Science and Health With Key to the Scriptures

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Remember, Lord, the reproach of Thy servants; how I do bear in my

bosom the reproach of all the mighty people; wherewith Thine enemies have reproached, O Lord; wherewith they have reproached the footsteps of Thine anointed. - PSALMS.

Practical preaching

1 THE best sermon ever preached is Truth practised

and demonstrated by the destruction of sin, sickness,

3 and death. Knowing this and knowing too

that one affection would be supreme in us and

take the lead in our lives, Jesus said, "No man can serve

6 two masters."

We cannot build safely on false foundations. Truth

makes a new creature, in whom old things pass away

9 and "all things are become new." Passions, selfishness,

false appetites, hatred, fear, all sensuality, yield to spirit-

uality, and the superabundance of being is on the side

12 of God, good.

The uses of truth

We cannot fill vessels already full. They must first be

emptied. Let us disrobe error. Then, when

15 the winds of God blow, we shall not hug our

tatters close about us.

The way to extract error from mortal mind is to pour

18 in truth through flood-tides of Love. Christian perfec-

tion is won on no other basis.

Grafting holiness upon unholiness, supposing that sin

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1 can be forgiven when it is not forsaken, is as foolish as

straining out gnats and swallowing camels.

3 The scientific unity which exists between God and man

must be wrought out in life-practice, and God's will must

be universally done.

Divine study

6 If men would bring to bear upon the study of the

Science of Mind half the faith they bestow upon the so-

called pains and pleasures of material sense,

9 they would not go on from bad to worse,

until disciplined by the prison and the scaffold; but

the whole human family would be redeemed through

12 the merits of Christ, - through the perception and ac-

ceptance of Truth. For this glorious result Christian

Science lights the torch of spiritual understanding.

Harmonious life-work

15 Outside of this Science all is mutable; but immortal

man, in accord with the divine Principle of His being,

God, neither sins, suffers, nor dies. The days

18 of our pilgrimage will multiply instead of di-

minish, when God's kingdom comes on earth; for the

true way leads to life instead of to death, and earthly

21 experience discloses the finity of error and the infinite

capacities of Truth, in which God gives man dominion

over all the earth.

Belief and practice

24 Our beliefs about a Supreme Being contradict the

practice growing out of them. Error abounds where

Truth should "much more abound." We

27 admit that God has almighty power, is "a

very present help in trouble;" and yet we rely on a drug

or hypnotism to heal disease, as if senseless matter or err-

30 ing mortal mind had more power than omnipotent Spirit.

Sure reward of righteousness

Common opinion admits that a man may take cold in

the act of doing good, and that this cold may produce

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1 fatal pulmonary disease; as though evil could overbear

the law of Love, and check the reward for do-

3 ing good. In the Science of Christianity, Mind

- omnipotence - has all-power, assigns sure

rewards to righteousness, and shows that matter can

6 neither heal nor make sick, create nor destroy.

Our belief and understanding

If God were understood instead of being merely be-

lieved, this understanding would establish health. The

9 accusation of the rabbis, "He made himself

the Son of God," was really the justification

of Jesus, for to the Christian the only true

12 spirit is Godlike. This thought incites to a more exalted

worship and self-abnegation. Spiritual perception brings

out the possibilities of being, destroys reliance on aught

15 but God, and so makes man the image of his Maker in

deed and in truth.

Suicide and sin

We are prone to believe either in more than one Su-

18 preme Ruler or in some power less than God. We im-

agine that Mind can be imprisoned in a sensuous body.

When the material body has gone to ruin, when evil has

21 overtaxed the belief of life in matter and destroyed it,

then mortals believe that the deathless Principle, or

Soul, escapes from matter and lives on; but this is not

24 true. Death is not a stepping-stone to life, immortality,

and bliss. The so-called sinner is a suicide.

Sin kills the sinner and will continue to kill

27 him so long as he sins. The foam and fury of illegiti-

mate living and of fearful and doleful dying should

disappear on the shore of time; then the waves of sin,

30 sorrow, and death beat in vain.

God, divine good, does not kill a man in order to give

him eternal Life, for God alone is man's life. God is at

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1 once the centre and circumference of being. It is evil

that dies; good dies not.

Spirit the only intelligence and substance

3 All forms of error support the false conclusions that

there is more than one Life; that material history is as

real and living as spiritual history; that mortal

6 error is as conclusively mental as immortal

Truth; and that there are two separate, an-

tagonistic entities and beings, two powers, - namely,

9 Spirit and matter, - resulting in a third person (mortal

man) who carries out the delusions of sin, sickness, and

death.

12 The first power is admitted to be good, an intelligence or

Mind called God. The so-called second power, evil, is the

unlikeness of good. It cannot therefore be mind, though

15 so called. The third power, mortal man, is a supposed

mixture of the first and second antagonistic powers, in-

telligence and non-intelligence, of Spirit and matter.

Unscientific theories

18 Such theories are evidently erroneous. They can never

stand the test of Science. Judging them by their fruits,

they are corrupt. When will the ages under-

21 stand the Ego, and realize only one God, one

Mind or intelligence?

False and self-assertive theories have given sinners the

24 notion that they can create what God cannot, - namely,

sinful mortals in God's image, thus usurping the name

without the nature of the image or reflection of divine

27 Mind; but in Science it can never be said that man

has a mind of his own, distinct from God, the all

Mind.

30 The belief that God lives in matter is pantheistic. The

error, which says that Soul is in body, Mind is in matter,

and good is in evil, must unsay it and cease from such

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1 utterances; else God will continue to be hidden from hu-

manity, and mortals will sin without knowing that they

3 are sinning, will lean on matter instead of Spirit, stumble

with lameness, drop with drunkenness, consume with dis-

case, - all because of their blindness, their false sense

6 concerning God and man.

Creation perfect

When will the error of believing that there is life in

matter, and that sin, sickness, and death are creations of

9 God, be unmasked? When will it be under-

stood that matter has neither intelligence, life,

nor sensation, and that the opposite belief is the prolific

12 source of all suffering? God created all through Mind,

and made all perfect and eternal. Where then is the

necessity for recreation or procreation?

Perceiving the divine image

15 Befogged in error (the error of believing that matter

can be intelligent for good or evil), we can catch clear

glimpses of God only as the mists disperse,

18 or as they melt into such thinness that we per-

ceive the divine image in some word or deed

which indicates the true idea, - the supremacy and real-

21 ity of good, the nothingness and unreality of evil.

Redemption from selfishness

When we realize that there is one Mind, the divine law

of loving our neighbor as ourselves is unfolded;

24 whereas a belief in many ruling minds hinders

man's normal drift towards the one Mind, one

God, and leads human thought into opposite channels

27 where selfishness reigns.

Selfishness tips the beam of human existence towards

the side of error, not towards Truth. Denial of the one-

30 ness of Mind throws our weight into the scale, not of

Spirit, God, good, but of matter.

When we fully understand our relation to the Divine,

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1 we can have no other Mind but His, - no other Love,

wisdom, or Truth, no other sense of Life, and no con-

3 sciousness of the existence of matter or error.

Will-power unrighteous

The power of the human will should be exercised only

in subordination to Truth; else it will misguide the judg-

6 ment and free the lower propensities. It is the

province of spiritual sense to govern man.

Material, erring, human thought acts injuriously both

9 upon the body and through it.

Will-power is capable of all evil. It can never heal

the sick, for it is the prayer of the unrighteous; while

12 the exercise of the sentiments - hope, faith, love - is the

prayer of the righteous. This prayer, governed by Science

instead of the senses, heals the sick.

15 In the scientific relation of God to man, we find that

whatever blesses one blesses all, as Jesus showed with

the loaves and the fishes, - Spirit, not matter, being the

18 source of supply.

Birth and death unreal

Does God send sickness, giving the mother her child

for the brief space of a few years and then taking it away

21 by death? Is God creating anew what He

has already created? The Scriptures are defi-

nite on this point, declaring that His work was finished,

24 nothing is new to God, and that it was good.

Can there be any birth or death for man, the spiritual

image and likeness of God? Instead of God sending

27 sickness and death, He destroys them, and brings to light

immortality. Omnipotent and infinite Mind made all

and includes all. This Mind does not make mistakes

30 and subsequently correct them. God does not cause man

to sin, to be sick, or to die.

No evil in Spirit

There are evil beliefs, often called evil spirits; but

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1 these evils are not Spirit, for there is no evil in Spirit.

Because God is Spirit, evil becomes more apparent and

3 obnoxious proportionately as we advance spir-

itually, until it disappears from our lives.

This fact proves our position, for every scientific state-

6 ment in Christianity has its proof. Error of statement

leads to error in action.

Subordination of evil

God is not the creator of an evil mind. Indeed, evil

9 is not Mind. We must learn that evil is the awful decep-

tion and unreality of existence. Evil is not

supreme; good is not helpless; nor are the

12 so-called laws of matter primary, and the law of Spirit

secondary. Without this lesson, we lose sight of the per-

fect Father, or the divine Principle of man.

Evident impossibilities

15 Body is not first and Soul last, nor is evil mightier than

good. The Science of being repudiates self-

evident impossibilities, such as the amalgama-

18 tion of Truth and error in cause or effect. Science sepa-

rates the tares and wheat in time of harvest.

One primal cause

There is but one primal cause. Therefore there can

21 be no effect from any other cause, and there can be no

reality in aught which does not proceed from

this great and only cause. Sin, sickness, dis-

24 ease, and death belong not to the Science of being. They

are the errors, which presuppose the absence of Truth,

Life, or Love.

27 The spiritual reality is the scientific fact in all things.

The spiritual fact, repeated in the action of man and the

whole universe, is harmonious and is the ideal of Truth.

30 Spiritual facts are not inverted; the opposite discord,

which bears no resemblance to spirituality, is not real.

The only evidence of this inversion is obtained from

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1 suppositional error, which affords no proof of God,

Spirit, or of the spiritual creation. Material sense de-

3 fines all things materially, and has a finite sense of the

infinite.

Seemingly independent authority

The Scriptures say, "In Him we live, and move, and

6 have our being." What then is this seeming power, in-

dependent of God, which causes disease and

cures it? What is it but an error of belief, -

9 a law of mortal mind, wrong in every sense,

embracing sin, sickness, and death? It is the very anti-

pode of immortal Mind, of Truth, and of spiritual law.

12 It is not in accordance with the goodness of God's char-

acter that He should make man sick, then leave man to

heal himself; it is absurd to suppose that matter can both

15 cause and cure disease, or that Spirit, God, produces

disease and leaves the remedy to matter.

John Young of Edinburgh writes: "God is the father

18 of mind, and of nothing else." Such an utterance is

"the voice of one crying in the wilderness" of human

beliefs and preparing the way of Science. Let us learn

21 of the real and eternal, and prepare for the reign of

Spirit, the kingdom of heaven, - the reign and rule of

universal harmony, which cannot be lost nor remain

24 forever unseen.

Sickness as only thought

Mind, not matter, is causation. A material body

only expresses a material and mortal mind. A mortal

27 man possesses this body, and he makes it

harmonious or discordant according to the

images of thought impressed upon it. You embrace

30 your body in your thought, and you should delineate

upon it thoughts of health, not of sickness. You should

banish all thoughts of disease and sin and of other beliefs

PAGE 209

1 included in matter. Man, being immortal, has a perfect

indestructible life. It is the mortal belief which makes

3 the body discordant and diseased in proportion as igno-

rance, fear, or human will governs mortals.

Allness of Truth

Mind, supreme over all its formations and governing

6 them all, is the central sun of its own systems of ideas,

the life and light of all its own vast creation;

and man is tributary to divine Mind. The

9 material and mortal body or mind is not the man.

The world would collapse without Mind, without the in-

telligence which holds the winds in its grasp. Neither

12 philosophy nor skepticism can hinder the march of the

Science which reveals the supremacy of Mind. The im-

manent sense of Mind-power enhances the glory of Mind.

15 Nearness, not distance, lends enchantment to this view.

Spiritual translation

The compounded minerals or aggregated substances

composing the earth, the relations which constituent

18 masses hold to each other, the magnitudes,

distances, and revolutions of the celestial

bodies, are of no real importance, when we remember

21 that they all must give place to the spiritual fact by the

translation of man and the universe back into Spirit. In

proportion as this is done, man and the universe will be

24 found harmonious and eternal.

Material substances or mundane formations, astro-

nomical calculations, and all the paraphernalia of specu-

27 lative theories, based on the hypothesis of material law

or life and intelligence resident in matter, will ulti-

mately vanish, swallowed up in the infinite calculus of

30 Spirit.

Spiritual sense is a conscious, constant capacity to un-

derstand God. It shows the superiority of faith by works

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1 over faith in words. Its ideas are expressed only in "new

tongues;" and these are interpreted by the translation of

3 the spiritual original into the language which human

thought can comprehend.

Jesus' disregard of matter

The Principle and proof of Christianity are discerned

6 by spiritual sense. They are set forth in Jesus' demon-

strations, which show - by his healing the

sick, casting out evils, and destroying death,

9 "the last enemy that shall be destroyed," -

his disregard of matter and its so-called laws.

Knowing that Soul and its attributes were forever

manifested through man, the Master healed the sick,

gave sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, feet to the

lame, thus bringing to light the scientific action of the

15 divine Mind on human minds and bodies and giving

a better understanding of Soul and salvation. Jesus

healed sickness and sin by one and the same metaphysical

18 process.

Mind not mortal

The expression mortal mind is really a solecism, for

Mind is immortal, and Truth pierces the error of mortality

21 as a sunbeam penetrates the cloud. Because,

in obedience to the immutable law of Spirit,

this so-called mind is self-destructive, I name it mortal.

24 Error soweth the wind and reapeth the whirlwind.

Matter mindless

What is termed matter, being unintelligent, cannot say,

"I suffer, I die, I am sick, or I am well." It is the so-

27 called mortal mind which voices this and ap-

pears to itself to make good its claim. To

mortal sense, sin and suffering are real, but immortal

30 sense includes no evil nor pestilence. Because immortal

sense has no error of sense, it has no sense of error; there

fore it is without a destructive element.

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1 If brain, nerves, stomach, are intelligent, - if they talk

to us, tell us their condition, and report how they feel, -

3 then Spirit and matter, Truth and error, commingle

and produce sickness and health, good and evil, life and

death; and who shall say whether Truth or error is the

6 greater?

Matter sensationless

The sensations of the body must either be the sensa-

tions of a so-called mortal mind or of matter. Nerves

9 are not mind. Is it not provable that Mind is

not mortal and that matter has no sensation?

Is it not equally true that matter does not appear in the

12 spiritual understanding of being?

The sensation of sickness and the impulse to sin seem

to obtain in mortal mind. When a tear starts, does not

15 this so-called mind produce the effect seen in the lachry-

mal gland? Without mortal mind, the tear could not

appear; and this action shows the nature of all so-called

18 material cause and effect.

It should no longer be said in Israel that "the fathers

have eaten sour grapes, and the children's teeth are set

21 on edge." Sympathy with error should disappear. The

transfer of the thoughts of one erring mind to another,

Science renders impossible.

Nerves painless

24 If it is true that nerves have sensation, that matter has

intelligence, that the material organism causes the eyes to

see and the ears to hear, then, when the body

27 is dematerialized, these faculties must be lost,

for their immortality is not in Spirit; whereas the fact

is that only through dematerialization and spiritualiza-

30 tion of thought can these faculties be conceived of as

immortal.

Nerves are not the source of pain or pleasure. We

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1 suffer or enjoy in our dreams, but this pain or pleasure

is not communicated through a nerve. A tooth which has

3 been extracted sometimes aches again in belief, and the

pain seems to be in its old place. A limb which has been

amputated has continued in belief to pain the owner. If

6 the sensation of pain in the limb can return, can be pro-

longed, why cannot the limb reappear?

Why need pain, rather than pleasure, come to this mor-

9 tal sense? Because the memory of pain is more vivid

than the memory of pleasure. I have seen an unwitting

attempt to scratch the end of a finger which had been cut

12 off for months. When the nerve is gone, which we say

was the occasion of pain, and the pain still remains, it

proves sensation to be in the mortal mind, not in matter.

15 Reverse the process; take away this so-called mind instead

of a piece of the flesh, and the nerves have no sensation.

Human falsities

Mortals have a modus of their own, undirected and un-

18 sustained by God. They produce a rose through seed and

soil, and bring the rose into contact with the

olfactory nerves that they may smell it. In

21 legerdemain and credulous frenzy, mortals believe that

unseen spirits produce the flowers. God alone makes

and clothes the lilies of the field, and this He does by

24 means of Mind, not matter.

No miracles in Mind-methods

Because all the methods of Mind are not understood,

we say the lips or hands must move in order to convey

27 thought, that the undulations of the air convey

sound, and possibly that other methods involve

so-called miracles. The realities of being, its

30 normal action, and the origin of all things are unseen to

mortal sense; whereas the unreal and imitative move-

ments of mortal belief, which would reverse the immortal

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1 modus and action, are styled the real. Whoever con-

tradicts this mortal mind supposition of reality is called

3 a deceiver, or is said to be deceived. Of a man it has

been said, "As he thinketh in his heart, so is he;" hence

as a man spiritually understandeth, so is he in truth.

Good indefinable

6 Mortal mind conceives of something as either liquid

or solid, and then classifies it materially. Immortal and

spiritual facts exist apart from this mortal and

9 material conception. God, good, is self-exist-

ent and self-expressed, though indefinable as a whole.

Every step towards goodness is a departure from materi-

12 ality, and is a tendency towards God, Spirit. Material

theories partially paralyze this attraction towards infinite

and eternal good by an opposite attraction towards the

15 finite, temporary, and discordant.

Sound is a mental impression made on mortal belief.

The ear does not really hear. Divine Science reveals

18 sound as communicated through the senses of Soul -

through spiritual understanding.

Music, rhythm of head and heart

Mozart experienced more than he expressed. The

21 rapture of his grandest symphonies was never heard. He

was a musician beyond what the world knew.

This was even more strikingly true of Beet-

24 hoven, who was so long hopelessly deaf. Men-

tal melodies and strains of sweetest music supersede con-

scious sound. Music is the rhythm of head and heart.

27 Mortal mind is the harp of many strings, discoursing

either discord or harmony according as the hand, which

sweeps over it, is human or divine.

30 Before human knowledge dipped to its depths into a

false sense of things, - into belief in material origins

which discard the one Mind and true source of being, -

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1 it is possible that the impressions from Truth were as

distinct as sound, and that they came as sound to the

3 primitive prophets. If the medium of hearing is wholly

spiritual, it is normal and indestructible.

If Enoch's perception had been confined to the evidence

6 before his material senses, he could never have "walked

with God," nor been guided into the demonstration of

life eternal.

Adam and the senses

9 Adam, represented in the Scriptures as formed from

dust, is an object-lesson for the human mind. The mate-

rial senses, like Adam, originate in matter and

12 return to dust, - are proved non-intelligent.

They go out as they came in, for they are still the error,

not the truth of being. When it is learned that the spirit-

15 ual sense, and not the material, conveys the impressions

of Mind to man, then being will be understood and found

to be harmonious.

Idolatrous illusions

18 We bow down to matter, and entertain finite thoughts

of God like the pagan idolater. Mortals are inclined to

fear and to obey what they consider a material

21 body more than they do a spiritual God. All

material knowledge, like the original "tree of knowledge,"

multiplies their pains, for mortal illusions would rob God,

24 slay man, and meanwhile would spread their table with

cannibal tidbits and give thanks.

The senses of Soul

How transient a sense is mortal sight, when a wound on

27 the retina may end the power of light and lens! But the

real sight or sense is not lost. Neither age nor

accident can interfere with the senses of Soul,

30 and there are no other real senses. It is evident that the

body as matter has no sensation of its own, and there is no

oblivion for Soul and its faculties. Spirit's senses are with-

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1 out pain, and they are forever at peace. Nothing can hide

from them the harmony of all things and the might and

3 permanence of Truth.

Real being never lost

If Spirit, Soul, could sin or be lost, then being and im-

mortality would be lost, together with all the faculties of

6 Mind; but being cannot be lost while God ex-

ists. Soul and matter are at variance from the

very necessity of their opposite natures. Mortals are

9 unacquainted with the reality of existence, because matter

and mortality do not reflect the facts of Spirit.

Spiritual vision is not subordinate to geometric alti-

12 tudes. Whatever is governed by God, is never for an

instant deprived of the light and might of intelligence

and Life.

Light and darkness

15 We are sometimes led to believe that darkness is as real

as light; but Science affirms darkness to be only a mortal

sense of the absence of light, at the coming of

18 which darkness loses the appearance of reality.

So sin and sorrow, disease and death, are the suppositional

absence of Life, God, and flee as phantoms of error before

21 truth and love.

With its divine proof, Science reverses the evidence of

material sense. Every quality and condition of mortality

24 is lost, swallowed up in immortality. Mortal man is the

antipode of immortal man in origin, in existence, and in his

relation to God.

Faith of Socrates

27 Because he understood the superiority and immor-

tality of good, Socrates feared not the hemlock poison.

Even the faith of his philosophy spurned phys-

30 ical timidity. Having sought man's spiritual

state, he recognized the immortality of man. The igno-

rance and malice of the age would have killed the vener-

PAGE 216

1 able philosopher because of his faith in Soul and his in-

difference to the body.

The serpent of error

3 Who shall say that man is alive to-day, but may be dead

to-morrow? What has touched Life, God, to such

strange issues? Here theories cease, and Sci-

6 ence unveils the mystery and solves the prob-

lem of man. Error bites the heel of truth, but cannot kill

truth. Truth bruises the head of error - destroys error.

9 Spirituality lays open siege to materialism. On which

side are we fighting?

Servants and masters

The understanding that the Ego is Mind, and that

12 there is but one Mind or intelligence, begins at once to

destroy the errors of mortal sense and to supply

the truth of immortal sense. This understand-

15 ing makes the body harmonious; it makes the nerves,

bones, brain, etc., servants, instead of masters. If man

is governed by the law of divine Mind, his body is in sub-

18 mission to everlasting Life and Truth and Love. The

great mistake of mortals is to suppose that man, God's

image and likeness, is both matter and Spirit, both good

21 and evil.

If the decision were left to the corporeal senses, evil

would appear to be the master of good, and sickness to

24 be the rule of existence, while health would seem the

exception, death the inevitable, and life a paradox. Paul

asked: "What concord hath Christ with Belial?" (2 Cor-

27 inthians vi. 15.)

Personal identity

When you say, "Man's body is material," I say with

Paul: Be "willing rather to be absent from the body,

30 and to be present with the Lord." Give up

your material belief of mind in matter, and

have but one Mind, even God; for this Mind forms its

PAGE 217

1 own likeness. The loss of man's identity through the

understanding which Science confers is impossible; and

3 the notion of such a possibility is more absurd than to

conclude that individual musical tones are lost in the

origin of harmony.

Paul's experience

6 Medical schools may inform us that the healing work

of Christian Science and Paul's peculiar Christian con-

version and experience, - which prove Mind

9 to be scientifically distinct from matter, - are

indications of unnatural mental and bodily conditions,

even of catalepsy and hysteria; yet if we turn to the Scrip-

12 tures, what do we read? Why, this: "If a man keep my

saying, he shall never see death!" and "Henceforth know

we no man after the flesh!"

Fatigue is mental

15 That scientific methods are superior to others, is

seen by their effects. When you have once conquered

a diseased condition of the body through

18 Mind, that condition never recurs, and you

have won a point in Science. When mentality gives

rest to the body, the next toil will fatigue you less, for

21 you are working out the problem of being in divine meta-

physics; and in proportion as you understand the con-

trol which Mind has over so-called matter, you will be

24 able to demonstrate this control. The scientific and

permanent remedy for fatigue is to learn the power of

Mind over the body or any illusion of physical weariness,

27 and so destroy this illusion, for matter cannot be weary

and heavy-laden.

You say, "Toil fatigues me." But what is this me!

30 Is it muscle or mind? Which is tired and so speaks?

Without mind, could the muscles be tired? Do the

muscles talk, or do you talk for them? Matter is non-

PAGE 218

1 intelligent. Mortal mind does the false talking, and that

which affirms weariness, made that weariness.

Mind never weary

3 You do not say a wheel is fatigued; and yet the body

is as material as the wheel. If it were not for what the

human mind says of the body, the body, like

6 the inanimate wheel, would never be weary.

The consciousness of Truth rests us more than hours of

repose in unconsciousness.

Coalition of sin and sickness

9 The body is supposed to say, "I am ill." The reports

of sickness may form a coalition with the reports of sin,

and say, "I am malice, lust, appetite, envy,

12 hate." What renders both sin and sickness

difficult of cure is, that the human mind is the

sinner, disinclined to self-correction, and believing that

15 the body can be sick independently of mortal mind and

that the divine Mind has no jurisdiction over the body.

Sickness akin to sin

Why pray for the recovery of the sick, if you are with-

18 out faith in God's willingness and ability to heal them?

If you do believe in God, why do you sub-

stitute drugs for the Almighty's power, and

21 employ means which lead only into material ways of

obtaining help, instead of turning in time of need to

God, divine Love, who is an ever-present help?

24 Treat a belief in sickness as you would sin, with sudden

dismissal. Resist the temptation to believe in matter as

intelligent, as having sensation or power.

27 The Scriptures say, "They that wait upon the Lord

. . . shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk,

and not faint." The meaning of that passage is not

30 perverted by applying it literally to moments of fatigue,

for the moral and physical are as one in their results.

When we wake to the truth of being, all disease,

PAGE 219

1 pain, weakness, weariness, sorrow, sin, death, will be

unknown, and the mortal dream will forever cease. My

3 method of treating fatigue applies to all bodily ailments,

since Mind should be, and is, supreme, absolute, and

final.

Affirmation and result

6 In mathematics, we do not multiply when we should

subtract, and then say the product is correct. No more

can we say in Science that muscles give strength,

9 that nerves give pain or pleasure, or that matter

governs, and then expect that the result will be harmony.

Not muscles, nerves, nor bones, but mortal mind makes

12 the whole body "sick, and the whole heart faint;" whereas

divine Mind heals.

When this is understood, we shall never affirm concern-

15 ing the body what we do not wish to have manifested. We

shall not call the body weak, if we would have it strong;

for the belief in feebleness must obtain in the human

18 mind before it can be made manifest on the body, and

the destruction of the belief will be the removal of its

effects. Science includes no rule of discord, but governs

21 harmoniously. "The wish," says the poet, "is ever father

to the thought."

Scientific beginning

We may hear a sweet melody, and yet misunderstand

24 the science that governs it. Those who are healed

through metaphysical Science, not compre-

hending the Principle of the cure, may misun-

27 derstand it, and impute their recovery to change of air or

diet, not rendering to God the honor due to Him alone.

Entire immunity from the belief in sin, suffering, and

30 death may not be reached at this period, but we may look

for an abatement of these evils; and this scientific begin-

ning is in the right direction.

PAGE 220

Hygiene ineffectual

1 We hear it said: " I exercise daily in the open air. I

take cold baths, in order to overcome a predisposition to

3 take cold; and yet I have continual colds,

catarrh, and cough." Such admissions ought

to open people's eyes to the inefficacy of material hygiene,

6 and induce sufferers to look in other directions for cause

and cure.

Instinct is better than misguided reason, as even na-

9 ture declares. The violet lifts her blue eye to greet the

early spring. The leaves clap their hands as nature's

untired worshippers. The snowbird sings and soars

12 amid the blasts; he has no catarrh from wet feet, and

procures a summer residence with more ease than a na-

bob. The atmosphere of the earth, kinder than the at-

15 mosphere of mortal mind, leaves catarrh to the latter.

Colds, coughs, and contagion are engendered solely by

human theories.

The reflex phenomena

18 Mortal mind produces its own phenomena, and then

charges them to something else, - like a kitten

glancing into the mirror at itself and thinking

21 it sees another kitten.

A clergyman once adopted a diet of bread and water

to increase his spirituality. Finding his health failing,

24 he gave up his abstinence, and advised others never to

try dietetics for growth in grace.

Volition far-reaching

The belief that either fasting or feasting makes men

27 better morally or physically is one of the fruits of "the

tree of the knowledge of good and evil," con-

cerning which God said, "Thou shalt not eat

30 of it." Mortal mind forms all conditions of the mortal

body, and controls the stomach, bones, lungs, heart, blood,

etc., as directly as the volition or will moves the mind.

PAGE 221

Starvation and dyspepsia

1 I knew a person who when quite a child adopted the

Graham system to cure dyspepsia. For many years, he

3 ate only bread and vegetables, and drank noth-

ing but water. His dyspepsia increasing, he

decided that his diet should be more rigid, and

6 thereafter he partook of but one meal in twenty-four

hours, this meal consisting of only a thin slice of bread

without water. His physician also recommended that

9 he should not wet his parched throat until three hours

after eating. He passed many weary years in hunger

and weakness, almost in starvation, and finally made up

12 his mind to die, having exhausted the skill of the doctors,

who kindly informed him that death was indeed his only

alternative. At this point Christian Science saved him,

15 and he is now in perfect health without a vestige of the

old complaint.

He learned that suffering and disease were the self-

18 imposed beliefs of mortals, and not the facts of being;

that God never decreed disease, - never ordained a law

that fasting should be a means of health. Hence semi-

21 starvation is not acceptable to wisdom, and it is equally

far from Science, in which being is sustained by God, Mind.

These truths, opening his eyes, relieved his stomach, and

24 he ate without suffering, "giving God thanks;" but he

never enjoyed his food as he had imagined he would

when, still the slave of matter, he thought of the flesh-

27 pots of Egypt, feeling childhood's hunger and undisci-

plined by self-denial and divine Science.

Mind and stomach

This new-born understanding, that neither food nor

30 the stomach, without the consent of mortal

mind, can make one suffer, brings with it an-

other lesson, - that gluttony is a sensual illusion, and

PAGE 222

1 that this phantasm of mortal mind disappears as we better

apprehend our spiritual existence and ascend the ladder

3 of life.

This person learned that food affects the body only

as mortal mind has its material methods of working, one

6 of which is to believe that proper food supplies nutriment

and strength to the human system. He learned also that

mortal mind makes a mortal body, whereas Truth re-

9 generates this fleshly mind and feeds thought with the

bread of Life.

Food had less power to help or to hurt him after he

12 had availed himself of the fact that Mind governs man,

and he also had less faith in the so-called pleasures and

pains of matter. Taking less thought about what he

15 should eat or drink, consulting the stomach less about

the economy of living and God more, he recovered

strength and flesh rapidly. For many years he had

18 been kept alive, as was believed, only by the strictest ad-

herence to hygiene and drugs, and yet he continued ill

all the while. Now he dropped drugs and material

21 hygiene, and was well.

He learned that a dyspeptic was very far from being

the image and likeness of God, - far from having "do-

24 minion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the

air, and over the cattle," if eating a bit of animal flesh

could overpower him. He finally concluded that God

27 never made a dyspeptic, while fear, hygiene, physiology,

and physics had made him one, contrary to His commands.

Life only in Spirit

In seeking a cure for dyspepsia consult matter not at

30 all, and eat what is set before you, "asking

no question for conscience sake." We must

destroy the false belief that life and intelligence are in

PAGE 223

1 matter, and plant ourselves upon what is pure and per-

fect. Paul said, "Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not

3 fulfil the lust of the flesh." Sooner or later we shall learn

that the fetters of man's finite capacity are forged by the

illusion that he lives in body instead of in Soul, in matter

6 instead of in Spirit.

Soul greater than body

Matter does not express Spirit. God is infinite omni-

present Spirit. If Spirit is all and is everywhere, what

9 and where is matter? Remember that truth

is greater than error, and we cannot put the

greater into the less. Soul is Spirit, and Spirit is greater

12 than body. If Spirit were once within the body, Spirit

would be finite, and therefore could not be Spirit.

The question of the ages

The question, "What is Truth," convulses the world.

15 Many are ready to meet this inquiry with the assurance

which comes of understanding; but more are

blinded by their old illusions, and try to "give

18 it pause." "If the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into

the ditch."

The efforts of error to answer this question by some

21 ology are vain. Spiritual rationality and free thought ac-

company approaching Science, and cannot be put down.

They will emancipate humanity, and supplant unscientific

24 means and so-called laws.

Heralds of Science

Peals that should startle the slumbering thought from

its erroneous dream are partially unheeded; but the last

27 trump has not sounded, or this would not be

so. Marvels, calamities, and sin will much

more abound as truth urges upon mortals its resisted

30 claims; but the awful daring of sin destroys sin, and

foreshadows the triumph of truth. God will over-

turn, until "He come whose right it is." Longevity

PAGE 224

1 is increasing and the power of sin diminishing, for the,

world feels the alterative effect of truth through every

3 pore.

