THERE is one infallible test by which a true follower of the Christ may be distinguished from those who are followers in name only, and it is one upon which perfect reliance may be placed, since it was given to us by Christ Jesus himself,—"By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another." Through the dust and din of nineteen centuries has come down to us this message of the Christ, profound in wisdom, unanswerable in argument, yet so sweetly simple that "the wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein ;" for we all recognize love whenever and wherever we find it. It has truly been called the universal language, which everybody understands. One may travel in a far country, unable to speak a word in the tongue which he hears about him, and yet if his heart is filled with love for God and man, its gentle, purifying influence will be felt and recognized, even as a delicate breath of perfume silently makes known the presence of the bed of mignonette just outside one's window.
No one has a better right to learn and to speak this universal language than has the Christian Scientist, for no one has been more clearly taught than he of that Love which is but another name for God, and which God's children, by reflection, ever possess and express. We all know it, for like the city set on an hill, it "cannot be hid." It shows itself in the eyes, the voice, the smile, the hand-clasp, radiating forth in a thousand different ways of which the possessor is unconscious, and ofttimes transforming the plainest face into a thing of loveliness and beauty.
Our Leader has told us that "the vital part, the heart and soul of Christian Science, is Love. Without this, the letter is but the dead body of Science,—pulseless, cold, inanimate" (Science and Health, p. 113). We have a right, then, to look for this radiant, God-given virtue in the life of every Christian Scientist, and if we fail to find it we have a right to believe that there is something wrong. Surely the sweetness, the tenderness, the heavenly compassion of the Christ-nature must have been outwardly expressed by the man Jesus, making him humanly lovable as well as divinely loving ; and we have a right today to look for this same gracious courtesy and consideration which was ever exemplified in the life of the gentle Nazarene. We have also a right to expect to find it, most of all places in the world, in a Christian Science church.
