Article December 28, 1935 Issue

The Dignity of Humility

MARY L. ALLEN

"Humility is the stepping-stone to a higher recognition of Deity. The mounting sense gathers fresh forms and strange fire from the ashes of dissolving self, and drops the world." So writes Mrs. Eddy on page 1 of "Miscellaneous Writings."

One student of Christian Science, who had earnestly desired to know true humility, was much cheered by a clear realization that humility means knowing that there is no evil in real being. Because God, infinite Love, creates and loves all, there is no reality in evil. Necessarily, then, humility is the willingness to accept and live this vital truth. Humility is a link to a higher recognition of God, wherein it is seen that evil does not exist.

Can there be found a more direct way to the daily expression of practical goodness than through humility, through a substantial proving that only good exists? Our Leader herself proved the truth of her words (Retrospection and Introspection, p. 86), "To energize wholesome spiritual warfare, to rebuke vainglory, to offset boastful emptiness, to crown patient toil, and rejoice in the spirit and power of Christian Science, we must ourselves be true." Is there anything that leaves thought more empty than boasting? What but ignorance could deceive one into yielding to such a temptation? Ignorance is never anything but the lack of right knowing. Therefore, when confronted with the energizing truth of being, the belief in evil vanishes. One writer has said, "Where boasting ends, there dignity begins."

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