One afternoon a little girl, six years of age, returned from school, burst into the house almost in tears, and running to her mother exclaimed, "I don't want ever, ever to go back to that school again."

Her mother was amazed to see this usually cheery and light-hearted child so resentful and perturbed. She had always been a sincere little Christian Scientist, quick to forgive and to forget. She had often worked out her own problems since starting in the Christian Science Sunday School at the age of three, and, as a rule, misunderstandings among her playmates were seldom brought to her mother's attention. But on this particular afternoon, resentment had closed the door on love, and angrily she related an experience which seemed very unkind and unjust to her childish thought. "All just because I couldn't cut out an elephant in art class," was the indignant explanation.

The mother tried to comfort her little daughter by talking to her as she had often done before when inharmonies had arisen. But on this occasion the child's thought was so filled with resentment that her words fell on heedless ears. Seeing that it was not the right moment to reason with her the mother waited for the child to be ready to see and accept the real and the true, and to unsee and reject that which was false and untrue about God's man.

At the dinner table the morning's experience was recounted to the rest of the family, accompanied by the same forceful statement of never wishing to return to school. That evening, the little girl became very ill, and despite the work that was done for her in Christian Science the illness continued during the greater part of the night. Once her mother said, "Now, dear, if you would just try to love your teacher I am sure you would soon be all right."

"But I don't want to love her," was the rebellious reply.

Only toward morning was there any rest for either of them. Then, about seven-thirty, the little girl slipped out of her bed walked across the room, and climbed into a large chair near the head of her mother's bed. She rocked quietly back and forth for several minutes and seemed to be thinking deeply. Suddenly she exclaimed. "Mother, do you remember what Jesus said when he was on the cross?"

"What was it dear?" her mother replied, grateful that at last the little girl was beginning to fill her consciousness with the truths she had always been taught.

"He said, 'Father, forgive them,' so I'm going to forgive my teacher and go back to school."

Her face was filled with the joyous light of a victory won. She got down from the chair and began to dress as usual. She ate a good breakfast and was soon ready for school.

In "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 269) Mary Baker Eddy writes, "Metaphysics resolves things into thoughts, and exchanges the objects of sense for the ideas of Soul." Not only had the little girl exchanged her wrong thinking of resentment and self-pity for love and forgiveness, but this right spiritual thinking had completed the physical healing, enabling her to continue with her daily activities as if nothing had occurred the night before. The cloud of error completely vanished when the light of Truth dawned.

Needless to say, the school year was completed and a harmonious relationship was established and maintained between teacher and pupil. Also, it turned out to be a year of spiritual growth and unfoldment for the child.

This little girl is now a young woman, but that earlier victory has continued to bless her, for it has helped her through many testing times. The loveliest of all these blessings has been a lasting healing of resentment. Many times, when unfairness or injustice would ordinarily have caused discord and prolonged unhappiness, she has risen calmly above it, for she has remembered that she had definitely proved that these errors cannot remain in the presence of love and forgiveness.

Error comes to every one of us many times in our daily experience, and we either accept or refuse it. But unless we meet and master the suggestions of error as they arise in thought, we can rest assured that they will continue to recur until we see their nothingness, as did the little girl.

One of the greatest joys of Christian Science is that demonstrations once made, do riot have to be repeated, any more than we, when studying arithmetic, have to continue to prove that two times two equals four. When we understand this clearly enough to demonstrate it, that particular problem has been solved. It is completed. That step does not have to be taken again because, whenever we apply the law of Principle and Love to any problem, "it is God which worketh in" us, and we are assured of a permanent and complete healing. "Whatsoever God doeth, it shall be for ever."