Contentment

CATHERINE D. CHAMBERLAIN

During a winter storm a sparrow was seeking shelter beneath a broad stone ledge. Under its wide protection he was completely shielded from the sleet and snow which drove past him. Possibly, however, the sparrow may not have felt it all that a comfortable shelter should be, because he kept hopping restlessly about, trying this and that position, every change bringing him to a narrower portion of the ledge. Presently he had gone beyond the place where he had any shelter at all, and then he tried to recover that first nook. Now, however, he did not know how to get back, and so sat huddled miserably in a shallow corner, bearing the full driving of the storm.

There are times in human experience when our situation seems unattractive, perhaps even unbearable, and we want to get out of it, feeling that any change whatever would be an improvement. The leading impulse of thought at such a time is to act, to do anything, go anywhere, if only thereby we are changing our situation. But if we are trying to let God govern us, this is the point at which, above all, we shall make no move; and we shall take the rushing impulse as a warning that we need to stand very still, to look within thought and see if our motives are worthy of having action built upon them.

If we honestly examine our lot, especially in the light which Christian Science throws upon it, we are apt to find that in it there is some good. If good and evil seem to be mixed, we are not yet seeing fully the shelter God has given us; because His idea is wholly good, and brings to us only joy and success in our efforts. How are we to see this whole situation correctly? How are we to get above the clouds of material sense? Surely the way is not to jump out of the little good we already have. Rather is it to recognize and be content with the good we see.

It would not be wise in our search for light to desert the bit of sunshine we have, on account of the clouds about; it would be wisdom, rather, to stay steadfastly with that one gleam until the clouds disperse. The one ray of good in our experience is the clue to the rest of good. Good is not something that is broken up, that each of us may have a small, insufficient portion of it. Good is the expression of the whole, indivisible God; like Him it is whole and indivisible. Therefore, wherever one ray of it appears, the rest is present and must inevitably appear. Seeing this, we shall be grateful for our ray of good, realizing its value. We shall be content, glimpsing something of the Science of contentment. To the soldiers who inquired of Jesus as to how to improve their lot, that master of right thinking replied, "Do violence to no man, neither accuse any falsely; and be content with your wages." He saw, as we are coming to see, the scientific necessity of barring from our mental homes the robbers of unrest, and of welcoming into our thought the angels of contentment, which are surely among those angels which Mrs. Eddy defines in part in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 581) as "God's thoughts passing to man."

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