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St. John
writes, in the tenth chapter of his book of Revelation: -
And I saw another mighty angel come down from
heaven, clothed with a cloud: and a rainbow was upon his head, and his face
was as it were the sun, and his feet as pillars of fire: and he had in his
hand a little book open: and he set his right foot upon the sea, and his left
foot on the earth.
The new
Evangel 558
This angel or message which comes from God,
clothed with a cloud, prefigures divine Science. To mortal sense Science seems
at first obscure, abstract, and dark; but a bright promise crowns its brow.
When understood, it is Truth's prism and praise. When you look it fairly in
the face, you can heal by its means, and it has for you a light above the sun,
for God "is the light thereof." Its feet are pillars of fire,
foundations of Truth and Love. It brings the baptism of the Holy Ghost, whose
flames of Truth were prophetically described by John the Baptist as consuming
error.
Truth's
volume 559
This angel had in his hand "a little
book," open for all to read and understand. Did this same book contain
the revelation of divine Science, the "right foot" or dominant power
of which was upon the sea, - upon elementary, latent error, the source of all
error's visible forms? The angel's left foot was upon the earth; that is, a
secondary power was exercised upon visible error and audible sin. The
"still, small voice" of scientific thought reaches over continent
and ocean to the globe's remotest bound. The inaudible voice of Truth is, to
the human mind, "as when a lion roareth." It is heard in the desert
and in dark places of fear. It arouses the "seven thunders" of evil,
and stirs their latent forces to utter the full diapason of secret tones. Then
is the power of Truth demonstrated, - made manifest in the destruction of
error. Then will a voice from harmony cry: "Go and take the little book.
. . . Take it, and eat it up; and it shall make thy belly bitter, but it shall
be in thy mouth sweet as honey." Mortals, obey the heavenly evangel. Take
divine Science. Read this book from beginning to end. Study it, ponder it. It
will be indeed sweet at its first taste, when it heals you; but murmur not
over Truth, if you find its digestion bitter. When you approach nearer and
nearer to this divine Principle, when you eat the divine body of this
Principle, - thus partaking of the nature, or primal elements, of Truth and
Love, - do not be surprised nor discontented because you must share the
hemlock cup and eat the bitter herbs; for the Israelites of old at the Paschal
meal thus prefigured this perilous passage out of bondage into the El Dorado
of faith and hope.
Today's
lesson 559
The twelfth chapter of the Apocalypse, or
Revelation of St. John, has a special suggestiveness in connection with the
nineteenth century. In the opening of the sixth seal, typical of six thousand
years since Adam, the distinctive feature has reference to the present age.
True
estimate of God's messenger 560
Revelation
xii. 1. And there appeared a great wonder in heaven; a woman clothed with the
sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars.
Heaven represents harmony, and divine Science
interprets the Principle of heavenly harmony. The great miracle, to human
sense, is divine Love, and the grand necessity of existence is to gain the
true idea of what constitutes the kingdom of heaven in man. This goal is never
reached while we hate our neighbor or entertain a false estimate of anyone
whom God has appointed to voice His Word. Again, without a correct sense of
its highest visible idea, we can never understand the divine Principle. The
botanist must know the genus and species of a plant in order to classify it
correctly. As it is with things, so is it with persons.
Persecution
harmful 560
Abuse of the motives and religion of St. Paul
hid from view the apostle's character, which made him equal to his great
mission. Persecution of all who have spoken something new and better of God
has not only obscured the light of the ages, but has been fatal to the
persecutors. Why? Because it has hid from them the true idea which has been
presented. To misunderstand Paul, was to be ignorant of the divine idea he
taught. Ignorance of the divine idea betrays at once a greater ignorance of
the divine Principle of the idea - ignorance of Truth and Love. The
understanding of Truth and Love, the Principle which works out the ends of
eternal good and destroys both faith in evil and the practice of evil, leads
to the discernment of the divine idea.