As the crude footprints of the past disappear from the

dissolving paths of the present, we shall better understand

6 the Science which governs these changes, and shall plant

our feet on firmer ground. Every sensuous pleasure or

pain is self-destroyed through suffering. There should

9 be painless progress, attended by life and peace instead

of discord and death.

Sectarianism and opposition

In the record of nineteen centuries, there are sects

12 many but not enough Christianity. Centuries ago re-

ligionists were ready to hail an anthropomor-

phic God, and array His vicegerent with pomp

15 and splendor; but this was not the manner

of truth's appearing. Of old the cross was truth's cen-

tral sign, and it is to-day. The modern lash is less

18 material than the Roman scourge, but it is equally as

cutting. Cold disdain, stubborn resistance, opposition

from church, state laws, and the press, are still the har-

21 bingers of truth's full-orbed appearing.

A higher and more practical Christianity, demonstrat-

ing justice and meeting the needs of mortals in sickness

24 and in health, stands at the door of this age, knocking

for admission. Will you open or close the door upon this

angel visitant, who cometh in the quiet of meekness, as he

27 came of old to the patriarch at noonday?

Mental emancipation

Truth brings the elements of liberty. On its banner

is the Soul-inspired motto, "Slavery is abolished." The

30 power of God brings deliverance to the cap-

tive. No power can withstand divine Love.

What is this supposed power, which opposes itself to God?

PAGE 225

1 Whence cometh it? What is it that binds man with iron

shackles to sin, sickness, and death? Whatever enslaves

3 man is opposed to the divine government. Truth makes

man free.

Truth's ordeal

You may know when first Truth leads by the few-

6 ness and faithfulness of its followers. Thus it is that

the march of time bears onward freedom's

banner. The powers of this world will fight,

9 and will command their sentinels not to let truth pass

the guard until it subscribes to their systems; but Science,

heeding not the pointed bayonet, marches on. There is

12 always some tumult, but there is a rallying to truth's

standard.

Immortal sentences

The history of our country, like all history, illustrates

15 the might of Mind, and shows human power to be propor-

tionate to its embodiment of right thinking. A

few immortal sentences, breathing the omnipo-

18 tence of divine justice, have been potent to break despotic

fetters and abolish the whipping-post and slave market;

but oppression neither went down in blood, nor did the

21 breath of freedom come from the cannon's mouth. Love

is the liberator.

Slavery abolished

Legally to abolish unpaid servitude in the United

24 States was hard; but the abolition of mental slavery is

a more difficult task. The despotic tenden-

cies, inherent in mortal mind and always ger-

27 minating in new forms of tyranny, must be rooted out

through the action of the divine Mind.

Men and women of all climes and races are still in

30 bondage to material sense, ignorant how to obtain their

freedom. The rights of man were vindicated in a single

section and on the lowest plane of human life, when Afri-

PAGE 226

1 can slavery was abolished in our land. That was only

prophetic of further steps towards the banishment of a

3 world-wide slavery, found on higher planes of existence

and under more subtle and depraving forms.

Liberty's crusade

The voice of God in behalf of the African slave was

6 still echoing in our land, when the voice of the herald of

this new crusade sounded the keynote of uni-

versal freedom, asking a fuller acknowledg-

9 ment of the rights of man as a Son of God, demanding

that the fetters of sin, sickness, and death be stricken

from the human mind and that its freedom be won, not

12 through human warfare, not with bayonet and blood, but

through Christ's divine Science.

Cramping systems

God has built a higher platform of human rights, and

15 He has built it on diviner claims. These claims are not

made through code or creed, but in demonstra-

tion of "on earth peace, good-will toward men."

18 Human codes, scholastic theology, material medicine and

hygiene, fetter faith and spiritual understanding. Divine

Science rends asunder these fetters, and man's birthright

21 of sole allegiance to his Maker asserts itself.

I saw before me the sick, wearing out years of servi-

tude to an unreal master in the belief that the body gov-

24 erned them, rather than Mind.

House of bondage

The lame, the deaf, the dumb, the blind, the sick, the

sensual, the sinner, I wished to save from the slavery of

27 their own beliefs and from the educational

systems of the Pharaohs, who to-day, as of

yore, hold the children of Israel in bondage. I saw be-

30 fore me the awful conflict, the Red Sea and the wilder-

ness; but I pressed on through faith in God, trusting

Truth, the strong deliverer, to guide me into the land

PAGE 227

1 of Christian Science, where fetters fall and the rights of

man are fully known and acknowledged.

Higher law ends bondage

3 I saw that the law of mortal belief included all error,

and that, even as oppressive laws are disputed and mor-

tals are taught their right to freedom, so the

6 claims of the enslaving senses must be de-

nied and superseded. The law of the divine Mind must

end human bondage, or mortals will continue unaware

9 of man's inalienable rights and in subjection to hope-

less slavery, because some public teachers permit

an ignorance of divine power, - an ignorance that

12 is the foundation of continued bondage and of human

suffering.

Native freedom

Discerning the rights of man, we cannot fail to fore-

15 see the doom of all oppression. Slavery is not the legiti-

mate state of man. God made man free.

Paul said, "I was free born." All men should

18 be free. "Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is lib-

erty." Love and Truth make free, but evil and error

lead into captivity.

Standard of liberty

21 Christian Science raises the standard of liberty and

cries: "Follow me! Escape from the bondage of sick-

ness, sin, and death!" Jesus marked out the

24 way. Citizens of the world, accept the "glori-

ous liberty of the children of God," and be free! This

is your divine right. The illusion of material sense, not

27 divine law, has bound you, entangled your free limbs,

crippled your capacities, enfeebled your body, and de-

faced the tablet of your being.

30 If God had instituted material laws to govern man,

disobedience to which would have made man ill, Jesus

would not have disregarded those laws by healing in

PAGE 228

1 direct opposition to them and in defiance of all material

conditions.

No fleshly heredity

3 The transmission of disease or of certain idiosyncra-

sies of mortal mind would be impossible if this great fact

of being were learned, - namely, that nothing

6 inharmonious can enter being, for Life is God.

Heredity is a prolific subject for mortal belief to pin the-

ories upon; but if we learn that nothing is real but the

9 right, we shall have no dangerous inheritances, and fleshly

ills will disappear.

God-given dominion

The enslavement of man is not legitimate. It will

12 cease when man enters into his heritage of freedom, his

God-given dominion over the material senses.

Mortals will some day assert their freedom in

15 the name of Almighty God. Then they will control their

own bodies through the understanding of divine Science.

Dropping their present beliefs, they will recognize har-

18 mony as the spiritual reality and discord as the material

unreality.

If we follow the command of our Master, "Take no

21 thought for your life," we shall never depend on bodily

conditions, structure, or economy, but we shall be masters

of the body, dictate its terms, and form and control it with

24 Truth.

Priestly pride humbled

There is no power apart from God. Omnipotence has

all-power, and to acknowledge any other power is to dis-

27 honor God. The humble Nazarene overthrew

the supposition that sin, sickness, and death

have power. He proved them powerless. It should have

30 humbled the pride of the priests, when they saw the dem-

onstration of Christianity excel the influence of their dead

faith and ceremonies.

PAGE 229

1 If Mind is not the master of sin, sickness, and death,

they are immortal, for it is already proved that mat-

3 ter has not destroyed them, but is their basis and

support.

No union of opposites

We should hesitate to say that Jehovah sins or suffers;

6 but if sin and suffering are realities of being, whence did

they emanate? God made all that was made,

and Mind signifies God, - infinity, not finity.

9 Not far removed from infidelity is the belief which

unites such opposites as sickness and health, holiness

and unholiness, calls both the offspring of spirit, and

12 at the same time admits that Spirit is God, - vir-

tually declaring Him good in one instance and evil in

another.

Self-constituted law

15 By universal consent, mortal belief has constituted

itself a law to bind mortals to sickness, sin, and death.

This customary belief is misnamed material

18 law, and the individual who upholds it is mis-

taken in theory and in practice. The so-called law of

mortal mind, conjectural and speculative, is made void

21 by the law of immortal Mind, and false law should be

trampled under foot.

Sickness from mortal mind

If God causes man to be sick, sickness must be good,

24 and its opposite, health, must be evil, for all that He

makes is good and will stand forever. If the

transgression of God's law produces sickness, it

27 is right to be sick; and we cannot if we would, and should

not if we could, annul the decrees of wisdom. It is the

transgression of a belief of mortal mind, not of a law of

30 matter nor of divine Mind, which causes the belief of sick-

ness. The remedy is Truth, not matter, - the truth that

disease is unreal.

PAGE 230

1 If sickness is real, it belongs to immortality; if true,

it is a part of Truth. Would you attempt with drugs,

3 or without, to destroy a quality or condition of Truth?

But if sickness and sin are illusions, the awakening from

this mortal dream, or illusion, will bring us into health,

6 holiness, and immortality. This awakening is the for-

ever coming of Christ, the advanced appearing of Truth,

which casts out error and heals the sick. This is the sal-

9 vation which comes through God, the divine Principle,

Love, as demonstrated by Jesus.

God never inconsistent

It would be contrary to our highest ideas of God to

12 suppose Him capable of first arranging law and causation

so as to bring about certain evil results, and

then punishing the helpless victims of His vo-

15 lition for doing what they could not avoid doing. Good

is not, cannot be, the author of experimental sins. God,

good, can no more produce sickness than goodness can

18 cause evil and health occasion disease.

Mental narcotics

Does wisdom make blunders which must afterwards

be rectified by man? Does a law of God produce sick-

21 ness, and can man put that law under his feet

by healing sickness? According to Holy Writ,

the sick are never really healed by drugs, hygiene, or any

24 material method. These merely evade the question.

They are soothing syrups to put children to sleep, satisfy

mortal belief, and quiet fear.

The true healing

27 We think that we are healed when a disease disap-

pears, though it is liable to reappear; but we are never

thoroughly healed until the liability to be

30 ill is removed. So-called mortal mind or the

mind of mortals being the remote, predisposing, and

the exciting cause of all suffering, the cause of disease

PAGE 231

1 must be obliterated through Christ in divine Science, or

the so-called physical senses will get the victory.

Destruction of all evil

3 Unless an ill is rightly met and fairly overcome by

Truth, the ill is never conquered. If God destroys not

sin, sickness, and death, they are not de-

6 stroyed in the mind of mortals, but seem to

this so-called mind to be immortal. What God cannot

do, man need not attempt. If God heals not the sick,

9 they are not healed, for no lesser power equals the infinite

All-power; but God, Truth, Life, Love, does heal the

sick through the prayer of the righteous.

12 If God makes sin, if good produces evil, if truth results

in error, then Science and Christianity are helpless; but

there are no antagonistic powers nor laws, spiritual or

15 material, creating and governing man through perpetual

warfare. God is not the author of mortal discords.

Therefore we accept the conclusion that discords have

18 only a fabulous existence, are mortal beliefs which divine

Truth and Love destroy.

Superiority to sickness and sin

To hold yourself superior to sin, because God made

21 you superior to it and governs man, is true wisdom. To

fear sin is to misunderstand the power of Love

and the divine Science of being in man's rela-

24 tion to God, - to doubt His government and

distrust His omnipotent care. To hold yourself superior

to sickness and death is equally wise, and is in accordance

27 with divine Science. To fear them is impossible, when

you fully apprehend God and know that they are no part

of His creation.

30 Man, governed by his Maker, having no other Mind, -

planted on the Evangelist's statement that "all things

were made by Him [the Word of God]; and without

PAGE 232

1 Him was not anything made that was made," - can

triumph over sin, sickness, and death.

Denials of divine power

3 Many theories relative to God and man neither make

man harmonious nor God lovable. The beliefs we com-

monly entertain about happiness and life

6 afford no scatheless and permanent evidence

of either. Security for the claims of harmonious and

eternal being is found only in divine Science.

9 Scripture informs us that "with God all things are

possible," - all good is possible to Spirit; but our prev-

alent theories practically deny this, and make healing

12 possible only through matter. These theories must be

untrue, for the Scripture is true. Christianity is not

false, but religions which contradict its Principle are

15 false.

In our age Christianity is again demonstrating the

power of divine Principle, as it did over nineteen hun-

18 dred years ago, by healing the sick and triumphing over

death. Jesus never taught that drugs, food, air, and ex-

ercise could make a man healthy, or that they could de-

21 stroy human life; nor did he illustrate these errors by his

practice. He referred man's harmony to Mind, not to

matter, and never tried to make of none effect the sen-

24 tence of God, which sealed God's condemnation of sin,

sickness, and death.

Signs following

In the sacred sanctuary of Truth are voices of sol-

27 emn import, but we heed them not. It is only when the

so-called pleasures and pains of sense pass

away in our lives, that we find unquestion-

30 able signs of the burial of error and the resurrection to

spiritual life.

Profession and proof

There is neither place nor opportunity in Science for error

PAGE 233

1 of any sort. Every day makes its demands upon us for

higher proofs rather than professions of Christian power.

3 These proofs consist solely in the destruction

of sin, sickness, and death by the power of

Spirit, as Jesus destroyed them. This is an element of

6 progress, and progress is the law of God, whose law de-

mands of us only what we can certainly fulfil.

Perfection gained slowly

In the midst of imperfection, perfection is seen and

9 acknowledged only by degrees. The ages must slowly

work up to perfection. How long it must be

before we arrive at the demonstration of scien-

12 tific being, no man knoweth, - not even "the

Son but the Father;" but the false claim of error con-

tinues its delusions until the goal of goodness is assidu-

15 ously earned and won.

Christ's mission

Already the shadow of His right hand rests upon the

hour. Ye who can discern the face of the sky, - the

18 sign material, - how much more should ye

discern the sign mental, and compass the de-

struction of sin and sickness by overcoming the thoughts

21 which produce them, and by understanding the spiritual

idea which corrects and destroys them. To reveal this

truth was our Master's mission to all mankind, including

24 the hearts which rejected him.

Efficacy of truth

When numbers have been divided according to a fixed

rule, the quotient is not more unquestionable than the

27 scientific tests I have made of the effects of

truth upon the sick. The counter fact rela-

tive to any disease is required to cure it. The utterance

30 of truth is designed to rebuke and destroy error. Why

should truth not be efficient in sickness, which is solely

the result of inharmony?

PAGE 234

1 Spiritual draughts heal, while material lotions interfere

with truth, even as ritualism and creed hamper spirit-

3 uality. If we trust matter, we distrust Spirit.

Crumbs of comfort

Whatever inspires with wisdom, Truth, or Love - be

it song, sermon, or Science - blesses the human family

6 with crumbs of comfort from Christ's table

feeding the hungry and giving living waters to

the thirsty.

Hospitality to health and good

9 We should become more familiar with good than with

evil, and guard against false beliefs as watchfully as we

bar our doors against the approach of thieves

12 and murderers. We should love our enemies

and help them on the basis of the Golden

Rule; but avoid casting pearls before those who trample

15 them under foot, thereby robbing both themselves and

others.

Cleansing the mind

If mortals would keep proper ward over mortal mind,

18 the brood of evils which infest it would be cleared out.

We must begin with this so-called mind and

empty it of sin and sickness, or sin and sick-

21 ness will never cease. The present codes of human

systems disappoint the weary searcher after a divine

theology, adequate to the right education of human

24 thought.

Sin and disease must be thought before they can be

manifested. You must control evil thoughts in the first

27 instance, or they will control you in the second. Jesus

declared that to look with desire on forbidden objects was

to break a moral precept. He laid great stress on the

30 action of the human mind, unseen to the senses.

Evil thoughts and aims reach no farther and do no more

harm than one's belief permits. Evil thoughts, lusts, and

PAGE 235

1 malicious purposes cannot go forth, like wandering pollen,

from one human mind to another, finding unsuspected

3 lodgment, if virtue and truth build a strong defence.

Better suffer a doctor infected with smallpox to attend

you than to be treated mentally by one who does not obey

6 the requirements of divine Science.

Teachers' functions

The teachers of schools and the readers in churches

should be selected with as direct reference to their

9 morals as to their learning or their correct

reading. Nurseries of character should be

strongly garrisoned with virtue. School-examinations are

12 one-sided; it is not so much academic education, as a

moral and spiritual culture, which lifts one higher. The

pure and uplifting thoughts of the teacher, constantly

15 imparted to pupils, will reach higher than the heavens of

astronomy; while the debased and unscrupulous mind,

though adorned with gems of scholarly attainment, will

18 degrade the characters it should inform and elevate.

Physicians' privilege

Physicians, whom the sick employ in their helplessness,

should be models of virtue. They should be wise spir-

21 itual guides to health and hope. To the trem-

blers on the brink of death, who understand

not the divine Truth which is Life and perpetuates being,

24 physicians should be able to teach it. Then when the soul

is willing and the flesh weak, the patient's feet may be

planted on the rock Christ Jesus, the true idea of spiritual

27 power.

Clergymen's duty

Clergymen, occupying the watchtowers of the world,

should uplift the standard of Truth. They should so raise

30 their hearers spiritually, that their listeners

will love to grapple with a new, right idea

and broaden their concepts. Love of Christianity, rather

PAGE 236

1 than love of popularity, should stimulate clerical labor

and progress. Truth should emanate from the pulpit,

3 but never be strangled there. A special privilege is vested

in the ministry. How shall it be used? Sacredly, in the

interests of humanity, not of sect.

6 Is it not professional reputation and emolument rather

than the dignity of God's laws, which many leaders seek?

Do not inferior motives induce the infuriated attacks on

9 individuals, who reiterate Christ's teachings in support

of his proof by example that the divine Mind heals sick-

ness as well as sin?

A mother's responsibility

12 A mother is the strongest educator, either for or

against crime. Her thoughts form the embryo of an-

other mortal mind, and unconsciously mould

15 it, either after a model odious to herself or

through divine influence, "according to the pattern

showed to thee in the mount." Hence the importance

18 of Christian Science, from which we learn of the one

Mind and of the availability of good as the remedy for

every woe.

Children's tractability

21 Children should obey their parents; insubordination

is an evil, blighting the buddings of self-government.

Parents should teach their children at the

24 earliest possible period the truths of health

and holiness. Children are more tractable than adults,

and learn more readily to love the simple verities that will

27 make them happy and good.

Jesus loved little children because of their freedom

from wrong and their receptiveness of right. While

30 age is halting between two opinions or battling with

false beliefs, youth makes easy and rapid strides towards

Truth.

PAGE 237

1 A little girl, who had occasionally listened to my ex-

planations, badly wounded her finger. She seemed not

3 to notice it. On being questioned about it she answered

ingenuously, "There is no sensation in matter." Bound-

ing off with laughing eyes, she presently added, "Mamma,

6 my finger is not a bit sore."

Soil and seed

It might have been months or years before her parents

would have laid aside their drugs, or reached the mental

9 height their little daughter so naturally at-

tained. The more stubborn beliefs and theo-

ries of parents often choke the good seed in the minds of

12 themselves and their offspring. Superstition, like "the

fowls of the air," snatches away the good seed before it

has sprouted.

Teaching children

15 Children should be taught the Truth-cure, Christian

Science, among their first lessons, and kept from discuss-

ing or entertaining theories or thoughts about

18 sickness. To prevent the experience of error

and its sufferings, keep out of the minds of your children

either sinful or diseased thoughts. The latter should

21 be excluded on the same principle as the former. This

makes Christian Science early available.

Deluded invalids

Some invalids are unwilling to know the facts or to

24 hear about the fallacy of matter and its supposed laws.

They devote themselves a little longer to their

material gods, cling to a belief in the life and

27 intelligence of matter, and expect this error to do more

for them than they are willing to admit the only living and

true God can do. Impatient at your explanation, unwill-

30 ing to investigate the Science of Mind which would rid

them of their complaints, they hug false beliefs and suffer

the delusive consequences.

PAGE 238

Patient waiting

1 Motives and acts are not rightly valued before they are

understood. It is well to wait till those whom you would

3 benefit are ready for the blessing, for Science

is working changes in personal character as

well as in the material universe.

6 To obey the Scriptural command, "Come out from

among them, and be ye separate," is to incur society's

frown; but this frown, more than flatteries, enables one

9 to be Christian. Losing her crucifix, the Roman Catholic

girl said, "I have nothing left but Christ." "If God be

for us, who can be against us?"

Unimproved opportunities

12 To fall away from Truth in times of persecution, shows

that we never understood Truth. From out the bridal

chamber of wisdom there will come the warn-

15 ing, "I know you not." Unimproved op-

portunities will rebuke us when we attempt to claim the

benefits of an experience we have not made our own, try

18 to reap the harvest we have not sown, and wish to enter

unlawfully into the labors of others. Truth often remains

unsought, until we seek this remedy for human woe be-

21 cause we suffer severely from error.

Attempts to conciliate society and so gain dominion over

mankind, arise from worldly weakness. He who leaves

24 all for Christ forsakes popularity and gains Christianity.

Society and intolerance

Society is a foolish juror, listening only to one side of

the case. Justice often comes too late to secure a verdict.

27 People with mental work before them have

no time for gossip about false law or testimony.

To reconstruct timid justice and place the fact above the

30 falsehood, is the work of time.

The cross is the central emblem of history. It is the

lodestar in the demonstration of Christian healing, - the

PAGE 239

1 demonstration by which sin and sickness are destroyed.

The sects, which endured the lash of their predecessors,

3 in their turn lay it upon those who are in advance of

creeds.

Right views of humanity

Take away wealth, fame, and social organizations,

6 which weigh not one jot in the balance of God, and we

get clearer views of Principle. Break up

cliques, level wealth with honesty, let worth

9 be judged according to wisdom, and we get better views

of humanity.

The wicked man is not the ruler of his upright

12 neighbor. Let it be understood that success in error is

defeat in Truth. The watchword of Christian Science

is Scriptural: "Let the wicked forsake his way, and the

15 unrighteous man his thoughts."

Standpoint revealed

To ascertain our progress, we must learn where our

affections are placed and whom we acknowledge and

18 obey as God. If divine Love is becoming

nearer, dearer, and more real to us, matter is

then submitting to Spirit. The objects we pursue and

21 the spirit we manifest reveal our standpoint, and show

what we are winning.

Antagonistic sources

Mortal mind is the acknowledged seat of human mo-

24 tives. It forms material concepts and produces every

discordant action of the body. If action pro-

ceeds from the divine Mind, action is harmo-

27 nious. If it comes from erring mortal mind, it is discord-

ant and ends in sin, sickness, death. Those two opposite

sources never mingle in fount or stream. The perfect

30 Mind sends forth perfection, for God is Mind. Imper-

fect mortal mind sends forth its own resemblances, of

which the wise man said, "All is vanity."

PAGE 240

Some lessons from nature

1 Nature voices natural, spiritual law and divine Love,

but human belief misinterprets nature. Arctic regions,

3 sunny tropics, giant hills, winged winds,

mighty billows, verdant vales, festive flowers,

and glorious heavens, - all point to Mind, the spiritual

6 intelligence they reflect. The floral apostles are hiero-

glyphs of Deity. Suns and planets teach grand lessons.

The stars make night beautiful, and the leaflet turns nat-

9 urally towards the light.

Perpetual motions

In the order of Science, in which the Principle is above

what it reflects, all is one grand concord. Change this

12 statement, suppose Mind to be governed by

matter or Soul in body, and you lose the key-

note of being, and there is continual discord. Mind is

15 perpetual motion. Its symbol is the sphere. The rota-

tions and revolutions of the universe of Mind go on

eternally.

Progress demanded

18 Mortals move onward towards good or evil as time

glides on. If mortals are not progressive, past failures

will be repeated until all wrong work is ef-

21 faced or rectified. If at present satisfied with

wrong-doing, we must learn to loathe it. If at present

content with idleness, we must become dissatisfied with

24 it. Remember that mankind must sooner or later, either

by suffering or by Science, be convinced of the error that

is to be overcome.

27 In trying to undo the errors of sense one must pay fully

and fairly the utmost farthing, until all error is finally

brought into subjection to Truth. The divine method

30 of paying sin's wages involves unwinding one's snarls

and learning from experience how to divide between sense

and Soul.

PAGE 241

1 "Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth." He, who

knows God's will or the demands of divine Science and

3 obeys them, incurs the hostility of envy; and he who

refuses obedience to God, is chastened by Love.

The doom of sin

Sensual treasures are laid up "where moth and rust

6 doth corrupt." Mortality is their doom. Sin breaks in

upon them, and carries off their fleeting joys.

The sensualist's affections are as imaginary,

9 whimsical, and unreal as his pleasures. Falsehood, envy,

hypocrisy, malice, hate, revenge, and so forth, steal away

the treasures of Truth. Stripped of its coverings, what

12 a mocking spectacle is sin!

Spirit transforms

The Bible teaches transformation of the body by the

renewal of Spirit. Take away the spiritual signification

15 of Scripture, and that compilation can do no

more for mortals than can moonbeams to melt

a river of ice. The error of the ages is preaching without

18 practice.

The substance of all devotion is the reflection and

demonstration of divine Love, healing sickness and

21 destroying sin. Our Master said, "If ye love me, keep

my commandments."

One's aim, a point beyond faith, should be to find the

24 footsteps of Truth, the way to health and holiness. We

should strive to reach the Horeb height where God is re-

vealed; and the corner-stone of all spiritual building is

27 purity. The baptism of Spirit, washing the body of all

the impurities of flesh, signifies that the pure in heart

see God and are approaching spiritual Life and its

30 demonstration.

Spiritual baptism

It is "easier for a camel to go through the eye of a

needle," than for sinful beliefs to enter the kingdom of

PAGE 242

1 heaven, eternal harmony. Through repentance, spiritual

baptism, and regeneration, mortals put off their material

3 beliefs and false individuality. It is only a

question of time when "they shall all know

Me [God], from the least of them unto the greatest."

6 Denial of the claims of matter is a great step towards

the joys of Spirit, towards human freedom and the final

triumph over the body.

The one only way

9 There is but one way to heaven, harmony, and Christ

in divine Science shows us this way. It is to know no

other reality - to have no other conscious-

12 ness of life - than good, God and His reflec-

tion, and to rise superior to the so-called pain and pleasure

of the senses.

15 Self-love is more opaque than a solid body. In pa-

tient obedience to a patient God, let us labor to dis-

solve with the universal solvent of Love the adamant

18 of error, - self-will, self-justification, and self-love, -

which wars against spirituality and is the law of sin

and death.

Divided vestments

21 The vesture of Life is Truth. According to the Bible,

the facts of being are commonly misconstrued, for it is

written: "They parted my raiment among

24 them, and for my vesture they did cast lots."

The divine Science of man is woven into one web of

consistency without seam or rent. Mere speculation or

27 superstition appropriates no part of the divine vesture,

while inspiration restores every part of the Christly gar-

ment of righteousness.

30 The finger-posts of divine Science show the way our

Master trod, and require of Christians the proof which

he gave, instead of mere profession. We may hide

PAGE 243

1 spiritual ignorance from the world, but we can never

succeed in the Science and demonstration of spiritual

3 good through ignorance or hypocrisy.

Ancient and modern miracles

The divine Love, which made harmless the poisonous

viper, which delivered men from the boiling oil, from

6 the fiery furnace, from the jaws of the lion,

can heal the sick in every age and triumph

over sin and death. It crowned the demon-

9 strations of Jesus with unsurpassed power and love. But

the same "Mind . . . which was also in Christ Jesus"

must always accompany the letter of Science in order to

12 confirm and repeat the ancient demonstrations of prophets

and apostles. That those wonders are not more com-

monly repeated to-day, arises not so much from lack of

15 desire as from lack of spiritual growth.

Mental telegraphy

The clay cannot reply to the potter. The head, heart,

lungs, and limbs do not inform us that they are dizzy,

18 diseased, consumptive, or lame. If this in-

formation is conveyed, mortal mind conveys

it. Neither immortal and unerring Mind nor matter,

21 the inanimate substratum of mortal mind, can carry

on such telegraphy; for God is "of purer eyes than

to behold evil," and matter has neither intelligence nor

24 sensation.

Annihilation of error

Truth has no consciousness of error. Love has no

sense of hatred. Life has no partnership

27 with death. Truth, Life, and Love are a law

of annihilation to everything unlike themselves, because

they declare nothing except God.

Deformity and perfection

30 Sickness, sin, and death are not the fruits of Life.

They are inharmonies which Truth destroys. Perfection

does not animate imperfection. Inasmuch as God is

PAGE 244

1 good and the fount of all being, He does not produce

moral or physical deformity; therefore such deformity is

3 not real, but is illusion, the mirage of error.

Divine Science reveals these grand facts. On

their basis Jesus demonstrated Life, never

6 fearing nor obeying error in any form.

If we were to derive all our conceptions of man from

what is seen between the cradle and the grave, happi-

9 ness and goodness would have no abiding-place in man,

and the worms would rob him of the flesh; but Paul

writes: "The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath

12 made me free from the law of sin and death."

Man never less than man

Man undergoing birth, maturity, and decay is like the

beasts and vegetables, - subject to laws of decay. If

15 man were dust in his earliest stage of exist-

ence, we might admit the hypothesis that he

returns eventually to his primitive condition;

18 but man was never more nor less than man.

If man flickers out in death or springs from matter into

being, there must be an instant when God is without His

21 entire manifestation, - when there is no full reflection

of the infinite Mind.

Man not evolved

Man in Science is neither young nor old. He has

24 neither birth nor death. He is not a beast, a vegetable,

nor a migratory mind. He does not pass from

matter to Mind, from the mortal to the im-

27 mortal, from evil to good, or from good to evil. Such

admissions cast us headlong into darkness and dogma.

Even Shakespeare's poetry pictures age as infancy, as

30 helplessness and decadence, instead of assigning to man

the everlasting grandeur and immortality of development,

power, and prestige.

PAGE 245

1 The error of thinking that we are growing old, and the

benefits of destroying that illusion, are illustrated in a

3 sketch from the history of an English woman, published

in the London medical magazine called The Lancet.

Perpetual youth

Disappointed in love in her early years, she became

6 insane and lost all account of time. Believing that she

was still living in the same hour which parted

her from her lover, taking no note of years,

9 she stood daily before the window watching for her

lover's coming. In this mental state she remained young.

Having no consciousness of time, she literally grew no

12 older. Some American travellers saw her when she was

seventy-four, and supposed her to be a young woman.

She had no care-lined face, no wrinkles nor gray hair, but

15 youth sat gently on cheek and brow. Asked to guess her

age, those unacquainted with her history conjectured that

she must be under twenty.

18 This instance of youth preserved furnishes a useful

hint, upon which a Franklin might work with more cer-

tainty than when he coaxed the enamoured lightning

21 from the clouds. Years had not made her old, because

she had taken no cognizance of passing time nor thought

of herself as growing old. The bodily results of her belief

24 that she was young manifested the influence of such a be-

lief. She could not age while believing herself young, for

the mental state governed the physical.

27 Impossibilities never occur. One instance like the

foregoing proves it possible to be young at seventy-four;

and the primary of that illustration makes it plain that

30 decrepitude is not according to law, nor is it a necessity of

nature, but an illusion.

Man reflects God

The infinite never began nor will it ever end. Mind

PAGE 246

1 and its formations can never be annihilated. Man is not

a pendulum, swinging between evil and good, joy and

3 sorrow, sickness and health, life and death.

Life and its faculties are not measured by

calendars. The perfect and immortal are the eternal

6 likeness of their Maker. Man is by no means a material

germ rising from the imperfect and endeavoring to reach

Spirit above his origin. The stream rises no higher than

9 its source.

The measurement of life by solar years robs youth and

gives ugliness to age. The radiant sun of virtue and truth

12 coexists with being. Manhood is its eternal noon, un-

dimmed by a declining sun. As the physical and mate-

rial, the transient sense of beauty fades, the radiance of

15 Spirit should dawn upon the enraptured sense with bright

and imperishable glories.

Undesirable records

Never record ages. Chronological data are no part

18 of the vast forever. Time-tables of birth and death are

so many conspiracies against manhood and

womanhood. Except for the error of meas-

21 uring and limiting all that is good and beautiful, man

would enjoy more than threescore years and ten and

still maintain his vigor, freshness, and promise. Man,

24 governed by immortal Mind, is always beautiful and

grand. Each succeeding year unfolds wisdom, beauty,

and holiness.

True life eternal

27 Life is eternal. We should find this out, and begin the

demonstration thereof. Life and goodness are immortal.

