Published by the Trustees under
the Will of Mary Baker G. Eddy
Boston, U.S.A.
By Mary Baker G. Eddy
| 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,
is not the evergreen of Soul; the coloring glory of
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
comply with an oft-repeated request;
namely, to collect |
| 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, -
in the opinions of men and the progress of our Cause.
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
subsequent books.
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
not unknown to nor unrewarded by Him.
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
may time's pastimes become footsteps to joys eternal.
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,
through the dim corridors of years, on to old battle-
grounds, there sadly to survey the fields of the slain and
the enemy's
losses. In compiling this work, I have tried
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
strong wing to lift my readers above the smoke of
conflict
into light and liberty. MARY BAKER EDDY
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
by sinners.
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
Science.
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
medica, hygiene, and animal
magnetism are impotent; |
| 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
deep demand for the Science of psychology to meet
sin,
and uncover it; thus to annihilate hallucination.
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,
not evil.
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-
nal. This should be understood. Our
College should |
| 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
mystery to those only who do not
understand the grand |
| 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
to believe that the body affects the mind, than that
the
mind affects the body.
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
of health are strictly enforced, great
caution is observed |
| 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
fed, and health is generally the rule; whereas, in small
families of one or two children, sickness is by no means
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
of healing. The loving patience of
Jesus, we must |
| 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
vineyard.
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
a lack of justice, as it is that the mens populi is
not suffi-
ciently enlightened on this great subject. More thought
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
have done more.
LOVE YOUR ENEMIES |
| 9 |
Who is thine enemy that thou shouldst love
him? Is
it a creature or a thing outside thine own creation?
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
one and all?
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-
mand and sentence, can only be fulfilled through the
gospel's
benediction. Then, "Blessed are ye," inso-
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
to fill it with the nectar of the gods. We
lift this cup |
| 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-
ing sense, with its delicious forms of
friendship, |
| 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-
tutes happiness is more disastrous to human progress
than all
that an enemy or enmity can obtrude upon
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
- the most remorseless motives that govern
mortal mind |
| 6 |
- whatever these try to do, shall "work
together for good
to them that love God."
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
is self-immolated.
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
that you have enemies; that evil is real; that aught
but
good exists in Science. Soon or late, your enemy will
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
of salvation, - I had done my whole duty to
students.
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,
and saying to them, "I love
you, and would not know-
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
when you have not been.
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;
and Love is Life and Truth.
Whatever manifests aught |
| 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;
imparting, so far as we reflect them, Truth, Life, and
Love
to all within the radius of our atmosphere of thought.
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
them, - taking special care to mind my own business.
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
the testimony of the five erring senses, and reveals
in
clearer divinity the existence of good only; that is, of
God and His
idea.
This postulate of
divine Science only needs to be con-
ceded, to afford opportunity for proof
of its correctness |
| 27 |
and the clearer discernment of good.
Seek the Anglo-Saxon
term for God, and you will
find it to be good; then define good as God, and
you |
| 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
or ultimate of good?
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
of proof - therefore, wholly problematical.
The Science of Truth
annihilates error, deprives evil |
| 30 |
of all power, and thereby destroys all
error, sin, sickness,
disease, and death. But the sinner is not sheltered
from
suffering from sin: he makes a great reality of evil, iden-
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
with moments, and goes on with years;
moments of sur- |
| 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,
and the fulness of the stature of man in Christ appears.
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
in matter, to the great fact that
God is the only 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
Spirit, and behold for the first time the irresistible con-
flict between the flesh and Spirit. You stand before the
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-
tal, not the immortal man. This birth is
more or less |
| 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
one loses himself as matter, and gains a truer sense of
Spirit and spiritual man.
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
and gospel of Christ, Truth.
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-
self from good, God; and he would
necessarily entertain |
| 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
aught that God sends is unjust, - or that those whom
He
commissions bring to you at His demand that which
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
unmerciful, never unwise.
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
of material and spiritual
gravitations, we go into or we |
| 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
of itself a bliss, health-giving and
joy-inspiring. This
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,
"Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden,
and I
will give you rest."