Espousals
supernal 561
Agassiz, through his microscope, saw the sun in
an egg at a point of so-called embryonic life. Because of his more spiritual
vision, St. John saw an "angel standing in the sun." The Revelator
beheld the spiritual idea from the mount of vision. Purity was the symbol of
Life and Love. The Revelator saw also the spiritual ideal as a woman clothed
in light, a bride coming down from heaven, wedded to the Lamb of Love. To
John, "the bride" and "the Lamb" represented the
correlation of divine Principle and spiritual idea, God and His Christ,
bringing harmony to earth.
Divinity
and humanity 561
John saw the human and divine coincidence,
shown in the man Jesus, as divinity embracing humanity in Life and its
demonstration, - reducing to human perception and understanding the Life which
is God. In divine revelation, material and corporeal selfhood disappear, and
the spiritual idea is understood.
Spiritual
sunlight 561
The woman in the Apocalypse symbolizes generic
man, the spiritual idea of God; she illustrates the coincidence of God and man
as the divine Principle and divine idea. The Revelator symbolizes Spirit by
the sun. The spiritual idea is clad with the radiance of spiritual Truth, and
matter is put under her feet. The light portrayed is really neither solar nor
lunar, but spiritual Life, which is "the light of men." In the first
chapter of the Fourth Gospel it is written, "There was a man sent from
God . . . to bear witness of that Light."
Spiritual
idea revealed 561
John the Baptist prophesied the coming of the
immaculate Jesus, and John saw in those days the spiritual idea as the
Messiah, who would baptize with the Holy Ghost, - divine Science. As Elias
presented the idea of the fatherhood of God, which Jesus afterwards
manifested, so the Revelator completed this figure with woman, typifying the
spiritual idea of God's motherhood. The moon is under her feet. This idea
reveals the universe as secondary and tributary to Spirit, from which the
universe borrows its reflected light, substance, life, and intelligence.
Spiritual
idea crowned 562
The spiritual idea is crowned with twelve
stars. The twelve tribes of Israel with all mortals, - separated by belief
from man's divine origin and the true idea, - will through much tribulation
yield to the activities of the divine Principle of man in the harmony of
Science. These are the stars in the crown of rejoicing. They are the lamps in
the spiritual heavens of the age, which show the workings of the spiritual
idea by healing the sick and the sinning, and by manifesting the light which
shines "unto the perfect day" as the night of materialism wanes.
Travail
and joy 562
Revelation
xii. 2. And she being with child cried, travailing in birth, and pained to be
delivered.
Also the spiritual idea is typified by a woman
in travail, waiting to be delivered of her sweet promise, but remembering no
more her sorrow for joy that the birth goes on; for great is the idea, and the
travail portentous.
The
dragon as a type 562
Revelation
xii. 3. And there appeared another wonder in heaven; and behold a great red
dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and seven crowns upon his heads.
Human sense may well marvel at discord, while,
to a diviner sense, harmony is the real and discord the unreal. We may well be
astonished at sin, sickness, and death. We may well be perplexed at human
fear; and still more astounded at hatred, which lifts its hydra head, showing
its horns in the many inventions of evil. But why should we stand aghast at
nothingness? The great red dragon symbolizes a lie, - the belief that
substance, life, and intelligence can be material. This dragon stands for the
sum total of human error. The ten horns of the dragon typify the belief that
matter has power of its own, and that by means of an evil mind in matter the
Ten Commandments can be broken.
The
sting of the serpent 563
The Revelator lifts the veil from this
embodiment of all evil, and beholds its awful character; but he also sees the
nothingness of evil and the allness of God. The Revelator sees that old
serpent, whose name is devil or evil, holding untiring watch, that he may bite
the heel of truth and seemingly impede the offspring of the spiritual idea,
which is prolific in health, holiness, and immortality.
Animal
tendency 563
Revelation
xii. 4. And his tail drew the third part of the stars of heaven, and did cast
them to the earth: and the dragon stood before the woman which was ready to be
delivered, for to devour her child as soon as it was born.
