One of my earliest recollections of childhood in a small western town is that of sitting in a parlor window on a Sunday morning. Standing near me were my mother and another woman reading the Lesson-Sermon from the Christian Science Quarterly to a small informal group of adults. On the improvised desk in front of the Readers, a highly burnished brass holder for the Quarterly glowed warmly in the soft morning light. When the sun got to the window where I was seated, its rays were caught by the upper part of the brass holder, and they burst into a blaze of rainbow lights.

In later years, after I began to study Christian Science for myself, I came to look upon this picture in memory as illustrative of the way that, in 1866, Mrs. Eddy's God-prepared thought caught the illumination of divine Truth and burst into the seven-hued light of her spiritual discovery. After years of searching the Scriptures and after her recovery from an injury that no material means could help, she caught the vision of Christ's Christianity, which she later named Christian Science.

In the years that followed Mrs. Eddy's singular experience, the illuminations of Truth continued to pour in upon her waiting thought, carrying it on and up to the full and final revelation of Truth, now recorded in the textbook. Science and Health. As the prophet Habakkuk wrote, "The Lord answered me, and said, Write the vision, and make it plain upon tables, that he may run that readeth it." ^{Hab. 2:2;} Each step of the way the vision proved itself to be demonstrable and equal to divine logic.

In this centennial year of the discovery of Christian Science, the rays of infinite Truth are still shining brightly and unabated in human consciousness. Though imperceptible to darkened mortal sense, the vision, or spiritual sense of life, substance, and intelligence, is being caught again and again by humble, receptive readers of Science and Health everywhere, and they are being healed in body as well as in mind. The fundamental need of humanity today is to awaken to the spiritual sense of being, sanctioned by the Scriptures.

Jesus once said, "Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures." ^{Matt. 22:29;} This may have seemed a strange thing to say to those who knew the history of the older Scriptures and were consistent in carrying out the letter of the ceremonial law. But Jesus knew that the practical demonstration of Scriptural truths in the lives of men depended upon their awakening to the original, or true, meaning of the Scriptures, that is, to the incorporeal sense of God as infinite Spirit and of man as coexistent with God—God's own infinite, spiritual idea, or likeness. Mrs. Eddy says: "The Scriptures are very sacred. Our aim must be to have them understood spiritually, for only by this understanding can truth be gained." ^{Science and Health, p. 547.}

In like manner the spiritual perception of Christian Science as the law of Truth needs to be gained, for the practical demonstration of Science in the lives of men is preceded by and is dependent upon this perception.

Just as true art in painting, sculpture, and music is brought out through exalted vision, so spiritual, scientific healing and living, the highest art known to mankind, derives from an exalted vision of the spiritual truth of being. The vision, or perception, of Life as ever-present Truth enables the student of Christian Science to prove his God-given dominion over the errors of material existence and to bring out the perfection and harmony of his true identity in Spirit, Soul.

Human belief is generally content with its mortal dream of life in matter as long as ways and means can be devised to palliate the ills it brings upon itself. Gaining the true spiritual sense of Science inspires the student to obey God's law and prevents him from dropping into the mire of materialism or drifting away from the simplicity of Christ into the confusion of spurious, worldly philosophies.

Essential to this spiritual vision is a recognition of Mrs. Eddy as the revelator of Truth to this age and as a star of the first magnitude in the heaven of spiritual history. This recognition impels progress and is indispensable to it.

In seeking to share the vision with their fellowmen, Christian Scientists must set an example of adhering strictly to the absolute Christian Science explained in the textbook, for this truth alone is demonstrable. Truth demonstrated is recognizable as the only real substance and life.

It is essential that the beginner in this Science see that all human needs are met by the understanding and demonstration of Truth, man's divine Principle. But if in any way he is made to believe that Christian Science is primarily a method of solving personal problems, he will be hindered from catching the illumination of divine Science. On the other hand, if his thought is so lifted up that it becomes illumined with the vision of Spirit's infinitude and the consequent nothingness of matter and evil, he will begin to solve the great problem of being, of which Mrs. Eddy speaks.

As Christian Scientists grow in their understanding of Truth, they gravitate Godward, or Spiritward, and by their example they inspire others to desire Truth. If by this process unprejudiced honest seekers are led to turn wholeheartedly to God, they will be healed mentally and physically. Thus the discords of mankind, which are produced by ignorance of God, will begin to yield to Truth, and mankind will begin to catch the vision of divine Science.