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
is not material; he is spiritual." (1)
(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
demonstrated it, according to the
rules of its divine |
| 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
simple fact cognized by the senses, to
which it seemed |
| 30 |
to fall by reason of its own ponderosity;
but the primal
cause, or Mind-force, invisible to material sense, lay
concealed in the treasure-troves of Science. True,
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
no other gods before me."
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
natural science, God, Spirit, could not change its
species
and evolve matter.
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-
ties or illusions, and thus destroy any supposed
effect
arising from false claims exercising their supposed power
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
Mind. As omni is from the Latin word
meaning all, |
| 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
recommend them for that purpose?
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
term for God is also good. From this premise
comes |
| 30 |
the logical conclusion that God is
naturally and divinely
infinite good. How, then, can this conclusion
change,
or be changed, to mean that good is evil, or the creator
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
bitter?"
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
sense, it is a small manifestation of
Mind, a type of spirit- |
| 30 |
ual substance, "the substance of things
hoped for."
Mortals can know a stone as substance, only by first ad-
mitting that it is substantial. Take away the mortal sense
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 illusion of matter.
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-
ration, "These signs shall follow them that believe; . .
.
if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them;
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-
tian era; "the Word was with God, and the Word
was |
| 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
in mathematics, should be working up to those higher
rules of Life which Jesus taught and proved. Do we
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
demonstrate all the possibilities of Christianity?
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-
contaminated, untrammelled, by matter. He
proved the |
| 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
Christian nor science!" is to-day the
fossil of wisdom- |
| 24 |
less wit, weakness, and superstition. "The
fool hath
said in his heart, There is no God."
Take courage, dear
reader, for any seeming mysti- |
| 27 |
cism surrounding realism is explained in
the Scripture,
"There went up a mist from the earth [matter];" and
the
mist of materialism will vanish as we approach spirit-
30 uality, the realm of reality; cleanse
our lives in Christ's
righteousness; bathe in the baptism of Spirit, and
awake
in His likeness.
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,
has all power.
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,
in order to retain his faith in evil and so succeed
with his
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-
third verse, you will find my views on
this subject; love |
| 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
societies are at present
necessary for the individual, |
| 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
in "Christ and Christmas;" or that these
refer not to |
| 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
healed by it?
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
the ordinary methods of healing disease?
Healing by Christian
Science has the following ad- |
| 24 |
vantages: -
First: It does away with all
material medicines, and
recognizes the fact that, as mortal mind is the
cause of |
| 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-
ence is not only healed of the disease, but is
improved |
| 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
Science? |
| 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.
I never knew so unselfish an
individual." |
| 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
what benefit is your book?
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
Key to the Scriptures,"(1) Vol. I. page 14:
"That which |
| 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;
but they manifest less of Mind. The
first and only |
| 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-
mortal Mind? |
| 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
manifest in all thoughts and desires that draw
man- |
| 6 |
kind toward purity, health, holiness, and
the spiritual
facts of being.
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;
which, at this hour, is in reality the least difficult of
the
labor that Christian Science demands.
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
metaphysics, when other institutions
find little interest in |
| 15 |
such a dry and abstract subject?
Metaphysics, as
taught by me at the Massachusetts
Metaphysical College, is far from dry
and abstract. It |
| 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
by it and keep
well? |
| 27 |
It is not necessary to make each patient a
student
in order to cure his present disease, if this is what
you mean.
Were it so, the Science would be of less
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
understanding of how you are
healed. In 1885, this |
| 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
which God reaches others to heal them,
and what most |
| 27 |
obstructs the way?
A Christian, or a
Christian Scientist, assumes no more
when claiming to work with God in
healing the sick, |
| 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
equal the ancient prophets as healers.
All true healing |
| 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
healers.
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
the disease itself or the ignorance by which one unin-
tentionally harms himself or another. An element of
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
through Christ, Truth, and thus is ready for
victory in |
| 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
summit in Science that otherwise could not be reached,
-
where the struggle with sin is forever done.
18 Can all classes of disease be healed
by your method?
We answer, Yes. Mind is the architect that
builds
its own idea, and produces all harmony that appears. |
| 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
be true.
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,
by passing through the belief
called death. After the |
| 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
shall be able to communicate with and to recognize
them.
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
existence.
