Miscellaneous Writings – Part Three

TO THE COLLEGE ASSOCIATION

Letter read at the meeting of the Massachusetts Metaphysical

College Association, June 3, 1891

TO THE MEMBERS OF THE CHRISTIAN SCIENTISTS’ ASSOCIATION OF

THE MASSACHUSETTS METAPHYSICAL COLLEGE

My Beloved Students: – You may be looking to see me

in my accustomed place with you, but this you must no

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1 longer expect. When I retired from the field of labor,

it was a departure, socially, publicly, and finally, from

3 the routine of such material modes as society and our

societies demand. Rumors are rumors, – nothing more.

I am still with you on the field of battle, taking forward

marches, broader and higher views, and with the hope

that you will follow.

The eternal and infinite, already brought to your

9 earnest consideration, so grow upon my vision that I

cannot feel justified in turning aside for one hour from

contemplation of them and of the faith unfeigned.

12 When the verities of being seem to you as to me, – as

they must some time, – you will understand the neces-

sity for my seclusion, and its fulfilment of divine order.

“Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye sepa-

rate, saith the Lord.”

All our thoughts should be given to the absolute

18 demonstration of Christian Science. You can well

afford to give me up, since you have in my last re-

vised edition of Science and Health your teacher and

guide.

I recommend that the June session of this honorable

body shall close your meetings for the summer; also, that

24 hereafter you hold three sessions annually, convening

once in four months; oftener is not requisite, and the

members coming from a distance will be accommodated

by this arrangement.

Yours affectionately,

MARY B. G. EDDY

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TO THE NATIONAL CHRISTIAN SCIENTIST ASSOCIATION

My Dear Students and Friends: – Accept my thanks

for your card of invitation, your badge, and order of exer-

cise, all of which are complete.

When I gave you a meagre reception in Boston at the

6 close of the first convention of the National Christian

Scientist Association, it was simply to give you the privi-

lege, poor as it was, of speaking a few words aside to your

9 teacher. I remember my regret, when, having asked in

general assembly if you had any questions to propose, I

received no reply. Since then you have doubtless realized

that such opportunity might have been improved; but

that time has passed.

I greatly rejoice over the growth of my students within

15 the last few years. It was kind of you to part so gently

with the protecting wings of the mother-bird, and to spread

your own so bravely. Now, dear ones, if you take my

advice again, you will do – what?

Even this: Disorganize the National Christian Scien-

tist Association! and each one return to his place of

labor, to work out individually and alone, for himself and

for others, the sublime ends of human life.

To accomplish this, you must give much time to self-

24 examination and correction; you must control appetite,

passion, pride, envy, evil-speaking, resentment, and each

one of the innumerable errors that worketh or maketh

27 a lie. Then you can give to the world the benefit of all

this, and heal and teach with increased confidence. My

students can now organize their students into associa-

tions, form churches, and hold these organizations of their

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1 own, – until, in turn, their students will sustain them-

selves and work for others.

3 The time it takes yearly to prepare for this national

convention is worse than wasted, if it causes thought to

wander in the wilderness or ways of the world. The de-

6 tail of conforming to society, in any way, costs you what

it would to give time and attention to hygiene in your

ministry and healing.

9 For students to work together is not always to co-

operate, but sometimes to coelbow! Each student should

seek alone the guidance of our common Father – even

12 the divine Principle which he claims to demonstrate, –

and especially should he prove his faith by works, ethi-

cally, physically, and spiritually. Remember that the

first and last lesson of Christian Science is love, perfect

love, and love made perfect through the cross.

I once thought that in unity was human strength; but

have grown to know that human strength is weakness, –

that unity is divine might, giving to human power, peace.

My counsel is applicable to the state of general growth

21 in the members of the National Christian Scientist Asso-

ciation, but it is not so adapted to the members of

students’ organizations. And wherefore? Because the

24 growth of these at first is more gradual; but whenever

they are equal to the march triumphant, God will give

to all His soldiers of the cross the proper command, and

27 under the banner of His love, and with the “still, small

voice” for the music of our march, we all shall take step

and march on in spiritual organization.

Your loving teacher,

MARY BAKER G. EDDY

CONCORD, N. H., May 23, 1890

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1 N. B. I recommend this honorable body to adjourn,

if it does not disorganize, to three years from this date;

or, if it does disorganize, to meet again in three years.

Then bring your tithes into the storehouse, and God will

pour you out a blessing such as you even yet have not

received.

M. B. G. E.

TO THE FIRST CHURCH OF CHRIST, SCIENTIST, BOSTON

(For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty

through God to the pulling down of strong holds;) casting down

12 imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the

knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the

obedience of Christ. – 2 COR. x. 4, 5.

15 In April, 1883, I started the Journal of Christian

Science, with a portion of the above Scripture for its

motto.

On December 10, 1889, I gave a lot of land – in

Boston, situated near the beautiful Back Bay Park, now

valued at $20,000 and rising in value – for the purpose

of having erected thereon a church edifice to be called The

Church of Christ, Scientist.

I had this desirable site transferred in a circuitous,

24 novel way, at the wisdom whereof a few persons have

since scrupled; but to my spiritual perception, like all

true wisdom, this transaction will in future be regarded

as greatly wise, and it will be found that this act was in

advance of the erring mind’s apprehension.

As with all former efforts in the interest of Christian

Science, I took care that the provisions for the land and

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1 building were such as error could not control. I knew

that to God’s gift, foundation and superstructure, no one

3 could hold a wholly material title. The land, and the

church standing on it, must be conveyed through a type

representing the true nature of the gift; a type morally

6 and spiritually inalienable, but materially questionable

– even after the manner that all spiritual good comes

to Christian Scientists, to the end of taxing their faith

in God, and their adherence to the superiority of the

claims of Spirit over matter or merely legal titles.

No one could buy, sell, or mortgage my gift as I had

12 it conveyed. Thus the case rested, and I supposed the

trustee-deed was legal; but this was God’s business, not

mine. Our church was prospered by the right hand of

15 His righteousness, and contributions to the Building Fund

generously poured into the treasury. Unity prevailed, –

till mortal man sought to know who owned God’s temple,

and adopted and urged only the material side of this

question.

The lot of land which I donated I redeemed from under

21 mortgage. The foundation on which our church was to

be built had to be rescued from the grasp of legal power,

and now it must be put back into the arms of Love, if we

would not be found fighting against God.

The diviner claim and means for upbuilding the Church

of Christ were prospered. Our title to God’s acres will

27 be safe and sound – when we can “read our title clear”

to heavenly mansions. Built on the rock, our church

will stand the storms of ages: though the material super-

structure should crumble into dust, the fittest would sur-

vive, – the spiritual idea would live, a perpetual type of

the divine Principle it reflects.

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1 The First Church of Christ, Scientist, our prayer in

stone, will be the prophecy fulfilled, the monument up-

3 reared, of Christian Science. It will speak to you of the

Mother, and of your hearts’ offering to her through whom

was revealed to you God’s all-power, all-presence, and

6 all-science. This building begun, will go up, and no one

can suffer from it, for no one can resist the power that

is behind it; and against this church temple “the gates

of hell” cannot prevail.

All loyal Christian Scientists hail with joy this pro-

posed type of universal Love; not so, however, with

12 error, which hates the bonds and methods of Truth, and

shudders at the freedom, might, and majesty of Spirit,

– even the annihilating law of Love.

15 I vindicate both the law of God and the laws of our

land. I believe, – yea, I understand, – that with the

spirit of Christ actuating all the parties concerned about

18 the legal quibble, it can easily be corrected to the satis-

faction of all. Let this be speedily done. Do not, I im-

plore you, stain the early history of Christian Science by

21 the impulses of human will and pride; but let the divine

will and the nobility of human meekness rule this busi-

ness transaction, in obedience to the law of Love and the

laws of our land.

As the ambassador of Christ’s teachings, I admonish

you: Delay not longer to commence building our church

27 in Boston; or else return every dollar that you yourselves

declare you have had no legal authority for obtaining, to

the several contributors, – and let them, not you, say

what shall be done with their money.

Of our first church in Boston, O recording angel!

write: God is in the midst of her: how beautiful are her

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1 feet! how beautiful are her garments! how hath He en-

larged her borders! how hath He made her wildernesses

to bud and blossom as the rose!

With love,

MARY BAKER EDDY

TO DONORS OF BOAT, FROM TORONTO, CANADA

Written on receipt of a beautiful boat presented by Christian

Scientists in Toronto, for the little pond at Pleasant View. The

boat displays, among other beautiful decorations, a number of

masonic symbols.

Beloved Students and Friends: – Accept my thanks

12 for the beautiful boat and presentation poem. Each day

since they arrived I have said, Let me write to the donors,

– and what?

15 My first impression was to indite a poem; my second,

a psalm; my third, a letter. Why the letter alone? Be-

cause your dear hearts expressed in their lovely gift such

18 varying types of true affection, shaded as autumn leaves

with bright hues of the spiritual, that my Muse lost her

lightsome lyre, and imagery of thought gave place to

chords of feeling too deep for words.

A boat song seemed more Olympian than the psalm in

spiritual strains of the Hebrew bard. So I send my

answer in a commonplace letter. Poor return, is it

not?

The symbols of freemasonry depicted on the boat

27 wakened memory, touched tender fibres of thought, and

I longed to say to the masonic brothers: If as a woman

I may not unite with you in freemasonry, nor you with

me in Christian Science, yet as friends we can feel the

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1 touch of heart to heart and hand to hand, on the broad

basis and sure foundation of true friendship’s “level”

and the “square” of moral sentiments.

My dear students may have explained to the kind par-

ticipants in beautifying this boat our spiritual points,

6 above the plane of matter. If so, I may hope that a

closer link hath bound us. Across lakes, into a kingdom,

I reach out my hand to clasp yours, with this silent bene-

9 diction: May the kingdom of heaven come in each of

your hearts!

With love,

MARY BAKER EDDY

ADDRESS, – LAYING THE CORNER-STONE

Beloved Students:-On the 21st day of May, A. D.

15 1894, with quiet, imposing ceremony, is laid the corner-

stone of “The First Church of Christ, Scientist,” in

Boston.

18 It gives me great pleasure to say that you, principally

the Normal class graduates of my College, well known

physicians, teachers, editors, and pastors of churches,

21 by contributions of one thousand dollars each, husband

and wife reckoned as one, have, within about three

months, donated the munificent sum of forty-two thou-

24 sand dollars toward building The Mother Church. A

quiet call from me for this extra contribution, in aid of

our Church Building Fund, found you all “with one

accord in one place.” Each donation came promptly;

sometimes at much self-sacrifice, but always accompanied

with a touching letter breathing the donor’s privileged joy.

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1 The granite for this church was taken from the quar-

ries in New Hampshire, my native State. The money

3 for building “Mother’s Room,” situated in the second

story of the tower on the northeast corner of this build-

ing, and the name thereof, came from the dear children

of Christian Scientists; a little band called Busy Bees,

organized by Miss Maurine R. Campbell.

On this memorable day there are laid away a copy of

9 this address, the subscription list on which appear your

several names in your own handwriting, your textbook,

“Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,” and

12 other works written by the same author, your teacher,

the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science; (1) with-

out pomp or pride, laid away as a sacred secret in the

15 heart of a rock, there to typify the prophecy, “And a man

shall be as an hiding place from the wind, and a covert

from the tempest; . . . as the shadow of a great rock in

18 weary land:” henceforth to whisper our Master’s

promise, “Upon this rock I will build my church; and

the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”

21 To-day, be this hope in each of our hearts, – precious

in God’s sight as shall be the assembling of His people

in this temple, sweet as the rest that remaineth for the

24 righteous, and fresh as a summer morn, – that, from

earth’s pillows of stone, our visible lives are rising to

God. As in the history of a seed, so may our earthly

sowing bear fruit that exudes the inspiration of the wine

poured into the cup of Christ.

To-day I pray that divine Love, the life-giving Prin-

ciple of Christianity, shall speedily wake the long night

of materialism, and the universal dawn shall break upon

the spire of this temple. The Church, more than any

(1) A copy of the Bible was included among the books placed in the corner-stone.

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1 other institution, at present is the cement of society, and

it should be the bulwark of civil and religious liberty.

3 But the time cometh when the religious element, or Church

of Christ, shall exist alone in the affections, and need no

organization to express it. Till then, this form of godli-

ness seems as requisite to manifest its spirit, as individ-

uality to express Soul and substance.

Does a single bosom burn for fame and power? Then

9 when that person shall possess these, let him ask him-

self, and answer to his name in this corner-stone of our

temple: Am I greater for them? And if he thinks that

12 he is, then is he less than man to whom God gave “do-

minion over all the earth,” less than the meek who “in-

herit the earth.” Even vanity forbids man to be vain;

15 and pride is a hooded hawk which flies in darkness. Over

a wounded sense of its own error, let not mortal thought

resuscitate too soon.

18 In our rock-bound friendship, delicate as dear, our

names may melt into one, and common dust, and their

modest sign be nothingness. Be this as it may, the visible

21 unity of spirit remains, to quicken even dust into sweet

memorial such as Isaiah prophesied: “The wolf also shall

dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with

the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling

together; and a little child shall lead them.”

When the hearts of Christian Scientists are woven to-

27 gether as are their names in the web of history, earth will

float majestically heaven’s heraldry, and echo the song

of angels: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth

peace, good will toward men.”

To The Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston, and to

the dear children that my heart folds within it, let me

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1 say, ‘Tis sweet to remember thee, and God’s Zion, with

healing on her wings. May her walls be vocal with sal-

vation; and her gates with praise!

TO THE FIRST CHURCH OF CHRIST, SCIENTIST, BOSTON

6 My Beloved Students: – I cannot conscientiously lend

my counsel to direct your action on receiving or dismiss-

ing candidates. To do this, I should need to be with

9 you. I cannot accept hearsay, and would need to know

the circumstances and facts regarding both sides of the

subject, to form a proper judgment. This is not my

12 present province; hence I have hitherto declined to be

consulted on these subjects, and still maintain this

position.

15 These are matters of grave import; and you cannot

be indifferent to this, but will give them immediate at-

tention, and be governed therein by the spirit and the

letter of this Scripture: “Whatsoever ye would that men

should do unto you, do ye even so to them.”

I cannot be the conscience for this church; but if I

21 were, I would gather every reformed mortal that desired

to come, into its fold, and counsel and help him to walk

in the footsteps of His flock. I feel sure that as Chris-

24 tian Scientists you will act, relative to this matter, up to

your highest understanding of justice and mercy.

Affectionately yours,

MARY BAKER EDDY

Feb. 12, 1895

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THE FIRST MEMBERS OF THE FIRST CHURCH OF CHRIST, SCIENTIST,

BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS

3 My Beloved Students: – Another year has rolled on,

another annual meeting has convened, another space of

time has been given us, and has another duty been done

6 and another victory won for time and eternity? Do you

meet in unity, preferring one another, and demonstrating

the divine Principle of Christian Science? Have you

9 improved past hours, and ladened them with records

worthy to be borne heavenward? Have you learned

that sin is inadmissible, and indicates a small mind?