Let us then shape our views of existence into

30 loveliness, freshness, and continuity, rather

than into age and blight.

Acute and chronic beliefs reproduce their own types.

PAGE 247

1 The acute belief of physical life comes on at a remote

period, and is not so disastrous as the chronic belief.

Eyes and teeth renewed

3 I have seen age regain two of the elements it had lost,

sight and teeth. A woman of eighty-five, whom I knew,

had a return of sight. Another woman at

6 ninety had new teeth, incisors, cuspids, bi-

cuspids, and one molar. One man at sixty

had retained his full set of upper and lower teeth without

9 a decaying cavity.

Eternal beauty

Beauty, as well as truth, is eternal; but the beauty

of material things passes away, fading and fleeting as

12 mortal belief. Custom, education, and fashion

form the transient standards of mortals. Im-

mortality, exempt from age or decay, has a glory of its

15 own, - the radiance of Soul. Immortal men and women

are models of spiritual sense, drawn by perfect Mind

and reflecting those higher conceptions of loveliness

18 which transcend all material sense.

The divine loveliness

Comeliness and grace are independent of matter. Be-

ing possesses its qualities before they are perceived hu-

21 manly. Beauty is a thing of life, which

dwells forever in the eternal Mind and re-

flects the charms of His goodness in expression, form,

24 outline, and color. It is Love which paints the petal

with myriad hues, glances in the warm sunbeam, arches

the cloud with the bow of beauty, blazons the night with

27 starry gems, and covers earth with loveliness.

The embellishments of the person are poor substitutes

for the charms of being, shining resplendent and eternal

30 over age and decay.

The recipe for beauty is to have less illusion and

more Soul, to retreat from the belief of pain or pleasure

PAGE 248

1 in the body into the unchanging calm and glorious free-

dom of spiritual harmony.

Love's endowment

3 Love never loses sight of loveliness. Its halo rests upon

its object. One marvels that a friend can ever seem less

than beautiful. Men and women of riper

6 years and larger lessons ought to ripen into

health and immortality, instead of lapsing into darkness

or gloom. Immortal Mind feeds the body with supernal

9 freshness and fairness, supplying it with beautiful images

of thought and destroying the woes of sense which each

day brings to a nearer tomb.

Mental sculpture

12 The sculptor turns from the marble to his model in

order to perfect his conception. We are all sculptors,

working at various forms, moulding and chisel-

15 ing thought. What is the model before mortal

mind? Is it imperfection, joy, sorrow, sin, suffering?

Have you accepted the mortal model? Are you repro-

18 ducing it? Then you are haunted in your work by vicious

sculptors and hideous forms. Do you not hear from all

mankind of the imperfect model? The world is holding

21 it before your gaze continually. The result is that you

are liable to follow those lower patterns, limit your life-

work, and adopt into your experience the angular outline

24 and deformity of matter models.

Perfect models

To remedy this, we must first turn our gaze in the right

direction, and then walk that way. We must form perfect

27 models in thought and look at them continually,

or we shall never carve them out in grand and

noble lives. Let unselfishness, goodness, mercy, justice,

30 health, holiness, love - the kingdom of heaven - reign

within us, and sin, disease, and death will diminish until

they finally disappear.

PAGE 249

1 Let us accept Science, relinquish all theories based on

sense-testimony, give up imperfect models and illusive

3 ideals; and so let us have one God, one Mind, and that

one perfect, producing His own models of excellence.

Renewed selfhood

Let the "male and female" of God's creating appear.

6 Let us feel the divine energy of Spirit, bringing us into

newness of life and recognizing no mortal nor

material power as able to destroy. Let us re-

9 joice that we are subject to the divine "powers that be."

Such is the true Science of being. Any other theory of

Life, or God, is delusive and mythological.

12 Mind is not the author of matter, and the creator of

ideas is not the creator of illusions. Either there is no

omnipotence, or omnipotence is the only power. God is

15 the infinite, and infinity never began, will never end, and

includes nothing unlike God. Whence then is soulless

matter?

Illusive dreams

18 Life is, like Christ, "the same yesterday, and to-day,

and forever." Organization and time have nothing to do

with Life. You say, "I dreamed last night."

21 What a mistake is that! The I is Spirit. God

never slumbers, and His likeness never dreams. Mortals

are the Adam dreamers.

24 Sleep and apath are phases of the dream that life, sub-

stance, and intelligence are material. The mortal night-

dream is sometimes nearer the fact of being than are the

27 thoughts of mortals when awake. The night-dream has

less matter as its accompaniment. It throws off some

material fetters. It falls short of the skies, but makes its

30 mundane flights quite ethereal.

Philosophical blunders

Man is the reflection of Soul. He is the direct oppo-

site of material sensation, and there is but one Ego. We

PAGE 250

1 run into error when we divide Soul into souls, multiply

Mind into minds and suppose error to be mind, then mind

3 to be in matter and matter to be a lawgiver,

unintelligence to act like intelligence, and mor-

tality to be the matrix of immortality.

Spirit the one Ego

6 Mortal existence is a dream; mortal existence has no

real entity, but saith "It is I." Spirit is the Ego which

never dreams, but understands all things;

9 which never errs, and is ever conscious; which

never believes, but knows; which is never born and

never dies. Spiritual man is the likeness of this Ego.

12 Man is not God, but like a ray of light which comes from

the sun, man, the outcome of God, reflects God.

Mortal existence a dream

Mortal body and mind are one, and that one is called

15 man; but a mortal is not man, for man is immortal. A

mortal may be weary or pained, enjoy or suffer,

according to the dream he entertains in sleep.

18 When that dream vanishes, the mortal finds himself

experiencing none of these dream-sensations. To the

observer, the body lies listless, undisturbed, and sensa-

21 tionless, and the mind seems to be absent.

Now I ask, Is there any more reality in the waking

dream of mortal existence than in the sleeping dream?

24 There cannot be, since whatever appears to be a mortal

man is a mortal dream. Take away the mortal mind,

and matter has no more sense as a man than it has as

27 a tree. But the spiritual, real man is immortal.

Upon this stage of existence goes on the dance of mortal

mind. Mortal thoughts chase one another like snowflakes,

30 and drift to the ground. Science reveals Life as not being

at the mercy of death, nor will Science admit that happi-

ness is ever the sport of circumstance.

PAGE 251

Error self-destroyed

1 Error is not real, hence it is not more imperative

as it hastens towards self-destruction. The so-called

3 belief of mortal mind apparent as an abscess

should not grow more painful before it suppu-

rates neither should a fever become more severe before

6 it ends.

Illusion of death

Fright is so great at certain stages of mortal belief

as to drive belief into new paths. In the illusion of

9 death, mortals wake to the knowledge of two

facts: (1) that they are not dead; (2) that

they have but passed the portals of a new belief. Truth

12 works out the nothingness of error in just these ways.

Sickness, as well as sin, is an error that Christ, Truth,

alone can destroy.

Mortal mind's disappearance

15 We must learn how mankind govern the body, -

whether through faith in hygiene, in drugs, or in will-

power. We should learn whether they govern

18 the body through a belief in the necessity of

sickness and death, sin and pardon, or govern

it from the higher understanding that the divine Mind

21 makes perfect, acts upon the so-called human mind

through truth, leads the human mind to relinquish all

error, to find the divine Mind to be the only Mind,

24 and the healer of sin, disease, death. This process of

higher spiritual understanding improves mankind until

error disappears, and nothing is left which deserves to

27 perish or to be punished.

Spiritual ignorance

Ignorance, like intentional wrong, is not Science.

Ignorance must be seen and corrected before we can at-

30 tain harmony. Inharmonious beliefs, which

rob Mind, calling it matter, and deify their

own notions, imprison themselves in what they create.

PAGE 252

1 They are at war with Science, and as our Master said,

"If a kingdom be divided against itself, that kingdom

3 cannot stand."

Human ignorance of Mind and of the recuperative

energies of Truth occasions the only skepticism regard-

6 ing the pathology and theology of Christian Science.

Eternal man recognized

When false human beliefs learn even a little of their

own falsity, they begin to disappear. A knowledge of

9 error and of its operations must precede that

understanding of Truth which destroys error,

until the entire mortal, material error finally disappears,

12 and the eternal verity, man created by and of Spirit,

is understood and recognized as the true likeness of his

Maker.

15 The false evidence of material sense contrasts strikingly

with the testimony of Spirit. Material sense lifts its voice

with the arrogance of reality and says:

Testimony of sense

18 I am wholly dishonest, and no man knoweth it. I can

cheat, lie, commit adultery, rob, murder, and I elude

detection by smooth-tongued villainy. Ani-

21 mal in propensity, deceitful in sentiment,

fraudulent in purpose, I mean to make my short span

of life one gala day. What a nice thing is sin! How

24 sin succeeds, where the good purpose waits! The world

is my kingdom. I am enthroned in the gorgeousness

of matter. But a touch, an accident, the law of God,

27 may at any moment annihilate my peace, for all my

fancied joys are fatal. Like bursting lava, I expand but

to my own despair, and shine with the resplendency of

30 consuming fire.

Spirit, bearing opposite testimony, saith:

Testimony of Soul

I am Spirit. Man, whose senses are spiritual, is my

PAGE 253

1 likeness. He reflects the infinite understanding, for I am

Infinity. The beauty of holiness, the perfection of being,

3 imperishable glory, - all are Mine, for I am

God. I give immortality to man, for I am

Truth. I include and impart all bliss, for I am Love.

6 I give life, without beginning and without end, for I am

Life. I am supreme and give all, for I am Mind. I am

the substance of all, because I AM THAT I AM.

Heaven-bestowed prerogative

9 I hope, dear reader, I am leading you into the under-

standing of your divine rights, your heaven-bestowed har-

mony, - that, as you read, you see there is no

12 cause (outside of erring, mortal, material sense

which is not power) able to make you sick or

sinful; and I hope that you are conquering this false sense.

15 Knowing the falsity of so-called material sense, you can

assert your prerogative to overcome the belief in sin, dis-

ease, or death.

Right endeavor possible

18 If you believe in and practise wrong knowingly, you

can at once change your course and do right. Matter can

make no opposition to right endeavors against

21 sin or sickness, for matter is inert, mindless.

Also, if you believe yourself diseased, you can

alter this wrong belief and action without hindrance from

24 the body.

Do not believe in any supposed necessity for sin, dis-

ease, or death, knowing (as you ought to know) that God

27 never requires obedience to a so-called material law, for

no such law exists. The belief in sin and death is de-

stroyed by the law of God, which is the law of Life in-

30 stead of death, of harmony instead of discord, of Spirit

instead of the flesh.

Patience and final perfection

The divine demand, "Be ye therefore perfect," is sci-

PAGE 254

1 entific, and the human footsteps leading to perfection are

indispensable. Individuals are consistent who, watching

3 and praying, can "run, and not be weary; . . .

walk, and not faint," who gain good rapidly

and hold their position, or attain slowly and

6 yield not to discouragement. God requires perfection,

but not until the battle between Spirit and flesh is fought

and the victory won. To stop eating, drinking, or being

9 clothed materially before the spiritual facts of existence

are gained step by step, is not legitimate. When we wait

patiently on God and seek Truth righteously, He directs

12 our path. Imperfect mortals grasp the ultimate of spir-

itual perfection slowly; but to begin aright and to con-

tinue the strife of demonstrating the great problem of

15 being, is doing much.

During the sensual ages, absolute Christian Science

may not be achieved prior to the change called death,

18 for we have not the power to demonstrate what we do

not understand. But the human self must be evangel-

ized. This task God demands us to accept lovingly

21 to-day, and to abandon so fast as practical the material,

and to work out the spiritual which determines the out-

ward and actual.

24 If you venture upon the quiet surface of error and are

in sympathy with error, what is there to disturb the waters?

What is there to strip off error's disguise?

The cross and crown

27 If you launch your bark upon the ever-agitated but

healthful waters of truth, you will encounter storms.

Your good will be evil spoken of. This is the

30 cross. Take it up and bear it, for through it

you win and wear the crown. Pilgrim on earth, thy home

is heaven; stranger, thou art the guest of God.

Table of Contents Previous Chapter Next Chapter

PAGE 165

Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall

eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on.

Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? - JESUS.

He sent His word, and healed them, and delivered them from their

destructions. - PSALMS.

1 PHYSIOLOGY is one of the apples from "the tree

of knowledge." Evil declared that eating this fruit

3 would open man's eyes and make him as a god. Instead

of so doing, it closed the eyes of mortals to man's God-

given dominion over the earth.

Man not structural

6 To measure intellectual capacity by the size of the

brain and strength by the exercise of muscle, is to

subjugate intelligence, to make mind mor-

9 tal, and to place this so-called mind at the

mercy of material organization and non-intelligent

matter.

12 Obedience to the so-called physical laws of health has

not checked sickness. Diseases have multiplied, since

man-made material theories took the place of spiritual

15 truth.

Causes of sickness

You say that indigestion, fatigue, sleeplessness, cause

distressed stomachs and aching heads. Then

18 you consult your brain in order to remember

what has hurt you, when your remedy lies in forgetting

PAGE 166

1 the whole thing; for matter has no sensation of its own,

and the human mind is all that can produce pain.

3 As a man thinketh, so is he. Mind is all that feels,

acts, or impedes action. Ignorant of this, or shrinking

from its implied responsibility, the healing effort is made

6 on the wrong side, and thus the conscious control over the

body is lost.

Delusions pagan and medical

The Mohammedan believes in a pilgrimage to Mecca

9 for the salvation of his soul. The popular doctor believes

in his prescription, and the pharmacist believes

in the power of his drugs to save a man's

12 life. The Mohammedan's belief is a religious

delusion; the doctor's and pharmacist's is a medical

mistake.

Health from reliance on spirituality

15 The erring human mind is inharmonious in itself.

From it arises the inharmonious body. To ignore

God as of little use in sickness is a mistake.

18 Instead of thrusting Him aside in times of

bodily trouble, and waiting for the hour of

strength in which to acknowledge Him, we should learn

21 that He can do all things for us in sickness as in

health.

Failing to recover health through adherence to physi-

24 ology and hygiene, the despairing invalid often drops

them, and in his extremity and only as a last resort, turns

to God. The invalid's faith in the divine Mind is less

27 than in drugs, air, and exercise, or he would have resorted

to Mind first. The balance of power is conceded to be

with matter by most of the medical systems; but when

30 Mind at last asserts its mastery over sin, disease, and

death, then is man found to be harmonious and

immortal.

PAGE 167

1 Should we implore a corporeal God to heal the sick

out of His personal volition, or should we understand the

3 infinite divine Principle which heals? If we rise no higher

than blind faith, the Science of healing is not attained, and

Soul-existence, in the place of sense-existence, is not com-

6 prehended. We apprehend Life in divine Science only

as we live above corporeal sense and correct it. Our pro-

portionate admission of the claims of good or of evil de-

9 termines the harmony of our existence, - our health, our

longevity, and our Christianity.

The two masters

We cannot serve two masters nor perceive divine Sci-

12 ence with the material senses. Drugs and hygiene cannot

successfully usurp the place and power of the

divine source of all health and perfection. If

15 God made man both good and evil, man must remain

thus. What can improve God's work? Again, an error

in the premise must appear in the conclusion. To have

18 one God and avail yourself of the power of Spirit, you

must love God supremely.

Half-way success

The "flesh lusteth against the Spirit." The flesh and

21 Spirit can no more unite in action, than good can coin-

cide with evil. It is not wise to take a halt-

ing and half-way position or to expect to work

24 equally with Spirit and matter, Truth and error. There,

is but one way - namely, God and His idea - which

leads to spiritual being. The scientific government of the

27 body must be attained through the divine Mind. It is im-

possible to gain control over the body in any other way.

On this fundamental point, timid conservatism is abso-

30 lutely inadmissible. Only through radical reliance on

Truth can scientific healing power be realized.

Substituting good words for a good life, fair seeming

PAGE 168

1 for straightforward character, is a poor shift for the weak

and worldly, who think the standard of Christian Science

3 too high for them.

Belief on the wrong side

If the scales are evenly adjusted, the removal of a single

weight from either scale gives preponderance to the oppo-

6 site. Whatever influence you cast on the side

of matter, you take away from Mind, which

would otherwise outweigh all else. Your belief militates

9 against your health, when it ought to be enlisted on the

side of health. When sick (according to belief) you rush

after drugs, search out the material so-called laws of

12 health, and depend upon them to heal you, though you

have already brought yourself into the slough of disease

through just this false belief.

The divine authority

15 Because man-made systems insist that man becomes

sick and useless, suffers and dies, all in consonance with

the laws of God, are we to believe it? Are

18 we to believe an authority which denies God's

spiritual command relating to perfection, - an authority

which Jesus proved to be false? He did the will of the

21 Father. He healed sickness in defiance of what is called

material law, but in accordance with God's law, the law

of Mind.

Disease foreseen

24 I have discerned disease in the human mind, and rec-

ognized the patient's fear of it, months before the so-called

disease made its appearance in the body. Dis-

27 ease being a belief, a latent illusion of mortal

mind, the sensation would not appear if the error of belief

was met and destroyed by truth.

Changed mentality

30 Here let a word be noticed which will be

better understood hereafter, - chemicalization.

By chemicalization I mean the process which mortal

PAGE 169

1 mind and body undergo in the change of belief from a

material to a spiritual basis.

Scientific foresight

3 Whenever an aggravation of symptoms has occurred

through mental chemicalization, I have seen the mental

signs, assuring me that danger was over, before

6 the patient felt the change; and I have said

to the patient, "You are healed," - sometimes to his dis-

comfiture, when he was incredulous. But it always came

9 about as I had foretold.

I name these facts to show that disease has a mental,

mortal origin, - that faith in rules of health or in drugs

12 begets and fosters disease by attracting the mind to the

subject of sickness, by exciting fear of disease, and by dos-

ing the body in order to avoid it. The faith reposed in

15 these things should find stronger supports and a higher

home. If we understood the control of Mind over body,

we should put no faith in material means.

Mind the only healer

18 Science not only reveals the origin of all disease as

mental, but it also declares that all disease is cured by

divine Mind. There can be no healing ex-

21 cept by this Mind, however much we trust

a drug or any other means towards which human faith

or endeavor is directed. It is mortal mind, not mat-

24 ter, which brings to the sick whatever good they may

seem to receive from materiality. But the sick are never

really healed except by means of the divine power.

27 Only the action of Truth, Life, and Love can give

harmony.

Modes of matter

Whatever teaches man to have other laws and to

30 acknowledge other powers than the divine

Mind, is anti-Christian. The good that a

poisonous drug seems to do is evil, for it robs man of

PAGE 170

1 reliance on God, omnipotent Mind, and according to be-

lief, poisons the human system. Truth is not the basis of

3 theogony. Modes of matter form neither a moral nor a

spiritual system. The discord which calls for material

methods is the result of the exercise of faith in material

6 modes, - faith in matter instead of in Spirit.

Physiology unscientific

Did Jesus understand the economy of man less than

Graham or Cutter? Christian ideas certainly present

9 what human theories exclude - the Principle

of man's harmony. The text, "Whosoever

liveth and believeth in me shall never die," not only con-

12 tradicts human systems, but points to the self-sustaining

and eternal Truth.

The demands of Truth are spiritual, and reach the

15 body through Mind. The best interpreter of man's needs

said: "Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat,

or what ye shall drink."

18 If there are material laws which prevent disease, what

then causes it? Not divine law, for Jesus healed the

sick and cast out error, always in opposition, never in

21 obedience, to physics.

Causation considered

Spiritual causation is the one question to be considered,

for more than all others spiritual causation relates to

24 human progress. The age seems ready to

approach this subject, to ponder somewhat

the supremacy of Spirit, and at least to touch the hem

27 of Truth's garment.

The description of man as purely physical, or as both

material and spiritual, - but in either case dependent

30 upon his physical organization, - is the Pandora box,

from which all ills have gone forth, especially despair.

Matter, which takes divine power into its own hands and

PAGE 171

1 claims to be a creator, is a fiction, in which paganism and

lust are so sanctioned by society that mankind has caught

3 their moral contagion.

Paradise regained

Through discernment of the spiritual opposite of ma-

teriality, even the way through Christ, Truth, man will

6 reopen with the key of divine Science the gates

of Paradise which human beliefs have closed,

and will find himself unfallen, upright, pure, and free,

9 not needing to consult almanacs for the probabilities either

of his life or of the weather, not needing to study brain-

ology to learn how much of a man he is.

A closed question

12 Mind's control over the universe, including man, is

no longer an open question, but is demonstrable Science.

Jesus illustrated the divine Principle and the

15 power of immortal Mind by healing sickness

and sin and destroying the foundations of death.

Matter versus Spirit

Mistaking his origin and nature, man believes himself to

18 be combined matter and Spirit. He believes that Spirit

is sifted through matter, carried on a nerve, ex-

posed to ejection by the operation of matter.

21 The intellectual, the moral, the spiritual, - yea, the image

of infinite Mind, - subject to non-intelligence!

No more sympathy exists between the flesh and Spirit

24 than between Belial and Christ.

The so-called laws of matter are nothing but false be-

liefs that intelligence and life are present where Mind

27 is not. These false beliefs are the procuring cause of all

sin and disease. The opposite truth, that intelligence and

life are spiritual, never material, destroys sin, sickness,

30 and death.

The fundamental error lies in the supposition that man

is a material outgrowth and that the cognizance of good

PAGE 172

1 or evil, which he has through the bodily senses, con-

stitutes his happiness or misery.

Godless Evolution

3 Theorizing about man's development from mushrooms

to monkeys and from monkeys into men

amounts to nothing in the right direction and

6 very much in the wrong.

Materialism grades the human species as rising from

matter upward. How then is the material species main-

9 tained, if man passes through what we call death and

death is the Rubicon of spirituality? Spirit can form

no real link in this supposed chain of material being.

12 But divine Science reveals the eternal chain of existence

as uninterrupted and wholly spiritual; yet this can be

realized only as the false sense of being disappears.

Degrees of development

15 If man was first a material being, he must have passed

through all the forms of matter in order to become man.

If the material body is man, he is a portion of

18 matter, or dust. On the contrary, man is the

image and likeness of Spirit; and the belief that there is

Soul in sense or Life in matter obtains in mortals, alias

21 mortal mind, to which the apostle refers when he says

that we must "put off the old man."

Identity not lost

What is man? Brain, heart, blood, bones, etc., the

24 material structure? If the real man is in the material

body, you take away a portion of the man when

you amputate a limb; the surgeon destroys

27 manhood, and worms annihilate it. But the loss of a limb

or injury to a tissue is sometimes the quickener of manli-

ness; and the unfortunate cripple may present more no-

30 bility than the statuesque athlete, - teaching us by his

very deprivations, that "a man's a man, for a' that."

When man is man

When we admit that matter (heart, blood, brain, acting

PAGE 173

1 through the five physical senses) constitutes man, we fail

to see how anatomy can distinguish between

3 humanity and the brute, or determine when

man is really man and has progressed farther than his

animal progenitors.

Individualization

6 When the supposition, that Spirit is within what it

creates and the potter is subject to the clay,

is individualized, Truth is reduced to the level

9 of error, and the sensible is required to be made manifest

through the insensible.

What is termed matter manifests nothing but a material

12 mentality. Neither the substance nor the manifestation

of Spirit is obtainable through matter. Spirit is positive.

Matter is Spirit's contrary, the absence of Spirit. For

15 positive Spirit to pass through a negative condition

would be Spirit's destruction.

Man not structural

Anatomy declares man to be structural. Physiology

18 continues this explanation, measuring human

strength by bones and sinews, and human life

by material law. Man is spiritual, individual, and eter-

21 nal; material structure is mortal.

Phrenology makes man knavish or honest according to

the development of the cranium; but anatomy, physiology,

24 phrenology, do not define the image of God, the real im-

mortal man.

Human reason and religion come slowly to the recogni-

27 tion of spiritual facts, and so continue to call upon

matter to remove the error which the human mind alone

has created.

30 The idols of civilization are far more fatal to health

and longevity than are the idols of barbarism. The idols

of civilization call into action less faith than Buddhism

PAGE 174

1 in a supreme governing intelligence. The Esquimaux

restore health by incantations as consciously as do civi-

3 lized practitioners by their more studied methods.

Is civilization only a higher form of idolatry, that

man should bow down to a flesh-brush, to flannels, to

6 baths, diet, exercise, and air? Nothing save divine

power is capable of doing so much for man as he can

do for himself.

Rise of thought

9 The footsteps of thought, rising above material stand-

points, are slow, and portend a long night to the traveller;

but the angels of His presence - the spiritual

12 intuitions that tell us when "the night is far

spent, the day is at hand" - are our guardians in the

gloom. Whoever opens the way in Christian Science is

15 a pilgrim and stranger, marking out the path for gen-

erations yet unborn.

The thunder of Sinai and the Sermon on the Mount

18 are pursuing and will overtake the ages, rebuking in

their course all error and proclaiming the kingdom of

heaven on earth. Truth is revealed. It needs only to

21 be practised.

Medical errors

Mortal belief is all that enables a drug to cure mortal

ailments. Anatomy admits that mind is somewhere in

24 man, though out of sight. Then, if an indi-

vidual is sick, why treat the body alone and

administer a dose of despair to the mind? Why declare

27 that the body is diseased, and picture this disease to the

mind, rolling it under the tongue as a sweet morsel and

holding it before the thought of both physician and pa-

30 tient? We should understand that the cause of disease

obtains in the mortal human mind, and its cure comes

from the immortal divine Mind. We should prevent the

PAGE 175

1 images of disease from taking form in thought, and we

should efface the outlines of disease already formulated in

3 the minds of mortals.

Novel Diseases

When there are fewer prescriptions, and less thought is

given to sanitary subjects, there will be better

6 constitutions and less disease. In old times

who ever heard of dyspepsia, cerebro-spinal meningitis,

hay-fever, and rose-cold?

9 What an abuse of natural beauty to say that a rose,

the smile of God, can produce suffering! The joy of its

presence, its beauty and fragrance, should uplift the

12 thought, and dissuade any sense of fear or fever. It is

profane to fancy that the perfume of clover and the breath

of new-mown hay can cause glandular inflammation,

15 sneezing, and nasal pangs.

No ancestral dyspepsia

If a random thought, calling itself dyspepsia, had

tried to tyrannize over our forefathers, it would have

18 been routed by their independence and in-

dustry. Then people had less time for self-

ishness, coddling, and sickly after-dinner talk. The ex-

21 act amount of food the stomach could digest was not

discussed according to Cutter nor referred to sanitary

laws. A man's belief in those days was not so severe

24 upon the gastric juices. Beaumont's "Medical Experi-

ments" did not govern the digestion.

Pulmonary misbeliefs

Damp atmosphere and freezing snow empurpled the

27 plump cheeks of our ancestors, but they never indulged

in the refinement of inflamed bronchial tubes.

They were as innocent as Adam, before he ate

30 the fruit of false knowledge, of the existence of tubercles

and troches, lungs and lozenges.

Our modern Eves

"Where ignorance is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise," says

PAGE 176

1 the English poet, and there is truth in his sentiment. The

action of mortal mind on the body was not so injurious

3 before inquisitive modern Eves took up the

study of medical works and unmanly Adams

attributed their own downfall and the fate of their off-

6 spring to the weakness of their wives.

The primitive custom of taking no thought about

food left the stomach and bowels free to act in obedi-

9 ence to nature, and gave the gospel a chance to be seen

in its glorious effects upon the body. A ghastly array of

diseases was not paraded before the imagination. There

12 were fewer books on digestion and more "sermons in

stones, and good in everything." When the mechanism

of the human mind gives place to the divine Mind, self-

15 ishness and sin, disease and death, will lose their

foothold.

Human fear of miasma would load with disease the

18 air of Eden, and weigh down mankind with superimposed

and conjectural evils. Mortal mind is the worst foe of

the body, while divine Mind is its best friend.

Diseases not to be classified

21 Should all cases of organic disease be treated by a

regular practitioner, and the Christian Scientist try

truth only in cases of hysteria, hypochon-

24 dria, and hallucination? One disease is no

more real than another. All disease is the

result of education, and disease can carry its ill-effects

27 no farther than mortal mind maps out the way. The

human mind, not matter, is supposed to feel, suffer, en-

joy. Hence decided types of acute disease are quite as

30 ready to yield to Truth as the less distinct type and chronic

form of disease. Truth handles the most malignant con-

tagion with perfect assurance.

PAGE 177

One basis for all sickness

1 Human mind produces what is termed organic dis-

ease as certainly as it produces hysteria, and it must re-

3 linquish all its errors, sicknesses, and sins.

I have demonstrated this beyond all cavil.

The evidence of divine Mind's healing power and abso-

6 lute control is to me as certain as the evidence of my own

existence.

Mental and physical oneness

Mortal mind and body are one. Neither exists without

9 the other, and both must be destroyed by immortal Mind.

Matter, or body, is but a false concept of mor-

tal mind. This so-called mind builds its own

12 superstructure, of which the material body is

the grosser portion; but from first to last, the body is a

sensuous, human concept.

The effect of names

15 In the Scriptural allegory of the material creation,

Adam or error, which represents the erroneous theory

of life and intelligence in matter , had the

18 naming of all that was material. These names

indicated matter's properties, qualities, and forms. But

a lie, the opposite of Truth, cannot name the qualities and

21 effects of what is termed matter, and create the so-called

laws of the flesh, nor can a lie hold the preponderance

of power in any direction against God, Spirit and

24 Truth.

Poison defined mentally

If a dose of poison is swallowed through mistake, and

the patient dies even though physician and

27 patient are expecting favorable results, does

human belief, you ask, cause this death? Even

so, and as directly as if the poison had been intentionally

30 taken.

In such cases a few persons believe the potion swal-

lowed by the patient to be harmless, but the vast ma-

PAGE 178

1 jority of mankind, though they know nothing of this par-

ticular case and this special person, believe the arsenic,

3 the strychnine, or whatever the drug used, to be poi-

sonous, for it is set down as a poison by mortal mind.

Consequently, the result is controlled by the majority of

6 opinions, not by the infinitesimal minority of opinions in

the sick-chamber.

Heredity is not a law. The remote cause or belief

9 of disease is not dangerous because of its priority and

the connection of past mortal thoughts with present.

The predisposing cause and the exciting cause are

12 mental.

Perhaps an adult has a deformity produced prior to his

birth by the fright of his mother. When wrested from

15 human belief and based on Science or the divine Mind, to

which all things are possible, that chronic case is not

difficult to cure.

Animal magnetism destroyed

18 Mortal mind, acting from the basis of sensation in

matter, is animal magnetism; but this so-called mind,

from which comes all evil, contradicts itself,

21 and must finally yield to the eternal Truth, or

the divine Mind, expressed in Science. In pro-

portion to our understanding of Christian Science, we are

24 freed from the belief of heredity, of mind in matter or ani-

mal magnetism; and we disarm sin of its imaginary power

in proportion to our spiritual understanding of the status

27 of immortal being.

Ignorant of the methods and the basis of metaphysical

healing, you may attempt to unite with it hypnotism,

30 spiritualism, electricity; but none of these methods can

be mingled with metaphysical healing.

Whoever reaches the understanding of Christian Science

PAGE 179

1 in its proper signification will perform the sudden cures

of which it is capable; but this can be done only by

3 taking up the cross and following Christ in the daily

life.

Absent patients

Science can heal the sick, who are absent from their

6 healers, as well as those present, since space is no ob-

stacle to Mind. Immortal Mind heals what eye

hath not seen; but the spiritual capacity to ap-

9 prehend thought and to heal by the Truth-power, is won

only as man is found, not in self-righteousness, but re-

flecting the divine nature.

Horses mistaught

12 Every medical method has its advocates. The prefer-

ence of mortal mind for a certain method creates a demand

for that method, and the body then seems to re-

15 quire such treatment. You can even educate a

healthy horse so far in physiology that he will take cold

without his blanket, whereas the wild animal, left to his

18 instincts, sniffs the wind with delight. The epizootic is

a humanly evolved ailment, which a wild horse might

never have.

Medical works objectionable

21 Treatises on anatomy, physiology, and health, sustained

by what is termed material law, are the pro-

moters of sickness and disease. It should not

24 be proverbial, that so long as you read medical works you

will be sick.

The sedulous matron - studying her Jahr with homoe-

27 opathic pellet and powder in hand, ready to put you

into a sweat, to move the bowels, or to produce sleep -

is unwittingly sowing the seeds of reliance on matter,

30 and her household may erelong reap the effect of this

mistake.

