"The harmony and immortality of man are intact. We should look away from the opposite supposition that man is created materially, and turn our gaze to the spiritual record of creation, to that which should be engraved on the understanding and heart 'with the point of a diamond' and the pen of an angel." So we read on page 521 of the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mary Baker Eddy.

What a magnificent invitation to thought! This short paragraph was read, reread, and earnestly considered by a young student of Christian Science. It became a constant companion to thought. This student knew that a diamond was used for engraving purposes. Because of the extreme hardness of the texture of the diamond, it can engrave the hardest substance. There arose in her hungry thought a desire to study the Bible and Mrs. Eddy's works until the divine ideas recorded therein were so deeply engraved upon her understanding and heart that nothing could ever efface them.

Sorrows and illnesses considerably out of proportion, even from the mortal standpoint, had been the experience of this student of Christian Science during childhood and young womanhood. But now she had found a way out of them, for they surely had not been impressed on her consciousness by "the pen of an angel," by God's angel messages.

She now realized that these discords could be relinquished as being without cause or actual existence because not created by God. Since the harmony and immortality of true being are always intact, she reasoned, these qualities and conditions are worthy of consideration and exemplification.

On page 418 of Science and Health, our Leader gives further counsel: "Stick to the truth of being in contradistinction to the error that life, substance, or intelligence can be in matter. Plead with an honest conviction of truth and a clear perception of the unchanging, unerring, and certain effect of divine Science."

As the student acknowledged persistently the crystal-clear and basic truth of man's pure, spiritual origin and unchanging perfection as God's likeness, her human experience gradually changed from darkness into light. Personal relationship problems were adjusted: lack was turned into bounty; fear was superseded by a sound conviction of good; sickness was displaced by health; weakness yielded to strength.

When we hold our gaze to the qualities of divine Spirit, Soul, and consecratedly live them in the minutiae of daily activity, our thought is led to accept the true, spiritual creation as recorded in the first chapter of Genesis. Here we read (verses 6-8): "God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so. And God called the firmament Heaven."

In Science and Health we read (p. 505), "Spiritual understanding, by which human conception, material sense, is separated from Truth, is the firmament." The spiritual understanding of God and man, accepted and engraved on our thought and action, will lift our lives much higher and make them much more useful than they were when we followed the lower arguments of a so-called mortal existence and record.

Christ Jesus understood, even at the age of twelve years, that he was the Son of God. This understanding led him completely above and out of the false mortal sense of existence.

Considering Paul's life after his conversion, we can readily deduce that the coming of the Christ-idea to his consciousness was heeded reverently and exclusively, for he never forsook it. This vision of true being took him through hostile regions of mortal mind, delivered him from the inner prison and from the poisonous viper, and led him during his life of service and enlightenment to his fellow men.

In like manner, every honest, humble, consecrated student of Jesus' teachings, which are revealed in the Bible and the writings of Mrs. Eddy, will be led through the mazes of false belief to accept the fact that his "harmony and immortality ... are intact."

Thoughts uppermost in our thinking, reappearing day after day and hugged close to the heart, become engraved in consciousness and determine our human experience. The Master, in his ever-memorable Sermon on the Mount, discusses the wonderful benefits which will accrue to mankind from the proper choice of thoughts. He knew that the harmony of our lives is determined by the character of our thoughts.

The spiritual creation includes good alone. The limiting, restrictive concepts of the supposed material creation should be rejected emphatically and constantly and not allowed to impress thought.

The Christlike consciousness of true, spiritual being, which unfolds increasingly through the earnest study and practice of the Science of Christianity, makes it possible for one to "look away from the opposite supposition that man is created materially."

Herein lies the key to harmonious, victorious, productive living. The heavenly messages will be engraved on thought " 'with the point of a diamond' and the pen of an angel" in the proportion that they are sacredly heeded and consecratedly lived in every incident of daily experience.