The term "individuality" is of profound interest to the student of Christian Science, for he knows that it is solely by conscious individual beings that God, the creative Principle of the real universe, is expressed. Every demonstration of Christian Science is a restoration, in some degree, of true individuality, and a disappearance in corresponding degree of the false mortal sense of existence. Mary Baker Eddy says of the master Christian (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 555), "Our great example, Jesus, could restore the individualized manifestation of existence, which seemed to vanish in death."
The word "individuality" is from the Latin, and is derived from in and dividuus, meaning "not divisible." In modern usage the word "individual" has come to mean singleness and aloneness—something having distinctive, distinguishing characteristics. Christian Science reveals that God is one infinite Mind, and that His creation consists of a universe of spiritual ideas, conscious beings, each one presenting or expressing an individualization of the one divine Mind. Each individuality in God's vast kingdom reflects the infinity of good, but each one does this in its individual, God-constituted way.
This great truth, understood, destroys the human illusion of conflicting interests, and the stultifying competition, envy, and rivalry seeming to arise therefrom. One individual can no more perform the function of another in the Science of being than one number can usurp the place of another in the science of mathematics. What order and harmony are here revealed, each spiritual identity actively expressing eternally its individual, untrammeled, divinely outlined usefulness and capability! This spiritual order is the law for everyone's activity, and when it is understood to be the basic fact of his activity, it governs his seeming human employment, providing him with permanent and satisfying occupation and revealing in some degree his true individuality.
