No one ever uttered a wiser, truer word than did Mrs. Eddy when she said, "Each individual is responsible for himself" (Miscellaneous Writings, p. 119). Paul also declared for individual work and responsibility when he wrote, "Let every man prove his own work, and then shall he have rejoicing in himself alone, and not in another." The failure to understand and act upon this necessity for individual endeavor is the cause of many of humanity's dissensions. It sometimes seems as though most people are either trying to shoulder responsibility for others, or to find others who will assume responsibility for them; always some one is seeking to do another's work for him, or to have his own work done for him by another. While this intrusion into another's work apparently goes on quite generally, it is often not so much from an intention to interfere as from an ignorant effort to give unrequested aid.
There is only one way in which one can fulfill his own responsibility; only one way in which he can win his own freedom; and that is through learning, as Christian Science teaches, to prove his own unity with God, divine Mind. Each one's individual work is to know and do the will of God, for this is the purpose for which God created man. Man as the expression of the will of God can never do aught but reflect God's perfection; and the individual responsibility of demonstrating this every one must finally fulfill. This way of light and Life can be attained only through the perpetual laying down of the beliefs in evil. Because the divine is always present it is discovered and realized in just the proportion that the false is recognized and relinquished.
No one can ever do another's work. Since each one is an individual reflection of God, each must demonstrate this truth for himself. In "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 18) our beloved Leader tells us that Jesus "did life's work aright not only in justice to himself, but in mercy to mortals,—to show them how to do theirs, but not to do it for them nor to relieve them of a single responsibility." While he did his own work so perfectly, there is no record that he ever made himself responsible for his human relatives, or even for his disciples. He did not condemn himself for Peter's inconstancy, for Thomas' doubt, or for Judas' sin. On the contrary, he must have seen that to accept such false responsibility would have been to acknowledge these evils as real; and this would have rendered him totally unfit to complete his own stupendous work.
