Lo, the Signal!
A mother teaches her child the traffic signals and way signs—not as danger signals, but as signs of protection insured by obedience. Impelling this instruction is an affection, self-forgotten, strong, resolute, wise, ceaselessly alert to guard.
A signal light flashed by divine Love is Section 6 of Article VIII in the Manual of The Mother Church, by Mary Baker Eddy. Under the heading of "Alertness to Duty" this By-Law reads: "It shall be the duty of every member of this Church to defend himself daily against aggressive mental suggestion, and not be made to forget nor to neglect his duty to God, to his Leader, and to mankind. By his works he shall be judged,—and justified or condemned." Error of any kind cannot escape the searchlight of infinite and perfect divine Love.
This "Thou shalt" in the Manual is a beneficent command to defend ourselves daily against what our Leader has designated "the highest attenuation of evil" (Miscellaneous Writings, p. 260 ). Effectually to defend is to comprehend the unreality of the evil named, and to enact what we understand by ordering our lives in conformity with our understanding. Such obedience to this By-Law calls into expression a fundamental understanding of the basic facts of Christian Science. It requires the application of the highest truths we know; and the true test of our work lies in the results made manifest. Experience quickly informs us that results are not obtained by perfunctory reading, repetitions, or formulas, but, Per contra, by mental convictions reached through divine Science, and admitted only because understood.
The unreality of mental wickedness becomes apparent only in the light of the great verities of Christian Science: the allness of God, His omnipotence and omnipresence; the great scientific fact that there is only one Mind, which wipes out all phenomena planted on the basis of minds many or powers many; in the light of our unity with God, discerned and intelligently acknowledged—that inviolable guaranty of divine Love which keeps man in uncontested security in eternal harmony.
The daily spiritual reconstruction afforded by obedience to Article VIII, Section 6, builds in the consciousness an impregnable fortress into which suggestion cannot gain entry—where evil comes and finds nothing in us. The spiritual cement of this fortress withstands and shatters the assaults of all the sham compounds of false belief. Divine Love is Love which helps those that help themselves. For to know the truth about ourselves is to help ourselves; it is to take our place as the expression of God's being. This God enables us to do. Obedience to this By-Law in a spirit of happy accord with it, and of joyous gratitude therefor, is a heavenly and precious experience.
Entering the secret dwelling place of Spirit, the Christian Scientist finds himself in the abiding place of reflection, revelation, and sweet discovery. Here is the Psalmist's prayer answered: "Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law." Loosed from the limited sense of purely intellectualistic logic, by the perceptive faculty of Spirit he discovers himself as the witness, the reflection, of self-existent, absolute, immutable Truth. He tastes of the permanence and continuity of his being. As the exponent only of God, responding to the divine power, he finds he is a law to himself outside the supposed focus of mesmerism. His heart is alight with grateful love to his Father-Mother God as he receives immortal testimony to the total unreality of every phase of confusion, envy, jealousy, revenge, hatred, claiming to operate either through him or upon him. In the orbits of divine consciousness, accident, disease, affliction, loss, poverty have no dwelling place, and find no receptive surface for operation. Scientific intelligence extinguishes all these ills of false material belief. Infinite Spirit denies the existence of minds many, spirits many, beings many, many, along with their imagined processes of mental projection; and immortal evidence sustains the scientific proposition in Christian Science of the indivisibility of Mind.