Do you manifest love for those that hate you and de-

spitefully use you?

The man of integrity is one who makes it his constant

15 rule to follow the road of duty, according as Truth and

the voice of his conscience point it out to him. He is not

guided merely by affections which may some time give

the color of virtue to a loose and unstable character.

The upright man is guided by a fixed Principle, which

destines him to do nothing but what is honorable, and to

21 abhor whatever is base or unworthy; hence we find him

ever the same, – at all times the trusty friend, the affec-

tionate relative, the conscientious man of business, the

pious worker, the public-spirited citizen.

He assumes no borrowed appearance. He seeks no

mask to cover him, for he acts no studied part; but he

27 is indeed what he appears to be, – full of truth, candor,

and humanity. In all his pursuits, he knows no path

but the fair, open, and direct one, and would much rather

fail of success than attain it by reproachable means. He

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1 never shows us a smiling countenance while he meditates

evil against us in his heart. We shall never find one part

3 of his character at variance with another.

Lovingly yours,

MARY BAKER EDDY

Sept. 30, 1895

EXTRACT FROM A LETTER

The Rules and By-laws in the Manual of The First

9 Church of Christ, Scientist, Boston, originated not in

solemn conclave as in ancient Sanhedrim. They were

not arbitrary opinions nor dictatorial demands, such as

12 one person might impose on another. They were im-

pelled by a power not one’s own, were written at differ-

ent dates, and as the occasion required. They sprang

15 from necessity, the logic of events, – from the immedi-

ate demand for them as a help that must be supplied to

maintain the dignity and defense of our Cause; hence

18 their simple, scientific basis, and detail so requisite to

demonstrate genuine Christian Science, and which will

do for the race what absolute doctrines destined for future

generations might not accomplish.

TO THE MOTHER CHURCH

Beloved Brethren: – Until recently, I was not aware

24 that the contribution box was presented at your Friday

evening meetings. I specially desire that you collect no

moneyed contributions from the people present on these

occasions.

Let the invitation to this sweet converse be in the words

of the prophet Isaiah: “Ho, every one that thirsteth,

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1 come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come

ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without

money and without price.”

Invite all cordially and freely to this banquet of Chris-

tian Science, this feast and flow of Soul. Ask them to

6 bring what they possess of love and light to help leaven

your loaf and replenish your scanty store. Then, after

presenting the various offerings, and one after another

9 has opened his lips to discourse and distribute what God

has given him of experience, hope, faith, and under-

standing, gather up the fragments, and count the baskets

full of accessions to your love, and see that nothing has

been lost.

With love,

MARY BAKER EDDY

TO FIRST CHURCH OF CHRIST, SCIENTIST, IN OCONTO

18 My Beloved Brethren: – Lips nor pen can ever ex-

press the joy you give me in parting so promptly with

your beloved pastor, Rev. Mr. Norcross, to send him to

21 aid me. It is a refreshing demonstration of Christianity,

brotherly love, and all the rich graces of the Spirit. May

this sacrifice bring to your beloved church a vision of the

24 new church, that cometh down from heaven, whose altar

is a loving heart, whose communion is fellowship with

saints and angels. This example of yours is a light that

cannot be hid.

Guided by the pillar and the cloud, this little church

that built the first temple for Christian Science worship

shall abide steadfastly in the faith of Jesus’ words: “Fear

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1 not, little flock; for it is your Father’s good pleasure to

give you the kingdom.” May He soon give you a pastor;

3 already you have the great Shepherd of Israel watch-

ing over you. Give my forever-love to your dear church.

Yours in bonds of Christ,

MARY BAKER G. EDDY

Boston, Mass., 1889

TO FIRST CHURCH OF CHRIST, SCIENTIST, IN SCRANTON

Beloved Brethren: – Space is no separator of hearts.

Spiritually, I am with all who are with Truth, and whose

12 hearts to-day are repeating their joy that God dwelleth

in the congregation of the faithful, and loveth the gates

of Zion.

15 The outlook is cheering. We have already seen the

salvation of many people by means of Christian Science.

Chapels and churches are dotting the entire land. Con-

18 venient houses and halls can now be obtained wherein, as

whereout, Christian Scientists may worship the Father

“in spirit and in truth,” as taught by our great Master.

21 “If God be for us, who can be against us?” If He

be with us, the wayside is a sanctuary, and the desert a

resting-place peopled with living witnesses of the fact

that “God is Love.”

God is universal; confined to no spot, defined by no

dogma, appropriated by no sect. Not more to one than

27 to all, is God demonstrable as divine Life, Truth, and

Love; and His people are they that reflect Him – that

reflect Love. Again, this infinite Principle, with its uni-

versal manifestation, is all that really is or can be;

hence God is our Shepherd. He guards, guides, feeds,

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1 and folds the sheep of His pasture; and their ears are

attuned to His call. In the words of the loving disciple,

3 “My sheep hear my voice, . . . and they follow me;

neither shall any man pluck them out of my

hand.”

6 God is a consuming fire. He separates the dross from

the gold, purifies the human character, through the

furnace of affliction. Those who bear fruit He purgeth,

9 that they may bear more fruit. Through the sacred law,

He speaketh to the unfruitful in tones of Sinai: and, in

the gospel, He saith of the barren fig-tree, “Cut it down;

why cumbereth it the ground?”

God is our Father and our Mother, our Minister and

the great Physician: He is man’s only real relative on

15 earth and in heaven. David sang, “Whom have I in

heaven but thee? and there is none upon earth that I

desire beside thee.”

18 Brother, sister, beloved in the Lord, knowest thou

thyself, and art thou acquainted with God? If not, I

pray thee as a Christian Scientist, delay not to make Him

thy first acquaintance.

Glorious things are spoken of you in His Word. Ye

are a chosen people, whose God is – what? Even All.

24 May mercy and truth go before you: may the lamp of

your life continually be full of oil, and you be wedded

to the spiritual idea, Christ; then will you heal, and

27 teach, and preach, on the ascending scale of everlasting

Life and Love.

Affectionately yours in Christ,

MARY BAKER EDDY

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TO FIRST CHURCH OF CHRIST, SCIENTIST, IN DENVER

3 Beloved Pastor and Brethren: – “As in water face

answereth to face,” and in love continents clasp hands, so

the oneness of God includes also His presence with those

6 whose hearts unite in the purposes of goodness. Of this

we may be sure: that thoughts winged with peace and

love breathe a silent benediction over all the earth, co-

operate with the divine power, and brood unconsciously

o’er the work of His hand.

I, as a corporeal person, am not in your midst: I, as a

12 dictator, arbiter, or ruler, am not present; but I, as a

mother whose heart pulsates with every throb of theirs

for the welfare of her children, am present, and rejoice

with them that rejoice.

May meekness, mercy, and love dwell forever in the

hearts of those who worship in this tabernacle: then

18 will they receive the heritage that God has prepared for

His people,-made ready for the pure in affection, the

meek in spirit, the worshipper in truth, the follower of

good.

Thus founded upon the rock of Christ, when storm

and tempest beat against this sure foundation, you,

24 safely sheltered in the strong tower of hope, faith, and

Love, are God’s nestlings; and He will hide you in His

feathers till the storm has passed. Into His haven of

27 Soul there enters no element of earth to cast out angels,

to silence the right intuition which guides you safely

home.

Exercise more faith in God and His spiritual means

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1 and methods, than in man and his material ways and

means, of establishing the Cause of Christian Science.

3 If right yourself, God will confirm His inheritance. “Be

not weary in well doing.” Truth is restful, and Love is

triumphant.

6 When God went forth before His people, they were

fed with manna: they marched through the wilderness:

they passed through the Red Sea, untouched by the bil-

9 lows. At His command, the rock became a fountain;

and the land of promise, green isles of refreshment. In

the words of the Psalmist, when” the Lord gave the word:

great was the company of those that published it.”

God is good to Israel, – washed in the waters of

Meribah, cleansed of the flesh, – good to His Israel

15 encompassed not with pride, hatred, self-will, and self-

justification; wherein violence covereth men as a gar-

ment, and as captives are they enchained.

18 Christian Scientists bring forth the fruits of Spirit,

not flesh; and God giveth this “new name” to no man

who honors Him not by positive proof of trust worthiness.

May you be able to say, “I have not cleansed my heart

in vain.”

Sir Edwin Arnold, to whom I presented a copy of

24 my first edition of “Science and Health with Key to the

Scriptures,” writes: –

Peace on earth and Good-will!

27 Souls that are gentle and still

Hear the first music of this

Far-off, infinite, Bliss!

So may the God of peace be and abide with this church.

Affectionately yours,

MARY BAKER EDDY

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TO FIRST CHURCH OF CHRIST, SCIENTIST, IN LAWRENCE

3 Beloved Brethren: – The spreading branches of The

Church of Christ, Scientist, are fast reaching out their

broad shelter to the entire world. Your faith has not

6 been without works, – and God’s love for His flock is

manifest in His care. He will dig about this little church,

prune its encumbering branches, water it with the dews

9 of heaven, enrich its roots, and enlarge its borders with

divine Love. God only waits for man’s worthiness to

enhance the means and measure of His grace. You

12 have already proof of the prosperity of His Zion. You

sit beneath your own vine and fig-tree as the growth

of spirituality – even that vine whereof our Father is

husbandman.

It is the purpose of divine Love to resurrect the under-

standing, and the kingdom of God, the reign of har-

18 mony already within us. Through the word that is

spoken unto you, are you made free. Abide in His word,

and it shall abide in you; and the healing Christ will

again be made manifest in the flesh – understood and

glorified.

Honor thy Father and Mother, God. Continue in

24 His love. Bring forth fruit – “signs following” – that

your prayers be not hindered. Pray without ceasing.

Watch diligently; never desert the post of spiritual ob-

27 servation and self-examination. Strive for self-abnega-

tion, justice, meekness, mercy, purity, love. Let your

light reflect Light. Have no ambition, affection, nor

aim apart from holiness. Forget not for a moment, that

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1 God is All-in-all-therefore, that in reality there is but

one cause and effect.

3 The pride of circumstance or power is the prince of

this world that has nothing in Christ. All power and

happiness are spiritual, and proceed from goodness.

6 Sacrifice self to bless one another, even as God has

blessed you. Forget self in laboring for mankind; then

will you woo the weary wanderer to your door, win the

9 pilgrim and stranger to your church, and find access to

the heart of humanity. While pressing meekly on, be

faithful, be valiant in the Christian’s warfare, and peace

will crown your joy.

Lovingly yours,

MARY BAKER EDDY

TO CORRESPONDENTS

Beloved Students: – Because Mother has not the time

even to read all of her interesting correspondence, and

18 less wherein to answer it (however much she desires

thus to do), she hereby requests: First, that you, her

students’ students, who write such excellent letters to

21 her, will hereafter, as a general rule, send them to the

editors of The Christian Science Journal for publication,

and thereby give to us all the pleasure of hearing from you.

24 If my own students cannot spare time to write to God,

– when they address me I shall be apt to forward their

letters to Him as our common Parent, and by way of

27 The Christian Science Journal; thus fulfilling their moral

obligation to furnish some reading-matter for our denomi-

national organ. Methinks, were they to contemplate the

universal charge wherewith divine Love has entrusted us,

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Miscellaneous Writings

1 in behalf of a suffering race, they would contribute oftener

to the pages of this swift vehicle of scientific thought;

for it reaches a vast number of earnest readers, and seek-

ers after Truth.

With love,

MARY BAKER EDDY

TO STUDENTS

Beloved Christian Scientists: – Please send in your

contributions as usual to our Journal. All is well at head-

9 quarters, and when the mist shall melt away you will see

clearly the signs of Truth and the heaven of Love within

your hearts. Let the reign of peace and harmony be

supreme and forever yours.

I proposed to merge the adjourned meeting in the one

held at Chicago, because I saw no advantage, but great

15 disadvantage, in one student’s opinions or modus oper-

andi becoming the basis for others: read “Retrospection”

on this subject. Science is absolute, and best under-

18 stood through the study of my works and the daily Chris-

tian demonstration thereof. It is their materiality that

clogs the progress of students, and “this kind goeth not

21 forth but by prayer and fasting.” It is materialism through

which the animal magnetizer preys, and in turn becomes

a prey. Spirituality is the basis of all true thought and

24 volition. Assembling themselves together, and listening

to each other amicably, or contentiously, is no aid to

students in acquiring solid Christian Science. Experi-

ence and, above all, obedience, are the aids and tests of

growth and understanding in this direction.

With love,

MARY B. G. EDDY

Page 157

TO A STUDENT

My Dear Student: – It is a great thing to be found

3 worthy to suffer for Christ, Truth. Paul said, “If we

suffer, we shall also reign with him.” Reign then, my

beloved in the Lord. He that marketh the sparrow’s fall

will direct thy way.

I have written, or caused my secretary to write, to Mr.

and Mrs. Stewart, of Toronto, Canada (you will find their

9 card in The C. S. Journal), that you or your lawyer will

ask them all questions important for your case, and re-

quested that they furnish all information possible. They

12 will be glad to help you. Every true Christian Scientist

will feel “as bound with you,” but as free in Truth and

Love, safe under the shadow of His wing.

15 Yes, my student, my Father is your Father; and He

helps us most when help is most needed, for He is the

ever-present help.

18 I am glad that you are in good cheer. I enclose you

the name of Mr. E. A. Kimball, C. S. D., of Chicago, –

5020 Woodlawn Ave., – for items relative to Mrs. Steb-

bin’s case.

“Commit thy way unto the Lord; trust also in Him;

and He shall bring it to pass. And He shall bring forth

thy righteousness as the light, and thy judgment as the

noonday.” This I know, for God is for us.

Write me when you need me. Error has no power

27 but to destroy itself. It cannot harm you; it cannot stop

the eternal currents of Truth.

Ever with love,

MARY B. G. EDDY

Page 158

TO A STUDENT

My Beloved Student: – In reply to your letter I will

3 say: God’s ways are not as our ways; but higher far

than the heavens above the earth is His wisdom above

ours. When I requested you to be ordained, I little

6 thought of the changes about to be made. When I in-

sisted on your speaking without notes, I little knew that

so soon another change in your pulpit would be demanded.

9 But now, after His messenger has obeyed the message

of divine Love, comes the interpretation thereof. But you

see we both had first to obey, and to do this through faith,

not sight.

The meaning of it all, as now shown, is this: when

you were bidden to be ordained, it was in reward for your

15 faithful service, thus to honor it. The second command,

to drop the use of notes, was to rebuke a lack of faith in

divine help, and to test your humility and obedience in

bearing this cross.

All God’s servants are minute men and women. As

of old, I stand with sandals on and staff in hand, wait-

21 ing for the watchword and the revelation of what, how,

whither. Let us be faithful and obedient, and God will

do the rest.

