Usage differs in regard to the prepositions employed in the phrases "under the circumstances" and "in the circumstances." But ordinarily, mortals are more interested in the "circumstances" than they are in usage.

In our human experience, circumstances appear to be either good or bad, pleasant or unpleasant, desirable or unwanted, promising greater good or predicting evil. How are circumstances formed? Does some element of chance enter into their formation? Do circumstances control mortals, or does thought control circumstances? Is a mortal in or under circumstances, or are these included in mortal thought?

In "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, throws light upon these questions as explained in Christian Science. Our Leader writes (pp. 86, 87): "Mortal mind sees what it believes as certainly as it believes what it sees. It feels, hears, and sees its own thoughts. Pictures are mentally formed before the artist can convey them to canvas. So is it with all material conceptions."

There is the familiar saying that "circumstances alter cases." But as thought turns to the life and works of Christ Jesus, one sees that the Master did not allow circumstances to alter his spiritually scientific view of all things. Circumstances can be different; but Truth, regardless of seeming circumstances, remains forever the same.

On the occasion of Jesus' stilling of the storm at sea, he was asleep "in the hinder part of the ship" when a great storm arose. He was called and immediately "rebuked the wind, ... and there was a great calm" (Mark 4:38, 39). Here were circumstances portending disaster, but the Master did not allow them to alter his understanding of the eternal fact of the omnipresence and omnipotence of divine Love.

And there were the circumstances of the man with the withered hand that Jesus healed. These circumstances did not alter in the slightest the power and the presence of the healing and saving Christ, Truth (see Matt. 12:10-13).

And in still another set of circumstances in which money was demanded, Jesus instructed Peter to cast a hook into the sea and take a piece of money from the mouth of the first fish caught; thus a need was met (see Matt. 17:27).

These three sets of circumstances were entirely different, but Jesus applied the same divine law in dealing with them. Mrs. Eddy tells us that we may safely lean upon God under all conditions. She writes in Science and Health (p. 319), "Having faith in the divine Principle of health and spiritually understanding God, sustains man under all circumstances."

Mortals may be tempted sometimes to believe that their circumstances are peculiar to them alone and that the conditions others may have to face are different and perhaps are less serious and difficult. They begin, therefore, to admit that some conditions are more real than others and hence more difficult to heal, or to meet. According to Christian Science, all error is unreal. It makes no difference whether it is called small or large, minor or major. All that in any way misrepresents the true and perfect nature of God is unreal and untrue.

There is no divine justification for believing that some errors are greater, or more serious, than others. Error is nothing, absolutely nothing. It has no degrees of reality whatever.

Circumstances claim to influence the lives of mortals more, perhaps, than is realized. It is rather common to hear someone mention that circumstances are beyond his control. To the extent that circumstances are evil, they deny the omnipresence and omnipotence of God, good. Man is not subject to any power apart from God. Christian Science declares that there is no other power. Evil circumstances do not proceed from God; and because God is the creator of all that exists, evil circumstances do not exist, and man is neither influenced nor affected by the belief that they do.

Circumstances are the creatures of thought. The more spiritual the thought, the more harmonious the circumstances. Man was given dominion over all the earth, the dominion of understanding. This dominion was not over everything with the exception of circumstances; it was over all.

One who understands this speaks to error with divine authority. This authority comes from Truth, which yields its power to nothing else. Truth is irreversible, irrevocable, uncompromising, unending. It is not affected in the least by material time, so-called mortal laws, beliefs, conditions, or circumstances. God, Truth, is forever expressed by that which is true. The sum total of the expression of Truth is the Christ that includes the right idea of everything. It includes the true nature of man and is individually expressed by God's offspring.

Are we claiming by our reflection of Truth dominion over all that limits or restricts good? Are we accepting evil circumstances as something imposed upon us from which we either must extricate ourselves or pay penalties? There is no circumstance or condition, no matter how disturbing or frightening it may suggest itself to be, in which the healing, redeeming Christ is not already present. Man is never outside, or out of reach of, the divine all-presence. God's Christ is here and there, is everywhere, awakening us from every dream of error.

One who demonstrates the power of divine Love speaks with authority to every claim of error, stands unmoved by evil's claims of erroneous conditions or circumstances, and, with clear eye and thought, views existence through the lens of Spirit beholding all in Christian Science; and by so doing he needs but to maintain these divine facts of being, unwaveringly, and whatever the battle may be, he will win.