The last degree of regeneration rises into the rest of perpetual, spiritual, individual existence. The first feeble fluttering of mortals Christward are infantile and more or less imperfect. The new-born Christian Scientist must mature, and work out his own salvation. [20] Spirit and flesh antagonize. Temptation, that mist of mortal mind which seems to be matter and the environ- ment of mortals, suggests pleasure and pain in matter; and, so long as this temptation lasts, the warfare is not ended and the mortal is not regenerated. The pleas- [25] ures—more than the pains—of sense, retard regenera- tion; for pain compels human consciousness to escape from sense into the immortality and harmony of Soul. Disease in error, more than ease in it, tends to destroy error: the sick often are thereby led to Christ, Truth, [30] and to learn their way out of both sickness and sin. [Page 86.] The material and physical are imperfect. The in- [1] dividual and spiritual are perfect; these have no fleshly nature. This final degree of regeneration is saving, and the Christian will, must, attain it; but it doth not yet appear. Until this be attained, the Christian Scientist [5] must continue to strive with sickness, sin, and death— though in lessening degrees—and manifest growth at every experience. _Is it correct to say of material objects, that they are noth-_ _ing and exist only in imagination?_ [10] _Nothing_ and _something_ are words which need correct definition. They either mean formations of indefinite and vague human opinions, or scientific classifications of the unreal and the real. My sense of the beauty of the universe is, that beauty typifies holiness, and is some- [15] thing to be desired. Earth is more spiritually beautiful to my gaze now than when it was more earthly to the eyes of Eve. The pleasant sensations of human belief, of form and color, must be spiritualized, until we gain the glorified sense of substance as in the new heaven and [20] earth, the harmony of body and Mind. Even the human conception of beauty, grandeur, and utility is something that defies a sneer. It is more than imagination. It is next to divine beauty and the gran- deur of Spirit. It lives with our earth-life, and is [25] the subjective state of high thoughts. The atmos- phere of mortal mind constitutes our mortal envi- ronment. What mortals hear, see, feel, taste, smell, constitutes their present earth and heaven: but we must grow out of even this pleasing thraldom, and find wings [30] to reach the glory of supersensible Life; then we shall [Page 87.] soar above, as the bird in the clear ether of the blue tem- [1] poral sky.