The serpentine form stands for subtlety,
winding its way amidst all evil, but doing this in the name of good. Its sting
is spoken of by Paul, when he refers to "spiritual wickedness in high
places." It is the animal instinct in mortals, which would impel them to
devour each other and cast out devils through Beelzebub.
As of old, evil still charges the spiritual
idea with error's own nature and methods. This malicious animal instinct, of
which the dragon is the type, incites mortals to kill morally and physically
even their fellow-mortals, and worse still, to charge the innocent with the
crime. This last infirmity of sin will sink its perpetrator into a night
without a star.
Malicious
barbarity 564
The author is convinced that the accusations
against Jesus of Nazareth and even his crucifixion were instigated by the
criminal instinct here described. The Revelator speaks of Jesus as the Lamb of
God and of the dragon as warring against innocence. Since Jesus must have been
tempted in all points, he, the immaculate, met and conquered sin in every
form. The brutal barbarity of his foes could emanate from no source except the
highest degree of human depravity. Jesus "
opened not his
mouth." Until the majesty of Truth should be demonstrated
in divine Science, the spiritual idea was arraigned before the tribunal of
so-called mortal mind, which was unloosed in order that the false claim of
mind in matter might uncover its own crime of defying immortal Mind.
Doom of
the dragon 564
From Genesis to the Apocalypse, sin, sickness,
and death, envy, hatred, and revenge, - all evil, - are typified by a serpent,
or animal subtlety. Jesus said, quoting a line from the Psalms, "They
hated me without a cause." The serpent is perpetually close upon the heel
of harmony. From the beginning to the end, the serpent pursues with hatred the
spiritual idea. In Genesis, this allegorical, talking serpent typifies mortal
mind, "more subtle than any beast of the field." In the Apocalypse,
when nearing its doom, this evil increases and becomes the great red dragon,
swollen with sin, inflamed with war against spirituality, and ripe for
destruction. It is full of lust and hate, loathing the brightness of divine
glory.
The
conflict with purity 565
Revelation
xii. 5. And she brought forth a man child, who was to rule all nations with a
rod of iron: and her child was caught up unto God, and to His throne.
Led on by the grossest element of mortal mind,
Herod decreed the death of every male child in order that the man Jesus, the
masculine representative of the spiritual idea, might never hold sway and
deprive Herod of his crown. The impersonation of the spiritual idea had a
brief history in the earthly life of our Master; but "of his kingdom
there shall be no end," for Christ, God's idea, will eventually rule all
nations and peoples - imperatively, absolutely, finally - with divine Science.
This immaculate idea, represented first by man and, according to the
Revelator, last by woman, will baptize with fire; and the fiery baptism will
burn up the chaff of error with the fervent heat of Truth and Love, melting
and purifying even the gold of human character. After the stars sang together
and all was primeval harmony, the material lie made war upon the spiritual
idea; but this only impelled the idea to rise to the zenith of demonstration,
destroying sin, sickness, and death, and to be caught up unto God, - to be
found in its divine Principle.
Spiritual
guidance 565
Revelation
xii. 6. And the woman fled into the wilderness, where she hath a place
prepared of God.
As the children of Israel were guided
triumphantly through the Red Sea, the dark ebbing and flowing tides of human
fear, - as they were led through the wilderness, walking wearily through the
great desert of human hopes, and anticipating the promised joy, - so shall the
spiritual idea guide all right desires in their passage from sense to Soul,
from a material sense of existence to the spiritual, up to the glory prepared
for them who love God. Stately Science pauses not, but moves before them, a
pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night, leading to divine heights.
If we remember the beautiful description which
Sir Walter Scott puts into the mouth of Rebecca the Jewess in the story of
Ivanhoe, -
When Israel, of the Lord beloved,
Out of the land of bondage came,
Her fathers' God before her moved,
An awful guide, in smoke and flame, -
we may also offer the prayer which concludes
the same hymn, -
And oh, when stoops on Judah's path
In shade and storm the frequent night,
Be Thou, longsuffering, slow to wrath,
A burning and a shining light!
