Verity of Being

GRACE HOFFMAN WHITE

What is man but an expression of Life,—man, whose origin and ultimate is Life? His great endeavor is to understand Life and demonstrate it, that he may thus become conscious of his immortality. We cannot conceive of the loss of anything that exists in God; its form and fashion may change, but it springs from the seed of eternity and hints at realities greater than those we yet know.

Does the simple laborer in some far-off quarry foresee what will become of the stone he is setting free from its prison of earth? Does he dream of vast marble palaces on sunlit slopes, of fountains playing in flowery gardens, of yewclipped paths leading to some retreat graced by a fair statue? His ignorance does not prevent the existence of all this, nor does our lack of intelligence or imagination hinder the universal Life from finding its own expression. How insignificant is what we have learned when we compare it with what we do not know.

One versed in the things that pertain to our higher life says, "What keeps us and will long keep us from enjoying the treasures of the universe is the hereditary resignation with which we tarry in the gloomy prison of the senses." Here we find the key to the whole matter. It is the senses that, in spite of the divine intuitions of Life and its ever widening circles, infest and feed our imagination with that which is not of Life and which tends to death. Submission to the conception of death presupposes a lack of high mental and spiritual activity, a bowing down to superstition, a belief in that of which we have no proof. The autumn comes, the leaves fall about our feet, and the trees, denuded of their luxury of leaves, stand etched against a gray sky. Yet we do not despair, for the revelation of past springs has shown us that like produces like; that the banners of the year will again be unfurled on the bare branches with greater glory; that the roots have gone deeper into the warm earth and the waving tops will be nearer the sky. Even those primeval trees that have fallen in the forest have gathered to themselves another form of service, and as coal renew their usefulness and bring us cheer and warmth, till they mount in flame to find other expressions of life in service.

Thus we come gradually by the things that are seen into the apprehension of things unseen, and learn slowly, as a child learns its picture-book, that the intelligence of the universe cannot produce non-intelligence, nor existence non-existence. To give up the belief in death cannot fail to advance us to a higher consciousness of Life. Mrs. Eddy says, "If the belief in death were obliterated, and the understanding obtained that there is no death, this would be a 'tree of life,' known by its fruits" (Science and Health, p. 426).

Thus we come at last to shape our thoughts toward the continuity of all that really exists, till the true consciousness of being is established in us. Then we do not fear if one we love passes us on the road and we lose sight of him. We no longer clothe ourselves with garments of night, nor hug to our bosom the torment of self-pity, nor bruise the flowers of affection by requiring repeated reiterations of sympathy. As travelers through a diversified country, we are not alarmed when from the sunny plain tall mountains loom before us, but with confidence we plunge into the tunnel that carries us through them, knowing that light awaits us at the other end, for the unity of the road is unbroken. So let us speed one another on the journey with thoughts of the continuity and beauty of life. Let not our senses be obsessed any longer with grief.

Then may we take account of ourselves. What is it we have lost? Is it not the flower in the garden that grew by our side, the touch of its petals, the daily association from which the habits of life seem to have sprung, the perfume of its existence? But does not the perfume remain with us? And what of the habits and associations? Are they not capable of deepening into a love that knows no separation, but ever seeks and finds its own? What then have we lost? That only which the senses call their own and which would hold us captive in gloomy prisons. Let us therefore obey our divine intuitions and see man as a spiritual individuality; then the fetters will fall from us and we shall rise free men. The treasures of the universe shall be ours in that life which expresses itself in service and is ever conscious of its own spiritual unity, because it knows, as our Leader says (Science and Health, p. 427), that "life is the law of Soul, even the law of the spirit of Truth, and Soul is never without its representative."

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