Article June 8, 1940 Issue

Uprightness

MABEL J. ANSON

Isaiah stated God's promise in these words: "Judgment also will I lay to the line, and righteousness to the plummet." The builder makes use of the plummet and other standards of measurement to ensure exactness and stability. The world will profit much when it learns that the only safeguard for its national and international dealings, to the end that permanent peace may be attained, is the plumb line of righteousness. "Upright," in one sense, is defined as "morally correct; having rectitude; honest; just." Uprightness includes loving-kindness, humility, meekness, purity, mercy, honesty, justice, courage, patience, fearlessness, and all kindred qualities of thought.

Solomon said of his father, David, that God showed him great mercy according as he walked before Him "in truth, and in righteousness, and in uprightness of heart." Integrity begets love, trust, co-operation, and uprightness. Man, in the likeness of God, expressing divine Mind, Life, Truth, and Love, is spiritually upright. Mortal sense, however, presents varied pictures of man as material, separated from God, unstable in health and happiness, and subject to many sad experiences or sinful tendencies of thought. Our Leader, Mary Baker Eddy, speaking of her own experience, writes (Retrospection and Introspection, p. 31), "Into mortal mind's material obliquity I gazed," adding, "My heart bent low before the omnipotence of Spirit."

In the Manual of The Mother Church, our Leader, Mrs. Eddy, has given us a high standard for thought and action in "A Rule for Motives and Acts." It reads in part (Art. VIII, Sect. 1), "Neither animosity nor mere personal attachment should impel the motives or acts of the members of The Mother Church," and includes the injunction, "The members of this Church should daily watch and pray to be delivered from all evil, from prophesying, judging, condemning, counseling, influencing or being influenced erroneously." On the first Sunday of each month in all Christian Science churches this rule is read, reminding students of the high standard of brotherly love which they should consistently maintain.

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