0.0 – Science & Health by Mary Baker Eddy Chapter 3 – Marriage – 1910 Edition

Our prayer for the at-one-ment of humanity with divinity leads us to the third chapter, MARRIAGE. What "God hath joined together" is the true human and the divine — the manhood and womanhood of God. Our humanity is found to be in wedlock with our divinity. All there is to you and me engaged in our rightful activities is the divine operating as you and me. So there is a beautiful state of marriage, when the divine is operating not  through us but as us.
~ DISSOLVING BARRIERS, The Healing Work of Christian Science by John L. MorganSHOW ALL

     Chapter 3                                                                     56

  	Marriage 

  	What therefore God hath joined together, 
  	let not man put asunder. 

  	In the resurrection they neither marry,
  	nor are given in marriage,
  	but are as the angels of God in heaven. — Jesus. 

 1	    When our great Teacher came to him for baptism,
  	John was astounded. Reading his thoughts, Jesus
 3	added: "Suffer it to be so now:  for thus it becometh us
  	to fulfil all righteousness." Jesus' concessions (in certain
  	cases) to material methods were for the advancement of
 6	spiritual good. 
  	    Marriage is the legal and moral provision for genera-
  	tion among human kind. Until the spiritual creation
 9	is  discerned intact, is apprehended and under-	Marriage
  	stood, and His kingdom is come as in the vision	temporal 
  	of the Apocalypse, — where the corporeal sense of crea-
12	tion was cast out, and its spiritual sense was revealed from
  	heaven, — marriage will continue, subject to such moral
  	regulations as will secure increasing virtue. 
15	    Infidelity to the marriage covenant is the social scourge
  	of all races, "the pestilence that walketh in darkness,
  	. . . the destruction that wasteth at noonday." 	Fidelity
18	The commandment, "Thou shalt not com-	required 
  	mit adultery," is no less imperative than the one, "Thou
  	shalt not kill." 

     Science and Health – Marriage                                                  57 

1	    Chastity is the cement of civilization and progress. 
  	Without it there is no stability in society, and without it
 3	one cannot attain the Science of Life. 
  	    Union of the masculine and feminine qualities consti-
  	tutes completeness. The masculine mind reaches a
 6	higher tone through certain elements of the	Mental
  	feminine, while the feminine mind gains cour-	elements 
  	age and strength through masculine qualities. These
 9	different elements conjoin naturally with each other, and
  	their true harmony is in spiritual oneness. Both sexes
  	should be loving, pure, tender, and strong. The attrac-
12	tion between native qualities will be perpetual only as it
  	is pure and true, bringing sweet seasons of renewal like
  	the returning spring. 
15	    Beauty, wealth, or fame is incompetent to meet the
  	demands of the affections, and should never weigh
  	against the better claims of intellect, good-	Affection's
18	ness, and virtue. Happiness is spiritual,	demands 
  	born of Truth and Love. It is unselfish; therefore
  	it cannot exist alone, but requires all mankind to
21	share it. 
  	    Human affection is not poured forth vainly, even
  	though it meet no return. Love enriches the nature, en-
24	larging, purifying, and elevating it. The wintry	Help and
  	blasts of earth may uproot the flowers of affec-	discipline 
  	tion, and scatter them to the winds; but this severance
27	of fleshly ties serves to unite thought more closely to
  	God, for Love supports the struggling heart until it ceases
  	to sigh over the world and begins to unfold its wings for
30	heaven. 
  	    Marriage is unblest or blest, according to the disap-
  	pointments it involves or the hopes it fulfils. To happify
 
     Science and Health – Marriage                                                  58 

 1	existence by constant intercourse with those adapted to
  	elevate it, should be the motive of society. Unity of
 3	spirit gives new pinions to joy, or else joy's drooping
  	wings trail in dust. 
  	    Ill-arranged notes produce discord. Tones of the
 6	human mind may be different, but they should be con-
  	cordant in order to blend properly. Unselfish	Chord and
  	ambition, noble life-motives, and purity, — 	discord 
 9	these constituents of thought, mingling, constitute in-
  	dividually and collectively true happiness, strength, and
  	permanence. 
12	    There is moral freedom in Soul. Never contract the
  	horizon of a worthy outlook by the selfish exaction of
  	all another's time and thoughts. With ad-	Mutual
15	ditional joys, benevolence should grow more	freedom 
  	diffusive. The narrowness and jealousy, which would
  	confine a wife or a husband forever within four walls, will
18	not promote the sweet interchange of confidence and love;
  	but on the other hand, a wandering desire for incessant
  	amusement outside the home circle is a poor augury for
21	the happiness of wedlock. Home is the dearest spot on
  	earth, and it should be the centre, though not the bound-
  	ary, of the affections. 
24	    Said the peasant bride to her lover: "Two eat no more
  	together than they eat separately." This is a hint that
  	a wife ought not to court vulgar extravagance	A useful
27	or stupid ease, because another supplies her	suggestion 
  	wants. Wealth may obviate the necessity for toil or the
  	chance for ill-nature in the marriage relation, but noth-
30	ing can abolish the cares of marriage. 
  	    "She that is married careth . . . how she may please
  	her husband," says the Bible; and this is the pleasantest