Descriptions of disease given by physicians and adver-

PAGE 180

1 tisements of quackery are both prolific sources of sickness.

As mortal mind is the husbandman of error, it should be

3 taught to do the body no harm and to uproot its false

sowing.

The invalid's outlook

The patient sufferer tries to be satisfied when he sees

6 his would-be healers busy, and his faith in their efforts is

somewhat helpful to them and to himself; but

in Science one must understand the resusci-

9 tating law of Life. This is the seed within itself bearing

fruit after its kind, spoken of in Genesis.

Physicians should not deport themselves as if Mind

12 were non-existent, nor take the ground that all causation

is matter, instead of Mind. Ignorant that the human

mind governs the body, its phenomenon, the invalid may

15 unwittingly add more fear to the mental reservoir already

overflowing with that emotion.

Wrong and right way

Doctors should not implant disease in the thoughts of

18 their patients, as they so frequently do, by declaring dis-

ease to be a fixed fact, even before they go to

work to eradicate the disease through the ma-

21 terial faith which they inspire. Instead of furnishing

thought with fear, they should try to correct this turbulent

element of mortal mind by the influence of divine Love

24 which casteth out fear.

When man is governed by God, the ever-present

Mind who understands all things, man knows that with

27 God all things are possible. The only way to this

living Truth, which heals the sick, is found in the Science

of divine Mind as taught and demonstrated by Christ

30 Jesus.

The important decision

To reduce inflammation, dissolve a tumor, or cure or-

ganic disease, I have found divine Truth more potent than

PAGE 181

1 all lower remedies. And why not, since Mind, God, is

the source and condition of all existence? Before decid-

3 ing that the body, matter, is disordered, one

should ask, "Who art thou that repliest to

Spirit? Can matter speak for itself, or does

6 it hold the issues of life?" Matter, which can neither

suffer nor enjoy, has no partnership with pain and pleas-

ure, but mortal belief has such a partnership.

Manipulation unscientific

9 When you manipulate patients, you trust in electricity

and magnetism more than in Truth; and for

that reason, you employ matter rather than

12 Mind. You weaken or destroy your power when you re-

sort to any except spiritual means.

It is foolish to declare that you manipulate patients but

15 that you lay no stress on manipulation. If this be so, why

manipulate? In reality you manipulate because you are

ignorant of the baneful effects of magnetism, or are not

18 sufficiently spiritual to depend on Spirit. In either case

you must improve your mental condition till you finally

attain the understanding of Christian Science.

Not words but deeds

21 If you are too material to love the Science of Mind and

are satisfied with good words instead of effects, if you

adhere to error and are afraid to trust Truth,

24 the question then recurs, "Adam, where art

thou?" It is unnecessary to resort to aught besides

Mind in order to satisfy the sick that you are doing some-

27 thing for them, for if they are cured, they generally know

it and are satisfied.

"Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also."

30 If you have more faith in drugs than in Truth, this faith

will incline you to the side of matter and error. Any

hypnotic power you may exercise will diminish your

PAGE 182

1 ability to become a Scientist, and vice versa. The act

of healing the sick through divine Mind alone, of casting

3 out error with Truth, shows your position as a Christian

Scientist.

Physiology or Spirit

The demands of God appeal to thought only; but the

6 claims of mortality, and what are termed laws of nature,

appertain to matter. Which, then, are we to

accept as legitimate and capable of producing

9 the highest human good? We cannot obey both physi-

ology and Spirit, for one absolutely destroys the other,

and one or the other must be supreme in the affections.

12 It is impossible to work from two standpoints. If we

attempt it, we shall presently "hold to the one,

and despise the other."

15 The hypotheses of mortals are antagonistic to Science

and cannot mix with it. This is clear to those, who heal

the sick on the basis of Science.

No material law

18 Mind's government of the body must supersede the so-

called laws of matter. Obedience to material law pre-

vents full obedience to spiritual law, - the law

21 which overcomes material conditions and puts

matter under the feet of Mind. Mortals entreat the di-

vine Mind to heal the sick, and forthwith shut out the aid

24 of Mind by using material means, thus working against

themselves and their prayers and denying man's God-

given ability to demonstrate Mind's sacred power. Pleas

27 for drugs and laws of health come from some sad incident,

or else from ignorance of Christian Science and its tran-

scendent power.

30 To admit that sickness is a condition over which God

has no control, is to presuppose that omnipotent power

is powerless on some occasions. The law of Christ, or

PAGE 183

1 Truth, makes all things possible to Spirit; but the so-

called laws of matter would render Spirit of no avail, and

3 demand obedience to materialistic codes, thus departing

from the basis of one God, one lawmaker. To suppose

that God constitutes laws of inharmony is a mistake; dis-

6 cords have no support from nature or divine law, however

much is said to the contrary.

Can the agriculturist, according to belief, produce a

9 crop without sowing the seed and awaiting its germina-

tion according to the laws of nature? The answer is no,

and yet the Scriptures inform us that sin, or error, first

12 caused the condemnation of man to till the ground, and

indicate that obedience to God will remove this necessity.

Truth never made error necessary, nor devised a law to

15 perpetuate error.

Laws of nature spiritual

The supposed laws which result in weariness and dis-

ease are not His laws, for the legitimate and only possible

18 action of Truth is the production of harmony.

Laws of nature are laws of Spirit; but mortals

commonly recognize as law that which hides the power of

21 Spirit. Divine Mind rightly demands man's entire obe-

dience, affection, and strength. No reservation is made

for any lesser loyalty. Obedience to Truth gives man

24 power and strength. Submission to error superinduces

loss of power.

Belief and understanding

Truth casts out all evils and materialistic methods

27 with the actual spiritual law, - the law which gives

sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, voice

to the dumb, feet to the lame. If Christian

30 Science dishonors human belief, it honors spir-

itual understanding; and the one Mind only is entitled to

honor.

PAGE 184

1 The so-called laws of health are simply laws of mortal

belief. The premises being erroneous, the conclusions

3 are wrong. Truth makes no laws to regulate sickness,

sin, and death, for these are unknown to Truth and should

not be recognized as reality.

6 Belief produces the results of belief, and the penal-

ties it affixes last so long as the belief and are insepara-

ble from it. The remedy consists in probing the trouble

9 to the bottom, in finding and casting out by denial the

error of belief which produces a mortal disorder, never

honoring erroneous belief with the title of law nor yield-

12 ing obedience to it. Truth, Life, and Love are the only

legitimate and eternal demands on man, and they are

spiritual lawgivers, enforcing obedience through divine

15 statutes.

Laws of human belief

Controlled by the divine intelligence, man is harmoni-

ous and eternal. Whatever is governed by a false belief

18 is discordant and mortal. We say man suffers

from the effects of cold, heat, fatigue. This

is human belief, not the truth of being, for matter cannot

21 suffer. Mortal mind alone suffers, - not because a law

of matter has been transgressed, but because a law of this

so-called mind has been disobeyed. I have demonstrated

24 this as a rule of divine Science by destroying the delusion

of suffering from what is termed a fatally broken physical

law.

27 A woman, whom I cured of consumption, always

breathed with great difficulty when the wind was from

the east. I sat silently by her side a few moments. Her

30 breath came gently. The inspirations were deep and nat-

ural. I then requested her to look at the weather-vane.

She looked and saw that it pointed due east. The wind

PAGE 185

1 had not changed, but her thought of it had and so her diffi-

culty in breathing had gone. The wind had not produced

3 the difficulty. My metaphysical treatment changed the

action of her belief on the lungs, and she never suffered

again from east winds, but was restored to health.

A so-called mind-cure

6 No system of hygiene but Christian Science is purely

mental. Before this book was published, other books

were in circulation, which discussed "mental

9 medicine" and "mind-cure," operating through

the power of the earth's magnetic currents to regulate life

and health. Such theories and such systems of so-called

12 mind-cure, which have sprung up, are as material as the

prevailing systems of medicine. They have their birth

in mortal mind, which puts forth a human conception

15 in the name of Science to match the divine Science of im-

mortal Mind, even as the necromancers of Egypt strove

to emulate the wonders wrought by Moses. Such theories

18 have no relationship to Christian Science, which rests on

the conception of God as the only Life, substance, and

intelligence, and excludes the human mind as a spiritual

21 factor in the healing work.

Jesus and hypnotism

Jesus cast out evil and healed the sick, not only with-

out drugs, but without hypnotism, which is

24 the reverse of ethical and pathological Truth-

power.

Erroneous mental practice may seem for a time to bene-

27 fit the sick, but the recovery is not permanent. This is

because erroneous methods act on and through the ma-

terial stratum of the human mind, called brain, which is

30 but a mortal consolidation of material mentality and its

suppositional activities.

False stimulus

A patient under the influence of mortal mind is healed

PAGE 186

1 only by removing the influence on him of this mind, by

emptying his thought of the false stimulus

3 and reaction of will-power and filling it with

the divine energies of Truth.

Christian Science destroys material beliefs through the

6 understanding of Spirit, and the thoroughness of this work

determines health. Erring human mind-forces can work

only evil under whatever name or pretence they are em-

9 ployed; for Spirit and matter, good and evil, light and

darkness, cannot mingle.

Evil negative and self-destructive

Evil is a negation, because it is the absence of truth.

12 It is nothing, because it is the absence of something. It

is unreal, because it presupposes the absence

of God, the omnipotent and omnipresent.

15 Every mortal must learn that there is neither

power nor reality in evil.

Evil is self-assertive. It says: "I am a real entity, over-

18 mastering good." This falsehood should strip evil of all

pretensions. The only power of evil is to destroy itself. It

can never destroy one iota of good. Every attempt of evil

21 to destroy good is a failure, and only aids in peremptorily

punishing the evil-doer. If we concede the same reality to

discord as to harmony, discord has as lasting a claim upon

24 us as has harmony. If evil is as real as good, evil is also as

immortal. If death is as real as Life, immortality is a myth.

If pain is as real as the absence of pain, both must be im-

27 mortal; and if so, harmony cannot be the law of being.

Ignorant idolatry

Mortal mind is ignorant of self, or it could never be

self-deceived. If mortal mind knew how to be better, it

30 would be better. Since it must believe in some-

thing besides itself, it enthrones matter as deity.

The human mind has been an idolater from the beginning,

PAGE 187

1 having other gods and believing in more than the one

Mind.

3 As mortals do not comprehend even mortal existence,

how ignorant must they be of the all-knowing Mind and

of His creations.

6 Here you may see how so-called material sense creates

its own forms of thought, gives them material names, and

then worships and fears them. With pagan blindness,

9 it attributes to some material god or medicine an ability

beyond itself. The beliefs of the human mind rob and

enslave it, and then impute this result to another illusive

12 personification, named Satan.

Action of mortal mind

The valves of the heart, opening and closing for the pas-

sage of the blood, obey the mandate of mor-

15 tal mind as directly as does the hand, ad-

mittedly moved by the will. Anatomy allows the mental

cause of the latter action, but not of the former.

18 We say, "My hand hath done it." What is this my but

mortal mind, the cause of all materialistic action? All

voluntary, as well as miscalled involuntary, action of the

21 mortal body is governed by this so-called mind, not by

matter. There is no involuntary action. The divine Mind

includes all action and volition, and man in Science is gov-

24 erned by this Mind. The human mind tries to classify

action as voluntary and involuntary, and suffers from the

attempt.

Death and the body

27 If you take away this erring mind, the mortal material

body loses all appearance of life or action, and this so-

called mind then calls itself dead; but the hu-

30 man mind still holds in belief a body, through

which it acts and which appears to the human mind to

live, - a body like the one it had before death. This body

PAGE 188

1 is put off only as the mortal, erring mind yields to God,

immortal Mind, and man is found in His image.

Embryonic sinful thoughts

3 What is termed disease does not exist. It is neither

mind nor matter. The belief of sin, which has grown

terrible in strength and influence, is an uncon-

6 scious error in the beginning, - an embryonic

thought without motive; but afterwards it

governs the so-called man. Passion, depraved appetites,

9 dishonesty, envy, hatred, revenge ripen into action, only to

pass from shame and woe to their final punishment.

Disease a dream

Mortal existence is a dream of pain and pleasure in

12 matter, a dream of sin, sickness, and death; and it is like

the dream we have in sleep, in which every one

recognizes his condition to be wholly a state of

15 mind. In both the waking, and the sleeping dream, the

dreamer thinks that his body is material and the suffering

is in that body.

18 The smile of the sleeper indicates the sensation pro-

duced physically by the pleasure of a dream. In the

same way pain and pleasure, sickness and care, are

21 traced upon mortals by unmistakable signs.

Sickness is a growth of error, springing from mortal

ignorance or fear. Error rehearses error. What causes

24 disease cannot cure it. The soil of disease is mortal

mind, and you have an abundant or scanty crop of disease,

according to the seedlings of fear. Sin and the fear of

27 disease must be uprooted and cast out.

Sense yields to understanding

When darkness comes over the earth, the physical

senses have no immediate evidence of a sun.

30 The human eye knows not where the orb of

day is, nor if it exists. Astronomy gives the

desired information regarding the sun. The human or

PAGE 189

1 material senses yield to the authority of this science, and

they are willing to leave with astronomy the explanation of

3 the sun's influence over the earth. If the eyes see no sun

for a week, we still believe that there is solar light and

heat. Science (in this instance named natural) raises

6 the human thought above the cruder theories of the

human mind, and casts out a fear.

In like manner mortals should no more deny the power

9 of Christian Science to establish harmony and to explain

the effect of mortal mind on the body, though the cause

be unseen, than they should deny the existence of the sun-

12 light when the orb of day disappears, or doubt that the sun

will reappear. The sins of others should not make good

men suffer.

Ascending the scale

15 We call the body material; but it is as truly mortal

mind, according to its degree, as is the material brain

which is supposed to furnish the evidence

18 of all mortal thought or things. The human

mortal mind, by an inevitable perversion, makes all

things start from the lowest instead of from the highest

21 mortal thought. The reverse is the case with all the

formations of the immortal divine Mind. They proceed

from the divine source; and so, in tracing them, we con-

24 stantly ascend in infinite being.

Human reproduction

From mortal mind comes the reproduction of the

species, - first the belief of inanimate, and then of ani-

27 mate matter. According to mortal thought,

the development of embryonic mortal mind

commences in the lower, basal portion of the brain, and

30 goes on in an ascending scale by evolution, keeping always

in the direct line of matter, for matter is the subjective

condition of mortal mind.

PAGE 190

1 Next we have the formation of so-called embryonic

mortal mind, afterwards mortal men or mortals, - all this

3 while matter is a belief, ignorant of itself, ignorant of what

it is supposed to produce. The mortal says that an inani-

mate unconscious seedling is producing mortals, both body

6 and mind; and yet neither a mortal mind nor the immortal

Mind is found in brain or elsewhere in matter or in mortals.

Human stature

This embryonic and materialistic human belief called

9 mortal man in turn fills itself with thoughts

of pain and pleasure, of life and death, and

arranges itself into five so-called senses, which presently

12 measure mind by the size of a brain and the bulk of a

body, called man.

Human frailty

Human birth, growth, maturity, and decay are as the

15 grass springing from the soil with beautiful green blades,

afterwards to wither and return to its native

nothingness. This mortal seeming is temporal;

18 it never merges into immortal being, but finally disap-

pears, and immortal man, spiritual and eternal, is found

to be the real man.

21 The Hebrew bard, swayed by mortal thoughts, thus

swept his lyre with saddening strains on human existence:

As for man, his days are as grass:

24 As a flower of the field, so he flourisheth.

For the wind passeth over it, and it is gone;

And the place thereof shall know it no more.

27 When hope rose higher in the human heart, he sang:

As for me, I will behold Thy face in righteousness:

I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with Thy likeness.

. . . . .

30 For with Thee is the fountain of life;

In Thy light shall we see light.

PAGE 191

1 The brain can give no idea of God's man. It can take

no cognizance of Mind. Matter is not the organ of infi-

3 nite Mind.

As mortals give up the delusion that there is more than

one Mind, more than one God, man in God's likeness will

6 appear, and this eternal man will include in that likeness

no material element.

The immortal birth

As a material, theoretical life-basis is found to be a

9 misapprehension of existence, the spiritual and divine

Principle of man dawns upon human thought,

and leads it to "where the young child was,"

12 - even to the birth of a new-old idea, to the spiritual

sense of being and of what Life includes. This the whole

earth will be transformed by Truth on its pinions of light,

15 chasing away the darkness of error.

Spiritual freedom

The human thought must free itself from self-imposed

materiality and bondage. It should no longer

18 ask of the head, heart, or lungs: What are

man's prospects for life? Mind is not helpless. Intelli-

gence is not mute before non-intelligence.

21 By its own volition, not a blade of grass springs up, not

a spray buds within the vale, not a leaf unfolds its fair

outlines, not a flower starts from its cloistered cell.

24 The Science of being reveals man and immortality as

based on Spirit. Physical sense defines mortal man as

based on matter, and from this premise infers the mor-

27 tality of the body.

No physical affinity

The illusive senses may fancy affinities with their op-

posites; but in Christian Science, Truth never mingles

30 with error. Mind has no affinity with matter,

and therefore Truth is able to cast out the ills

of the flesh. Mind, God, sends forth the aroma of Spirit,

PAGE 192

1 the atmosphere of intelligence. The belief that a pulpy

substance under the skull is mind is a mockery of intelli-

3 gence, a mimicry of Mind.

We are Christian Scientists, only as we quit our reliance

upon that which is false and grasp the true. We are not

6 Christian Scientists until we leave all for Christ. Human

opinions are not spiritual. They come from the hearing

of the ear, from corporeality instead of from Principle,

9 and from the mortal instead of from the immortal. Spirit

is not separate from God. Spirit is God.

Human power a blind force

Erring power is a material belief, a blind miscalled force,

12 the offspring of will and not of wisdom, of the mortal mind

and not of the immortal. It is the headlong

cataract, the devouring flame, the tempest's

15 breath. It is lightning and hurricane, all that is selfish,

wicked, dishonest, and impure.

The one real power

Moral and spiritual might belong to Spirit, who holds

18 the "wind in His fists;" and this teaching accords with

Science and harmony. In Science, you can

have no power opposed to God, and the physi-

21 cal senses must give up their false testimony. Your in-

fluence for good depends upon the weight you throw into

the right scale. The good you do and embody gives you

24 the only power obtainable. Evil is not power. It is a

mockery of strength, which erelong betrays its weakness

and falls, never to rise.

27 We walk in the footsteps of Truth and Love by follow-

ing the example of our Master in the understanding of

divine metaphysics. Christianity is the basis of true heal-

30 ing. Whatever holds human thought in line with unselfed

love, receives directly the divine power.

Mind cures hip-disease

I was called to visit Mr. Clark in Lynn, who had been

PAGE 193

1 confined to his bed six months with hip-disease, caused by

a fall upon a wooden spike when quite a boy. On enter-

3 ing the house I met his physician, who said that

the patient was dying. The physician had just

probed the ulcer on the hip, and said the bone was carious

6 for several inches. He even showed me the probe, which

had on it the evidence of this condition of the bone. The

doctor went out. Mr. Clark lay with his eyes fixed and

9 sightless. The dew of death was on his brow. I went to

his bedside. In a few moments his face changed; its

death-pallor gave place to a natural hue. The eyelids

12 closed gently and the breathing became natural; he was

asleep. In about ten minutes he opened his eyes and

said: "I feel like a new man. My suffering is all gone."

15 It was between three and four o'clock in the afternoon

when this took place.

I told him to rise, dress himself, and take supper with

18 his family. He did so. The next day I saw him in the

yard. Since then I have not seen him, but am informed

that he went to work in two weeks. The discharge from

21 the sore stopped, and the sore was healed. The diseased

condition had continued there ever since the injury was

received in boyhood.

24 Since his recovery I have been informed that his physi-

cian claims to have cured him, and that his mother has

been threatened with incarceration in an insane asylum

27 for saying: "It was none other than God and that woman

who healed him." I cannot attest the truth of that

report, but what I saw and did for that man, and what

30 his physician said of the case, occurred just as I have

narrated.

It has been demonstrated to me that Life is God

PAGE 194

1 and that the might of omnipotent Spirit shares not its

strength with matter or with human will. Review-

3 ing this brief experience, I cannot fail to discern the

coincidence of the spiritual idea of man with the divine

Mind.

Change of belief

6 A change in human belief changes all the physical symp-

toms, and determines a case for better or for

worse. When one's false belief is corrected

9 Truth sends a report of health over the body.

Destruction of the auditory nerve and paralysis of the

optic nerve are not necessary to ensure deafness and blind-

12 ness; for if mortal mind says, "I am deaf and blind," it

will be so without an injured nerve. Every theory op-

posed to this fact (as I learned in metaphysics) would

15 presuppose man, who is immortal in spiritual under-

standing, a mortal in material belief.

Power of habit

The authentic history of Kaspar Hauser is a useful hint

18 as to the frailty and inadequacy of mortal mind. It

proves beyond a doubt that education consti-

tutes this so-called mind, and that, in turn,

21 mortal mind manifests itself in the body by the false

sense it imparts. Incarcerated in a dungeon, where

neither sight nor sound could reach him, at the age of

24 seventeen Kaspar was still a mental infant, crying and

chattering with no more intelligence than a babe, and

realizing Tennyson's description:

27 An infant crying in the night,

An infant crying for the light,

And with no language but a cry.

30 His case proves material sense to be but a belief formed

by education alone. The light which affords us joy gave

PAGE 195

1 him a belief of intense pain. His eyes were inflamed by

the light. After the babbling boy had been taught to

3 speak a few words, he asked to be taken back to his dun-

geon, and said that he should never be happy elsewhere.

Outside of dismal darkness and cold silence he found no

6 peace. Every sound convulsed him with anguish. All

that he ate, except his black crust, produced violent

retchings. All that gives pleasure to our educated senses

9 gave him pain through those very senses, trained in an

opposite direction.

Useful knowledge

The point for each one to decide is, whether it is mortal

12 mind or immortal Mind that is causative. We

should forsake the basis of matter for meta-

physical Science and its divine Principle.

15 Whatever furnishes the semblance of an idea governed

by its Principle, furnishes food for thought. Through as-

tronomy, natural history, chemistry, music, mathematics,

18 thought passes naturally from effect back to cause.

Academics of the right sort are requisite. Observa-

tion, invention, study, and original thought are expansive

21 and should promote the growth of mortal mind out of it-

self, out of all that is mortal.

It is the tangled barbarisms of learning which we

24 deplore, - the mere dogma, the speculative theory, the

nauseous fiction. Novels, remarkable only for their

exaggerated pictures, impossible ideals, and specimens

27 of depravity, fill our young readers with wrong tastes

and sentiments. Literary commercialism is lowering the

intellectual standard to accommodate the purse and to

30 meet a frivolous demand for amusement instead of for

improvement. Incorrect views lower the standard of

truth.

PAGE 196

1 If materialistic knowledge is power, it is not wisdom.

It is but a blind force. Man has "sought out many inven-

3 tions," but he has not yet found it true that knowledge can

save him from the dire effects of knowledge. The power

of mortal mind over its own body is little understood.

Sin destroyed through suffering

6 Better the suffering which awakens mortal mind from

its fleshly dream, than the false pleasures

which tend to perpetuate this dream. Sin

9 alone brings death, for sin is the only element

of destruction.

"Fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body

12 in hell," said Jesus. A careful study of this text allows

that here the word soul means a false sense or material

consciousness. The command was a warning to beware,

15 not of Rome, Satan, nor of God, but of sin. Sickness,

sin, and death are not concomitants of Life or Truth.

No law supports them. They have no relation to God

18 wherewith to establish their power. Sin makes its own

hell, and goodness its own heaven.

Dangerous shoals avoided

Such books as will rule disease out of mortal mind, -

21 and so efface the images and thoughts of dis-

ease, instead of impressing them with forcible

descriptions and medical details, - will help

24 to abate sickness and to destroy it.

Many a hopeless case of disease is induced by a single

post mortem examination, - not from infection nor from

27 contact with material virus, but from the fear of the

disease and from the image brought before the mind; it

is a mental state, which is afterwards outlined on the

30 body.

Pangs caused by the press

The press unwittingly sends forth many sorrows and

diseases among the human family. It does this by giv-

PAGE 197

1 ing names to diseases and by printing long descriptions

which mirror images of disease distinctly in thought. A

3 new name for an ailment affects people like a

Parisian name for a novel garment. Every one

hastens to get it. A minutely described dis-

6 ease costs many a man his earthly days of comfort. What

a price for human knowledge! But the price does not ex-

ceed the original cost. God said of the tree of knowledge,

9 which bears the fruit of sin, disease, and death, "In the

day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die."

Higher standard for mortals

The less that is said of physical structure and laws, and

12 the more that is thought and said about moral

and spiritual law, the higher will be the stand-

ard of living and the farther mortals will be re-

15 moved from imbecility or disease.

We should master fear, instead of cultivating it. It

was the ignorance of our forefathers in the departments

18 of knowledge now broadcast in the earth, that made them

hardier than our trained physiologists, more honest than

our sleek politicians.

Diet and dyspepsia

21 We are told that the simple food our forefathers ate

helped to make them healthy, but that is a mistake.

Their diet would not cure dyspepsia at this

24 period. With rules of health in the head

and the most digestible food in the stomach, there would

still be dyspeptics. Many of the effeminate constitutions

27 of our time will never grow robust until individual opin-

ions improve and immortal belief loses some portion of its

error.

Harm done by physicians

30 The doctor's mind reaches that of his patient. The

doctor should suppress his fear of disease, else his belief

in its reality and fatality will harm his patients even more

PAGE 198

1 than his calomel and morphine, for the higher stratum of

mortal mind has in belief more power to harm man than

3 the substratum, matter. A patient hears the

doctor's verdict as a criminal hears his death-

sentence. The patient may seem calm under it, but he is

6 not. His fortitude may sustain him, but his fear, which

has already developed the disease that is gaining the

mastery, is increased by the physician's words.

Disease depicted

9 The materialistic doctor, though humane, is an art-

ist who outlines his thought relative to disease, and then

fills in his delineations with sketches from text-

12 books. It is better to prevent disease from

forming in mortal mind afterwards to appear on the

body; but to do this requires attention. The thought of

15 disease is formed before one sees a doctor and before

the doctor undertakes to dispel it by a counter-irritant,

- perhaps by a blister, by the application of caustic or

18 croton oil, or by a surgical operation. Again, giving an-

other direction to faith, the physician prescribes drugs,

until the elasticity of mortal thought haply causes a

21 vigorous reaction upon itself, and reproduces a picture

of healthy and harmonious formations.

A patient's belief is more or less moulded and formed

24 by his doctor's belief in the case, even though the doctor

says nothing to support his theory. His thoughts and his

patient's commingle, and the stronger thoughts rule the

27 weaker. Hence the importance that doctors be Christian

Scientists.

Mind over matter

Because the muscles of the blacksmith's arm are

30 strongly developed, it does not follow that

exercise has produced this result or that a

less used arm must be weak. If matter were the cause

PAGE 199

1 of action, and if muscles, without volition of mortal

mind, could lift the hammer and strike the anvil, it

3 might be thought true that hammering would enlarge

the muscles. The trip-hammer is not increased in size

by exercise. Why not, since muscles are as material as

6 wood and iron? Because nobody believes that mind is

producing such a result on the hammer.

Muscles are not self-acting. If mind does not move

9 them, they are motionless. Hence the great fact that

Mind alone enlarges and empowers man through its

mandate, - by reason of its demand for and supply of

12 power. Not because of muscular exercise, but by rea-

son of the blacksmith's faith in exercise, his arm becomes

stronger.

Latent fear subdued

15 Mortals develop their own bodies or make them sick,

according as they influence them through mortal mind.

To know whether this development is produced

18 consciously or unconsciously, is of less impor-

tance than a knowledge of the fact. The feats of the gym-

nast prove that latent mental fears are subdued by him.

21 The devotion of thought to an honest achievement makes

the achievement possible. Exceptions only confirm this

rule, proving that failure is occasioned by a too feeble

24 faith.

Had Blondin believed it impossible to walk the rope

over Niagara's abyss of waters, he could never have

27 done it. His belief that he could do it gave his thought-

forces, called muscles, their flexibility and power which

the unscientific might attribute to a lubricating oil. His

30 fear must have disappeared before his power of putting

resolve into action could appear.

Homer and Moses

When Homer sang of the Grecian gods, Olympus was

PAGE 200

1 dark, but through his verse the gods became alive in a

nation's belief. Pagan worship began with muscularity,

3 but the law of Sinai lifted thought into the

song of David. Moses advanced a nation to

the worship of God in Spirit instead of matter, and il-

6 lustrated the grand human capacities of being bestowed

by immortal Mind.

A mortal not man

Whoever is incompetent to explain Soul would be wise

9 not to undertake the explanation of body. Life is, always

has been, and ever will be independent of

matter; for life is God, and man is the idea

12 of God, not formed materially but spiritually, and not

subject to decay and dust. The Psalmist said: "Thou

madest him to have dominion over the works of Thy

15 hands. Thou hast put all things under his feet."

The great truth in the Science of being, that the real

man was, is, and ever shall be perfect, is incontrovertible;

18 for if man is the image, reflection, of God, he is neither

inverted nor subverted, but upright and Godlike.

The suppositional antipode of divine infinite Spirit

21 is the so-called human soul or spirit, in other words

the five senses, - the flesh that warreth against Spirit.

These so called material senses must yield to the infinite

24 Spirit, named God.

St. Paul said: "For I determined not to know any-

thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified."

27 (I Cor. ii. 2.) Christian Science says: I am determined

not to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ, and

him glorified.

Table of Contents Previous Chapter Next Chapter

PAGE 100

For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, forni-

cations, thefts, false witness, blasphemies: these are the things which

defile a man. - JESUS.

Earliest investigations

1 MESMERISM or animal magnetism was first brought

into notice by Mesmer in Germany in 1775. Ac-

3 cording to the American Cyclopaedia, he regarded this

so-called force, which he said could be ex-

erted by one living organism over another, as

6 a means of alleviating disease. His propositions were

as follows :

"There exists a mutual influence between the celestial

9 bodies, the earth, and animated things. Animal bodies

are susceptible to the influence of this agent, disseminat-

ing itself through the substance of the nerves."

12 In 1784, the French government ordered the medical

faculty of Paris to investigate Mesmer's theory and to

report upon it. Under this order a commission was

15 appointed, and Benjamin Franklin was one of the com-

missioners. This commission reported to the govern-

ment as follows:

18 "In regard to the existence and utility of animal mag-

netism, we have come to the unanimous conclusions that

there is no proof of the existence of the animal magnetic

PAGE 101

1 fluid; that the violent effects, which are observed in

the public practice of magnetism, are due to manipula-

3 tions, or to the excitement of the imagination and the

impressions made upon the senses; and that there is one

more fact to be recorded in the history of the errors of

6 the human mind, and an important experiment upon

the power of the imagination."

Clairvoyance, magnetism

In 1837, a committee of nine persons was appointed,

9 among whom were Roux, Bouillaud, and Clo-

quet, which tested during several sessions the

phenomena exhibited by a reputed clairvoyant. Their

12 report stated the results as follows:

"The facts which had been promised by Monsieur

Berna [the magnetizer] as conclusive, and as adapted to

15 throw light on physiological and therapeutical questions,

are certainly not conclusive in favor of the doctrine of

animal magnetism, and have nothing in common with

18 either physiology or therapeutics."

This report was adopted by the Royal Academy of

Medicine in Paris.

Personal conclusions

21 The author's own observations of the workings of

animal magnetism convince her that it is not

a remedial agent, and that its effects upon

24 those who practise it, and upon their subjects who do

not resist it, lead to moral and to physical death.

If animal magnetism seems to alleviate or to cure dis-

27 ease, this appearance is deceptive, since error cannot

remove the effects of error. Discomfort under error is

preferable to comfort. In no instance is the effect of

30 animal magnetism, recently called hypnotism, other

than the effect of illusion. Any seeming benefit derived

from it is proportional to one's faith in esoteric magic.

PAGE 102

Mere negation

1 Animal magnetism has no scientific foundation, for

God governs all that is real, harmonious, and eternal, and

3 His power is neither animal nor human. Its

basis being a belief and this belief animal, in

Science animal magnetism, mesmerism, or hypnotism is

6 a mere negation, possessing neither intelligence, power,

nor reality, and in sense it is an unreal concept of the so-

called mortal mind.

9 There is but one real attraction, that of Spirit. The

pointing of the needle to the pole symbolizes this all-

embracing power or the attraction of God, divine Mind.

