Editorial July 14, 1923 Issue

Enduring to the End

Ella W. Hoag

The meaning of endurance has been associated largely in the thought of mankind with patient submission to something unpleasant. Enduring to the end has often been supposed to imply the bearing of difficulties with fortitude and courage until the difficulties themselves have seemed finally to triumph. Men have also believed that much exercise of self-will was requisite for them to endure properly, even though the endurance resulted only in final disaster. With such a sense as this they would have but a forlorn hope in continuing to endure, and it might easily be questioned how long, under such circumstances, endurance would be a virtue.

How different from all this was the meaning Jesus attached to this quality when he said, "He that endureth to the end shall be saved." Since he always preached and proved salvation from evil, here is a promise which immediately proclaims endurance—when properly exercised—to be a potent factor in bringing about the victory over all that is wrong. In the demonstration of Christian Science, endurance is considered from the standpoint of Jesus' statement. It therefore does not present to the student the thought of a supine yielding to evil; neither does it argue for a stubborn resistance of it, both of which tendencies Christian Science shows as wrong and undesirable. Quite to the contrary, this quality is seen to be a heavenly friend, teaching the beauty of maintaining constancy, patience, firmness, under whatever the seeming difficulty. It thus enables one to go steadily forward in the vanquishment of error until every falsity is proved unreal.

Considered spiritually, like all the qualities of divine Mind, endurance partakes of the divine nature. It is allied with perseverance and strength and includes security and joy as well. Never looking upon trials as merely torments, it sees in them opportunities for progress and spiritual growth. It recognizes that when tribulations of all sorts "cease to bless they will cease to occur" (Miscellany, p. 143). It approaches every claim of evil with the understanding that it must be conquered, and that there must be no cessation of persistent effort until good has been proved triumphant. It is therefore never satisfied with half results.

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