Article April 17, 1971 Issue

Why Have a Bad Disposition?

JULIA IRENE FITZGERALD

Martha Washington once wrote to a niece that "the greater part of our happiness or misery depends on our dispositions, and not on our circumstances."^{Memoirs of the Mother and Wife of Washington by Margaret C. Conkling, p. 202;} How important it is that we refuse to be governed by bad dispositional traits, which are no part of man's true selfhood!

The glorious import of Christ Jesus' mission was to reveal the true nature of man, God's image and likeness. The great Master expressed in the highest degree this harmonious divine nature and pointed to God, Spirit, as the source of man's real being. In this light we see that it is as natural for man to reflect the pure, loving qualities emanating from the one perfect Mind as it is for a sunbeam to reflect the light going out from the sun.

Studying and advancing in Christian Science, one learns the nature of his true self. He learns that man is the representation of intelligent Mind and includes all Mind's qualities and ideas and the ability to express them. Mrs. Eddy writes, "He who gains self-knowledge, self-control, and the kingdom of heaven within himself, within his own consciousness, is saved through Christ, Truth."^{The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, p. 161;} The understanding of man's perfection as God's idea manumits the individual from false beliefs that would hold him in bondage to a bad disposition, serving an unreal master, the carnal mind.