12 The planets have no more power over man than over

his Maker, since God governs the universe; but man,

reflecting God's power, has dominion over all the earth

15 and its hosts.

Hidden agents

The mild forms of animal magnetism are disappear-

ing, and its aggressive features are coming to the front.

18 The looms of crime, hidden in the dark re-

cesses of mortal thought, are every hour weav-

ing webs more complicated and subtle. So secret are the

21 present methods of animal magnetism that they ensnare

the age into indolence, and produce the very apathy on

the subject which the criminal desires. The following

24 is an extract from the Boston Herald:

"Mesmerism is a problem not lending itself to an easy

explanation and development. It implies the exercise

27 of despotic control, and is much more likely to be abused

by its possessor, than otherwise employed, for the in-

dividual or society."

Mental despotism

30 Mankind must learn that evil is not power. Its so-

called despotism is but a phase of nothingness. Christian

Science despoils the kingdom of evil, and pre-eminently

PAGE 103

1 promotes affection and virtue in families and therefore

in the community. The Apostle Paul refers to the

3 personification of evil as "the god of this

world," and further defines it as dishonesty

and craftiness. Sin was the Assyrian moon-god.

Liberation of mental powers

6 The destruction of the claims of mortal mind through

Science, by which man can escape from sin

and mortality, blesses the whole human fam-

9 ily. As in the beginning, however, this libera-

tion does not scientifically show itself in a knowledge of

both good and evil, for the latter is unreal.

12 On the other hand, Mind-science is wholly separate

from any half-way impertinent knowledge, because Mind-

science is of God and demonstrates the divine Principle,

15 working out the purposes of good only. The maximum

of good is the infinite God and His idea, the All-in-all.

Evil is a suppositional lie.

The genus of error

18 As named in Christian Science, animal magnetism or

hypnotism is the specific term for error, or mortal mind.

It is the false belief that mind is in matter, and

21 is both evil and good; that evil is as real as

good and more powerful. This belief has not one qual-

ity of Truth. It is either ignorant or malicious. The

24 malicious form of hypnotism ultimates in moral idiocy.

The truths of immortal Mind sustain man, and they anni-

hilate the fables of mortal mind, whose flimsy and gaudy

27 pretensions, like silly moths, singe their own wings and

fall into dust.

Thought-transference

In reality there is no mortal mind, and conse-

30 quently no transference of mortal thought

and will-power. Life and being are of

God. In Christian Science, man can do no harm, for

PAGE 104

1 scientific thoughts are true thoughts, passing from God

to man.

3 When Christian Science and animal magnetism are

both comprehended, as they will be at no distant date,

it will be seen why the author of this book has been

6 so unjustly persecuted and belied by wolves in sheep's

clothing.

Agassiz, the celebrated naturalist and author, has

9 wisely said: "Every great scientific truth goes through

three stages. First, people say it conflicts with the Bible.

Next, they say it has been discovered before. Lastly,

12 they say they have always believed it."

Perfection of divine government

Christian Science goes to the bottom of mental action,

and reveals the theodicy which indicates the rightness of

15 all divine action, as the emanation of divine

Mind, and the consequent wrongness of the

opposite so-called action, - evil, occultism,

18 necromancy, mesmerism, animal magnetism, hypnotism.

Adulteration of Truth

The medicine of Science is divine Mind; and dishonesty,

sensuality, falsehood, revenge, malice, are animal pro-

21 pensities and by no means the mental quali-

ties which heal the sick. The hypnotizer

employs one error to destroy another. If he heals sick-

24 ness through a belief, and a belief originally caused the

sickness, it is a case of the greater error overcoming the

lesser. This greater error thereafter occupies the ground,

27 leaving the case worse than before it was grasped by the

stronger error.

Motives considered

Our courts recognize evidence to prove the motive as

30 well as the commission of a crime. Is it not

clear that the human mind must move the

body to a wicked act? Is not mortal mind the mur-

PAGE 105

1 derer? The hands, without mortal mind to direct them,

could not commit a murder.

Mental crimes

3 Courts and juries judge and sentence mortals in order

to restrain crime, to prevent deeds of violence or to punish

them. To say that these tribunals have no

6 jurisdiction over the carnal or mortal mind,

would be to contradict precedent and to admit that the

power of human law is restricted to matter, while mortal

9 mind, evil, which is the real outlaw, defies justice and is

recommended to mercy. Can matter commit a crime?

Can matter be punished? Can you separate the men-

12 tality from the body over which courts hold jurisdiction?

Mortal mind, not matter, is the criminal in every case;

and human law rightly estimates crime, and courts rea-

15 sonably pass sentence, according to the motive.

Important decision

When our laws eventually take cognizance of mental

crime and no longer apply legal rulings wholly to physical

18 offences, these words of Judge Parmenter of

Boston will become historic: "I see no reason

why metaphysics is not as important to medicine as to

21 mechanics or mathematics."

Evil let loose

Whoever uses his developed mental powers like an es-

caped felon to commit fresh atrocities as opportunity oc-

24 curs is never safe. God will arrest him. Di-

vine justice will manacle him. His sins will

be millstones about his neck, weighing him down to the

27 depths of ignominy and death. The aggravation of er-

ror foretells its doom, and confirms the ancient axiom:

"Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad."

The misuse of mental power

30 The distance from ordinary medical prac-

tice to Christian Science is full many a league

in the line of light; but to go in healing from the use of

PAGE 106

1 inanimate drugs to the criminal misuse of human will-

power, is to drop from the platform of common manhood

3 into the very mire of iniquity, to work against the free

course of honesty and justice, and to push vainly against

the current running heavenward.

Proper self-government

6 Like our nation, Christian Science has its Declaration

of Independence. God has endowed man with inalien-

able rights, among which are self-government,

9 reason, and conscience. Man is properly self-

governed only when he is guided rightly and governed by

his Maker, divine Truth and Love.

12 Man's rights are invaded when the divine order is in-

terfered with, and the mental trespasser incurs the divine

penalty due this crime.

Right methods

15 Let this age, which sits in judgment on Christian

Science, sanction only such methods as are demonstrable

in Truth and known by their fruit, and classify

18 all others as did St. Paul in his great epistle

to the Galatians, when he wrote as follows:

"Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are

21 these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness,

idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath,

strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness,

24 revellings and such like: of the which I tell you before,

as I have also told you in time past, that they which do

such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. But

27 the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering,

gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against

such there is no law."

Table of Contents Previous Chapter Next Chapter

PAGE 107

But I certify you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached of me

is not after man. For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught

it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ. - PAUL.

The kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven, which a woman took, and

hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened. - JESUS.

Christian Science discovered

1 In the year 1866, I discovered the Christ Science or

divine laws of Life, Truth, and Love, and

3 named my discovery Christian Science. God

had been graciously preparing me during many

years for the reception of this final revelation of the ab-

6 solute divine Principle of scientific mental healing.

Mission of Christian Science

This apodictical Principle points to the revelation of

Immanuel, "God with us," - the sovereign ever-pres-

9 ence, delivering the children of men from

every ill "that flesh is heir to." Through

Christian Science, religion and medicine are

12 inspired with a diviner nature and essence; fresh pinions

are given to faith and understanding, and thoughts ac-

quaint themselves intelligently with God.

Discontent with life

15 Feeling so perpetually the false consciousness that life

inheres in the body, yet remembering that in

reality God is our Life, we may well tremble

18 in the prospect of those days in which we must say, "I

have no pleasure in them."

PAGE 108

1 Whence came to me this heavenly conviction, - a con-

viction antagonistic to the testimony of the physical senses?

3 According to St. Paul, it was "the gift of the grace of

God given unto me by the effectual working of His power."

It was the divine law of Life and Love, unfolding to me

6 the demonstrable fact that matter possesses neither sen-

sation nor life; that human experiences show the falsity

of all material things; and that immortal cravings, "the

9 price of learning love," establish the truism that the

only sufferer is mortal mind, for the divine Mind cannot

suffer.

Demonstrable evidence

12 My conclusions were reached by allowing the evidence

of this revelation to multiply with mathematical certainty

and the lesser demonstration to prove the

15 greater, as the product of three multiplied by

three, equalling nine, proves conclusively that three times

three duodecillions must be nine duodecillions, - not

18 a fraction more, not a unit less.

Light shining in darkness

When apparently near the confines of mortal existence,

standing already within the shadow of the death-valley,

21 I learned these truths in divine Science: that

all real being is in God, the divine Mind, and

that Life, Truth, and Love are all-powerful and ever-

24 present; that the opposite of Truth, - called error, sin,

sickness, disease, death, - is the false testimony of false

material sense, of mind in matter; that this false sense

27 evolves, in belief, a subjective state of mortal mind which

this same so-called mind names matter thereby shutting

out the true sense of Spirit.

New lines of thought

30 My discovery, that erring, mortal, misnamed

mind produces all the organism and action of

the mortal body, set my thoughts to work in new channels,

PAGE 109

1 and led up to my demonstration of the proposition that

Mind is All and matter is naught as the leading factor in

3 Mind-science.

Scientific evidence

Christian Science reveals incontrovertibly that Mind

is All-in-all, that the only realities are the divine Mind

6 and idea. This great fact is not, however, seen

to be supported by sensible evidence, until its

divine Principle is demonstrated by healing the sick and

9 thus proved absolute and divine. This proof once seen,

no other conclusion can be reached.

Solitary research

For three years after my discovery, I sought the solu-

12 tion of this problem of Mind-healing, searched the Scrip-

tures and read little else, kept aloof from so-

ciety, and devoted time and energies to dis-

15 covering a positive rule. The search was sweet, calm, and

buoyant with hope, not selfish nor depressing. I knew

the Principle of all harmonious Mind-action to be God,

18 and that cures were produced in primitive Christian

healing by holy, uplifting faith; but I must know the

Science of this healing, and I won my way to absolute

21 conclusions through divine revelation, reason, and dem-

onstration. The revelation of Truth in the understand-

ing came to me gradually and apparently through divine

24 power. When a new spiritual idea is borne to earth, the

prophetic Scripture of Isaiah is renewedly fulfilled:

"Unto us a child is born, . . . and his name shall be

27 called Wonderful."

Jesus once said of his lessons: "My doctrine is not

mine, but His that sent me. If any man will do His will,

30 he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or

whether I speak of myself." (John vii. 16,17.)

God's allness learned

The three great verities of Spirit, omnipotence, omni-

PAGE 110

1 presence, omniscience, - Spirit possessing all power,

filling all space, constituting all Science, - contradict

3 forever the belief that matter can be actual.

These eternal verities reveal primeval exist-

ence as the radiant reality of God's creation,

6 in which all that He has made is pronounced by His wis-

dom good.

Thus it was that I beheld, as never before, the awful

9 unreality called evil. The equipollence of God brought

to light another glorious proposition, - man's perfecti-

bility and the establishment of the kingdom of heaven on

12 earth.

Scriptural foundations

In following these leadings of scientific revelation,

the Bible was my only textbook. The Scriptures were

15 illumined; reason and revelation were recon-

ciled, and afterwards the truth of Christian

Science was demonstrated. No human pen nor tongue

18 taught me the Science contained in this book, SCIENCE

AND HEALTH; and neither tongue nor pen can over-

throw it. This book may be distorted by shallow criti-

21 cism or by careless or malicious students, and its ideas

may be temporarily abused and misrepresented; but the

Science and truth therein will forever remain to be dis-

24 cerned and demonstrated.

The demonstration lost and found

Jesus demonstrated the power of Christian Science to

heal mortal minds and bodies. But this power was lost

27 sight of, and must again be spiritually dis-

cerned, taught, and demonstrated according

to Christ's command, with "signs following."

30 Its Science must be apprehended by as many as believe

on Christ and spiritually understand Truth.

Mystical antagonists

No analogy exists between the vague hypotheses of

PAGE 111

1 agnosticism, pantheism, theosophy, spiritualism, or

millenarianism and the demonstrable truths of Chris-

3 tian Science; and I find the will, or sensuous

reason of the human mind, to be opposed to

the divine Mind as expressed through divine Science.

Optical illustration of Science

6 Christian Science is natural, but not physical. The

Science of God and man is no more supernatural than

is the science of numbers, though departing

9 from the realm of the physical, as the Science

of God, Spirit, must, some may deny its right to

the name of Science. The Principle of divine metaphysics

12 is God; the practice of divine metaphysics is the utiliza-

tion of the power of Truth over error; its rules demon-

strate its Science. Divine metaphysics reverses perverted

15 and physical hypotheses as to Deity, even as the ex-

planation of optics rejects the incidental or inverted

image and shows what this inverted image is meant to

18 represent.

Pertinent proposal

A prize of one hundred pounds, offered in Oxford Uni-

versity, England, for the best essay on Natural Science,

21 - an essay calculated to offset the tendency of

the age to attribute physical effects to physical

causes rather than to a final spiritual cause, - is one of

24 many incidents which show that Christian Science meets

a yearning of the human race for spirituality.

Confirmatory tests

After a lengthy examination of my discovery and its

27 demonstration in healing the sick, this fact became evi-

dent to me, - that Mind governs the body,

not partially but wholly. I submitted my

30 metaphysical system of treating disease to the broad-

est practical tests. Since then this system has gradually

gained ground, and has proved itself, whenever scien-

PAGE 112

1 tifically employed, to be the most effective curative agent

in medical practice.

One school of Truth

3 Is there more than one school of Christian Science?

Christian Science is demonstrable. There can, there-

fore, be but one method in its teaching. Those who de-

6 part from this method forfeit their claims to

belong to its school, and they become adher-

ents of the Socratic, the Platonic, the Spencerian, or some

9 other school. By this is meant that they adopt and ad-

here to some particular system of human opinions. Al-

though these opinions may have occasional gleams of

12 divinity, borrowed from that truly divine Science which

eschews man-made systems, they nevertheless remain

wholly human in their origin and tendency and are not

15 scientifically Christian.

Unchanging Principle

From the infinite One in Christian Science comes one

Principle and its infinite idea, and with this infinitude

18 come spiritual rules, laws, and their demon-

stration, which, like the great Giver, are "the

same yesterday, and to-day, and forever;" for thus are

21 the divine Principle of healing and the Christ-idea charac-

terized in the epistle to the Hebrews.

On sandy foundations

Any theory of Christian Science, which departs from

24 what has already been stated and proved to be true, af-

fords no foundation upon which to establish

a genuine school of this Science. Also, if any

27 so-called new school claims to be Christian Science, and

yet uses another author's discoveries without giving that

author proper credit, such a school is erroneous, for it

30 inculcates a breach of that divine commandment in the

Hebrew Decalogue, "Thou shalt not steal."

Principle and practice

God is the Principle of divine metaphysics. As there

PAGE 113

1 is but one God, there can be but one divine Principle of

all Science; and there must be fixed rules for the demon-

3 stration of this divine Principle. The letter

of Science plentifully reaches humanity to-day,

but its spirit comes only in small degrees. The vital part,

6 the heart and soul of Christian Science, is Love. With-

out this, the letter is but the dead body of Science, -

pulseless, cold, inanimate.

Reversible propositions

9 The fundamental propositions of divine metaphysics

are summarized in the four following, to me, self-evident

propositions. Even if reversed, these proposi-

12 tions will be found to agree in statement and

proof, showing mathematically their exact relation to

Truth. De Quincey says mathematics has not a foot to

15 stand upon which is not purely metaphysical.

1. God is All-in-all.

2. God is good. Good is Mind.

18 3. God, Spirit, being all, nothing is matter.

4. Life, God, omnipotent good, deny death, evil, sin,

disease. - Disease, sin, evil, death, deny good, omnipo-

21 tent God, Life.

Which of the denials in proposition four is true? Both

are not, cannot be, true. According to the Scripture,

24 I find that God is true, "but every [mortal] man a

liar."

Metaphysical inversions

The divine metaphysics of Christian Science, like the

27 method in mathematics, proves the rule by inversion.

For example: There is no pain in Truth, and

no truth in pain; no nerve in Mind, and no

30 mind in nerve; no matter in Mind, and no mind in mat-

ter; no matter in Life, and no life in matter; no matter

in good, and no good in matter.

PAGE 114

Definition of mortal mind

1 Usage classes both evil and good together as mind;

therefore, to be understood, the author calls sick and sin-

3 ful humanity mortal mind, - meaning by this

term the flesh opposed to Spirit, the human

mind and evil in contradistinction to the divine Mind, or

6 Truth and good. The spiritually unscientific definition

of mind is based on the evidence of the physical senses,

which makes minds many and calls mind both human and

9 divine.

In Science, Mind is one, including noumenon and phe-

nomena, God and His thoughts.

Imperfect terminology

12 Mortal mind is a solecism in language, and involves an

improper use of the word mind. As Mind is immortal,

the phrase mortal mind implies something un-

15 true and therefore unreal; and as the phrase

is used in teaching Christian Science, it is meant to

designate that which has no real existence. Indeed, if

18 a better word or phrase could be suggested, it would

be used; but in expressing the new tongue we must

sometimes recur to the old and imperfect, and the new

21 wine of the Spirit has to be poured into the old bottles of

the letter.

Causation mental

Christian Science explains all cause and effect as men-

24 tal, not physical. It lifts the veil of mystery from Soul and

body. It shows the scientific relation of man

to God, disentangles the interlaced ambiguities

27 of being, and sets free the imprisoned thought. In divine

Science, the universe, including man, is spiritual, harmoni-

ous, and eternal. Science shows that what is termed mat-

30 ter is but the subjective state of what is termed by the

author mortal mind.

Philological inadequacy

Apart from the usual opposition to everything new,

PAGE 115

1 the one great obstacle to the reception of that spiritual-

ity, through which the understanding of Mind-science

3 comes, is the inadequacy of material terms for

metaphysical statements, and the consequent

difficulty of so expressing metaphysical ideas as to make

6 them comprehensible to any reader, who has not person-

ally demonstrated Christian Science as brought forth in

my discovery. Job says: "The ear trieth words, as the

9 mouth tasteth meat." The great difficulty is to give the

right impression, when translating material terms back

into the original spiritual tongue.

12 SCIENTIFIC TRANSLATION OF IMMORTAL MIND

Divine synonyms

GOD: Divine Principle, Life, Truth, Love,

Soul, Spirit, Mind.

Divine image

15 MAN: God's spiritual idea, individual, per-

fect, eternal.

Divine reflection

IDEA: An image in Mind; the immediate

18 object of understanding. - Webster.

SCIENTIFIC TRANSLATION OF MORTAL MIND

First Degree: Depravity.

Unreality

21 PHYSICAL. Evil beliefs, passions and appetites, fear,

depraved will, self-justification, pride, envy, de-

ceit, hatred, revenge, sin, sickness, disease,

24 death.

Second Degree: Evil beliefs disappearing.

Transitional qualities

MORAL. Humanity, honesty, affection, com-

passion, hope, faith, meekness, temperance.

PAGE 116

1 Third Degree: Understanding.

Reality

SPIRITUAL. Wisdom, purity, spiritual understanding,

3 spiritual power, love, health, holiness.

Spiritual universe

In the third degree mortal mind disappears, and man as

God's image appears. Science so reverses the evidence

6 before the corporeal human senses, as to make

this Scriptural testimony true in our hearts,

"The last shall be first, and the first last," so that God

9 and His idea may be to us what divinity really is and

must of necessity be, - all-inclusive.

Aim of Science

A correct view of Christian Science and of its adapta-

12 tion to healing includes vastly more than is at first seen.

Works on metaphysics leave the grand point

untouched. They never crown the power of

15 Mind as the Messiah, nor do they carry the day against

physical enemies, - even to the extinction of all belief in

matter, evil, disease, and death, - nor insist upon the fact

18 that God is all, therefore that matter is nothing beyond an

image in mortal mind.

Divine personality

Christian Science strongly emphasizes the thought that

21 God is not corporeal, but incorporeal, - that is,

bodiless. Mortals are corporeal, but God is

incorporeal.

24 As the words person and personal are commonly and

ignorantly employed, they often lead, when applied to

Deity, to confused and erroneous conceptions of divinity

27 and its distinction from humanity. If the term personality,

as applied to God, means infinite personality, then God is

infinite Person, - in the sense of infinite personality, but

30 not in the lower sense. An infinite Mind in a finite form

is an absolute impossibility.

PAGE 117

1 The term individuality is also open to objections, be-

cause an individual may be one of a series, one of many,

3 as an individual man, an individual horse; whereas God

is One, - not one of a series, but one alone and without

an equal.

Spiritual language

6 God is Spirit; therefore the language of Spirit must

be, and is, spiritual. Christian Science attaches no physi-

cal nature and significance to the Supreme

9 Being or His manifestation; mortals alone do

this. God's essential language is spoken of in the last

chapter of Mark's Gospel as the new tongue, the spir-

12 itual meaning of which is attained through "signs

following."

The miracles of Jesus

Ear hath not heard, nor hath lip spoken, the pure lan-

15 guage of Spirit. Our Master taught spirituality by simili-

tudes and parables. As a divine student he

unfolded God to man, illustrating and demon-

18 strating Life and Truth in himself and by his power over

the sick and sinning. Human theories are inadequate to

interpret the divine Principle involved in the miracles

21 (marvels) wrought by Jesus and especially in his mighty,

crowning, unparalleled, and triumphant exit from the

flesh.

Opacity of the senses

24 Evidence drawn from the five physical senses relates

solely to human reason; and because of opaci-

ty to the true light, human reason dimly re-

27 flects and feebly transmits Jesus' works and words. Truth

is a revelation.

Leaven of Truth

Jesus bade his disciples beware of the leaven of the

30 Pharisees and of the Sadducees, which he de-

fined as human doctrines. His parable of the

"leaven, which a woman took, and hid in three measures

PAGE 118

1 of meal, till the whole was leavened," impels the infer-

ence that the spiritual leaven signifies the Science of Christ

3 and its spiritual interpretation, - an inference far above

the merely ecclesiastical and formal applications of the

illustration.

6 Did not this parable point a moral with a prophecy,

foretelling the second appearing in the flesh of the

Christ, Truth, hidden in sacred secrecy from the visi-

9 ble world?

Ages pass, but this leaven of Truth is ever at work. It

must destroy the entire mass of error, and so be eternally

12 glorified in man's spiritual freedom.

The divine and human contrasted

In their spiritual significance, Science, Theology, and

Medicine are means of divine thought, which include spirit-

15 ual laws emanating from the invisible and in-

finite power and grace. The parable may

import that these spiritual laws, perverted by

18 a perverse material sense of law, are metaphysically pre-

sented as three measures of meal, - that is, three modes

of mortal thought. In all mortal forms of thought, dust

21 is dignified as the natural status of men and things, and

modes of material motion are honored with the name of

laws. This continues until the leaven of Spirit changes

24 the whole of mortal thought, as yeast changes the chemical

properties of meal.

Certain contradictions

The definitions of material law, as given by natural

27 science, represent a kingdom necessarily divided against

itself, because these definitions portray law as

physical, not spiritual. Therefore they con-

30 tradict the divine decrees and violate the law of Love, in

which nature and God are one and the natural order of

heaven comes down to earth.

PAGE 119

Unescapable dilemma

1 When we endow matter with vague spiritual power,

that is, when we do so in our theories, for of course we

3 cannot really endow matter with what it does

not and cannot possess, - we disown the Al-

mighty, for such theories lead to one of two things. They

6 either presuppose the self-evolution and self-government

of matter, or else they assume that matter is the product

of Spirit. To seize the first horn of this dilemma and con-

9 sider matter as a power in and of itself, is to leave the cre-

ator out of His own universe; while to grasp the other

horn of the dilemma and regard God as the creator of

12 matter, is not only to make Him responsible for all disas-

ters, physical and moral, but to announce Him as their

source, thereby making Him guilty of maintaining perpet-

15 ual misrule in the form and under the name of natural

law.

God and nature

In one sense God is identical with nature, but this na-

18 ture is spiritual and is not expressed in matter. The law-

giver, whose lightning palsies or prostrates in

death the child at prayer, is not the divine ideal

21 of omnipresent Love. God is natural good, and is repre-

sented only by the idea of goodness; while evil should be

regarded as unnatural, because it is opposed to the nature

24 of Spirit, God.

The sun and Soul

In viewing the sunrise, one finds that it contradicts

the evidence before the senses to believe that the earth

27 is in motion and the sun at rest. As astron-

omy reverses the human perception of the

movement of the solar system, so Christian Science re-

30 verses the seeming relation of Soul and body and makes

body tributary to Mind. Thus it is with man, who

is but the humble servant of the restful Mind, though it

PAGE 120

1 seems otherwise to finite sense. But we shall never under-

stand this while we admit that soul is in body or mind in

3 matter, and that man is included in non-intelligence.

Soul, or Spirit, is God, unchangeable and eternal; and

man coexists with and reflects Soul, God, for man is God's

6 image.

Reversal of testimony

Science reverses the false testimony of the physical

senses, and by this reversal mortals arrive at the funda-

9 mental facts of being. Then the question in-

evitably arises: Is a man sick if the material

senses indicate that he is in good health? No! for matter

12 can make no conditions for man. And is he well if the

senses say he is sick? Yes, he is well in Science in which

health is normal and disease is abnormal.

Health and the senses

15 Health is not a condition of matter, but of Mind; nor

can the material senses bear reliable testimony on the sub-

ject of health. The Science of Mind-healing

18 shows it to be impossible for aught but Mind

to testify truly or to exhibit the real status of man. There-

fore the divine Principle of Science, reversing the testi-

21 mony of the physical senses, reveals man as harmoniously

existent in Truth, which is the only basis of health; and

thus Science denies all disease, heals the sick, overthrows

24 false evidence, and refutes materialistic logic.

Any conclusion pro or con, deduced from supposed sen-

sation in matter or from matter's supposed consciousness

27 of health or disease, instead of reversing the testimony of

the physical senses, confirms that testimony as legitimate

and so leads to disease.

Historic illustrations

30 When Columbus gave freer breath to the

globe, ignorance and superstition chained the

limbs of the brave old navigator, and disgrace and star-

PAGE 121

1 vation stared him in the face; but sterner still would have

been his fate, if his discovery had undermined the favor-

3 ite inclinations of a sensuous philosophy.

Copernicus mapped out the stellar system, and before

he spake, astrography was chaotic, and the heavenly fields

6 were incorrectly explored.

Perennial beauty

The Chaldean Wisemen read in the stars the fate of

empires and the fortunes of men. Though no higher

9 revelation than the horoscope was to them dis-

played upon the empyrean, earth and heaven

were bright, and bird and blossom were glad in God's

12 perennial and happy sunshine, golden with Truth. So

we have goodness and beauty to gladden the heart; but

man, left to the hypotheses of material sense unexplained

15 by Science, is as the wandering comet or the desolate

star - "a weary searcher for a viewless home."

Astronomic unfoldings

The earth's diurnal rotation is invisible to the physical

18 eye, and the sun seems to move from east to west, instead

of the earth from west to east. Until rebuked

by clearer views of the everlasting facts, this

21 false testimony of the eye deluded the judgment and in-

duced false conclusions. Science shows appearances often

to be erroneous, and corrects these errors by the simple

24 rule that the greater controls the lesser. The sun is the

central stillness, so far as our solar system is concerned,

and the earth revolves about the sun once a year, besides

27 turning daily on its own axis.

As thus indicated, astronomical order imitates the

action of divine Principle; and the universe, the reflec-

30 tion of God, is thus brought nearer the spiritual fact, and

is allied to divine Science as displayed in the everlasting

government of the universe.

PAGE 122

Opposing testimony

1 The evidence of the physical senses often reverses the

real Science of being, and so creates a reign of discord, -

3 assigning seeming power to sin, sickness, and

death; but the great facts of Life, rightly un-

derstood, defeat this triad of errors, contradict their false

6 witnesses, and reveal the kingdom of heaven, - the actual

reign of harmony on earth. The material senses' re-

versal of the Science of Soul was practically exposed nine-

9 teen hundred years ago by the demonstrations of Jesus;

yet these so-called senses still make mortal mind tributary

to mortal body, and ordain certain sections of matter, such

12 as brain and nerves, as the seats of pain and pleasure,

from which matter reports to this so-called mind its status

of happiness or misery.

Testimony of the senses

15 The optical focus is another proof of the illusion of

material sense. On the eye's retina, sky and tree-tops

apparently join hands, clouds and ocean meet

18 and mingle. The barometer, - that little

prophet of storm and sunshine, denying the testimony of

the senses, - points to fair weather in the midst of murky

21 clouds and drenching rain. Experience is full of instances

of similar illusions, which every thinker can recall for

himself.

Spiritual sense of life

24 To material sense, the severance of the jugular vein

takes away life; but to spiritual sense and

in Science, Life goes on unchanged and

27 being is eternal. Temporal life is a false sense of

existence.

Ptolemaic and psychical error

Our theories make the same mistake regarding Soul

30 and body that Ptolemy made regarding the solar system.

They insist that soul is in body and mind therefore tribu-

tary to matter. Astronomical science has destroyed the

PAGE 123

1 false theory as to the relations of the celestial bodies, and

Christian Science will surely destroy the greater error as

3 to our terrestrial bodies. The true idea and

Principle of man will then appear. The Ptole-

maic blunder could not affect the harmony of

6 being as does the error relating to soul and body, which

reverses the order of Science and assigns to matter the

power and prerogative of Spirit, so that man becomes

9 the most absolutely weak and inharmonious creature in

the universe.

Seeming and being

The verity of Mind shows conclusively how it is that

12 matter seems to be, but is not. Divine Science,

rising above physical theories, excludes matter,

resolves things into thoughts, and replaces the objects of

15 material sense with spiritual ideas.

The term CHRISTIAN SCIENCE was introduced by

the author to designate the scientific system of divine

18 healing.

The revelation consists of two parts:

1. The discovery of this divine Science of Mind-

21 healing, through a spiritual sense of the Scriptures and

through the teachings of the Comforter, as promised by

the Master.

24 2. The proof, by present demonstration, that the so-

called miracles of Jesus did not specially belong to a

dispensation now ended, but that they illustrated an

27 ever-operative divine Principle. The operation of this

Principle indicates the eternality of the scientific order

and continuity of being.

Scientific basis

30 Christian Science differs from material sci-

ence, but not on that account is it less scien-

tific. On the contrary, Christian Science is pre-emi-

PAGE 124

1 mently scientific, being based on Truth, the Principle of

all science.

Physical science a blind belief

3 Physical science (so-called) is human knowledge, - a

law of mortal mind, a blind belief, a Samson shorn of his

strength. When this human belief lacks organ-

6 izations to support it, its foundations are gone.

Having neither moral might, spiritual basis,

nor holy Principle of its own, this belief mistakes effect

9 for cause and seeks to find life and intelligence in matter,

thus limiting Life and holding fast to discord and death.

In a word, human belief is a blind conclusion from material

12 reasoning. This is a mortal, finite sense of things, which

immortal Spirit silences forever.

Right interpretation

The universe, like man, is to be interpreted by Science

15 from its divine Principle, God, and then it can be under-

stood; but when explained on the basis of

physical sense and represented as subject to

18 growth, maturity, and decay, the universe, like man, is,

and must continue to be, an enigma.

All force mental

Adhesion, cohesion, and attraction are properties of

21 Mind. They belong to divine Principle, and support

the equipoise of that thought-force, which

launched the earth in its orbit and said to the

24 proud wave, "Thus far and no farther."

Spirit is the life, substance, and continuity of all

things. We tread on forces. Withdraw them, and

27 creation must collapse. Human knowledge calls them

forces of matter; but divine Science declares that they

belong wholly to divine Mind, are inherent in this

30 Mind, and so restores them to their rightful home and

classification.

Corporeal changes

The elements and functions of the physical body and

PAGE 125

1 of the physical world will change as mortal mind changes

its beliefs. What is now considered the best condition

3 for organic and functional health in the human

body may no longer be found indispensable

to health. Moral conditions will be found always har-

6 monious and health-giving. Neither organic inaction

nor overaction is beyond God's control; and man will

be found normal and natural to changed mortal thought,

9 and therefore more harmonious in his manifestations than

he was in the prior states which human belief created and

sanctioned.

12 As human thought changes from one stage to an-

other of conscious pain and painlessness, sorrow and

joy, - from fear to hope and from faith to understand-

15 ing, - the visible manifestation will at last be man gov-

erned by Soul, not by material sense. Reflecting God's

government, man is self-governed. When subordinate

18 to the divine Spirit, man cannot be controlled by sin or

death, thus proving our material theories about laws of

health to be valueless.

