"Happiness consists in being and in doing good; only what God gives, and what we give ourselves and others through His tenure, confers happiness: conscious worth satisfies the hungry heart, and nothing else can." This statement is found on page 17 of Mary Baker Eddy's Message to The Mother Church for 1902.
To be able to do good has been the noble desire of numberless people, but it has not always brought happiness. Often it has brought disappointment and frustration, sometimes even deep sorrow and regret, because it has not been "through His tenure." To hold something through tenure is to utilize and enjoy that which is given or entrusted to one.
The search of the hungry heart has always been for satisfaction. Although this search has often sprung from a desire for satisfaction in material living, a deeper human desire, shared by almost every individual, is his longing to be satisfied with himself. How often the strutting egotist is covering up a deep sense of inferiority with a mantle of bombastic self-advertisement. On the other hand, there are those with an inferior sense of themselves, who constantly compare themselves with others. There is also the self-righteous martyr, with his sense of personal good, ever nursing his wounded spirit. The majority of mortals probably fall into the category of the general run of mankind—those who are up today and down tomorrow, riding the seesaw of personal sense, satisfied with themselves one day, dissatisfied the next. Who has not known the depression that often follows close on the heels of elation?
Mortal mind associates worth with achievement in some line of endeavor, and often much struggle goes into attempting to attain this sense of worth. But sometimes the effort is exhausting and the reward insecure and empty. Christian Science brings to those who seek true satisfaction an understanding of man's "conscious worth." Through its teachings one learns that a sustained consciousness of real worth can never be attained as long as one regards oneself as a mortal. The contemplation of oneself as a mortal, either good or bad, is inevitably depressing. Neither is true worth based upon or influenced by human circumstances, nor is it made up of human conditions.
Job's long lament resulted from mortal self-contemplation. He, having been so good to everyone, asks why evil should have come upon him. He cries aloud that he is worthless and fit only to die. The basis of all his anguish is belief in a selfhood apart from God, a selfhood with its goodness, achievement, possessions, all precariously balanced on the belief of human origin.
The words of Job's young friend, Elihu, voice the true basis of all correct contemplation of one's being (Job 33:4): "The Spirit of God hath made me, and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life." This is a scientific fact, and from it thought proceeds logically and accurately to all that man is because of his exact likeness to God.
When an understanding of God, as taught in Christian Science, unfolds, trust in mere human intellect is replaced with confidence in the intelligence that is man's because of his reflection of Mind. The inspiration of Soul floods consciousness with an abiding peace born of the realization that man's unity with God ensures an infinitude of spiritual ideas, in which there is no ebb tide, no periodic barrenness.
When Truth is claimed as the source of one's being, it assures the expression of absolute precision, ruling out all possibility of inaccuracy and of wasted or misguided efforts. The understanding that the real man is the very evidence of all-acting divine Principle lifts the oppressive beliefs of hereditary limitations, temperamental proclivities, and the superstitions of chance and fate.
The knowledge that Love is true consciousness replaces the mortal sense of haphazard existence with the orderly unfoldment of Love's beautiful ideas, radiant, joy-giving, and drabness and boredom flee. Proportionately as these truths and similar spiritual facts deduced from the hypothesis that man is the likeness of God are understood and applied in daily experience, the vitality of Spirit permeates all that we call our human activities, and "conscious worth" is demonstrated.
As this "conscious worth" is recognized and claimed, horizons widen, capacities are enlarged, and the way is opened for the expression of unlimited talents. Through reflection, man expresses the genius with which God has endowed him. Through the apprehension and understanding of this truth, satisfaction is found in the realization of completeness.
In "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" Mrs. Eddy writes (p. 264), "When we realize that Life is Spirit, never in nor of matter, this understanding will expand into self-completeness, finding all in God, good, and needing no other consciousness." In this self-completeness lies everything worth doing or being, as well as every right relationship. Nothing lies outside; everything is within.
Therefore all that man is, all that he has, reflects God. His great talents are expressed individually in infinite variety, each expression of equal value and importance. The kaleidoscope may be used to illustrate this point. Looking through the opening into the interior of the kaleidoscope, one sees a beautiful and symmetrical pattern. It is made by the reflection of pieces of colored glass in the mirrors which constitute the internal structure of the kaleidoscope. A slight moving of the instrument will change the whole pattern, but it is still a symmetrical design, still beautiful. This can go on and on; but regardless of the pattern or reflection, it is always the image of the colored glass. The origin of each pattern is the same, only the reflection varies in its individuality. So it is with each individual reflection of God: all ability, all beauty, all originality, all inspiration, is of "His tenure." Thus we give ourselves, through this bestowal, the satisfaction and joy of "conscious worth."
But how do we give this happiness to others? How do we do them good? Surely not from the standpoint that worth lies with one, but not with another, or that worth is hidden from one, yet known to another, or that it can be taken from one and given to another. Such reasoning is built upon the basis of finite, personal sense and often stirs up such unlovely traits of the carnal mind as wounded pride, ingratitude, resentment, envy, sloth, greed, and even hatred. On the other hand, every generous, compassionate act, motivated by the recognition of man's completeness, has its source in divine Love and opens the channels whereby Love meets the human need in the way that each one is prepared to receive it. To see, in the place of lack, man's God-given bounty, in the place of limitation, his infinite capabilities and freedom to express the dominion which is his by reflection, is to be conscious of man's worth. This is also claiming another's identification with all that God is.
To abide steadfastly in the consciousness of the truth of God is being good. To understand and demonstrate man's identification with all that God is, is doing good.
