Miscellaneous Writings
1883-1896
by
Mary Baker Eddy
Author of Science and Health with Key to the
Scriptures
Published by the Trustees under the Will of Mary Baker G. Eddy
Boston, U.S.A.
Copyright, 1896
By Mary Baker G. Eddy
Copyright renewed, 1924
_______
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
TO
LOYAL CHRISTIAN SCIENTISTS
IN THIS AND EVERY LAND
I LOVINGLY DEDICATE THESE PRACTICAL TEACHINGS
INDISPENSABLE TO THE CULTURE AND ACHIEVEMENTS WHICH
CONSTITUTE THE SUCCESS OF A STUDENT
AND DEMONSTRATE THE ETHICS
OF CHRISTIAN SCIENCE
MARY BAKER EDDY
PRAY thee, take care, that tak'st my book in hand,
To read it well; that is, to understand.
BEN JONSON: Epigram I
WHEN I would know thee . . . my thought looks
Upon thy well made choice of friends and books;
Then do I love thee, and behold thy ends
In making thy friends books, and thy books friends.
BEN JONSON: Epigram 86
-----
IF worlds were formed by matter,
And mankind from the dust;
Till time shall end more timely,
There's nothing here to trust.
Thenceforth to evolution's
Geology, we say, -
Nothing have we gained therefrom,
And nothing have to pray:
MY world has sprung from Spirit,
In everlasting day;
Whereof, I've more to glory,
Wherefor, have much to pay.
MARY BAKER EDDY
Page ix
Preface
| 1 | A CERTAIN apothegm of a Talmudical philosopher suits my sense of doing good. It reads thus: "The |
| 3 | noblest charity is to prevent a man from accepting charity; and the best alms are to show and to enable a man to dispense with alms." |
| 6 | In the early history of Christian Science, among my thousands of students few were wealthy. Now, Christian Scientists are not indigent; and their comfortable fortunes |
| 9 | are acquired by healing mankind morally, physically, spiritually. The easel of time presents pictures - once fragmentary and faint - now rejuvenated by the touch |
| 12 | of God's right hand. Where joy, sorrow, hope, disap- pointment, sigh, and smile commingled, now hope sits dove-like. |
| 15 | To preserve a long course of years still and uniform, amid the uniform darkness of storm and cloud and tempest, requires strength from above, - deep draughts |
| 18 | from the fount of divine Love. Truly may it be said: There is an old age of the heart, and a youth that never grows old; a Love that is a boy, and a Psyche who is |
| 21 |
ever a girl. The fleeting freshness of youth, however, Page x |
| 1 | perpetual bloom; the spiritual glow and grandeur of a consecrated life wherein dwelleth peace, sacred and |
| 3 |
sincere in trial or in triumph. The opportunity has at length offered
itself for me to |
| 6 | my miscellaneous writings published in The Christian Science Journal, since April, 1883, and republish them in book form, - accessible as reference, and reliable as |
| 9 | old landmarks. Owing to the manifold demands on my time in the early pioneer days, most of these articles were originally written in haste, without due preparation. |
| 12 | To those heretofore in print, a few articles are herein appended. To some articles are affixed data, where these are most requisite, to serve as mile-stones measuring the |
| 15 |
distance, - or the difference between then and now, - My signature has been slightly changed from my |
| 18 | Christian name, Mary Morse Baker. Timidity in early years caused me, as an author, to assume various noms de plume. After my first marriage, to Colonel Glover |
| 21 | of Charleston, South Carolina, I dropped the name of Morse to retain my maiden name, - thinking that other- wise the name would be too long. |
| 24 | In 1894, I received from the Daughters of the American Revolution a certificate of membership made out to Mary Baker Eddy, and thereafter adopted that form of signa- |
| 27 |
ture, except in connection with my published works. Page xi |
| 1 | The first edition of Science and Health having been copyrighted at the date of its issue, 1875, in my name |
| 3 |
of Glover, caused me to retain the initial "G" on
my These pages, although a reproduction of what has |
| 6 | been written, are still in advance of their time; and are richly rewarded by what they have hitherto achieved for the race. While no offering can liquidate one's debt of |
| 9 |
gratitude to God, the fervent heart and willing hand are May this volume be to the reader a graphic guide- |
| 12 | book, pointing the path, dating the unseen, and enabling
him to walk the untrodden in the hitherto unexplored fields of Science. At each recurring holiday the Christian |
| 15 |
Scientist will find herein a "canny" crumb; and
thus Realism will at length be found to surpass imagination, |
| 18 | and to suit and savor all literature. The shuttlecock of
religious intolerance will fall to the ground, if there be no battledores to fling it back and forth. It is reason for |
| 21 | rejoicing that the vox populi is inclined to grant
us peace, together with pardon for the preliminary battles that purchased it. |
| 24 |
With tender tread, thought sometimes walks in memory, Page xii |
| 1 | to remove the pioneer signs and ensigns of war, and to retain at this date the privileged armaments of peace. |
| 3 | With armor on, I continue the march, command and countermand; meantime interluding with loving thought this afterpiece of battle. Supported, cheered, I take my |
| 6 |
pen and pruning-hook, to "learn war no more," and
with CONCORD, N. H. January, 1897 Miscellaneous
Writings CHAPTER I
- INTRODUCTORY PROSPECTUS THE ancient Greek looked longingly for the Olym- |
| 3 | piad. The Chaldee watched the appearing of a star; to him, no higher destiny dawned on the dome of being than that foreshadowed by signs in the heav- |
| 6 | ens. The meek Nazarene, the scoffed of all scoffers, said, "Ye can discern the face of the sky; but can ye not discern the signs of the times?" - for he forefelt |
| 9 |
and foresaw the ordeal of a perfect Christianity, hated To kindle all minds with a gleam of gratitude, the |
| 12 | new idea that comes welling up from infinite Truth needs
to be understood. The seer of this age should be a sage. |
| 15 | Humility is the stepping-stone to a higher recognition of Deity. The mounting sense gathers fresh forms and strange fire from the ashes of dissolving self, and drops |
| 18 | the world. Meekness heightens immortal attributes only by removing the dust that dims them. Goodness reveals another scene and another self seemingly rolled |
| 21 |
up in shades, but brought to light by the evolutions of Page 2 |
| 1 | advancing thought, whereby we discern the power of Truth and Love to heal the sick. |
| 3 | Pride is ignorance; those assume most who have the least wisdom or experience; and they steal from their neighbor, because they have so little of their own. |
| 6 | The signs of these times portend a long and strong determination of mankind to cleave to the world, the flesh, and evil, causing great obscuration of Spirit. |
| 9 | When we remember that God is just, and admit the total depravity of mortals, alias mortal mind, - and that this Adam legacy must first be seen, and then must be |
| 12 | subdued and recompensed by justice, the eternal attri- bute of Truth, - the outlook demands labor, and the laborers seem few. To-day we behold but the first |
| 15 | faint view of a more spiritual Christianity, that embraces a deeper and broader philosophy and a more rational and divine healing. The time approaches when divine Life, |
| 18 | Truth, and Love will be found alone the remedy for sin, sickness, and death; when God, man's saving Principle, and Christ, the spiritual idea of God, will be revealed. |
| 21 | Man's probation after death is the necessity of his immortality; for good dies not and evil is self-destruc- tive, therefore evil must be mortal and self-destroyed. |
| 24 | If man should not progress after death, but should re- main in error, he would be inevitably self-annihilated. Those upon whom "the second death hath no power" |
| 27 | are those who progress here and hereafter out of evil, their mortal element, and into good that is immortal; thus laying off the material beliefs that war against |
| 30 |
Spirit, and putting on the spiritual elements in divine While we entertain decided views as
to the best method Page 3 |
| 1 | for elevating the race physically, morally, and spiritu- ally, and shall express these views as duty demands, we |
| 3 | shall claim no especial gift from our divine origin, no supernatural power. If we regard good as more natural than evil, and spiritual understanding - the true knowl- |
| 6 | edge of God - as imparting the only power to heal the sick and the sinner, we shall demonstrate in our lives the power of Truth and Love. |
| 9 | The lessons we learn in divine Science are applica- ble to all the needs of man. Jesus taught them for this very purpose; and his demonstration hath taught us |
| 12 | that "through his stripes" - his life-experience
- and divine Science, brought to the understanding through Christ, the Spirit-revelator, is man healed and saved. |
| 15 | No opinions of mortals nor human hypotheses enter this line of thought or action. Drugs, inert matter, never are needed to aid spiritual power. Hygiene, manipulation, |
| 18 | and mesmerism are not Mind's medicine. The Prin- ciple of all cure is God, unerring and immortal Mind. We have learned that the erring or mortal thought holds |
| 21 | in itself all sin, sickness, and death, and imparts these states to the body; while the supreme and perfect Mind, as seen in the truth of being, antidotes and destroys these |
| 24 |
material elements of sin and death. Because God is supreme and omnipotent,
materia |
| 27 | and their only supposed efficacy is in apparently delud-
ing reason, denying revelation, and dethroning Deity. The tendency of mental healing is to uplift mankind; but |
| 30 |
this method perverted, is "Satan let loose." Hence
the Page 4 |
| 1 | Thought imbued with purity, Truth, and Love, in- structed in the Science of metaphysical healing, is the |
| 3 | most potent and desirable remedial agent on the earth. At this period there is a marked tendency of mortal mind to plant mental healing on the basis of hypnotism, |
| 6 | calling this method "mental science." All Science
is Christian Science; the Science of the Mind that is God, and of the universe as His idea, and their relation to each |
| 9 |
other. Its only power to heal is its power to do good, A TIMELY ISSUE |
| 12 | At this date, 1883, a newspaper edited and published by the Christian Scientists has become a necessity. Many questions important to be disposed of come to the Col- |
| 15 | lege and to the practising students, yet but little time
has been devoted to their answer. Further enlight- enment is necessary for the age, and a periodical de- |
| 18 | voted to this work seems alone adequate to meet the requirement. Much interest is awakened and expressed on the subject of metaphysical healing, but in many |
| 21 | minds it is confounded with isms, and even infidelity, so that its religious specialty and the vastness of its worth are not understood. |
| 24 | It is often said, "You must have a very strong will- power to heal," or, "It must require a great deal of faith to make your demonstrations." When it is answered |
| 27 | that there is no will-power required, and that something more than faith is necessary, we meet with an expression of incredulity. It is not alone the mission of Christian |
| 30 |
Science to heal the sick, but to destroy sin in mortal Page 5 |
| 1 | thought. This work well done will elevate and purify the race. It cannot fail to do this if we devote our best |
| 3 |
energies to the work. Science reveals man as spiritual, harmonious,
and eter- |
| 6 | be crowded with students who are willing to consecrate themselves to this Christian work. Mothers should be able to produce perfect health and perfect morals in their |
| 9 | children - and ministers, to heal the sick - by study- ing this scientific method of practising Christianity. Many say, "I should like to study, but have not suffi- |
| 12 | cient faith that I have the power to heal." The healing power is Truth and Love, and these do not fail in the greatest emergencies. |
| 15 | Materia medica says, "I can do no more. I have
done all that can be done. There is nothing to build upon. There is no longer any reason for hope." Then |
| 18 | metaphysics comes in, armed with the power of Spirit, not matter, takes up the case hopefully and builds on the stone that the builders have rejected, and is suc- |
| 21 |
cessful. Metaphysical therapeutics can seem a
miracle and a |
| 24 | reality that Mind controls the body. They acknowledge an erring or mortal mind, but believe it to be brain mat- ter. That man is the idea of infinite Mind, always perfect |
| 27 | in God, in Truth, Life, and Love, is something not easily accepted, weighed down as is mortal thought with mate- rial beliefs. That which never existed, can seem solid |
| 30 |
substance to this thought. It is much easier for people Page 6 |
| 1 | We hear from the pulpits that sickness is sent as a discipline to bring man nearer to God, - even though |
| 3 | sickness often leaves mortals but little time free from complaints and fretfulness, and Jesus cast out disease as evil. |
| 6 | The most of our Christian Science practitioners have plenty to do, and many more are needed for the ad- vancement of the age. At present the majority of the |
| 9 | acute cases are given to the M. D.'s, and only those cases that are pronounced incurable are passed over to the Scientist. The healing of such cases should cer- |
| 12 | tainly prove to all minds the power of metaphysics over physics; and it surely does, to many thinkers, as the rapid growth of the work shows. At no distant day, |
| 15 | Christian healing will rank far in advance of allopathy and homoeopathy; for Truth must ultimately succeed where error fails. |
| 18 | Mind governs all. That we exist in God, perfect, there is no doubt, for the conceptions of Life, Truth, and Love must be perfect; and with that basic truth we con- |
| 21 | quer sickness, sin, and death. Frequently it requires time to overcome the patient's faith in drugs and mate- rial hygiene; but when once convinced of the uselessness |
| 24 |
of such material methods, the gain is rapid. It is a noticeable fact, that in families
where laws |
| 27 | in regard to diet, and the conversation chiefly confined to the ailments of the body, there is the most sickness. Take a large family of children where the mother has |
| 30 |
all that she can attend to in keeping them clothed and Page 7 |
| 1 | the exception. These children must not be allowed to eat certain food, nor to breathe the cold air, because |
| 3 | there is danger in it; when they perspire, they must be loaded down with coverings until their bodies become dry, - and the mother of one child is often busier than |
| 6 |
the mother of eight. Great charity and humility is necessary
in this work |
| 9 | strive to emulate. "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself" has daily to be exemplified; and, although skepticism and incredulity prevail in places where |
| 12 | one would least expect it, it harms not; for if serving Christ, Truth, of what can mortal opinion avail? Cast not your pearls before swine; but if you cannot bring |
| 15 |
peace to all, you can to many, if faithful laborers in His Looking over the newspapers of the day, one naturally |
| 18 | reflects that it is dangerous to live, so loaded with disease seems the very air. These descriptions carry fears to many minds, to be depicted in some future time upon |
| 21 | the body. A periodical of our own will counteract to some extent this public nuisance; for through our paper, at the price at which we shall issue it, we shall be able |
| 24 | to reach many homes with healing, purifying thought. A great work already has been done, and a greater work yet remains to be done. Oftentimes we are denied the |
| 27 | results of our labors because people do not understand the nature and power of metaphysics, and they think that health and strength would have returned natu- |
| 30 |
rally without any assistance. This is not so much from Page 8 |
| 1 | is given to material illusions than to spiritual facts. If we can aid in abating suffering and diminishing sin, |
| 3 | we shall have accomplished much; but if we can bring to the general thought this great fact that drugs do not, cannot, produce health and harmony, since "in Him |
| 6 |
[Mind] we live, and move, and have our being," we shall LOVE YOUR ENEMIES |
| 9 |
Who is thine enemy that thou shouldst love him? Is Can you see an enemy, except you first formulate this |
| 12 | enemy and then look upon the object of your own con- ception? What is it that harms you? Can height, or depth, or any other creature separate you from the |
| 15 |
Love that is omnipresent good, - that blesses infinitely Simply count your enemy to be that which defiles, |
| 18 | defaces, and dethrones the Christ-image that you should reflect. Whatever purifies, sanctifies, and consecrates human life, is not an enemy, however much we suffer in |
| 21 | the process. Shakespeare writes: "Sweet are the uses of adversity." Jesus said: "Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all |
| 24 | manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake; .