The time and tide

21 The seasons will come and go with changes of time and

tide, cold and heat, latitude and longitude. The agri-

culturist will find that these changes cannot

24 affect his crops. "As a vesture shalt Thou

change them and they shall be changed." The mariner

will have dominion over the atmosphere and the great

27 deep, over the fish of the sea and the fowls of the air.

The astronomer will no longer look up to the stars, -

he will look out from them upon the universe; and the

30 florist will find his flower before its seed.

Mortal nothingness

Thus matter will finally be proved nothing more

than a mortal belief, wholly inadequate to affect a man

PAGE 126

1 through its supposed organic action or supposed exist-

ence. Error will be no longer used in stating truth. The

3 problem of nothingness, or "dust to dust," will

be solved, and mortal mind will be without

form and void, for mortality will cease when man beholds

6 himself God's reflection, even as man sees his reflection

in a glass.

A lack of originality

All Science is divine. Human thought never pro-

9 jected the least portion of true being. Human belief

has sought and interpreted in its own way

the echo of Spirit, and so seems to have

12 reversed it and repeated it materially; but the human

mind never produced a real tone nor sent forth a positive

sound.

Antagonistic questions

15 The point at issue between Christian Science on the

one hand and popular theology on the other is this: Shall

Science explain cause and effect as being

18 both natural and spiritual? Or shall all that

is beyond the cognizance of the material senses be called

supernatural, and be left to the mercy of speculative

21 hypotheses?

Biblical basis

I have set forth Christian Science and its application

to the treatment of disease just as I have discovered them.

24 I have demonstrated through Mind the effects

of Truth on the health, longevity, and morals

of men; and I have found nothing in ancient or in modern

27 systems on which to found my own, except the teachings

and demonstrations of our great Master and the lives of

prophets and apostles. The Bible has been my only au-

30 thority. I have had no other guide in "the straight and

narrow way" of Truth.

Science and Christianity

If Christendom resists the author's application of the

PAGE 127

1 word Science to Christianity, or questions her use of the

word Science, she will not therefore lose faith in Chris-

3 tianity, nor will Christianity lose its hold upon

her. If God, the All-in-all, be the creator of

the spiritual universe, including man, then everything

6 entitled to a classification as truth, or Science, must be

comprised in a knowledge or understanding of God, for

there can be nothing beyond illimitable divinity.

Scientific terms

9 The terms Divine Science, Spiritual Science, Christ

Science or Christian Science, or Science alone, she em-

ploys interchangeably, according to the re-

12 quirements of the context. These synony-

mous terms stand for everything relating to God, the in-

finite, supreme, eternal Mind. It may be said, however,

15 that the term Christian Science relates especially to

Science as applied to humanity. Christian Science re-

veals God, not as the author of sin, sickness, and death,

18 but as divine Principle, Supreme Being, Mind, exempt

from all evil. It teaches that matter is the falsity, not

the fact, of existence; that nerves, brain, stomach, lungs,

21 and so forth, have - as matter - no intelligence, life, nor

sensation.

No physical science

There is no physical science, inasmuch as all truth

24 proceeds from the divine Mind. Therefore truth is not

human, and is not a law of matter, for matter

is not a lawgiver. Science is an emanation of

27 divine Mind, and is alone able to interpret God aright.

It has a spiritual, and not a material origin. It is a divine

utterance, - the Comforter which leadeth into all truth.

30 Christian Science eschews what is called natural science,

in so far as this is built on the false hypotheses that matter

is its own lawgiver, that law is founded on material con-

PAGE 128

1 ditions, and that these are final and overrule the might of

divine Mind. Good is natural and primitive. It is not

3 miraculous to itself.

Practical Science

The term Science, properly understood, refers only to

the laws of God and to His government of the universe,

6 inclusive of man. From this it follows that

business men and cultured scholars have found

that Christian Science enhances their endurance and

9 mental powers, enlarges their perception of character,

gives them acuteness and comprehensiveness and an

ability to exceed their ordinary capacity. The human

12 mind, imbued with this spiritual understanding, becomes

more elastic, is capable of greater endurance, escapes

somewhat from itself, and requires less repose. A knowl-

15 edge of the Science of being develops the latent abilities

and possibilities of man. It extends the atmosphere of

thought, giving mortals access to broader and higher

18 realms. It raises the thinker into his native air of insight

and perspicacity.

An odor becomes beneficent and agreeable only in pro-

21 portion to its escape into the surrounding atmosphere.

So it is with our knowledge of Truth. If one would

not quarrel with his fellow-man for waking him from

24 a cataleptic nightmare, he should not resist Truth, which

banishes - yea, forever destroys with the higher testi-

mony of Spirit - the so-called evidence of matter.

Mathematics and scientific logic

27 Science relates to Mind, not matter. It rests on fixed

Principle and not upon the judgment of false sensation.

The addition of two sums in mathematics must

30 always bring the same result. So is it with

logic. If both the major and the minor propo-

sitions of a syllogism are correct, the conclusion, if properly

PAGE 129

1 drawn, cannot be false. So in Christian Science there

are no discords nor contradictions, because its logic is as

3 harmonious as the reasoning of an accurately stated syl-

logism or of a properly computed sum in arithmetic.

Truth is ever truthful, and can tolerate no error in

6 premise or conclusion.

Truth by inversion

If you wish to know the spiritual fact, you can dis-

cover it by reversing the material fable, be the

9 fable pro or con, - be it in accord with your

preconceptions or utterly contrary to them.

Antagonistic theories

Pantheism may be defined as a belief in the intelli-

12 gence of matter, - a belief which Science overthrows.

In those days there will be "great tribulation

such as was not since the beginning of the

15 world;" and earth will echo the cry, "Art thou [Truth]

come hither to torment us before the time?" Animal

magnetism, hypnotism, spiritualism, theosophy, agnos-

18 ticism, pantheism, and infidelity are antagonistic to true

being and fatal to its demonstration; and so are some

other systems.

Ontology needed

21 We must abandon pharmaceutics, and take up ontol-

ogy, - "the science of real being." We must look deep

into realism instead of accepting only the out-

24 ward sense of things. Can we gather peaches

from a pine-tree, or learn from discord the concord of

being? Yet quite as rational are some of the leading

27 illusions along the path which Science must tread in its

reformatory mission among mortals. The very name,

illusion, points to nothingness.

Reluctant guests

30 The generous liver may object to the author's small

estimate of the pleasures of the table. The sinner sees,

in the system taught in this book, that the demands of

PAGE 130

1 God must be met. The petty intellect is alarmed by con-

stant appeals to Mind. The licentious disposition is dis-

3 couraged over its slight spiritual prospects.

When all men are bidden to the feast, the ex-

cuses come. One has a farm, another has merchandise,

6 and therefore they cannot accept.

Excuses for ignorance

It is vain to speak dishonestly of divine Science, which

destroys all discord, when you can demonstrate

9 the actuality of Science. It is unwise to doubt

if reality is in perfect harmony with God, divine Principle,

- if Science, when understood and demonstrated, will

12 destroy all discord, - since you admit that God is om-

nipotent; for from this premise it follows that good and

its sweet concords have all-power.

Children and adults

15 Christian Science, properly understood, would dis-

abuse the human mind of material beliefs which war

against spiritual facts; and these material

18 beliefs must be denied and cast out to make

place for truth. You cannot add to the contents of a

vessel already full. Laboring long to shake the adult's

21 faith in matter and to inculcate a grain of faith in God, -

an inkling of the ability of Spirit to make the body har-

monious, - the author has often remembered our Master's

24 love for little children, and understood how truly such as

they belong to the heavenly kingdom.

All evil unnatural

If thought is startled at the strong claim of Science

27 for the supremacy of God, or Truth, and doubts the su-

premacy of good, ought we not, contrari-

wise, to be astounded at the vigorous claims

30 of evil and doubt them, and no longer think it natural to

love sin and unnatural to forsake it, - no longer imagine

evil to be ever-present and good absent? Truth should

PAGE 131

1 not seem so surprising and unnatural as error, and error

should not seem so real as truth. Sickness should not seem

3 so real as health. There is no error in Science, and our

lives must be governed by reality in order to be in har-

mony with God, the divine Principle of all being.

The error of carnality

6 When once destroyed by divine Science, the false evi-

dence before the corporeal senses disappears. Hence the

opposition of sensuous man to the Science of

9 Soul and the significance of the Scripture, "The

carnal mind is enmity against God." The central fact of

the Bible is the superiority of spiritual over physical power.

12 THEOLOGY

Churchly neglect

Must Christian Science come through the Christian

churches as some persons insist? This Science has come

15 already, after the manner of God's appoint-

ing, but the churches seem not ready to re-

ceive it, according to the Scriptural saying, "He came

18 unto his own, and his own received him not." Jesus once

said: "I thank Thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and

earth, that Thou hast hid these things from the wise

21 and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes: even

so, Father, for so it seemed good in Thy sight." As afore-

time, the spirit of the Christ, which taketh away the cere-

24 monies and doctrines of men, is not accepted until the

hearts of men are made ready for it.

John the Baptist, and the Messiah

The mission of Jesus confirmed prophecy, and ex-

27 plained the so-called miracles of olden time as natural

demonstrations of the divine power, demonstra- ,

tions which were not understood. Jesus' works

30 established his claim to the Messiahship. In

reply to John's inquiry, "Art thou he that should come,"

PAGE 132

1 Jesus returned an affirmative reply, recounting his works

instead of referring to his doctrine, confident that this

3 exhibition of the divine power to heal would fully an-

swer the question. Hence his reply: "Go and show

John again those things which ye do hear and see: the

6 blind receive their sight and the lame walk, the lepers

are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up,

and the poor have the gospel preached to them. And

9 blessed is he, whosoever shall not be offended in me." In

other words, he gave his benediction to any one who

should not deny that such effects, coming from divine

12 Mind, prove the unity of God, - the divine principle

which brings out all harmony.

Christ rejected

The Pharisees of old thrust the spiritual idea and the

15 man who lived it out of their synagogues, and retained

their materialistic beliefs about God. Jesus'

system of healing received no aid nor approval

18 from other sanitary or religious systems, from doctrines

of physics or of divinity; and it has not yet been gener-

ally accepted. To-day, as of yore, unconscious of the

21 reappearing of the spiritual idea, blind belief shuts the

door upon it, and condemns the cure of the sick and sin-

ning if it is wrought on any but a material and a doctrinal

24 theory. Anticipating this rejection of idealism, of the

true idea of God, - this salvation from all error, physi-

cal and mental, - Jesus asked, "When the Son of man

27 cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?"

John's misgivings

Did the doctrines of John the Baptist confer healing

power upon him, or endow him with the truest concep-

30 tion of the Christ? This righteous preacher

once pointed his disciples to Jesus as "the

Lamb of God;" yet afterwards he seriously questioned

PAGE 133

1 the signs of the Messianic appearing, and sent the inquiry

to Jesus, "Art thou he that should come?"

Faith according to works

3 Was John's faith greater than that of the Samaritan

woman, who said, "Is not this the Christ?"

There was also a certain centurion of whose

6 faith Jesus himself declared, "I have not found so great

faith, no, not in Israel."

In Egypt, it was Mind which saved the Israelites from

9 belief in the plagues. In the wilderness, streams flowed

from the rock, and manna fell from the sky. The Israelites

looked upon the brazen serpent, and straightway believed

12 that they were healed of the poisonous stings of vipers.

In national prosperity, miracles attended the successes of

the Hebrews; but when they departed from the true

15 idea, their demoralization began. Even in captivity

among foreign nations, the divine Principle wrought

wonders for the people of God in the fiery furnace and

18 in kings' palaces.

Judaism antipathetic

Judaism was the antithesis of Christianity, because

Judaism engendered the limited form of a national or

21 tribal religion. It was a finite and material

system, carried out in special theories concern-

ing God, man, sanitary methods, and a religious cultus.

24 That he made "himself equal with God," was one of the

Jewish accusations against him who planted Christianity

on the foundation of Spirit, who taught as he was in-

27 spired by the Father and would recognize no life, intelli-

gence, nor substance outside of God.

Priestly learning

The Jewish conception of God, as Yawah, Jehovah,

30 or only a mighty hero and king, has not quite

given place to the true knowledge of God.

Creeds and rituals have not cleansed their hands of

PAGE 134

1 rabbinical lore. To-day the cry of bygone ages is re-

peated, "Crucify him!" At every advancing step, truth

3 is still opposed with sword and spear.

Testimony of martyrs

The word martyr, from the Greek, means witness; but

those who testified for Truth were so often persecuted

6 unto death, that at length the word martyr

was narrowed in its significance and so has

come always to mean one who suffers for his convictions.

9 The new faith in the Christ, Truth, so roused the hatred

of the opponents of Christianity, that the followers of

Christ were burned, crucified, and otherwise persecuted;

12 and so it came about that human rights were hallowed

by the gallows and the cross.

Absence of Christ-power

Man-made doctrines are waning. They have not waxed

15 strong in times of trouble. Devoid of the Christ-power,

how can they illustrate the doctrines of Christ

or the miracles of grace? Denial of the possi-

18 bility of Christian healing robs Christianity of the very

element, which gave it divine force and its astonishing and

unequalled success in the first century.

Basis of miracles

21 The true Logos is demonstrably Christian Science, the

natural law of harmony which overcomes discord, - not

because this Science is supernatural or pre-

24 ternatural, nor because it is an infraction of

divine law, but because it is the immutable law of God,

good. Jesus said: "I knew that Thou hearest me al-

27 ways;" and he raised Lazarus from the dead, stilled the

tempest, healed the sick, walked on the water. There

is divine authority for believing in the superiority of

30 spiritual power over material resistance.

Lawful wonders

A miracle fulfils God's law, but does not violate that

law. This fact at present seems more mysterious than

PAGE 135

1 the miracle itself. The Psalmist sang: "What ailed

thee, O thou sea, that thou fleddest? Thou Jordan,

3 that thou wast driven back? Ye mountains,

that ye skipped like rams, and ye little hills,

like lambs? Tremble, thou earth, at the presence of the

6 Lord, at the presence of the God of Jacob." The miracle

introduces no disorder, but unfolds the primal order,

establishing the Science of God's unchangeable law.

9 Spiritual evolution alone is worthy of the exercise of

divine power.

Fear and sickness identical

The same power which heals sin heals also sickness.

12 This is "the beauty of holiness," that when Truth heals

the sick it casts out evils, and when Truth

casts out the evil called disease, it heals the

15 sick. When Christ cast out the devil of

dumbness, "it came to pass, when the devil was gone out,

the dumb spake." There is to-day danger of repeating

18 the offence of the Jews by limiting the Holy One of Israel

and asking: "Can God furnish a table in the wilderness?"

What cannot God do?

The unity of Science and Christianity

21 It has been said, and truly, that Christianity must be

Science, and Science must be Christianity, else one or the

other is false and useless; but neither is unim-

24 portant or untrue, and they are alike in demon-

stration. This proves the one to be identical

with the other. Christianity as Jesus taught it was not

27 a creed, nor a system of ceremonies, nor a special gift

from a ritualistic Jehovah; but it was the demonstration

of divine Love casting out error and healing the sick,

30 not merely in the name of Christ, or Truth, but in demon-

stration of Truth, as must be the case in the cycles of

divine light.

PAGE 136

The Christ-mission

1 Jesus established his church and maintained his mission

on a spiritual foundation of Christ-healing. He taught

3 his followers that his religion had a divine

Principle, which would cast out error and heal

both the sick and the sinning. He claimed no intelli-

6 gence, action, nor life separate from God. Despite the

persecution this brought upon him, he used his divine

power to save men both bodily and spiritually.

Ancient spiritualism

9 The question then as now was, How did Jesus heal the

sick? His answer to this question the world rejected.

He appealed to his students: "Whom do

12 men say that I, the Son of man, am?" That

is: Who or what is it that is thus identified with casting

out evils and healing the sick? They replied, "Some

15 say that thou art John the Baptist; some, Elias; and

others, Jeremias, or one of the prophets." These prophets

were considered dead, and this reply may indicate that

18 some of the people believed that Jesus was a medium,

controlled by the spirit of John or of Elias.

This ghostly fancy was repeated by Herod himself.

21 That a wicked king and debauched husband should have

no high appreciation of divine Science and the great work

of the Master, was not surprising; for how could such

24 a sinner comprehend what the disciples did not fully

understand? But even Herod doubted if Jesus was con-

trolled by the sainted preacher. Hence Herod's asser-

27 tion: "John have I beheaded: but who is this?" No

wonder Herod desired to see the new Teacher.

Doubting disciples

The disciples apprehended their Master better than

30 did others; but they did not comprehend all

that he said and did, or they would not have

questioned him so often. Jesus patiently persisted in

PAGE 137

1 teaching and demonstrating the truth of being. His stu-

dents saw this power of Truth heal the sick, cast out evil,

3 raise the dead; but the ultimate of this wonderful work

was not spiritually discerned, even by them, until after the

crucifixion, when their immaculate Teacher stood before

6 them, the victor over sickness, sin, disease, death, and

the grave.

Yearning to be understood, the Master repeated,

9 "But whom say ye that I am?" This renewed inquiry

meant: Who or what is it that is able to do the work, so

mysterious to the popular mind? In his rejection of the

12 answer already given and his renewal of the question,

it is plain that Jesus completely eschewed the narrow

opinion implied in their citation of the common report

15 about him.

A divine response

With his usual impetuosity, Simon replied for his

brethren, and his reply set forth a great fact: "Thou

18 art the Christ, the Son of the living God!"

That is: The Messiah is what thou hast de-

clared, - Christ, the spirit of God, of Truth, Life, and

21 Love, which heals mentally. This assertion elicited from

Jesus the benediction, "Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-

jona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee,

24 but my Father which is in heaven;" that is, Love hath

shown thee the way of Life!

The true and living rock

Before this the impetuous disciple had been called

27 only by his common names, Simon Bar-jona, or son of

Jona; but now the Master gave him a spir-

itual name in these words: "And I say also

30 unto thee, That thou art Peter; and upon this rock [the

meaning of the Greek word petros, or stone] I will build

my church; and the gates of hell [hades, the under-

PAGE 138

1 world, or the grave] shall not prevail against it." In

other words, Jesus purposed founding his society, not

3 on the personal Peter as a mortal, but on the God-

power which lay behind Peter's confession of the true

Messiah.

Sublime summary

6 It was now evident to Peter that divine Life, Truth, and

Love, and not a human personality, was the healer of the

sick and a rock, a firm foundation in the realm

9 of harmony. On this spiritually scientific basis

Jesus explained his cures, which appeared miraculous to

outsiders. He showed that diseases were cast out neither

12 by corporeality, by materia medica, nor by hygiene, but by

the divine Spirit, casting out the errors of mortal mind.

The supremacy of Spirit was the foundation on which

15 Jesus built. His sublime summary points to the religion

of Love.

New era in Jesus

Jesus established in the Christian era the precedent for

18 all Christianity, theology, and healing. Christians are

under as direct orders now, as they were then,

to be Christlike, to possess the Christ-spirit, to

21 follow the Christ-example, and to heal the sick as well as

the sinning. It is easier for Christianity to cast out sick-

ness than sin, for the sick are more willing to part with

24 pain than are sinners to give up the sinful, so-called pleas-

ure of the senses. The Christian can prove this to-day as

readily is it was proved centuries ago.

Healthful theology

27 Our Master said to every follower: "Go ye into all the

world, and preach the gospel to every creature! . . .

Heal the sick! . . . Love thy neighbor as

30 thyself!" It was this theology of Jesus which

healed the sick and the sinning. It is his theology in this

book and the spiritual meaning of this theology, which

PAGE 139

1 heals the sick and causes the wicked to "forsake his way,

and the unrighteous man his thoughts." It was our Mas-

3 ter's theology which the impious sought to destroy.

Marvels and reformations

From beginning to end, the Scriptures are full of

accounts of the triumph of Spirit, Mind, over matter.

6 Moses proved the power of Mind by what men

called miracles ; so did Joshua, Elijah, and

Elisha. The Christian era was ushered in with signs and

9 wonders. Reforms have commonly been attended with

bloodshed and persecution, even when the end has been

brightness and peace; but the present new, yet old, re-

12 form in religious faith will teach men patiently and wisely

to stem the tide of sectarian bitterness, whenever it flows

inward.

Science obscured

15 The decisions by vote of Church Councils as to what

should and should not be considered Holy Writ; the man-

ifest mistakes in the ancient versions; the

18 thirty thousand different readings in the Old

Testament, and the three hundred thousand in the New,

- these facts show how a mortal and material sense stole

21 into the divine record, with its own hue darkening to some

extent the inspired pages. But mistakes could neither

wholly obscure the divine Science of the Scriptures seen

24 from Genesis to Revelation, mar the demonstration of

Jesus, nor annul the healing by the prophets, who foresaw

that "the stone which the builders rejected" would be-

27 come "the head of the corner."

Opponents benefited

Atheism, pantheism, theosophy, and agnosticism are

opposed to Christian Science, as they are to ordinary re-

30 ligion; but it does not follow that the profane

or atheistic invalid cannot be healed by Chris-

tian Science. The moral condition of such a man de-

PAGE 140

1 mands the remedy of Truth more than it is needed in most

cases; and Science is more than usually effectual in the

3 treatment of moral ailments.

God invisible to the senses

That God is a corporeal being, nobody can truly affirm.

The Bible represents Him as saying: "Thou canst not

6 see My face; for there shall no man see Me

and live." Not materially but spiritually we

know Him as divine Mind, as Life, Truth, and Love. We

9 shall obey and adore in proportion as we apprehend the

divine nature and love Him understandingly, warring no

more over the corporeality, but rejoicing in the affluence

12 of our God. Religion will then be of the heart and not of

the head. Mankind will no longer be tyrannical and pro-

scriptive from lack of love, - straining out gnats and

15 swallowing camels.

The true worship

We worship spiritually, only as we cease to worship

materially. Spiritual devoutness is the soul of Chris-

18 tianity. Worshipping through the medium of

matter is paganism. Judaic and other rituals

are but types and shadows of true worship. "The true

21 worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in

truth."

Anthropomorphism

The Jewish tribal Jehovah was a man-projected God,

24 liable to wrath, repentance, and human changeableness.

The Christian Science God is universal, eter-

nal, divine love, which changeth not and caus-

27 eth no evil, disease, nor death. It is indeed mournfully

true that the older Scripture is reversed. In the begin-

ing God created man in His, God's, image; but mor-

30 tals would procreate man, and make God in their own

human image. What is the god of a mortal, but a mortal

magnified?

PAGE 141

More than profession required

1 This indicates the distance between the theological and

ritualistic religion of the ages and the truth preached by

3 Jesus. More than profession is requisite for

Christian demonstration. Few understand or

adhere to Jesus' divine precepts for living and

6 healing. Why? Because his precepts require the disci-

ple to cut off the right hand and pluck out the right eye,

- that is, to set aside even the most cherished beliefs

9 and practices, to leave all for Christ.

No ecclesiastical monopoly

All revelation (such is the popular thought!) must come

from the schools and along the line of scholarly and eccle-

12 siastical descent, as kings are crowned from a

royal dynasty. In healing the sick and sinning,

Jesus elaborated the fact that the healing effect

15 followed the understanding of the divine Principle and

of the Christ-spirit which governed the corporeal Jesus.

For this Principle there is no dynasty, no ecclesiastical

18 monopoly. Its only crowned head is immortal sover-

eignty. Its only priest is the spiritualized man. The

Bible declares that all believers are made "kings and

21 priests unto God." The outsiders did not then, and

do not now, understand this ruling of the Christ; there-

fore they cannot demonstrate God's healing power.

24 Neither can this manifestation of Christ be com-

prehended, until its divine Principle is scientifically

understood.

A change demanded

27 The adoption of scientific religion and of divine heal-

ing will ameliorate sin, sickness, and death. Let our

pulpits do justice to Christian Science. Let

30 it have fair representation by the press. Give

to it the place in our institutions of learning now occu-

pied by scholastic theology and physiology, and it will

PAGE 142

1 eradicate sickness and sin in less time than the old systems,

devised for subduing them, have required for self-estab-

3 lishment and propagation.

Two claims omitted

Anciently the followers of Christ, or Truth, measured

Christianity by its power over sickness, sin, and death;

6 but modern religions generally omit all but one

of these powers, - the power over sin. We

must seek the undivided garment, the whole Christ, as our

9 first proof of Christianity, for Christ, Truth, alone can

furnish us with absolute evidence.

Selfishness and loss

If the soft palm, upturned to a lordly salary, and archi-

12 tectural skill, making dome and spire tremulous with

beauty, turn the poor and the stranger from the

gate, they at the same time shut the door on

15 progress. In vain do the manger and the cross tell their

story to pride and fustian. Sensuality palsies the right

hand, and causes the left to let go its grasp on the divine.

Temple cleansed

18 As in Jesus' time, so to-day, tyranny and pride need to

be whipped out of the temple, and humility and divine Sci-

ence to be welcomed in. The strong cords of

21 scientific demonstration, as twisted and wielded

by Jesus, are still needed to purge the temples of their

vain traffic in worldly worship and to make them meet

24 dwelling-places for the Most High.

MEDICINE

Question of precedence

Which was first, Mind or medicine? If Mind was

27 first and self-existent, then Mind, not matter, must have

been the first medicine. God being All-in-

all, He made medicine; but that medicine was

30 Mind. It could not have been matter, which departs

from the nature and character of Mind, God. Truth

PAGE 143

1 is God's remedy for error of every kind, and Truth de-

stroys only what is untrue. Hence the fact that, to-day,

3 as yesterday, Christ casts out evils and heals the

sick.

Methods rejected

It is plain that God does not employ drugs or hygiene,

6 nor provide them for human use; else Jesus would have

recommended and employed them in his heal-

ing. The sick are more deplorably lost than

9 the sinning, if the sick cannot rely on God for help and

the sinning can. The divine Mind never called matter

medicine, and matter required a material and human be-

12 lief before it could be considered as medicine.

Error not curative

Sometimes the human mind uses one error to medi-

cine another. Driven to choose between two difficulties,

15 the human mind takes the lesser to relieve the

greater. On this basis it saves from starva-

tion by theft, and quiets pain with anodynes. You

18 admit that mind influences the body somewhat, but

you conclude that the stomach, blood, nerves, bones,

etc., hold the preponderance of power. Controlled by

21 this belief, you continue in the old routine. You lean on

the inert and unintelligent, never discerning how this de-

prives you of the available superiority of divine Mind.

24 The body is not controlled scientifically by a negative

mind.

Impossible coalescence

Mind is the grand creator, and there can be no power

27 except that which is derived from Mind. If Mind was

first chronologically, is first potentially, and

must be first eternally, then give to Mind the

30 glory, honor, dominion, and power everlastingly due its

holy name. Inferior and unspiritual methods of healing

may try to make Mind and drugs coalesce, but the two will

PAGE 144

1 not mingle scientifically. Why should we wish to make

them do so, since no good can come of it?

3 If Mind is foremost and superior, let us rely upon Mind,

which needs no cooperation from lower powers, even if

these so-called powers are real.

6 Naught is the squire, when the king is nigh;

Withdraws the star, when dawns the sun's brave light.

Soul and sense

The various mortal beliefs formulated in human philoso-

9 phy, physiology, hygiene, are mainly predicated of matter,

and afford faint gleams of God, or Truth.

The more material a belief, the more obstinately

12 tenacious its error; the stronger are the manifestations of

the corporeal senses, the weaker the indications of Soul.

Will-power detrimental

Human will-power is not Science. Human will belongs

15 to the so-called material senses, and its use is to be con-

demned. Willing the sick to recover is not the

metaphysical practice of Christian Science, but

18 is sheer animal magnetism. Human will-power may in-

fringe the rights of man. It produces evil continually,

and is not a factor in the realism of being. Truth, and

21 not corporeal will, is the divine power which says to

disease, "Peace, be still."

Conservative antagonism

Because divine Science wars with so-called physical

24 science, even as Truth wars with error, the old schools

still oppose it. Ignorance, pride, or prejudice

closes the door to whatever is not stereotyped.

27 When the Science of being is universally understood,

every man will be his own physician, and Truth will be

the universal panacea.

Ancient healers

30 It is a question to-day, whether the ancient inspired

healers understood the Science of Christian healing, or

PAGE 145

1 whether they caught its sweet tones, as the natural

musician catches the tones of harmony, without being

3 able to explain them. So divinely imbued

were they with the spirit of Science, that the

lack of the letter could not hinder their work; and that

6 letter, without the spirit, would have made void their

practice.

The struggle and victory

The struggle for the recovery of invalids goes on, not

9 between material methods, but between mortal minds

and immortal Mind. The victory will be on

the patient's side only as immortal Mind

12 through Christ, Truth, subdues the human belief in

disease. It matters not what material method one may

adopt, whether faith in drugs, trust in hygiene, or reliance

15 on some other minor curative.

Mystery of godliness

Scientific healing has this advantage over other meth-

ods, - that in it Truth controls error. From this fact

18 arise its ethical as well as its physical ef-

fects. Indeed, its ethical and physical effects

are indissolubly connected. If there is any mystery

21 in Christian healing, it is the mystery which godliness

always presents to the ungodly, - the mystery always

arising from ignorance of the laws of eternal and unerr-

24 ing Mind.

Matter versus matter

Other methods undertake to oppose error with error,

and thus they increase the antagonism of one form of

27 matter towards other forms of matter or error,

and the warfare between Spirit and the flesh

goes on. By this antagonism mortal mind must con-

30 tinually weaken its own assumed power.

How healing was lost

The theology of Christian Science includes healing

the sick. Our Master's first article of faith propounded

PAGE 146

1 to his students was healing, and he proved his faith by

his works. The ancient Christians were healers. Why

3 has this element of Christianity been lost?

Because our systems of religion are governed

more or less by our systems of medicine. The first idol-

6 atry was faith in matter. The schools have rendered

faith in drugs the fashion, rather than faith in Deity. By

trusting matter to destroy its own discord, health and

9 harmony have been sacrificed. Such systems are barren

of the vitality of spiritual power, by which material sense

is made the servant of Science and religion becomes

12 Christlike.

Drugs and divinity

Material medicine substitutes drugs for the power of

God - even the might of Mind - to heal the body.

15 Scholasticism clings for salvation to the per-

son, instead of to the divine Principle, of the

man Jesus; and his Science, the curative agent of God,

18 is silenced. Why? Because truth divests material drugs

of their imaginary power, and clothes Spirit with suprem-

acy. Science is the "stranger that is within thy gates,"

21 remembered not, even when its elevating effects prac-

tically prove its divine origin and efficacy.

Christian Science as old as God

Divine Science derives its sanction from the Bible,

24 and the divine origin of Science is demonstrated through

the holy influence of Truth in healing sick-

ness and sin. This healing power of Truth

27 must have been far anterior to the period in

which Jesus lived. It is as ancient as "the Ancient of

days." It lives through all Life, and extends throughout

30 all space.

Reduction to system

Divine metaphysics is now reduced to a system, to a

form comprehensible by and adapted to the thought of

PAGE 147

1 the age in which we live. This system enables the

learner to demonstrate the divine Principle,

3 upon which Jesus' healing was based, and

the sacred rules for its present application to the cure of

disease.

6 Late in the nineteenth century I demonstrated the divine

rules of Christian Science. They were submitted to the

broadest practical test, and everywhere, when honestly ap-

9 plied under circumstances where demonstration was hu-

manly possible, this Science showed that Truth had lost

none of its divine and healing efficacy, even though cen-

12 turies had passed away since Jesus practised these rules

on the hills of Judaea and in the valleys of Galilee.

Perusal and practice

Although this volume contains the complete Science of

15 Mind-healing, never believe that you can absorb the whole

meaning of the Science by a simple perusal

of this book. The book needs to be studied,

18 and the demonstration of the rules of scientific healing

will plant you firmly on the spiritual groundwork of

Christian Science. This proof lifts you high above the

21 perishing fossils of theories already antiquated, and en-

ables you to grasp the spiritual facts of being hitherto

unattained and seemingly dim.

A definite rule discovered

24 Our Master healed the sick, practised Christian heal-

ing, and taught the generalities of its divine Principle to

his students; but he left no definite rule for

27 demonstrating this Principle of healing and

preventing disease. This rule remained to be discovered

in Christian Science. A pure affection takes form in good-

30 ness, but Science alone reveals the divine Principle of

goodness and demonstrates its rules.

