Bill's home in San Francisco was only a few blocks from the zoo. His mother often said laughingly that twelve-year-old Bill was trying to run a zoo at home with all of his pets!

In Bill's room two white mice lived in a big cage. The mice were very comfortable in there, but Bill often took them out of the cage so they could play on his bed while he stretched out to do his homework or read his Sunday School lesson. Bill had attended a Christian Science Sunday School since he was two years old.

Downstairs in the basement lived the dogs Tinker and Midge with Fat Cat, the big black-and-white tom. There was also Piglet, the guinea pig, who roamed the fenced-in backyard, scampering under the rosebushes, squealing whenever Midge or Tinker teased him.

There was a hard-and-fast rule in Bill's home that the door to his room and the door leading to the basement must always be securely closed to keep the dogs and Fat Cat in their own quarters away from his mice.

One afternoon when Bill came home from school, his mother was out. To his horror he found the door to the mouse cage was open and there were no mice inside. But there was Fat Cat curled up right on the bed, fast asleep!

Bill cried out, and Fat Cat opened his eyes and stretched lazily. Then Bill started a frantic search of the room—he looked behind the dresser, and poked quickly in the wastebasket and in his closet. There was no sign of a mouse, but Fat Cat was happy and purring. To Bill he looked just like a cat who had enjoyed a fine mouse dinner.

He was heartbroken. Suddenly he hated Fat Cat. Fat Cat was going to get a good beating. But when Bill tried to hit him, he just couldn't do it. He loved Fat Cat, too, just as he had loved his mice.

He remembered that Mary Baker Eddy had written in her book Science and Health, "If mortal mind knew how to be better, it would be better."  ^{Science and Health, p.186;}

Bill sobbed as he sat down with Fat Cat on his lap. He wanted to express the kind of forgiveness Christ Jesus taught. Fat Cat didn't know any better, he thought, and tears ran down his cheeks. He was very angry at that person who had closed the wrong doors, so that Fat Cat was shut right in the room with the mice. Bill wondered a bit how the cat could have opened the cage door, but he was crying too hard to think much about that.

Whenever Bill was in trouble, he turned to God to help him. Now, even though he couldn't see very well through the tears, he opened his Science and Health and read. He wasn't sure afterward just where the book had opened, but God's love was on every page. Mrs. Eddy had throughout given stirring reminders of God's care and protection. Even though it seemed too late for his little pets, Bill felt comforted just thinking about God's love.

He remembered a picture he had seen in the nursery at church of a little child leading a procession of animals—sheep, wolves, lions, cattle—all loving the child and each other. It was a picture of what the Bible says: "The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them...They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain: for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea."  ^{Isa. 11:6,9;}

He began to see clearly that the spiritual universe of God's creating, which reflects only love and peace, is all there is. He realized that even the smallest creature of God is a spiritual idea that can never be destroyed in spite of what the material senses— our eyes and ears—tell us. And there is never a spiritual reason to attribute to an animal the instinct of a killer.

Bill closed his Science and Health, healed of his sorrow.

Suddenly there was a rustling in the wastepaper basket, and up popped two tiny pink ears and two bright pink eyes. While Bill stared in astonishment, up popped two more pink ears and eyes!

All the time Bill had been crying, the little mice had been safely napping in the wastepaper basket! Fat Cat himself had only wanted a soft bed to sleep on. He hadn't done anything wrong.

Then Bill gave Fat Cat a treat and put him outside. He let the mice have a good romp on his bed before he returned them to their own comfortable quarters.

"That should teach us all a good lesson," Bill's mom said after he told her about his experience. "The Bible says, 'Judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment.'  ^{John 7:24.} Lots of times mortal mind will show us an unhappy picture and try to make us believe it is true."

"Hey!" Bill said. "I'll bet I can prove that at school, too. There's this kid who's always going around making trouble..." Well, you guessed it! The understanding of spiritual truth healed that too.