"EACH individual is responsible for himself." Much encouragement is to be found in these words of Mary Baker Eddy's in "Miscellaneous Writings" (p. 119). Nothing is more discouraging than to believe that we are the helpless victims of the carnal mind's inhibitions, coming under the guise of persons, circumstances, or conditions beyond our control. On the other hand, nothing is more comforting and assuring than the realization that the degree of health and abundance, of success and peace, yes, of all good, made manifest in our individual experience, is in exact proportion to our understanding reliance upon God as the source of infinite good and to our awareness of man's at-one-ment with Him.
Mortal mind is prone to tempt us to evade the responsibility for our own thoughts, words, and deeds, and to blame others more than ourselves for the mistakes and ills which may seem to be so much a part of our human experience. In "Pulpit and Press" our Leader shows us how to achieve immunity from aggressive suggestions and their distressing results in these words (p. 3): "Know, then, that you possess sovereign power to think and act rightly, and that nothing can dispossess you of this heritage and trespass on Love." She adds, "If you maintain this position, who or what can cause you to sin or suffer?"
So long as we continue to think of ourselves as male or female physicalities, incomplete, therefore unsatisfied, just so long shall we believe in the necessity for human interdependence and seek in vain for what we feel we lack. In the degree we behold our true nature as the image and likeness of God, as revealed in the spiritual account of creation in the first chapter of Genesis, we see that we all individually include every quality and attribute of our impartial Father-Mother God, and that the boundless unfoldment of our true being can never be stopped. or even temporarily retarded unless in belief we ourselves give consent.
