THE tendency of the so-called human mind is to look for unnecessary trouble by constituting itself a law unto others. One often attends to his neighbor's most intimate affairs,—in thought, if not in deed,— and consequently burdens himself, besides hindering or interfering with the operation of divine law in another's life. Sometimes this quality is to be found manifested in an otherwise unselfish character. But is there not enough in one's own mental garden that needs to be weeded out, or nourished and cultivated, so that one ought rather to stay at home and tend to the work there?
This mental meddlesomeness on the part of humanity can be curbed and healed only as one begins to recognize that there is a divine law which controls and regulates, when left to its own wise and orderly unfoldment, governing far better than we, with our as yet imperfect sense of right, can possibly do. Faultfinding, scolding, nagging are so unlovely! And do they ever accomplish that which we desire? Who among us has not been made uncomfortable, even embarrassed at times, when in the intimacy of another's family life we have had to listen to faultfinding among the members of the household? Until men learn that divine power is greater than human will and wisdom, discord will find a channel of expression in unhappy hearts and homes. But when there dawns in consciousness a dependence on that same Love which inspired the shepherd poet to write, "The Lord is my shepherd," they will find this law of deliverance present now as it was then.
We all have to learn our lessons of humility, of contrition, of purification, of selflessness,—and through our own experiences too, for salvation is truly individual. It is our privilege and our duty to prove daily, hourly, that man is governed, protected, and directed by divine law, and no other, and that supposititious evil only claims to control and operate in the affairs of men. Evil claims that there is pleasure in sin, in power to influence and direct the affairs of others. Each time we are awake sufficiently to prove our dominion over its claim to operate within, we are made more capable of resisting its influence from without.
