In the book of Job we read, "If thou prepare thine heart, and stretch out thine hands toward him [God]; ... thine age shall be clearer than the noonday." Mortals have always associated the thought of decrepitude, disease, suffering, and decay with old age; and death, it has been assumed, is the most welcome form of relief. The writer of the book of Ecclesiastes drew a mournful picture of the "evil days" which come to man when all is dark, when the body is feeble, when the faculties have nearly faded, just before he goes to his "long home." And there is a correlative passage in Shakespeare's description of the "seven ages," where the mortal drifts helplessly into the "last scene of all," into "second childishness, ... sans everything."

What is outlined in the above passages is the general belief which mankind holds with regard to mortal man. It is true that philosophers have sought to soften the picture by describing old age in a less repulsive way, with a pleasant retrospect and a joyous hope of better things to come, "like a Stradivarius," as one described it, "whose tone has become so sweet that its value has increased a hundredfold and it seems almost to have a soul." But they leave everything to be desired; they never even intimate that possibly the basis upon which the fear of old age is built is entirely wrong. It is only when we turn to Christian Science that we see this.

In the text-book, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," Mrs. Eddy uncovers the cause of the trouble, and with unerring skill and spiritual insight reveals the way to all who desire to be freed from this enslavement. What is the error? It is, as she says on page 246, that of "measuring and limiting all that is good and beautiful." But for this, she adds, "man would enjoy more than threescore years and ten and still maintain his vigor, freshness, and promise." On the preceding page she gives a remarkable illustration of an Englishwoman who retained the thought of perpetual youth, so that even at the age of seventy-four, "she had no care-lined face, no wrinkles nor gray hair, but youth sat gently on cheek and brow," making it "plain that decrepitude is not according to law, not is it a necessity of nature, but an illusion."

Unfolding so clearly the wonderful effect of right thinking, Christian Science has a distinct message to humanity on this problem of old age. It teaches that man is not material, subject to all the incidents of mortal existence, but spiritual; not both matter and spirit, not a mixture of truth and error. Made in the divine image and likeness, man can never depart from it, and he is therefore the reflection of all that is perfect. When thought is centered upon the mortal, the result can only be mortal. The constant dwelling upon that which is material and therefore transient, produces results in accordance therewith; these are the beliefs of sin, sickness, and death. But these can be overcome by that knowledge of God which is in harmony with all His works. Mortal thought is invariably circumscribed. It places a limit upon time, and declares, with an emphasis which misleads the unthinking, that man is the creature of circumstances, and that it is impossible for him to avoid manifesting the signs of disease and decay. How such thoughts act upon the human body and create the illusion of fear from which humanity suffers, is everywhere painfully in evidence.

The error in all this is a misconception of God and His creation. In the light of the fuller revelation of Truth which the world now has, past concepts of the giver of every good and every perfect gift seem like a caricature. It is impossible to conceive that infinite Mind, the Principle of the universe, could have created man to be the poor creature which mortal thought has pictured him to be; that he is powerless against the host of deadly enemies with which he is apparently surrounded. It is with a sense of relief that humanity is awakening to the falsity of material belief and proving that there is freedom from the bondage of fear. This applies to the depressing forecast of old age just as forcibly as it does to poverty and disease and every other human woe.

When the testimony of the corporeal senses is accepted as true and reliable, we accept as real many things that have no inherent claim to reality; but as we learn the truth of being, thought becomes transformed. Then we begin to dwell more in the spiritual than in the material. We look at life in a different light, and focus it from an entirely new standpoint. We must destroy the belief of life in matter if we would get the victory over physical and mental disabilities. We come to recognize the power of Spirit over the flesh, and we learn to bar the door of thought against the entrance of every intimation that the passing years must necessarily be attended by signs of dotage.

As thought is spiritualized, it is brought into harmony with all that is pure and holy, and we find that Truth is doing its work in us. Its effect is seen in the healing of the sense of fatigue, of the belief in sickness and in every inharmonious condition. As false sense is overcome, we begin to see the spiritual, eternal man, who knows neither birth, growth, nor decay, but is as God made him. We are thus awakening from the mortal dream of existence as material instead of spiritual, and acquiring spiritual understanding, which will give us power to demonstrate that error of every kind can be and must be destroyed by Truth.

Mrs. Eddy says, "If man is governed by the law of divine Mind, his body is in submission to everlasting Life and Truth and Love" (Science and Health, p. 216). He cannot be mesmerized by a false sense of existence and of the limitation of life; rather, he will know that as he enters into and abides in the consciousness of good as the only reality, he will effectually exclude all thought that does not reflect the nature of God. Moreover, he will recognize that divine Love is unceasingly making for his peace and happiness, and that the abundant life which is given to all who follow Christ, Truth, in sincerity, is an unfaltering conviction of the truth of man's immortality.

So, therefore, if it happen that one has become enslaved and is dominated by the fear of evil days, it is a wonderful consolation to learn that the Saviour is here; that one may know the truth that gives freedom; that one may so demonstrate that truth—revealed as it is in all its sacred beauty and power in Christian Science—that every belief which is not based on the spiritual law of Love will perish. It is in this way only that we shall cease to measure life by time. Life is eternal, immortal, divine, and man, conscious of his spiritual individuality, can never be anything but the perfect reflection of his perfect creator.

Copyright, 1914, by The Christian Science Publishing Society