Editorial December 1, 1928 Issue

Harvest

Albert F. Gilmore

There is nothing more certain than that Mrs. Eddy anticipated abundant fruitage as the result of the application of Christian Science by her students to the solution of humanity's problems. As hers was the large vision, so hers was the keen expectancy. She averred that, as the result of the dissemination of her teachings, "ethics and temperance have received an impulse, health has been restored, and longevity increased" (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 348). And she queried, "If such are the present fruits, what will the harvest be, when this Science is more generally understood?"

That Mrs. Eddy's anticipations are in a great measure being realized, there can be no doubt. The effects of the leavening of human consciousness through the incoming of the regenerative Christ are manifest on every hand. Quite generally, to be sure, this transformation is taking place without due recognition of its source. But the failure to identify the nature of the redemptive power by no means lessens the fact of the great accomplishments that are taking place. There is but one source of righteous power, and that source is God, whose agency is the Christ, Truth. Whether this fact is generally acknowledged or not, it remains a fact, and ultimately mortals will awaken to the recognition of the Christ as the instrumentality whereby God blesses all.

While with longing eyes we are looking ahead to the increasing abundance of the harvest, let us not fail to make the most of the bounty already ours, the fruit of the seed sown in the fertile soil of right desire. How sure it is that our ingathering depends wholly on the character of our sowing! Like seed, like harvest! We have no justification for anticipating a transformation of kind in the process of unfoldment from seed to fruit. As we sow, so shall we reap; and the harvest will inevitably be determined by the kind of seed which we plant in the ground of human hopes. We can neither plant thistles and gather figs, nor gather grapes from the sowing of thorns. If our sowing be the seeds of selfishness, of self-will, hatred, false ambition, our harvest will be in kind, a false sense of selfhood, disappointment, and ultimately despair. If, on the other hand, our scattering be of the seeds of good will, love of our fellow-men, obedience to divine will, guilelessness, humility, and the like, our harvest will be righteousness and peace.

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