Mary Baker Eddy - Retrospection and Introspection
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Mary Baker Eddy >> Retrospection and Introspection
Centuries will intervene before the statement of the inexhaustible topics
of Science and Health is sufficiently understood to be fully demonstrated.
The teacher himself should continue to study this textbook, and to
spiritualize his own thoughts and human life from this open fount of Truth
and Love.
He who sees clearly and enlightens other minds most readily, keeps his own
lamp trimmed and burning. Throughout his entire explanations he strictly
adheres to the teachings in the chapter on Recapitulation. When closing the
class, each member should own a copy of Science and Health, and continue to
study and assimilate this inexhaustible subject--Christian Science.
The opinions of men cannot be substituted for God's revelation. In times
past, arrogant pride, in attempting to steady the ark of Truth, obscured
even the power and glory of the Scriptures,--to which Science and Health is
the Key.
That teacher does most for his students who divests himself most of pride
and self, and by reason thereof is able to empty his students' minds of
error, that they may be filled with Truth. Thus doing, posterity will call
him blessed, and the tired tongue of history be enriched.
The less the teacher personally controls other minds, and the more he
trusts them to the divine Truth and Love, the better it will be for both
teacher and student.
A teacher should take charge only of his own pupils and patients, and of
those who voluntarily place themselves under his direction; he should avoid
leaving his own regular institute or place of labor, or expending his labor
where there are other teachers who should be specially responsible for
doing their own work well.
Teachers of Christian Science will find it advisable to band together their
students into associations, to continue the organization of churches, and
at present they can employ any other organic operative method that may
commend itself as useful to the Cause and beneficial to mankind.
Of this also rest assured, that books and teaching are but a ladder let
down from the heaven of Truth and Love, upon which angelic thoughts ascend
and descend, bearing on their pinions of light the Christ-spirit.
Guard yourselves against the subtly hidden suggestion that the Son of man
will be glorified, or humanity benefited, by any deviation from the order
prescribed by supernal grace. Seek to occupy no position whereto you do not
feel that God ordains you. Never forsake your post without due deliberation
and light, but always wait for God's finger to point the way. The loyal
Christian Scientist is incapable alike of abusing the practice of
Mind-healing or of healing on a material basis.
The tempter is vigilant, awaiting only an opportunity to divide the ranks
of Christian Science and scatter the sheep abroad; but "if God be for us,
who can be against us?" The Cause, _our_ Cause, is highly prosperous,
rapidly spreading over the globe; and the morrow will crown the effort of
to-day with a diadem of gems from the New Jerusalem.
EXEMPLIFICATION
To energize wholesome spiritual warfare, to rebuke vainglory, to offset
boastful emptiness, to crown patient toil, and rejoice in the spirit and
power of Christian Science, we must ourselves be true. There is but one way
of _doing_ good, and that is to _do_ it! There is but one way of _being_
good, and that is to _be_ good!
Art thou still unacquainted with thyself? Then be introduced to this self.
"Know thyself!" as said the classic Grecian motto. Note well the falsity of
this mortal self! Behold its vileness, and remember this poverty-stricken
"stranger that is within thy gates." Cleanse every stain from this
wanderer's soiled garments, wipe the dust from his feet and the tears from
his eyes, that you may behold the real man, the fellow-saint of a holy
household. There should be no blot on the escutcheon of our Christliness
when we offer our gift upon the altar.
A student desiring growth in the knowledge of Truth, can and will obtain it
by taking up his cross and following Truth. If he does this not, and
another one undertakes to carry his burden and do his work, the duty will
_not be accomplished_. No one can save himself without God's help, and God
will help each man who performs his own part. After this manner and in no
other way is every man cared for and blessed. To the unwise helper our
Master said, "Follow me; and let the dead bury their dead."
The poet's line, "Order is heaven's first law," is so eternally true, so
axiomatic, that it has become a truism; and its wisdom is as obvious in
religion and scholarship as in astronomy or mathematics.
Experience has taught me that the rules of Christian Science can be far
more thoroughly and readily acquired by regularly settled and systematic
workers, than by unsettled and spasmodic efforts. Genuine Christian
Scientists are, or should be, the most systematic and law-abiding people on
earth, because their religion demands implicit adherence to fixed rules, in
the orderly demonstration thereof. Let some of these rules be here stated.
_First_: Christian Scientists are to "heal the sick" as the Master
commanded.
In so doing they must follow the divine order as prescribed by
Jesus,--never, in any way, to trespass upon the rights of their neighbors,
but to obey the celestial injunction, "Whatsoever ye would that men should
do to you, do ye even so to them."
In this orderly, scientific dispensation healers become a law unto
themselves. They feel their own burdens less, and can therefore bear the
weight of others' burdens, since it is only through the lens of their
unselfishness that the sunshine of Truth beams with such efficacy as to
dissolve error.