Revelation
xii. 7, 8. And there was war in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against
the dragon; and the dragon fought, and his angels, and prevailed not; neither
was their place found any more in heaven.
The Old Testament assigns to the angels, God's
divine messages, different offices. Michael's characteristic is spiritual
strength. He leads the hosts of heaven against the power of sin, Satan, and
fights the holy wars. Gabriel has the more quiet task of imparting a sense of
the ever-presence of ministering Love. These angels deliver us from the
depths. Truth and Love come nearer in the hour of woe, when strong faith or
spiritual strength wrestles and prevails through the understanding of God. The
Gabriel of His presence has no contests. To infinite, ever-present Love, all
is Love, and there is no error, no sin, sickness, nor death. Against Love, the
dragon warreth not long, for he is killed by the divine Principle. Truth and
Love prevail against the dragon because the dragon cannot war with them. Thus
endeth the conflict between the flesh and Spirit.
Dragon
cast down to earth 567
Revelation
xii. 9. And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the devil,
and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth,
and his angels were cast out with him.
That false claim - that ancient belief, that
old serpent whose name is devil (evil), claiming that there is intelligence in
matter either to benefit or to injure men - is pure delusion, the red dragon;
and it is cast out by Christ, Truth, the spiritual idea, and so proved to be
powerless. The words "cast unto the earth" show the dragon to be
nothingness, dust to dust; and therefore, in his pretence of being a talker,
he must be a lie from the beginning. His angels, or messages, are cast out
with their author. The beast and the false prophets are lust and hypocrisy.
These wolves in sheep's clothing are detected and killed by innocence, the
Lamb of Love.
Warfare
with error 567
Divine Science shows how the Lamb slays the
wolf. Innocence and Truth overcome guilt and error. Ever since the foundation
of the world, ever since error would establish material belief, evil has tried
to slay the Lamb; but Science is able to destroy this lie, called evil. The
twelfth chapter of the Apocalypse typifies the divine method of warfare in
Science, and the glorious results of this warfare. The following chapters
depict the fatal effects of trying to meet error with error. The narrative
follows the order used in Genesis. In Genesis, first the true method of
creation is set forth and then the false. Here, also, the Revelator first
exhibits the true warfare and then the false.
Paean of
jubilee 568
Revelation
xii. 10-12. And I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, Now is come salvation,
and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of His Christ: for the
accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accused them before our God day
and night. And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of
their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death. Therefore
rejoice, ye heavens, and ye that dwell in them. Woe to the inhabiters of the
earth and of the sea! for the devil is come down unto you, having great wrath,
because he knoweth that he hath but a short time.
For victory over a single sin, we give thanks
and magnify the Lord of Hosts. What shall we say of the mighty conquest over
all sin? A louder song, sweeter than has ever before reached high heaven, now
rises clearer and nearer to the great heart of Christ; for the accuser is not
there, and Love sends forth her primal and everlasting strain.
Self-abnegation, by which we lay down all for Truth, or Christ, in our warfare
against error, is a rule in Christian Science. This rule clearly interprets
God as divine Principle, - as Life, represented by the Father; as Truth,
represented by the Son; as Love, represented by the Mother. Every mortal at
some period, here or hereafter, must grapple with and overcome the mortal
belief in a power opposed to God.
The robe
of Science 569
The Scripture, "Thou hast been faithful
over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many," is literally
fulfilled, when we are conscious of the supremacy of Truth, by which the
nothingness of error is seen; and we know that the nothingness of error is in
proportion to its wickedness. He that touches the hem of Christ's robe and
masters his mortal beliefs, animality, and hate, rejoices in the proof of
healing, - in a sweet and certain sense that God is Love. Alas for those who
break faith with divine Science and fail to strangle the serpent of sin as
well as of sickness! They are dwellers still in the deep darkness of belief.
They are in the surging sea of error, not struggling to lift their heads above
the drowning wave.