. . for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you." |
| 27 |
The Hebrew law with its "Thou shalt not," its de- Page 9 |
| 1 | much as the consciousness of good, grace, and peace, comes through affliction rightly understood, as sanctified |
| 3 | by the purification it brings to the flesh, - to pride, self- ignorance, self-will, self-love, self-justification. Sweet, indeed, are these uses of His rod! Well is it that the |
| 6 | Shepherd of Israel passes all His flock under His rod into His fold; thereby numbering them, and giving them refuge at last from the elements of earth. |
| 9 | "Love thine enemies" is identical with "Thou
hast no enemies." Wherein is this conclusion relative to those who have hated thee without a cause? Simply, in |
| 12 | that those unfortunate individuals are virtually thy best
friends. Primarily and ultimately, they are doing thee good far beyond the present sense which thou canst enter- |
| 15 |
tain of good. Whom we call friends seem to sweeten
life's cup and |
| 18 | to our lips; but it slips from our grasp, to fall in frag- ments before our eyes. Perchance, having tasted its tempting wine, we become intoxicated; become lethar- |
| 21 | gic, dreamy objects of self-satisfaction; else, the con- tents of this cup of selfish human enjoyment having lost its flavor, we voluntarily set it aside as tasteless and |
| 24 |
unworthy of human aims. And wherefore our failure longer to
relish this fleet- |
| 27 | wherewith mortals become educated to gratification in personal pleasure and trained in treacherous peace? Because it is the great and only danger in the path |
| 30 |
that winds upward. A false sense of what consti- Page 10 |
| 1 | the mind or engraft upon its purposes and achievements wherewith to obstruct life's joys and enhance its sor- |
| 3 |
rows. We have no enemies. Whatever envy, hatred,
revenge |
| 6 |
- whatever these try to do, shall "work together for
good Why? |
| 9 | Because He has called His own, armed them, equipped them, and furnished them defenses impregnable. Their God will not let them be lost; and if they fall they shall |
| 12 | rise again, stronger than before the stumble. The good cannot lose their God, their help in times of trouble. If they mistake the divine command, they will recover |
| 15 | it, countermand their order, retrace their steps, and reinstate His orders, more assured to press on safely. The best lesson of their lives is gained by crossing |
| 18 | swords with temptation, with fear and the besetments of evil; insomuch as they thereby have tried their strength and proven it; insomuch as they have found |
| 21 |
their strength made perfect in weakness, and their fear This destruction is a moral chemicalization, wherein |
| 24 | old things pass away and all things become new. The worldly or material tendencies of human affections and pursuits are thus annihilated; and this is the advent of |
| 27 | spiritualization. Heaven comes down to earth, and mortals learn at last the lesson, "I have no enemies." Even in belief you have but one (that, not in reality), |
| 30 |
and this one enemy is yourself - your erroneous belief Page 11 |
| 1 | wake from his delusion to suffer for his evil intent; to find that, though thwarted, its punishment is tenfold. |
| 3 | Love is the fulfilling of the law: it is grace, mercy, and justice. I used to think it sufficiently just to abide by our State statutes; that if a man should aim a ball at |
| 6 | my heart, and I by firing first could kill him and save my own life, that this was right. I thought, also, that if I taught indigent students gratuitously, afterwards |
| 9 | assisting them pecuniarily, and did not cease teach- ing the wayward ones at close of the class term, but followed them with precept upon precept; that if my |
| 12 |
instructions had healed them and shown them the sure way Love metes not out human justice, but divine mercy. |
| 15 | If one's life were attacked, and one could save it only in accordance with common law, by taking another's, would one sooner give up his own? We must love our |
| 18 | enemies in all the manifestations wherein and whereby we love our friends; must even try not to expose their faults, but to do them good whenever opportunity |
| 21 | occurs. To mete out human justice to those who per- secute and despitefully use one, is not leaving all retribu- tion to God and returning blessing for cursing. If special |
| 24 | opportunity for doing good to one's enemies occur not, one can include them in his general effort to benefit the race. Because I can do much general good to such as |
| 27 | hate me, I do it with earnest, special care-since they permit me no other way, though with tears have I striven for it. When smitten on one cheek, I have turned the |
| 30 |
other: I have but two to present. I would enjoy taking by the hand all
who love me not, Page 12 |
| 1 | ingly harm you." Because I thus feel, I say to
others: Hate no one; for hatred is a plague-spot that spreads |
| 3 | its virus and kills at last. If indulged, it masters us; brings suffering upon suffering to its possessor, through- out time and beyond the grave. If you have been badly |
| 6 | wronged, forgive and forget: God will recompense this wrong, and punish, more severely than you could, him who has striven to injure you. Never return evil for evil; |
| 9 |
and, above all, do not fancy that you have been wronged The present is ours; the future, big with events. |
| 12 | Every man and woman should be to-day a law to him- self, herself, - a law of loyalty to Jesus' Sermon on the Mount. The means for sinning unseen and unpunished |
| 15 | have so increased that, unless one be watchful and stead- fast in Love, one's temptations to sin are increased a hundredfold. Mortal mind at this period mutely works |
| 18 | in the interest of both good and evil in a manner least understood; hence the need of watching, and the danger of yielding to temptation from causes that at former |
| 21 | periods in human history were not existent. The action and effects of this so-called human mind in its silent argu- ments, are yet to be uncovered and summarily dealt with |
| 24 |
by divine justice. In Christian Science, the law of Love
rejoices the heart; |
| 27 | else in its effects upon mankind, demonstrably is not Love. We should measure our love for God by our love for man; and our sense of Science will be measured by our obedience |
| 30 |
to God, - fulfilling the law of Love, doing good to all; Page 13 |
| 1 | The only justice of which I feel at present capable, is mercy and charity toward every one, - just so far as |
| 3 |
one and all permit me to exercise these sentiments toward The falsehood, ingratitude, misjudgment, and sharp |
| 6 | return of evil for good - yea, the real wrongs (if wrong can be real) which I have long endured at the hands of others - have most happily wrought out for me the law |
| 9 | of loving mine enemies. This law I now urge upon the solemn consideration of all Christian Scientists. Jesus said, "If ye love them which love you, what thank have |
| 12 |
ye? for sinners also love those that love them." CHRISTIAN THEISM Scholastic theology elaborates the proposition that |
| 15 | evil is a factor of good, and that to believe in the reality of evil is essential to a rounded sense of the existence of good. |
| 18 | This frail hypothesis is founded upon the basis of mate- rial and mortal evidence - only upon what the shifting mortal senses confirm and frail human reason accepts. |
| 21 |
The Science of Soul reverses this proposition, overturns This postulate of divine Science only
needs to be con- |
| 27 |
and the clearer discernment of good. Seek the Anglo-Saxon term for God, and
you will |
| 30 |
will find that good is omnipotence, has all power; it fills Page 14 |
| 1 | all space, being omnipresent; hence, there is neither place nor power left for evil. Divest your thought, then, of |
| 3 | the mortal and material view which contradicts the ever- presence and all-power of good; take in only the immor- tal facts which include these, and where will you see or |
| 6 |
feel evil, or find its existence necessary either to the origin It is urged that, from his original state of perfec- |
| 9 | tion, man has fallen into the imperfection that requires evil through which to develop good. Were we to admit this vague proposition, the Science of man could |
| 12 | never be learned; for in order to learn Science, we begin with the correct statement, with harmony and its Principle; and if man has lost his Principle and |
| 15 | its harmony, from evidences before him he is inca- pable of knowing the facts of existence and its con- comitants: therefore to him evil is as real and eternal |
| 18 | as good, God! This awful deception is evil's umpire and empire, that good, God, understood, forcibly destroys. |
| 21 | What appears to mortals from their standpoint to be the necessity for evil, is proven by the law of opposites to be without necessity. Good is the primitive Princi- |
| 24 | ple of man; and evil, good's opposite, has no Principle, and is not, and cannot be, the derivative of good. Thus evil is neither a primitive nor a derivative, but |
| 27 |
is suppositional; in other words, a lie that is incapable The Science of Truth annihilates error, deprives evil |
| 30 |
of all power, and thereby destroys all error, sin, sickness, Page 15 |
| 1 | tifies himself with it, fancies he finds pleasure in it,
and will reap what he sows; hence the sinner must endure |
| 3 |
the effects of his delusion until he awakes from it. THE NEW BIRTH St. Paul speaks of the new birth as "waiting for the |
| 6 | adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body." The great Nazarene Prophet said, "Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God." Nothing aside from the |
| 9 | spiritualization - yea, the highest Christianization - of thought and desire, can give the true perception of God and divine Science, that results in health, happiness, and |
| 12 |
holiness. The new birth is not the work of a moment.
It begins |
| 15 | render to God, of childlike trust and joyful adoption of good; moments of self-abnegation, self-consecration, heaven-born hope, and spiritual love. |
| 18 | Time may commence, but it cannot complete, the new birth: eternity does this; for progress is the law of infinity. Only through the sore travail of mortal mind |
| 21 | shall soul as sense be satisfied, and man awake in His likeness. What a faith-lighted thought is this! that mortals can lay off the "old man," until man is found |
| 24 |
to be the image of the infinite good that we name God, In mortal and material man, goodness seems in em- |
| 27 | bryo. By suffering for sin, and the gradual fading out of the mortal and material sense of man, thought is de- veloped into an infant Christianity; and, feeding at first |
| 30 |
on the milk of the Word, it drinks in the sweet revealings
Page 16 |
| 1 | of a new and more spiritual Life and Love. These nourish the hungry hope, satisfy more the cravings for immor- |
| 3 | tality, and so comfort, cheer, and bless one, that he saith:
In mine infancy, this is enough of heaven to come down to earth. |
| 6 | But, as one grows into the manhood or womanhood of Christianity, one finds so much lacking, and so very much requisite to become wholly Christlike, that one |
| 9 | saith: The Principle of Christianity is infinite: it is indeed God; and this infinite Principle hath infinite claims on man, and these claims are divine, not human; |
| 12 | and man's ability to meet them is from God; for, being His likeness and image, man must reflect the full dominion of Spirit - even its supremacy over sin, sick- |
| 15 |
ness, and death. Here, then, is the awakening from the
dream of life |
| 18 | that, therefore, we must entertain a higher sense of both God and man. We must learn that God is infinitely more than a person, or finite form, can contain; that |
| 21 | God is a divine Whole, and All, an all-pervading
in- telligence and Love, a divine, infinite Principle; and that Christianity is a divine Science. This newly |
| 24 | awakened consciousness is wholly spiritual; it emanates from Soul instead of body, and is the new birth begun in Christian Science. |
| 27 | Now, dear reader, pause for a moment with me, earn- estly to contemplate this new-born spiritual altitude; for this statement demands demonstration. |
| 30 |
Here you stand face to face with the laws of infinite Page 17 |
| 1 | awful detonations of Sinai. You hear and record the thunderings of the spiritual law of Life, as opposed to |
| 3 | the material law of death; the spiritual law of Love, as opposed to the material sense of love; the law of om- nipotent harmony and good, as opposed to any supposi- |
| 6 | titious law of sin, sickness, or death. And, before the flames have died away on this mount of revelation, like the patriarch of old, you take off your shoes-lay aside |
| 9 | your material appendages, human opinions and doc- trines, give up your more material religion with its rites and ceremonies, put off your materia medica and hygiene |
| 12 | as worse than useless - to sit at the feet of Jesus. Then, you meekly bow before the Christ, the spiritual idea that our great Master gave of the power of God to heal |
| 15 | and to save. Then it is that you behold for the first time the divine Principle that redeems man from under the curse of materialism, - sin, disease, and death. |
| 18 | This spiritual birth opens to the enraptured understand- ing a much higher and holier conception of the supremacy of Spirit, and of man as His likeness, whereby man reflects |
| 21 |
the divine power to heal the sick. A material or human birth is the appearing
of a mor- |
| 24 | prolonged and painful, according to the timely or un- timely circumstances, the normal or abnormal material conditions attending it. |
| 27 | With the spiritual birth, man's primitive, sinless, spiritual existence dawns on human thought, - through the travail of mortal mind, hope deferred, the perishing |
| 30 |
pleasure and accumulating pains of sense, - by which Page 18 |
| 1 | The purification or baptismals that come from Spirit, develop, step by step, the original likeness of perfect man, |
| 3 | and efface the mark of the beast. "Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom He receiveth;" therefore rejoice in tribulation, and wel- |
| 6 |
come these spiritual signs of the new birth under the law The prominent laws which forward birth in the divine |
| 9 | order of Science, are these: "Thou shalt have no other gods before me;" "Love thy neighbor as thyself." These commands of infinite wisdom, translated into |
| 12 | the new tongue, their spiritual meaning, signify: Thou shalt love Spirit only, not its opposite, in every God- quality, even in substance; thou shalt recognize thy- |
| 15 | self as God's spiritual child only, and the true man and true woman, the all-harmonious "male and female," as of spiritual origin, God's reflection, - thus as chil- |
| 18 | dren of one common Parent, - wherein and whereby Father, Mother, and child are the divine Principle and divine idea, even the divine "Us" - one in good, and |
| 21 |
good in One. With this recognition man could never
separate him- |
| 24 | habitual love for his fellow-man. Only by admitting evil as a reality, and entering into a state of evil thoughts, can we in belief separate one man's interests |
| 27 | from those of the whole human family, or thus attempt to separate Life from God. This is the mistake that causes much that must be repented of and overcome. |
| 30 |
Not to know what is blessing you, but to believe that Page 19 |
| 1 | is unjust, - is wrong and cruel. Envy, evil thinking, evil speaking, covetousness, lust, hatred, malice, are |
| 3 | always wrong, and will break the rule of Christian Science and prevent its demonstration; but the rod of God, and the obedience demanded of His servants in |
| 6 |
carrying out what He teaches them, - these are never The task of healing the sick is far lighter than that |
| 9 | of so teaching the divine Principle and rules of Chris- tian Science as to lift the affections and motives of men to adopt them and bring them out in human lives. He |
| 12 | who has named the name of Christ, who has virtually accepted the divine claims of Truth and Love in divine Science, is daily departing from evil; and all the wicked |
| 15 | endeavors of suppositional demons can never change the current of that life from steadfastly flowing on to God, its divine source. |
| 18 | But, taking the livery of heaven wherewith to cover iniquity, is the most fearful sin that mortals can commit. I should have more faith in an honest drugging-doctor, |
| 21 | one who abides by his statements and works upon as high a basis as he understands, healing me, than I could or would have in a smooth-tongued hypocrite or mental |
| 24 |
malpractitioner. Between the centripetal and centrifugal
mental forces |
| 27 | go out of materialism or sin, and choose our course and its results. Which, then, shall be our choice, - the sin- ful, material, and perishable, or the spiritual, joy-giving, |
| 30 |
and eternal? The spiritual sense of Life and its
grand pursuits is Page 20 |
| 1 | sense of Life illumes our pathway with the radiance of divine Love; heals man spontaneously, morally and |
| 3 |
physically, - exhaling the aroma of Jesus' own words, CHAPTER II
ONE CAUSE AND EFFECT |
| 1 | CHRISTIAN SCIENCE begins with the First Com- mandment of the Hebrew Decalogue, "Thou |
| 3 | shalt have no other gods before me." It goes on in perfect unity with Christ's Sermon on the Mount, and in that age culminates in the Revelation of St. John, |
| 6 | who, while on earth and in the flesh, like ourselves, beheld "a new heaven and a new earth," - the spiritual universe, whereof Christian Science now bears testimony. |
| 9 | Our Master said, "The works that I do shall ye do also," and, "The kingdom of God is within you." This makes practical all his words and works. As the ages |
| 12 | advance in spirituality, Christian Science will be seen to depart from the trend of other Christian denomina- tions in no wise except by increase of spirituality. |
| 15 | My first plank in the platform of Christian Science is as follows: "There is no life, truth, intelligence, nor substance in matter. All is infinite Mind and its infinite |
| 18 | manifestation, for God is All-in-all. Spirit is immortal Truth; matter is mortal error. Spirit is the real and eternal; matter is the unreal and temporal. Spirit is |
| 21 |
God, and man is His image and likeness. Therefore man (1) The order of this sentence has been conformed to the text of |
| 24 |
the 1908 edition of Science and Health. Page 22 |
| 1 | I am strictly a theist - believe in one God, one Christ or Messiah. |
| 3 | Science is neither a law of matter nor of man. It is the unerring manifesto of Mind, the law of God, its divine Principle. Who dare say that matter or |
| 6 | mortals can evolve Science? Whence, then, is it, if not from the divine source, and what, but the contempo- rary of Christianity, so far in advance of human knowl- |
| 9 | edge that mortals must work for the discovery of even a portion of it? Christian Science translates Mind, God, to mortals. It is the infinite calculus defining the line, |