It is already understood that Christian Scientists will not receive a
patient who is under the care of a regular physician, until he has done
with the case and different aid is sought. The same courtesy should be
observed in the professional intercourse of Christian Science healers with
one another.
_Second_: Another command of the Christ, his prime command, was that his
followers should "raise the dead." He lifted his own body from the
sepulchre. In him, Truth called the physical man from the tomb to health,
and the so-called dead forthwith emerged into a higher manifestation of
Life.
The spiritual significance of this command, "Raise the dead," most concerns
mankind. It implies such an elevation of the understanding as will enable
thought to apprehend the living beauty of Love, its practicality, its
divine energies, its health-giving and life-bestowing qualities,--yea, its
power to demonstrate immortality. This end Jesus achieved, both by example
and precept.
_Third_: This leads inevitably to a consideration of another part of
Christian Science work,--a part which concerns us intimately,--preaching
the gospel.
This evangelistic duty should not be so warped as to signify that we must
or may go, uninvited, to work in other vineyards than our own. One would,
or should, blush to enter unasked another's pulpit, and preach without the
consent of the stated occupant of that pulpit. The Lord's command means
this, that we should adopt the spirit of the Saviour's ministry, and abide
in such a spiritual attitude as will draw men unto us. Itinerancy should
not be allowed to clip the wings of divine Science. Mind demonstrates
omnipresence and omnipotence, but Mind revolves on a spiritual axis, and
its power is displayed and its presence felt in eternal stillness and
immovable Love. The divine potency of this spiritual mode of Mind, and the
hindrance opposed to it by material motion, is proven beyond a doubt in the
practice of Mind-healing.
In those days preaching and teaching were substantially one. There was no
church preaching, in the modern sense of the term. Men assembled in the one
temple (at Jerusalem) for sacrificial ceremonies, not for sermons. Into the
synagogues, scattered about in cities and villages, they went for
liturgical worship, and instruction in the Mosaic law. If one worshipper
preached to the others, he did so informally, and because he was bidden to
this privileged duty at that particular moment. It was the custom to pay
this hortatory compliment to a stranger, or to a member who had been away
from the neighborhood; as Jesus was once asked to exhort, when he had been
some time absent from Nazareth but once again entered the synagogue which
he had frequented in childhood.
Jesus' method was to instruct his own students; and he watched and guarded
them unto the end, even according to his promise, "Lo, I am with you
alway!" Nowhere in the four Gospels will Christian Scientists find any
precedent for employing another student to take charge of their students,
or for neglecting their own students, in order to enlarge their sphere of
action.
Above all, trespass not intentionally upon other people's thoughts, by
endeavoring to influence other minds to any action not first made known to
them or sought by them. Corporeal and selfish influence is human, fallible,
and temporary; but incorporeal impulsion is divine, infallible, and
eternal. The student should be most careful not to thrust aside Science,
and shade God's window which lets in light, or seek to stand in God's
stead.
Does the faithful shepherd forsake the lambs,--retaining his salary for
tending the home flock while he is serving another fold? There is no
evidence to show that Jesus ever entered the towns whither he sent his
disciples; no evidence that he there taught a few hungry ones, and then
left them to starve or to stray. To these selected ones (like "the elect
lady" to whom St. John addressed one of his epistles) he gave personal
instruction, and gave in plain words, until they were able to fulfil his
behest and depart on their united pilgrimages. This he did, even though one
of the twelve whom he kept near himself betrayed him, and others forsook
him.
The true mother never willingly neglects her children in their early and
sacred hours, consigning them to the care of nurse or stranger. Who can
feel and comprehend the needs of her babe like the ardent mother? What
other heart yearns with her solicitude, endures with her patience, waits
with her hope, and labors with her love, to promote the welfare and
happiness of her children? Thus must the Mother in Israel give all her
hours to those first sacred tasks, till her children can walk steadfastly
in wisdom's ways.
One of my students wrote to me: "I believe the proper thing for us to do is
to follow, as nearly as we can, in the path you have pursued!" It is
gladdening to find, in such a student, one of the children of light. It is
safe to leave with God the government of man. He appoints and He anoints
His Truth-bearers, and God is their sure defense and refuge.
The parable of "the prodigal son" is rightly called "the pearl of
parables," and our Master's greatest utterance may well be called "the
diamond sermon." No purer and more exalted teachings ever fell upon human
ears than those contained in what is commonly known as the Sermon on the
Mount,--though this name has been given it by compilers and translators of
the Bible, and not by the Master himself or by the Scripture authors.
Indeed, this title really indicates more the Master's mood, than the
material locality.