Can I be treated
without being present during treatment? |
| 30 |
Mind is not confined to limits; and
nothing but our
own false admissions prevent us from demonstrating this
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
Science, teach it correctly?
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
on the health of the community.
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
necessity for immediate relief, as in membranous croup?
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
have the tooth extracted, and then
the pain ceases, has |
| 15 |
the mind, or extracting, or both,
caused the pain to
cease?
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
has no intelligence of its own. By applying this men-
tal remedy or antidote directly to your belief, you scien-
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,
or Christian Science?
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
did evil originate?
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."
In John i. 3 we read, "All things were made by Him;
and without Him was not anything made that was made. "
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.
You entertain an adipose belief of your
self as substance; |
| 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
exhibitions of mesmerism?
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-
ton Mr. Carpenter made a man drunk on
water, and |
| 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
at this period.
Was ever a person
made insane by studying meta- |
| 24 |
physics?
Such an occurrence
would be impossible, for the
proper study of Mind-healing would cure the
insane. |
| 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.
The enemy is trying to make capital out of the follow-
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
man to discern between the real and the
unreal. Enter- |
| 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
never created error, or such a capacity, is self-evident;
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
real.
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 -
that there must be a change from human
affections, de- |
| 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
not require.
Is a belief of
nervousness, accompanied by great mental |
| 6 |
depression, mesmerism?
All mesmerism is of
one of three kinds; namely, the
ignorant, the fraudulent, or the malicious
workings of |
| 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
use of the rod teach him life in matter?
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
Shall, like a whirlwind, scatter in its
breeze |
| 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,
Shall walk transparent like some holy thing."
Are both prayer
and drugs necessary to heal? |
| 30 |
The apostle James said, "Ye ask, and
receive not,
because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your
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
of being.
Do you sometimes
find it advisable to use medicine to |
| 12 |
assist in producing a cure, when it is
difficult to start the
patient's recovery?
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
it not more simple, so that all can readily understand
it?
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
revolve around it? Who is it that
discovered, dem- |
| 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-
asked, are testifying thereto.
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
treatment by one of your students.
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
as great miracles in healing as
Jesus and his disciples did, |
| 27 |
does it not suggest the possibility
that they do not heal on
the same basis?
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
and matter? |
| 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
beliefs.
If Mind is in matter
and beneath a skull bone, it is |
| 30 |
in something unlike Him; hence it is
either a godless and
material Mind, or it is God in matter, - which are
theo-
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,
were organic, disorganization would
destroy Spirit and |
| 6 |
annihilate man.
If Mind is not
substance, form, and tangibility, God
is substanceless; for the substance
of Spirit is divine |
| 9 |
Mind. Life is God, the only creator, and
Life is im-
mortal Mind, not matter.
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,
and replenish the earth," if all minds
(men) have existed |
| 27 |
from the beginning, and have had
successive stages of
existence to the present time?
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
of Genesis.
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
and last day, if he was coexistent
with God? |
| 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
that is God, wherein man is foremost.
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
it has no power over one. Waking from
the dream of |
| 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
correctly, if one must deny the
evidences of the senses? |
| 12 |
She had to use her eyes to read.
Jesus said, "Having
eyes, see ye not?" I read the in-
spired page through a higher than mortal
sense. As |
| 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-
ing? |
| 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,
- even one human mind governing another; by which,
if
you agree that God is Mind, you admit that there is
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
the first.
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
let us reason together." There is but one
right Mind, 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
for the divine Mind, who is the only physician; the
divine
Mind is the scientific healer.
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
to the Science of being.
If mortal mind
and body are myths, what is the con- |
| 24 |
nection between them and real identity,
and why are there
as many identities as mortal bodies?
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-
itual Science, against the material
symbolic counterfeit |
| 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,
and of Life over death.
"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
for the 'sin.' "
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
mortal; but man is immortal.
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
landscape.
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,
by that much, less available.
Why do Christian
Scientists hold that their theology is |
| 15 |
essential to heal the sick, when the
mind-cure claims to heal
without it?
The theology of
Christian Science is Truth; opposed |
| 18 |
to which is the error of sickness, sin,
and death, that
Truth destroys.