24 In the April number of The Christian Science Journal

you will find the forthcoming completion (as I now think)

of the divine directions sent out to the churches. It is

27 satisfactory to note, however, that the order therein given

corresponds to the example of our Master. Jesus was

not ordained as our churches ordain ministers. We

have no record that he used notes when preaching. He

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1 spake in their synagogues, reading the Scriptures and

expounding them; and God has given to this age “Science

and Health with Key to the Scriptures,” to elucidate

His Word.

You may read this letter to your church, and then

6 send it to Rev. Mr. Norcross, and he will understand.

May the God of all grace give you peace.

With love,

MARY BAKER EDDY

EXTRACT FROM A CHRISTMAS LETTER

Beloved Students: – My heart has many rooms: one

12 of these is sacred to the memory of my students. Into

this upper chamber, where all things are pure and of

good report, – into this sanctuary of love, – I often

15 retreat, sit silently, and ponder. In this chamber is

memory’s wardrobe, where I deposit certain recollec-

tions and rare grand collections once in each year. This

18 is my Christmas storehouse. Its goods commemorate,

– not so much the Bethlehem babe, as the man of God,

the risen Christ, and the adult Jesus. Here I deposit

21 the gifts that my dear students offer at the shrine of

Christian Science, and to their lone Leader. Here I talk

once a year, – and this is a bit of what I said in 1890:

24 “O glorious Truth ! O Mother Love ! how has the sense

of Thy children grown to behold Thee! and how have

many weary wings sprung upward! and how has our

Model, Christ, been unveiled to us, and to the age!”

I look at the rich devices in embroidery, silver, gold,

and jewels,-all gifts of Christian Scientists from all

parts of our nation, and some from abroad, – then al-

Page 160

1 most marvel at the power and permanence of affection

under the régime of Christian Science! Never did grati-

3 tude and love unite more honestly in uttering the word

thanks, than ours at this season. But a mother’s love

behind words has no language; it may give no material

token, but lives steadily on, through time and circum-

stance, as part and paramount portion of her being.

Thus may our lives flow on in the same sweet rhythm

9 of head and heart, till they meet and mingle in bliss super-

nal. There is a special joy in knowing that one is gaining

constantly in the knowledge of Truth and divine Love.

12 Your progress, the past year, has been marked. It satis-

fies my present hope. Of this we rest assured, that every

trial of our faith in God makes us stronger and firmer in

understanding and obedience.

Lovingly yours,

MARY BAKER G. EDDY

Page 161

CHAPTER VI – SERMONS

A CHRISTMAS SERMON

DELIVERED IN CHICKERING HALL, BOSTON, MASS., ON THE

SUNDAY BEFORE CHRISTMAS, 1888

SUBJECT: The Corporeal and Incorporeal Saviour

TEXT: For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the

6 government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called

Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The

Prince of Peace. – ISAIAH ix. 6.

9 TO the senses, Jesus was the son of man: in Science,

man is the son of God. The material senses could

not cognize the Christ, or Son of God: it was Jesus’

approximation to this state of being that made him the

Christ-Jesus, the Godlike, the anointed.

The prophet whose words we have chosen for our

15 text, prophesied the appearing of this dual nature, as

both human and divinely endowed, the personal and the

impersonal Jesus.

18 The only record of our Master as a public benefactor,

or personal Saviour, opens when he was thirty years of

age; owing in part, perhaps, to the Jewish law that none

21 should teach or preach in public under that age. Also,

it is natural to conclude that at this juncture he was

specially endowed with the Holy Spirit; for he was given

the new name, Messiah, or Jesus Christ, – the God-

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1 anointed; even as, at times of special enlightenment,

Jacob was called Israel; and Saul, Paul.

3 The third event of this eventful period, – a period of

such wonderful spiritual import to mankind! – was the

advent of a higher Christianity.

6 From this dazzling, God-crowned summit, the Naza-

rene stepped suddenly before the people and their schools

of philosophy; Gnostic, Epicurean, and Stoic. He must

stem these rising angry elements, and walk serenely over

their fretted, foaming billows.

Here the cross became the emblem of Jesus’ history;

while the central point of his Messianic mission was peace,

good will, love, teaching, and healing.

Clad with divine might, he was ready to stem the tide

15 of Judaism, and prove his power, derived from Spirit, to

be supreme; lay himself as a lamb upon the altar of

materialism, and therefrom rise to his nativity in Spirit.

18 The corporeal Jesus bore our infirmities, and through

his stripes we are healed. He was the Way-shower, and

suffered in the flesh, showing mortals how to escape from

the sins of the flesh.

There was no incorporeal Jesus of Nazareth. The

spiritual man, or Christ, was after the similitude of the

Father, without corporeality or finite mind.

Materiality, worldliness, human pride, or self-will, by

demoralizing his motives and Christlikeness, would have

dethroned his power as the Christ.

To carry out his holy purpose, he must be oblivious of

human self.

Of the lineage of David, like him he went forth, simple

as the shepherd boy, to disarm the Goliath. Panoplied

in the strength of an exalted hope, faith, and understand-

Page 163

1 ing, he sought to conquer the three-in-one of error: the

world, the flesh, and the devil.

3 Three years he went about doing good. He had for

thirty years been preparing to heal and teach divinely;

but his three-years mission was a marvel of glory: its

chaplet, a grave to mortal sense dishonored – from which

sprang a sublime and everlasting victory!

He who dated time, the Christian era, and spanned

9 eternity, was the meekest man on earth. He healed

and taught by the wayside, in humble homes: to arrant

hypocrite and to dull disciples he explained the Word

of God, which has since ripened into interpretation

through Science.

His words were articulated in the language of a de-

15 clining race, and committed to the providence of God.

In no one thing seemed he less human and more divine

than in his unfaltering faith in the immortality of Truth.

18 Referring to this, he said, “Heaven and earth shall

pass away, but my words shall not pass away!” and

they have not: they still live; and are the basis of divine

liberty, the medium of Mind, the hope of the race.

Only three years a personal Saviour! yet the founda-

tions he laid are as eternal as Truth, the chief corner-

stone.

After his brief brave struggle, and the crucifixion of

the corporeal man, the incorporeal Saviour – the Christ

27 or spiritual idea which leadeth into all Truth – must

needs come in Christian Science, demonstrating the spir-

itual healing of body and mind.

This idea or divine essence was, and is, forever about

the Father’s business; heralding the Principle of health,

holiness, and immortality.

Page 164

1 Its divine Principle interprets the incorporeal idea, or

Son of God; hence the incorporeal and corporeal are

3 distinguished thus: the former is the spiritual idea that

represents divine good, and the latter is the human

presentation of goodness in man. The Science of Chris-

6 tianity, that has appeared in the ripeness of time, re-

veals the incorporeal Christ; and this will continue

to be seen more clearly until it be acknowledged, under-

stood, – and the Saviour, which is Truth, be compre-

hended.

To the vision of the Wisemen, this spiritual idea of the

12 Principle of man or the universe, appeared as a star. At

first, the babe Jesus seemed small to mortals; but from

the mount of revelation, the prophet beheld it from the

beginning as the Redeemer, who would present a wonder-

ful manifestation of Truth and Love.

In our text Isaiah foretold, “His name shall be called

Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting

Father, The Prince of Peace.”

As the Wisemen grew in the understanding of Christ,

21 the spiritual idea, it grew in favor with them. Thus it

will continue, as it shall become understood, until man

be found in the actual likeness of his Maker. Their

24 highest human concept of the man Jesus, that portrayed

him as the only Son of God, the only begotten of the

Father, full of grace and Truth, will become so magnified

27 to human sense, by means of the lens of Science, as to

reveal man collectively, as individually, to be the son of

God.

The limited view of God’s ideas arose from the testimony

of the senses. Science affords the evidence that God is the

Father of man, of all that is real and eternal. This spir-

Page 165

1 itual idea that the personal Jesus demonstrated, casting

out evils and healing, more than eighteen centuries ago,

3 disappeared by degrees; both because of the ascension

of Jesus, in which it was seen that he had grown beyond

the human sense of him, and because of the corruption of

the Church.

The last appearing of Truth will be a wholly spiritual

idea of God and of man, without the fetters of the flesh, or

9 corporeality. This infinite idea of infinity will be, is, as

eternal as its divine Principle. The daystar of this appear-

ing is the light of Christian Science – the Science which

12 rends the veil of the flesh from top to bottom. The light

of this revelation leaves nothing that is material; neither

darkness, doubt, disease, nor death. The material cor-

poreality disappears; and individual spirituality, perfect

and eternal, appears – never to disappear.

The truth uttered and lived by Jesus, who passed on

18 and left to mortals the rich legacy of what he said and

did, makes his followers the heirs to his example; but

they can neither appreciate nor appropriate his treasures

21 of Truth and Love, until lifted to these by their own

growth and experiences. His goodness and grace pur-

chased the means of mortals’ redemption from sin; but,

24 they never paid the price of sin. This cost, none but the

sinner can pay; and accordingly as this account is settled

with divine Love, is the sinner ready to avail himself of

the rich blessings flowing from the teaching, example,

and suffering of our Master.

The secret stores of wisdom must be discovered, their

treasures reproduced and given to the world, before man

can truthfully conclude that he has been found in the

order, mode, and virgin origin of man according to divine

Page 166

1 Science, which alone demonstrates the divine Principle

and spiritual idea of being.

3 The monument whose finger points upward, commem-

orates the earthly life of a martyr; but this is not all of

the philanthropist, hero, and Christian. The Truth he

6 has taught and spoken lives, and moves in our midst a

divine afflatus. Thus it is that the ideal Christ – or

impersonal infancy, manhood, and womanhood of Truth

and Love – is still with us.

And what of this child? – “For unto us a child is

born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall

be upon his shoulder.”

This child, or spiritual idea, has evolved a more ready

ear for the overture of angels and the scientific under-

15 standing of Truth and Love. When Christ, the incor-

poreal idea of God, was nameless, and a Mary knew not

how to declare its spiritual origin, the idea of man was

18 not understood. The Judaean religion even required the

Virgin-mother to go to the temple and be purified, for

having given birth to the corporeal child Jesus, whose

21 origin was more spiritual than the senses could inter-

pret. Like the leaven that a certain woman hid in three

measures of meal, the Science of God and the spiritual

24 idea, named in this century Christian Science, is leaven-

ing the lump of human thought, until the whole shall

be leavened and all materialism disappear. This action

27 of the divine energy, even if not acknowledged, has

come to be seen as diffusing richest blessings. This

spiritual idea, or Christ, entered into the minutiae of the

life of the personal Jesus. It made him an honest man,

a good carpenter, and a good man, before it could make

him the glorified.

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1 The material questions at this age on the reappearing

of the infantile thought of God’s man, are after the man-

3 ner of a mother in the flesh, though their answers per-

tain to the spiritual idea, as in Christian Science: –

Is he deformed?

6 He is wholly symmetrical; the one altogether lovely.

Is the babe a son, or daughter?

Both son and daughter: even the compound idea of

9 all that resembles God.

How much does he weigh?

His substance outweighs the material world.

12 How old is he?

Of his days there is no beginning and no ending.

What is his name?

15 Christ Science.

Who are his parents, brothers, and sisters?

His Father and Mother are divine Life, Truth, and

18 Love; and they who do the will of his Father are his

brethren.

Is he heir to an estate?

21 “The government shall be upon his shoulder!” He

has dominion over the whole earth; and in admiration

of his origin, he exclaims, “I thank Thee, O Father, Lord

24 of heaven and earth, that Thou hast hid these things

from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto

babes !”

Is he wonderful?

His works thus prove him. He giveth power, peace,

and holiness; he exalteth the lowly; he giveth liberty

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1 to the captive, health to the sick, salvation from sin to

the sinner – and overcometh the world !

3 Go, and tell what things ye shall see and hear: how

the blind, spiritually and physically, receive sight; how

the lame, those halting between two opinions or hob-

6 bling on crutches, walk; how the physical and moral

lepers are cleansed; how the deaf – those who, having

ears, hear not, and are afflicted with “tympanum on the

9 brain” – hear; how the dead, those buried in dogmas

and physical ailments, are raised; that to the poor –

the lowly in Christ, not the man-made rabbi – the

12 gospel is preached. Note this: only such as are pure

in spirit, emptied of vainglory and vain knowledge, re-

ceive Truth.

Here ends the colloquy; and a voice from heaven seems

to say, “Come and see.”

The nineteenth-century prophets repeat, “Unto us a

son is given.”

The shepherds shout, “We behold the appearing of

the star!” – and the pure in heart clap their hands.

EDITOR’S EXTRACTS FROM SERMON

TEXT: Ye do err, not knowing the Scriptures, nor the power of

God. – MATT. xxii. 29.

The Christian Science Journal reported as follows: –

The announcement that the Rev. Mary B. G. Eddy

would speak before the Scientist denomination on the

27 afternoon of October 26, drew a large audience. Haw-

thorne Hall was densely packed, and many had to go

away unable to obtain seats. The distinguished speaker

began by saying: –

Page 169

1 Within Bible pages she had found all the divine Science

she preaches; noticing, all along the way of her researches

3 therein, that whenever her thoughts had wandered into

the bypaths of ancient philosophies or pagan literatures,

her spiritual insight had been darkened thereby, till

6 she was God-driven back to the inspired pages. Early

training, through the misinterpretation of the Word,

had been the underlying cause of the long years of in-

9 validism she endured before Truth dawned upon her

understanding, through right interpretation. With the

understanding of Scripture-meanings, had come physical

rejuvenation. The uplifting of spirit was the upbuild-

ing of the body.

She affirmed that the Scriptures cannot properly be

15 interpreted in a literal way. The truths they teach must

be spiritually discerned, before their message can be

borne fully to our minds and hearts. That there is a

18 dual meaning to every Biblical passage, the most eminent

divines of the world have concluded; and to get at the

highest, or metaphysical, it is necessary rightly to read

21 what the inspired writers left for our spiritual instruction.

The literal rendering of the Scriptures makes them noth-

ing valuable, but often is the foundation of unbelief and

24 hopelessness. The metaphysical rendering is health and

peace and hope for all. The literal or material reading is

the reading of the carnal mind, which is enmity toward

God, Spirit.

Taking several Bible passages, Mrs. Eddy showed how

beautiful and inspiring are the thoughts when rightly

understood. “Let the dead bury their dead; follow

thou me,” was one of the passages explained metaphysi-

cally. In their fullest meaning, those words are salvation

Page 170

1 from the belief of death, the last enemy to be overthrown;

for by following Christ truly, resurrection and life im-

3 mortal are brought to us. If we follow him, to us there

can be no dead. Those who know not this, may still

believe in death and weep over the graves of their beloved;

6 but with him is Life eternal, which never changes to

death. The eating of bread and drinking of wine at the

Lord’s supper, merely symbolize the spiritual refresh-

9 ment of God’s children having rightly read His Word,

whose entrance into their understanding is healthful life.

This is the reality behind the symbol.

