WHEN a certain man addressed Jesus as "Good Master," the Master gently reproved him with these words (Matt. 19: 17): "Why callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is, God." Thus he directed the thought of the seeker after eternal life away from his person to God, the source and Giver of all true life and good.
Throughout her life as the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, Mary Baker Eddy did all that was in her power to discourage the adulation and idolizing of her own and others' human personalities. In her writings she consistently turns the reader's thought away from finite person to the contemplation and adoration of divine Principle, or God. She knew that thereby she would not only ensure her students' spiritual growth but also the continuity of her Cause, for she writes in "The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany" (p. 117): "There was never a religion or philosophy lost to the centuries except by sinking its divine Principle in personality. May all Christian Scientists ponder this fact, and give their talents and loving hearts free scope only in the right direction!"
Christian Science points out "the right direction," for it fully reveals the divine Principle of the teaching and practice of the Master. It interprets and demonstrates this divine Principle as God, Life, Truth, and Love, eternal, absolute, unerring. The teaching and practice of divine Science proceed from and rest upon this one divine, intelligent Principle, the fundamental law of which governs all its operations.
Students of Christian Science take this perfect Principle and its perfect idea, man, as the basis from which to work out their salvation. They acknowledge Spirit, or Soul, as the Principle of all health, happiness, and success. They are healed by this Principle as it becomes understood and demonstrated. They do not rely upon humanly mental or material means and methods. Through class instruction they learn of Christian Science from the inspiration of the all-knowing Mind, or Principle, expressed by the teacher, in fulfillment of the Master's promise (John 6:45), "They shall be all taught of God." But they do not learn of it from the teacher's personal views and human opinions. In their relations to fellow students, they therefore bear in mind that divine Principle, God, is infinitely wiser than any human teacher, practitioner, relative, or friend, for mortals may err, but Principle never does.
The human or mortal mind has always been an idolater. Drawing its conclusions from its own fictitious five physical senses, which testify of matter instead of Spirit as having substance, life, and intelligence, it worships or idolizes matter and material so-called man. Believing in many minds or gods, it sometimes induces Christians to personalize their religion and to worship spiritually-minded men and women, instead of following their example. It repeatedly suggests disobedience and disloyalty to the one Mind, or Principle.
Trying to sink Mind into matter, the divine Principle into human personality, was idolatry of old and is idolatry now, because it breaks the First Commandment. It is recorded in the fourteenth chapter of Acts that the heathen at Lystra, having seen Paul heal the man crippled from birth, thought that the gods had come down to them in the likeness of men. Believing that the healing power was inherent in the personality of Paul and his fellow worker Barnabas, they began to deify them, and their priest "would have done sacrifice with the people." Hearing of this, the apostles "ran in among the people, crying out, and saying, Sirs, why do ye these things? We also are men of like passions with you, and preach unto you that ye should turn from these vanities unto the living God."
Deification of human personality comes from entertaining a material or humanly personal sense of God or of man. It leads to divisions, cliques, rivalries in families and organizations. It fosters self-importance, self-glorification, and disrespect for constituted authority, and furthers evil's method of conquering by dividing.
By idolizing the human personality of a fellow man, we may unwittingly put a stumbling block in his upward path. It is a test of one's metal to have deceitful flattery, adulation, and popularity constantly thrust at one. If he is not watchful, it may poison his thought and inflate his ego and cause him to demand it, thus himself adding fuel to the flame that would consume his humility and his moral and spiritual stature. Personalizing good would clothe it with the limitations and fluctuations of mortal personality.
We can keep this unholy flame from flaring up in our homes, our churches, and our businesses by dwelling less and less on the material personality and perceiving more and more the spiritual individuality which is the true selfhood of man. We can realize more fully that every good and perfect gift comes from God and belongs to man as His reflection. We can further aid in checking this personal contagion, as Mrs. Eddy calls it (see Miscellany, pp. 116-118), by refusing to resort to praise from mere personal motives.
Those who are striving to be constantly aware of divine Principle as the source of all truth and good will be able to express gratitude and appreciation for valuable service rendered by a fellow Christian Scientist without nurturing vainglory, self-love, or desire for personal leadership. Such expressions will not foster the idolatrous belief of good as originating in or possessed by human personality. Rather will they strengthen the fellow worker's reliance on Principle and encourage Him to greater spiritual endeavor.
