Article August 26, 1933 Issue

Lessons from Shadows

ADELAIDE ROGERS CALKINS

One of the most familiar things in the world is a shadow. All around us we see shadows, but we never fear or avoid them, because we know they cannot harm us since they have no substance. Were the metaphysical fact maintained consistently that Spirit, Mind, is the only substance, and that matter, its opposite, is but shadow, nothingness, much of the world's fear would evaporate. It would be seen that spiritual ideas alone are real, to be desired, claimed, and manifested in blessings, and that matter is not a thing to covet, to dread, to have, or to lose.

In a famous motion picture an interesting and somewhat enlightening scene portrays the transformation of Mary Magdalene from vice to nobility. One sees a beautiful, serene, pure face and lovely form surrounded by shadowy figures with ugly facial expressions of envy, hatred, and other sins. These gradually fade away, one by one, as the light touches and illumines the Magdalen.

When one is awakening from the dream of material existence and is endeavoring to apply the lessons learned by the study of Christian Science, an illustration, even though drawn from a seemingly trivial source such as the above, may serve to enlighten thought. So it was that a student of Christian Science, who had long been pondering the truth about the real man, was able after viewing this picture to draw a helpful lesson from the scene. This lesson pointed to the fact that the real spiritual man is always complete and harmonious, absolutely separate from and untouched by the material, mortal shadows or false beliefs about man; that mortal sense may temporarily seem to dim one's perception of the perfect reflection, but that the errors of mortal sense are only temptations, which must not be accepted, and are as distinct from man as are the tares from the wheat. Mrs. Eddy says in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 300), "The temporal and unreal never touch the eternal and real." When the light of the Christ, Truth, appears and is applied to any condition, the shadows of false material belief are dissolved, and the real man is clearly seen as he has always been, perfect and unmarred.

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