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.
But man forsakes this earthly scene, ah! never to return;
Shall any following spring revive the ashes of the urn?
While this may seem inconsistent with the religious thought of the present time, it is evident that the sentiment therein expressed still dominates the thought of many sincere Christians, else why the sadness which comes to many when springtime paints the field with delicate tints, telling in every token of a renewed sense of life? Are not their eyes holden by the belief in material law,—a belief which gives no hope of man's eternal existence, but which forever contradicts the divine possibilities that can only be known through the recognition of "the law of the spirit of life" in its ceaseless activity? There is little hope of any great gain of assurance in respect to the resurrection, until each individual becomes conscious of the operation of this law of Spirit which reveals the immortality of all that has its origin in good. As this consciousness is reached through the understanding of Divine Science, all will see in the unfolding beauties of spring a reflection of the good which was first recognized in their spiritual awakening, their healing from sin and sickness, and this sense of good will come with sweeter and stronger renewals as clearer views of Truth are gained.
