In the Glossary in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" Mary Baker Eddy, with deep spiritual insight and originality, has defined the words "I, or Ego," as follows (p. 588): "Divine Principle; Spirit; Soul; incorporeal, unerring, immortal, and eternal Mind;" and, amplifying it, she adds in part, "There is but one I, or Us, but one divine Principle, or Mind, governing all existence."
This arresting, illuminating definition reveals the perfection of God's creation, and rivets attention upon its inseparability from the nature of its divine source. It is a clear bugle call to the individual to watch that in his often careless use of the pronoun of the first person he does not disregard his spiritual origin and even deny his true selfhood.
One of the effects of a faithful and inspired study of Christian Science is to bring to the student a new precision in his thinking and speech, and this necessarily reflects itself in his actions. Exactness is an expression of divine Principle or Mind, and, as it appears to human sense, it naturally includes the scientific understanding of words and their application. How important, then, to take as our starting point an intelligent apprehension of what we really are!
