Article July 30, 1921 Issue

Vision

HAZEL L. ZIMMERMAN

A man's most urgent need, if he would work out his own salvation and do his part thereby in working out the salvation of the world, is vision, not the vision referred to as the act of seeing materially but, on the contrary, the act of spiritual perception which enables him to take cognizance of the unfolding of the purposes of infinite Mind through spiritual thinking, through founding his thinking upon Principle. Under the marginal heading, "Vision opening," on page 428 of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," Mrs. Eddy says, "Man's privilege at this supreme moment is to prove the words of our Master: 'If a man keep my saying, he shall never see death.' To divest thought of false trusts and material evidences in order that the spiritual facts of being may appear,—this is the great attainment by means of which we shall sweep away the false and give place to the true."

Undoubtedly the world's great need in this supreme moment of greater responsibilities, shifting standards and new ideals is a vision that will not fail, a vision that will look straight through the seeming to the real, and that vision is to be attained by the individual and therefore by the world through proving the words which Jesus has already proved: "If a man keep my saying, he shall never see death." "My" as it is used in this instance does not refer to any personal statement, but rather to the "I" or one Mind of which the Christ-idea is the infinite manifestation. Just what it is that God, Mind, requires of man is recorded clearly and concisely in the sixth chapter of Micah: "He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?" It is interesting in analyzing the first line of this verse to consider the thirty-first verse of the first chapter of Genesis, where we read that "God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good." It follows, then, that God, being the one cause and creator, and man and the universe being His perfect and complete creation, the ever presence of good as the only reality both in the creator and His creation is a permanent fact. The real man, therefore, could never do otherwise than reflect the allness of good in doing justly, in loving-kindness and merciful dealing manifested through his right activity; for man as spiritual idea is the conscious and constant reflection of infinite Mind.

The real work to be undertaken in carrying out the requirements as set forth by Micah, necessitates diligent effort in the right direction. It means proving the spiritual man to be the only reality. It means constant mental alertness; for when the supposititious opposite of the real, the counterfeit of the one Mind, called mortal mind, would lay claim to an existence of its own, an existence apart from God in which it would attempt to counterfeit God's creation in its own forms of matter call them good, and seek to urge them upon the world in the guise of good, then the vision which calmly looks straight through the seeming to the real is imperative.

Send a comment to the editors

We'd love to hear from you!

Easily submit your testimonies, articles, and poems online.

Submit

Vision

We'd love to hear from you!

Sign up for unlimited access