IT is safe to say that we all have our El Dorados, goals that we seek from the first moments when in childhood fancy we build castles in the air. Men ceaselessly pursue material power, wealth, and fame only to find that the attainment of such objectives does not bring lasting happiness or true peace of mind. Many have echoed the words of the Preacher (Eccl. 2:11), "Behold, all was vanity and vexation of spirit and there was no profit under the sun."

Mary Baker Eddy was a seeker and finder of the true El Dorado. She writes in the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 9): "Dost thou 'love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind'? This command includes much, even the surrender of all merely material sensation, affection, and worship. This is the El Dorado of Christianity." She then adds, "It involves the Science of Life, and recognizes only the divine control of Spirit, in which Soul is our master, and material sense and human will have no place."

In our continual quest for the El Dorado of lasting happiness, unbroken health, permanent peace, success, or abundance, are we really ready to give up "all merely material sensation, affection, and worship"? In order to apprehend God and to find our true selfhood as His immortal likeness, we need to be willing to drop every belief in matter's actuality and to accept the fact, which Christian Science teaches, that only Spirit is real. An understanding of this fact is prerequisite to spiritual growth and true attainment.

The earnest seeker for "the El Dorado of Christianity" is learning through Christian Science that the one Father-Mother, Spirit, Soul, is the one infinite divine Mind and is his only physician; that the spiritual, pure ideas which he constantly draws from this one Mind are preventive as well as curative. He therefore cannot be deceived by the world's display of a multiplicity of drugs and material remedies claiming to prevent, allay, or cure the so-called ills of the flesh. Rather, his confidence in God as the only power increases as he yields to divine Love's ability to obliterate fear and utilizes Truth's power to heal through spiritual means alone.

The seeker resists every temptation to invest unintelligent matter with powers that it has never had and can never possess. Of Christ Jesus, Mrs. Eddy states on page 232 of the textbook: "Jesus never taught that drugs, food, air, and exercise could make a man healthy, or that they could destroy human life; nor did he illustrate these errors by his practice. He referred man's harmony to Mind, not to matter, and never tried to make of none effect the sentence of God, which sealed God's condemnation of sin, sickness, and death."

The writer had ample opportunity to prove the forgoing statement of our Leader while serving in one of the Armed Forces throughout the Second World War. By turning to God, divine Mind, for his health, safety, and well-being, he was never tempted to resort to drugs or to so-called stimulants. Changes of climate, food, activity, and living conditions had no adverse effect upon his God-bestowed God-maintained harmony.

This experience was without doubt shared by many students of Christian Science, similarly placed, who, like our Master, "referred man's harmony to Mind, not to matter." Thus doing, they were able in many ways to illustrate Shakespeare's stirring words.

When we cease to depend upon matter for enjoyment or support and look to Spirit, God, as the source of our joy and satisfaction, realizing our unity with Spirit as its expression, life takes on a lovelier aspect. It becomes song-filled as we learn that no human props are needed to give an animus to living or a zest to endeavor.

The humble, obedient study and practice of Christian Science encourage us to drop the belief of a selfhood apart from God with its false claims of personal ability or inability, good health or bad health, happiness or unhappiness, success or failure. The thought freed somewhat from self becomes more receptive to heavenly inspiration. Those who thus enter the purified atmosphere of spiritual thought are bound to feel the irresistable attraction of spiritual qualities and are blessed and healed thereby.

Our Leader's teachings reveal to us more and more of man's spiritual nature as the image and likeness of God, created and governed by Spirit only. Under this government, man is safe and secure, serene and unafraid, satisfied and complete. Each one of us can know that this spiritual man is one's only true selfhood, for there is no other kind of man to be !

This selfhood must have been clearly apparent to faithful Abraham, of whom we read in Hebrews (11:8—10): "By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went. . . . For he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God."

That city which Abraham sought may be thought of as symbolizing a state of spiritual consciousness, the peace and bliss and satisfaction of knowing God and man, His beloved child. This city is not remote, and it is ours when we diligently seek it.

The road to spiritual discovery in Christian Science has no restrictive signs, no frustrating limitations. Its signposts clearly point to "the El Dorado of Christianity"— satisfied hope, substantiated faith, and enlightened understanding. This way leads us progressively onward.

Mrs. Eddy writes in "The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany" (p. 149): "More than regal is the majesty of the meekness of the Christ-principle; and its might is the ever-flowing tides of truth that sweep the universe, create and govern it; and its radiant stores of knowledge are the mysteries of exhaustless being. Seek ye these till you make their treasures yours."