Article February 12, 1944 Issue

The First Beatitude

HELEN W. KINCADE

Several years ago, on the far side of a six-acre wooden covering to a city reservoir, a fire started. Almost instantly the blaze had swept the entire creosoted surface. Flames and smoke rose higher and higher, reaching across the narrow roadway towards the walls of the adjacent houses. A student of Christian Science turned on the threshold of her home, and glanced back at its loved furniture, pictures, and books. Outside the windows a wall of flame was rising. From the instant that she had seen this terrifying picture of destruction she had been making strong affirmations of truth. She knew the picture was an illusion, and that spiritual consciousness could not admit such a falsity.

As the fire department ordered the house evacuated, aggressive suggestion said, "All these cherished possessions will be burned!" But in spite of the blaze of mortal mind's furor, she was conscious of the illumination of spiritual unfoldment, which testified: All these houses as well as personal possessions have existence only as evidences of thought. Thought does not burn. Home, heaven, harmony, protection, beauty, abundance do not burn, because they are of the indestructible substance of Spirit. Blessed is the realization that the universe as matter does not exist, but that all does exist in and of Spirit. "Blessed are the poor in spirit: for their's is the kingdom of heaven."

With a sense of security, the student left the house and her possessions, without even an impulse to carry out one small treasure. Soon the entire row of buildings was engulfed in smoke, tongues of flame leaping above the roofs. The firemen worked with courage and intelligence, streaming the water behind the buildings. Then, finally, two rainbows sprang from the ground at the student's feet and arched into the black smoke where the houses were hidden. Her thoughts turned to the beautiful lines from Mrs. Eddy's poem entitled "Love" (Poems, p. 7),

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