Greenacre represents a gathering of workers in the field of social and spiritual advancement, of scientific research, of ethical and economic progress-in a word, of the "higher education” along all lines of soul culture and mental development. MIND is always glad to chronicle undertakings of this kind within the New Thought movement at large, for they tend toward unity of effort and teaching and promote understanding of the fundamental principles of being.

J. E. M.

NATURE'S POTENCIES.

The potencies in Nature are various and manifold, ready to serve us at our slightest call. They are ever seeking to help us in the accomplishment of all that we set out to do.

We resist; hence the discord, the failure to express physically and spiritually our desire. There is no spiritual attribute without its material counterpart. Love has its material essences, which, when united in due proportion, constitute the greatest of all healing agencies. We put forth energy to accomplish a certain task; we draw for sustenance potencies that, properly combined, enable us to carry out our desires.

Where are these potencies-this all-sustaining substanceto be found? Within ourselves as well as in all Nature, and it behooves us to become acquainted with Nature's method and her resources in order to avail ourselves of that which she holds for us.

In beginning investigation of this subject, we are only touching the outermost hem of a garment whose every fold is woven with richest threads of infinite variety, with all of which we may clothe ourselves through knowledge of their use. It is an open book to all. After acquainting ourselves with the method of direct study from Nature's pages, the printed page offers less inducement, and we go to it only for confirmation of that which has been revealed to us from the Source direct.

We can have what we will, but we must ask for it in the

right way, and if we have not learned the ways of Nature, which are the ways of God (or good) for us, we must open this book of Nature and study its pages. We must learn to extract from the ether potencies helpful in our upbuilding-in the replenishment of cells with vital substance. In this, as in the case of material food, we must select and use what we want for the supply of special needs. It may be had for the asking, but we must learn to ask and then use what we have appropriated, putting all to wisest purpose. We must use the potencies drawn for expression in desired directions, or our last state is worse than the first: we have sinned against the Holy Spirit-Divine Inspiration-and there is no forgiveness until we obey, i.e., make use of the knowledge that comes to us. We must work as well as think, and wait for results. Action is the key-note of success in all life's undertakings; not action all the time, but at the right time and in the best manner we know. Living always with a purpose, not merely drifting, the time for action and the time for rest come to our consciousness with certain knowledge, and there need be no fear as to the right division of our time. But purpose must be established subconsciously to insure a properly balanced life.

MATHILDE HOEHN TYNER.

"FOR THE VERY WORKS' SAKE."

For the very works' sake, O Lord,

We believed and turned unto Thee.

Then into the field at thy word,
With the harvesters forth went we,
For the very works' sake.

The harvest is plenteous, and few
Are the laborers. O Christ, with us stay!
Make our lives within glorious and true,
Lest we lose thee and fall by the way,
For the very works' sake.

HARRIET B. BRADBURY.

THE FAMILY CIRCLE.

Conducted by

FLORENCE PELtier Perry and the Rev. Helen Van-AnDERSON.

FOR THE PARENTS.

NATURE TEACHING.

Summer, with its ever-varying beauties, its song-filled mornings and twilight whisperings, its long sunny days and refreshing nights, seems Nature's school-time. Every minute is crowded with the subtle suggestion of a larger, fuller life. The beauty and order everywhere cannot fail to teach, even though there be no books to study and no prosy recitation-drills.

To the parents who recognize the advantage, not to say the necessity, of such influences for their children, we would say: Make all haste to get the children out of the crowded, stifling city, with its conventional and necessary restrictions, into the open, God-blessed country. Don't dress them like French dolls and take them to a fashionable hotel, where their sense of beauty will either be perverted or destroyed, but let them live close to Nature in all her moods. Let them grow as the wild things grow, with all the wide expanse of sky above them and fields, woods, hills, and streams around them. Let them lie on the ground and watch the ants, gaze into the tree-tops and study the building of birds' nests, get up in the morning to see the miracle of sunrise, and run barefoot through the dewy grass. So far as possible give them freedom to do what they like.

The child whose mind has been trained to thoughtfulness, whose eyes and ears have been opened to the beauties and melodies around him, will gain more real knowledge as well as character-building material in this way than through a year's training

in school. Perhaps there is no comparison. The parent or teacher needs only to call attention and interpret. The child will catch the lesson. Even small children can learn about the birds, bees, flowers, etc., and will eagerly attain classified knowledge. Any interesting little incident or fact, attractively told, will awaken an interest and leave a memory. This is all that is necessary. In pointing out the different characteristics and habits of birds, for example, you can so clothe the information that the child will have it as a fact to be remembered all the rest of his life. Here is a bit about the bluebird, as an illustration:

"He flew and flew till he flew so high

He brushed the blue right off the sky,

Then folded his wing

And you and I

Call him the bluebird, the herald of spring."

Here are four items about the bluebird that are especially characteristic of it: First, his habit of high soaring; second, his color; third, his name; fourth, his coming first in the spring. To hear this little verse, to watch eagerly for bluebirds, to distinguish them from other birds, and the lesson is learned-not as a hard task, but a delightful recreation.

How many of us recall in time of need the old rhyme of childhood days, to freshen our memory about the months and their allotment of days?

"Thirty days hath September, April, June, and November," etc.

This Nature teaching is on the same principle. An interest as absorbing as it is delightful helps impress a fact when it is told as Nature tells it, with all the accompaniment of music and scenic effect.

To have a child alert and eager to know all about the beautiful world and its denizens is to insure him against the baneful selfconsciousness that too often stultifies and perverts the natural loves and desires of his heart. It is as natural for a child to love beauty as to breathe. Instinctively he desires to possess and embody what he admires; but, unless he have the wise teaching of a thoughtful interpreter, his love of the beautiful may become the prison-wall of his soul rather than the wondrous gateway for its egress. Here is an incident, taken from life, that may illustrate:

Several years ago a lady was staying for a few days at a fashionable summer hotel in the mountains. Among the guests were a mother and daughter-both extremely beautiful, both the center of attraction wherever they were. The mother was a young woman who apparently had no thought beyond dress, jewels, and luxury. The child was about five years old, a queen in miniature, born to command and demand.

The lady who relates the incident was one afternoon sitting in the parlor, which appeared entirely deserted, no one being present but herself. Suddenly the child and her nurse entered, the former exquisitely dressed and beautiful as a picture. She looked about the deserted parlor and her face fell with disappointment. Finally she walked up to the lady and, pulling her by the sleeve, said in a pleading voice: "Look at me!" The lady turned from her book and looked at the child, saying some pleasant words as she did so. The child said nothing, waited a few minutes, turned and looked again about the rooms, and then, in a despairing voice and with the most tragic gesture, she exclaimed: "My God! Is there no one to see Moma dressed?"

Pathetic? Ah! where shall we find adequate words? Here was a child whose love of the beautiful was veritably as a prison wall, centered in self, the vision of the eyes feasting only on what could adorn the person, the love of admiration fostered until life was a tragedy without it-what expansion of soul, what openness to ideals, what glimpses of the heaven of unselfish love could come to that poor little spiritual dwarf?

Yes; she was "out in the country"-but she did not know it. There were birds and bees, and squirrels, flowers, trees, clouds, and all the wonderful enchantments the country possesses; but Moma knew only about her beautiful dresses and what people said about them. Her heaven was admiration, her hell the lack of it. Her capacity for joy was starved, because it was confined to herself. Its boundaries could be measured by the length and breadth of her person.

On the other hand, here are some words from a happyhearted little boy who had been taught of the beauty without and about him. One day he was overheard saying: "God has made such pretty sky and little white clouds to-day. Thank you, God."