Editorial February 17, 1923 Issue

Advancement

Ella W. Hoag

SIR THOMAS MORE once said, "In heaven ... every one (so well they love each other) rejoiceth and hath his part in each other's advancement." And yet, comparatively few have looked forward to such a heaven as this! How many are there in the world to-day who are expecting a heaven in which they are to find their own good in that of their brother? So innately selfish is the so-called human mind that mortals think principally of their own advantage. To be sure, to seek properly one's own advancement is a perfectly right thing to do, since all must sooner or later awaken out of the undesirability of selfishness into that understanding of divine Love which alone can give true satisfaction. It needs, however, the vision of Christian Science to show how this is to be done.

When one approaches Christian Science, he finds that to walk in the path it marks out is to be continuously progressing out of evil into good. Its way is the way of absolute unselfishness, and will be traversed slowly or rapidly in proportion as the desire for right spiritual advancement is cherished and allowed to prevail in one's thinking and acting. Jesus understood this, for he said, "The Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many." He knew that the only true way of advancement is the progress out of materiality into the understanding and demonstration of spirituality. He knew and proved that self-abnegation—the relinquishment of personal sense—is the way to reach heaven, wherein divine Love reigns supreme.

Christian Science points out very plainly that not only must there be willingness to seek spiritual advancement, but this must be established on the constant recognition that nothing else can satisfy. Certainly one will never go forward rapidly if he is constantly looking backward longingly. In "Retrospection and Introspection" (p. 81) Mrs. Eddy writes, "A realization of the shifting scenes of human happiness, and of the frailty of mortal anticipations,—such as first led me to the feet of Christian Science,—seems to be requisite at every stage of advancement." In our Leader's own experience she also saw the necessity of always keeping her eyes fixed on the heights of unselfed endeavor, for she tells us in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 426), "The discoverer of Christian Science finds the path less difficult when she has the high goal always before her thoughts, than when she counts her footsteps in endeavoring to reach it."

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