No valid excuse for discouragement exists in God's universe. No element of failure, disappointment, or limitation can find lodgment therein, for harmony and spiritual satisfaction characterize His creation. Discouragement could only arise from a mistaken sense of the reality of evil. The admission that evil has power, law, being, force, or execution must necessarily discourage the pilgrim on the road from sense to Soul; whereas the spiritual perception of evil's essential unreality encourages the wayfarer to persevere and rejoice. Christian Science is a mighty power in behalf of courage for humanity. Where else except in the pages of the Bible and of the Christian Science text-book, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mrs. Eddy, can the modern man and woman find assurance that God governs and that He is wholly good?

The Bible message of good cheer is intelligible, but it needs to be spiritually discerned in order that the suggestion of a seeming power opposed to the divine Mind may be dispelled. The Christian Science text-book is needed in conjunction with the Bible in order that God may be realized as the maker of good, and of good only. This is one of the many benefits rendered humanity by Christian Science, that it discloses the hidden treasures of the Bible and makes its history, prophecy, and precept available for individual uplift and salvation. Nothing, for instance, can be more discouraging to the Christian than to be told that he must follow in the footsteps of the great Master and be assured at the same time that Jesus was endowed with special miraculous powers which ceased with his disappearance from the earth. The Christian so taught naturally asks how he can possibly emulate the Galilean Prophet if the latter's equipment for spiritual warfare was designed for himself alone. This teaching has reacted upon his would-be followers and has discouraged them from trying to obey his command to "heal the sick, cleanse lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils." Christian Science, by proving his works to be normal and scientific, encourages Christians to imitate them as best they may, and thus fit themselves to carry out the Master's injunctions.

On occasions the best schooled human being is betrayed into showing discouragement, unless he is supported by spiritual understanding. If the passing show of human activity, experience, sorrow, suffering, fictitious joy is viewed dispassionately, the reasons for discouragement seem far to outweigh those for gratitude and rejoicing. So far as mere material existence is concerned, it presents only spasmodic moments of satisfaction, and such moments are apt to be quickly superseded by periods of doubt and depression. There is little to stimulate the joy of living when human life is conceded to be exposed to the assaults of numberless foes. The material body is recognized as a most complicated and easily deranged piece of machinery. The so-called mind within the cranium has a precarious place of residence and quickly shows signs of being unbalanced when subjected to excep tional strain. Most of the occupations by which humanity seeks to feed and clothe itself are exposed to sudden disturbances. Frequent alarms pass through human consciousness as to its own safety, and bring in their train epidemics and mysterious diseases of physique as well as of the mentality.

Every new danger conjured up by material medicine, by health laws (so called), and by pseudo-science tends to make human life less worth living and adds to the list of the disheartened and the discouraged. To counteract this evil tendency, Christian Science unfurls the banner of spiritual freedom emblazoned with Truth. It teaches the eternal nature of good and the unreality of evil. It encourages sick, sinning, and sorrowing humanity by the assurance that there is a way out of every difficulty, a cure for every disease, a relief from every burden.

True courage can proceed only from spiritual understanding. Sense-testimony does not furnish good and sufficient reasons for courage. Mere optimism is skin deep, and in the presence of danger reveals itself as insufficient. Only the understanding of the truth of being, of reality, can save humanity from the pretense to power claimed by error and unreality. Christian Science reveals the fact that God is the only Mind and that He is the absolute good. Moreover, this wholly good Mind operates as law, and with it man can speak to sin and sickness as one having authority. As though this were not reason enough for encouragement, Christian Science also affords the proof that the realization of Truth brings the kingdom of heaven to earth, makes heaven truly at hand, so that every problem, individual or collective, is capable of solution here and now, without waiting for a future state of existence.

A peculiar case of temporary discouragement is that of Elijah as recorded in the first book of Kings. Although the great prophet had received striking proof of God's ever watchful care in causing the ravens to feed him by the brook Cherith, and although the widow's cruse of oil had not failed him; although through the power of God he had been enabled to raise her son from the shadow of death and to conquer the priests of Baal; yet when Jezebel, the wicked queen, sent a threatening message to him, he yielded to bitter discouragement, fled "into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a juniper tree: and he requested for himself that he might die; and said, It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life; for I am not better than my fathers."

He who had braved the anger of Ahab, the perils of starvation, the presence of death, and the fanaticism of the four hundred and fifty prophets of Baal, quailed before the curse of an evil woman and for a while was under the seeming spell of hypnotic sleep, oblivious of good and of his duty to God. Not until the "still small voice" came to his rescue did Elijah fully awaken and take up once more the work of divine prophecy. Many an earnest Christian has nobly mastered the more obvious temptations of evil only to fall a seeming victim to the subtle suggestions of malice, hate, and revenge. Natures which are proof against open attacks need to steel themselves against the secret influences against which Mrs. Eddy has warned the world in her chapter on Animal Magnetism Unmasked, in the Christian Science text-book.

It behooves the practical Christian Scientist to guard against experiences similar to those of Elijah. He must learn to draw the line between Truth and error, Life and death, Love and hate or fear, so closely that the unreal cannot reach the real, nor the false the true in his experience. Elijah had delivered a telling stroke at the carnal mind. He had met and mastered the priests of idolatrous worship. In so doing he had incurred the displeasure of Jezebel, a woman of evil intent and revengeful character. The life of the faithful Christian Scientist is exposed to similar experiences, for it is his profession and career to help good uncover evil when the latter seeks to disguise itself as good, and then to stand and see the fire of the Lord consume (make unreal) the wood and the stones and the dust of material belief, thus reducing evil to nonentity. This process requires moral courage of a very high order, and discouragement would naturally attempt to palsy the hand and paralyze the intelligence which annihilates evil.

Referring to a symbol in the Apocalypse, Mrs. Eddy writes in Science and Health (p. 514): "Moral courage is 'the lion of the tribe of Juda,' the king of the mental realm. Free and fearless it roams in the forest. Undisturbed it lies in the open field, or rests in 'green pastures, . . . beside the still waters.'"

Copyright, 1915, by The Christian Science Publishing Society