Expiation
by suffering 569
What must the end be? They must eventually
expiate their sin through suffering. The sin, which one has made his bosom
companion, comes back to him at last with accelerated force, for the devil
knoweth his time is short. Here the Scriptures declare that evil is temporal,
not eternal. The dragon is at last stung to death by his own malice; but how
many periods of torture it may take to remove all sin, must depend upon sin's
obduracy.
Apathy
to occultism 569
Revelation
xii. 13. And when the dragon saw that he was cast unto the earth, he
persecuted the woman which brought forth the man child.
The march of mind and of honest investigation
will bring the hour when the people will chain, with fetters of some sort, the
growing occultism of this period. The present apathy as to the tendency of
certain active yet unseen mental agencies will finally be shocked into another
extreme mortal mood, - into human indignation; for one extreme follows
another.
Receptive
hearts 570
Revelation
xii. 15, 16. And the serpent cast out of his mouth water as a flood, after the
woman, that he might cause her to be carried away of the flood. And the earth
helped the woman, and the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed up the flood
which the dragon cast out of his mouth.
Millions of unprejudiced minds - simple seekers
for Truth, weary wanderers, athirst in the desert - are waiting and watching
for rest and drink. Give them a cup of cold water in Christ's name, and never
fear the consequences. What if the old dragon should send forth a new flood to
drown the Christ-idea? He can neither drown your voice with its roar, nor
again sink the world into the deep waters of chaos and old night. In this age
the earth will help the woman; the spiritual idea will be understood. Those
ready for the blessing you impart will give thanks. The waters will be
pacified, and Christ will command the wave.
Hidden
ways of iniquity 570
When God heals the sick or the sinning, they
should know the great benefit which Mind has wrought. They should also know
the great delusion of mortal mind, when it makes them sick or sinful. Many are
willing to open the eyes of the people to the power of good resident in divine
Mind, but they are not so willing to point out the evil in human thought, and
expose evil's hidden mental ways of accomplishing iniquity.
Christly
warning 571
Why this backwardness, since exposure is
necessary to ensure the avoidance of the evil? Because people like you better
when you tell them their virtues than when you tell them their vices. It
requires the spirit of our blessed Master to tell a man his faults, and so
risk human displeasure for the sake of doing right and benefiting our race.
Who is telling mankind of the foe in ambush? Is the informer one who sees the
foe? If so, listen and be wise. Escape from evil, and designate those as
unfaithful stewards who have seen the danger and yet have given no warning.
The
armor of divinity 571
At all times and under all circumstances,
overcome evil with good. Know thyself, and God will supply the wisdom and the
occasion for a victory over evil. Clad in the panoply of Love, human hatred
cannot reach you. The cement of a higher humanity will unite all interests in
the one divinity.
Pure
religion enthroned 571
Through trope and metaphor, the Revelator,
immortal scribe of Spirit and of a true idealism, furnishes the mirror in
which mortals may see their own image. In significant figures he depicts the
thoughts which he beholds in mortal mind. Thus he rebukes the conceit of sin,
and foreshadows its doom. With his spiritual strength, he has opened wide the
gates of glory, and illumined the night of paganism with the sublime grandeur
of divine Science, outshining sin, sorcery, lust, and hypocrisy. He takes away
mitre and sceptre. He enthrones pure and undefiled religion, and lifts on high
only those who have washed their robes white in obedience and suffering.
Native
nothingness of sin 572
Thus we see, in both the first and last books
of the Bible, - in Genesis and in the Apocalypse, - that sin is to be
Christianly and scientifically reduced to its native nothingness. "Love
one another" "(I John, iii. 23), is the most simple and profound
counsel of the inspired writer. In Science we are children of God; but
whatever is of material sense, or mortal, belongs not to His children, for
materiality is the inverted image of spirituality.
Fulfilment
of the Law 572
Love fulfils the law of Christian Science, and
nothing short of this divine Principle, understood and demonstrated, can ever
furnish the vision of the Apocalypse, open the seven seals of error with
Truth, or uncover the myriad illusions of sin, sickness, and death. Under the
supremacy of Spirit, it will be seen and acknowledged that matter must
disappear.
