Article January 25, 1975 Issue

Proving Dominion

AMY DAVISON FIELD

As a college student, I rebelled at the requirement that we attend weekly chapel services. I attended, but I paid little attention to the talks given by various visiting speakers.

Then one day as I studied the Bible Lesson in the Christian Science Quarterly, my attention focused on this statement by Mrs. Eddy in Science and Health: "Whatever inspires with wisdom, Truth, or Love—be it song, sermon, or Science—blesses the human family with crumbs of comfort from Christ's table, feeding the hungry and giving living waters to the thirsty."^{Science and Health, p. 234;} I said to myself, "Why, the talks at chapel are certainly intended to be helpful, and this indicates that I can look for 'crumbs of comfort' in them!"

Soon afterward I heard a talk that gave me much food for thought. It was based on a passage in Psalm 8: "When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; what is man, that thou art mindful of him?" Most people read that query as if it means that man is of little consequence in comparison with the wonders of the celestial universe. But the speaker pointed out that the Psalmist says God is mindful of man, whereas He employed only His fingers in creating everything else. This puts man far above the stars in the scale of importance! And the psalm says further, "Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet."^{Ps. 8:3, 4, 6;} In view of this, shouldn't the query "What is man?" be read with wonder that man is the ultimate of the divine creation?