The carnal mind would sometimes deceive and divert those who are ascending the Christianly scientific path to health, freedom, and eternal life by suggesting to them fraudulent counterfeits of the divinely revealed spiritual way of healing and salvation. It would use any weaknesses in their spiritual armor through which to divide the movement. How this so-called mind would enfeeble and neutralize the healing power of Christian Science, Mrs. Eddy indicates in this passage from "Christian Healing" (p. 3): "In proportion as the personal and material element stole into religion, it lost Christianity and the power to heal."
The material, personal sense of life and intelligence may tempt someone still clinging to an impractical or sentimental human idealism to believe that the demands of divine Principle are too exacting or too transcendental, and that the attainment of some sense of human goodness and affection is easier, goes far enough, and does not demand the giving up of matter and its concepts. This error may also whisper to him that salvation lies in the spiritualizing and beautifying of matter and in making a discordant mortal into a well mortal, and that to this end the mixing of spiritual and material modes of healing is legitimate.
The scientific fact remains that the only reality is God, Spirit, and His spiritual, perfect, and immortal creation, and that the so-called material and imperfect creation of illusive mortal mind, even though in some respects beautiful, is transitory and unreal. The attainment of the highest sense of human goodness, therefore, does not bring salvation. The perfection of being can only be reached as one progressively lays off the material sense of being and puts on the spiritual and divine. There is only one way of liberation from the ills of mortal existence, and that is the Christianly scientific overcoming of the false belief of life, substance, and intelligence in matter through the understanding and demonstration of the allness of God, Spirit, and of man's true selfhood as spiritual and perfect now. This is the way the Master taught, and it is now revealed and made plain in Christian Science.
The laws of divine Principle are undeviating, all-powerful, and eternal, and their unceasing operation is not influenced by the false beliefs and theories of the human mind. The qualities which reflect Principle are constancy, justice, honesty, loyalty, steadfastness, consecration, and the like, and in proportion as we are obedient to this Principle and governed by its law do we bring these qualities into our human experience.
Obedience to divine Principle strengthens character and ensures success in Christian healing and all rightful human endeavors. It enhances singleness of purpose, trustworthiness, dependability, promptness, and impartiality. As one brings these qualities into his home, church, and business they increase his usefulness to society and dignify his life. They enable him to set an example of rectitude and moral courage that commands respect and is more far-reaching than can be humanly measured.
Disobedience to divine law plants one in the barren and shifting sands of material, erring theories and arguments, causes one to lose himself in the maze of human speculation and intellectual wrestlings, involves him in the clash of human wills and personalities over who shall be greatest, and leads to disappointment and despair. Hence Christ Jesus' words (John 15:1, 4,5): "I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman. . . . Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me. I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing."
An understanding of divine Principle as Love unites men in Christ and brings a freedom, joy, peace, and dominion unattainable without it. It purifies one's affections by freeing them from binding material selfishness and unfolds the spiritual sense of Love, steadfast, unselfish, and pure, embracing all mankind. It lifts one from the chance and changeableness, the personal attachments and enmities, of a personal sense of life to the true sense of being, which reflects the immutable power and government of divine Principle.
May students of Christian Science follow their Leader's counsel and example in eschewing the deification of corporeal, human personality, avoiding popularity, and adhering faithfully to the unerring divine Principle of their true being. Only thus will they promote their own spiritual growth, demonstrate the healing power of Christian Science, and safeguard the unity and progress of their great Cause.
Our Leader writes in "Miscellaneous Writings" (p. 135): "Principle, instead of person, is next to our hearts, on our lips, and in our lives. Our watchwords are Truth and Love; and if we abide in these, they will abound in us, and we shall be one in heart,—one in motive, purpose, pursuit." And she continues: "Abiding in Love, not one of you can be separated from me; and the sweet sense of journeying on together, doing unto others as ye would they should do unto you, conquers all opposition, surmounts all obstacles, and secures success. If you falter, or fail to fulfil this Golden Rule, though you should build to the heavens, you would build on sand."