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
of the divine Mind over the human
mind and body; |
| 30 |
whereas, "mind-cure" rests on the notion
that the human
mind can cure its own disease, or that which it causes,
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
triune Principle of all pure
theology; also, that this divine |
| 9 |
trinity is one infinite remedy for the
opposite triad, sick-
ness, sin, and death.
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,
why hast Thou forsaken
me?" |
| 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
of mortality? |
| 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
great realities.
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-
ready is, apprehended by those who
understand my in- |
| 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
man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed." But this
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
proof.
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-
entific treatment of the sick. Disease
that is superin- |
| 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
present capability of the learner, and
to support 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.
First is the law, which saith: -
"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-
presses the sense of words in one
language by equiva- |
| 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
have been taken up to the very throne, up to the
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
would protest against metaphysical healing
being called |
| 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
experience," is a further definition.
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,
mercy, and might.
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
our image, after our likeness: and let them
have |
| 12 |
dominion over the fish of the sea, and
over the fowl of
the air."
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
over the fish in his stomach?
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-
mutable and just law of Science, that God is good only,
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
bad traits of the parents are
transmitted to their help- |
| 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
matter?
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,
That ye which have followed me, in the
regeneration when |
| 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-
standing; the spiritualization that comes
from spiritual |
| 30 |
sense in contradistinction to the
testimony of the so-
called material senses. The phenomena of Spirit
in
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
systems of etiology and teleology.
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
which mortals entertain: his nativity
was a spiritual and |
| 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
substance, intelligence, nor Life, you may have all that
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
Soul is not in the body?
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
Soul cannot be formed or brought forth by human
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
shall never see death." This statement of our
Master |
| 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
less important.
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
of this glorious prophecy of the master
Metaphysician,
who overcame the last enemy, death.
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
Jesus had their birth, - healing the sick, casting out
evils, and resurrecting the human sense to the belief
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
who are absent? |
| 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
made alive."
What course
should Christian Scientists take in regard |
| 27 |
to aiding persons brought before the
courts for violation of
medical statutes?
Beware of joining
any medical league which in any |
| 30 |
way obligates you to assist - because they
chance to be
under arrest - vendors of patent pills, mesmerists,
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
laws, infringing individual rights, must be
"of few days, |
| 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-
stand the medical system of the new.
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
we drift, by right of God's dear
love, into more spiritual |
| 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
day, the Christ-idea mingled with
the teachings of John |
| 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
the Baptist, at some date must cry in
the desert of |
| 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
the peace symbolized by a dove; and this
peace floweth |
| 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-
tion of mortal
mind? |
| 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,
Truth, and Love.
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.
A mythical or mortal sense of existence is
consumed |
| 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
subject to growth, change, or diminution, but is the
divine
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
good.
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
[the lie]."
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
minds unprepared for them. This cost
them their lives, |
| 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
to live is Christ, and to die is
gain." |
| 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
nearer sense of Life to those who have utilized the
present,
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
sick been
regenerated? |
| 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
perpetual, spiritual, individual
existence. The first |
| 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,
and to learn their way out of both sickness and sin.
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-
ing and exist only in imagination?
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
utility is something that defies a
sneer. It is more than |
| 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
to reach the glory of supersensible Life; then we shall
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.
After class teaching, he does best in
the investigation of |
| 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
they have been taught.
If they are haunted
by obsequious helpers, who, un- |
| 30 |
called for, imagine they can help anybody
and steady
God's altar - this interference prolongs the struggle
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
and dull debaters.
"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-
healing, and healing with drugs, are
opposite modes of |
| 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
the family, or a friend in sickness,
who is employing a |
| 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
others.
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
controversy, for I am a seeker after Truth.
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
understand it.
Is it wrong for a
wife to have a husband treated for |
| 9 |
sin, when she knows he is sinning, or
for drinking and
smoking?
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
Passover, or last supper, without this
prerogative being |
| 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
church. It is not absolutely
necessary to ordain pas- |
| 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-
cumstance, to perpetuate no ceremonials
except as |
| 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
study the lessons before recitations.
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
most readily, keeps his own lamp trimmed
and burning. |
| 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
revelation. It must not be forgotten that
in times past, |
| 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
divests himself of pride and self,
spiritualizes his own
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
been healed by Christian Science?
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
Mount, even if you suffer for it in the first instance, -
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. |
