Article January 12, 1935 Issue

Window Dressing

FANNY DE GROOT HASTINGS

Putting the best foot forward, as an ancient maxim has it, is in accordance with human instinct. It expresses a mortal's desire to advance his own enterprises, private or public, and is manifested variously according to the nature of those enterprises. It prompts the merchant to display most prominently goods which he considers his best and most salable, and, in consequence, window dressing has become one of his important concerns; in fact, it is today almost a business in itself.

In their personal experience individuals are apt to follow a like course. Too frequently, with a desire to make a good impression upon the outer world, their first consideration is the outward appearance. And yet many have already learned and more are coming to admit that, still figuratively speaking, the material foot is never the best foot to put forward; that in fact it is no part of the real spiritual man, and can therefore never serve to advance his highest interests. Human means and methods, though right and necessary at our present stage of progress, can never be more than accessories, and should be seen as such and not allowed to assume undue proportions in thought.

Mrs. Eddy says in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 527), "Man is God's reflection, needing no cultivation, but ever beautiful and complete." Through the study of Christian Science we soon realize that the outward material unreality can never be a substitute for the spiritual reality. As Christian Scientists we recognize spiritual thinking and understanding as the best or right foot to put forward on all occasions, for these alone promote, inevitably, manifestations of harmony.

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