What is the metaphysical aspect of The Christian Science Monitor? The writer was once invited to answer this question, and the task proved to be an interesting and valuable one. As one enters upon a consideration of the question he comes to realize, with increasing conviction, that from the first page of its news items, through its feature and general information pages, and even through its advertisements, to its editorials and editorial notes on the last page, the purpose of this newspaper is metaphysical. De Quincey stated that mathematics has not a foot to stand upon which is not purely metaphysical; and this can truly be said of The Christian Science Monitor.

It is sometimes asserted that Christian Scientists have merely set out to establish the Monitor as a good, wholesome newspaper, though upon more ethical lines than other great journalistic enterprises, and having the advantage of one religious article printed in it daily, but that to claim for the Monitor a spiritual home in our church, with the protection of the metaphysical work of our members, work as alert and as consecrated as that given to the other activities of our movement, is something which was never intended.

It would in itself be a laudable human enterprise to run a newspaper having as its object those ideals of clean journalism and good fellowship which the Monitor is seeking to make practical in its columns, and it would certainly be deserving of success; but, based as it would be on a belief in human goodness, with its correlative belief in human evil, it would not have a permanent place within the channels of The Mother Church.

If we want to understand its metaphysical aspect, is not the best way to read what Mrs. Eddy has written about it? There is a passage on page 100 of "Miscellaneous Writings" which we can hardly turn to without gaining fresh inspiration and enlightenment in seeking to think rightly about our daily newspaper. It is as follows: "The spiritual monitor understood is coincidence of the divine with the human, the acme of Christian Science. Pure humanity, friendship, home, the interchange of love, bring to earth a foretaste of heaven. They unite terrestrial and celestial joys, and crown them with blessings infinite." Our Leader wrote those words many years before she established our daily newspaper, yet it seems as though there must be something prophetic in that statement. It is as though already Mind had foreshadowed in her thought the work which The Christian Science Monitor was to do. "Coincidence of the divine with the human"! What a marvelous meeting ground from whence to view the affairs of men, to bring into play the faculties of judgment and selection on all subjects which engage the labors, the interests, the pleasures, and the desires of mankind! Let us think for a moment of what immeasurable opportunities for the display of the divine gifts of "pure humanity, friendship, home, the interchange of love" are given us in our daily newspaper, that thus there may be brought "to earth a foretaste of heaven."

Surely it was of such things our revered Leader was thinking when she told the Directors of The Mother Church in 1908 that the time had come to found a daily newspaper. Through prayer and continual waiting upon the divine Mind for guidance and inspiration, The Christian Science Monitor had taken shape in Mrs. Eddy's thought; and when her followers were sufficiently prepared to carry out her wishes up to their highest demonstration of obedience and comprehension, it was given to the world.

"To spread undivided the Science that operates unspent"! This is the mission of the Monitor as given in our Leader's words, on page 353 of "The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany." Her words are fraught with a tremendous meaning. To each of us they are as a bugle call to higher endeavor, to a clearer vision of what that great instrument must become, in order that it may carry out the work which Mrs. Eddy foresaw for it. As we continue to think along these lines, whatever view of it we may have been entertaining, we shall find ourselves forced to admit that as our Leader saw The Christian Science Monitor endowed with a divine mission we, her followers, must thus learn to see it. No one who reads or writes for this newspaper is as yet entirely freed from literary, artistic, political, or national prejudice, so that at times we may find ourselves disturbed by some point of view contrary to our own. If so, what is the remedy? Through such experiences shall we not come to recognize our individual responsibility to maintain its metaphysical aspect by studying what our Leader has written about it and seeking for ourselves that vision which was hers in presenting it to us?

"Gather out the stones," says Isaiah, "lift up a standard for the people." Let us not forget in how many directions the Monitor is already carrying out the destiny Mrs. Eddy foresaw for it, in lifting up a standard for the people. Its inception and purpose being the outcome of spiritual vision, nothing can overturn that which is "under the shadow of the Almighty," nor rob it of its healing and redemptive mission to mankind.

As our recognition of the beneficent purpose which brought the Monitor into existence increases, there will appear more positively in the columns of our newspaper the attributes of intelligence, justice, and strength, and of tenderness, compassion, and protection. And in due course there will appear in ever increasing measure an understanding of man's true spiritual relationship to man, an understanding which alone can insure enduring peace among the peoples of the earth.

As we gain a clearer sense of the spiritual import of The Christian Science Monitor, our sense of responsibility increases. We see that it demands our intelligent cooperation, our alert metaphysical work, our loving support and protection, and that only through this realization and demonstration will its metaphysical aspect for all time and in the eyes of all mankind be established, and the great work for which our Leader destined it be accomplished—"to spread undivided the Science that operates unspent."