Editorial July 2, 1921 Issue

Seven Days

Gustavus S. Paine

In spite of the multiplication of interests and activities in the the modern world, humanity is constantly seeking for novelty, never satisfied with the most exuberant forms of materiality. Hideous formlessness in art and literature, for instance, is but an evidence of this desire for escape from mortal conventions, without, however, any comprehension by those who revel in the grotesque of where the escape is to be found, in Spirit, Mind, not in earthly concepts. Savagery itself may seem attractive to those mortals who have become cloyed with what they mistakenly conceived of as civilization, society, and culture. When Boswell remarked that "Lord Monboddo still maintains the superiority of the savage life," Dr. Johnson exclaimed, "What strange narrowness of mind now is that, to think the things we have not known are better than the things which we have known." Twentieth century restlessness, seeking "things we have not known" in such supposedly wild regions as the South Sea Islands, must find in the end that no mere things or human conditions, whether primitive or elaborate, can satisfy.

Of course the true civilization, society, and culture must be found in infinite Mind, where limitless spiritual action unfolds as genuine satisfaction and progress. When a man sees the unreality of material aims and accomplishments, he is ready to accept the actuality of Spirit and its substantial, though altogether spiritual, manifestation. Speaking of the compassing of Jericho by Joshua and his associates, Mrs. Eddy says on page 279 of "Miscellaneous Writings," "They went seven times around these walls, the seven times corresponding to the seven days of creation: the six days are to find out the nothingness of matter; the seventh is the day of rest, when it is found that evil is naught and good is all."

Now the spiritual fact is that there is, always has been, and always will be, in reality, only one infinite Mind conscious of its infinite spiritual manifestation, which is the idea suppositionally counterfeited by the human sense of things. The accounts of creation in Genesis are just human ways of stating this fact; for the first, or true, account shows in human language something of the unfoldment of infinite Mind that is ever going on, whereas the second, or false, account typifies the suppositional counterfeit, which never has been real. In one sense, what the divine Mind knows and maintains is ever new, fresh, and spiritually animated; and yet, in another sense, there is nothing novel to God, divine Principle. As Mrs. Eddy points out on page 518 of Science and Health, explaining the end of the sixth day as depicted in the first chapter of Genesis, "The divine Principle, or Spirit, comprehends and expresses all, and all must therefore be as perfect as the divine Principle is perfect. Nothing is new to Spirit. Nothing can be novel to eternal Mind, the author of all things, who from all eternity knoweth His own ideas."

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