Article December 1, 1980 Issue

Are we shaking our "feather beds"?

EUNICE H. DIZER

Have you ever slept in a feather bed? I remember the pleasure I had as a child, jumping from an icy cold room into bed and snuggling deep into the warmth and comfort of the feathers.

These feather-filled beds had one drawback, however. Each morning they had to be vigorously shaken and turned so that the feathers would be evenly distributed and not become lumpy and hard to sleep on. Evidently Mary Baker Eddy, who discovered and founded Christian Science, was well acquainted with such items and their peculiarities, for she writes: "The human heart, like a feather bed, needs often to be stirred, sometimes roughly, and given a variety of turns, else it grows hard and uncomfortable whereon to repose."^{Miscellaneous Writings, pp. 127-128;}

Just how is the human heart to be stirred and turned? Christ Jesus laid emphasis on two commandments which, if obeyed, will stir and turn the heart to higher affections. The first: "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind." And the second: "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself."^{See Matt. 22:35-40;}

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