Article June 1, 1940 Issue

Originality

FLORENCE IRENE GUBBINS

In "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mary Baker Eddy, on page 286, we read that "physical causation was put aside from first to last by this original man, Jesus." And on page 126 of the same book, in a paragraph whose marginal heading is "A lack of originality," we read that "human thought never projected the least portion of true being," but that it "has sought and interpreted in its own way the echo of Spirit."

The word "original" is defined in Webster's Dictionary, in part, as "that which is not copied, imitated, or translated: underived, first-hand." Therefore, to be original is to be the very opposite of all that is characteristic of mortal mind. From this standpoint, we can say that a lack of originality is a lack of divinity. Sameness, monotony, lack of initiative, all denote absence of Mind; and since Mind, God, is omnipresent, they cannot be actual or real. And so it is for us to affirm the presence of Mind, showing itself in continuous unfoldment, spontaneity, and a wealth and variety of ideas just where these seem to be most lacking; for the one Mind is expressed only in that which is like itself.

Mortals are usually afraid of originality, particularly those among them whose thoughts are regulated by an outward code that is not as yet written on the heart. Originality to them savors of unorthodoxy and even lawlessness, a divergence from right. But it was the Master's supreme obedience to the law of spiritual being that made him the most original man on earth. Since there is only one Mind, originality can only be the expression of the one Mind; and no idea can operate in such a way as to harm or interfere with another, for each and every idea, in its very diversity, expresses the one infinite divine Being.

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