(PART II) - MISCELLANY
Books by Mary Baker Eddy
COMMUNION, JUNE 4, 1899
COMMUNION, JUNE 4, 1899My Beloved Brethren: - Looking on this annual assemblage of human consciousness, - health, harmony, growth, grandeur, and achievement, garlanded with glad faces, willing hands, and warm hearts, - who would say to-day, "What a fond fool is hope"? The fruition of friendship, the world's arms outstretched to us, heart meeting heart across continents and oceans, bloodless sieges and tearless triumphs, the "well done" already yours, and the undone waiting only your swift hands, - these are enough to make this hour glad. What more abounds and abides in the hearts of these hearers and speakers, pen may not tell. Nature reflects man and art pencils him, but it remains for Science to reveal man to man; and between these lines of thought is written in luminous letters, O man, what art thou? Where art thou? Whence and whither? And what shall the answer be? Expressive silence, or with finger pointing upward, - Thither! Then produce thy records, time-table, log, traveller's companion, et cetera, and prove fairly the facts relating to the thitherward, - the rate of speed, the means of travel, and the number en route. Now what have you learned? The mystery of godliness - God made "manifest in the flesh," seen of men, and spiritually understood; and the mystery of iniquity - how to separate the tares from the wheat, that they consume in their own fires and no longer MY 125 kindle altars for human sacrifice. Have you learned to conquer sin, false affections, motives, and aims, - to be not only sayers but doers of the law? Brethren, our annual meeting is a grave guardian. It requires you to report progress, to refresh memory, to rejuvenate the branches and to vivify the buds, to bend upward the tendrils and to incline the vine towards the parent trunk. You come from feeding your flocks, big with promise; and you come with the sling of Israel's chosen one to meet the Goliaths. I have only to dip my pen in my heart to say, All honor to the members of our Board of Lectureship connected with The Mother Church. Loyal to the divine Principle they so ably vindicate, they earn their laurels. History will record their words, and their works will follow them. When reading their lectures, I have felt the touch of the spirit of the Mars' Hill orator, which always thrills the soul. The members of the Board of Education, under the auspices of the Massachusetts Metaphysical College, have acquitted themselves nobly. The students in my last class in 1898 are stars in my crown of rejoicing. We are deeply grateful that the church militant is looking into the subject of Christian Science, for Zion must put on her beautiful garments - her bridal robes. The hour is come; the bride (Word) is adorned, and lo, the bridegroom cometh! Are our lamps trimmed and burning? The doom of the Babylonish woman, referred to in Revelation, is being fulfilled. This woman, "drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus," "drunk with the wine of her fornication," MY 126 would enter even the church, - the body of Christ, Truth; and, retaining the heart of the harlot and the purpose of the destroying angel, would pour wormwood into the waters - the disturbed human mind - to drown the strong swimmer struggling for the shore, - aiming for Truth, - and if possible, to poison such as drink of the living water. But the recording angel, standing with |
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