Potentially, Article VIII, Section 6, is a command to awaken to our true being as Mind's offspring. Such is the nature of all Christian Science practice, all realization of Truth. And this unfoldment is our surest defense. How can we best forward this defense? Of prime importance is it that personal defects be progressively eradicated under the burning-glass of spiritual understanding. Then is seen only the celestial glow of reflection in Christian Science, and thence ascends the prayer of humility: "Make me to understand the way of thy precepts: so shall I talk of thy wondrous works." When our reflection of divine sense outshines the shadows, we have mounted in consciousness where "death hath no more dominion over" us; and since, as Mrs. Eddy says, "the understanding of Life, makes man immortal" (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 485 ), we have passed from death unto Life. In this spiritual illumination, the reflected perceptive faculty of Spirit makes us aware of immortality. Did not Jesus say, "This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent"? And since Truth is indeed the Life of man, we are in actual life when spiritual truth-knowing receives of God and shows it unto us—as Jesus promised. In the atmosphere of divine Science the precepts of Soul are admitted understandingly, and they bring to us divine tidings of man's dominion over aggressive mental suggestion in any of its presentments, thus redeeming us from all the etceteras which aggressive malice involves—sin, suffering, grief, disease, death. Jesus overcame the belief of death. Mrs. Eddy reëstablished this abolishment. God never made death. Who can breathe His praise? What words can utter His glory and the glory of His messengers who declare Him?
Through the lens of such obedience, we view with profound peace how "the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus" has made us "free from the law of sin and death" with its heterogeneous panorama of mutables and perishables. We begin to apprehend our freedom from the whole illusion of matter existence; of personal sense; of the human concept with its suppositional mind-forms, thoughts, and ways. In the mental process of seeing scientifically that the lie that deceives—delusion—has no basis for existence in the absolute, eternal divine Principle, Truth and Life, the supposed foundation of the motley dreamland of evil crumbles away.
A worker in Christian Science is washed clean by right obedience to this demand. We have to do our own ascending, aided by the power of spiritual understanding, and Article VIII, Section 6, is a sine qua non in this ascent. Can it be doubted that to advance continually throughout time and eternity we must perform the utmost labor for ourselves? How precious is that perfect obedience to the Manual which empowers us to radiate more of the afflatus of that love which heals! And how blessed it is that throughout the day's work the spiritualization called forth by obedience to this clause helps everyone coming for help and healing. To awaken the sick and the sinner requires much prayer that we keep ourselves awake—because the blind cannot lead the blind. Hence the necessity of persistent self-examination to find out to what extent we ourselves are holden of mesmerism, and to cast out suggestion until we become worthy representatives of Christian Science. And thus does Article VIII, Section 6, fit the practitioner for the duties of each day. "Before they call" will the spiritualized consciousness "answer."
The higher the office, the more important the post, the more serious the case to be healed, the more would error attempt to block the way to one's performance of "duty to God, to his Leader, and to mankind;" and the more would aggressive mental suggestion attempt to mar the clearness of vision, so indispensable in Christian Science work. One gauge of a church member's reflection of manhood is how he can stand under the assaults of aggressive mental suggestion. Therefore the more incumbent is it upon us to keep the spiritual windows spotless and shining. the lenses of a great telescope must excel in spotlessness; and to this end there is night and day vigilance, constant inspection, that no tiny speck blur the perfection of the magnifiers. Shall mortals at their material posts be more vigilant than Christian Scientists at their life posts?
What folly is remissness in this task! Does anyone imagine that working for others excuses him from this duty? Is anyone going to achieve the heights through doing this work by halves—by cursory, unfinished, absent-minded obedience? To assume that work for others can take the place of this individual work for ourselves deceives and deludes into a treacherous peace; and this so-called peace is brought on by the very evil against which we are so emphatically cautioned in Article VIII, Section 6; by a false peace that flatters and betrays even while it robs us. Jesus went apart into a mountain to pray. Over and over our Leader exhorts us to for ourselves and to guard against evil mental practices. Daily spiritual work is of incalculable value—refining, purifying, tempering. Each day's tempering leaves the steel of true thought more potent, more perfect, more pure.
Copyright, 1932, by The Christian Science Publishing Society, Falmouth and St. Paul Streets, Boston, Massachusetts. Entered at Boston post office as second-class matter. Acceptance for mailing at a special rate of postage provided for in section 1103, Act of October 3, 1917, authorized on July 11, 1918.
