In the epistle to the Hebrews it is said of Enoch, "Before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God." This pleasing of God is a question of vast importance and one which cannot be considered too often or too earnestly. On its proper understanding rest right conclusions as to man's relationship not only to God but to his fellow man.
For the most part the human race has apparently thought little about it. To be sure, there is perhaps nothing which humanity values more highly than it does approval. Men, however, all too frequently think and act from the standpoint of what their neighbors will think of them, thus embracing a tendency to live so as to receive praise of men rather than of God, without consideration as to where such tendency may lead. John relates that many of the chief rulers believed, but because of the Pharisees would not confess the Christ; "for they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God."
This mistaken sense is often early fostered in the education of mortals. Children are taught to crave the approbation or to fear the disapproval of those around them to the exclusion of a higher motive. This perpetual looking to their fellow men for commendation has held mankind in subjection to a limited, unsatisfying sense of good. The mistaken education of men which has tended to set them watching for their neighbor's approval is based on the false belief of existence as material. In "No and Yes" (p. 40) Mrs. Eddy says, "Because of vanity and self-righteousness, mortals seek, and expect to receive, a material sense of approval." Looking to a finite, mortal concept of persons and things, men can see no larger hope of good than may be afforded by the expected commendation of their own little world.
