0.0 – Christian Science Publication Contents

"CHRIST AND CHRISTMAS" 

27	                                    An Illustrated Poem 

  	    This poem and its illustrations are as hopelessly origi-
  	nal as is "Science and Health with Key to the Scrip-
      
  Miscellaneous Writings --- “Christ and Christmas                       
  page 372

 1	tures." When the latter was first issued, critics declared
  	that it was incorrect, contradictory, unscientific, unchris-
 3	tian; but those human opinions had not one feather's
  	weight in the scales of God. The fact remains, that
  	the textbook of Christian Science is transforming the
 6	universe. 
  	    "Christ and Christmas" voices Christian Science
  	through song and object-lesson. In two weeks from the
 9	date of its publication in December, 1893, letters extoll-
  	ing it were pouring in from artists and poets. A mother
  	wrote, "Looking at the pictures in your wonderful book
12	has healed my child." 
  	    Knowing that this book would produce a stir, I sought
  	the judgment of sound critics familiar with the works
15	of masters in France and Italy. From them came such
  	replies as the following: "The illustrations of your poem
  	are truly a work of art, and the artist seems quite familiar
18	with delineations from the old masters." I am delighted
  	to find "Christ and Christmas" in accord with the
  	ancient and most distinguished artists. 
21	    The Christian Science Journal gives no uncertain dec-
  	laration concernin...g the spirit and mission of "Christ and
  	Christmas." 
24	    I aimed to reproduce, with reverent touch, the modest
  	glory of divine Science. Not by aid of foreign device
  	or environment could I copy art, — never having seen
27	the painter's masterpieces; but the art of Christian
  	Science, with true hue and character of the living God,
  	is akin to its Science: and Science and Health gives
30	scopes and shades to the shadows of divinity, thus im-
  	parting to humanity the true sense of meekness and
  	might. 
 
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 1	    One incident serves to illustrate the simple nature of
  	art. 
 3	    I insisted upon placing the serpent behind the woman
  	in the picture "Seeking and Finding." My artist at the
  	easel objected, as he often did, to my sense of Soul's
 6	expression through the brush; but, as usual, he finally
  	yielded. A few days afterward, the following from Roth-
  	erham's translation of the New Testament was handed
 9	to me, — I had never before seen it: "And the serpent
  	cast out of his mouth, behind the woman, water as a
  	river, that he might cause her to be river-borne." Neither
12	material finesse, standpoint, nor perspective guides the
  	infinite Mind and spiritual vision that should, does, guide
  	His children. 
15	    One great master clearly delineates Christ's appear-
  	ing in the flesh, and his healing power, as clad not in
  	soft raiment or gorgeous apparel; and when forced out
18	of its proper channel, as living feebly, in kings' courts. 
  	This master's thought presents a sketch of Christian-
  	ity's state, in the early part of the Christian era, as
21	homelessness in a wilderness. But in due time Chris-
  	tianity entered into synagogues, and, as St. Mark
  	writes, it has rich possession here, with houses and
24	lands. In Genesis we read that God gave man do-
  	minion over all things; and this assurance is followed
  	by Jesus' declaration, "All power is given unto me
27	in heaven and in earth," and by his promise that the
  	Christlike shall finally sit down at the right hand of the
  	Father. 
30	    Christian Science is more than a prophet or a proph-
  	ecy:  it presents not words alone, but works, — the daily
  	demonstration of Truth and Love. Its healing and sav-
      
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 1	ing power was so great a proof of Immanuel and the
  	realism of Christianity, that it caused even the publi-
 3	cans to justify God. Although clad in panoply of power,
  	the Pharisees scorned the spirit of Christ in most of its
  	varied manifestations. To them it was cant and carica-
 6	ture, — always the opposite of what it was. Keen and
  	alert was their indignation at whatever rebuked hypocrisy
  	and demanded Christianity in life and religion. In view
 9	of this, Jesus said, "Wisdom is justified of all her
  	children." 
  	    Above the fogs of sense and storms of passion, Chris-
12	tian Science and its art will rise triumphant; ignorance,
  	envy, and hatred — earth's harmless thunder — pluck
  	not their heaven-born wings. Angels, with overtures,
15	hold charge over both, and announce their Principle and
  	idea. 
  	    It is most fitting that Christian Scientists memorize
18	the nativity of Jesus. To him who brought a great light
  	to all ages, and named his burdens light, homage is in-
  	deed due, — but is bankrupt. I never looked on my
21	ideal of the face of the Nazarite Prophet; but the one
  	illustrating my poem approximates it. 
  	    Extremists in every age either doggedly deny or fran-
24	tically affirm what is what:  one renders not unto Caesar
  	"the things that are Caesar's;" the other sees "Helen's
  	beauty in a brow of Egypt." 
27	    Pictures are portions of one's ideal, but this ideal is
  	not one's personality. Looking behind the veil, he that
  	perceives a semblance between the thinker and his thought
30	on canvas, blames him not. 
  	    Because my ideal of an angel is a woman without
  	feathers on her wings, — is it less artistic or less natu-
      
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 1	ral? Pictures which present disordered phases of ma-
  	terial conceptions and personality blind with animality,
 3	are not my concepts of angels. What is the material ego,
  	but the counterfeit of the spiritual? 
  	    The truest art of Christian Science is to be a Chris-
 6	tian Scientist; and it demands more than a Raphael to
  	delineate this art. 
  	    The following is an extract from a letter reverting to
 9	the illustrations of "Christ and Christmas": —  
  	    "In my last letter, I did not utter all I felt about the
  	wonderful new book you have given us.  Years ago,
12	while in Italy, I studied the old masters and their great
  	works of art thoroughly, and so got quite an idea of
  	what constitutes true art.  Then I spent two years in
15	Paris, devoting every moment to the study of music and
  	art. 
  	    "The first thing that impressed me in your illustra-
18	tions was the conscientious application to detail, which
  	is the foundation of true art. From that, I went on to
  	study each illustration thoroughly, and to my amazement
21	and delight I find an almost identical resemblance, in
  	many things, to the old masters! In other words, the art
  	is perfect. 
24	    "The hands and feet of the figures — how many times
  	have I seen these hands and feet in Angelico's 'Jesus,'
  	or Botticelli's 'Madonna'! 
27	    "It gave me such a thrill of joy as no words can ex-
  	press, to see produced to-day that art — the only true
  	art — that we have identified with the old masters, and
30	mourned as belonging to them exclusively, — a thing of
  	the past, impossible of reproduction. 
  	    "All that I can say to you, as one who gives no mean
      
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 1	attention to such matters, is that the art is perfect.  It
  	is the true art of the oldest, most revered, most authen-
 3	tic Italian school, revived.  I use the words most au-
  	thentic in the following sense:  the face, figure, and
  	drapery of Jesus, very closely resemble in detail the
 6	face, figure, and drapery of that Jesus portrayed by the
  	oldest of the old masters, and said to have been authen-
  	tic; the face having been taken by Fra Angelico from
 9	Caesar's Cameo, the figure and garments from a descrip-
  	tion, in The Galaxy, of a small sketch handed down
  	from the living reality.  Their productions are expres-
12	sionless copies of an engraving cut in a stone.  Yours
  	is a palpitating, living Saviour engraven on the heart.  
  	You have given us back our Jesus, and in a much better
15	form." 
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