When she was a young girl, Mrs. Eddy, later the author of Science and Health, wrote a poem entitled "Upward." The first and last stanzas read as follows (Poems, pp. 18, 19):
I've watched in the azure the eagle's proud wing,
His soaring majestic, and feathersome fling—
Careening in liberty higher and higher—
Like genius unfolding a quenchless desire.
My course, like the eagle's, oh, still be it high,
Celestial the breezes that waft o'er its sky!
God's eye is upon me—I am not alone
When onward and upward and heavenward borne.
When he was in his early teens, and before he became a student of Christian Science, the writer used to hunt on the prairies and in the mountains of Colorado. Occasionally, on a warm summer afternoon, he would sit and rest on a rock or a log and watch an eagle soaring in the sky. The eagle would start to soar from the top of a cliff or a mountain and continue to soar in ever-widening circles until he would soon be out of sight.
It was a beautiful thing to see the giant bird, with its broad wings outstretched, continue his upward flight without once moving his wings. It was fascinating to see this definite and rapid upward flight without any physical effort on the part of the eagle. The beauty of the flight, the grace of the eagle, the loveliness of the azure blue sky have left a never-to-be-forgotten picture that has always been a source of inspiration to the writer.
In recalling these incidents, he often wondered, "How did the eagle soar upward without any physical effort on his part?" Many years later he learned that the air, as it becomes warm from the sun, rises, as all warm or hot air does, and the eagle was simply riding the warm air currents as they rose upward.
In Science and Health we read (SH 445:19-21), "Christian Science silences human will, quiets fear with Truth and Love, and illustrates the unlabored motion of the divine energy in healing the sick." Through years of studying this Science, the writer has learned to some degree that he too can with "unlabored motion" rise above the belief of life in matter, calling itself a mortal man, into the atmosphere of divine Love, where all is good, where health, harmony, and joy prevail.
Divine energy is the power of God, the only real power there is, and this power is the power that motivates and governs the whole universe, including man. As one studies and practices these truths that are taught in Christian Science, he will find his thought becoming uplifted and joyous. This inspired state of consciousness is expressed as the divine energy, or the power, of divine Love that causes the individual to turn from the belief of life in matter, with its delusions of sickness, sin, death, discord, and unhappiness, to the consciousness of the allness and power of divine Love, God. This divine energy is the impulsion of the warmth of divine Love, which causes one to love his neighbor and to glimpse the infinity of good. These warm currents, or the ceaseless flow of divine Love from God to man, lift us heavenward and draw us closer to God.
How effortless, how easy, it is to love! There is nothing that is more effortless or that possesses more power than love for God and man. How easy a task becomes when love motivates! The most menial or the most difficult task becomes an uplifting and joyous experience when love governs, and by the same token a most glorious undertaking can become meaningless and empty when love is not the motive that governs.
A Christian Science practitioner when called to the bedside of one who seems to be ill and in pain relies wholly upon divine Science, which "illustrates the unlabored motion of the divine energy in healing the sick." He allows this "unlabored motion" to fill his consciousness with God's love; this in turn destroys the patient's fear, which is largely the cause of the illness; and when the fear is destroyed, the patient is healed.
Christ Jesus said (John 12:32), "I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me." The spiritual idea, or Christ, lifts all mankind effortlessly into the realm of divine Love, where all is good and where there is no evil or sickness. Just as the eagle was lifted upward effortlessly by the warm currents of the summer air, so we are lifted effortlessly by the warm currents of divine Love, demonstrating health and harmony. There is no struggle to demonstrate this "unlabored motion."
Mrs. Eddy states in "Miscellaneous Writings" (p. 355), "To strike out right and left against the mist, never clears the vision; but to lift your head above it, is a sovereign panacea." To contend with evil or error as if it were something instead of what it really is—nothing—can cause a student of Christian Science to be engulfed in a severe struggle, making demonstration difficult, even impossible. We do have to know and declare the truth with certainty and conviction, but this need not be a struggle. The truth is already true and real; we do not make it true and real, and a quiet and loving realization that it is true and real right now will bring the desired results.
How beautifully Isaiah summarized "the unlabored motion of the divine energy" when he wrote (40:31), "They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint"!
The first time the writer read the poem "Upward," he recalled the times when he watched the upward-soaring eagles on those warm summer afternoons. He now knows that what so raptly held his attention and gave him such a great sense of peace and harmony was "the unlabored motion of the divine energy," or the power of divine Love, which the eagle's flight symbolized, but which came from God.
