One summer evening I was leaving a scenic national park after an inspiring day of sight-seeing. As I drove through the darkening mountains, I recalled the beauty I had seen during the day and remembered the words from a hymn, "In beauty, grandeur, order,/His handiwork is shown." ^{Christian Science Hymnal, No. 329;} Maroon Lake had been so clear in the sunshine that it distinctly reflected the majesty of snow-capped peaks. Acres of blooming dandelions had formed a golden carpet for the magnificent aspen trees.

As the darkness deepened, I thought, If someone drove through that park now, he wouldn't see the beauty surrounding him. In the same way, my thoughts went on, because of darkened, ignorant, false views of creation, we are often blind to the infinite beauty and goodness of God's gentle ever-presence, including the beauty and goodness of spiritual man. Every child of God, in perfect unity with the divine Mind or Soul, is beautiful in an individual, unique way. In Science and Health beside a marginal heading "The divineloveliness" is Mrs. Eddy's statement, "Beauty is a thing of life, which dwells forever in the eternal Mind and reflects the charms of His goodness in expression, form, outline, and color." ^{Science and Health, p. 247;}

In God's creation there are no duplicates. No identity is more beautiful or acceptable than another; each one is indispensable to the complete and whole manifestation of divine Love's loveliness. When even the visible symbols of the universe and man are so wonderfully beautiful and gladden the heart, we have to stand in awe of the indescribable beauty and perfection reality must include.

Christ Jesus described himself as "the light of the world." ^{John 8:12;} One function of light is to reveal or make visible that which would otherwise remain unseen. Jesus' mission was to reveal the beauty and perfection of man as God's image. His love for God and man enabled him to heal deformity, disease, and sinning ways. He saw beyond the Adam man of dust to the invisible spiritual man of God's creating, to that which is satisfying and precious to the creator.

When Jesus healed the man with the withered hand, he demonstrated for all time that disease has no power to disable or disfigure life. When the Master healed the woman who had been bowed together for eighteen years, can we begin to imagine her joy as she was able to lift up her head with flexibility and grace? No longer was she handicapped, no longer an object of cruel curiosity. The Bible gives us God's assurance, "My people shall never be ashamed." ^{Joel 2:26;}

The study of Christian Science teaches us that the human body is the objective state of human thought and must necessarily improve with the improvement of thought. When through Science human thought is purified of false beliefs—the belief of life and substance in matter, with its attendant beliefs of fear, self-hate, inferiorities, and gloom—and thought becomes spiritualized, the body expresses not only health and well-being but a greater degree of normality and attractiveness.

What is the greatest of all beautifiers? Love! Love for God and for mankind; love that is expressed in the qualities of forgiveness, a soft answer, spiritual-mindedness, the love of serving. A young man remarked to a woman with six children, "You have your hands full." The woman agreed and added, "They are full of what I love," to which the young man replied, "You're beautiful." His evaluation of beauty was based primarily on the individual's character—on what she did rather than on just how she looked.

Mrs. Eddy presents this clear, enlightening instruction: "Simply asking that we may love God will never make us love Him; but the longing to be better and holier, expressed in daily watchfulness and in striving to assimilate more of the divine character, will mould and fashion us anew, until we awake in His likeness." ^{Science and Health, p. 4;} Through this daily "striving to assimilate more of the divine character" and through the calm, quiet activity of prayerful research in Mrs. Eddy's writings, together with the Bible, the student of Christian Science learns to live at peace with himself.

He gains confidence and an ability to be satisfied with his true identity—its value and wonderfulness. His pure affection extends to his neighbor as the beloved son of God, the expression of every beautiful quality of Mind. His expression of universal love erases from his thought every defect and blemish of envy and jealousy. It destroys every dishonest and insincere tendency. This unwavering effort "to be better and holier" through one's expression of love will without question be manifested in a fuller appearing of the radiancy of expression that is true beauty.

Beauty, being spiritual, therefore eternal, cannot be lost through the passage of time. When we accept the liberating truth that man is the individual expression of the ageless qualities of Mind, we cannot deny to an individual, at whatever time in his human experience, the ability to bear witness to all the qualities of Mind, including beauty. Furthermore, one can never be placed in any situation or occupation where he cannot express the beautiful gifts of Soul. The God-derived attributes of efficiency, love of perfection, and industry glorify the humblest task.

In Mary Baker Eddy and Her Books by William Dana Orcutt, we read that when the author was a youthful publisher he wanted to leave the printing business. In explaining his wish to Mrs. Eddy, he said, "I want to devote myself to something in which there is beauty." Mrs. Eddy replied, "Have you never realized that if a man has beauty in himself, he can put beauty into anything?" ^{Mary Baker Eddy and Her Books (Boston: The Christian Science Publishing Society, 1950), p. 45;} Mr. Orcutt continued in his work with books.

What a glorious tomorrow emerges from the today of spiritual enlightenment as one truth after another reveals man and the universe as God's beautiful reflection, and the mortal, unsatisfying concept disappears from view! Then we rejoice in the appearing of the divine loveliness, the new man and the new universe, where God "hath made every thing beautiful in his time." ^{Eccl. 3:11.}