| 12 | plane, space, and fourth dimension of Spirit. It abso- lutely refutes the amalgamation, transmigration, absorp- tion, or annihilation of individuality. It shows the |
| 15 | impossibility of transmitting human ills, or evil, from one individual to another; that all true thoughts revolve in God's orbits: they come from God and return to |
| 18 | Him, - and untruths belong not to His creation, there- fore these are null and void. It hath no peer, no com- petitor, for it dwelleth in Him besides whom "there is |
| 21 |
none other." That Christian Science is Christian,
those who have |
| 24 | Principle, - together with the sick, the lame, the deaf,
and the blind, healed by it, - have proven to a waiting world. He who has not tested it, is incompetent to condemn it; |
| 27 |
and he who is a willing sinner, cannot demonstrate it. A falling apple suggested to Newton
more than the |
| 30 |
to fall by reason of its own ponderosity; but the primal Page 23 |
| 1 | Newton named it gravitation, having learned so much; but Science, demanding more, pushes the question: |
| 3 | Whence or what is the power back of gravitation, - the intelligence that manifests power? Is pantheism true? Does mind "sleep in the mineral, or dream in the |
| 6 | animal, and wake in man"? Christianity answers this question. The prophets, Jesus, and the apostles, demon- strated a divine intelligence that subordinates so-called |
| 9 | material laws; and disease, death, winds, and waves, obey this intelligence. Was it Mind or matter that spake in creation, "and it was done"? The answer is self- |
| 12 |
evident, and the command remains, "Thou shalt have It is plain that the Me spoken of in the First Com- |
| 15 | mandment, must be Mind; for matter is not the Chris- tian's God, and is not intelligent. Matter cannot even talk; and the serpent, Satan, the first talker in its behalf, |
| 18 | lied. Reason and revelation declare that God is both noumenon and phenomena, - the first and only cause. The universe, including man, is not a result of atomic |
| 21 | action, material force or energy; it is not organized dust. God, Spirit, Mind, are terms synonymous for the one God, whose reflection is creation, and man is His image |
| 24 | and likeness. Few there are who comprehend what Chris- tian Science means by the word reflection. God is seen only in that which reflects good, Life, Truth, Love - |
| 27 | yea, which manifests all His attributes and power, even as the human likeness thrown upon the mirror repeats precisely the looks and actions of the object in front of it. |
| 30 |
All must be Mind and Mind's ideas; since, according to Page 24 |
| 1 | These facts enjoin the First Commandment; and knowledge of them makes man spiritually minded. St. |
| 3 | Paul writes: "For to be carnally minded is death; but
to be spiritually minded is life and peace." This knowl- edge came to me in an hour of great need; and I give it |
| 6 | to you as death-bed testimony to the daystar that dawned on the night of material sense. This knowledge is practical, for it wrought my immediate recovery from |
| 9 | an injury caused by an accident, and pronounced fatal by the physicians. On the third day thereafter, I called for my Bible, and opened it at Matthew ix. 2. As I |
| 12 | read, the healing Truth dawned upon my sense; and the result was that I rose, dressed myself, and ever after was in better health than I had before enjoyed. That |
| 15 | short experience included a glimpse of the great fact that I have since tried to make plain to others, namely, Life in and of Spirit; this Life being the sole reality of |
| 18 | existence. I learned that mortal thought evolves a sub- ective state which it names matter, thereby shutting out the true sense of Spirit. Per contra, Mind and man |
| 21 | are immortal; and knowledge gained from mortal sense is illusion, error, the opposite of Truth; therefore it cannot be true. A knowledge of both good and evil |
| 24 | (when good is God, and God is All) is impossible. Speak- ing of the origin of evil, the Master said: "When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, |
| 27 | and the father of it." God warned man not to believe the talking serpent, or rather the allegory describing it. The Nazarene Prophet declared that his followers |
| 30 |
should handle serpents; that is, put down all subtle falsi- Page 25 |
| 1 | on the mind and body of man, against his holiness and health. |
| 3 | That there is but one God or Life, one cause and one effect, is the multum in parvo of Christian Science; and to my understanding it is the heart of Christianity, |
| 6 | the religion that Jesus taught and demonstrated. In divine Science it is found that matter is a phase of error, and that neither one really exists, since God is |
| 9 | Truth, and All-in-all. Christ's Sermon on the Mount, in its direct application to human needs, confirms this conclusion. |
| 12 | Science, understood, translates matter into Mind, rejects all other theories of causation, restores the spir- itual and original meaning of the Scriptures, and ex- |
| 15 | plains the teachings and life of our Lord. It is religion's "new tongue," with "signs following," spoken of by St. Mark. It gives God's infinite meaning to mankind, |
| 18 | healing the sick, casting out evil, and raising the spirit- ually dead. Christianity is Christlike only as it re- iterates the word, repeats the works, and manifests the |
| 21 |
spirit of Christ. Jesus' only medicine was omnipotent
and omniscient |
| 24 | this medicine is all-power; and omniscience means as well, all-science. The sick are more deplorably situated than the sinful, if the sick cannot trust God for help and |
| 27 | the sinful can. If God created drugs good, they cannot be harmful; if He could create them otherwise, then they are bad and unfit for man; and if He created drugs for |
| 30 |
healing the sick, why did not Jesus employ them and No human hypotheses, whether in philosophy,
medi- Page 26 |
| 1 | cine, or religion, can survive the wreck of time; but whatever is of God, hath life abiding in it, and ulti- |
| 3 | mately will be known as self-evident truth, as demonstra- ble as mathematics. Each successive period of progress is a period more humane and spiritual. The only logical |
| 6 | conclusion is that all is Mind and its manifestation, from the rolling of worlds, in the most subtle ether, to a potato- patch. |
| 9 | The agriculturist ponders the history of a seed, and believes that his crops come from the seedling and the loam; even while the Scripture declares He made "every |
| 12 | plant of the field before it was in the earth." The
Scien- tist asks, Whence came the first seed, and what made the soil? Was it molecules, or material atoms ? Whence |
| 15 | came the infinitesimals, - from infinite Mind, or from matter? If from matter, how did matter originate ? Was it self-existent? Matter is not intelligent, and thus able |
| 18 | to evolve or create itself: it is the very opposite of Spirit, intelligent, self-creative, and infinite Mind. The belief of mind in matter is pantheism. Natural history shows |
| 21 | that neither a genus nor a species produces its opposite. God is All, in all. What can be more than All? Noth- ing: and this is just what I call matter, nothing. Spirit, |
| 24 | God, has no antecedent; and God's consequent is the spiritual cosmos. The phrase, "express image," in the common version of Hebrews i. 3, is, in the Greek Tes- |
| 27 |
tament, character. The Scriptures name God as good, and
the Saxon |
| 30 |
the logical conclusion that God is naturally and divinely Page 27 |
| 1 | of evil? What can there be besides infinity? Nothing! Therefore the Science of good calls evil nothing. In |
| 3 | divine Science the terms God and good, as Spirit, are synonymous. That God, good, creates evil, or aught that can result in evil, - or that Spirit creates its oppo- |
| 6 | site, named matter, - are conclusions that destroy their premise and prove themselves invalid. Here is where Christian Science sticks to its text, and other systems |
| 9 | of religion abandon their own logic. Here also is found the pith of the basal statement, the cardinal point in Christian Science, that matter and evil (including all |
| 12 | inharmony, sin, disease, death) are unreal. Mortals accept natural science, wherein no species ever pro- duces its opposite. Then why not accept divine Sci- |
| 15 | ence on this ground? since the Scriptures maintain this fact by parable and proof, asking, "Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?" "Doth a |
| 18 |
fountain send forth at the same place sweet water and According to reason and revelation, evil and matter |
| 21 | are negation: for evil signifies the absence of good, God, though God is ever present; and matter claims some- thing besides God, when God is really All. Creation, |
| 24 | evolution, or manifestation, - being in and of Spirit, Mind, and all that really is, - must be spiritual and mental. This is Science, and is susceptible of proof. |
| 27 |
But, say you, is a stone spiritual? To erring material sense, No! but to
unerring spiritual |
| 30 |
ual substance, "the substance of things hoped for." Page 28 |
| 1 | of substance, and the stone itself would disappear, only to reappear in the spiritual sense thereof. Matter can |
| 3 | neither see, hear, feel, taste, nor smell; having no sen- sation of its own. Perception by the five personal senses is mental, and dependent on the beliefs that mortals |
| 6 | entertain. Destroy the belief that you can walk, and volition ceases; for muscles cannot move without mind. Matter takes no cognizance of matter. In dreams, things |
| 9 | are only what mortal mind makes them; and the phe- nomena of mortal life are as dreams; and this so-called life is a dream soon told. In proportion as mortals turn |
| 12 | from this mortal and material dream, to the true sense of reality, everlasting Life will be found to be the only Life. That death does not destroy the beliefs of the flesh, |
| 15 | our Master proved to his doubting disciple, Thomas. Also, he demonstrated that divine Science alone can overbear materiality and mortality; and this great truth was shown |
| 18 |
by his ascension after death, whereby he arose above The First Commandment, "Thou shalt have no other |
| 21 | gods before me," suggests the inquiry, What meaneth this Me, - Spirit, or matter? It certainly does not signify a graven idol, and must mean Spirit. Then |
| 24 | the commandment means, Thou shalt recognize no intelligence nor life in matter; and find neither pleasure nor pain therein. The Master's practical knowledge |
| 27 | of this grand verity, together with his divine Love, healed the sick and raised the dead. He literally annulled the claims of physique and of physical law, |
| 30 |
by the superiority of the higher law; hence his decla- Page 29 |
| 1 | they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall re- cover." |
| 3 | Do you believe his words? I do, and that his prom- ise is perpetual. Had it been applicable only to his immediate disciples, the pronoun would be you, not them. |
| 6 | The purpose of his life-work touches universal human- ity. At another time he prayed, not for the twelve only, but "for them also which shall believe on me through |
| 9 |
their word." The Christ-healing was practised even before the Chris- |
| 12 | God." There is, however, no analogy between Christian
Science and spiritualism, or between it and any specu- lative theory. |
| 15 | In 1867, I taught the first student in Christian Science. Since that date I have known of but fourteen deaths in the ranks of my about five thousand students. The |
| 18 | census since 1875 (the date of the first publication of my work, "Science and Health with Key to the Scrip- tures") shows that longevity has increased. Daily letters |
| 21 | inform me that a perusal of my volume is healing the writers of chronic and acute diseases that had defied medi- cal skill. |
| 24 | Surely the people of the Occident know that esoteric magic and Oriental barbarisms will neither flavor Chris- tianity nor advance health and length of days. |
| 27 | Miracles are no infraction of God's laws; on the contrary, they fulfil His laws; for they are the signs fol- lowing Christianity, whereby matter is proven power- |
| 30 |
less and subordinate to Mind. Christians, like students Page 30 |
| 1 | really understand the divine Principle of Christianity before we prove it, in at least some feeble demonstra- |
| 3 | tion thereof, according to Jesus' example in healing the sick? Should we adopt the "simple addition" in Chris- tian Science and doubt its higher rules, or despair of |
| 6 |
ultimately reaching them, even though failing at first to St. John spiritually discerned and revealed the sum |
| 9 | total of transcendentalism. He saw the real earth and heaven. They were spiritual, not material; and they were without pain, sin, or death. Death was not the |
| 12 | door to this heaven. The gates thereof he declared were inlaid with pearl, - likening them to the priceless under- standing of man's real existence, to be recognized here |
| 15 |
and now. The great Way-shower illustrated Life
unconfined, un- |
| 18 | superiority of Mind over the flesh, opened the door to the captive, and enabled man to demonstrate the law of Life, which St. Paul declares "hath made me free from |
| 21 |
the law of sin and death." The stale saying that Christian Science
"is neither |
| 24 |
less wit, weakness, and superstition. "The fool hath Take courage, dear reader, for any seeming mysti- |
| 27 |
cism surrounding realism is explained in the Scripture, 30 uality, the realm of reality; cleanse our lives in Christ's
Page 31 CHAPTER III QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS |
| 1 |
What do you consider to be mental malpractice? MENTAL malpractice is a bland denial of Truth, |
| 3 | and is the antipode of Christian Science. To mentally argue in a manner that can disastrously affect the happiness of a fellow-being - harm him |
| 6 | morally, physically, or spiritually - breaks the Golden Rule and subverts the scientific laws of being. This, therefore, is not the use but the abuse of mental treat- |
| 9 | ment, and is mental malpractice. It is needless to say that such a subversion of right is not scientific. Its claim to power is in proportion to the faith in evil, and |
| 12 | consequently to the lack of faith in good. Such false faith finds no place in, and receives no aid from, the Principle or the rules of Christian Science; for it denies |
| 15 |
the grand verity of this Science, namely, that God, good,
This leaves the individual no alternative but to re- |
| 18 | linquish his faith in evil, or to argue against his own convictions of good and so destroy his power to be or to do good, because he has no faith in the omnipotence |
| 21 |
of God, good. He parts with his understanding of good, Page 32 |
| 1 | wrong argument, - if indeed he desires success in this broad road to destruction. |
| 3 | How shall we demean ourselves towards the students of disloyal students? And what about that clergyman's remarks on "Christ and Christmas"? |
| 6 | From this question, I infer that some of my students seem not to know in what manner they should act towards the students of false teachers, or such as have strayed |
| 9 | from the rules and divine Principle of Christian Science. The query is abnormal, when "precept upon precept; line upon line" are to be found in the Scriptures, and in |
| 12 |
my books, on this very subject. In Mark, ninth chapter, commencing at
the thirty- |
| 15 | alone is admissible towards friend and foe. My sym- pathies extend to the above-named class of students more than to many others. If I had the time to talk with all |
| 18 | students of Christian Science, and correspond with them, I would gladly do my best towards helping those un- fortunate seekers after Truth whose teacher is straying |
| 21 | from the straight and narrow path. But I have not mo- ments enough in which to give to my own flock all the time and attention that they need, - and charity must |
| 24 |
begin at home. Distinct denominational and social organizations
and |
| 27 | and for our Cause. But all people can and should be just, merciful; they should never envy, elbow, slander, hate, or try to injure, but always should try to bless their |
| 30 |
fellow-mortals. To the query in regard to some clergyman's
com- Page 33 |
| 1 | ments on my illustrated poem, I will say: It is the righteous prayer that avails with God. Whatever is wrong will |
| 3 | receive its own reward. The high priests of old caused the crucifixion of even the great Master; and thereby they lost, and he won, heaven. I love all ministers and |
| 6 |
ministries of Christ, Truth. All clergymen may not understand the
illustrations |
| 9 | personality, but present the type and shadow of Truth's appearing in the womanhood as well as in the manhood of God, our divine Father and Mother. |
| 12 |
Must I have faith in Christian Science in order to be This is a question that is being asked every day. It |
| 15 | has not proved impossible to heal those who, when they began treatment, had no faith whatever in the Science, - other than to place themselves under my care, and |
| 18 | follow the directions given. Patients naturally gain con-
fidence in Christian Science as they recognize the help they derive therefrom. |
| 21 |
What are the advantages of your system of healing, over
Healing by Christian Science has the following ad- |
| 24 |
vantages: - First:
It does away with all material medicines, and |
| 27 | all "the ills that flesh is heir to," the antidote
for sickness, as well as for sin, may and must be found in mortal mind's opposite, - the divine Mind. |
| 30 |
Second: It is more effectual than drugs; curing where
Page 34 |
| 1 | these fail, and leaving none of the harmful "after effects" of these in the system; thus proving that metaphysics |
| 3 |
is above physics. Third:
One who has been healed by Christian Sci- |
| 6 | morally. The body is governed by mind; and mortal mind must be improved, before the body is renewed and harmonious, - since the physique is simply thought |
| 9 |
made manifest. Is spiritualism or mesmerism included
in Christian |
| 12 | They are wholly apart from it. Christian Science is based on divine Principle; whereas spiritualism, so far as I understand it, is a mere speculative opinion and |
| 15 | human belief. If the departed were to communicate with us, we should see them as they were before death, and have them with us; after death, they can no more |
| 18 | come to those they have left, than we, in our present state of existence, can go to the departed or the adult can re- turn to his boyhood. We may pass on to their state |
| 21 | of existence, but they cannot return to ours. Man is im-mortal, and there is not a moment when he ceases to exist. All that are called "communications from spirits," |
| 24 | lie within the realm of mortal thought on this present plane of existence, and are the antipodes of Christian Science; the immortal and mortal are as direct opposites as light |
| 27 |
and darkness. Who is the Founder of mental healing?