Jesus' own practice

Jesus never spoke of disease as dangerous or as difficult

PAGE 148

1 to heal. When his students brought to him a case they

had failed to heal, he said to them, "O faithless gen-

3 eration," implying that the requisite power

to heal was in Mind. He prescribed no drugs,

urged no obedience to material laws, but acted in direct

6 disobedience to them.

The man of anatomy and of theology

Neither anatomy nor theology has ever described man

as created by Spirit, - as God's man. The former ex-

9 plains the men of men, or the "children of

men," as created corporeally instead of spir-

itually and as emerging from the lowest, in-

12 stead of from the highest, conception of being. Both

anatomy and theology define man as both physical and

mental, and place mind at the mercy of matter for every

15 function, formation, and manifestation. Anatomy takes

up man at all points materially. It loses Spirit, drops the

true tone, and accepts the discord. Anatomy and the-

18 ology reject the divine Principle which produces harmo-

nious man, and deal - the one wholly, the other primarily

- with matter, calling that man which is not the counter-

21 part, but the counterfeit, of God's man. Then theology

tries to explain how to make this man a Christian, - how

from this basis of division and discord to produce the con-

24 cord and unity of Spirit and His likeness.

Physiology deficient

Physiology exalts matter, dethrones Mind, and claims

to rule man by material law, instead of spiritual. When

27 physiology fails to give health or life by this

process, it ignores the divine Spirit as unable

or unwilling to render help in time of physical need.

30 When mortals sin, this ruling of the schools leaves them

to the guidance of a theology which admits God to be

the healer of sin but not of sickness, although our great

PAGE 149

1 Master demonstrated that Truth could save from sickness

as well as from sin.

Blunders and blunderers

3 Mind as far outweighs drugs in the cure of disease as

in the cure of sin. The more excellent way is divine

Science in every case. Is materia medica a

6 science or a bundle of speculative human

theories? The prescription which succeeds in one in-

stance fails in another, and this is owing to the different

9 mental states of the patient. These states are not com-

prehended and they are left without explanation except

in Christian Science. The rule and its perfection of opera-

12 tion never vary in Science. If you fail to succeed in any

case, it is because you have not demonstrated the life of

Christ, Truth, more in your own life, - because you have

15 not obeyed the rule and proved the Principle of divine

Science.

Old-school physician

A physician of the old school remarked with great

18 gravity: "We know that mind affects the body some-

what, and advise our patients to be hopeful

and cheerful and to take as little medicine as

21 possible; but mind can never cure organic difficulties."

The logic is lame, and facts contradict it. The author

has cured what is termed organic disease as readily as she

24 has cured purely functional disease, and with no power

but the divine Mind.

Tests in our day

Since God, divine Mind, governs all, not partially but

27 supremely, predicting disease does not dignify therapeutics.

Whatever guides thought spiritually benefits

mind and body. We need to understand the

30 affirmations of divine Science, dismiss superstition, and

demonstrate truth according to Christ. To-day there

is hardly a city, village, or hamlet, in which are not to

PAGE 150

1 be found living witnesses and monuments to the virtue

and power of Truth, as applied through this Christian

3 system of healing disease.

The main purpose

To-day the healing power of Truth is widely demon-

strated as an immanent, eternal Science, instead of a

6 phenomenal exhibition. Its appearing is the

coming anew of the gospel of "on earth peace,

good-will toward men." This coming, as was promised

9 by the Master, is for its establishment as a permanent

dispensation among men; but the mission of Christian

Science now, as in the time of its earlier demonstration,

12 is not primarily one of physical healing. Now, as then,

signs and wonders are wrought in the metaphysical heal-

ing of physical disease; but these signs are only to demon-

15 strate its divine origin, - to attest the reality of the higher

mission of the Christ-power to take away the sins of the

world.

Exploded doctrine

18 The science (so-called) of physics would have one be-

lieve that both matter and mind are subject to disease,

and that, too, in spite of the individual's pro-

21 test and contrary to the law of divine Mind.

This human view infringes man's free moral agency; and

it is as evidently erroneous to the author, and will be to

24 all others at some future day, as the practically rejected

doctrine of the predestination of souls to damnation or

salvation. The doctrine that man's harmony is gov-

27 erned by physical conditions all his earthly days, and that

he is then thrust out of his own body by the operation of

matter, - even the doctrine of the superiority of matter

30 over Mind, - is fading out.

Disease mental

The hosts of AEsculapius are flooding the world with

diseases, because they are ignorant that the human mind

PAGE 151

1 and body are myths. To be sure, they sometimes treat

the sick as if there was but one factor in the case; but

3 this one factor they represent to be body, not

mind. Infinite Mind could not possibly create

a remedy outside of itself, but erring, finite, human mind

6 has an absolute need of something beyond itself for its

redemption and healing.

Intentions respected

Great respect is due the motives and philanthropy of

9 the higher class of physicians. We know that if they un-

derstood the Science of Mind-healing, and were

in possession of the enlarged power it confers

12 to benefit the race physically and spiritually, they would

rejoice with us. Even this one reform in medicine would

ultimately deliver mankind from the awful and oppres-

15 sive bondage now enforced by false theories, from which

multitudes would gladly escape.

Man governed by Mind

Mortal belief says that death has been occasioned by

18 fright. Fear never stopped being and its action. The

blood, heart, lungs, brain, etc., have nothing

to do with Life, God. Every function of the

21 real man is governed by the divine Mind. The human

mind has no power to kill or to cure, and it has no com-

trol over God's man. The divine Mind that made man

24 maintain His own image and likeness. The human

mind is opposed to God and must be put off, as St. Paul

declares. All that really exists is the divine Mind and

27 its idea, and in this Mind the entire being is found har-

monious and eternal. The straight and narrow way is to

see and acknowledge this fact, yield to this power, and

30 follow the leadings of truth.

Mortal mind dethroned

That mortal mind claims to govern every organ of the

mortal body, we have overwhelming proof. But this so-

PAGE 152

1 called mind is a myth, and must by its own consent yield

to Truth. It would wield the sceptre of a monarch, but

3 it is powerless. The immortal divine Mind

takes away all its supposed sovereignty, and

saves mortal mind from itself. The author has endeavored

6 to make this book the AEsculapius of mind as well as of

body, that it may give hope to the sick and heal them,

although they know not how the work is done. Truth

9 has a healing effect, even when not fully understood.

All activity from thought

Anatomy describes muscular action as produced by

mind in one instance and not in another. Such errors

12 beset every material theory, in which one

statement contradicts another over and over

again. It is related that Sir Humphry Davy once ap-

15 parently cured a case of paralysis simply by introducing

a thermometer into the patient's mouth. This he did

merely to ascertain the temperature of the patient's body;

18 but the sick man supposed this ceremony was intended

to heal him, and he recovered accordingly. Such a fact

illustrates our theories.

The author's experiments in medicine

21 The author's medical researches and experiments had

prepared her thought for the metaphysics of Christian

Science. Every material dependence had

24 failed her in her search for truth; and she can

now understand why, and can see the means

by which mortals are divinely driven to a spiritual source

27 for health and happiness.

Homoeopathic attenuations

Her experiments in homoeopathy had made her skep-

tical as to material curative methods. Jahr, from

30 Aconitum to Zincum oxydatum, enumerates

the general symptoms, the characteristic

signs, which demand different remedies; but the drug

PAGE 153

1 is frequently attenuated to such a degree that not a ves-

tige of it remains. Thus we learn that it is not the drug

3 which expels the disease or changes one of the symptoms

of disease.

Only salt and water

The author has attenuated Natrum muriaticum (com-

6 mon table-salt) until there was not a single saline property

left. The salt had "lost his savour;" and yet,

with one drop of that attenuation in a goblet of

9 water, and a teaspoonful of the water administered at in-

tervals of three hours, she has cured a patient sinking in

the last stage of typhoid fever. The highest attenuation

12 of homoeopathy and the most potent rises above matter into

mind. This discovery leads to more light. From it may

be learned that either human faith or the divine Mind is

15 the healer and that there is no efficacy in a drug.

Origin of pain

You say a boil is painful; but that is impossible, for

matter without mind is not painful. The boil simply

18 manifests, through inflammation and swell-

ing, a belief in pain, and this belief is called a

boil. Now administer mentally to your patient a high

21 attenuation of truth, and it will soon cure the boil. The

fact that pain cannot exist where there is no mortal mind

to feel it is a proof that this so-called mind makes its

24 own pain - that is, its own belief in pain.

Source of contagion

We weep because others weep, we yawn because they

yawn, and we have smallpox because others have it; but

27 mortal mind, not matter, contains and carries

the infection. When this mental contagion is

understood, we shall be more careful of our mental con-

30 ditions and we shall avoid loquacious tattling about

disease, as we would avoid advocating crime. Neither

sympathy nor society should ever tempt us to cherish

PAGE 154

1 error in any form, and certainly we should not be error's

advocate.

3 Disease arises, like other mental conditions, from as-

sociation. Since it is a law of mortal mind that certain

diseases should be regarded as contagious, this law ob-

6 tains credit through association, - calling up the fear that

creates the image of disease and its consequent manifes-

tation in the body.

Imaginary cholera

9 This fact in metaphysics is illustrated by the following

incident: A man was made to believe that he occupied a

bed where a cholera patient had died. Imme-

12 diately the symptoms of this disease appeared,

and the man died. The fact was, that he had not caught

the cholera by material contact, because no cholera patient

15 had been in that bed.

Children's ailments

If a child is exposed to contagion or infection, the

mother is frightened and says, "My child will be sick."

18 The law of mortal mind and her own fears gov-

ern her child more than the child's mind gov-

erns itself, and they produce the very results which might

21 have been prevented through the opposite understanding.

Then it is believed that exposure to the contagion wrought

the mischief.

24 That mother is not a Christian Scientist, and her affec-

tions need better guidance, who says to her child: "You

look sick," "You look tired," "You need rest," or "You

27 need medicine."

Such a mother runs to her little one, who thinks she has

hurt her face by falling on the carpet, and says, moaning

30 more childishly than her child, "Mamma knows you are

hurt." The better and more successful method for any

mother to adopt is to say: "Oh, never mind! You're not

PAGE 155

1 hurt, so don't think you are." Presently the child forgets

all about the accident, and is at play.

Drug-power mental

3 When the sick recover by the use of drugs, it is the law

of a general belief, culminating in individual faith, which

heals; and according to this faith will the effect

6 be. Even when you take away the individual

confidence in the drug, you have not yet divorced the drug

from the general faith. The chemist, the botanist, the

9 druggist, the doctor, and the nurse equip the medicine

with their faith, and the beliefs which are in the majority

rule. When the general belief endorses the inanimate

12 drug as doing this or that, individual dissent or faith, un-

less it rests on Science, is but a belief held by a minority,

and such a belief is governed by the majority.

Belief in physics

15 The universal belief in physics weighs against the high

and mighty truths of Christian metaphysics. This errone-

ous general belief, which sustains medicine and

18 produces all medical results, works against

Christian Science; and the percentage of power on the

side of this Science must mightily outweigh the power of

21 popular belief in order to heal a single case of disease. The

human mind acts more powerfully to offset the discords

of matter and the ills of flesh, in proportion as it puts less

24 weight into the material or fleshly scale and more weight

into the spiritual scale. Homoeopathy diminishes the

drug, but the potency of the medicine increases as the

27 drug disappears.

Nature of drugs

Vegetarianism, homoeopathy, and hydropathy have

diminished drugging; but if drugs are an antidote to

30 disease, why lessen the antidote? If drugs

are good things, is it safe to say that the

less in quantity you have of them the better? If drugs

PAGE 156

1 possess intrinsic virtues or intelligent curative qualities,

these qualities must be mental. Who named drugs, and

3 what made them good or bad for mortals, beneficial or

injurious?

Dropsy cured without drugs

A case of dropsy, given up by the faculty, fell into

6 my hands. It was a terrible case. Tapping had been

employed, and yet, as she lay in her bed, the

patient looked like a barrel. I prescribed

9 the fourth attenuation of Argentum nitratum with occa-

sional doses of a high attenuation of Sulphuris. She im-

proved perceptibly. Believing then somewhat in the

12 ordinary theories of medical practice, and learning that

her former physician had prescribed these remedies, I

began to fear an aggravation of symptoms from their

15 prolonged use, and told the patient so; but she was

unwilling to give up the medicine while she was re-

covering. It then occurred to me to give her un-

18 medicated pellets and watch the result. I did so, and

she continued to gain. Finally she said that she would

give up her medicine for one day, and risk the

21 effects. After trying this, she informed me that she

could get along two days without globules; but on

the third day she again suffered, and was relieved by

24 taking them. She went on in this way, taking the

unmedicated pellets, - and receiving occasional visits

from me, - but employing no other means, and she was

27 cured.

A stately advance

Metaphysics, as taught in Christian Science, is the

next stately step beyond homoeopathy. In metaphysics,

30 matter disappears from the remedy entirely,

and Mind takes its rightful and supreme

place. Homoeopathy takes mental symptoms largely

PAGE 157

1 into consideration in its diagnosis of disease. Christian

Science deals wholly with the mental cause in judging and

3 destroying disease. It succeeds where homoeopathy fails,

solely because its one recognized Principle of healing is

Mind, and the whole force of the mental element is em-

6 ployed through the Science of Mind, which never shares

its rights with inanimate matter.

The modus of homoeopathy

Christian Science exterminates the drug, and rests on

9 Mind alone as the curative Principle, acknowledging that

the divine Mind has all power. Homoeopathy

mentalizes a drug with such repetition of

12 thought-attenuations, that the drug becomes

more like the human mind than the substratum of this so-

called mind, which we call matter; and the drug's power

15 of action is proportionately increased.

Drugging unchristian

If drugs are part of God's creation, which (according

to the narrative in Genesis) He pronounced good, then

18 drugs cannot be poisonous. If He could cre-

ate drugs intrinsically bad, then they should

never be used. If He creates drugs at all and designs

21 them for medical use, why did Jesus not employ them

and recommend them for the treatment of disease?

Matter is not self-creative, for it is unintelligent. Erring

24 mortal mind confers the power which the drug seems to

possess.

Narcotics quiet mortal mind, and so relieve the body;

27 but they leave both mind and body worse for this sub-

mission. Christian Science impresses the entire corpore-

ality, - namely, mind and body, - and brings out the

30 proof that Life is continuous and harmonious. Science

both neutralizes error and destroys it. Mankind is the

better for this spiritual and profound pathology.

PAGE 158

Mythology and materia medica

1 It is recorded that the profession of medicine originated

in idolatry with pagan priests, who besought the gods to

3 heal the sick and designated Apollo as "the god

of medicine." He was supposed to have dic-

tated the first prescription, according to the

6 "History of Four Thousand Years of Medicine." It is

here noticeable that Apollo was also regarded as the sender

of disease, "the god of pestilence." Hippocrates turned

9 from image-gods to vegetable and mineral drugs for heal-

ing. This was deemed progress in medicine; but

what we need is the truth which heals both mind and

12 body. The future history of material medicine may

correspond with that of its material god, Apollo, who was

banished from heaven and endured great sufferings

15 upon earth.

Footsteps to intemperance

Drugs, cataplasms, and whiskey are stupid substitutes

for the dignity and potency of divine Mind and its effi-

18 cacy to heal. It is pitiful to lead men into

temptation through the byways of this wil-

derness world, - to victimize the race with intoxicating

21 prescriptions for the sick, until mortal mind acquires an

educated appetite for strong drink, and men and women

become loathsome sots.

Advancing degrees

24 Evidences of progress and of spiritualization greet us

on every hand. Drug-systems are quitting their hold on

matter and so letting in matter's higher stra-

27 tum, mortal mind. Homoeopathy, a step in

advance of allopathy, is doing this. Matter is going out

of medicine; and mortal mind, of a higher attenuation

30 than the drug, is governing the pellet.

Effects of fear

A woman in the city of Lynn, Massachusetts, was

etherized and died in consequence, although her physi-

PAGE 159

1 cians insisted that it would be unsafe to perform a needed

surgical operation without the ether. After the autopsy,

3 her sister testified that the deceased protested

against inhaling the ether and said it would kill

her, but that she was compelled by her physicians to take

6 it. Her hands were held, and she was forced into sub-

mission. The case was brought to trial. The evidence

was found to be conclusive, and a verdict was returned that

9 death was occasioned, not by the ether, but by fear of

inhaling it.

Mental conditions to be heeded

Is it skilful or scientific surgery to take no heed of men-

12 tal conditions and to treat the patient as if she were so

much mindless matter, and as if matter were

the only factor to be consulted? Had these

15 unscientific surgeons understood metaphysics,

they would have considered the woman's state of mind,

and not have risked such treatment. They would either

18 have allayed her fear or would have performed the opera-

tion without ether.

The sequel proved that this Lynn woman died from

21 effects produced by mortal mind, and not from the disease

or the operation.

False source of knowledge

The medical schools would learn the state of man

24 from matter instead of from Mind. They examine the

lungs, tongue, and pulse to ascertain how

much harmony, or health, matter is permit-

27 ting to matter, - how much pain or pleasure, action or

stagnation, one form of matter is allowing another form

of matter.

30 Ignorant of the fact that a man's belief produces dis-

ease and all its symptoms, the ordinary physician is

liable to increase disease with his own mind, when he

PAGE 160

1 should address himself to the work of destroying it through

the power of the divine Mind.

3 The systems of physics act against metaphysics, and

vice versa. When mortals forsake the material for the

spiritual basis of action, drugs lose their healing force,

6 for they have no innate power. Unsupported by the

faith reposed in it, the inanimate drug becomes

powerless.

Obedient muscles

9 The motion of the arm is no more dependent upon the

direction of mortal mind, than are the organic action and

secretion of the viscera. When this so-called

12 mind quits the body, the heart becomes as tor-

pid as the hand.

Anatomy and mind

Anatomy finds a necessity for nerves to convey the man-

15 date of mind to muscle and so cause action; but what does

anatomy say when the cords contract and be-

come immovable? Has mortal mind ceased

18 speaking to them, or has it bidden them to be impotent?

Can muscles, bones, blood, and nerves rebel against mind

in one instance and not in another, and become cramped

21 despite the mental protest?

Unless muscles are self-acting at all times, they are

never so, - never capable of acting contrary to mental

24 direction. If muscles can cease to act and become rigid

of their own preference, - be deformed or symmetrical,

as they please or as disease directs, - they must be self-

27 directing. Why then consult anatomy to learn how mor-

tal mind governs muscle, if we are only to learn from

anatomy that muscle is not so governed?

Mind over matter

30 Is man a material fungus without Mind

to help him? Is a stiff joint or a contracted

muscle as much a result of law as the supple and

PAGE 161

1 elastic condition of the healthy limb, and is God the

lawgiver?

3 You say, "I have burned my finger." This is an

exact statement, more exact than you suppose; for mor-

tal mind, and not matter, burns it. Holy inspiration

6 has created states of mind which have been able to nullify

the action of the flames, as in the Bible case of the three

young Hebrew captives, cast into the Babylonian furnace;

9 while an opposite mental state might produce spontaneous

combustion.

Restrictive regulations

In 1880, Massachusetts put her foot on a proposed

12 tyrannical law, restricting the practice of medicine. If

her sister States follow this example in har-

mony with our Constitution and Bill of Rights,

15 they will do less violence to that immortal sentiment of the

Declaration, "Man is endowed by his Maker with certain

inalienable rights, among which are life, liberty, and the

18 pursuit of happiness."

The oppressive state statutes touching medicine re-

mind one of the words of the famous Madame Roland,

21 as she knelt before a statue of Liberty, erected near the

guillotine: "Liberty, what crimes are committed in thy

name!"

Metaphysics challenges physics

24 The ordinary practitioner, examining bodily symptoms,

telling the patient that he is sick, and treating the case ac-

cording to his physical diagnosis, would natu-

27 rally induce the very disease he is trying to cure,

even if it were not already determined by mor-

tal mind. Such unconscious mistakes would not occur, if

30 this old class of philanthropists looked as deeply for cause

and effect into mind as into matter. The physician agrees

with his "adversary quickly," but upon different terms

PAGE 162

1 than does the metaphysician; for the matter-physician

agrees with the disease, while the metaphysician agrees

3 only with health and challenges disease.

Truth an alterative

Christian Science brings to the body the sunlight of

Truth, which invigorates and purifies. Christian Science

6 acts as an alterative, neutralizing error with

Truth. It changes the secretions, expels hu-

mors, dissolves tumors, relaxes rigid muscles, restores

9 carious bones to soundness. The effect of this Science is

to stir the human mind to a change of base, on which it

may yield to the harmony of the divine Mind.

Practical success

12 Experiments have favored the fact that Mind governs

the body, not in one instance, but in every instance. The

indestructible faculties of Spirit exist without

15 the conditions of matter and also without the

false beliefs of a so-called material existence. Working

out the rules of Science in practice, the author has re-

18 stored health in cases of both acute and chronic disease in

their severest forms. Secretions have been changed, the

structure has been renewed, shortened limbs have been

21 elongated, ankylosed joints have been made supple, and

carious bones have been restored to healthy conditions. I

have restored what is called the lost substance of lungs, and

24 healthy organizations have been established where disease

was organic. Christian Science heals organic disease as

surely as it heals what is called functional, for it requires

27 only a fuller understanding of the divine Principle of

Christian Science to demonstrate the higher rule.

Testimony of medical teachers

With due respect for the faculty, I kindly

30 quote from Dr. Benjamin Rush, the famous

Philadelphia teacher of medical practice. He

declared that "it is impossible to calculate the mischief

PAGE 163

1 which Hippocrates has done, by first marking Nature

with his name, and afterward letting her loose upon sick

3 people."

Dr. Benjamin Waterhouse, Professor in Harvard Uni-

versity, declared himself "sick of learned quackery."

6 Dr. James Johnson, Surgeon to William IV, King Of

England, said:

"I declare my conscientious opinion, founded on long

9 observation and reflection, that if there were not a single

physician, surgeon, apothecary, man-midwife, chemist,

druggist, or drug on the face of the earth, there would be

12 less sickness and less mortality."

Dr. Mason Good, a learned Professor in London,

said :

15 "The effects of medicine on the human system are in

the highest degree uncertain; except, indeed, that it has

already destroyed more lives than war, pestilence, and

18 famine, all combined."

Dr. Chapman, Professor of the Institutes and Practice

of Physic in the University of Pennsylvania, in a published

21 essay said

"Consulting the records of our science, we cannot

help being disgusted with the multitude of hypotheses

24 obtruded upon us at different times. Nowhere is the

imagination displayed to a greater extent; and perhaps

so ample an exhibition of human invention might gratify

27 our vanity, if it were not more than compensated by the

humiliating view of so much absurdity, contradiction,

and falsehood. To harmonize the contrarieties of med-

30 ical doctrines is indeed a task as impractible as to

arrange the fleeting vapors around us, or to reconcile the

fixed and repulsive antipathies of nature. Dark and

PAGE 164

1 perplexed, our devious career resembles the groping of

Homer's Cyclops around his cave."

3 Sir John Forbes, M.D., F.R.S., Fellow of the Royal

College of Physicians, London, said:

"No systematic or theoretical classification of diseases

6 or of therapeutic agents, ever yet promulgated, is true, or

anything like the truth, and none can be adopted as a safe

guidance in practice."

9 It is just to say that generally the cultured class of medi-

cal practitioners are grand men and women, therefore

they are more scientific than are false claimants to Chris-

12 tian Science. But all human systems based on material

premises are minus the unction of divine Science. Much

yet remains to be said and done before all mankind is

15 saved and all the mental microbes of sin and all diseased

thought-germs are exterminated.

If you or I should appear to die, we should not be

18 dead. The seeming decease, caused by a majority of

human beliefs that man must die, or produced by mental

assassins, does not in the least disprove Christian Science;

21 rather does it evidence the truth of its basic proposition

that mortal thoughts in belief rule the materiality mis-

called life in the body or in matter. But the forever fact

24 remains paramount that Life, Truth, and Love save from

sin, disease, and death. "When this corruptible shall have

put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on

27 immortality [divine Science], then shall be brought to pass

the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in

victory" (St. Paul).

Table of Contents Previous Chapter Next Chapter

PAGE 70

And when they shall say unto you,

Seek unto them that have familiar spirits,

And unto wizards that peep and that mutter;

Should not a people seek unto their God? - ISAIAH.

Verily, verily, I say unto you, If a man keep my saying, he shall never

see death. Then said the Jews unto him, Now we know that thou hast a

devil. - JOHN.

The infinite one Spirit

MORTAL existence is an enigma. Every day is a

mystery. The testimony of the corporeal senses

cannot inform us what is real and what is delusive, but

the revelations of Christian Science unlock the treasures

of Truth. Whatever is false or sinful can

never enter the atmosphere of Spirit. There

is but one Spirit. Man is never God, but spiritual man,

made in God's likeness, reflects God. In this scientific

reflection the Ego and the Father are inseparable. The

supposition that corporeal beings are spirits, or that there

are good and evil spirits, is a mistake.

Real and unreal identity

The divine Mind maintains all identities, from a blade

of grass to a star, as distinct and eternal. The

questions are: What are God's identities?

What is Soul? Does life or soul exist in the thing

formed?

PAGE 71

Nothing is real and eternal, - nothing is Spirit, - but

God and His idea. Evil has no reality. It is neither

person, place, nor thing, but is simply a belief, an illusion

of material sense.

The identity, or idea, of all reality continues forever;

but Spirit, or the divine Principle of all, is not in Spirit's

formations. Soul is synonymous with Spirit, God, the

creative, governing, infinite Principle outside of finite form,

which forms only reflect.

Dream-lessons

Close your eyes, and you may dream that you see a

flower, - that you touch and smell it. Thus you learn

that the flower is a product of the so-called

mind, a formation of thought rather than of

matter. Close your eyes again, and you may see land-

scapes, men, and women. Thus you learn that these

also are images, which mortal mind holds and evolves

and which simulate mind, life, and intelligence. From

dreams also you learn that neither mortal mind nor

matter is the image or likeness of God, and that im-

mortal Mind is not in matter.

Found wanting

When the Science of Mind is understood, spiritualism

will be found mainly erroneous, having no scientific basis

nor origin, no proof nor power outside of

human testimony. It is the offspring of the

physical senses. There is no sensuality in Spirit. I never

could believe in spiritualism.

The basis and structure of spiritualism are alike ma-

terial and physical. Its spirits are so many corporealities,

limited and finite in character and quality. Spiritualism

therefore presupposes Spirit, which is ever infinite, to be

a corporeal being, a finite form, - a theory contrary to

Christian Science.

PAGE 72

There is but one spiritual existence, - the Life of

which corporeal sense can take no cognizance. The

divine Principle of man speaks through immortal sense.

If a material body - in other words, mortal, material

sense - were permeated by Spirit, that body would

disappear to mortal sense, would be deathless. A con-

dition precedent to communion with Spirit is the gain of

spiritual life.

Spirits obsolete

So-called spirits are but corporeal communicators. As

light destroys darkness and in the place of darkness all

is light, so (in absolute Science) Soul, or God,

is the only truth-giver to man. Truth de-

stroys mortality, and brings to light immortality. Mortal

belief (the material sense of life) and immortal Truth

(the spiritual sense) are the tares and the wheat, which

are not united by progress, but separated.

Perfection is not expressed through imperfection.

Spirit is not made manifest through matter, the anti-

pode of Spirit. Error is not a convenient sieve through

which truth can be strained.

Scientific phenomena

God, good, being ever present, it follows in divine

logic that evil, the suppositional opposite of good, is never

present. In Science, individual good derived

from God, the infinite All-in-all, may flow

from the departed to mortals; but evil is neither com-

municable nor scientific. A sinning, earthly mortal is

not the reality of Life nor the medium through which

truth passes to earth. The joy of intercourse becomes

the jest of sin, when evil and suffering are communicable.

Not personal intercommunion but divine law is the com-

municator of truth, health, and harmony to earth and

humanity. As readily can you mingle fire and frost as

PAGE 73

Spirit and matter. In either case, one does not support

the other.

Spiritualism calls one person, living in this world, ma-

terial, but another, who has died to-day a sinner and sup-

posedly will return to earth to-morrow, it terms a spirit.

The fact is that neither the one nor the other is infinite

Spirit, for Spirit is God, and man is His likeness.

One government

The belief that one man, as spirit, can control an-

other man, as matter, upsets both the individuality and

the Science of man, for man is image. God

controls man, and God is the only Spirit. Any

other control or attraction of so-called spirit is a mortal

belief, which ought to be known by its fruit, - the repe-

tition of evil.

If Spirit, or God, communed with mortals or controlled

them through electricity or any other form of matter, the

divine order and the Science of omnipotent, omnipresent

Spirit would be destroyed.

Incorrect theories

The belief that material bodies return to dust, hereafter

to rise up as spiritual bodies with material sensations and

desires, is incorrect. Equally incorrect is the

belief that spirit is confined in a finite, ma-

terial body, from which it is freed by death, and that, when

it is freed from the material body, spirit retains the sensa-

tions belonging to that body.

No me-diumship

It is a grave mistake to suppose that matter is any part

of the reality of intelligent existence, or that Spirit and

matter, intelligence and non-intelligence, can

commune together. This error Science will

destroy. The sensual cannot be made the mouthpiece of

the spiritual, nor can the finite become the channel of

the infinite. There is no communication between so-

PAGE 74

called material existence and spiritual life which is not

subject to death.

Opposing conditions

To be on communicable terms with Spirit, persons must

be free from organic bodies; and their return to a mate-

rial condition, after having once left it, would

be as impossible as would be the restoration

to its original condition of the acorn, already absorbed

into a sprout which has risen above the soil. The seed

which has germinated has a new form and state of exist-

ence. When here or hereafter the belief of life in matter

is extinct, the error which has held the belief dissolves

with the belief, and never returns to the old condition.

No correspondence nor communion can exist between

persons in such opposite dreams as the belief of having

died and left a material body and the belief of still living

in an organic, material body.

Bridgeless division

The caterpillar, transformed into a beautiful insect,

is no longer a worm, nor does the insect return to

fraternize with or control the worm. Such

a backward transformation is impossible in

Science. Darkness and light, infancy and manhood,

sickness and health, are opposites, - different beliefs,

which never blend. Who will say that infancy can utter

the ideas of manhood, that darkness can represent light,

that we are in Europe when we are in the opposite hemi-

sphere? There is no bridge across the gulf which divides

two such opposite conditions as the spiritual, or incor-

poreal, and the physical, or corporeal.

In Christian Science there is never a retrograde step,

never a return to positions outgrown. The so-called dead

and living cannot commune together, for they are in

separate states of existence, or consciousness.

PAGE 75

Unscientific investiture

This simple truth lays bare the mistaken assumption

that man dies as matter but comes to life as spirit. The

so-called dead, in order to reappear to those

still in the existence cognized by the physical

senses, would need to be tangible and material, - to have

a material investiture, - or the material senses could take

no cognizance of the so-called dead.

Spiritualism would transfer men from the spiritual sense

of existence back into its material sense. This gross mate-

rialism is scientifically impossible, since to infinite Spirit

there can be no matter.

Raising the dead

Jesus said of Lazarus: "Our friend Lazarus sleepeth;

but I go, that I may awake him out of sleep." Jesus

restored Lazarus by the understanding that

Lazarus had never died, not by an admis-

sion that his body had died and then lived again. Had

Jesus believed that Lazarus had lived or died in his

body, the Master would have stood on the same plane of

belief as those who buried the body, and he could not have

resuscitated it.

When you can waken yourself or others out of the belief

that all must die, you can then exercise Jesus' spiritual

power to reproduce the presence of those who have thought

they died, - but not otherwise.

Vision of the dying

There is one possible moment, when those living on the

earth and those called dead, can commune together, and

that is the moment previous to the transition,

- the moment when the link between their op-

posite beliefs is being sundered. In the vestibule through

which we pass from one dream to another dream, or

when we awake from earth's sleep to the grand verities

of Life, the departing may hear the glad welcome of those

PAGE 76

who have gone before. The ones departing may whisper

this vision, name the face that smiles on them and the

hand which beckons them, as one at Niagara, with eyes

open only to that wonder, forgets all else and breathes

aloud his rapture.

Real Life is God

When being is understood, Life will be recognized as

neither material nor finite, but as infinite, - as God,

universal good; and the belief that life, or

mind, was ever in a finite form, or good in

evil, will be destroyed. Then it will be understood that

Spirit never entered matter and was therefore never

raised from matter. When advanced to spiritual being

and the understanding of God, man can no longer com-

mune with matter; neither can he return to it, any more

than a tree can return to its seed. Neither will man seem

to be corporeal, but he will be an individual conscious-

ness, characterized by the divine Spirit as idea, not matter.

