Editorial January 24, 1942 Issue

Tangibility

Evelyn F. Heywood

The writer of Ecclesiastes beheld the vanity and inevitable conclusion of all materiality. "He that loveth silver shall not be satisfied with silver; nor he that loveth abundance with increase," he wrote. He knew that men might perform great tasks, build houses and plant vineyards, yet such things in themselves could bring no lasting satisfaction.

In instinctive homage to their own achievements, thinking in terms of matter, of material wealth and its tangible evidence, men in the ratio of their fortunes and rank have built houses and accumulated possessions. The necessity they have felt for a manifestation of prestige and power has been shown also in their outward display of homage, temporal and spiritual, in the erecting of their palaces and their churches, their castles and their shrines. Characteristic of all ages and all religions has been the pride men have felt in the outpouring of riches and toil in the building of edifices for their kings and rulers, their God or gods. In this mere symbol of glory and substantiality, they have continually overlooked that which alone endures, enriches, and inspires. True homage, the abnegation of human self and sense, has been overshadowed or forgotten.

Essential in our day is the human evidence of Church, practical, co-ordinating. Yet the words of Jesus to the woman at the well find their tangible fulfillment in the life of the Christian Scientist: "The hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth."

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Tangibility

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