The author of "Science and Health with Key to the |
| 30 |
Scriptures," who discovered the Science of healing em- Page 35 |
| 1 | bodied in her works. Years of practical proof, through homoeopathy, revealed to her the fact that Mind, in- |
| 3 | stead of matter, is the Principle of pathology; and subsequently her recovery, through the supremacy of Mind over matter, from a severe casualty pronounced |
| 6 | by the physicians incurable, sealed that proof with the signet of Christian Science. In 1883, a million of peo- ple acknowledge and attest the blessings of this mental |
| 9 | system of treating disease. Perhaps the following words of her husband, the late Dr. Asa G. Eddy, afford the most concise, yet complete, summary of the |
| 12 |
matter: - "Mrs. Eddy's works are the outgrowths
of her life. |
| 15 | Will the book Science and Health, that you offer for sale
at three dollars, teach its readers to heal the sick, - or is one obliged to become a student under your personal in- |
| 18 |
struction? And if one is obliged to study under you, of
Why do we read the Bible, and then go to church to |
| 21 | hear it expounded? Only because both are important. Why do we read moral science, and then study it at college? |
| 24 | You are benefited by reading Science and Health, but it is greatly to your advantage to be taught its Science by the author of that work, who explains it in detail. |
| 27 |
What is immortal Mind? In reply, we refer you to "Science
and Health with |
| 30 |
(1) See the sixth edition. Page 36 |
| 1 | is erring, sinful, sick, and dying, termed material or mortal man, is neither God's man nor Mind; but to be |
| 3 | understood, we shall classify evil and error as mortal mind, in contradistinction to good and Truth, or the Mind which is immortal." |
| 6 |
Do animals and beasts have a mind? Beasts, as well as men, express Mind
as their origin; |
| 9 | cause is the eternal Mind, which is God, and there is but one God. The ferocious mind seen in the beast is mortal mind, which is harmful and proceeds not from |
| 12 | God; for His beast is the lion that lieth down with the lamb. Appetites, passions, anger, revenge, subtlety, are the animal qualities of sinning mortals; and the |
| 15 | beasts that have these propensities express the lower qualities of the so-called animal man; in other words, the nature and quality of mortal mind, - not immortal |
| 18 |
Mind. What is the distinction between mortal
mind and im- |
| 21 | Mortal mind includes all evil, disease, and death; also, all beliefs relative to the so-called material laws, and all material objects, and the law of sin and death. |
| 24 | The Scripture says, "The carnal mind [in other words, mortal mind] is enmity against God; for it is not sub- ject to the law of God, neither indeed can be." Mortal |
| 27 | mind is an illusion; as much in our waking moments as in the dreams of sleep. The belief that intelligence, Truth, and Love, are in matter and separate from God, |
| 30 |
is an error; for there is no intelligent evil, and no power Page 37 |
| 1 | besides God, good. God would not be omnipotent if there were in reality another mind creating or governing |
| 3 |
man or the universe. Immortal Mind is God; and this Mind
is made |
| 6 |
kind toward purity, health, holiness, and the spiritual Jesus recognized this relation so clearly that he said, |
| 9 | "I and my Father are one." In proportion as we
oppose the belief in material sense, in sickness, sin, and death, and recognize ourselves under the control of God, |
| 12 | spiritual and immortal Mind, shall we go on to leave the animal for the spiritual, and learn the meaning of those words of Jesus, "Go ye into all the world . . . heal the |
| 15 |
sick." Can your Science cure intemperance? Christian Science lays the axe at the root of the tree. |
| 18 | Its antidote for all ills is God, the perfect Mind, which
corrects mortal thought, whence cometh all evil. God can and does destroy the thought that leads to moral |
| 21 | or physical death. Intemperance, impurity, sin of every sort, is destroyed by Truth. The appetite for alcohol yields to Science as directly and surely as do sickness |
| 24 |
and sin. Does Mrs. Eddy take patients? She now does not. Her time is wholly devoted to in- |
| 27 |
struction, leaving to her students the work of healing; Page 38 |
| 1 | Why do you charge for teaching Christian Science, when all the good we can do must be done freely? |
| 3 | When teaching imparts the ability to gain and main- tain health, to heal and elevate man in every line of life, - as this teaching certainly does, - is it un- |
| 6 | reasonable to expect in return something to support one's self and a Cause? If so, our whole system of education, secular and religious, is at fault, and the |
| 9 | instructors and philanthropists in our land should ex- pect no compensation. "If we have sown unto you spiritual things, is it a great thing if we shall reap your |
| 12 |
carnal things ?" How happened you to establish a college
to instruct in |
| 15 |
such a dry and abstract subject? Metaphysics, as taught by me at the
Massachusetts |
| 18 | is a Science that has the animus of Truth. Its practical application to benefit the race, heal the sick, enlighten and reform the sinner, makes divine metaphysics need- |
| 21 | ful, indispensable. Teaching metaphysics at other col- leges means, mainly, elaborating a man-made theory, or some speculative view too vapory and hypothetical |
| 24 |
for questions of practical import. Is it necessary to study your Science
in order to be healed |
| 27 |
It is not necessary to make each patient a student Page 39 |
| 1 | practical value. Many who apply for help are not prepared to take a course of instruction in Christian |
| 3 |
Science. To avoid being subject to disease,
would require the |
| 6 | knowledge can be obtained in its genuineness at the Massachusetts Metaphysical College. There are abroad at this early date some grossly incorrect and false |
| 9 | teachers of what they term Christian Science; of such beware. They have risen up in a day to make this claim; whereas the Founder of genuine Christian Science has |
| 12 |
been all her years in giving it birth. . Can you take care of yourself ? God giveth to every one this puissance; and I have |
| 15 | faith in His promise, "Lo, I am with you alway"
- all the way. Unlike the M. D.'s, Christian Scientists are not afraid to take their own medicine, for this |
| 18 | medicine is divine Mind; and from this saving, ex- haustless source they intend to fill the human mind with enough of the leaven of Truth to leaven the whole lump. |
| 21 | There may be exceptional cases, where one Christian Scientist who has more to meet than others needs support at times; then, it is right to bear "one another's burdens, |
| 24 |
and so fulfil the law of Christ." In what way is a Christian Scientist
an instrument by |
| 27 |
obstructs the way? A Christian, or a Christian Scientist,
assumes no more |
| 30 |
than in converting the sinner. Divine help is as neces- Page 40 |
| 1 | sary in the one case as in the other. The scientific Prin- ciple of healing demands such cooperation; but this |
| 3 | unison and its power would be arrested if one were to mix material methods with the spiritual, - were to min- gle hygienic rules, drugs, and prayers in the same pro- |
| 6 | cess, - and thus serve "other gods." Truth is as effectual in destroying sickness as in the destruction of sin. |
| 9 | It is often asked, "If Christian Science is the same method of healing that Jesus and the apostles used, why do not its students perform as instantaneous cures |
| 12 |
as did those in the first century of the Christian era?" In some instances the students of Christian
Science |
| 15 | is governed by, and demonstrated on, the same Princi- ple as theirs; namely, the action of the divine Spirit, through the power of Truth to destroy error, discord |
| 18 | of whatever sort. The reason that the same results fol- low not in every case, is that the student does not in every case possess sufficiently the Christ-spirit and its |
| 21 | power to cast out the disease. The Founder of Chris- tian Science teaches her students that they must possess the spirit of Truth and Love, must gain the power |
| 24 |
over sin in themselves, or they cannot be instantaneous In this Christian warfare the student or practitioner |
| 27 | has to master those elements of evil too common to other minds. If it is hate that is holding the purpose to kill his patient by mental means, it requires more divine |
| 30 |
understanding to conquer this sin than to nullify either Page 41 |
| 1 | brute-force that only the cruel and evil can send forth,
is given vent in the diabolical practice of one who, having |
| 3 | learned the power of liberated thought to do good, per- verts it, and uses it to accomplish an evil purpose. This mental malpractice would disgrace Mind-healing, were it |
| 6 | not that God overrules it, and causes "the wrath of
man" to praise Him. It deprives those who practise it of the power to heal, and destroys their own possibility of |
| 9 |
progressing. The honest student of Christian Science
is purged |
| 12 | the ennobling strife. The good fight must be fought by those who keep the faith and finish their course. Mental purgation must go on: it promotes spiritual growth, |
| 15 |
scales the mountain of human endeavor, and gains the 18 Can all classes of disease be healed by your method?
We answer, Yes. Mind is the architect that builds |
| 21 | There is no other healer in the case. If mortal mind, through the action of fear, manifests inflammation and a belief of chronic or acute disease, by removing the cause |
| 24 | in that so-called mind the effect or disease will disappear
and health will be restored; for health, alias harmony, is the normal manifestation of man in Science. The |
| 27 | divine Principle which governs the universe, including man, if demonstrated, is sufficient for all emergencies. But the practitioner may not always prove equal to |
| 30 |
bringing out the result of the Principle that he knows to
Page 42 |
| 1 | After the change called death takes place, do we meet those gone before? - or does life continue in thought only |
| 3 |
as in a dream? Man is not annihilated, nor does he
lose his identity, |
| 6 | momentary belief of dying passes from mortal mind, this mind is still in a conscious state of existence; and the in- dividual has but passed through a moment of extreme |
| 9 | mortal fear, to awaken with thoughts, and being, as material as before. Science and Health clearly states that spiritualization of thought is not attained by the death |
| 12 | of the body, but by a conscious union with God. When we shall have passed the ordeal called death, or destroyed this last enemy, and shall have come upon the same plane |
| 15 |
of conscious existence with those gone before, then we If, before the change whereby we meet the dear de- |
| 18 | parted, our life-work proves to have been well done, we shall not have to repeat it; but our joys and means of ad- vancing will be proportionately increased. |
| 21 | The difference between a belief of material existence and the spiritual fact of Life is, that the former is a dream and unreal, while the latter is real and eternal. Only |
| 24 | as we understand God, and learn that good, not evil, lives and is immortal, that immortality exists only in spiritual perfection, shall we drop our false sense of Life |
| 27 |
in sin or sense material, and recognize a better state of Can I be treated without being present during treatment? |
| 30 |
Mind is not confined to limits; and nothing but our Page 43 |
| 1 | great fact. Christian Science, recognizing the capabili- ties of Mind to act of itself, and independent of matter, |
| 3 | enables one to heal cases without even having seen the individual, - or simply after having been made ac- quainted with the mental condition of the patient. |
| 6 |
Do all who at present claim to be teaching Christian By no means: Christian Science is not sufficiently un- |
| 9 | derstood for that. The student of this Science who under- stands it best, is the one least likely to pour into other minds a trifling sense of it as being adequate to make safe |
| 12 | and successful practitioners. The simple sense one gains
of this Science through careful, unbiased, contemplative reading of my books, is far more advantageous to the |
| 15 | sick and to the learner than is or can be the spurious teaching of those who are spiritually unqualified. The sad fact at this early writing is, that the letter is gained |
| 18 | sooner than the spirit of Christian Science: time is re- quired thoroughly to qualify students for the great ordeal of this century. |
| 21 | If one student tries to undermine another, such sinister
rivalry does a vast amount of injury to the Cause. To fill one's pocket at the expense of his conscience, or to |
| 24 | build on the downfall of others, incapacitates one to practise or teach Christian Science. The occasional tem- porary success of such an one is owing, in part, to the im- |
| 27 | possibility for those unacquainted with the mighty Truth
of Christian Science to recognize, as such, the barefaced errors that are taught - and the damaging effects these |
| 30 |
leave on the practice of the learner, on the Cause, and Page 44 |
| 1 | Honest students speak the truth "according to the pattern showed to thee in the mount," and live it: these |
| 3 | are not working for emoluments, and may profitably teach people, who are ready to investigate this subject, the rudiments of Christian Science. |
| 6 |
Can Christian Science cure acute cases where there is The remedial power of Christian Science is positive, |
| 9 | and its application direct. It cannot fail to heal in every case of disease, when conducted by one who un- derstands this Science sufficiently to demonstrate its |
| 12 |
highest possibilities. If I have the toothache, and nothing
stops it until I |
| 15 |
the mind, or extracting, or both, caused the pain to What you thought was pain in the bone or nerve, could |
| 18 | only have been a belief of pain in matter; for matter has no sensation. It was a state of mortal thought made manifest in the flesh. You call this body matter, when |
| 21 | awake, or when asleep in a dream. That matter can re- port pain, or that mind is in matter, reporting sensa- tions, is but a dream at all times. You believed that if |
| 24 | the tooth were extracted, the pain would cease: this de- mand of mortal thought once met, your belief assumed a new form, and said, There is no more pain. When |
| 27 |
your belief in pain ceases, the pain stops; for matter Page 45 |
| 1 | tifically prove the fact that Mind is supreme. This is not done by will-power, for that is not Science but mesmerism. |
| 3 | The full understanding that God is Mind, and that mat- ter is but a belief, enables you to control pain. Chris- tian Science, by means of its Principle of metaphysical |
| 6 | healing, is able to do more than to heal a toothache; although its power to allay fear, prevent inflammation, and destroy the necessity for ether - thereby avoiding |
| 9 | the fatal results that frequently follow the use of that
drug - render this Science invaluable in the practice of dentistry. |
| 12 |
Can an atheist or a profane man be cured by metaphysics, The moral status of the man demands the remedy of |
| 15 | Truth more in this than in most cases; therefore, under the deific law that supply invariably meets demand, this Science is effectual in treating moral ailments. Sin is |
| 18 | not the master of divine Science, but vice versa;
and when Science in a single instance decides the conflict, the patient is better both morally and physically. |
| 21 |
If God made all that was made, and it was good, where It never originated or existed as an entity. It is but a |
| 24 | false belief; even the belief that God is not what the Scriptures imply Him to be, All-in-all, but that there is an opposite intelligence or mind termed evil. This |
| 27 |
error of belief is idolatry, having "other gods before
me." Page 46 |
| 1 | The admission of the reality of evil perpetuates the belief or faith in evil. The Scriptures declare, "To whom ye |
| 3 | yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are." The leading self-evident proposition of Christian Science is: good being real, evil, good's opposite, is unreal. This |
| 6 | truism needs only to be tested scientifically to be found true, and adapted to destroy the appearance of evil to an extent beyond the power of any doctrine previously |
| 9 |
entertained. Do you teach that you are equal with
God? A reader of my writings would not present this ques- |
| 12 | tion. There are no such indications in the premises or conclusions of Christian Science, and such a misconcep- tion of Truth is not scientific. Man is not equal with |
| 15 | his Maker; that which is formed is not cause, but effect, and has no power underived from its creator. It is pos- sible, and it is man's duty, so to throw the weight of his |
| 18 | thoughts and acts on the side of Truth, that he be ever found in the scale with his creator; not weighing equally with Him, but comprehending at every point, in |
| 21 | divine Science, the full significance of what the apostle meant by the declaration, "The Spirit itself beareth wit- ness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: and |
| 24 | if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ." In Science, man represents his divine Prin- ciple, - the Life and Love that are God, - even as the |
| 27 | idea of sound, in tones, represents harmony; but thought has not yet wholly attained unto the Science of being, wherein man is perfect even as the Father, his divine |
| 30 |
Principle, is perfect. Page 47 |
| 1 | How can I believe that there is no such thing as matter, when I weigh over two hundred pounds and carry about |
| 3 |
this weight daily? By learning that matter is but manifest
mortal mind. |