12 So, also, she spoke of the hades, or hell of Scripture,

saying, that we make our own heavens and our own hells,

by right and wise, or wrong and foolish, conceptions of

15 God and our fellow-men. Jesus interpreted all spirit-

ually: “I have bread to eat that ye know not of,” he

said. The bread he ate, which was refreshment of divine

strength, we also may all partake of.

The material record of the Bible, she said, is no more

important to our well-being than the history of Europe

21 and America; but the spiritual application bears upon

our eternal life. The method of Jesus was purely meta-

physical; and no other method is Christian Science. In

24 the passage recording Jesus’ proceedings with the blind

man (Mark viii.) he is said to have spat upon the dust.

Spitting was the Hebrew method of expressing the utmost

27 contempt. So Jesus is recorded as having expressed

contempt for the belief of material eyes as having any

power to see. Having eyes, ye see not; and ears, ye hear

not, he had just told them. The putting on of hands

mentioned, she explained as the putting forth of power.

“Hand,” in Bible usage, often means spiritual power.

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1 “His hand is not shortened that it cannot save,” can

never be wrested from its true meaning to signify human

3 hands. Jesus’ first effort to realize Truth was not wholly

successful; but he rose to the occasion with the second

attempt, and the blind saw clearly. To suppose that

6 Jesus did actually anoint the blind man’s eyes with his

spittle, is as absurd as to think, according to the report

of some, that Christian Scientists sit in back-to-back

9 seances with their patients, for the divine power to filter

from vertebrae to vertebrae. When one comes to the age

with spiritual translations of God’s messages, expressed

12 in literal or physical terms, our right action is not to con-

demn and deny, but to “try the spirits” and see what

manner they are of. This does not mean communing

15 with spirits supposed to have departed from the earth,

but the seeking out of the basis upon which are accom-

plished the works by which the new teacher would prove

his right to be heard. By these signs are the true disciples

of the Master known: the sick are healed; to the poor

the gospel is preached.

EXTRACT FROM A SERMON DELIVERED IN BOSTON,

JANUARY 18, 1885

TEXT: The kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven, which a woman

took, and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened.

– MATT. xiii. 33.

Few people at present know aught of the Science of

27 mental healing; and so many are obtruding upon the

public attention their ignorance or false knowledge in

the name of Science, that it behooves all clad in the shin-

ing mail to keep bright their invincible armor; to keep

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1 their demonstrations modest, and their claims and lives

steadfast in Truth.

3 Dispensing the Word charitably, but separating the

tares from the wheat, let us declare the positive and

the negative of metaphysical Science; what it is, and

6 what it is not. Intrepid, self-oblivious Protestants in

a higher sense than ever before, let us meet and defeat

the claims of sense and sin, regardless of the bans or

9 clans pouring in their fire upon us; and white-winged

charity, brooding over all, shall cover with her feathers

the veriest sinner.

12 Divine and unerring Mind measures man, until the

three measures be accomplished, and he arrives at

fulness of stature; for “the Lord God omnipotent

reigneth.”

Science is divine: it is neither of human origin nor of

human direction. That which is termed “natural science,”

18 the evidences whereof are taken in by the five personal

senses, presents but a finite, feeble sense of the infinite

law of God; which law is written on the heart, received

through the affections, spiritually understood, and dem-

onstrated in our lives.

This law of God is the Science of mental healing,

spiritually discerned, understood, and obeyed.

Mental Science, and the five personal senses, are at

war; and peace can only be declared on the side of im-

27 mutable right, – the health, holiness, and immortality

of man. To gain this scientific result, the first and funda-

mental rule of Science must be understood and adhered

to; namely, the oft-repeated declaration in Scripture

that God is good; hence, good is omnipotent and

omnipresent.

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1 Ancient and modern philosophy, human reason, or

man’s theorems, misstate mental Science, its Principle

and practice. The most enlightened sense herein sees

nothing but a law of matter.

Who has ever learned of the schools that there is but

one Mind, and that this is God, who healeth all our sick-

ness and sins?

Who has ever learned from the schools, pagan phi-

9 losophy, or scholastic theology, that Science is the law of

Mind and not of matter, and that this law has no relation

to, or recognition of, matter?

12 Mind is its own great cause and effect. Mind is God,

omnipotent and omnipresent. What, then, of an oppo-

site so-called science, which says that man is both matter

15 and mind, that Mind is in matter? Can the infinite

be within the finite? And must not man have preexisted

in the All and Only? Does an evil mind exist without

space to occupy, power to act, or vanity to pretend that

it is man?

If God is Mind and fills all space, is everywhere, matter

21 is nowhere and sin is obsolete. If Mind, God, is all-power

and all-presence, man is not met by another power

and presence, that – obstructing his intelligence –

24 pains, fetters, and befools him. The perfection of man

is intact; whence, then, is something besides Him that

is not the counterpart but the counterfeit of man’s creator?

27 Surely not from God, for He made man in His own

likeness. Whence, then, is the atom or molecule called

matter? Have attraction and cohesion formed it?

But are these forces laws of matter, or laws of

Mind?

For matter to be matter, it must have been self-created.

Page 174

1 Mind has no more power to evolve or to create matter

than has good to produce evil. Matter is a misstatement

3 of Mind; it is a lie, claiming to talk and disclaim against

Truth; idolatry, having other gods; evil, having presence

and power over omnipotence!

6 Let us have a clearing up of abstractions. Let us

come into the presence of Him who removeth all iniqui-

ties, and healeth all our diseases. Let us attach our sense

9 of Science to what touches the religious sentiment within

man. Let us open our affections to the Principle that

moves all in harmony, – from the falling of a sparrow

12 to the rolling of a world. Above Arcturus and his sons,

broader than the solar system and higher than the at-

mosphere of our planet, is the Science of mental

healing.

What is the kingdom of heaven? The abode of Spirit,

the realm of the real. No matter is there, no night is

18 there – nothing that maketh or worketh a lie. Is this

kingdom afar off? No: it is ever-present here. The

first to declare against this kingdom is matter. Shall

that be called heresy which pleads for Spirit – the All of

God, and His omnipresence?

The kingdom of heaven is the reign of divine Science:

24 it is a mental state. Jesus said it is within you, and

taught us to pray, “Thy kingdom come;” but he did

not teach us to pray for death whereby to gain heaven.

27 We do not look into darkness for light. Death can never

usher in the dawn of Science that reveals the spiritual

facts of man’s Life here and now.

The leaven which a woman took and hid in three

measures of meal, is Divine Science; the Comforter;

the Holy Ghost that leadeth into all Truth; the “still,

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1 small voice” that breathes His presence and power, cast-

ing out error and healing the sick. And woman, the

3 spiritual idea, takes of the things of God and showeth

them unto the creature, until the whole sense of being

is leavened with Spirit. The three measures of meal

6 may well be likened to the false sense of life, substance,

and intelligence, which says, I am sustained by bread,

matter, instead of Mind. The spiritual leaven of divine

9 Science changes this false sense, giving better views of

Life; saying, Man’s Life is God; and when this shall

appear, it shall be “the substance of things hoped for.”

12 The measure of Life shall increase by every spiritual

touch, even as the leaven expands the loaf. Man shall

keep the feast of Life, not with the old leaven of the

15 scribes and Pharisees, neither with “the leaven of malice

and wickedness; but the unleavened bread of sincerity

and truth.”

18 Thus it can be seen that the Science of mental healing

must be understood. There are false Christs that would

“deceive, if it were possible, the very elect,” by institut-

21 ing matter and its methods in place of God, Mind. Their

supposition is, that there are other minds than His; that

one mind controls another; that one belief takes the

24 place of another. But this ism of to-day has nothing

to do with the Science of mental healing which acquaints

us with God and reveals the one perfect Mind and His

laws.

The attempt to mix matter and Mind, to work by

means of both animal magnetism and divine power, is

literally saying, Have we not in thy name cast out devils,

and done many wonderful works?

But remember God in all thy ways, and thou shalt

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1 find the truth that breaks the dream of sense, letting the

harmony of Science that declares Him, come in with

healing, and peace, and perfect love.

SUNDAY SERVICES ON JULY FOURTH

– EXTEMPORE REMARKS

6 The great theme so deeply and solemnly expounded

by the preacher, has been exemplified in all ages, but

chiefly in the great crises of nations or of the human race.

9 It is then that supreme devotion to Principle has espe-

cially been called for and manifested. It is then that we

learn a little more of the nothingness of evil, and more

of the divine energies of good, and strive valiantly for the

liberty of the sons of God.

The day we celebrate reminds us of the heroes and

15 heroines who counted not their own lives dear to them,

when they sought the New England shores, not as the

flying nor as conquerors, but, steadfast in faith and love,

18 to build upon the rock of Christ, the true idea of God –

the supremacy of Spirit and the nothingness of matter.

When first the Pilgrims planted their feet on Plymouth

21 Rock, frozen ritual and creed should forever have melted

away in the fire of love which came down from heaven.

The Pilgrims came to establish a nation in true freedom,

in the rights of conscience.

But what of ourselves, and our times and obligations?

Are we duly aware of our own great opportunities and

responsibilities? Are we prepared to meet and improve

them, to act up to the acme of divine energy wherewith

we are armored?

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1 Never was there a more solemn and imperious call

than God makes to us all, right here, for fervent de-

3 votion and an absolute consecration to the greatest and

holiest of all causes. The hour is come. The great

battle of Armageddon is upon us. The powers of evil

6 are leagued together in secret conspiracy against the

Lord and against His Christ, as expressed and opera-

tive in Christian Science. Large numbers, in desperate

9 malice, are engaged day and night in organizing action

against us. Their feeling and purpose are deadly, and

they have sworn enmity against the lives of our standard-

bearers.

What will you do about it? Will you be equally in

earnest for the truth? Will you doff your lavender-kid

15 zeal, and become real and consecrated warriors? Will

you give yourselves wholly and irrevocably to the great

work of establishing the truth, the gospel, and the Science

which are necessary to the salvation of the world from

error, sin, disease, and death? Answer at once and practi-

cally, and answer aright!

EASTER SERVICES

The editor of The Christian Science Journal said that

at three o’clock, the hour for the church service proper,

24 the pastor, Rev. Mary Baker G. Eddy, accompanied

by Rev. D. A. Easton, who was announced to preach

the sermon, came on the platform. The pastor intro-

duced Mr. Easton as follows: –

Friends: – The homesick traveller in foreign lands

greets with joy a familiar face. I am constantly home-

sick for heaven. In my long journeyings I have met

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1 one who comes from the place of my own sojourning

for many years, – the Congregational Church. He is

3 a graduate of Bowdoin College and of Andover The-

ological School. He has left his old church, as I did,

from a yearning of the heart; because he was not sat-

6 isfied with a manlike God, but wanted to become a God-

like man. He found that the new wine could not be

put into old bottles without bursting them, and he came

to us.

Mr. Easton then delivered an interesting discourse

from the text, “If ye then be risen with Christ, seek

12 those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the

right hand of God” (Col. iii. 1), which he prefaced by

saying: –

15 “I think it was about a year ago that I strayed into

this hall, a stranger, and wondered what sort of people

you were, and of what you were worshippers. If any

18 one had said to me that to-day I should stand before

you to preach a sermon on Christian Science, I should

have replied, ‘Much learning’ – or something else –

21 ‘hath made thee mad.’ If I had not found Christian

Science a new gospel, I should not be standing before you:

if I had not found it truth, I could not have stood up

again to preach, here or elsewhere.”

At the conclusion of the sermon, the pastor again came

forward, and added the following: –

27 My friends, I wished to be excused from speaking

to-day, but will yield to circumstances. In the flesh, we

are as a partition wall between the old and the new;

between the old religion in which we have been educated,

and the new, living, impersonal Christ-thought that has

been given to the world to-day.

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1 The old churches are saying, “He is not here;” and,

“Who shall roll away the stone?”

3 The stone has been rolled away by human suffer-

ing. The first rightful desire in the hour of loss, when

believing we have lost sight of Truth, is to know where

He is laid. This appeal resolves itself into these

questions: –

Is our consciousness in matter or in God? Have we

9 any other consciousness than that of good? If we have,

He is saying to us to-day, “Adam, where art thou?” We

are wrong if our consciousness is in sin, sickness, and

death. This is the old consciousness.

In the new religion the teaching is, “He is not here;

Truth is not in matter; he is risen; Truth has become

more to us, – more true, more spiritual.”

Can we say this to-day? Have we left the conscious-

ness of sickness and sin for that of health and

holiness?

What is it that seems a stone between us and the

resurrection morning?

21 It is the belief of mind in matter. We can only come

into the spiritual resurrection by quitting the old con-

sciousness of Soul in sense.

24 These flowers are floral apostles. God does all this

through His followers; and He made every flower in

Mind before it sprang from the earth: yet we look into

matter and the earth to give us these smiles of God!

We must lay aside material consciousness, and then

we can perceive Truth, and say with Mary, “Rabboni!”

– Master!

In 1866, when God revealed to me this risen Christ,

this Life that knows no death, that saith, “Because he

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1 lives, I live,” I awoke from the dream of Spirit in the

flesh so far as to take the side of Spirit, and strive to cease

my warfare.

When, through this consciousness, I was delivered from

the dark shadow and portal of death, my friends were

frightened at beholding me restored to health.

A dear old lady asked me, “How is it that you are

restored to us? Has Christ come again on earth?”

“Christ never left,” I replied; “Christ is Truth, and

Truth is always here, – the impersonal Saviour.”

Then another person, more material, met me, and I

12 said, in the words of my Master, “Touch me not.” I

shuddered at her material approach; then my heart went

out to God, and I found the open door from this sepulchre

of matter.

I love the Easter service: it speaks to me of Life, and

not of death.

Let us do our work; then we shall have part in his

resurrection.

BIBLE LESSONS

21 But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the

sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: which were born,

not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of

God. – JOHN i. 12, 13.

Here, the apostle assures us that man has power to

become the son of God. In the Hebrew text, the word

27 “son” is defined variously; a month is called the son

of a year. This term, as applied to man, is used in both

a material and a spiritual sense. The Scriptures speak

of Jesus as the Son of God and the Son of man; but

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1 Jesus said to call no man father; “for one is your Father,”

even God.

3 Is man’s spiritual sonship a personal gift to man, or

is it the reality of his being, in divine Science? Man’s

knowledge of this grand verity gives him power to dem-

6 onstrate his divine Principle, which in turn is requisite

in order to understand his sonship, or unity with God,

good. A personal requirement of blind obedience to

9 the law of being, would tend to obscure the order of

Science, unless that requirement should express the claims

of the divine Principle. Infinite Principle and infinite

12 Spirit must be one. What avail, then, to quarrel over

what is the person of Spirit, – if we recognize infinitude

as personality,-for who can tell what is the form of

15 infinity ? When we understand man’s true birthright, that

he is “born, not . . . of the will of the flesh, nor of the

will of man, but of God,” we shall understand that man

18 is the offspring of Spirit, and not of the flesh; recognize

him through spiritual, and not material laws; and regard

him as spiritual, and not material. His sonship, referred

21 to in the text, is his spiritual relation to Deity: it is not,

then, a personal gift, but is the order of divine Science.

