Editorial July 29, 1922 Issue

"Diligence, promptness, and perseverance"

Ella W. Hoag

On page 514 of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," Mrs. Eddy writes: "In the figurative transmission from the divine thought to the human, diligence, promptness, and perseverance are likened to 'the cattle upon a thousand hills.' They carry the baggage of stern resolve, and keep pace with highest purpose." What breadth of vision is presented in the words "diligence, promptness, and perseverance." Immediately they point to limitless possibility of achievement in every right direction. With such qualities as these for companions how impossible of failure would be any true endeavor; as Mrs. Eddy says, "They carry the baggage of stern resolve, and keep pace with highest purpose."

Every Christian Scientist knows full well how necessary these qualities are to each demonstration of the problem of being. No worthy purpose has ever been brought to fulfillment and no vanquishment of evil has ever been won without their aid. Perhaps, however, Christian Scientists do not always realize how slow they are to use these valuable assistants in their journey Spiritward. These qualities are quite the opposite of what mortals generally acknowledge as agreeable. The human thought in its purpose to win what it considers desirable is always prone to start out with the opposite tendencies. It wants first of all what it calls a pleasant way and an easy one. It does not wish to work; and even though it may decide that some work is important, it wishes to do it when it is convenient. As for keeping at work,—No, thank you! it says, I am already weary with the very thought of such a thing! To be sure, this human thought is filled with its own complaints that it never gets anywhere, it never reaches the goal it sets for itself; but what then? Why, it settles back into inertia, and thinks at some future day it will win what it desires without effort. It has not even glimpsed the fact that nothing worth while is ever gained without persistent endeavor.

One great difficulty with the work of the Christian Scientist is that he is in too much of a hurry to reach his goal. He is not always willing to use these spiritual qualities and take the steps they indicate. Instead of watching that he takes each step in the right manner and in the right direction, he is too apt to be thinking about the way he wants his work to terminate. Often he wonders why he so frequently has to go over and over the same ground; but it is simply because he has forgotten his necessary companions, "diligence, promptness, and perseverance." Because he has forgotten them he has lost sight of the stern resolve whose baggage they are carrying, and so his high purpose has, temporarily, also vanished.

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