| 6 | whereas, substance means more than matter: it is the glory and permanence of Spirit: it is that which is hoped for but unseen, that which the material senses |
| 9 | cannot take in. Have you never been so preoccupied in thought when moving your body, that you did this with- out consciousness of its weight? If never in your waking |
| 12 | hours, you have been in your night-dreams; and these tend to elucidate your day-dream, or the mythical nature of matter, and the possibilities of mind when let loose |
| 15 | from its own beliefs. In sleep, a sense of the body ac- companies thought with less impediment than when awake, which is the truer sense of being. In Science, |
| 18 | body is the servant of Mind, not its master: Mind is supreme. Science reverses the evidence of material sense with the spiritual sense that God, Spirit, is the only |
| 21 | substance; and that man, His image and likeness, is spiritual, not material. This great Truth does not de- stroy but substantiates man's identity, - together with |
| 24 | his immortality and preexistence, or his spiritual co- existence with his Maker. That which has a beginning must have an ending. |
| 27 |
What should one conclude as to Professor Carpenter's That largely depends upon what one accepts as either |
| 30 |
useful or true. I have no knowledge of mesmerism, Page 48 |
| 1 | practically or theoretically, save as I measure its demon- strations as a false belief, and avoid all that works ill. If |
| 3 | mesmerism has the power attributed to it by the gentle- man referred to, it should neither be taught nor practised, but should be conscientiously condemned. One thing |
| 6 | is quite apparent; namely, that its so-called power is despotic, and Mr. Carpenter deserves praise for his public exposure of it. If such be its power, I am opposed to it, |
| 9 | as to every form of error, - whether of ignorance or fanaticism, prompted by money-making or malice. It is enough for me to know that animal magnetism is neither |
| 12 |
of God nor Science. It is alleged that at one of his recent
lectures in Bos- |
| 15 | then informed his audience that he could produce the effect of alcohol, or of any drug, on the human system, through the action of mind alone. This honest declara- |
| 18 | tion as to the animus of animal magnetism and the pos- sible purpose to which it can be devoted, has, we trust, been made in season to open the eyes of the people to the |
| 21 |
hidden nature of some tragic events and sudden deaths Was ever a person made insane by studying meta- |
| 24 |
physics? Such an occurrence would be impossible,
for the |
| 27 | That persons have gone away from the Massachusetts Metaphysical College "made insane by Mrs. Eddy's teachings," like a hundred other stories, is a baseless |
| 30 |
fabrication offered solely to injure her or her school. Page 49 |
| 1 | ing case. A young lady entered the College class who, I quickly saw, had a tendency to monomania, and re- |
| 3 | quested her to withdraw before its close. We are cred- ibly informed that, before entering the College, this young lady had manifested some mental unsoundness, |
| 6 | and have no doubt she could have been restored by Christian Science treatment. Her friends employed a homoeopathist, who had the skill and honor to state, as his |
| 9 | opinion given to her friends, that "Mrs. Eddy's teach- ings had not produced insanity." This is the only case that could be distorted into the claim of insanity ever |
| 12 | having occurred in a class of Mrs. Eddy's; while ac- knowledged and notable cases of insanity have been cured in her class. |
| 15 | If all that is mortal is a dream or error, is not our capacity for formulating a dream, real; is it not God-made; and if God-made, can it be wrong, sinful, or |
| 18 |
an error? The spirit of Truth leads into all truth,
and enables |
| 21 | taining the common belief in the opposite of goodness, and that evil is as real as good, opposes the leadings of the divine Spirit that are helping man Godward: it pre- |
| 24 | vents a recognition of the nothingness of the dream, or belief, that Mind is in matter, intelligence in non-intel- ligence, sin, and death. This belief presupposes not |
| 27 | only a power opposed to God, and that God is not All- in-all, as the Scriptures imply Him to be, but that the capacity to err proceeds from God. |
| 30 |
That God is Truth, the Scriptures aver; that Truth Page 50 |
| 1 | that God made all that was made, is again Scriptural; therefore your answer is, that error is an illusion of |
| 3 |
mortals; that God is not its author, and it cannot be Does "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" |
| 6 | explain the entire method of metaphysical healing, or
is there a secret back of what is contained in that book, as some say? |
| 9 | "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" is a complete textbook of Christian Science; and its metaphysical method of healing is as lucid in presenta- |
| 12 | tion as can be possible, under the necessity to express the metaphysical in physical terms. There is absolutely no additional secret outside of its teachings, or that gives |
| 16 | one the power to heal; but it is essential that the student gain the spiritual understanding of the contents of this book, in order to heal. |
| 18 |
Do you believe in change of heart? We do believe, and understand - which
is more - |
| 21 | sires, and aims, to the divine standard, "Be ye therefore perfect;" also, that there must be a change from the be- lief that the heart is matter and sustains life, to the |
| 24 | understanding that God is our Life, that we exist in Mind, live thereby, and have being. This change of heart would deliver man from heart-disease, and ad- |
| 27 | vance Christianity a hundredfold. The human affections need to be changed from self to benevolence and love for God and man; changed to having but one God and |
| 30 |
loving Him supremely, and helping our brother man. Page 51 |
| 1 | This change of heart is essential to Christianity, and will have its effect physically as well as spiritually, |
| 3 |
healing disease. Burnt offerings and drugs, God does Is a belief of nervousness, accompanied by great mental |
| 6 |
depression, mesmerism? All mesmerism is of one of three kinds;
namely, the |
| 9 | error or mortal mind. We have not the particulars of the case to which you may refer, and for this reason can- not answer your question professionally. |
| 12 |
How can I govern a child metaphysically? Doesn't the The use of the rod is virtually a declaration to the |
| 15 | child's mind that sensation belongs to matter. Motives govern acts, and Mind governs man. If you make clear to the child's thought the right motives for action, and |
| 18 | cause him to love them, they will lead him aright: if you
educate him to love God, good, and obey the Golden Rule, he will love and obey you without your having to |
| 21 |
resort to corporeal punishment. "When from the lips of Truth one
mighty breath |
| 24 | The whole dark pile of human mockeries; Then shall the reign of Mind commence on earth, And starting fresh, as from a second birth, |
| 27 |
Man in the sunshine of the world's new spring, Are both prayer and drugs necessary to heal? |
| 30 |
The apostle James said, "Ye ask, and receive not, Page 52 |
| 1 | lusts." This text may refer to such as seek the material to aid the spiritual, and take drugs to support God's |
| 3 | power to heal them. It is difficult to say how much one can do for himself, whose faith is divided be- tween catnip and Christ; but not so difficult to know |
| 6 | that if he were to serve one master, he could do vastly more. Whosoever understands the power of Spirit, has no doubt of God's power, - even the might of Truth, - |
| 9 |
to heal, through divine Science, beyond all human means and methods. What do you think of marriage? |
| 12 | That it is often convenient, sometimes pleasant, and occasionally a love affair. Marriage is susceptible of many definitions. It sometimes presents the most |
| 15 | wretched condition of human existence. To be normal, it must be a union of the affections that tends to lift mortals higher. |
| 18 | If this life is a dream not dispelled, but only changed, by death, - if one gets tired of it, why not commit suicide? |
| 21 | Man's existence is a problem to be wrought in divine Science. What progress would a student of science make, if, when tired of mathematics or failing to dem- |
| 24 | onstrate one rule readily, he should attempt to work out a rule farther on and more difficult - and this, because the first rule was not easily demonstrated? In |
| 27 | that case he would be obliged to turn back and work out the previous example, before solving the advanced problem. Mortals have the sum of being to work out, |
| 30 |
and up, to its spiritual standpoint. They must work Page 53 |
| 1 | out of this dream or false claim of sensation and life in matter, and up to the spiritual realities of existence, |
| 3 | before this false claim can be wholly dispelled. Com- mitting suicide to dodge the question is not working it out. The error of supposed life and intelligence in |
| 6 | matter, is dissolved only as we master error with Truth. Not through sin or suicide, but by overcoming tempta- tion and sin, shall we escape the weariness and wicked- |
| 9 |
ness of mortal existence, and gain heaven, the harmony Do you sometimes find it advisable to use medicine to |
| 12 |
assist in producing a cure, when it is difficult to start
the You only weaken your power to heal through Mind, |
| 15 | by any compromise with matter; which is virtually ac- knowledging that under difficulties the former is not equal to the latter. He that resorts to physics, seeks what is |
| 18 | below instead of above the standard of metaphysics; showing his ignorance of the meaning of the term and of Christian Science. |
| 21 |
If Christian Science is the same as Jesus taught, why is The teachings of Jesus were simple; and yet he found |
| 24 | it difficult to make the rulers understand, because of their great lack of spirituality. Christian Science is simple, and readily understood by the children; only |
| 27 | the thought educated away from it finds it abstract or difficult to perceive. Its seeming abstraction is the mystery of godliness; and godliness is simple to the |
| 30 |
godly; but to the unspiritual, the ungodly, it is dark Page 54 |
| 1 | and difficult. The carnal mind cannot discern spiritual things. |
| 3 |
Has Mrs. Eddy lost her power to heal? Has the sun forgotten to shine, and
the planets to |
| 6 | onstrated, and teaches Christian Science? That one, whoever it be, does understand something of what can- not be lost. Thousands in the field of metaphysical |
| 9 | healing, whose lives are worthy testimonials, are her students, and they bear witness to this fact. Instead of losing her power to heal, she is demonstrating the |
| 12 | power of Christian Science over all obstacles that envy and malice would fling in her path. The reading of her book, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," |
| 15 |
is curing hundreds at this very time; and the sick, un- Must I study your Science in order to keep well all my |
| 18 |
life? I was healed of a chronic trouble after one month's When once you are healed by Science, there is no rea- |
| 21 | son why you should be liable to a return of the disease that you were healed of. But not to be subject again to any disease whatsoever, would require an understanding |
| 24 |
of the Science by which you were healed. Because none of your students have
been able to perform |
| 27 |
does it not suggest the possibility that they do not heal
on You would not ask the pupil in simple equations to |
| 30 |
solve a problem involving logarithms; and then, because Page 55 |
| 1 | he failed to get the right answer, condemn the pupil and the science of numbers. The simplest problem |
| 3 | in Christian Science is healing the sick, and the least understanding and demonstration thereof prove all its possibilities. The ability to demonstrate to the extent |
| 6 | that Jesus did, will come when the student possesses as much of the divine Spirit as he shared, and utilizes its power to overcome sin. |
| 9 | Opposite to good, is the universal claim of evil that seeks the proportions of good. There may be those who, having learned the power of the unspoken thought, |
| 12 | use it to harm rather than to heal, and who are using that power against Christian Scientists. This giant sin is the sin against the Holy Ghost spoken of in Matt. |
| 15 |
xii. 31, 32. Is Christian Science based on the
facts of both Spirit |
| 18 | Christian Science is based on the facts of Spirit and its forms and representations, but these facts are the direct antipodes of the so-called facts of matter; and |
| 21 | the eternal verities of Spirit assert themselves over their
opposite, or matter, in the final destruction of all that is unlike Spirit. |
| 24 | Man knows that he can have one God only, when he regards God as the only Mind, Life, and substance. If God is Spirit, as the Scriptures declare, and All-in- |
| 27 |
all, matter is mythology, and its laws are mortal If Mind is in matter and beneath a skull bone, it is |
| 30 |
in something unlike Him; hence it is either a godless and
Page 56 |
| 1 | ries of agnosticism and pantheism, the very antipodes of Christian Science. |
| 3 |
What is organic life? Life is inorganic, infinite Spirit;
if Life, or Spirit, |
| 6 |
annihilate man. If Mind is not substance, form, and
tangibility, God |
| 9 |
Mind. Life is God, the only creator, and Life is im- Every indication of matter's constituting life is mortal, |
| 12 | the direct opposite of immortal Life, and infringes the rights of Spirit. Then, to conclude that Spirit consti- tutes or ever has constituted laws to that effect, is a mor- |
| 15 | tal error, a human conception opposed to the divine government. Mind and matter mingling in perpetual warfare is a kingdom divided against itself, that shall be |
| 18 | brought to desolation. The final destruction of this false belief in matter will appear at the full revelation of Spirit, - one God, and the brotherhood of man. |
| 21 | Organic life is an error of statement that Truth destroys. The Science of Life needs only to be understood; its dem- onstration proves the correctness of my statements, and |
| 24 |
brings blessings infinite. Why did God command, "Be fruitful,
and multiply, |
| 27 |
from the beginning, and have had successive stages of Your question implies that Spirit, which first spirit- |
| 30 |
ually created the universe, including man, created man Page 57 |
| 1 | over again materially; and, by the aid of mankind, all was later made which He had made. If the first record |
| 3 | is true, what evidence have you - apart from the evi- dence of that which you admit cannot discern spiritual things - of any other creation? The creative "Us" |
| 6 | made all, and Mind was the creator. Man originated not from dust, materially, but from Spirit, spiritually. This work had been done; the true creation was finished, |
| 9 |
and its spiritual Science is alluded to in the first chapter Jesus said of error, "That thou doest, do quickly." |
| 12 | By the law of opposites, after the truth of man had been
demonstrated, the postulate of error must appear. That this addendum was untrue, is seen when Truth, God, |
| 15 | denounced it, and said: "I will greatly multiply thy
sorrow." "In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." The opposite error said, "I am true," and |
| 18 | declared, "God doth know . . . that your eyes shall
be opened, and ye shall be as gods," creators. This was false; and the Lord God never said it. This history of a falsity |
| 21 | must be told in the name of Truth, or it would have no seeming. The Science of creation is the universe with man created spiritually. The false sense and error of creation |
| 24 |
is the sense of man and the universe created materially. Why does the record make man a creation
of the sixth |
| 27 | In its genesis, the Science of creation is stated in mathe- matical order, beginning with the lowest form and ascend- ing the scale of being up to man. But all that really is, |
| 30 |
always was and forever is; for it existed in and of the Mind Page 58 |
| 1 | If one has died of consumption, and he has no remem- brence of that disease or dream, does that disease have any |
| 3 |
more power over him? Waking from a dream, one learns its
unreality; then |
| 6 | death, proves to him who thought he died that it was a dream, and that he did not die; then he learns that con- sumption did not kill him. When the belief in the power |
| 9 |
of disease is destroyed, disease cannot return. How does Mrs. Eddy know that she
has read and studied |
| 12 |
She had to use her eyes to read. Jesus said, "Having eyes, see ye
not?" I read the in- |
| 15 | matter, the eye cannot see; and as mortal mind, it is a belief that sees. I may read the Scriptures through a belief of eyesight; but I must spiritually understand |
| 18 |
them to interpret their Science. Does the theology of Christien Science
aid its heal- |
| 21 | Without its theology there is no mental science, no order that proceeds from God. All Science is divine, not human, in origin and demonstration. If God does |
| 24 | not govern the action of man, it is inharmonious: if He does govern it, the action is Science. Take away the theology of mental healing and you take away its science, |
| 27 |
leaving it a human "mind-cure," nothing more nor
less, Page 59 |
| 1 | more than one government and God. Having no true sense of the healing theology of Mind, you can neither |
| 3 | understand nor demonstrate its Science, and will prac- tise your belief of it in the name of Truth. This is the mortal "mind-cure" that produces the effect of mes- |
| 6 | merism. It is using the power of human will, instead of the divine power understood, as in Christian Science; and without this Science there had better be no "mind- |
| 9 |
cure," - in which the last state of patients is worse
than Is it wrong to pray for the recovery of the sick? |
