I would I could voice the thoughts that seek for expression this morning, as I look into the faces of the disciples of Christ, who have come from the East, the West, the North, and the South, to unite with us, in establishing "His kingdom on earth as it is in heaven." Language is weak to convey our message, but thought, laden with realization of Life, Truth, and Love, must reach each consciousness, as I speak the welcome the Christian Scientists of New York City extend to you, our brothers and sisters in Christ. We put out both hands, and clasp them over hands that with us, through sunshine and tempest, have held aloft the banner of Christian Science, upon which is inscribed, in letters luminous with Truth, "All is Mind, there is no matter." "God is Spirit, and man is His image and likeness, hence man is spiritual, and not material." Science & Health, 40th ed., p. 406. Since we last met, many a worn pilgrim has been led through the ministry of Truth to the fountain of Life; many a wanderer has quit the husks of creed (the Adam thought in which all die) and has come to the understanding of the power of the Christ-mind, in which all are made alive. For the understanding of Christian Science lifts the veil of sense that hides from mortals the real and Eternal, and discloses the Principle of Being, the spiritual law of Life. Thus the sense of Life as personal disappears, and that of harmony with the One Mind—Omnipotent, Omniscient, and Omnipresent Intelligence—"in whom we live and move and are," takes its place; thus we enter "The secret place of the most High," and "abide under the shadow of the Almighty." We become conscious of the Divine Love that envelops, of the Infinite Light that illumines all; material sense begins to fall off, and we to become conscious of the Spiritual and Real. In this state of consciousness the human reaches out for the Divine.
The age of passive acquiescence to time-honored creeds and dogmas has passed. The thinker of to-day denies theological assumptions, and opposes ecclesiastical pretensions. The falsity of theological and medical theories is revealed by the light of Christian Science. Traditions lose their power, and material strongholds are shaken through the teaching of a demonstrable Christianity, and the example of verification of the promises of Jesus the Christ.
We are embassadors and disciples of Christ. We have accepted the commission, "Go into all the world, preach the Gospel, heal the sick, cast out evils, raise the dead." The Word, which Jesus proved effectual in healing the sick ("for many were brought to him for divers diseases ... and He healed them all with the Word "*), has not lost its power. Through Christian Science we have found the key that unlocks the hidden mysteries of God; that opens the door of understanding to mortals groping in sense, that they may find "What the hieroglyphics mean, of the unseen in the seen." We have touched the hem of the garment of Cause—the power of the Mind of God, the potency of the Word. We are realizing the Mind that was in Christ Jesus. God's command was, and is: "Let there be Light." Christian Science— the power of God—is working the destruction of doubt, of material creeds and ritual. It meets with the same resistance that was opposed to Jesus and his early disciples, but it speaks its "Peace, be still" to the seeming tumult of error, and declares: "Now is come salvation, and strength, and the power of our Christ." To mortals in the Adam dream of "life in matter" it calls louder, and ever more loudly: "Awake thou that sleepest, and come forth from the dead, and Christ (Truth) shall give thee light."
