The signs for the wayfarer in divine Science lie in meekness, in unselfish motives and acts, in shuffling off scholastic rhetoric, in ridding the thought of effete doctrines, in the purification of the affections and desires.

Dishonesty, envy, and mad ambition are “lusts of the flesh,” which uproot the germs of growth in Science and leave the inscrutable problem of being unsolved.  Through the channels of material sense, of worldly policy, pomp, and pride, cometh no success in Truth.  If beset with misguided emotions, we shall be stranded on the quicksands of worldly commotion, and practically come short of the wisdom requisite for teaching and demonstrating the victory over self and sin.

Be temperate in thought, word, and deed.  Meekness and temperance are the jewels of Love, set in wisdom.  Restrain untempered zeal.  “Learn to labor and to wait.”  Of old the children of Israel were saved by patient waiting.

“The kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force!” said Jesus.  Therefore are its spiritual gates not captured, nor its golden streets invaded.

We recognize this kingdom, the reign of harmony within us, by an unselfish affection or love, for this is the pledge of divine good and the insignia of heaven.  This also is proverbial, that though eternal justice be graciously gentle, yet it may seem severe.

    For whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth,
    And scourgeth every son whom He receiveth.

As the poets in different languages have expressed it:—­

    Though the mills of God grind slowly,
      Yet they grind exceeding small;
    Though with patience He stands waiting,
      With exactness grinds He all.

Though the divine rebuke is effectual to the pulling down of sin’s strongholds, it may stir the human heart to resist Truth, before this heart becomes obediently receptive of the heavenly discipline.  If the Christian Scientist recognize the mingled sternness and gentleness which permeate justice and Love, he will not scorn the timely reproof, but will so absorb it that this warning will be within him a spring, welling up into unceasing spiritual rise and progress.  Patience and obedience win the golden scholarship of experimental tuition.

The kindly shepherd of the East carries his lambs in his arms to the sheepcot, but the older sheep pass into the fold under his compelling rod.  He who sees the door and turns away from it, is guilty, while innocence strayeth yearningly.

There are no greater miracles known to earth than perfection and an unbroken friendship.  We love our friends, but ofttimes we lose them in proportion to our affection.  The sacrifices made for others are not infrequently met by envy, ingratitude, and enmity, which smite the heart and threaten to paralyze its beneficence.  The unavailing tear is shed both for the living and the dead.

Nothing except sin, in the students themselves, can separate them from me.  Therefore we should guard thought and action, keeping them in accord with Christ, and our friendship will surely continue.