Man's
present possibilities 572
In Revelation xxi. 1 we read: -
And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the
first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea.
The Revelator had not yet passed the
transitional stage in human experience called death, but he already saw a new
heaven and a new earth. Through what sense came this vision to St. John? Not
through the material visual organs for seeing, for optics are inadequate to
take in so wonderful a scene. Were this new heaven and new earth terrestrial
or celestial, material or spiritual? They could not be the former, for the
human sense of space is unable to grasp such a view. The Revelator was on our
plane of existence, while yet beholding what the eye cannot see, - that which
is invisible to the uninspired thought. This testimony of Holy Writ sustains
the fact in Science, that the heavens and earth to one human consciousness,
that consciousness which God bestows, are spiritual, while to another, the
unillumined human mind, the vision is material. This shows unmistakably that
what the human mind terms matter and spirit indicates states and stages of
consciousness.
Nearness
of Deity 573
Accompanying this scientific consciousness was
another revelation, even the declaration from heaven, supreme harmony, that
God, the divine Principle of harmony, is ever with men, and they are His
people. Thus man was no longer regarded as a miserable sinner, but as the
blessed child of God. Why? Because St. John's corporeal sense of the heavens
and earth had vanished, and in place of this false sense was the spiritual
sense, the subjective state by which he could see the new heaven and new
earth, which involve the spiritual idea and consciousness of reality. This is
Scriptural authority for concluding that such a recognition of being is, and
has been, possible to men in this present state of existence, - that we can
become conscious, here and now, of a cessation of death, sorrow, and pain.
This is indeed a foretaste of absolute Christian Science. Take heart, dear
sufferer, for this reality of being will surely appear sometime and in some
way. There will be no more pain, and all tears will be wiped away. When you
read this, remember Jesus' words, "The kingdom of God is within
you." This spiritual consciousness is therefore a present possibility.
Vials of
wrath and consolation 574
The Revelator also takes in another view,
adapted to console the weary pilgrim, journeying "uphill all the
way."
He writes, in Revelation xxi. 9: -
And there came unto me one of the seven angels
which had the seven vials full of the seven last plagues, and talked with me,
saying, Come hither, I will show thee the bride, the Lamb's wife.
This ministry of Truth, this message from
divine Love, carried John away in spirit. It exalted him till he became
conscious of the spiritual facts of being and the "New Jerusalem, coming
down from God, out of heaven," - the spiritual outpouring of bliss and
glory, which he describes as the city which "lieth foursquare." The
beauty of this text is, that the sum total of human misery, represented by the
seven angelic vials full of seven plagues, has full compensation in the law of
Love. Note this, - that the very message, or swift-winged thought, which
poured forth hatred and torment, brought also the experience which at last
lifted the seer to behold the great city, the four equal sides of which were
heaven-bestowed and heaven-bestowing.
Think of this, dear reader, for it will lift
the sackcloth from your eyes, and you will behold the soft-winged dove
descending upon you. The very circumstance, which your suffering sense deems
wrathful and afflictive, Love can make an angel entertained unawares. Then
thought gently whispers: "Come hither! Arise from your false
consciousness into the true sense of Love, and behold the Lamb's wife, - Love
wedded to its own spiritual idea." Then cometh the marriage feast, for
this revelation will destroy forever the physical plagues imposed by material
sense.
The city
foursquare 575
This sacred city, described in the Apocalypse (xxi.
16) as one that "lieth foursquare" and cometh "down from God,
out of heaven," represents the light and glory of divine Science. The
builder and maker of this New Jerusalem is God, as we read in the book of
Hebrews; and it is "a city which hath foundations." " The
description is metaphoric. Spiritual teaching must always be by symbols. Did
not Jesus illustrate the truths he taught by the mustard-seed and the
prodigal? Taken in its allegorical sense, the description of the city as
foursquare has a profound meaning. The four sides of our city are the Word,
Christ, Christianity, and divine Science; "and the gates of it shall not
be shut at all by day: for there shall be no night there." This city is
wholly spiritual, as its four sides indicate.
