Editorial August 12, 1922 Issue

Advancing Demonstration

Ella W. Hoag

Every Christian Scientist who is really in earnest, if asked to formulate his greatest desire, might easily answer: To advance in the demonstration of the Science of being. Knowing as he does that Christian Science is the Science of Life, and that it contains all the rules whereby perfect living may be demonstrated, he naturally desires to progress in the understanding and practice of it. When he first decides to undertake to live in accordance with its demands, he expects to move along smooth ways and anticipates few struggles and easy victories. He naturally reasons that, since he has in his textbooks all necessary instruction as to the way in which to encounter and master any untoward condition or circumstance, nothing will be able to interfere with or hinder his continued and happy progress. He has not gone far, however, before he sees that if he is to continue to go forward more is required than he had supposed. To be sure, he may have grasped with a considerable degree of clearness the letter of Christian Science, but he early recognizes that putting it into practice means something more than he had imagined.

Right here the student is fortunate if he discovers the primal necessity of successful demonstration; namely, his need of absolute dependence on God, divine Mind. In "Retrospection and Introspection" (p. 28), Mrs. Eddy writes of this situation as follows: "He [God] must be ours practically, guiding our every thought and action; else we cannot understand the omnipresence of good sufficiently to demonstrate, even in part, the Science of the perfect Mind and divine healing." In other words, from the first moment to the last of the true demonstration of Christian Science there must be that constant turning to divine Mind, God, which will destroy all belief in any possibility of action or thought except under His direct control.

When Jesus said, "I can of mine own self do nothing," and, "The Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works," he too set forth this necessity. Because he never once failed to establish his own dependence on and unity with God, he brought his every effort for demonstration to successful fruition. "Except ye ... become as little children,"—except the thought turns trustingly for guidance each instant,—this blissful unity with the Father which Jesus compassed will never be realized in the degree necessary to perform the mighty works which Christ Jesus did and told us we too must do. In the self-righteous egotism of the so-called human mind, such humility as this is an unknown quantity; therefore the student must be constantly on guard lest he drop into the belief in his own unaided ability to demonstrate Christian Science. The understanding that his demonstration must ever be through reflection, must be won before any correct advancement can be made. It may take much patience and steadfast effort to gain this sense of absolute dependence on divine Mind, but it can and must be done.

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