| 12 | Not if we pray Scripturally, with the understanding that God has given all things to those who love Him; but pleading with infinite Love to love us, or to restore |
| 15 | health and harmony, and then to admit that it has been lost under His government, is the prayer of doubt and mortal belief that is unavailing in divine Science. |
| 18 |
Is not all argument mind over mind? The Scriptures refer to God as saying,
"Come now, and |
| 21 | that one should and does govern man. Any copartnership with that Mind is impossible; and the only benefit in speaking often one to another, arises from the success that |
| 24 | one individual has with another in leading his thoughts away from the human mind or body, and guiding them with Truth. That individual is the best healer who as- |
| 27 |
serts himself the least, and thus becomes a transparency Page 60 |
| 1 | How can you believe there is no sin, and that God does not recognize any, when He sent His Son to save from |
| 3 | sin, and the Bible is addressed to sinners? How can you believe there is no sickness, when Jesus came healing the sick? |
| 6 | To regard sin, disease, and death with less deference, and only as the woeful unrealities of being, is the only way to destroy them; Christian Science is proving this by |
| 9 | healing cases of disease and sin after all other means have failed. The Nazarene Prophet could make the unreality of both apparent in a moment. |
| 12 | Does it not limit the power of Mind to deny the possi- bility of communion with departed friends - dead only in belief ? |
| 15 | Does it limit the power of Mind to say that addition is not subtraction in mathematics ? The Science of Mind reveals the impossibility of two individual sleepers, in |
| 18 | different phases of thought, communicating, even if touch- ing each other corporeally; or for one who sleeps to communicate with another who is awake. Mind's possi- |
| 21 |
bilities are not lessened by being confined and conformed If mortal mind and body are myths, what is the con- |
| 24 |
nection between them and real identity, and why are there Evil in the beginning claimed the power, wisdom, and |
| 27 | utility of good; and every creation or idea of Spirit has its counterfeit in some matter belief. Every material be- lief hints the existence of spiritual reality; and if mortals |
| 30 |
are instructed in spiritual things, it will be seen that ma- Page 61 |
| 1 | terial belief, in all its manifestations, reversed, will
be found the type and representative of verities priceless, |
| 3 |
eternal, and just at hand. The education of the future will be
instruction, in spir- |
| 6 | sciences. All the knowledge and vain strivings of mortal
mind, that lead to death, - even when aping the wisdom and magnitude of immortal Mind, - will be swallowed |
| 9 |
up by the reality and omnipotence of Truth over error, "Dear Mrs. Eddy: - In the October Journal I read |
| 12 | the following: 'But the real man, who was created in the
image of God, does not commit sin.' What then does sin? What commits theft? Or who does murder? For instance, |
| 15 | the man is held responsible for the crime; for I went once
to a place where a man was said to be 'hanged for mur- der' - and certainly I saw him, or his effigy, dangling |
| 18 |
at the end of a rope. This 'man' was held responsible What sins? |
| 21 | According to the Word, man is the image and likeness of God. Does God's essential likeness sin, or dangle at the end of a rope? If not, what does? A culprit, a sinner, |
| 24 |
- anything but a man! Then, what is a sinner? A Again: mortals are the embodiments (or bodies, if |
| 27 | you please) of error, not of Truth; of sickness, sin, and death. Naming these His embodiment, can neither make them so nor overthrow the logic that man is God's like- |
| 30 |
ness. Mortals seem very material; man in the likeness Page 62 |
| 1 | of Spirit is spiritual. Holding the right idea of man in
my mind, I can improve my own, and other people's individ- |
| 3 | uality, health, and morals; whereas, the opposite image of man, a sinner, kept constantly in mind, can no more improve health or morals, than holding in thought the |
| 6 |
form of a boa-constrictor can aid an artist in painting a Man is seen only in the true likeness of his Maker. |
| 9 | Believing a lie veils the truth from our vision; even as in mathematics, in summing up positive and negative quantities, the negative quantity offsets an equal positive |
| 12 |
quantity, making the aggregate positive, or true quantity, Why do Christian Scientists hold that their theology is |
| 15 |
essential to heal the sick, when the mind-cure claims to
heal The theology of Christian Science is Truth; opposed |
| 18 |
to which is the error of sickness, sin, and death, that A "mind-cure" is a matter-cure. An adherent to this |
| 21 | method honestly acknowledges this fact in her work entitled "Mind-cure on a Material Basis." In that work the author grapples with Christian Science, attempts |
| 24 | to solve its divine Principle by the rule of human mind, fails, and ends in a parody on this Science which is amus- ing to astute readers, - especially when she tells them |
| 27 |
that she is practising this Science. The theology of Christian Science is
based on the action |
| 30 |
whereas, "mind-cure" rests on the notion that the
human Page 63 |
| 1 | and the sickness of matter, - which is infidel in
the one case, and anomalous in the other. It was said of old by |
| 3 | Truth-traducers, that Jesus healed through Beelzebub; but the claim that one erring mind cures another one was at first gotten up to hinder his benign influence and to hide |
| 6 |
his divine power. Our Master understood that Life, Truth,
Love are the |
| 9 |
trinity is one infinite remedy for the opposite triad, sick- If there is no sin, why did Jesus come to save sinners? |
| 12 | If there is no reality in sickness, why does a Chris- tian Scientist go to the bedside and address himself to the healing of disease, on the basis of its unreality? |
| 15 | Jesus came to seek and to save such as believe in the reality of the unreal; to save them from this false belief; that they might lay hold of eternal Life, the great reality |
| 18 | that concerns man, and understand the final fact, - that
God is omnipotent and omnipresent; yea, "that the Lord He is God; there is none else beside Him," as the Scrip- |
| 21 |
tures declare. If Christ was God, why did Jesus
cry out, "My God, |
| 24 | Even as the struggling heart, reaching toward a higher goal, appeals to its hope and faith, Why failest thou me? Jesus as the son of man was human: Christ as |
| 27 | the Son of God was divine. This divinity was reaching humanity through the crucifixion of the human, - that momentous demonstration of God, in which Spirit proved |
| 30 |
its supremacy over matter. Jesus assumed for mortals the Page 64 |
| 1 | weakness of flesh, that Spirit might be found "All-in-all." Hence, the human cry which voiced that struggle; |
| 3 | thence, the way he made for mortals' escape. Our Master bore the cross to show his power over death; then relinquished his earth-task of teaching and dem- |
| 6 | onstrating the nothingness of sickness, sin, and death, and rose to his native estate, man's indestructible eternal life in God. |
| 9 | What can prospective students of the College take for preliminary studies? Do you regard the study of litera- ture and languages as objectionable? |
| 12 | Persons contemplating a course at the Massachusetts Metaphysical College, can prepare for it through no books except the Bible, and "Science and Health with |
| 15 | Key to the Scriptures." Man-made theories are nar- row, else extravagant, and are always materialistic. The ethics which guide thought spiritually must bene- |
| 18 | fit every one; for the only philosophy and religion that afford instruction are those which deal with facts and resist speculative opinions and fables. |
| 21 | Works on science are profitable; for science is not human. It is spiritual, and not material. Literature and languages, to a limited extent, are aids to a student |
| 24 |
of the Bible and of Christian Science. Is it possible to know why we are
put into this condition |
| 27 | It is quite as possible to know wherefore man is thus conditioned, as to be certain that he is in a state of mortality. The only evidence of the existence of a mor- |
| 30 |
tal man, or of a material state and universe, is gathered Page 65 |
| 1 | from the five personal senses. This delusive evidence, Science has dethroned by repeated proofs of its falsity. |
| 3 | We have no more proof of human discord, - sin, sickness, disease, or death, - than we have that the earth's surface is flat, and her motions imaginary. If |
| 6 | man's ipse dixit as to the stellar system is correct,
this is because Science is true, and the evidence of the senses is false. Then why not submit to the affirmations of |
| 9 | Science concerning the greater subject of human weal and woe? Every question between Truth and error, Science must and will decide. Left to the decision of |
| 12 | Science, your query concerns a negative which the posi- tive Truth destroys; for God's universe and man are immortal. We must not consider the false side of exist- |
| 15 |
ence in order to gain the true solution of Life and its Have you changed your instructions as to the right way |
| 18 |
of treating disease? I have not; and this important fact
must be, and al- |
| 21 | structions on this question. Christian Science demands both law and gospel, in order to demonstrate healing, and I have taught them both in its demonstration, and |
| 24 | with signs following. They are a unit in restoring the equipoise of mind and body, and balancing man's ac- count with his Maker. The sequence proves that strict |
| 27 | adherence to one is inadequate to compensate for the absence of the other, since both constitute the divine law of healing. |
| 30 |
The Jewish religion demands that "whoso sheddeth Page 66 |
| 1 | law is not infallible in wisdom; and obedience thereto may be found faulty, since false testimony or mistaken |
| 3 | evidence may cause the innocent to suffer for the guilty. Hence the gospel that fulfils the law in righteousness, the genius whereof is displayed in the surprising wisdom |
| 6 | of these words of the New Testament: "Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap." No possible injustice lurks in this mandate, and no human mis- |
| 9 | judgment can pervert it; for the offender alone suffers, and always according to divine decree. This sacred, solid precept is verified in all directions in Mind- |
| 12 |
healing, and is supported in the Scripture by parallel The law and gospel of Truth and Love teach, through |
| 15 | divine Science, that sin is identical with suffering, and that suffering is the lighter affliction. To reach the sum- mit of Science, whence to discern God's perfect ways |
| 18 | and means, the material sense must be controlled by the higher spiritual sense, and Truth be enthroned, while "we look not at the things which are seen, but at |
| 21 |
the things which are not seen." Cynical critics misjudge my meaning
as to the sci- |
| 24 | duced by sin is not healed like the more physical ailment. The beginner in sin-healing must know this, or he never can reach the Science of Mind-healing, and |
| 27 | so "overcome evil with good." Error in premise
is met with error in practice; yea, it is "the blind leading the blind." Ignorance of the cause of disease can neither |
| 30 |
remove that cause nor its effect. I endeavor to accommodate my instructions
to the Page 67 |
| 1 | liberated thought until its altitude reaches beyond the mere alphabet of Mind-healing. Above physical wants, |
| 3 |
lie the higher claims of the law and gospel of healing. "Thou shalt not commit adultery;" in other words, |
| 6 | thou shalt not adulterate Life, Truth, or Love, - men- tally, morally, or physically. "Thou shalt not steal;" that is, thou shalt not rob man of money, which is but |
| 9 | trash, compared with his rights of mind and character. "Thou shalt not kill;" that is, thou shalt not strike at the eternal sense of Life with a malicious aim, but shalt |
| 12 | know that by doing thus thine own sense of Life shall be
forfeited. "Thou shalt not bear false witness;" that is, thou shalt not utter a lie, either mentally or audibly, nor |
| 15 | cause it to be thought. Obedience to these command- ments is indispensable to health, happiness, and length of days. |
| 18 | The gospel of healing demonstrates the law of Love. Justice uncovers sin of every sort; and mercy demands that if you see the danger menacing others, you shall, |
| 21 | Deo volente, inform them thereof. Only thus is the
right practice of Mind-healing achieved, and the wrong prac- tice discerned, disarmed, and destroyed. |
| 24 |
Do you believe in translation? If your question refers to language,
whereby one ex- |
| 27 | lent words in another, I do. If you refer to the removal
of a person to heaven, without his subjection to death, I modify my affirmative answer. I believe in this |
| 30 |
removal being possible after all the footsteps requisite Page 68 |
| 1 | spiritual sense and fact of divine substance, intelligence, Life, and Love. This translation is not the work of mo- |
| 3 | ments; it requires both time and eternity. It means more than mere disappearance to the human sense; it must include also man's changed appearance and diviner form |
| 6 |
visible to those beholding him here. The Rev. - said in a sermon: A true
Christian |
| 9 | Christian Science. He also maintained that pain and disease are not illusions but realities; and that it is not Christian to believe they are illusions. Is this so? |
| 12 | It is unchristian to believe that pain and sickness are anything but illusions. My proof of this is, that the penalty for believing in their reality is the very pain and |
| 15 | disease. Jesus cast out a devil, and the dumb spake; hence it is right to know that the works of Satan are the illusion and error which Truth casts out. |
| 18 | Does the gentleman above mentioned know the meaning of divine metaphysics, or of metaphysical theology? |
| 21 | According to Webster, metaphysics is defined thus: "The science of the conceptions and relations which are necessary to thought and knowledge; science of the |
| 24 | mind." Worcester defines it as "the philosophy
of mind, as distinguished from that of matter; a science of which the object is to explain the principles and causes of |
| 27 | all things existing." Brande calls metaphysics "the science which regards the ultimate grounds of being, as distinguished from its phenomenal modifications." "A |
| 30 |
speculative science, which soars beyond the bounds of Page 69 |
| 1 | Divine metaphysics is that which treats of the exist- ence of God, His essence, relations, and attributes. A |
| 3 |
sneer at metaphysics is a scoff at Deity; at His goodness,
Christian Science is the unfolding of true metaphysics; |
| 6 | that is, of Mind, or God, and His attributes. Science rests
on Principle and demonstration. The Principle of Chris- tian Science is divine. Its rule is, that man shall utilize |
| 9 |
the divine power. In Genesis i. 26, we read: "Let
us make man in |
| 12 |
dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of I was once called to visit a sick man to whom the |
| 15 | regular physicians had given three doses of Croton oil, and then had left him to die. Upon my arrival I found him barely alive, and in terrible agony. In one |
| 18 | hour he was well, and the next day he attended to his business. I removed the stoppage, healed him of en- teritis, and neutralized the bad effects of the poison- |
| 21 | ous oil. His physicians had failed even to move his bowels, - though the wonder was, with the means used in their effort to accomplish this result, that |
| 24 | they had not quite killed him. According to their diagnosis, the exciting cause of the inflammation and stoppage was - eating smoked herring. The man is |
| 27 | living yet; and I will send his address to any one who may wish to apply to him for information about his case. |
| 30 |
Now comes the question: Had that sick man dominion His want of control over "the fish
of the sea" must Page 70 |
| 1 | have been an illusion, or else the Scriptures misstate man's power. That the Bible is true I believe, not |
| 3 | only, but I demonstrated its truth when I exercised my power over the fish, cast out the sick man's illu- sion, and healed him. Thus it was shown that the |
| 6 | healing action of Mind upon the body has its only ex- planation in divine metaphysics. As a man "thinketh in his heart, so is he." When the mortal thought, or be- |
| 9 | lief, was removed, the man was well. What did Jesus mean when he said to the dying thief, "To-day shalt thou be with me in paradise"? |
| 12 | Paradisaical rest from physical agony would come to the criminal, if the dream of dying should startle him from the dream of suffering. The paradise of Spirit |
| 15 | would come to Jesus, in a spiritual sense of Life and power. Christ Jesus lived and reappeared. He was too good to die; for goodness is immortal. The thief was |
| 18 | not equal to the demands of the hour; but sin was de- stroying itself, and had already begun to die, - as the poor thief's prayer for help indicated. The dy- |
| 21 | ing malefactor and our Lord were inevitably sepa- rated through Mind. The thief's body, as matter, must dissolve into its native nothingness; whereas the |
| 24 | body of the holy Spirit of Jesus was eternal. That day the thief would be with Jesus only in a finite and material sense of relief; while our Lord would |
| 27 | soon be rising to the supremacy of Spirit, working out, even in the silent tomb, those wonderful demon- strations of divine power, in which none could equal his |
| 30 |
glory. Page 71 |
| 1 | Is it right for me to treat others, when I am not entirely well myself ? |
| 3 | The late John B. Gough is said to have suffered from an appetite for alcoholic drink until his death; yet he saved many a drunkard from this fatal appetite. Paul |