     Science and Health – Marriage                                                  59 

 1	thing to do. Matrimony should never be entered into
  	without a full recognition of its enduring obligations on
 3	both sides. There should be the most tender	Differing
  	solicitude for each other's happiness, and mu-	duties 
  	tual attention and approbation should wait on all the years
 6	of married life. 
  	    Mutual compromises will often maintain a compact
  	which might otherwise become unbearable. Man should
 9	not be required to participate in all the annoyances and
  	cares of domestic economy, nor should woman be ex-
  	pected to understand political economy. Fulfilling the
12	different demands of their united spheres, their sympa-
  	thies should blend in sweet confidence and cheer, each
  	partner sustaining the other, — thus hallowing the union
15	of interests and affections, in which the heart finds peace
  	and home. 
  	    Tender words and unselfish care in what promotes the
18	welfare and happiness of your wife will prove more salutary
  	in prolonging her health and smiles than stolid	Trysting
  	indifference or jealousy. Husbands, hear this	renewed 
21	and remember how slight a word or deed may renew the
  	old trysting-times. 
  	    After marriage, it is too late to grumble over incompati-
24	bility of disposition. A mutual understanding should
  	exist before this union and continue ever after, for decep-
  	tion is fatal to happiness. 
27	    The nuptial vow should never be annulled, so long as
  	its moral obligations are kept intact; but the frequency
  	of divorce shows that the sacredness of this re-	Permanent
30	lationship is losing its influence, and that fatal	obligation 
  	mistakes are undermining its foundations. Separation
  	never should take place, and it never would, if both
 
 
     Science and Health – Marriage                                                  60 


1	husband and wife were genuine Christian Scientists. 
  	Science inevitably lifts one's being higher in the scale of
 3	harmony and happiness. 
  	    Kindred tastes, motives, and aspirations are necessary
  	to the formation of a happy and permanent companion-
 6	ship. The beautiful in character is also the	Permanent
  	good, welding indissolubly the links of affec-	affection 
  	tion. A mother's affection cannot be weaned from her
 9	child, because the mother-love includes purity and con-
  	stancy, both of which are immortal. Therefore maternal
  	affection lives on under whatever difficulties. 
12	    From the logic of events we learn that selfishness
  	and impurity alone are fleeting, and that wisdom will
  	ultimately put asunder what she hath not joined
15	together. 
  	    Marriage should improve the human species, becoming
  	a barrier against vice, a protection to woman, strength to
18	man, and a centre for the affections. This,	Centre for
  	however, in a majority of cases, is not its	affections 
  	present tendency, and why? Because the education of
21	the higher nature is neglected, and other considerations,
  	 — passion, frivolous amusements, personal adornment,
  	display, and pride, — occupy thought. 
24	    An ill-attuned ear calls discord harmony, not appreciat-
  	ing concord. So physical sense, not discerning the true
  	happiness of being, places it on a false basis. 	Spiritual
27	Science will correct the discord, and teach us	concord 
  	life's sweeter harmonies. 
  	    Soul has infinite resources with which to bless mankind,
30	and happiness would be more readily attained and would
  	be more secure in our keeping, if sought in Soul. Higher
  	enjoyments alone can satisfy the cravings of immortal
 
     Science and Health – Marriage                                                  61

1	man. We cannot circumscribe happiness within the
  	limits of personal sense. The senses confer no real
 3	enjoyment. 
  	    The good in human affections must have ascendency
  	over the evil and the spiritual over the animal, or happi-
 6	ness will never be won. The attainment of	Ascendency
  	this celestial condition would improve our	of good 
  	progeny, diminish crime, and give higher aims to ambi-
 9	tion. Every valley of sin must be exalted, and every
  	mountain of selfishness be brought low, that the highway
  	of our God may be prepared in Science. The offspring
12	of heavenly-minded parents inherit more intellect, better
  	balanced minds, and sounder constitutions. 
  	    If some fortuitous circumstance places promising chil-
15	dren in the arms of gross parents, often these beautiful
  	children early droop and die, like tropical	Propensities
  	flowers born amid Alpine snows. If perchance	inherited 
18	they live to become parents in their turn, they may re-
  	produce in their own helpless little ones the grosser traits
  	of their ancestors. What hope of happiness, what noble
21	ambition, can inspire the child who inherits propensities
  	that must either be overcome or reduce him to a loath-
  	some wreck? 
24	    Is not the propagation of the human species a greater
  	responsibility, a more solemn charge, than the culture of
  	your garden or the raising of stock to increase your flocks
27	and herds? Nothing unworthy of perpetuity should be
  	transmitted to children. 
  	    The formation of mortals must greatly improve to
30	advance mankind. The scientific morale of marriage is
  	spiritual unity. If the propagation of a higher human
  	species is requisite to reach this goal, then its material con-
 

