editorial February 21, 1920 Issue

The Affirmative Side

Ella W. Hoag

In Science and Health (p. 418) Mrs. Eddy writes: "Truth is affirmative, and confers harmony. All metaphysical logic is inspired by this simple rule of Truth, which governs all reality." In this statement our Leader not only presents a profound verity, but she also gives a method whereby all that is true and real may be recognized and brought into manifest activity to the human consciousness. Humanity has always proclaimed this taking of the affirmative side as a desideratum; but much as it has wished to stand on the positive side of existence it has not understood perfectly the way to accomplish this. The reason has been that there has seemed to be a very indistinct concept of what should be held affirmatively,—of just what constitutes the right affirmatives of Truth.

This brings us again to the question of Pilate: "What is truth?" Now it is almost impossible to imagine that one would not be willing to stand for Truth, affirm it, utilize its power, if he really knew what it is. Nevertheless humanity's love for and comprehension of the truth have been so vacillating, so uncertain, that the whole of mortal existence has been little more than a fluctuation between the affirmative and the negative, with a strong leaning to the negative. Even when the truth has been glimpsed, there has been so little faith in it, so little reliance on it as a power, that, at most, there has been but a weak holding to it.

Jesus stated plainly what the truth is when he said, "Thy word is truth;" and again, "It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life." When he thus taught and proved by his works that Spirit and things spiritual are the reality of existence, he also promised that whoever would take the side of Spirit and stay there should perform the same works he did. In spite of this he found but a comparative few who were ready to turn from matter sufficiently to grasp the wonders of Spirit and its affirmative truth. It is well known that the affirmative side of Spirit was forsaken a few hundred years later, and the world sank again into the negation which is materialism.

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