Where did Jesus deliver this great lesson--or, rather, this series of great
lessons--on humanity and divinity? On a hillside, near the sloping shores
of the Lake of Galilee, where he spake primarily to his immediate
disciples.
In this simplicity, and with such fidelity, we see Jesus ministering to the
spiritual needs of all who placed themselves under his care, always leading
them into the divine order, under the sway of his own perfect
understanding. His power over others was spiritual, not corporeal. To the
students whom he had chosen, his immortal teaching was the bread of Life.
When _he_ was with them, a fishing-boat became a sanctuary, and the
solitude was peopled with holy messages from the All-Father. The grove
became his class-room, and nature's haunts were the Messiah's university.
What has this hillside priest, this seaside teacher, done for the human
race? Ask, rather, what has he _not_ done. His holy humility,
unworldliness, and self-abandonment wrought infinite results. The method
of his religion was not too simple to be sublime, nor was his power so
exalted as to be unavailable for the needs of suffering mortals, whose
wounds he healed by Truth and Love.
His order of ministration was "first the blade, then the ear, after that
the full corn in the ear." May we unloose the latchets of his Christliness,
inherit his legacy of love, and reach the fruition of his promise: "If ye
abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it
shall be done unto you."
WAYMARKS
In the first century of the Christian era Jesus went about doing good. The
evangelists of those days wandered about. Christ, or the spiritual idea,
appeared to human consciousness as the man Jesus. At the present epoch the
human concept of Christ is based on the incorporeal divine Principle of
man, and Science has elevated this idea and established its rules in
consonance with their Principle. Hear this saying of our Master, "And I, if
I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me."
The ideal of God is no longer impersonated as a waif or wanderer; and Truth
is not fragmentary, disconnected, unsystematic, but concentrated and
immovably fixed in Principle. The best spiritual type of Christly method
for uplifting human thought and imparting divine Truth, is stationary
power, stillness, and strength; and when this spiritual ideal is made our
own, it becomes the model for human action.
St. Paul said to the Athenians, "For in Him we live, and move, and have our
being." This statement is in substance identical with my own: "There is no
life, truth, substance, nor intelligence in matter." It is quite clear that
as yet this grandest verity has not been fully demonstrated, but it is
nevertheless true. If Christian Science reiterates St. Paul's teaching, we,
as Christian Scientists, should give to the world convincing proof of the
validity of this scientific statement of being. Having perceived, in
advance of others, this scientific fact, we owe to ourselves and to the
world a struggle for its demonstration.
At some period and in some way the conclusion must be met that whatsoever
seems true, and yet contradicts divine Science and St. Paul's text, must be
and is false; and that whatsoever seems to be good, and yet errs, though
acknowledging the true way, is really evil.
As dross is separated from gold, so Christ's baptism of fire, his
purification through suffering, consumes whatsoever is of sin. Therefore
this purgation of divine mercy, destroying all error, leaves no flesh, no
matter, to the mental consciousness.
When all fleshly belief is annihilated, and every spot and blemish on the
disk of consciousness is removed, then, and not till then, will immortal
Truth be found true, and scientific teaching, preaching, and practice be
essentially one. "Happy is he that condemneth not himself in that thing
which he alloweth ... for whatsoever is not of faith is sin." (Romans xiv.
22, 23.)
There is no "lo here! or lo there!" in divine Science; its manifestation
must be "the same yesterday, and to-day, and forever," since Science is
eternally one, and unchanging, in Principle, rule, and demonstration.
I am persuaded that only by the modesty and distinguishing affection
illustrated in Jesus' career, can Christian Scientists aid the
establishment of Christ's kingdom on the earth. In the first century of the
Christian era Jesus' teachings bore much fruit, and the Father was
glorified therein. In this period and the forthcoming centuries, watered
by dews of divine Science, this "tree of life" will blossom into greater
freedom, and its leaves will be "for the healing of the nations."
Ask God to give thee skill
In comfort's art:
That thou may'st consecrated be
And set apart
Unto a life of sympathy.
For heavy is the weight of ill
In every heart;
And comforters are needed much
Of Christlike touch.
--A.E. HAMILTON.
THE PLIMPTON PRESS
NORWOOD MASS USA
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote A: See Page 311, Lines 12 to 17, "The First Church of Christ,
Scientist, and Miscellany."]
[Footnote B: This statement appears to be based upon the Annual Report of
the Secretary of The Christian Scientist Association, read at its meeting,
January 15, 1880, in which June is named as the month in which the charter
for The Mother Church was obtained, instead of August 23, 1879, the correct
date.]
[Footnote C: An alder growing from the bent branch of a pear-tree.]
[Footnote D: Steps were taken to promote the Church of Christ, Scientist,
in April, May and June; formal organization was accomplished and the
charter obtained in August, 1879]