The Right Beginning for Thought WILLIAM P. McKENZIE, CSB          In the night men who must follow some path carry all sorts of tapers, torches, candles, lanterns, in whose insufficient light they travel or stumble on their way. But how differently everything appears in the daylight. What simplicity, what universality, there is in the illumination from that one source of light, the sun. For one who has been following into bypaths the swinging lanterns of many eccentric leaders, seeking thus to be guided by others, and, as the saying is, landing nowhere, — for him to find, ere he despair, the guidance of Christian Science, is just like opening the eyes to the simplicity and universality of the honest sunlight. Christian Science relieves a man's thinking of its confusion and duplexity. Here is the simple rule given in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 467) where the author, Mrs. Eddy, says, "Reasoning from cause to effect in the Science of Mind, we begin with Mind, which must be understood through the idea which expresses it and cannot be learned from its opposite, matter."          There is a song written by Tennyson which has been sung with saddening effect unnumbered times: — Break, break, break, On thy cold, gray stones, O Sea! And I would that my tongue could utter The thoughts that arise in me. As the song continues, it shows that the thoughts arising and characterized by sadness are expressive of bereavement and they grow from or begin with the sense of death. Thoughts that gave glimpses of immortality or expressed assurance of it would be of an entirely different nature, kindling hope instead of offering despair. Our Master said, "In the world ye shall have tribulation;" and John went so far as to say, "The whole world lieth in wickedness." What is the matter with the whole world? Why do the children of the world persecute the children of God, and while not earning happiness for themselves try to argue it away from others? The trouble with the children of men is with what they call thinking; but as it starts from a wrong basis it never gains a right status. The Discoverer of Christian Science says (Science and Health, p. 262): "The foundation of mortal discord is a false sense of man's origin. To begin rightly is to end rightly. Every concept which seems to begin with the brain begins falsely. Divine Mind is the only cause or Principle of existence."          How many there are who like the poet let imagination control their thought! The curse of the early world was this wrong imagining, whereof it is said in the book of Genesis, "God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually." The inward purposes and desires are expressed through imagination. It will be often found that a man's imagination is his own mental "movie show," wherein he is the hero achieving honor without earning it, escaping the consequences of sin without forsaking it; or he may depict his neighbors in every aspect of inferiority to himself; or keep viewing a series of mental pictures of disease, disorder, dissipation, despair. In no instance thus supposed is there a right beginning; hence healing or the happy ending comes not.          If one is going to help himself or bless a suffering world he must learn to begin thinking aright. The human helper who takes only a physical view finds out all that he can about the symptoms and feelings of the sick person to whom he would minister. After that he turns over the pages of his mental pictures of disease until one is found from which to name the case in hand. Then to the case will be attached expectation of what all others have feared or suffered from this disease; and prognostication will be made on the basis that evil is real, life uncertain, God unavailable, and drugs remedial. The metaphysical practitioner remembers always to "begin with Mind." Let it be such a simple matter as an unintentional insult. Were he to begin as some do with that item of false belief, he might arrive as they do at indignation, bitterness, fury, hatred, and cherish the state of mind of the potential murderer. But guided by divine wisdom the practitioner of Christian Science makes his beginning of thinking with Principle. He recognizes divine Principle as Love, wherein dwelling, his peace cannot be invaded by contumely, nor his love assailed by fear; hence what he manifests is a sort of impregnable kindness, and a fullness of hope and faith and love.          It is by right thinking that the helper is able to minister to those seeking relief from doubt, enmity, fear, sickness, and ill morals. They can be encouraged and enabled to "begin with Mind." The sick man, for example, has been beginning with his own fear. His visitors have contributed their imagined fears, and he has perhaps accepted them. A medical diagnosis may have made definite and terrible what before was vague and but dimly outlined. Full of dread, lonely, unhelped, he really needs just what Christian Science offers to him, — a right understanding of causation, a reconciliation with true cause, and therefore obedience to it as Mind, as Life, Truth, Love. This recognition of reality heals the sick and the sinner too. Paul expresses the universality of the salvation that awaits those who receive it, when he says, "We trust in the living God, who is the Saviour of all men, specially of those that believe."          By this right beginning for thought, all the unfoldings of the right way are assured. Men say in their proverbs that the first step is costly. This is indeed true, because it is a laying aside of the old nature and the putting on of a new nature; or one might say, accepting a heavenly pattern for life in lieu of the earthly. Mrs. Eddy says (Miscellany, p. 274), "To begin rightly enables one to end rightly, and thus it is that one achieves the Science of Life, demonstrates health, holiness, and immortality."   "The Right Beginning for Thought" by William P. McKenzie, CSB Christian Science Sentinel, January 31, 1920

 

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