The apostle urges upon our acceptance this great fact:

24 “But as many as received him, to them gave he power

to become the sons of God.” Mortals will lose their sense

of mortality – disease, sickness, sin, and death – in

27 the proportion that they gain the sense of man’s spirit-

ual preexistence as God’s child; as the offspring of

good, and not of God’s opposite, – evil, or a fallen

man.

John the Baptist had a clear discernment of divine

Science: being born not of the human will or flesh, he

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1 antedated his own existence, began spiritually instead

of materially to reckon himself logically; hence the im-

possibility of putting him to death, only in belief, through

violent means or material methods.

“As many as received him;” that is, as many as per-

6 ceive man’s actual existence in and of his divine Princi-

ple, receive the Truth of existence; and these have no

other God, no other Mind, no other origin; therefore, in

9 time they lose their false sense of existence, and find

their adoption with the Father; to wit, the redemption

of the body. Through divine Science man gains the

power to become the son of God, to recognize his perfect

and eternal estate.

“Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of

15 the flesh.” This passage refers to man’s primal, spirit-

ual existence, created neither from dust nor carnal de-

sire. “Nor of the will of man.” Born of no doctrine,

18 no human faith, but beholding the truth of being; even

the understanding that man was never lost in Adam,

since he is and ever was the image and likeness of God,

21 good. But no mortal hath seen the spiritual man, more

than he hath seen the Father. The apostle indicates

no personal plan of a personal Jehovah, partial and finite;

24 but the possibility of all finding their place in God’s great

love, the eternal heritage of the Elohim, His sons and

daughters. The text is a metaphysical statement of exist-

ence as Principle and idea, wherein man and his Maker

are inseparable and eternal.

When the Word is made flesh, – that is, rendered

practical, – this eternal Truth will be understood; and

sickness, sin, and death will yield to it, even as they did

more than eighteen centuries ago. The lusts of the flesh

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1 and the pride of life will then be quenched in the divine

Science of being; in the ever-present good, omnipotent

3 Love, and eternal Life, that know no death. In the great

forever, the verities of being exist, and must be acknowl-

edged and demonstrated. Man must love his neighbor

6 as himself, and the power of Truth must be seen and

felt in health, happiness, and holiness: then it will be

found that Mind is All-in-all, and there is no matter to

cope with.

Man is free born: he is neither the slave of sense, nor a

silly ambler to the so-called pleasures and pains of self-

12 conscious matter. Man is God’s image and likeness;

whatever is possible to God, is possible to man as God’s

reflection. Through the transparency of Science we learn

15 this, and receive it: learn that man can fulfil the Scrip-

tures in every instance; that if he open his mouth it shall

be filled – not by reason of the schools, or learning, but

by the natural ability, that reflection already has bestowed

on him, to give utterance to Truth.

“Who hath believed our report?” Who understands

21 these sayings? He to whom the arm of the Lord is re-

vealed; to whom divine Science unfolds omnipotence,

that equips man with divine power while it shames human

24 pride. Asserting a selfhood apart from God, is a denial

of man’s spiritual sonship; for it claims another father.

As many as do receive a knowledge of God through

27 Science, will have power to reflect His power, in proof of

man’s “dominion over all the earth.” He is bravely

brave who dares at this date refute the evidence of material

sense with the facts of Science, and will arrive at the true

status of man because of it. The material senses would

make man, that the Scriptures declare reflects his Maker,

Page 184

the very opposite of that Maker, by claiming that God is

Spirit, while man is matter; that God is good, but man is

3 evil; that Deity is deathless, but man dies. Science and

sense conflict, from the revolving of worlds to the death

of a sparrow.

6 The Word will be made flesh and dwell among mortals,

only when man reflects God in body as well as in mind.

The child born of a woman has the formation of his

9 parents; the man born of Spirit is spiritual, not material.

Paul refers to this when speaking of presenting our bodies

holy and acceptable, which is our reasonable service;

and this brings to remembrance the Hebrew strain,

“Who healeth all thy diseases.”

If man should say of the power to be perfect which he

15 possesses, “I am the power,” he would trespass upon

divine Science, yield to material sense, and lose his power;

even as when saying, “I have the power to sin and be

18 sick,” and persisting in believing that he is sick and a

sinner. If he says, “I am of God, therefore good,” yet

persists in evil, he has denied the power of Truth, and

21 must suffer for this error until he learns that all power is

good because it is of God, and so destroys his self-de-

ceived sense of power in evil. The Science of being gives

24 back the lost likeness and power of God as the seal of

man’s adoption. Oh, for that light and love ineffable,

which casteth out all fear, all sin, sickness, and death;

that seeketh not her own, but another’s good; that saith

Abba, Father, and is born of God!

John came baptizing with water. He employed a type

of physical cleanliness to foreshadow metaphysical purity,

even mortal mind purged of the animal and human, and

submerged in the humane and divine, giving back the

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1 lost sense of man in unity with, and reflecting, his Maker.

None but the pure in heart shall see God, – shall be able

3 to discern fully and demonstrate fairly the divine Principle

of Christian Science. The will of God, or power of Spirit,

is made manifest as Truth, and through righteousness, –

6 not as or through matter, – and it strips matter of all

claims, abilities or disabilities, pains or pleasures. Self-

renunciation of all that constitutes a so-called material

9 man, and the acknowledgment and achievement of his

spiritual identity as the child of God, is Science that

opens the very flood-gates of heaven; whence good

12 flows into every avenue of being, cleansing mortals of

all uncleanness, destroying all suffering, and demon-

strating the true image and likeness. There is no other

way under heaven whereby we can be saved, and man

be clothed with might, majesty, and immortality.

“As many as received him,” – as accept the truth

18 of being, – “to them gave he power to become the sons

of God.” The spiritualization of our sense of man opens

the gates of paradise that the so-called material senses

21 would close, and reveals man infinitely blessed, upright,

pure, and free; having no need of statistics by which to

learn his origin and age, or to measure his manhood, or to

24 know how much of a man he ever has been: for, “as

many as received him, to them gave he power to become

the sons of God.”

And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul;

the last Adam was made a quickening spirit. – I COR. xv. 45.

When reasoning on this subject of man with the Corin-

thian brethren, the apostle first spake from their stand-

point of thought; namely, that creation is material:

Page 186

1 he was not at this point giving the history of the spiritual

man who originates in God, Love, who created man

3 in His own image and likeness. In the creation of Adam

from dust, – in which Soul is supposed to enter the

embryo-man after his birth, – we see the material self-

6 constituted belief of the Jews as referred to by St. Paul.

Their material belief has fallen far below man’s original

standard, the spiritual man made in the image and like-

9 ness of God; for this erring belief even separates its

conception of man from God, and ultimates in the op-

posite of immortal man, namely, in a sick and sinning

a mortal.

We learn in the Scriptures, as in divine Science, that

God made all; that He is the universal Father and Mother

15 of man; that God is divine Love: therefore divine Love

is the divine Principle of the divine idea named man;

in other words, the spiritual Principle of spiritual man.

18 Now let us not lose this Science of man, but gain it clearly;

then we shall see that man cannot be separated from

his perfect Principle, God, inasmuch as an idea cannot

21 be torn apart from its fundamental basis. This scien-

tific knowledge affords self-evident proof of immortality;

proof, also, that the Principle of man cannot produce a

24 less perfect man than it produced in the beginning. A

material sense of existence is not the scientific fact of

being; whereas, the spiritual sense of God and His uni-

verse is the immortal and true sense of being.

As the apostle proceeds in this line of thought, he

undoubtedly refers to the last Adam represented by the

Messias, whose demonstration of God restored to mortals

the lost sense of man’s perfection, even the sense of the

real man in God’s likeness, who restored this sense by

Page 187

1 the spiritual regeneration of both mind and body, –

casting out evils, healing the sick, and raising the dead.

3 The man Jesus demonstrated over sin, sickness, disease,

and death. The great Metaphysician wrought, over and

above every sense of matter, into the proper sense of the

6 possibilities of Spirit. He established health and har-

mony, the perfection of mind and body, as the reality of

man; while discord, as seen in disease and death, was to

9 him the opposite of man, hence the unreality; even as in

Science a chord is manifestly the reality of music, and

discord the unreality. This rule of harmony must be ac-

cepted as true relative to man.

The translators of the older Scriptures presuppose a

material man to be the first man, solely because their

15 transcribing thoughts were not lifted to the inspired sense

of the spiritual man, as set forth in original Holy Writ.

Had both writers and translators in that age fully com-

18 prehended the later teachings and demonstrations of

our human and divine Master, the Old Testament might

have been as spiritual as the New.

21 The origin, substance, and life of man are one, and

that one is God, – Life, Truth, Love. The self-existent,

perfect, and eternal are God; and man is their reflection

24 and glory. Did the substance of God, Spirit, become a

clod, in order to create a sick, sinning, dying man? The

primal facts of being are eternal; they are never extin-

guished in a night of discord.

That man must be evil before he can be good; dying,

before deathless; material, before spiritual; sick and a

sinner in order to be healed and saved, is but the declara-

tion of the material senses transcribed by pagan religion-

ists, by wicked mortals such as crucified our Master, –

Page 188

1 whose teachings opposed the doctrines of Christ that

demonstrated the opposite, Truth.

3 Man is as perfect now, and henceforth, and forever,

as when the stars first sang together, and creation joined

in the grand chorus of harmonious being. It is the trans-

6 lator, not the original Word, who presents as being first

that which appears second, material, and mortal; and

as last, that which is primal, spiritual, and eternal. Be-

9 cause of human misstatement and misconception of God

and man, of the divine Principle and idea of being, there

seems to be a war between the flesh and Spirit, a contest

12 between Truth and error; but the apostle says, “There

is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in

Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the

Spirit.”

On our subject, St. Paul first reasons upon the basis

of what is seen, the effects of Truth on the material senses;

thence, up to the unseen, the testimony of spiritual sense;

and right there he leaves the subject.

Just there, in the intermediate line of thought, is where

21 the present writer found it, when she discovered Christian

Science. And she has not left it, but continues the ex-

planation of the power of Spirit up to its infinite meaning,

24 its allness. The recognition of this power came to her

through a spiritual sense of the real, and of the unreal

or mortal sense of things; not that there is, or can

27 be, an actual change in the realities of being, but

that we can discern more of them. At the moment

of her discovery, she knew that the last Adam, namely,

the true likeness of God, was the first, the only man.

This knowledge did become to her “a quickening

spirit;” for she beheld the meaning of those words

Page 189

1 of our Master, “The last shall be first, and the first

last.”

3 When, as little children, we are receptive, become

willing to accept the divine Principle and rule of being,

as unfolded in divine Science, the interpretation therein

will be found to be the Comforter that leadeth into all

truth.

The meek Nazarene’s steadfast and true knowledge of

9 preexistence, of the nature and the inseparability of God

and man, – made him mighty. Spiritual insight of

Truth and Love antidotes and destroys the errors of flesh,

12 and brings to light the true reflection: man as God’s

image, or “the first man,” for Christ plainly declared,

through Jesus, “Before Abraham was, I am.”

15 The supposition that Soul, or Mind, is breathed into

matter, is a pantheistic doctrine that presents a false

sense of existence, and the quickening spirit takes it

18 away: revealing, in place thereof, the power and per-

fection of a released sense of Life in God and Life as

God. The Scriptures declare Life to be the infinite I

21 AM, – not a dweller in matter. For man to know Life

as it is, namely God, the eternal good, gives him not

merely a sense of existence, but an accompanying con-

24 sciousness of spiritual power that subordinates matter

and destroys sin, disease, and death. This, Jesus demon-

strated; insomuch that St. Matthew wrote, “The people

27 were astonished at his doctrine: for he taught them

as one having authority, and not as the scribes.” This

spiritual power, healing sin and sickness, was not con-

fined to the first century; it extends to all time, inhabits

eternity, and demonstrates Life without beginning or

end.

Page 190

1 Atomic action is Mind, not matter. It is neither the

energy of matter, the result of organization, nor the out-

3 come of life infused into matter: it is infinite Spirit, Truth,

Life, defiant of error or matter. Divine Science demon-

strates Mind as dispelling a false sense and giving the

6 true sense of itself, God, and the universe; wherein the

mortal evolves not the immortal, nor does the material

ultimate in the spiritual; wherein man is coexistent with

Mind, and is the recognized reflection of infinite Life and

Love.

And he was casting out a devil, and it was dumb. And it came to

pass, when the devil was gone out, the dumb spake. – LUKE xi. 14.

The meaning of the term “devil” needs yet to be

learned. Its definition as an individual is too limited

15 and contradictory. When the Scripture is understood,

the spiritual signification of its terms will be understood,

and will contradict the interpretations that the senses

give them; and these terms will be found to include the

inspired meaning.

It could not have been a person that our great Master

21 cast out of another person; therefore the devil herein

referred to was an impersonal evil, or whatever worketh

ill. In this case it was the evil of dumbness, an error of

24 material sense, cast out by the spiritual truth of being;

namely, that speech belongs to Mind instead of matter,

and the wrong power, or the lost sense, must yield to the

right sense, and exist in Mind.

In the Hebrew, “devil” is denominated Abaddon; in

the Greek, Apollyon, serpent, liar, the god of this world,

etc. The apostle Paul refers to this personality of evil

as “the god of this world;” and then defines this god

Page 191

1 as “dishonesty, craftiness, handling the word of God

deceitfully.” The Hebrew embodies the term “devil”

3 in another term, serpent, – which the senses are supposed

to take in, – and then defines this serpent as “more

subtle than all the beasts of the field.” Subsequently,

the ancients changed the meaning of the term, to their

sense, and then the serpent became a symbol of wisdom.

The Scripture in John, sixth chapter and seventieth

9 verse, refers to a wicked man as the devil: “Have not

I chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil ?” Accord-

ing to the Scripture, if devil is an individuality, there is

12 more than one devil. In Mark, ninth chapter and thirty-

eighth verse, it reads: “Master, we saw one casting out

devils in thy name.” Here is an assertion indicating

15 the existence of more than one devil; and by omitting the

first letter, the name of his satanic majesty is found

to be evils, apparent wrong traits, that Christ, Truth,

18 casts out. By no possible interpretation can this passage

mean several individuals cast out of another individual

no bigger than themselves. The term, being here em-

21 ployed in its plural number, destroys all consistent sup-

position of the existence of one personal devil. Again,

our text refers to the devil as dumb; but the original

24 devil was a great talker, and was supposed to have out-

talked even Truth, and carried the question with Eve.

Also, the original texts define him as an “accuser,” a

27 “calumniator,” which would be impossible if he were

speechless. These two opposite characters ascribed to

him could only be possible as evil beliefs, as different

phases of sin or disease made manifest.