| 6 | had a thorn in the flesh: one writer thinks that he was troubled with rheumatism, and another that he had sore eyes; but this is certain, that he healed others who were |
| 9 | sick. It is unquestionably right to do right; and heal- ing the sick is a very right thing to do. Does Christian Science set aside the law of transmission, |
| 12 | prenatal desires, and good or bad influences on the unborn
child? Science never averts law, but supports it. All actual |
| 15 | causation must interpret omnipotence, the all-knowing Mind. Law brings out Truth, not error; unfolds divine Principle, - but neither human hypothesis nor matter. |
| 18 | Errors are based on a mortal or material formation; they are suppositional modes, not the factors of divine presence and power. |
| 21 | Whatever is humanly conceived is a departure from divine law; hence its mythical origin and certain end. According to the Scriptures, - St. Paul declares astutely, |
| 24 | "For of Him, and through Him, and to Him, are all things," - man is incapable of originating: nothing can be formed apart from God, good, the all-knowing Mind. |
| 27 | What seems to be of human origin is the counterfeit of the divine, - even human concepts, mortal shadows flitting across the dial of time. |
| 30 |
Whatever is real is right and eternal; hence the im- Page 72 |
| 1 | and can transmit to man and the universe nothing evil, or unlike Himself. For the innocent babe to be born a |
| 3 | lifelong sufferer because of his parents' mistakes or sins, were sore injustice. Science sets aside man as a creator, and unfolds the eternal harmonies of the only living and |
| 6 |
true origin, God. According to the beliefs of the flesh,
both good and |
| 9 | less offspring, and God is supposed to impart to man this fatal power. It is cause for rejoicing that this belief is as false as it is remorseless. The immutable Word |
| 12 | saith, through the prophet Ezekiel, "What mean ye, that ye use this proverb concerning the land of Israel, saying, The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children's |
| 15 | teeth are set on edge? As I live, saith the Lord God, ye shall not have occasion any more to use this proverb in Israel." |
| 18 | Are material things real when they are harmonious, and do they disappear only to the natural sense? Does this Scripture, "Your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have |
| 21 |
need of all these things," imply that Spirit takes
note of The Science of Mind, as well as the material uni- |
| 24 | verse, shows that nothing which is material is in perpetual harmony. Matter is manifest mortal mind, and it exists only to material sense. Real sensation |
| 27 | is not material; it is, and must be, mental: and Mind is not mortal, it is immortal. Being is God, infinite Spirit; therefore it cannot cognize aught material, or |
| 30 |
outside of infinity. The Scriptural passage quoted affords
no evidence of Page 73 |
| 1 | the reality of matter, or that God is conscious of it. The so-called material body is said to suffer, but this |
| 3 | supposition is proven erroneous when Mind casts out the suffering. The Scripture saith, "Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth;" and again, "He doth not |
| 6 | afflict willingly." Interpreted materially, these pas-
sages conflict; they mingle the testimony of immor- tal Science with mortal sense; but once discern their |
| 9 | spiritual meaning, and it separates the false sense from
the true, and establishes the reality of what is spiritual, and the unreality of materiality. |
| 12 | Law is never material: it is always mental and moral, and a commandment to the wise. The foolish disobey moral law, and are punished. Human wisdom therefore |
| 15 | an get no farther than to say, He knoweth that we have need of experience. Belief fulfils the conditions of a be- lief, and these conditions destroy the belief. Hence the |
| 18 | verdict of experience: We have need of these things; we have need to know that the so-called pleasures and pains of matter - yea, that all subjective states of false sensa- |
| 21 |
tion - are unreal. "And Jesus said unto them, Verily
I say unto you, |
| 24 | the Son of man shall sit in the throne of his glory, ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel." (Matt. xix. 28.) What is meant |
| 27 |
by regeneration? It is the appearing of divine law to
human under- |
| 30 |
sense in contradistinction to the testimony of the so- Page 74 |
| 1 | Christian Science, and the divine correspondence of noumenon and phenomenon understood, are here signi- |
| 3 | fied. This new-born sense subdues not only the false sense of generation, but the human will, and the un- natural enmity of mortal man toward God. It quickly |
| 6 | imparts a new apprehension of the true basis of being, and the spiritual foundation for the affections which en- throne the Son of man in the glory of his Father; and |
| 9 |
judges, through the stern mandate of Science, all human If God does not recognize matter, how did Jesus, who was |
| 12 |
"the way, the truth, and the life," cognize it? Christ Jesus' sense of matter was the
opposite of that |
| 15 | immortal sense of the ideal world. His earthly mission was to translate substance into its original meaning, Mind. He walked upon the waves; he turned the water |
| 18 | into wine; he healed the sick and the sinner; he raised the dead, and rolled away the stone from the door of his own tomb. His demonstration of Spirit virtually van- |
| 21 | quished matter and its supposed laws. Walking the wave, he proved the fallacy of the theory that matter is substance; healing through Mind, he removed any sup- |
| 24 | position that matter is intelligent, or can recognize or express pain and pleasure. His triumph over the grave was an everlasting victory for Life; it demonstrated the |
| 27 | lifelessness of matter, and the power and permanence of Spirit. He met and conquered the resistance of the world. |
| 30 |
If you will admit, with me, that matter is neither Page 75 |
| 1 | is left of it; and you will have touched the hem of the garment of Jesus' idea of matter. Christ was "the way; " |
| 3 | since Life and Truth were the way that gave us, through a human person, a spiritual revelation of man's possible earthly development. |
| 6 |
Why do you insist that there is but one Soul, and that
First: I urge this fundamental fact and grand verity |
| 9 | of Christian Science, because it includes a rule that must
be understood, or it is impossible to demonstrate the Sci- ence. Soul is a synonym of Spirit, and God is Spirit. |
| 12 | There is but one God, and the infinite is not within the
finite; hence Soul is one, and is God; and God is not in matter or the mortal body. |
| 15 | Second: Because Soul is a term for Deity, and this
term should seldom be employed except where the word God can be used and make complete sense. The word |
| 18 | Soul may sometimes be used metaphorically; but if
this term is warped to signify human quality, a substitution of sense for soul clears the meaning, and assists one to |
| 21 | understand Christian Science. Mary's exclamation, "My soul doth magnify the Lord," is rendered in Sci- ence, "My spiritual sense doth magnify the Lord;" |
| 24 | for the name of Deity used in that place does not bring out the meaning of the passage. It was evidently an illuminated sense through which she discovered the |
| 27 | spiritual origin of man. "The soul that sinneth, it
shall die," means, that mortal man (alias material sense) that sinneth, shall die; and the commonly accepted view is |
| 30 |
that soul is deathless. Soul is the divine Mind, -
for Page 76 |
| 1 | thought, - and must proceed from God; hence it must be sinless, and destitute of self-created or derived capacity |
| 3 |
to sin. Third:
Jesus said, "If a man keep my saying, he |
| 6 | is true, and remains to be demonstrated; for it is the ultimatum of Christian Science; but this immortal saying can never be tested or proven true upon a false premise, |
| 9 | such as the mortal belief that soul is in body, and life and intelligence are in matter. That doctrine is not theism, but pantheism. According to human belief the |
| 12 | bodies of mortals are mortal, but they contain immortal souls! hence these bodies must die for these souls to escape and be immortal. The theory that death must |
| 15 | occur, to set a human soul free from its environments, is rendered void by Jesus' divine declaration, who spake as never man spake, - and no man can rationally reject |
| 18 |
his authority on this subject and accept it on other topics Now, exchange the term soul for sense whenever this |
| 21 | word means the so-called soul in the body, and you will find the right meaning indicated. The misnamed human soul is material sense, which sinneth and shall die; for |
| 24 | it is an error or false sense of mentality in matter, and matter has no sense. You will admit that Soul is the Life of man. Now if Soul sinned, it would die; for "the |
| 27 | wages of sin is death." The Scripture saith, "When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory." The Science of Soul, Spirit, |
| 30 |
involves this appearing, and is essential to the fulfilment Page 77 |
| 1 | Did the salvation of the eunuch depend merely on his believing that Jesus Christ was the Son of God? |
| 3 | It did; but this believing was more than faith in the fact that Jesus was the Messiah. Here the verb believe took its original meaning, namely, to be firm, - yea, to |
| 6 | understand those great truths asserted of the Messiah: it meant to discern and consent to that infinite demand made upon the eunuch in those few words of the apostle. |
| 9 | Philip's requirement was, that he should not only ac- knowledge the incarnation, - God made manifest through man, - but even the eternal unity of man and God, as |
| 12 | the divine Principle and spiritual idea; which is the in-
dissoluble bond of union, the power and presence, in divine Science, of Life, Truth, and Love, to support their |
| 15 | ideal man. This is the Father's great Love that He hath bestowed upon us, and it holds man in endless Life and one eternal round of harmonious being. It |
| 18 | guides him by Truth that knows no error, and with supersensual, impartial, and unquenchable Love. To believe is to be firm. In adopting all this vast idea of |
| 21 | Christ Jesus, the eunuch was to know in whom he be-
lieved. To believe thus was to enter the spiritual sanctuary of Truth, and there learn, in divine Science, somewhat |
| 24 | of the All-Father-Mother God. It was to understand God and man: it was sternly to rebuke the mortal belief that man has fallen away from his first estate; that |
| 27 | man, made in God's own likeness, and reflecting Truth, could fall into mortal error; or, that man is the father of man. It was to enter unshod the Holy of Holies, where |
| 30 |
the miracle of grace appears, and where the miracles of Page 78 |
| 1 | that Life, God, is not buried in matter. This is the spirit- ual dawn of the Messiah, and the overture of the |
| 3 | angels. This is when God is made manifest in the flesh, and thus it destroys all sense of sin, sickness, and death, - when the brightness of His glory encompasseth |
| 6 |
all being. Can Christian Science Mind-healing
be taught to those |
| 9 | The Science of Mind-healing can no more be taught thus, than can science in any other direction. I know not how to teach either Euclid or the Science of Mind |
| 12 | silently; and never dreamed that either of these partook of the nature of occultism, magic, alchemy, or necro- mancy. These "ways that are vain" are the inventions |
| 15 | of animal magnetism, which would deceive, if possible, the very elect. We will charitably hope, however, that some people employ the et cetera of ignorance and self- |
| 18 | conceit unconsciously, in their witless ventilation of false statements and claims. Misguiding the public mind and taking its money in exchange for this abuse, has become |
| 21 | too common: we will hope it is the froth of error passing off; and that Christian Science will some time appear all the clearer for the purification of the public thought con- |
| 24 |
cerning it. Has man fallen from a state of perfection?
If God is the Principle of man (and He is), man is the |
| 27 | idea of God; and this idea cannot fail to express the ex- act nature of its Principle, - any more than goodness, to present the quality of good. Human hypotheses are |
| 30 |
always human vagaries, formulated views antagonistic Page 79 |
| 1 | to the divine order and the nature of Deity. All these mortal beliefs will be purged and dissolved in the cru- |
| 3 | cible of Truth, and the places once knowing them will know them no more forever, having been swept clean by the winds of history. The grand verities of Science |
| 6 | will sift the chaff from the wheat, until it is clear to
hu- man comprehension that man was, and is, God's perfect likeness, that reflects all whereby we can know God. In |
| 9 | Him we live, move, and have being. Man's origin and existence being in Him, man is the ultimatum of per- fection, and by no means the medium of imperfection. |
| 12 | Immortal man is the eternal idea of Truth, that cannot lapse into a mortal belief or error concerning himself and his origin: he cannot get out of the focal distance of |
| 15 | infinity. If God is upright and eternal, man as His like-
ness is erect in goodness and perpetual in Life, Truth, and Love. If the great cause is perfect, its effect is per- |
| 18 | fect also; and cause and effect in Science are immutable
and immortal. A mortal who is sinning, sick, and dying, is not immortal man; and never was, and never can be, |
| 21 | God's image and likeness, the true ideal of immortal man's divine Principle. The spiritual man is that per- fect and unfallen likeness, coexistent and coeternal with |
| 24 |
God. "As in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all
be What course should Christian Scientists take in regard |
| 27 |
to aiding persons brought before the courts for violation
of Beware of joining any medical league which in any |
| 30 |
way obligates you to assist - because they chance to be Page 80 |
| 1 | occultists, sellers of impure literature, and authors of spurious works on mental healing. By rendering error |
| 3 | such a service, you lose much more than can be gained by mere unity on the single issue of opposition to unjust medical laws. |
| 6 | A league which obligates its members to give money and influence in support and defense of medical char- latans in general, and possibly to aid individual rights |
| 9 | in a wrong direction - which Christian Science eschews - should be avoided. Anybody and everybody, who will fight the medical faculty, can join this league. It is |
| 12 | better to be friendly with cultured and conscientious medical men, who leave Christian Science to rise or fall on its own merit or demerit, than to affiliate with a wrong |
| 15 |
class of people. Unconstitutional and unjust coercive
legislation and |
| 18 | and full of trouble." The vox populi, through
the provi- dence of God, promotes and impels all true reform; and, at the best time, will redress wrongs and rectify injus- |
| 21 | tice. Tyranny can thrive but feebly under our Govern- ment. God reigns, and will "turn and overturn" until right is found supreme. |
| 24 | In a certain sense, we should commiserate the lot of regular doctors, who, in successive generations for cen- turies, have planted and sown and reaped in the fields |
| 27 | of what they deem pathology, hygiene, and therapeutics, but are now elbowed by a new school of practitioners, outdoing the healing of the old. The old will not patronize |
| 30 |
the new school, at least not until it shall come to under- Christian Science Mind-healing rests
demonstrably on Page 81 |
| 1 | the broad and sure foundation of Science; and this is not the basis of materia medica, as some of the most skil- |
| 3 |
ful and scholarly physicians openly admit. To prevent all unpleasant and unchristian
action - as |
| 6 | lines of life - let each society of practitioners, the matter- physicians and the metaphysicians, agree to disagree, and then patiently wait on God to decide, as surely He will, |
| 9 |
which is the true system of medicine. Do we not see in the commonly accepted
teachings of the |
| 12 | the Baptist? or, rather, Are not the last eighteen centuries
but the footsteps of Truth being baptized of John, and com- ing up straightway out of the ceremonial (or ritualistic) |
| 15 | waters to receive the benediction of an honored Father,
and afterwards to go up into the wilderness, in order to over- come mortal sense, before it shall go forth into all the cities |
| 18 | and towns of Judea, or see many of the people from beyond
Jordan? Now, if all this be a fair or correct view of this question, why does not John hear this voice, or see the |
| 21 |
dove, - or has not Truth yet reached the shore? Every individual character, like the
individual John |
| 24 | earthly joy; and his voice be heard divinely and humanly. In the desolation of human understanding, divine Love hears and answers the human call for help; |
| 27 | and the voice of Truth utters the divine verities of being
which deliver mortals out of the depths of ignorance and vice. This is the Father's benediction. It gives |
| 30 |
lessons to human life, guides the understanding, peoples Page 82 |
| 1 | the mind with spiritual ideas, reconstructs the Judean religion, and reveals God and man as the Principle and |
| 3 |
idea of all good. Understanding this fact in Christian
Science, brings |
| 6 | as a river into a shoreless eternity. He who knew the foretelling Truth, beheld the forthcoming Truth, as it came up out of the baptism of Spirit, to enlighten and |
| 9 | redeem mortals. Such Christians as John cognize the symbols of God, reach the sure foundations of time, stand upon the shore of eternity, and grasp and gather - in all |
| 12 |
glory - what eye hath not seen. Is there infinite progression with
man after the destruc- |