Suffering, sinning, dying beliefs are unreal. When

divine Science is universally understood, they will have

no power over man, for man is immortal and lives by

divine authority.

Immaterial pleasure

The sinless joy, - the perfect harmony and immortality

of Life, possessing unlimited divine beauty and goodness

without a single bodily pleasure or pain, -

constitutes the only veritable, indestructible

man, whose being is spiritual. This state of existence

is scientific and intact, - a perfection discernible only

by those who have the final understanding of Christ in

divine Science. Death can never hasten this state of

existence, for death must be overcome, not submitted to,

before immortality appears.

The recognition of Spirit and of infinity comes not

PAGE 77

suddenly here or hereafter. The pious Polycarp said:

"I cannot turn at once from good to evil." Neither do

other mortals accomplish the change from error to truth

at a single bound.

Second death

Existence continues to be a belief of corporeal sense

until the Science of being is reached. Error brings its

own self-destruction both here and hereafter,

for mortal mind creates its own physical con-

ditions. Death will occur on the next plane of existence

as on this, until the spiritual understanding of Life is

reached. Then, and not until then, will it be demon-

strated that "the second death hath no power."

A dream vanishing

The period required for this dream of material life,

embracing its so-called pleasures and pains, to vanish

from consciousness, "knoweth no man . . .

neither the Son, but the Father." This period

will be of longer or shorter duration according to the

tenacity of error. Of what advantage, then, would it be

to us, or to the departed, to prolong the material state and

so prolong the illusion either of a soul inert or of a sinning,

suffering sense, - a so-called mind fettered to matter.

Progress and purgatory

Even if communications from spirits to mortal con-

sciousness were possible, such communications would

grow beautifully less with every advanced stage

of existence. The departed would gradually

rise above ignorance and materiality, and Spiritualists

would outgrow their beliefs in material spiritualism.

Spiritism consigns the so-called dead to a state resembling

that of blighted buds, - to a wretched purgatory, where

the chances of the departed for improvement narrow

into nothing and they return to their old standpoints of

matter.

PAGE 78

Unnatural deflections

The decaying flower, the blighted bud, the gnarled oak,

the ferocious beast, - like the discords of disease, sin,

and death, - are unnatural. They are the fal-

sities of sense, the changing deflections of mor-

tal mind; they are not the eternal realities of Mind.

Absurd oracles

How unreasonable is the belief that we are wearing

out life and hastening to death, and that at the same

time we are communing with immortality!

If the departed are in rapport with mor-

tality, or matter, they are not spiritual, but must still

be mortal, sinning, suffering, and dying. Then why

look to them - even were communication possible - for

proofs of immortality, and accept them as oracles? Com-

munications gathered from ignorance are pernicious in

tendency.

Spiritualism with its material accompaniments would

destroy the supremacy of Spirit. If Spirit pervades all

space, it needs no material method for the transmission

of messages. Spirit needs no wires nor electricity in order

to be omnipresent.

Spirit intangible

Spirit is not materially tangible. How then can it

communicate with man through electric, material effects?

How can the majesty and omnipotence of

Spirit be lost? God is not in the medley

where matter cares for matter, where spiritism makes

many gods, and hypnotism and electricity are claimed

to be the agents of God's government.

Spirit blesses man, but man cannot "tell whence

it cometh." By it the sick are healed, the sorrowing are

comforted, and the sinning are reformed. These are the

effects of one universal God, the invisible good dwelling

in eternal Science.

PAGE 79

Thought regarding death

The act of describing disease - its symptoms, locality,

and fatality - is not scientific. Warning people against

death is an error that tends to frighten into

death those who are ignorant of Life as God.

Thousands of instances could be cited of health restored

by changing the patient's thoughts regarding death.

Fallacious hypotheses

A scientific mental method is more sanitary than the

use of drugs, and such a mental method produces perma-

nent health. Science must go over the whole

ground, and dig up every seed of error's sow-

ing. Spiritualism relies upon human beliefs and hy-

potheses. Christian Science removes these beliefs and

hypotheses through the higher understanding of God, for

Christian Science, resting on divine Principle, not on ma-

terial personalities, in its revelation of immortality, intro-

duces the harmony of being.

Jesus cast out evil spirits, or false beliefs. The Apostle

Paul bade men have the Mind that was in the Christ.

Jesus did his own work by the one Spirit. He said: "My

Father worketh hitherto, and I work." He never de-

scribed disease, so far as can be learned from the Gospels,

but he healed disease.

Mistaken methods

The unscientific practitioner says: "You are ill. Your

brain is overtaxed, and you must rest. Your body is

weak, and it must be strengthened. You have

nervous prostration, and must be treated for it."

Science objects to all this, contending for the rights of in-

telligence and asserting that Mind controls body and brain.

Divine strength

Mind-science teaches that mortals need "not be weary

in well doing." It dissipates fatigue in doing

good. Giving does not impoverish us in the

service of our Maker, neither does withholding enrich us.

PAGE 80

We have strength in proportion to our apprehension of

the truth, and our strength is not lessened by giving

utterance to truth. A cup of coffee or tea is not the equal

of truth, whether for the inspiration of a sermon or for

the support of bodily endurance.

A denial of immortality

A communication purporting to come from the late

Theodore Parker reads as follows: "There never was,

and there never will be, an immortal spirit."

Yet the very periodical containing this sen-

tence repeats weekly the assertion that spirit-communica-

tions are our only proofs of immortality.

Mysticism unscientific

I entertain no doubt of the humanity and philanthropy

of many Spiritualists, but I cannot coincide with their

views. It is mysticism which gives spiritual-

ism its force. Science dispels mystery and

explains extraordinary phenomena; but Science never

removes phenomena from the domain of reason into the

realm of mysticism.

Physical falsities

It should not seem mysterious that mind, without the

aid of hands, can move a table, when we already know

that it is mind-power which moves both table

and hand. Even planchette - the French toy

which years ago pleased so many people - attested the con-

trol of mortal mind over its substratum, called matter.

It is mortal mind which convulses its substratum, matter.

These movements arise from the volition of human belief,

but they are neither scientific nor rational. Mortal mind

produces table-tipping as certainly as table-setting, and

believes that this wonder emanates from spirits and elec-

tricity. This belief rests on the common conviction that

mind and matter cooperate both visibly and invisibly,

hence that matter is intelligent.

PAGE 81

Poor post-mortem evidence

There is not so much evidence to prove intercommuni-

cation between the so-called dead and the living, as there

is to show the sick that matter suffers and has

sensation; yet this latter evidence is destroyed by

the Mind-science. If Spiritualists understood the

Science of being, their belief in mediumship would vanish.

No proof of immortality

At the very best and on its own theories, spiritualism

can only prove that certain individuals have a continued

existence after death and maintain their affili-

ation with mortal flesh; but this fact affords

no certainty of everlasting life. A man's assertion that

he is immortal no more proves him to be so, than the op-

posite assertion, that he is mortal, would prove immor-

tality a lie. Nor is the case improved when alleged spirits

teach immortality. Life, Love, Truth, is the only proof

of immortality.

Mind's manifestations immortal

Man in the likeness of God as revealed in Science can-

not help being immortal. Though the grass seemeth to

wither and the flower to fade, they reappear.

Erase the figures which express number, silence

the tones of music, give to the worms the body

called man, and yet the producing, governing, divine

Principle lives on, - in the case of man as truly as in

the case of numbers and of music, - despite the so-called

laws of matter, which define man as mortal. Though

the inharmony resulting from material sense hides the

harmony of Science, inharmony cannot destroy the divine

Principle of Science. In Science, man's immortality de-

pends upon that of God, good, and follows as a necessary

consequence of the immortality of good.

Reading thoughts

That somebody, somewhere, must have known the

deceased person, supposed to be the communicator, is

PAGE 82

evident, and it is as easy to read distant thoughts as near.

We think of an absent friend as easily as we do of one

present. It is no more difficult to read the

absent mind than it is to read the present.

Chaucer wrote centuries ago, yet we still read his thought

in his verse. What is classic study, but discernment of

the minds of Homer and Virgil, of whose personal exist-

ence we may be in doubt?

Impossible intercommunion

If spiritual life has been won by the departed, they

cannot return to material existence, because different

states of consciousness are involved, and one

person cannot exist in two different states of

consciousness at the same time. In sleep we

do not communicate with the dreamer by our side despite

his physical proximity, because both of us are either un-

conscious or are wandering in our dreams through differ-

ent mazes of consciousness.

In like manner it would follow, even if our departed

friends were near us and were in as conscious a state of

existence as before the change we call death, that their

state of consciousness must be different from ours. We

are not in their state, nor are they in the mental realm

in which we dwell. Communion between them and

ourselves would be prevented by this difference. The

mental states are so unlike, that intercommunion is as

impossible as it would be between a mole and a human

being. Different dreams and different awakenings be-

token a differing consciousness. When wandering in

Australia, do we look for help to the Esquimaux in their

snow huts?

In a world of sin and sensuality hastening to a

greater development of power, it is wise earnestly to

PAGE 83

consider whether it is the human mind or the divine

Mind which is influencing one. What the prophets of

Jehovah did, the worshippers of Baal failed to do; yet

artifice and delusion claimed that they could equal the

work of wisdom.

Science only can explain the incredible good and evil

elements now coming to the surface. Mortals must find

refuge in Truth in order to escape the error of these latter

days. Nothing is more antagonistic to Christian Science

than a blind belief without understanding, for such a

belief hides Truth and builds on error.

Natural wonders

Miracles are impossible in Science, and here Science

takes issue with popular religions. The scientific mani-

festation of power is from the divine nature

and is not supernatural, since Science is an

explication of nature. The belief that the universe, in-

cluding man, is governed in general by material laws, but

that occasionally Spirit sets aside these laws, - this be-

lief belittles omnipotent wisdom, and gives to matter the

precedence over Spirit.

Conflicting standpoints

It is contrary to Christian Science to suppose that life

is either material or organically spiritual. Between

Christian Science and all forms of superstition

a great gulf is fixed, as impassable as that be-

tween Dives and Lazarus. There is mortal mind-reading

and immortal Mind-reading. The latter is a revelation

of divine purpose through spiritual understanding, by

which man gains the divine Principle and explanation of

all things. Mortal mind-reading and immortal Mind-

reading are distinctly opposite standpoints, from which

cause and effect are interpreted. The act of reading

mortal mind investigates and touches only human beliefs.

PAGE 84

Science is immortal and coordinate neither with the

premises nor with the conclusions of mortal beliefs.

Scientific foreseeing

The ancient prophets gained their foresight from a

spiritual, incorporeal standpoint, not by foreshadowing

evil and mistaking fact for fiction, - predict-

ing the future from a groundwork of corpo-

reality and human belief. When sufficiently advanced

in Science to be in harmony with the truth of being, men

become seers and prophets involuntarily, controlled not

by demons, spirits, or demigods, but by the one Spirit.

It is the prerogative of the ever-present, divine Mind, and

of thought which is in rapport with this Mind, to know

the past, the present, and the future.

Acquaintance with the Science of being enables us to

commune more largely with the divine Mind, to foresee

and foretell events which concern the universal welfare,

to be divinely inspired, - yea, to reach the range of fetter-

less Mind.

The Mind unbounded

To understand that Mind is infinite, not bounded by

corporeality, not dependent upon the ear and eye for

sound or sight nor upon muscles and bones

for locomotion, is a step towards the Mind-

science by which we discern man's nature and existence.

This true conception of being destroys the belief of spirit-

ualism at its very inception, for without the concession of

material personalities called spirits, spiritualism has no

basis upon which to build.

Scientific foreknowing

All we correctly know of Spirit comes from God, divine

Principle, and is learned through Christ and Christian

Science. If this Science has been thoroughly

learned and properly digested, we can know

the truth more accurately than the astronomer can read

PAGE 85

the stars or calculate an eclipse. This Mind-reading

is the opposite of clairvoyance. It is the illumination of

the spiritual understanding which demonstrates the ca-

pacity of Soul, not of material sense. This Soul-sense

comes to the human mind when the latter yields to the

divine Mind.

Value of intuition

Such intuitions reveal whatever constitutes and per-

petuates harmony, enabling one to do good, but not

evil. You will reach the perfect Science of

healing when you are able to read the human

mind after this manner and discern the error you would

destroy. The Samaritan woman said: "Come, see a

man, which told me all things that ever I did: is not this

the Christ?"

It is recorded that Jesus, as he once journeyed with his

students, "knew their thoughts," - read them scientifi-

cally. In like manner he discerned disease and healed

the sick. After the same method, events of great mo-

ment were foretold by the Hebrew prophets. Our

Master rebuked the lack of this power when he said:

"O ye hypocrites! ye can discern the face of the sky;

but can ye not discern the signs of the times?"

Hyprocrisy condemned

Both Jew and Gentile may have had acute corporeal

senses, but mortals need spiritual sense. Jesus knew the

generation to be wicked and adulterous, seek-

ing the material more than the spiritual. His

thrusts at materialism were sharp, but needed. He never

spared hypocrisy the sternest condemnation.. He said :

"These ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other

undone." The great Teacher knew both cause and

effect, knew that truth communicates itself but never

imparts error.

PAGE 86

Mental contact

Jesus once asked, "Who touched me?" Supposing

this inquiry to be occasioned by physical contact alone,

his disciples answered, "The multitude throng

thee." Jesus knew, as others did not, that

it was not matter, but mortal mind, whose touch called

for aid. Repeating his inquiry, he was answered by the

faith of a sick woman. His quick apprehension of this

mental call illustrated his spirituality. The disciples'

misconception of it uncovered their materiality. Jesus

possessed more spiritual susceptibility than the disciples.

Opposites come from contrary directions, and produce

unlike results.

Images of thought

Mortals evolve images of thought. These may appear

to the ignorant to be apparitions; but they are myste-

rious only because it is unusual to see

thoughts, though we can always feel their

influence. Haunted houses, ghostly voices, unusual

noises, and apparitions brought out in dark seances

either involve feats by tricksters, or they are images and

sounds evolved involuntarily by mortal mind. Seeing

is no less a quality of physical sense than feeling. Then

why is it more difficult to see a thought than to feel one?

Education alone determines the difference. In reality

there is none.

Phenomena explained

Portraits, landscape-paintings, fac-similes of penman-

ship, peculiarities of expression, recollected sentences,

can all be taken from pictorial thought and

memory as readily as from objects cognizable

by the senses. Mortal mind sees what it believes as

certainly as it believes what it sees. It feels, hears, and

sees its own thoughts. Pictures are mentally formed

before the artist can convey them to canvas. So is it

PAGE 87

with all material conceptions. Mind-readers perceive

these pictures of thought. They copy or reproduce

them, even when they are lost to the memory of the mind

in which they are discoverable.

Mental environment

It is needless for the thought or for the person hold-

ing the transferred picture to be individually and con-

sciously present. Though individuals have

passed away, their mental environment re-

mains to be discerned, described, and transmitted. Though

bodies are leagues apart and their associations forgotten,

their associations float in the general atmosphere of human

mind.

Second sight

The Scotch call such vision "second sight", when

really it is first sight instead of second, for it presents

primal facts to mortal mind. Science enables

one to read the human mind, but not as a

clairvoyant. It enables one to heal through Mind, but

not as a mesmerist.

Buried secrets

The mine knows naught of the emeralds within its

rocks; the sea is ignorant of the gems within its caverns,

of the corals, of its sharp reefs, of the tall ships

that float on its bosom, or of the bodies which

lie buried in its sands: yet these are all there. Do not

suppose that any mental concept is gone because you do

not think of it. The true concept is never lost. The

strong impressions produced on mortal mind by friend-

ship or by any intense feeling are lasting, and mind-

readers can perceive and reproduce these impressions.

Recollected friends

Memory may reproduce voices long ago silent. We

have but to close the eyes, and forms rise

before us, which are thousands of miles away

or altogether gone from physical sight and sense, and

PAGE 88

this not in dreamy sleep. In our day-dreams we can

recall that for which the poet Tennyson expressed the

heart's desire, -

the touch of a vanished hand,

And the sound of a voice that is still.

The mind may even be cognizant of a present flavor and

odor, when no viand touches the palate and no scent

salutes the nostrils.

Illusions not ideas

How are veritable ideas to be distinguished from il-

lusions? By learning the origin of each. Ideas are

emanations from the divine Mind. Thoughts,

proceeding from the brain or from matter, are

offshoots of mortal mind; they are mortal material be-

liefs. Ideas are spiritual, harmonious, and eternal. Beliefs

proceed from the so-called material senses, which at one

time are supposed to be substance-matter and at another

are called spirits.

To love one's neighbor as one's self, is a divine idea;

but this idea can never be seen, felt, nor understood

through the physical senses. Excite the organ of ven-

eration or religious faith, and the individual manifests

profound adoration. Excite the opposite development,

and he blasphemes. These effects, however, do not pro-

ceed from Christianity, nor are they spiritual phenomena,

for both arise from mortal belief.

Trance speaking illusion

Eloquence re-echoes the strains of Truth and Love.

It is due to inspiration rather than to erudition. It shows

the possibilities derived from divine Mind,

though it is said to be a gift whose endowment

is obtained from books or received from the

impulsion of departed spirits. When eloquence proceeds

from the belief that a departed spirit is speaking, who

PAGE 89

can tell what the unaided medium is incapable of know-

ing or uttering? This phenomenon only shows that the

beliefs of mortal mind are loosed. Forgetting her igno-

rance in the belief that another mind is speaking through

her, the devotee may become unwontedly eloquent. Hav-

ing more faith in others than in herself, and believing

that somebody else possesses her tongue and mind, she

talks freely.

Destroy her belief in outside aid, and her eloquence

disappears. The former limits of her belief return. She

says, " I am incapable of words that glow, for I am un-

educated." This familiar instance reaffirms the Scrip-

tural word concerning a man, "As he thinketh in his heart,

so is he." If one believes that he cannot be an orator with-

out study or a superinduced condition, the body responds

to this belief, and the tongue grows mute which before

was eloquent.

Scientific improvisation

Mind is not necessarily dependent upon educational

processes. It possesses of itself all beauty and poetry,

and the power of expressing them. Spirit,

God, is heard when the senses are silent. We

are all capable of more than we do. The influence or

action of Soul confers a freedom, which explains the phe-

nomena of improvisation and the fervor of untutored lips.

Divine origination

Matter is neither intelligent nor creative. The tree is

not the author of itself. Sound is not the originator of

music, and man is not the father of man. Cain

very naturally concluded that if life was in the

body, and man gave it, man had the right to take it away.

This incident shows that the belief of life in matter was

"a murderer from the beginning."

If seed is necessary to produce wheat, and wheat to

PAGE 90

produce flour, or if one animal can originate another,

how then can we account for their primal origin? How

were the loaves and fishes multiplied on the shores of

Galilee, - and that, too, without meal or monad from

which loaf or fish could come?

Mind is substance

The earth's orbit and the imaginary line called the

equator are not substance. The earth's motion and

position are sustained by Mind alone. Divest

yourself of the thought that there can be sub-

stance in matter, and the movements and transitions now

possible for mortal mind will be found to be equally

possible for the body. Then being will be recognized

as spiritual, and death will be obsolete, though now

some insist that death is the necessary prelude to

immortality.

Mortal delusions

In dreams we fly to Europe and meet a far-off friend.

The looker-on sees the body in bed, but the supposed

inhabitant of that body carries it through

the air and over the ocean. This shows the

possibilities of thought. Opium and hashish eaters men-

tally travel far and work wonders, yet their bodies stay

in one place. This shows what mortal mentality and

knowledge are.

Scientific finalities

The admission to one's self that man is God's own like-

ness sets man free to master the infinite idea. This con-

viction shuts the door on death, and opens it

wide towards immortality. The understanding

and recognition of Spirit must finally come, and we may

as well improve our time in solving the mysteries of being

through an apprehension of divine Principle. At present

we know not what man is, but we certainly shall know

this when man reflects God.

PAGE 91

The Revelator tells us of "a new heaven and a

new earth." Have you ever pictured this heaven and

earth, inhabited by beings under the control of supreme

wisdom?

Let us rid ourselves of the belief that man is separated

from God, and obey only the divine principle, Life and

Love. Here is the great point of departure for all true

spiritual growth.

Man's genuine being

It is difficult for the sinner to accept divine Science,

because Science exposes his nothingness; but the sooner

error is reduced to its native nothingness, the

sooner man's great reality will appear and his

genuine being will be understood. The destruction of

error is by no means the destruction of Truth or Life, but

is the acknowledgment of them.

Absorbed in material selfhood we discern and reflect

but faintly the substance of Life or Mind. The denial of

material selfhood aids the discernment of man's spirit-

ual and eternal individuality, and destroys the erroneous

knowledge gained from matter or through what are termed

the material senses.

Erroneous postulates

Certain erroneous postulates should be here considered

in order that the spiritual facts may be better

apprehended.

The first erroneous postulate of belief is, that substance,

life, and intelligence are something apart from God.

The second erroneous postulate is, that man is both

mental and material.

The third erroneous postulate is, that mind is both evil

and good; whereas the real Mind cannot be evil nor the

medium of evil, for Mind is God.

The fourth erroneous postulate is, that matter is in-

PAGE 92

telligent, and that man has a material body which is part

of himself.

The fifth erroneous postulate is, that matter holds in

itself the issues of life and death, - that matter is not

only capable of experiencing pleasure and pain, but also

capable of imparting these sensations. From the illusion

implied in this last postulate arises the decomposition of

mortal bodies in what is termed death.

Mind is not an entity within the cranium with the power

of sinning now and forever.

Knowledge of good and evil

In old Scriptural pictures we see a serpent coiled around

the tree of knowledge and speaking to Adam and Eve.

This represents the serpent in the act of

commending to our first parents the knowl-

edge of good and evil, a knowledge gained from matter,

or evil, instead of from Spirit. The portrayal is still

graphically accurate, for the common conception of mor-

tal man - a burlesque of God's man - is an outgrowth

of human knowledge or sensuality, a mere offshoot of

material sense.

Opposing power

Uncover error, and it turns the lie upon you. Until

the fact concerning error - namely, its nothingness -

appears, the moral demand will not be met,

and the ability to make nothing of error will

be wanting. We should blush to call that real which is

only a mistake. The foundation of evil is laid on a belief

in something besides God. This belief tends to support

two opposite powers, instead of urging the claims of Truth

alone. The mistake of thinking that error can be real,

when it is merely the absence of truth, leads to belief in

the superiority of error.

The age's privilege

Do you say the time has not yet come in which to

PAGE 93

recognize Soul as substantial and able to control the

body? Remember Jesus, who nearly nineteen centuries

ago demonstrated the power of Spirit and said,

"He that believeth on me, the works that I

do shall he do also," and who also said, "But the hour

cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall

worship the Father in spirit and in truth." "Behold,

now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of sal-

vation," said Paul.

Logic and revelation

Divine logic and revelation coincide. If we believe

otherwise, we may be sure that either our

logic is at fault or that we have misinterpreted

revelation. Good never causes evil, nor creates aught

that can cause evil.

Good does not create a mind susceptible of causing

evil, for evil is the opposing error and not the truth of

creation. Destructive electricity is not the offspring of in-

finite good. Whatever contradicts the real nature of the

divine Esse, though human faith may clothe it with angelic

vestments, is without foundation.

Derivatives of spirit

The belief that Spirit is finite as well as infinite has

darkened all history. In Christian Science, Spirit, as a

proper noun, is the name of the Supreme Being.

It means quantity and quality, and applies ex-

clusively to God. The modifying derivatives of the word

spirit refer only to quality, not to God. Man is spiritual.

He is not God, Spirit. If man were Spirit, then men

would be spirits, gods. Finite spirit would be mortal,

and this is the error embodied in the belief that the infi-

nite can be contained in the finite. This belief tends to

becloud our apprehension of the kingdom of heaven and

of the reign of harmony in the Science of being.

PAGE 94

Scientific man

Jesus taught but one God, one Spirit, who makes man

in the image and likeness of Himself, - of Spirit, not of

matter. Man reflects infinite Truth, Life, and

Love. The nature of man, thus understood,

includes all that is implied by the terms "image" and

"likeness" as used in Scripture. The truly Christian

and scientific statement of personality and of the relation

of man to God, with the demonstration which accompa-

nied it, incensed the rabbis, and they said: "Crucify him,

crucify him . . . by our law he ought to die, because he

made himself the Son of God."

The eastern empires and nations owe their false gov-

ernment to the misconceptions of Deity there prevalent.

Tyranny, intolerance, and bloodshed, wherever found,

arise from the belief that the infinite is formed after the

pattern of mortal personality, passion, and impulse.

Ingratitude and denial

The progress of truth confirms its claims, and our

Master confirmed his words by his works. His healing-

power evoked denial, ingratitude, and be-

trayal, arising from sensuality. Of the ten

lepers whom Jesus healed, but one returned to give God

thanks, - that is, to acknowledge the divine Principle

which had healed him.

Spiritual insight

Our Master easily read the thoughts of mankind, and

this insight better enabled him to direct those thoughts

aright; but what would be said at this period of an in-

fidel blasphemer who should hint that Jesus used his in-

cisive power injuriously? Our Master read mortal mind

on a scientific basis, that of the omnipresence of Mind.

An approximation of this discernment indicates spiritual

growth and union with the infinite capacities of the one

Mind. Jesus could injure no one by his Mind-reading.

PAGE 95

The effect of his Mind was always to heal and to save,

and this is the only genuine Science of reading mortal

mind. His holy motives and aims were tra-

duced by the sinners of that period, as they

would be to-day if Jesus were personally present. Paul

said, "To be spiritually minded is life." We approach

God, or Life, in proportion to our spirituality, our fidel-

ity to Truth and Love; and in that ratio we know all

human need and are able to discern the thought of the

sick and the sinning for the purpose of healing them.

Error of any kind cannot hide from the law of God.

Whoever reaches this point of moral culture and good-

ness cannot injure others, and must do them good. The

greater or lesser ability of a Christian Scientist to discern

thought scientifically, depends upon his genuine spirit-

uality. This kind of mind-reading is not clairvoyance,

but it is important to success in healing, and is one of the

special characteristics thereof.

Christ's reappearance

We welcome the increase of knowledge and the end

of error, because even human invention must have its

day, and we want that day to be succeeded

by Christian Science, by divine reality. Mid-

night foretells the dawn. Led by a solitary star amid

the darkness, the Magi of old foretold the Messiahship

of Truth. Is the wise man of to-day believed, when he

beholds the light which heralds Christ's eternal dawn

and describes its effulgence?

Spiritual awakening

Lulled by stupefying illusions, the world is asleep

in the cradle of infancy, dreaming away the hours.

Material sense does not unfold the facts of

existence; but spiritual sense lifts human

consciousness into eternal Truth. Humanity advances

PAGE 96

slowly out of sinning sense into spiritual understanding;

unwillingness to learn all things rightly, binds Christen-

dom with chains.

The darkest hours of all

Love will finally mark the hour of harmony, and spir-

itualization will follow, for Love is Spirit. Before error

is wholly destroyed, there will be interrup-

tions of the general material routine. Earth

will become dreary and desolate, but summer and winter,

seedtime and harvest (though in changed forms), will

continue unto the end, - until the final spiritualization of

all things. "The darkest hour precedes the dawn."

Arena of contest

This material world is even now becoming the arena

for conflicting forces. On one side there will be discord

and dismay; on the other side there will be

Science and peace. The breaking up of mate-

rial beliefs may seem to be famine and pestilence, want

and woe, sin, sickness, and death, which assume new

phases until their nothingness appears. These disturb-

ances will continue until the end of error, when all

discord will be swallowed up in spiritual Truth.

Mortal error will vanish in a moral chemicalization.

This mental fermentation has begun, and will continue

until all errors of belief yield to understanding. Belief is

changeable, but spiritual understanding is changeless.

Millennial glory

As this consummation draws nearer, he who has

shaped his course in accordance with divine Science

will endure to the end. As material knowl-

edge diminishes and spiritual understanding

increases, real objects will be apprehended mentally

instead of materially.

During this final conflict, wicked minds will endeavor

to find means by which to accomplish more evil; but

PAGE 97

those who discern Christian Science will hold crime in

check. They will aid in the ejection of error. They

will maintain law and order, and cheerfully await the

certainty of ultimate perfection.

Dangerous resemblances

In reality, the more closely error simulates truth and

so-called matter resembles its essence, mortal mind, the

more impotent error becomes as a belief. Ac-

cording to human belief, the lightning is fierce

and the electric current swift, yet in Christian Science

the flight of one and the blow of the other will become

harmless. The more destructive matter becomes, the

more its nothingness will appear, until matter reaches

its mortal zenith in illusion and forever disappears. The

nearer a false belief approaches truth without passing

the boundary where, having been destroyed by divine

Love, it ceases to be even an illusion, the riper it becomes

for destruction. The more material the belief, the more

obvious its error, until divine Spirit, supreme in its do-

main, dominates all matter, and man is found in the like-

ness of Spirit, his original being.

The broadest facts array the most falsities against

themselves, for they bring error from under cover. It

requires courage to utter truth; for the higher Truth

lifts her voice, the louder will error scream, until its in-

articulate sound is forever silenced in oblivion.

"He uttered His voice, the earth melted." This Scrip-

ture indicates that all matter will disappear before the

supremacy of Spirit.

Christianity still rejected

Christianity is again demonstrating the Life that is

Truth, and the Truth that is Life, by the apos-

tolic work of casting out error and healing the

sick. Earth has no repayment for the persecutions which

PAGE 98

attend a new step in Christianity; but the spiritual recom-

pense of the persecuted is assured in the elevation of ex-

istence above mortal discord and in the gift of divine Love.

Spiritual foreshadowings

The prophet of to-day beholds in the mental horizon

the signs of these times, the reappearance of the Chris-

tianity which heals the sick and destroys error,

and no other sign shall be given. Body can-

not be saved except through Mind. The Science of Chris-

tianity is misinterpreted by a material age, for it is the

healing influence of Spirit (not spirits) which the material

senses cannot comprehend, which can only be spiritu-

ally discerned. Creeds, doctrines, and human hypotheses

do not express Christian Science; much less can they

demonstrate it.

Revelation of Science

Beyond the frail premises of human beliefs, above the

loosening grasp of creeds, the demonstration of Christian

Mind-healing stands a revealed and practical

Science. It is imperious throughout all ages

as Christ's revelation of Truth, of Life, and of Love, which

remains inviolate for every man to understand and to

practise.

Science as foreign to all religion

For centuries - yea, always - natural science has not

been considered a part of any religion, Christianity not

excepted. Even now multitudes consider that

which they call science has no proper con-

nection with faith and piety. Mystery does

not enshroud Christ's teachings, and they are not theo-

retical and fragmentary, but practical and complete; and

being practical and complete, they are not deprived of

their essential vitality.

Key to the kingdom

The way through which immortality and life are learned

is not ecclesiastical but Christian, not human but divine,

PAGE 99

not physical but metaphysical, not material but scien-

tifically spiritual. Human philosophy, ethics, and super-

stition afford no demonstrable divine Principle

by which mortals can escape from sin; yet

to escape from sin, is what the Bible demands. "Work

out your own salvation with fear and trembling," says

the apostle, and he straightway adds: "for it is God

which worketh in you both to will and to do of His good

pleasure" (Philippians ii. 12, 13). Truth has furnished

the key to the kingdom, and with this key Christian Sci-

ence has opened the door of the human understanding.

None may pick the lock nor enter by some other door.

The ordinary teachings are material and not spiritual.

Christian Science teaches only that which is spiritual and

divine, and not human. Christian Science is unerring

and Divine; the human sense of things errs because it

is human.

Those individuals, who adopt theosophy, spiritualism,

or hypnotism, may possess natures above some others

who eschew their false beliefs. Therefore my contest is

not with the individual, but with the false system. I

love mankind, and shall continue to labor and to endure.

The calm, strong currents of true spirituality, the

manifestations of which are health, purity, and self-

immolation, must deepen human experience, until the

beliefs of material existence are seen to be a bald imposi-

tion, and sin, disease, and death give everlasting place

to the scientific demonstration of divine Spirit and to

God's spiritual, perfect man.

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CHAPTER VIII - FOOTSTEPS OF TRUTH

CHAPTER VII - PHYSIOLOGY

CHAPTER V - ANIMAL MAGNETISM UNMASKED

CHAPTER VI - SCIENCE, THEOLOGY, MEDICINE

CHAPTER IV - CHRISTIAN SCIENCE VERSUS SPIRITUALISM