In these strange and stirring times, when the disintegration of mortal mind goes on apace, when strife and tumult walk hand in hand with limitation and fear, it is well to remember where our succor is. The terror of those outside the ark of safety is pitiful; but when we remember that it is likewise baseless, we rejoice in some understanding of good that disarms error. We may marvel at the manifestations, even while we see through their foolish pretensions; but we are not affrighted at either.
As we go on in the line of progress indicated in the teaching of Christian Science, we appreciate the great need of systematic, constructive thinking, the ability to identify one's thinking—as spiritual understanding—with the one Mind, that the errors of sense may be seen at their true value, as illusion, and overcome. We are coming out of these phases of mortal thought, knowing they are no part of us, nor we of them. It is not this mental state alone that satisfies the Christian Scientist. He is seeking and working for the house built without hands, eternal in harmony, and not the earthly embodiment with its pains and pleasures of human sense. All this means work. It means sacrifice, purification, persistency. It means alertness to duty in order to meet the aggressive suggestions of mortal mind, not as verities which we fear, but as illegitimate and illusive arguments which we can rebuke and expel.
We must grow in grace and goodness and in the understanding of God and love for man. These demonstrated are manifest proofs of the presence and power of God. It is such comfort and joy to realize that these waymarks of spiritual progress conversely show that we are leaving the hitching posts of mortal mind behind us. It is the only way wherein peace is brought to the struggling heart weary of the world and its allurements, determined to renounce the devil and all his works, the vain pomp and glory of mortal thought, that promises so much and performs nothing. In the most attenuated guise, evil's suggestion—always in the name of good—besets us, and it requires much strong protection to stand. Here personal goodness and blind faith avail little, and we stand only because we understand. We are by no means to be fearful, but watchful, and experience has taught us that the systematic and careful study of the Scriptures and of our Leader's writings is absolutely necessary to this unfoldment. Nothing can take the place of this study because no other writings present the truth as they do.