Let us obey St. Paul’s injunction to reject fables, and

accept the Scriptures in their broader, more spiritual

Page 192

1 and practical sense. When we speak of a good man, we

do not mean that man is God because the Hebrew term

3 for Deity was “good,” and vice versa; so, when referring

to a liar, we mean not that he is a personal devil, because

the original text defines devil as a “liar.”

6 It is of infinite importance to man’s spiritual progress,

and to his demonstration of Truth in casting out error,

– sickness, sin, disease, and death, in all their forms, –

that the terms and nature of Deity and devil be understood.

He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and

greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father. –

JOHN xiv. 12.

Such are the words of him who spake divinely, well

knowing the omnipotence of Truth. The Hebrew bard

15 saith, “His name shall endure forever: His name shall

be continued as long as the sun.” Luminous with the

light of divine Science, his words reveal the great Principle

18 of a full salvation. Neither can we question the practi-

cability of the divine Word, who have learned its adapta-

bility to human needs, and man’s ability to prove the

truth of prophecy.

The fulfilment of the grand verities of Christian healing

belongs to every period; as the above Scripture plainly

24 declares, and as primitive Christianity confirms. Also,

the last chapter of Mark is emphatic on this subject;

making healing a condition of salvation, that extends to

27 all ages and throughout all Christendom. Nothing can

be more conclusive than this: “And these signs shall

follow them that believe; . . . they shall lay hands on

the sick, and they shall recover.” This declaration of

our Master settles the question; else we are entertaining

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1 the startling inquiries, Are the Scriptures inspired? Are

they true? Did Jesus mean what he said?

3 If this be the cavil, we reply in the affirmative that the

Scripture is true; that Jesus did mean all, and even more

than he said or deemed it safe to say at that time. His

6 words are unmistakable, for they form propositions of

self-evident demonstrable truth. Doctrines that deny

the substance and practicality of all Christ’s teachings

9 cannot be evangelical; and evangelical religion can be

established on no other claim than the authenticity of

the Gospels, which support unequivocally the proof that

Christian Science, as defined and practised by Jesus,

heals the sick, casts out error, and will destroy death.

Referring to The Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston,

of which I am pastor, a certain clergyman charitably

expressed it, “the so-called Christian Scientists.”

I am thankful even for his allusion to truth; it being

18 a modification of silence on this subject, and also of what

had been said when critics attacked me for supplying the

word Science to Christianity, – a word which the people

are now adopting.

The next step for ecclesiasticism to take, is to admit

that all Christians are properly called Scientists who

24 follow the commands of our Lord and His Christ, Truth;

and that no one is following his full command without

this enlarged sense of the spirit and power of Christianity.

27 “He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do,”

is a radical and unmistakable declaration of the right and

power of Christianity to heal; for this is Christlike,

and includes the understanding of man’s capabilities and

spiritual power. The condition insisted upon is, first,

“belief;” the Hebrew of which implies understanding.

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1 How many to-day believe that the power of God equals

even the power of a drug to heal the sick! Divine Science

3 reveals the Principle of this power, and the rule whereby

sin, sickness, disease, and death are destroyed; and God

is this Principle. Let us, then, seek this Science; that we

may know Him better, and love Him more.

Though a man were begirt with the Urim and Thum-

mim of priestly office, yet should deny the validity or

9 permanence of Christ’s command to heal in all ages,

this denial would dishonor that office and misinterpret

evangelical religion. Divine Science is not an interpo-

12 lation of the Scriptures, but is redolent with love, health,

and holiness, for the whole human race. It only needs

the prism of this Science to divide the rays of Truth, and

15 bring out the entire hues of Deity, which scholastic theol-

ogy has hidden. The lens of Science magnifies the divine

power to human sight; and we then see the supremacy

of Spirit and the nothingness of matter.

The context of the foregoing Scriptural text explains

Jesus’ words, “because I go unto my Father.” “Because”

21 in following him, you understand God and how to turn

from matter to Spirit for healing; how to leave self, the

sense material, for the sense spiritual; how to accept

24 God’s power and guidance, and become imbued with

divine Love that casts out all fear. Then are you bap-

tized in the Truth that destroys all error, and you receive

the sense of Life that knows no death, and you know that

God is the only Life.

To reach the consummate naturalness of the Life that

is God, good, we must comply with the first condition

set forth in the text, namely, believe; in other words,

understand God sufficiently to exclude all faith in any

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1 other remedy than Christ, the Truth that antidotes all

error. Thence will follow the absorption of all action,

motive, and mind, into the rules and divine Principle of

metaphysical healing.

Whosoever learns the letter of Christian Science but

6 possesses not its spirit, is unable to demonstrate this

Science; or whosoever hath the spirit without the letter,

is held back by reason of the lack of understanding. Both

9 the spirit and the letter are requisite; and having these,

every one can prove, in some degree, the validity of those

words of the great Master, “For the Son of man is come

to save that which was lost.”

It has been said that the New Testament does not au-

thorize us to expect the ministry of healing at this period.

15 We ask what is the authority for such a conclusion,

the premises whereof are not to be found in the Scriptures.

The Master’s divine logic, as seen in our text, contradicts

18 this inference, – these are his words: “He that believeth

on me, the works that I do shall he do also.” That per-

fect syllogism of Jesus has but one correct premise and

21 conclusion, and it cannot fall to the ground beneath the

stroke of unskilled swordsmen. He who never unsheathed

his blade to try the edge of truth in Christian Science, is

24 unequal to the conflict, and unfit to judge in the case;

the shepherd’s sling would slay this Goliath. I once be-

lieved that the practice and teachings of Jesus relative to

27 healing the sick, were spiritual abstractions, impractical

and impossible to us; but deed, not creed, and practice

more than theory, have given me a higher sense of

Christianity.

The “I” will go to the Father when meekness, purity,

and love, informed by divine Science, the Comforter,

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1 lead to the one God: then the ego is found not in

matter but in Mind, for there is but one God, one

3 Mind; and man will then claim no mind apart from God.

Idolatry, the supposition of the existence of many minds

and more than one God, has repeated itself in all manner

6 of subtleties through the entire centuries, saying as in

the beginning, “Believe in me, and I will make you as

gods;” that is, I will give you a separate mind from God

9 (good), named evil; and this so-called mind shall open

your eyes and make you know evil, and thus become

material, sensual, evil. But bear in mind that a serpent

12 said that; therefore that saying came not from Mind,

good, or Truth. God was not the author of it; hence the

words of our Master: “He is a liar, and the father of it;”

also, the character of the votaries to “other gods” which

sprung from it.

The sweet, sacred sense and permanence of man’s

18 unity with his Maker, in Science, illumines our present

existence with the ever-presence and power of God, good.

It opens wide the portals of salvation from sin, sickness,

21 and death. When the Life that is God, good, shall ap-

pear, “we shall be like Him;” we shall do the works of

Christ, and, in the words of David, “the stone which the

24 builders refused is become the head stone of the corner,”

because the “I” does go unto the Father, the ego does

arise to spiritual recognition of being, and is exalted, –

not through death, but Life, God understood.

Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved. – ACTS

xvi. 31.

The Scriptures require more than a simple admission

and feeble acceptance of the truths they present; they

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1 require a living faith, that so incorporates their lessons

into our lives that these truths become the motive-power

of every act.

Our chosen text is one more frequently used than

many others, perhaps, to exhort people to turn from sin

6 and to strive after holiness; but we fear the full import

of this text is not yet recognized. It means a full salva-

tion, – man saved from sin, sickness, and death; for,

9 unless this be so, no man can be wholly fitted for heaven

in the way which Jesus marked out and bade his followers

pursue.

12 In order to comprehend the meaning of the text, let

us see what it is to believe. It means more than an opinion

entertained concerning Jesus as a man, as the Son of God,

15 or as God; such an action of mind would be of no more

help to save from sin, than would a belief in any historical

event or person. But it does mean so to understand the

18 beauty of holiness, the character and divinity which Jesus

presented in his power to heal and to save, that it will

compel us to pattern after both; in other words, to “let

this Mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus.”

(Phil. ii. 5.)

Mortal man believes in, but does not understand life

24 in, Christ. He believes there is another power or intelli-

gence that rules over a kingdom of its own, that is both

good and evil; yea, that is divided against itself, and there-

fore cannot stand. This belief breaks the First Command-

ment of God.

Let man abjure a theory that is in opposition to God,

recognize God as omnipotent, having all-power; and,

placing his trust in this grand Truth, and working from

no other Principle, he can neither be sick nor forever a

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1 sinner. When wholly governed by the one perfect Mind,

man has no sinful thoughts and will have no desire

to sin.

To arrive at this point of unity of Spirit, God, one must

commence by turning away from material gods; denying

6 material so-called laws and material sensation, – or mind

in matter, in its varied forms of pleasure and pain. This

must be done with the understanding that matter has no

9 sense; thus it is that consciousness silences the mortal

claim to life, substance, or mind in matter, with the words

of Jesus: “When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his

own.” (John viii. 44.)

When tempted to sin, we should know that evil pro-

ceedeth not from God, good, but is a false belief of the

15 personal senses; and if we deny the claims of these senses

and recognize man as governed by God, Spirit, not by

material laws, the temptation will disappear.

18 On this Principle, disease also is treated and healed.

We know that man’s body, as matter, has no power to

govern itself; and a belief of disease is as much the prod-

21 uct of mortal thought as sin is. All suffering is the fruit

of the tree of the knowledge of both good and evil; of

adherence to the “doubleminded” senses, to some belief,

24 fear, theory, or bad deed, based on physical material law,

so-called as opposed to good, – all of which is corrected

alone by Science, divine Principle, and its spiritual laws.

27 Suffering is the supposition of another intelligence than

God; a belief in self-existent evil, opposed to good; and

in whatever seems to punish man for doing good, –

by saying he has overworked, suffered from inclement

weather, or violated a law of matter in doing good, there-

fore he must suffer for it.

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1 God does not reward benevolence and love with pen-

alties; and because of this, we have the right to deny the

3 supposed power of matter to do it, and to allege that only

mortal, erring mind can claim to do thus, and dignify the

result with the name of law: thence comes man’s ability

6 to annul his own erring mental law, and to hold himself

amenable only to moral and spiritual law, – God’s gov-

ernment. By so doing, male and female come into their

rightful heritage, “into the glorious liberty of the children

of God.”

Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in neces-

sities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ’s sake. – 2 COR.

xii. 10.

The miracles recorded in the Scriptures illustrate the

15 life of Jesus as nothing else can; but they cost him the

hatred of the rabbis. The rulers sought the life of Jesus;

they would extinguish whatever denied and defied their

18 superstition. We learn somewhat of the qualities of the

divine Mind through the human Jesus. The power of

his transcendent goodness is manifest in the control it

gave him over the qualities opposed to Spirit which mor-

tals name matter.

The Principle of these marvellous works is divine; but

24 the actor was human. This divine Principle is discerned

in Christian Science, as we advance in the spiritual under-

standing that all substance, Life, and intelligence are

27 God. The so-called miracles contained in Holy Writ are

neither supernatural nor preternatural; for God is good,

and goodness is more natural than evil. The marvellous

healing-power of goodness is the outflowing life of Chris-

tianity, and it characterized and dated the Christian era.

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1 It was the consummate naturalness of Truth in the

mind of Jesus, that made his healing easy and instan-

3 taneous. Jesus regarded good as the normal state of man,

and evil as the abnormal; holiness, life, and health as

the better representatives of God than sin, disease, and

6 death. The master Metaphysician understood omnipo-

tence to be All-power: because Spirit was to him All-

in-all, matter was palpably an error of premise and

conclusion, while God was the only substance, Life,

and intelligence of man.

The apostle Paul insists on the rare rule in Christian

12 Science that we have chosen for a text; a rule that is sus-

ceptible of proof, and is applicable to every stage and

state of human existence. The divine Science of this rule

15 is quite as remote from the general comprehension of man-

kind as are the so-called miracles of our Master, and for

the sole reason that it is their basis. The foundational

18 facts of Christian Science are gathered from the supremacy

of spiritual law and its antagonism to every supposed ma-

terial law. Christians to-day should be able to say, with

21 the sweet sincerity of the apostle, “I take pleasure in

infirmities,” – I enjoy the touch of weakness, pain, and

all suffering of the flesh, because it compels me to seek the

24 remedy for it, and to find happiness, apart from the per-

sonal senses. The holy calm of Paul’s well-tried hope

met no obstacle or circumstances paramount to the tri-

27 umph of a reasonable faith in the omnipotence of good,

involved in its divine Principle, God: the so-called pains

and pleasures of matter were alike unreal to Jesus; for he

regarded matter as only a vagary of mortal belief, and sub-

dued it with this understanding.

The abstract statement that all is Mind, supports the

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1 entire wisdom of the text; and this statement receives

the mortal scoff only because it meets the immortal de-

3 mands of Truth. The Science of Paul’s declaration re-

solves the element misnamed matter into its original sin,

or human will; that will which would oppose bringing the

6 qualities of Spirit into subjection to Spirit. Sin brought

death; and death is an element of matter, or material

falsity, never of Spirit.

9 When Jesus reproduced his body after its burial, he

revealed the myth or material falsity of evil; its power-

lessness to destroy good, and the omnipotence of the

12 Mind that knows this: he also showed forth the error

and nothingness of supposed life in matter, and the great

somethingness of the good we possess, which is of Spirit,

and immortal.

Understanding this, Paul took pleasure in infirmities,

for it enabled him to triumph over them, – he declared

18 that “the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath

made me free from the law of sin and death;” he took

pleasure in “reproaches” and “persecutions,” because

21 they were so many proofs that he had wrought the prob-

lem of being beyond the common apprehension of sinners;

he took pleasure in “necessities,” for they tested and de-

veloped latent power.

We protect our dwellings more securely after a robbery,

and our jewels have been stolen; so, after losing those

27 jewels of character, – temperance, virtue, and truth, –

the young man is awakened to bar his door against further

robberies.

Go to the bedside of pain, and there you can demon-

strate the triumph of good that has pleasure in infirmities;

because it illustrates through the flesh the divine power

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1 of Spirit, and reaches the basis of all supposed miracles;

whereby the sweet harmonies of Christian Science are

found to correct the discords of sense, and to lift man’s

being into the sunlight of Soul.

“The chamber where the good man meets his fate

Is privileged beyond the walks of common life,

Quite on the verge of heaven.”

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CHAPTER VII

POND AND PURPOSE

1 BELOVED STUDENTS: – In thanking you for your

gift of the pretty pond contributed to Pleasant View,

3 in Concord, New Hampshire, I make no distinction be-

tween my students and your students; for here, thine

becomes mine through gratitude and affection.

6 From my tower window, as I look on this smile of

Christian Science, this gift from my students and their

students, it will always mirror their love, loyalty, and

good works. Solomon saith, “As in water face answereth

to face, so the heart of man to man.”

The waters that run among the valleys, and that

12 you have coaxed in their course to call on me, have

served the imagination for centuries. Theology religiously

bathes in water, medicine applies it physically, hydrology

15 handles it with so-called science, and metaphysics appro-

priates it topically as type and shadow. Metaphysically,

baptism serves to rebuke the senses and illustrate Christian

Science.

