Editorials

PERHAPS no subject arouses greater interest than does that of the future life, as it is called. People who do not concern themselves about religion are ready to admit their interest in a possible future existence.

In Christian Science we no longer think of the returning seasons from a material standpoint, but instead, we learn to measure the unfoldment of our spiritual capacities by our power to gain from every aspect of nature higher and more helpful lessons. Spiritual sense alone can rightly interpret nature, and as its spiritual lessons unfold to us, we smile when we think upon the sombre teaching of the not very remote past, expressed in the following lines, which were sung in the churches of an orthodox faith,— Yet soon reviving plants and flowers anew shall deck the plain; The woods shall hear the voice of spring and flourish green again.

Open our eyes, that we that world may see! Open our ears, that we Thy voice may hear, And in the spirit land may ever be, And feel Thy presence, with us, always near. Jones Very.

We feel sure that our readers will join with us in thanking the Herald for so promptly and unequivocally refuting this "oft-repeated falsehood" which has been circulated quite industriously in order to impugn the good faith of Mrs. Eddy and her followers.

The following excerpts are from an article written by a reporter for The New York Herald and published in the March 5 issue of that paper. "Pleasant View, Concord, N.

The nuptial vow should never be annulled so long as the morale of marriage is preserved. The frequency of divorce shows the imperative nature of this relationship to be losing ground, hence that some fundamental error is engrafted therein.

There are few religious thinkers who would not readily admit that the sense of materiality militates against spirituality, but they are by no means clear to what extent this material sense should be resisted. Here Christian Science declares, in no uncertain terms, that all reality is spiritual, and that any reliance upon materiality is sure to result in disappointment, if not disaster.

Thoughtful students of Christian Science are never more grateful for the illumination which has come to them, than when they note the uncertainty and mental confusion in which the many are yet immersed, for they realize how hopeless is the endeavor which others are so earnestly putting forth to reconcile reason and revelation while yet maintaining a tenacious hold upon incongruous, traditional beliefs. A great body of sincere Christian people have ever found themselves face to face with an insuperable difficulty in their effort to adjust the dualism involved in the generally accepted declaration of the reality of both Spirit and matter, good and evil, to a fundamental postulate of every variety of Christian faith; viz.

" There are many who forget— ministers of the gospel as well as laymen—that by prayer many cures have been accomplished—cures of bodily as well as spiritual ills. If the gospel had been properly preached, if it had been preached in its entirety, there would have been no occasion for the Christian Science Church.

Article XXVI. Private Communications.