The
royally divine gates 575
As the Psalmist saith, "Beautiful for
situation, the joy of the whole earth, is mount Zion, on the sides of the
north, the city of the great King." It is indeed a city of the Spirit,
fair, royal, and square. Northward, its gates open to the North Star, the
Word, the polar magnet of Revelation; eastward, to the star seen by the
Wisemen of the Orient, who followed it to the manger of Jesus; southward, to
the genial tropics, with the Southern Cross in the skies, - the Cross of
Calvary, which binds human society into solemn union; westward, to the grand
realization of the Golden Shore of Love and the Peaceful Sea of Harmony.
Revelation's
pure zenith 576
This heavenly city, lighted by the Sun of
Righteousness, - this New Jerusalem, this infinite All, which to us seems
hidden in the mist of remoteness, - reached St. John's vision while yet he
tabernacled with mortals.
The
shrine celestial 576
In Revelation xxi. 22, further describing this
holy city, the beloved Disciple writes: -
And I saw no temple therein: for the Lord God
Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it.
There was no temple, - that is, no material
structure in which to worship God, for He must be worshipped in spirit and in
love. The word temple
also means body. The
Revelator was familiar with Jesus' use of this word, as when Jesus spoke of
his material body as the temple to be temporarily rebuilt (John ii. 21). What
further indication need we of the real man's incorporeality than this, that
John saw heaven and earth with "no temple [body] therein"? This
kingdom of God "is within you," - is within reach of man's
consciousness here, and the spiritual idea reveals it. In divine Science, man
possesses this recognition of harmony consciously in proportion to his
understanding of God.
Divine
sense of Deity 576
The term Lord, as used in our version of the
Old Testament, is often synonymous with Jehovah, and expresses the Jewish
concept, not yet elevated to deific apprehension through spiritual
transfiguration. Yet the word gradually approaches a higher meaning. This
human sense of Deity yields to the divine sense, even as the material sense of
personality yields to the incorporeal sense of God and man as the infinite
Principle and infinite idea, - as one Father with His universal family, held
in the gospel of Love. The Lamb's wife presents the unity of male and female
as no longer two wedded individuals, but as two individual natures in one; and
this compounded spiritual individuality reflects God as Father-Mother, not as
a corporeal being. In this divinely united spiritual consciousness, there is
no impediment to eternal bliss, - to the perfectibility of God's creation.
The city
of our God 577
This spiritual, holy habitation has no boundary
nor limit, but its four cardinal points are: first, the Word of Life, Truth,
and Love; second, the Christ, the spiritual idea of God; third, Christianity,
which is the outcome of the divine Principle of the Christ-idea in Christian
history; fourth, Christian Science, which to-day and forever interprets this
great example and the great Exemplar. This city of our God has no need of sun
or satellite, for Love is the light of it, and divine Mind is its own
interpreter. All who are saved must walk in this light. Mighty potentates and
dynasties will lay down their honors within the heavenly city. Its gates open
towards light and glory both within and without, for all is good, and nothing
can enter that city, which "defileth, . . . or maketh a lie."
The writer's present feeble sense of Christian
Science closes with St. John's Revelation as recorded by the great apostle,
for his vision is the acme of this Science as the Bible reveals it.
- Psalm
XXIII - 577
In the following Psalm one word shows, though
faintly, the light which Christian Science throws on the Scriptures by
substituting for the corporeal sense, the incorporeal or spiritual sense of
Deity: -
PSALM XXIII
Divine Love] is my shepherd; I shall not want.
Love] maketh me to lie down in green pastures: Love] leadeth me beside the
still waters.
Love] restoreth my soul [spiritual sense]: [Love] leadeth me in the paths of
righteousness for His name's sake.
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the
shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for [Love] is with me; [Love's] rod and
[Love's] staff they comfort me.
Love] prepareth a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: [Love]
anointeth my head with oil; my cup runneth over.
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all
the days of my life; and I will dwell in the house [the consciousness] of
[Love] for ever.
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