First: The baptism of repentance is indeed a stricken

state of human consciousness, wherein mortals gain

severe views of themselves; a state of mind which rends

the veil that hides mental deformity. Tears flood the eyes,

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1 agony struggles, pride rebels, and a mortal seems a

monster, a dark, impenetrable cloud of error; and falling

3 on the bended knee of prayer, humble before God, he

cries, “Save, or I perish.” Thus Truth, searching the

heart, neutralizes and destroys error.

6 This mental period is sometimes chronic, but oftener

acute. It is attended throughout with doubt, hope, sorrow,

joy, defeat, and triumph. When the good fight is fought,

9 error yields up its weapons and kisses the feet of Love,

while white-winged peace sings to the heart a song of

angels.

12 Second: The baptism of the Holy Ghost is the spirit

of Truth cleansing from all sin; giving mortals new

motives, new purposes, new affections, all pointing up-

15 ward. This mental condition settles into strength, free-

dom, deep-toned faith in God; and a marked loss of faith

in evil, in human wisdom, human policy, ways, and means.

18 It develops individual capacity, increases the intellectual

activities, and so quickens moral sensibility that the

great demands of spiritual sense are recognized, and they

rebuke the material senses, holding sway over human

consciousness.

By purifying human thought, this state of mind per-

24 meates with increased harmony all the minutiae of human

affairs. It brings with it wonderful foresight, wisdom,

and power; it unselfs the mortal purpose, gives steadi-

27 ness to resolve, and success to endeavor. Through the

accession of spirituality, God, the divine Principle of

Christian Science, literally governs the aims, ambition,

and acts of the Scientist. The divine ruling gives pru-

dence and energy; it banishes forever all envy, rivalry,

evil thinking, evil speaking and acting; and mortal

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1 mind, thus purged, obtains peace and power outside of

itself.

3 This practical Christian Science is the divine Mind,

the incorporeal Truth and Love, shining through the mists

of materiality and melting away the shadows called sin,

disease, and death.

In mortal experience, the fire of repentance first sepa-

rates the dross from the gold, and reformation brings

9 the light which dispels darkness. Thus the operation

of the spirit of Truth and Love on the human thought,

in the words of St. John, “shall take of mine and show it

unto you.”

Third: The baptism of Spirit, or final immersion of

human consciousness in the infinite ocean of Love, is the

15 last scene in corporeal sense. This omnipotent act drops

the curtain on material man and mortality. After this,

man’s identity or consciousness reflects only Spirit, good,

18 whose visible being is invisible to the physical senses: eye

hath not seen it, inasmuch as it is the disembodied in-

dividual Spirit-substance and consciousness termed in

21 Christian metaphysics the ideal man – forever permeated

with eternal life, holiness, heaven. This order of Science

is the chain of ages, which maintain their obvious corre-

24 spondence, and unites all periods in the divine design.

Mortal man’s repentance and absolute abandonment of

sin finally dissolves all supposed material life or physical

27 sensation, and the corporeal or mortal man disappears

forever. The encumbering mortal molecules, called man,

vanish as a dream; but man born of the great Forever,

lives on, God-crowned and blest.

Mortals who on the shores of time learn Christian

Science, and live what they learn, take rapid transit to

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1 heaven, – the hinge on which have turned all revolu-

tions, natural, civil, or religious, the former being servant

3 to the latter, – from flux to permanence, from foul to

pure, from torpid to serene, from extremes to intermediate.

Above the waves of Jordan, dashing against the receding

6 shore, is heard the Father and Mother’s welcome, saying

forever to the baptized of Spirit: “This is my beloved

Son.” What but divine Science can interpret man’s

eternal existence, God’s allness, and the scientific inde-

structibility of the universe?

The advancing stages of Christian Science are gained

12 through growth, not accretion; idleness is the foe of

progress. And scientific growth manifests no weakness,

no emasculation, no illusive vision, no dreamy absentness,

no insubordination to the laws that be, no loss nor lack

of what constitutes true manhood.

Growth is governed by intelligence; by the active,

18 all-wise, law-creating, law-disciplining, law-abiding Prin-

ciple, God. The real Christian Scientist is constantly

accentuating harmony in word and deed, mentally and

21 orally, perpetually repeating this diapason of heaven:

“Good is my God, and my God is good. Love is my God,

and my God is Love.”

24 Beloved students, you have entered the path. Press

patiently on; God is good, and good is the reward of all

who diligently seek God. Your growth will be rapid, if

27 you love good supremely, and understand and obey the

Way-shower, who, going before you, has scaled the steep

ascent of Christian Science, stands upon the mount of

holiness, the dwelling-place of our God, and bathes in the

baptismal font of eternal Love.

As you journey, and betimes sigh for rest “beside the

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1 still waters,” ponder this lesson of love. Learn its pur-

pose; and in hope and faith, where heart meets heart

3 reciprocally blest, drink with me the living waters of the

spirit of my life-purpose, – to impress humanity with

the genuine recognition of practical, operative Christian

Science.

Page 208

CHAPTER VIII – PRECEPT UPON PRECEPT

“THY WILL BE DONE”

THIS is the law of Truth to error, “Thou shalt surely

3 die.” This law is a divine energy. Mortals cannot

prevent the fulfilment of this law; it covers all sin and

its effects. God is All, and by virtue of this nature and

6 allness He is cognizant only of good. Like a legislative

bill that governs millions of mortals whom the legislators

know not, the universal law of God has no knowledge

of evil, and enters unconsciously the human heart and

governs it.

Mortals have only to submit to the law of God, come

12 into sympathy with it, and to let His will be done. This

unbroken motion of the law of divine Love gives, to the

weary and heavy-laden, rest. But who is willing to do

His will or to let it be done? Mortals obey their own

wills, and so disobey the divine order.

All states and stages of human error are met and

18 mastered by divine Truth’s negativing error in the way

of God’s appointing. Those “whom the Lord loveth He

chasteneth.” His rod brings to view His love, and inter-

prets to mortals the gospel of healing. David said, “Be-

fore I was afflicted I went astray: but now have I

kept Thy word.” He who knows the end from the be-

Page 209

1 ginning, attaches to sin due penalties as its antidotes and

remedies.

3 Who art thou, vain mortal, that usurpest the preroga-

tive of divine wisdom, and wouldst teach God not to pun-

ish sin? that wouldst shut the mouth of His prophets,

and cry, “Peace, peace; when there is no peace,” – yea,

that healest the wounds of my people slightly?

The Principle of divine Science being Love, the divine

9 rule of this Principle demonstrates Love, and proves that

human belief fulfils the law of belief, and dies of its own

physics. Metaphysics also demonstrates this Principle of

12 cure when sin is self-destroyed. Short-sighted physics

admits the so-called pains of matter that destroy its more

dangerous pleasures.

15 Insomnia compels mortals to learn that neither obliv-

ion nor dreams can recuperate the life of man, whose

Life is God, for God neither slumbers nor sleeps. The

18 loss of gustatory enjoyment and the ills of indigestion

tend to rebuke appetite and destroy the peace of a false

sense. False pleasure will be, is, chastened; it has no

21 right to be at peace. To suffer for having “other gods

before me,” is divinely wise. Evil passions die in their

own flames, but are punished before extinguished. Peace

24 has no foothold on the false basis that evil should be

concealed and that life and happiness should still attend

it. Joy is self-sustained; goodness and blessedness are

one: suffering is self-inflicted, and good is the master of

evil.

To this scientific logic and the logic of events, egotism

and false charity say, ” ‘Not so, Lord;’ it is wise to

cover iniquity and punish it not, then shall mortals have

peace.” Divine Love, as unconscious as incapable of

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1 error, pursues the evil that hideth itself, strips off its

disguises, and – behold the result: evil, uncovered, is

self-destroyed.

Christian Science never healed a patient without prov-

ing with mathematical certainty that error, when found

6 out, is two-thirds destroyed, and the remaining third

kills itself. Do men whine over a nest of serpents, and

post around it placards warning people not to stir up

9 these reptiles because they have stings? Christ said,

“They shall take up serpents;” and, “Be ye therefore

wise as serpents and harmless as doves.” The wisdom

12 of a serpent is to hide itself. The wisdom of God, as

revealed in Christian Science, brings the serpent out of

its hole, handles it, and takes away its sting. Good deeds

15 are harmless. He who has faith in woman’s special adapt-

ability to lead on Christian Science, will not be shocked

when she puts her foot on the head of the serpent, as it

biteth at the heel.

Intemperance begets a belief of disordered brains,

membranes, stomach, and nerves; and this belief serves

21 to uncover and kill this lurking serpent, intemperance,

that hides itself under the false pretense of human need,

innocent enjoyment, and a medical prescription. The

24 belief in venereal diseases tears the black mask from the

shameless brow of licentiousness, torments its victim, and

thus may save him from his destroyer.

27 Charity has the courage of conviction; it may suffer

long, but has neither the cowardice nor the foolhardiness

to cover iniquity. Charity is Love; and Love opens

the eyes of the blind, rebukes error, and casts it out.

Charity never flees before error, lest it should suffer

from an encounter. Love your enemies, or you will not

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1 loose them; and if you love them, you will help to reform

them.

3 Christ points the way of salvation. His mode is not

cowardly, uncharitable, nor unwise, but it teaches mor-

tals to handle serpents and cast out evil. Our own vision

6 must be clear to open the eyes of others, else the blind

will lead the blind and both shall fall. The sickly charity

that supplies criminals with bouquets has been dealt

9 with summarily by the good judgment of people in

the old Bay State. Inhuman medical bills, class legisla-

tion, and Salem witchcraft, are not indigenous to her

son.

“Out of the depths have I delivered thee.” The

drowning man just rescued from the merciless wave is

15 unconscious of suffering. Why, then, do you break his

peace and cause him to suffer in coming to life? Because

you wish to save him from death. Then, if a criminal

18 is at peace is he not to be pitied and brought back to

life? Or, are you afraid to do this lest he suffer, trample

on your pearls of thought, and turn on you and rend you?

21 Cowardice is selfishness. When one protects himself at

his neighbor’s cost, let him remember, “Whosoever will

save his life shall lose it.” He risks nothing who obeys

the law of God, and shall find the Life that cannot be

lost.

Our Master said, “Ye shall drink indeed of my cup.”

27 Jesus stormed sin in its citadels and kept peace with

God. He drank this cup giving thanks, and he said to

his followers, “Drink ye all of it,” – drink it all, and let

all drink of it. He lived the spirit of his prayer, – “Thy

kingdom come.” Shall we repeat our Lord’s Prayer

when the heart denies it, refuses to bear the cross and

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1 to fulfil the conditions of our petition? Human policy

is a fool that saith in his heart, “No God” – a caressing

3 Judas that betrays you, and commits suicide. This god-

less policy never knows what happiness is, and how it is

obtained.

6 Jesus did his work, and left his glorious career for our

example. On the shore of Gennesaret he tersely re-

minded his students of their worldly policy. They had

9 suffered, and seen their error. This experience caused

them to remember the reiterated warning of their Mas-

ter and cast their nets on the right side. When they

12 were fit to be blest, they received the blessing. The

ultimatum of their human sense of ways and means

ought to silence ours. One step away from the direct

16 line of divine Science cost them – what? A speedy re-

turn under the reign of difficulties, darkness, and unre-

quited toil.

18 The currents of human nature rush in against the right

course; health, happiness, and life flow not into one of

their channels. The law of Love saith, “Not my will,

21 but Thine, be done,” and Christian Science proves that

human will is lost in the divine; and Love, the white

Christ, is the remunerator.

24 If, consciously or unconsciously, one is at work in a

wrong direction, who will step forward and open his

eyes to see this error? He who is a Christian Scientist,

27 who has cast the beam out of his own eye, speaks plainly

to the offender and tries to show his errors to him before

letting another know it.

Pitying friends took down from the cross the fainting

form of Jesus, and buried it out of their sight. His dis-

ciples, who had not yet drunk of his cup, lost sight of

Page 213

1 him; they could not behold his immortal being in the

form of Godlikeness.

3 All that I have written, taught, or lived, that is good,

flowed through cross-bearing, self-forgetfulness, and my

faith in the right. Suffering or Science, or both, in the

6 proportion that their instructions are assimilated, will

point the way, shorten the process, and consummate the

joys of acquiescence in the methods of divine Love. The

9 Scripture saith, “He that covereth his sins shall not pros-

per.” No risk is so stupendous as to neglect opportuni-

ties which God giveth, and not to forewarn and forearm

our fellow-mortals against the evil which, if seen, can

be destroyed.

May my friends and my enemies so profit by these

15 waymarks, that what has chastened and illumined

another’s way may perfect their own lives by gentle

benedictions. In every age, the pioneer reformer must

18 pass through a baptism of fire. But the faithful adher-

ents of Truth have gone on rejoicing. Christian Science

gives a fearless wing and firm foundation. These are

21 its inspiring tones from the lips of our Master, “My

sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow

me: and I give unto them eternal life; and they shall

24 never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of

my hand.” He is but “an hireling” who fleeth when he

seeth the wolf coming.

27 Loyal Christian Scientists, be of good cheer: the night

is far spent, the day dawns; God’s universal kingdom

will appear, Love will reign in every heart, and His will

be done on earth as in heaven.

Page 214

“PUT UP THY SWORD”

While Jesus’ life was full of Love, and a demonstra-

3 tion of Love, it appeared hate to the carnal mind, or

mortal thought, of his time. He said, “Think not that

I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send

6 peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at

variance against his father, and the daughter against her

mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-

law. And a man’s foes shall be they of his own house-

hold.”

This action of Jesus was stimulated by the same Love

12 that closed – to the senses – that wondrous life, and

that summed up its demonstration in the command,

“Put up thy sword. ” The very conflict his Truth brought,

15 in accomplishing its purpose of Love, meant, all

the way through, “Put up thy sword;” but the sword

must have been drawn before it could be returned into

the scabbard.

My students need to search the Scriptures and “Science

and Health with Key to the Scriptures,” to understand

21 the personal Jesus’ labor in the flesh for their salvation:

they need to do this even to understand my works, their

motives, aims, and tendency.

24 The attitude of mortal mind in being healed morally,

is the same as its attitude physically. The Christian

Scientist cannot heal the sick, and take error along with

27 Truth, either in the recognition or approbation of it.

This would prevent the possibility of destroying the

tares: they must be separated from the wheat before

they can be burned, and Jesus foretold the harvest hour

Page 215

1 and the final destruction of error through this very pro-

cess, – the sifting and the fire. The tendency of mortal

3 mind is to go from one extreme to another: Truth comes

into the intermediate space, saying, “I wound to heal;

I punish to reform; I do it all in love; my peace I leave

6 with thee: not as the world giveth, give I unto thee.

Arise, let us go hence; let us depart from the material

sense of God’s ways and means, and gain a spiritual

understanding of them.”

