Christ Jesus said that "no man can serve two masters,"and in Science and Health(p. 182) we read that "we cannot obey both physiology and Spirit." The strife in human thought between its opposite beliefs in good and evil, the spiritual and material sense of being, indicates the individual need of choosing definitely which one we will accept and serve. The decisive question should be as to which is the real, and which will therefore yield the most profitable results of service. In which of these conditions do mankind find their greatest good, their most enduring satisfaction? Which incites them to good works, to purity, kindness, charity, or leads them nearest to God? Which better embodies the idea of immortality, that is, the idea of man in the divine image? It should be clear that we cannot have more than one of these as our ideal, for as Paul said, "The flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other."
As a rule mortals are inclined to alternate between these opposites, until the self-punishment of their error eventually drives them for peace and safety to Truth, to the side of the spiritual. But men should not wait for suffering to decide their choice rightly for them. Apart from the promptings of their religious training, the common instinct of self-preservation should turn them to that from which flows the more good, to that which holds out the stronger hope of freedom and happiness. In view of the direful conditions through which the human race has come, and of the suffering which so saddens earth to-day, the standing marvel is that mankind continue their allegiance to that which has always repaid them with ruin and desolation.
Jesus declared the impossibility of serving more than one master simultaneously, or of having more than one trust. It were well if we all examined ourselves on this crucial point, to see whether our allegiance to God as All in all measures up to the standard He requires. Does our daily living correspond with our theoretical acceptance of the truth of infinite good? Is our confidence in Spirit supreme? or do matter and evil receive our superior faith and service? One's belief in evil implies a corresponding disbelief in God, as surely as that the same weight cannot be on both sides of the scale at once. Jesus taught his followers to render unto God alone the things which are His; but does not Christendom, as with one consent, render some of these things unto Caesar? The opinions and beliefs of men regarding man, the conclusions of human knowledge, the means and methods of material sense, have been given preference over the plan of salvation demonstrated by Christ Jesus and embodied in his teachings. Apart from any spirit of criticism or controversy, let us look at the question fairly and squarely, and see what our professions of faith demand of us, and whether our service, is given to God or to mammon.
