In studying the familiar and well-loved emblem of Christian Science, the cross and crown, which must ever be the hallmark of authentic Christian Science literature, one is impressed with the character of the crown. He discovers it to be the opposite of the crown of thorns; rather is it a crown of power and authority, of triumph and rejoicing. May not the cross symbolize the way of material sense, the human way of dream and suffering, and the crown the way of Truth, of Love's reality? We need to keep clearly in thought that the crown is not material. It is the crown of Spirit, signifying spiritual understanding and rejoicing. As we follow the way of the crown, the cross disappears, is eliminated from consciousness.
On page 350 of "Miscellaneous Writings" Mary Baker Eddy says, "I issue no arguments, and cause none to be used in mental practice, which consign people to suffering." The way of the cross, then, is not the way of Love, of divine Principle. It is the way of material dream; and this waking dream, like the sleeping dream, has no self, no ego, through which it can be identified. It is always a dream calling itself a dreamer. However, it does at times seem to mesmerize one into claiming it and giving it a selfhood, carrying the cross of suffering, of belief in separation from the good which is God. Through the crown of spiritual understanding, however, one finds his true selfhood in Spirit, and the cross fades into nothingness. How beautifully one finds this fading out of the cross illustrated in our Leader's poem "Christ and Christmas."
In one of her best-loved poems Mrs. Eddy writes (Poems, p. 12):
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