But let us not seek to climb up some other way, as we

shall do if we take the end for the beginning or start

12 from wrong motives. Christian Science demands order

and truth. To abide by these we must first understand

the Principle and object of our work, and be clear that

15 it is Love, peace, and good will toward men. Then we

shall demonstrate the Principle in the way of His ap-

pointment, and not according to the infantile concep-

18 tion of our way; as when a child in sleep walks on the

summit of the roof of the house because he is a som-

nambulist, and thinks he is where he is not, and would

fall immediately if he knew where he was and what he

was doing.

My students are at the beginning of their demonstra-

24 tion; they have a long warfare with error in themselves

and in others to finish, and they must at this stage use

the sword of Spirit.

27 They cannot in the beginning take the attitude, nor

adopt the words, that Jesus used at the end of his

demonstration.

If you would follow in his footsteps, you must not try

to gather the harvest while the corn is in the blade, nor

yet when it is in the ear; a wise spiritual discernment

Page 216

1 must be used in your application of his words and infer-

ence from his acts, to guide your own state of combat

3 with error. There remaineth, it is true, a Sabbath rest

for the people of God; but we must first have done our

work, and entered into our rest, as the Scriptures give

example.

SCIENTIFIC THEISM

In the May number of our Journal, there appeared a

review of, and some extracts from, “Scientific Theism,”

by Phare Pleigh.

Now, Phare Pleigh evidently means more than “hands

12 off.” A live lexicographer, given to the Anglo-Saxon

tongue, might add to the above definition the “laying

on of hands,” as well. Whatever his nom de plume

15 means, an acquaintance with the author justifies one

in the conclusion that he is a power in criticism, a

big protest against injustice; but, the best may be

mistaken.

One of these extracts is the story of the Cheshire Cat,

which “vanished quite slowly, beginning with the end

21 of the tail, and ending with the grin, which remained

some time after the rest of it had gone.” Was this a witty

or a happy hit at idealism, to illustrate the author’s

24 lowing point? –

“When philosophy becomes fairy-land, in which neither

laws of nature nor the laws of reason hold good, the

27 attempt of phenomenism to conceive the universe as a

phenomenon without a noumenon may succeed, but not

before; for it is an attempt to conceive a grin without

a cat.”

Page 217

1 True idealism is a divine Science, which combines in

logical sequence, nature, reason, and revelation. An

3 effect without a cause is inconceivable; neither philoso-

phy nor reason attempts to find one; but all should con-

ceive and understand that Spirit cannot become less than

6 Spirit; hence that the universe of God is spiritual, – even

the ideal world whose cause is the self-created Principle,

with which its ideal or phenomenon must correspond in

quality and quantity.

The fallacy of an unscientific statement is this: that

matter and Spirit are one and eternal; or, that the phe-

12 nomenon of Spirit is the antipode of Spirit, namely, mat-

ter. Nature declares, throughout the mineral, vegetable,

and animal kingdoms, that the specific nature of all things

is unchanged, and that nature is constituted of and by

Spirit.

Sensuous and material realistic views presuppose that

18 nature is matter, and that Deity is a finite person con-

taining infinite Mind; and that these opposites, in sup-

positional unity and personality, produce matter, – a

21 third quality unlike God. Again, that matter is both

cause and effect, but that the effect is antagonistic to its

cause; that death is at war with Life, evil with good, –

24 and man a rebel against his Maker. This is neither

Science nor theism. According to Holy Writ, it is a

kingdom divided against itself, that shall be brought

to desolation.

The nature of God must change in order to become

matter, or to become both finite and infinite; and matter

must disappear, for Spirit to appear. To the material

sense, everything is matter; but spiritualize human

thought, and our convictions change: for spiritual sense

Page 218

1 takes in new views, in which nature becomes Spirit; and

Spirit is God, and God is good. Science unfolds the fact

that Deity was forever Mind, Spirit; that matter never

produced Mind, and vice versa.

The visible universe declares the invisible only by re-

6 version, as error declares Truth. The testimony of mate-

rial sense in relation to existence is false; for matter can

neither see, hear, nor feel, and mortal mind must change

9 all its conceptions of life, substance, and intelligence,

before it can reach the immortality of Mind and its ideas.

It is erroneous to accept the evidence of the material

12 senses whence to reason out God, when it is conceded

that the five personal senses can take no cognizance of

Spirit or of its phenomena. False realistic views sap the

15 Science of Principle and idea; they make Deity unreal

and inconceivable, either as mind or matter; but Truth

comes to the rescue of reason and immortality, and un-

18 folds the real nature of God and the universe to the spirit-

ual sense, which beareth witness of things spiritual, and

not material.

21 To begin with, the notion of Spirit as cause and end,

with matter as its effect, is more ridiculous than the “grin

without a cat;” for a grin expresses the nature of a cat,

24 and this nature may linger in memory: but matter does

not express the nature of Spirit, and matter’s graven

grins are neither eliminated nor retained by Spirit. What

27 can illustrate Dr. – ‘s views better than Pat’s echo,

when he said “How do you do?” and echo answered,

“Pretty well, I thank you!”

Dr. – says: “The recognition of teleology in nature

is necessarily the recognition of purely spiritual person-

ality in God.”

Page 219

1 According to lexicography, teleology is the science of

the final cause of things; and divine Science (and all

3 Science is divine) neither reveals God in matter, cause

in effect, nor teaches that nature and her laws are the

material universe, or that the personality of infinite Spirit

6 is finite or material. Jesus said, “Ye do err, not know-

ing the Scriptures, nor the power of God.” Now, what

saith the Scripture? “God is a Spirit: and they that

worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in

truth.”

MENTAL PRACTICE

12 It is admitted that mortals think wickedly and act

wickedly: it is beginning to be seen by thinkers, that

mortals think also after a sickly fashion. In common

15 parlance, one person feels sick, another feels wicked. A

third person knows that if he would remove this feeling

in either case, in the one he must change his patient’s

18 consciousness of dis-ease and suffering to a consciousness

of ease and loss of suffering; while in the other he must

change the patient’s sense of sinning at ease to a sense of

discomfort in sin and peace in goodness.

This is Christian Science: that mortal mind makes

sick, and immortal Mind makes well; that mortal mind

24 makes sinners, while immortal Mind makes saints; that

a state of health is but a state of consciousness made mani-

fest on the body, and vice versa; that while one person

27 feels wickedly and acts wickedly, another knows that if

he can change this evil sense and consciousness to a good

sense, or conscious goodness, the fruits of goodness will

follow, and he has reformed the sinner.

Page 220

1 Now, demonstrate this rule, which obtains in every

line of mental healing, and you will find that a good rule

works one way, and a false rule the opposite way.

Let us suppose that there is a sick person whom an-

other would heal mentally. The healer begins by mental

6 argument. He mentally says, “You are well, and you

know it;” and he supports this silent mental force by

audible explanation, attestation, and precedent. His

9 mental and oral arguments aim to refute the sick man’s

thoughts, words, and actions, in certain directions, and

turn them into channels of Truth. He persists in this

12 course until the patient’s mind yields, and the harmonious

thought has the full control over this mind on the point

at issue. The end is attained, and the patient says and

feels, “I am well, and I know it.”

This mental practitioner has changed his patient’s

consciousness from sickness to health. The patient’s

18 mental state is now the diametrical opposite of what it

was when the mental practitioner undertook to transform

it, and he is improved morally and physically.

21 That this mental method has power and bears fruit,

is patent both to the conscientious Christian Scientist and

the observer. Both should understand with equal clear-

24 ness, that if this mental process and power be reversed,

and people believe that a man is sick and knows it, and

speak of him as being sick, put it into the minds of others

27 that he is sick, publish it in the newspapers that he is

failing, and persist in this action of mind over mind, it

follows that he will believe that he is sick, – and Jesus

said it would be according to the woman’s belief; but if

with the certainty of Science he knows that an error of

belief has not the power of Truth, and cannot, does

Page 221

1 not, produce the slightest effect, it has no power over

him. Thus a mental malpractitioner may lose his

3 power to harm by a false mental argument; for it

gives one opportunity to handle the error, and when

mastering it one gains in the rules of metaphysics, and

6 thereby learns more of its divine Principle. Error pro-

duces physical sufferings, and these sufferings show

the fundamental Principle of Christian Science; namely,

that error and sickness are one, and Truth is their

remedy.

The evil-doer can do little at removing the effect of sin

12 on himself, unless he believes that sin has produced the

effect and knows he is a sinner; or, knowing that he is a

sinner, if he denies it, the good effect is lost. Either of

15 these states of mind will stultify the power to heal men-

tally. This accounts for many helpless mental practi-

tioners and mysterious diseases.

18 Again: If error is the cause of disease, Truth being

the cure, denial of this fact in one instance and

acknowledgment of it in another saps one’s under-

21 standing of the Science of Mind-healing. Such denial

dethrones demonstration, baffles the student of Mind-

healing, and divorces his work from Science. Such de-

24 nial also contradicts the doctrine that we must mentally

struggle against both evil and disease, and is like saying

that five times ten are fifty while ten times five are not

27 fifty; as if the multiplication of the same two numbers

would not yield the same product whichever might serve

as the multiplicand.

Who would tell another of a crime that he himself is

committing, or call public attention to that crime ? The

belief in evil and in the process of evil, holds the issues

Page 222

1 of death to the evil-doer. It takes away a man’s proper

sense of good, and gives him a false sense of both evil

3 and good. It inflames envy, passion, evil-speaking, and

strife. It reverses Christian Science in all things. It

causes the victim to believe that he is advancing while

6 injuring himself and others. This state of false conscious-

ness in many cases causes the victim great physical suffer-

ing; and conviction of his wrong state of feeling reforms

9 him, and so heals him: or, failing of conviction and re-

form, he becomes morally paralyzed – in other words,

a moral idiot.

12 In this state of misled consciousness, one is ready to

listen complacently to audible falsehoods that once he

would have resisted and loathed; and this, because the

15 false seems true. The malicious mental argument and

its action on the mind of the perpetrator, is fatal, morally

and physically. From the effects of mental malpractice

18 the subject scarcely awakes in time, and must suffer its

full penalty after death. This sin against divine Science

is cancelled only through human agony: the measure it

has meted must be remeasured to it.

The crimes committed under this new régime of mind-

power, when brought to light, will make stout hearts quail.

24 Its mystery protects it now, for it is not yet known. Error

is more abstract than Truth. Even the healing Principle,

whose power seems inexplicable, is not so obscure; for

this is the power of God, and good should seem more

natural than evil.

I shall not forget the cost of investigating, for this age,

the methods and power of error. While the ways, means,

and potency of Truth had flowed into my consciousness

as easily as dawns the morning light and shadows flee,

Page 223

1 the metaphysical mystery of error – its hidden paths,

purpose, and fruits – at first defied me. I was say-

3 ing all the time, “Come not thou into the secret” –

but at length took up the research according to God’s

command.

6 Streams which purify, necessarily have pure fountains;

while impure streams flow from corrupt sources. Here,

divine light, logic, and revelation coincide.

9 Science proves, beyond cavil, that the tree is known

by its fruit; that mind reaches its own ideal, and cannot

be separated from it. I respect that moral sense which

12 is sufficiently strong to discern what it believes, and to say,

if it must, “I discredit Mind with having the power to

heal.” This individual disbelieves in Mind-healing, and

15 is consistent. But, alas! for the mistake of believing in

mental healing, claiming full faith in the divine Principle,

and saying, “I am a Christian Scientist,” while doing

unto others what we would resist to the hilt if done unto

ourselves.

May divine Love so permeate the affections of all those

who have named the name of Christ in its fullest sense,

that no counteracting influence can hinder their growth

or taint their examples.

TAKING OFFENSE

There is immense wisdom in the old proverb, “He

that is slow to anger is better than the mighty.” Hannah

More said, “If I wished to punish my enemy, I should

make him hate somebody.”

To punish ourselves for others’ faults, is superlative

folly. The mental arrow shot from another’s bow is

Page 224

1 practically harmless, unless our own thought barbs it.

It is our pride that makes another’s criticism rankle, our

3 self-will that makes another’s deed offensive, our egotism

that feels hurt by another’s self-assertion. Well may we

feel wounded by our own faults; but we can hardly afford

to be miserable for the faults of others.

A courtier told Constantine that a mob had broken

the head of his statue with stones. The emperor lifted

his hands to his head, saying: “It is very surprising, but

I don’t feel hurt in the least.”

We should remember that the world is wide; that there

12 are a thousand million different human wills, opinions,

ambitions, tastes, and loves; that each person has a differ-

ent history, constitution, culture, character, from all the

15 rest; that human life is the work, the play, the ceaseless

action and reaction upon each other of these different

atoms. Then, we should go forth into life with the smallest

18 expectations, but with the largest patience; with a keen

relish for and appreciation of everything beautiful, great,

and good, but with a temper so genial that the friction

21 of the world shall not wear upon our sensibilities; with

an equanimity so settled that no passing breath nor

accidental disturbance shall agitate or ruffle it; with a

24 charity broad enough to cover the whole world’s evil, and

sweet enough to neutralize what is bitter in it, – de-

termined not to be offended when no wrong is meant, nor

even when it is, unless the offense be against God.

Nothing short of our own errors should offend us. He

who can wilfully attempt to injure another, is an object

of pity rather than of resentment; while it is a question

in my mind, whether there is enough of a flatterer, a fool,

or a liar, to offend a whole-souled woman.

Page 225

HINTS TO THE CLERGY

At the residence of Mr. Rawson, of Arlington, Massa-

3 chusetts, a happy concourse of friends had gathered to

celebrate the eighty-second birthday of his mother – a

friend of mine, and a Christian Scientist.

Among the guests, were an orthodox clergyman, his

wife and child.

In the course of the evening, conversation drifted to

9 the seventh modern wonder, Christian Science; where-

upon the mother, Mrs. Rawson, who had drunk at its

fount, firmly bore testimony to the power of Christ, Truth,

to heal the sick.

Soon after this conversation, the clergyman’s son

was taken violently ill. Then was the clergyman’s

15 opportunity to demand a proof of what the Christian

Scientist had declared; and he said to this venerable

Christian: –

“If you heal my son, when seeing, I may be led to

believe.”

Mrs. Rawson then rose from her seat, and sat down

beside the sofa whereon lay the lad with burning brow,

moaning in pain.

Looking away from all material aid, to the spiritual

24 source and ever-present help, silently, through the divine

power, she healed him.

The deep flush faded from the face, a cool perspira-

tion spread over it, and he slept.

In about one hour he awoke, and was hungry.

The parents said: –

“Wait until we get home, and you shall have some

gruel.”

Page 226

1 But Mrs. Rawson said: –

“Give the child what he relishes, and doubt not that

3 the Father of all will care for him.”

Thus, the unbiased youth and the aged Christian

carried the case on the side of God; and, after eating

6 several ice-creams, the clergyman’s son returned home

– well.

Part Four Table of Contents

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