| 15 | Man is the offspring and idea of the Supreme Being, whose law is perfect and infinite. In obedience to this law, man is forever unfolding the endless beatitudes of |
| 18 |
Being; for he is the image and likeness of infinite Life, Infinite progression is concrete being, which finite |
| 21 | mortals see and comprehend only as abstract glory. As mortal mind, or the material sense of life, is put off, the spiritual sense and Science of being is brought to |
| 24 |
light. Mortal mind is a myth; the one Mind
is immortal. |
| 27 | as a moth, in the treacherous glare of its own flame - the errors which devour it. Immortal Mind is God, immortal good; in whom the Scripture saith "we live, |
| 30 |
and move, and have our being." This Mind, then, is not Page 83 |
| 1 | intelligence, or Principle, of all real being; holding man forever in the rhythmic round of unfolding bliss, |
| 3 |
as a living witness to and perpetual idea of inexhaustible In your book, Science and Health,(1) page 181, you |
| 6 | say: "Every sin is the author of itself, and every invalid the cause of his own suferings." On page 182 you say: "Sickness is a growth of illusion, spring- |
| 9 | ing from a seed of thought, - either your own thought or another's." Will you please explain this seeming contradiction? |
| 12 | No person can accept another's belief, except it be with the consent of his own belief. If the error which knocks at the door of your own thought originated in |
| 15 | another's mind, you are a free moral agent to reject or to accept this error; hence, you are the arbiter of your own fate, and sin is the author of sin. In the words |
| 18 |
of our Master, you are "a liar, and the father of it Why did Jesus call himself "the Son of man"? |
| 21 | In the life of our Lord, meekness was as conspicuous as might. In John xvii. he declared his sonship with God: "These words spake Jesus, and lifted up his |
| 24 | eyes to heaven, and said, Father, the hour is come; glorify Thy Son, that Thy Son also may glorify Thee." The hour had come for the avowal of this great truth, |
| 27 |
and for the proof of his eternal Life and sonship. Jesus'
(1) Quoted from the sixteenth edition. Page 84 |
| 1 | wisdom ofttimes was shown by his forbearing to speak, as well as by speaking, the whole truth. Haply he waited |
| 3 | for a preparation of the human heart to receive start- ling announcements. This wisdom, which character- ized his sayings, did not prophesy his death, and thereby |
| 6 |
hasten or permit it. The disciples and prophets thrust disputed
points on |
| 9 | and the world's temporary esteem; but the prophecies were fulfilled, and their motives were rewarded by growth and more spiritual understanding, which dawns |
| 12 | by degrees on mortals. The spiritual Christ was infal- lible; Jesus, as material manhood, was not Christ. The "man of sorrows" knew that the man of joys, his spiritual |
| 15 | self, or Christ, was the Son of God; and that the mor- tal mind, not the immortal Mind, suffered. The human manifestation of the Son of God was called the Son of |
| 18 |
man, or Mary's son. Please explain Paul's meaning in
the text, "For to me |
| 21 | The Science of Life, overshadowing Paul's sense of life in matter, so far extinguished the latter as forever to quench his love for it. The discipline of the flesh is |
| 24 | designed to turn one, like a weary traveller, to the home of Love. To lose error thus, is to live in Christ, Truth. A true sense of the falsity of material joys and sorrows, |
| 27 | pleasures and pains, takes them away, and teaches Life's lessons aright. The transition from our lower sense of Life to a new and higher sense thereof, even though it be |
| 30 |
through the door named death, yields a clearer and Page 85 |
| 1 | and are ripe for the harvest-home. To the battle- worn and weary Christian hero, Life eternal brings |
| 3 |
blessings. Is a Christian Scientist ever sick,
and has he who is |
| 6 | The Christian Scientist learns spiritually all that he knows of Life, and demonstrates what he understands. God is recognized as the divine Principle of his being, |
| 9 | and of every thought and act leading to good. His pur- pose must be right, though his power is temporarily lim- ited. Perfection, the goal of existence, is not won in a |
| 12 | moment; and regeneration leading thereto is gradual, for it culminates in the fulfilment of this divine rule in Science: "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father |
| 15 |
which is in heaven is perfect." The last degree of regeneration rises
into the rest of |
| 18 | feeble flutterings of mortals Christward are infantile and more or less imperfect. The new-born Christian Scientist must mature, and work out his own salvation. |
| 21 | Spirit and flesh antagonize. Temptation, that mist of mortal mind which seems to be matter and the environ- ment of mortals, suggests pleasure and pain in matter; |
| 24 | and, so long as this temptation lasts, the warfare is not
ended and the mortal is not regenerated. The pleas- ures - more than the pains - of sense, retard regenera- |
| 27 | tion; for pain compels human consciousness to escape from sense into the immortality and harmony of Soul. Disease in error, more than ease in it, tends to destroy |
| 30 |
error: the sick often are thereby led to Christ, Truth, Page 86 |
| 1 | The material and physical are imperfect. The in- dividual and spiritual are perfect; these have no fleshly |
| 3 | nature. This final degree of regeneration is saving, and the Christian will, must, attain it; but it doth not yet appear. Until this be attained, the Christian Scientist |
| 6 | must continue to strive with sickness, sin, and death - though in lessening degrees - and manifest growth at every experience. |
| 9 |
Is it correct to say of material objects, that they are
noth- Nothing and something are words which need correct |
| 12 | definition. They either mean formations of indefinite and vague human opinions, or scientific classifications of the unreal and the real. My sense of the beauty of |
| 15 | the universe is, that beauty typifies holiness, and is some- thing to be desired. Earth is more spiritually beautiful to my gaze now than when it was more earthly to the |
| 18 | eyes of Eve. The pleasant sensations of human belief, of form and color, must be spiritualized, until we gain the glorified sense of substance as in the new heaven and |
| 21 |
earth, the harmony of body and Mind. Even the human conception of beauty,
grandeur, and |
| 24 | imagination. It is next to divine beauty and the gran- deur of Spirit. It lives with our earth-life, and is the subjective state of high thoughts. The atmos- |
| 27 | phere of mortal mind constitutes our mortal envi- ronment. What mortals hear, see, feel, taste, smell, constitutes their present earth and heaven: but we must |
| 30 |
grow out of even this pleasing thraldom, and find wings Page 87 |
| 1 | soar above, as the bird in the clear ether of the blue tem- poral sky. |
| 3 | To take all earth's beauty into one gulp of vacuity and label beauty nothing, is ignorantly to caricature God's creation, which is unjust to human sense and |
| 6 | to the divine realism. In our immature sense of spirit- ual things, let us say of the beauties of the sensuous universe: "I love your promise; and shall know, some |
| 9 | time, the spiritual reality and substance of form, light,
and color, of what I now through you discern dimly; and knowing this, I shall be satisfied. Matter is a frail con- |
| 12 | ception of mortal mind; and mortal mind is a poorer representative of the beauty, grandeur, and glory of the immortal Mind." |
| 15 | Please inform us, through your Journal, if you sent Mrs. - to - . She said that you sent her there to look after the students; and also, that no one there was working |
| 18 |
in Science, - which is certainly a mistake. I never commission any one to teach
students of mine. |
| 21 | Christian Science who is most reliant on himself and God. My students are taught the divine Principle and rules of the Science of Mind-healing. What they need |
| 24 | hereafter is to study thoroughly the Scriptures and "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures." To watch and pray, to be honest, earnest, loving, and truth- |
| 27 |
ful, is indispensable to the demonstration of the truth If they are haunted by obsequious helpers, who, un- |
| 30 |
called for, imagine they can help anybody and steady Page 88 |
| 1 | and tends to blight the fruits of my students. A faith- ful student may even sometimes feel the need of |
| 3 | physical help, and occasionally receive it from others; but the less this is required, the better it is for that student. |
| 6 | Please give us, through your Journal, the name of the author of that genuine critique in the September number, "What Quibus Thinks." |
| 9 | I am pleased to inform this inquirer, that the author of the article in question is a Boston gentleman whose thought is appreciated by many liberals. Patience, ob- |
| 12 | servation, intellectual culture, reading, writing, exten- sive travel, and twenty years in the pulpit, have equipped him as a critic who knows whereof he speaks. His allu- |
| 15 | sion to Christian Science in the following paragraph, glows in the shadow of darkling criticism like a mid- night sun. Its manly honesty follows like a benediction |
| 18 |
after prayer, and closes the task of talking to deaf ears "We have always insisted that this Science is natural, |
| 21 | spiritually natural; that Jesus was the highest type of real nature; that Christian healing is supernatural, or extra-natural, only to those who do not enter into its |
| 24 | sublimity or understand its modes - as imported ice was miraculous to the equatorial African, who had never seen water freeze." |
| 27 |
Is it right for a Scientist to treat with a doctor? This depends upon what kind of a doctor
it is. Mind- |
| 30 |
medicine. As a rule, drop one of these doctors when you Page 89 |
| 1 | employ the other. The Scripture saith, "No man can serve two masters;" and, "Every kingdom divided |
| 3 |
against itself is brought to desolation." If Scientists are called upon to
care for a member of |
| 6 | regular physician, would it be right to treat this patient
at all; and ought the patient to follow the doctor's directions? |
| 9 | When patients are under material medical treatment, it is advisable in most cases that Scientists do not treat them, or interfere with materia medica. If the patient |
| 12 | is in peril, and you save him or alleviate his sufferings,
although the medical attendant and friends have no faith in your method, it is humane, and not unchristian, |
| 15 | to do him all the good you can; but your good will gen- erally "be evil spoken of." The hazard of casting "pearls before swine" caused our Master to refuse help to some |
| 18 |
who sought his aid; and he left this precaution for If mortal man is unreal, how can he be saved, and why |
| 21 |
does he need to be saved? I ask for information, not for
You will find the proper answer to this question in |
| 24 | my published works. Man is immortal. Mortal man is a false concept that is not spared or prolonged by being saved from itself, from whatever is false. This salva- |
| 27 | tion means: saved from error, or error overcome. Im- mortal man, in God's likeness, is safe in divine Science. Mortal man is saved on this divine Principle, if he will |
| 30 |
only avail himself of the efficacy of Truth, and recog- Page 90 |
| 1 | nize his Saviour. He must know that God is omnipo- tent; hence, that sin is impotent. He must know that |
| 3 | the power of sin is the pleasure in sin. Take away this pleasure, and you remove all reality from its power. Jesus demonstrated sin and death to be powerless. This |
| 6 |
practical Truth saves from sin, and will save all who Is it wrong for a wife to have a husband treated for |
| 9 |
sin, when she knows he is sinning, or for drinking and It is always right to act rightly; but sometimes, under |
| 12 | circumstances exceptional, it is inexpedient to attack evil. This rule is forever golden: "As ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them." Do you |
| 15 | desire to be freed from sin? Then help others to be free; but in your measures, obey the Scriptures, "Be ye wise as serpents." Break the yoke of bondage in every wise |
| 18 | way. First, be sure that your means for doing good are equal to your motives; then judge them by their fruits. |
| 21 | If not ordained, shall the pastor of the Church of Christ, Scientist, administer the communion, - and shall members of a church not organized receive the |
| 24 |
communion? Our great Master administered to his
disciples the |
| 27 | conferred by a visible organization and ordained priest- hood. His spiritually prepared breakfast, after his resurrection, and after his disciples had left their nets |
| 30 |
to follow him, is the spiritual communion which Chris- Page 91 |
| 1 | tian Scientists celebrate in commemoration of the Christ. This ordinance is significant as a type of the true worship, |
| 3 |
and it should be observed at present in our churches. It is not indispensable to organize
materially Christ's |
| 6 | tors and to dedicate churches; but if this be done, let it be in concession to the period, and not as a per- petual or indispensable ceremonial of the church. If |
| 9 | our church is organized, it is to meet the demand, "Suffer it to be so now." The real Christian compact is love for one another. This bond is wholly spiritual |
| 12 |
and inviolate. It is imperative, at all times and under
every cir- |
| 15 | types of these mental conditions, - remembrance and love; a real affection for Jesus' character and example. Be it remembered, that all types employed in the ser- |
| 18 | vice of Christian Science should represent the most spir- itual forms of thought and worship that can be made visible. |
| 21 | Should not the teacher of Christian Science have our textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," in his schoolroom and teach from it? |
| 24 | I never dreamed, until informed thereof, that a loyal student did not take his textbook with him into the class- room, ask questions from it, answer them according to |
| 27 | it, and, as occasion required, read from the book as au-
thority for what he taught. I supposed that students had followed my example, and that of other teachers, |
| 30 |
sufficiently to do this, and also to require their pupils
to Page 92 |
| 1 | To omit these important points is anomalous, con- sidering the necessity for understanding Science, and |
| 3 | the present liability of deviating from Christian Science. Centuries will intervene before the statement of the inex- haustible topics of that book become sufficiently under- |
| 6 | stood to be absolutely demonstrated. The teacher of Christian Science needs continually to study this textbook. His work is to replenish thought, and to spiritualize human |
| 9 |
life, from this open fount of Truth and Love. He who sees most clearly and enlightens
other minds |
| 12 | He will take the textbook of Christian Science into his class, repeat the questions in the chapter on Recapitula- tion, and his students will answer them from the same |
| 15 | source. Throughout his entire explanations, the teacher should strictly adhere to the questions and answers con- tained in that chapter of "Science and Health with Key |
| 18 | to the Scriptures." It is important to point out the lesson to the class, and to require the students thor- oughly to study it before the recitations; for this spirit- |
| 21 | ualizes their thoughts. When closing his class, the teacher should require each member to own a copy of the above-named book and to continue the study of this |
| 24 |
textbook. The opinions of men cannot be substituted
for God's |
| 27 | arrogant ignorance and pride, in attempting to steady the ark of Truth, have dimmed the power and glory of the Scriptures, to which this Christian Science textbook |
| 30 |
is the Key. That teacher does most for his students
who most Page 93 |
| 1 | thought, and by reason thereof is able to empty his stu- dents' minds, that they may be filled with Truth. |
| 3 | Beloved students, so teach that posterity shall call you blessed, and the heart of history shall be made glad! |
| 6 |
Can fear or sin bring back old beliefs of disease that
have The Scriptures plainly declare the allness and oneness |
| 9 | of God to be the premises of Truth, and that God is good: in Him dwelleth no evil. Christian Science au- thorizes the logical conclusion drawn from the Scriptures, |
| 12 | that there is in reality none besides the eternal, infinite
God, good. Evil is temporal: it is the illusion of time and mortality. |
| 15 | This being true, sin has no power; and fear, its coeval, is without divine authority. Science sanctions only what is supported by the unerring Principle of being. Sin can |
| 18 | do nothing: all cause and effect are in God. Fear is a belief of sensation in matter: this belief is neither main- tained by Science nor supported by facts, and exists only |
| 21 | as fable. Your answer is, that neither fear nor sin can bring on disease or bring back disease, since there is in reality no disease. |
| 24 | Bear in mind, however, that human consciousness does not test sin and the fact of its nothingness, by believing that sin is pardoned without repentance and reforma- |
| 27 | tion. Sin punishes itself, because it cannot go unpun- ished either here or hereafter. Nothing is more fatal than to indulge a sinning sense or consciousness for even one |
| 30 |
moment. Knowing this, obey Christ's Sermon on the Page 94 |
| 1 | are misjudged and maligned; in the second, you will reign with him. |
| 3 | I never knew a person who knowingly indulged evil, to be grateful; to understand me, or himself. He must first see himself and the hallucination of sin; then he |
| 6 | must repent, and love good in order to understand God. The sinner and the sin are the twain that are one flesh, - but which God hath not joined together. |