"I Will praise thee, O Lord, with my whole heart.... I will be glad and rejoice in thee: I will sing praise to thy name, O thou most High." So sang the Psalmist (Ps. 9:1,2).

This also is the song of the Christian Scientist. How precious to the heart of the Christian Scientist is God's name, His nature and qualities! The consecrated student of Christian Science looks forward to that time when he will have so assimilated His name that he may feel sufficiently prepared to sign the church register and assume the new name, Christian Scientist.

To be a Christian Scientist is indeed a great privilege and responsibility. This means to so live the life of Christliness that others may see our good works and be drawn Godward. This step means that we are willing to live according to the laws that Christian Science reveals; that we are willing to mold our lives to conform with the name we have now outwardly assumed. It means that we shall endeavor with our whole heart to love God supremely and our neighbor as ourselves. It means that we shall have no other gods and accept no other power than the one God, who is infinite power.

Recently the writer, on a visit to the home of Mary Baker Eddy in Chestnut Hill, was much impressed by two identical pictures which hung there, one upstairs and one down. She was told that Mrs. Eddy was very fond of these pictures. The writer lingered to study the subject. It depicted a beautiful young maiden arraigned before judges and standing before the goddess Diana, while her lover urged her to offer the incense to this goddess which would save her human life. The young woman, her face glowing with the inspiration of an exalted purpose, maintained her loyalty to worship the one God.

Perhaps Mrs. Eddy's special interest in this picture stemmed from her deep desire that those who commit themselves to the great Cause of Christian Science might be found as steadfast. Perhaps to her it symbolized her own proof of steadfastness under circumstances of persecution which in more refined and subtle ways paralleled that portrayed in the picture. That today there is as great a need of steadfastness and courage for Christianity's sake, our Leader has shown us in her writings. In "Miscellaneous Writings" she says (p. 99): "Men and women of the nineteenth century, are you called to voice a higher order of Science? Then obey this call. Go, if you must, to the dungeon or the scaffold, but take not back the words of Truth. How many are there ready to suffer for a righteous cause, to stand a long siege, take the front rank, face the foe, and be in the battle every day?"

Here is a call to arms, a demand for strength and courage and ability to see to it that God's great truth, Christian Science, wins, and encircles the earth; a call to do our part in seeing that the kingdom of God comes on earth, no matter what the personal cost may be. Such a call to battle is Paul's in his exhortation to Timothy (I Tim. 6:12), "Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art also called, and hast professed a good profession before many witnesses;" and again (II Tim. 2:3, 4): "Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life; that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier."

Such a call, the writer reasoned, is a demand above the mere desire to seek Christian Science as a means of attaining ease in matter or as merely a palliative to the ills of the flesh. She saw the need of lifting one's sense of Science into the spiritual realm, where the incentive is to see and prove the infinitude and all-inclusiveness of real being, the need of ceasing to struggle to make sick matter well matter, the need of spiritual knowing for the sheer joy of demonstrating Spirit, God, as the All-in-all.

Christian Science proves that physical healing is not the primary aim of its teachings. Physical healing is the effect of purification and spiritualization of thought. The fundamental aim of Christian Science is the healing of sin, the Christianization of mankind, the awakening of mortal man from his dream of life in matter. However, any public practitioner of this Science could tell of the many primary demands that sick physical bodies be made well.

Often beginners in Christian Science turn to this Science believing it to be merely a system designed to heal physically. This is natural, and not infrequently they receive quick physical healings, but what beginners sometimes fail to grasp is the fact that, during the process of healing, their thinking has changed its base somewhat from matter to Spirit, and that therefore what they accept as a physical healing is fundamentally a mental or spiritual healing. As they progress in the understanding of Christian Science, they endeavor primarily to know themselves spiritually and scientifically and to see God's creation in its correct spiritual sense. This changed attitude results in quicker healings.

To sign our names to Christian Science—to subscribe to its rules and laws—includes, therefore, vastly more than the willingness to leave an old creed or to give up the use of material medicines in the endeavor to have sick bodies made well. It is, in fact, not just another system of treating matter, but a method which deals entirely with the mental condition of the patient. As scientific truths concerning the nature of God and of man as God's spiritual child, inseparable from Him, are poured into his thinking, the power and laws of God operate to produce good. They act as an alterative in his consciousness and therefore in his entire system, and thus neutralize the error and heal the sickness. Thus we see that the primary object of Christian Science is to make our lives conform to the beautiful pattern of spiritual perfection, which Truth reveals.

It is indeed a privilege to sign our names as members of the Church of Christ, Scientist. But it is a responsibility also. Without church members there would be no organized church; without organization there would be no periodicals, no publishing of Mrs. Eddy's writings, no lecturers, no practitioners. Some students earnestly study the textbooks of Christian Science, the Bible and "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mrs. Eddy, read the periodicals, call on practitioners to help them in time of need, but do not sign their names as members of Churches of Christ, Scientist, even though they have sufficient understanding of Science to do so. They are willing to enjoy the privileges, but unwilling to assume the responsibilities which make these privileges possible. They say there are problems to work out within the churches and they might be called on to help.

The reference quoted from "Miscellaneous Writings" distinctly tells us of problems to be worked out, of foes to be faced, of willingness to suffer for a righteous cause, if we would be known by the new name of Christian Scientist and sign our names as members of The First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston, Massachusetts, or one of its branches. But the joy and the spiritual inspiration of knowing God aright and of knowing ourselves as His children, gained by serving as church members, far outweigh all else.

It is recorded that when Admiral Coligny was converted to Protestantism he was urged by his wife to come out and confess his faith, but he felt that he should count the cost. His wife, however, declared that he should count the cost of not becoming a true Christian. So in Christian Science it is the cost of not identifying oneself with our church that needs to be counted, for within its folds all is gain.

In "Miscellaneous Writings" Mrs. Eddy says of an album given her by members of her March Primary Class in 1889 (p. 281): "Among the gifts of my students, this of yours is one of the most beautiful and the most costly, because you have signed your names. I felt the weight of this yesterday, but it came to me more clearly this morning when I realized what a responsibility you assume when subscribing to Christian Science."

God gave to our Leader this marvelous revelation of Christian Science. She was faithful in inditing it and in planting and watering God's vineyard—establishing and founding her Church. Now it is committed to us, her faithful followers, to prove and carry Christian Science into all the world. May we be found ready to assume this responsibility of bringing the kingdom of heaven to earth and equal to our task; and may all who love this great Cause and look to it for their inspiraiton and help be ready to sign their names in the highest sense of its meaning.