In the fourth chapter of the book of Zechariah we read that Zechariah was awakened by an angel, a divine illumination. In this spiritually awakened state of consciousness the prophet beheld a symbolic presentation of great importance to the whole world of religious thought.

Zechariah beheld "a candlestick all of gold, with a bowl upon the top of it, and his seven lamps thereon, and seven pipes to the seven lamps, which are upon the top thereof: and two olive trees by it, one upon the right side of the bowl, and the other upon the left side thereof." When he asked the meaning of this, the angel replied in so many words that it was a refutation of power in matter, or physical might, and a declaration of the supremacy of the power of Spirit. Later Zechariah asked, "What be these two olive branches which through the two golden pipes empty the golden oil out of themselves?" And the angel replied, "These are the two anointed ones, that stand by the Lord of the whole earth."

In Scriptural symbolism the candlestick represents the light of Truth, of God, and "in him is no darkness at all." The seven lamps may be thought of as representing the full radiance of God, indicated in Christian Science by these seven definitive terms for Deity: Life, Truth, Love, Principle, Soul, Spirit, Mind. The infinite manifestation of this light is the universal Christ, whose golden oil anoints all through or unto whom it flows. The divinely chosen individuals by whose teachings the reality of spiritual existence purifies human consciousness are "the two anointed ones" in whom is found no resistance to the truth that Spirit is all-power and all-substance.

On the basis of their teachings and the healing works accomplished by the application of them, it becomes increasingly clear that the two outstanding revelators and demonstrators of Truth are Christ Jesus and Mary Baker Eddy. Who before Jesus ever declared that the whole universe of matter shall pass away, but that the eternal reality of Spirit's ever-present kingdom shall remain untouched in all its supremacy and perfection? Since the time of Jesus and the early Christians, Mrs. Eddy has been the one who has most clearly seen, revealed, and demonstrated the healing truth of the Christ Science.

So important is this instructive symbolism of "the two anointed ones" that it appears again in Revelation (11:3–5): "And I will give power unto my two witnesses, and they shall prophesy a thousand two hundred and threescore days, clothed in sackcloth." The truth which they proclaim is to go forth though it be despised and rejected of men. We read: "These are the two olive trees, and the two candlesticks standing before the God of the earth. And if any man will hurt them, fire proceedeth out of their mouth, and devoureth their enemies." The flaming power of Spirit will annihilate the error that would deny or oppose it.

No other Christian leaders have so clearly realized the availability of divine power to purge human consciousness of the works of the devil or have so fearlessly challenged the tyrannical mesmerism of materiality, claiming man to be imprisoned in matter. They both taught that only through the annihilation of carnal-mindedness, or the material sense of existence, by spiritual understanding, shall the kingdom of God stand revealed in all its eternal glory.

On page 543 of the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," Mrs. Eddy says: "In divine Science, the material man is shut out from the presence of God. The five corporeal senses cannot take cognizance of Spirit. They cannot come into His presence, and must dwell in dreamland, until mortals arrive at the understanding that material life, with all its sin, sickness, and death, is an illusion, against which divine Science is engaged in a warfare of extermination."

These great truths, understood, separate the individual from the devilish mesmerism of material existence and enable consciousness to take cognizance of the immaculate grandeur and reality of perfect God, perfect man, and perfect universe. Oh, how much more precious, potent, and instantaneous healing in Christian Science will be as we more fully awaken to the holy light of Truth and behold the infinite goodness and eternal loveliness of God, expressed through His Christ Science, illumining all time and space with a divine brilliancy far too bright for mortal eyes, but exquisitely enjoyable to spiritual sense! Then we shall know that our only real being never has left Spirit's matterless, substantial infinitude.

Surely mankind can never understand or joyously accept the reign of God, the ever-present kingdom of heaven, in place of the mortal dream of earth, unless it follows "the two anointed ones." For they, through self-abnegation, revealed and demonstrated God's eternal love and care for His sinless, diseaseless, deathless Son, ever at home in the reality of spiritual blessedness, even before the world was.