     Science and Health – Marriage                                                  62


 1	ditions can only be permitted for the purpose of gener-
  	ating. The foetus must be kept mentally pure and the
 3	period of gestation have the sanctity of virginity. 
  	    The entire education of children should be such as to
  	form habits of obedience to the moral and spiritual law,
 6	with which the child can meet and master the belief in so-
  	called physical laws, a belief which breeds disease. 
  	    If parents create in their babes a desire for incessant
 9	amusement, to be always fed, rocked, tossed, or talked
  	to, those parents should not, in after years,	Inheritance
  	complain of their children's fretfulness or fri-	heeded 
12	volity, which the parents themselves have occasioned. 
  	Taking less "thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or
  	what ye shall drink"; less thought "for your body what
15	ye shall put on," will do much more for the health of the
  	rising generation than you dream. Children should be
  	allowed to remain children in knowledge, and should
18	become men and women only through growth in the
  	understanding of man's higher nature. 
  	    We must not attribute more and more intelligence
21	to matter, but less and less, if we would be wise and
  	healthy. The divine Mind, which forms the	The Mind
  	bud and blossom, will care for the human	creative 
24	body, even as it clothes the lily; but let no mortal inter-
  	fere with God's government by thrusting in the laws of
  	erring, human concepts. 
27	    The higher nature of man is not governed by the lower;
  	if it were, the order of wisdom would be reversed. 
  	Our false views of life hide eternal harmony,	Superior law
30	and produce the ills of which we complain. 	of Soul 
  	Because mortals believe in material laws and reject the
  	Science of Mind, this does not make materiality first and

     Science and Health – Marriage                                                  63 

1	the superior law of Soul last. You would never think
  	that flannel was better for warding off pulmonary disease
 3	than the controlling Mind, if you understood the Science
  	of being. 
  	    In Science man is the offspring of Spirit. The beauti-
 6	ful, good, and pure constitute his ancestry. His origin is
  	not, like that of mortals, in brute instinct, nor	Spiritual
  	does he pass through material conditions prior	origin 
 9	to reaching intelligence. Spirit is his primitive and ulti-
  	mate source of being; God is his Father, and Life is the
  	law of his being. 
12	    Civil law establishes very unfair differences between the
  	rights of the two sexes. Christian Science furnishes no
  	precedent for such injustice, and civilization	The rights
15	mitigates it in some measure. Still, it is a	of woman 
  	marvel why usage should accord woman less rights than
  	does either Christian Science or civilization. 
18	    Our laws are not impartial, to say the least, in their
  	discrimination as to the person, property, and parental
  	claims of the two sexes. If the elective fran-	Unfair
21	chise for women will remedy the evil with-	discrimination 
  	out encouraging difficulties of greater magnitude, let us
  	hope it will be granted. A feasible as well as rational
24	means of improvement at present is the elevation of
  	society in general and the achievement of a nobler
  	race for legislation, — a race having higher aims and
27	motives. 
  	    If a dissolute husband deserts his wife, certainly the
  	wronged, and perchance impoverished, woman should be
30	allowed to collect her own wages, enter into business
  	agreements, hold real estate, deposit funds, and own her
  	children free from interference. 
 
 

     Science and Health – Marriage                                                  64


1	    Want of uniform justice is a crying evil caused by the
  	selfishness and inhumanity of man. Our forefathers
 3	exercised their faith in the direction taught by the Apostle
  	James, when he said: "Pure religion and undefiled before
  	God and the Father, is this, To visit the fatherless and
 6	widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted
  	from the world." 
  	    Pride, envy, or jealousy seems on most occasions to
 9	be the master of ceremonies, ruling out primitive Chris-
  	tianity. When a man lends a helping hand	Benevolence
  	to some noble woman, struggling alone with	hindered 
12	adversity, his wife should not say, "It is never well to
  	interfere with your neighbor's business." A wife is
  	sometimes debarred by a covetous domestic tyrant from
15	giving the ready aid her sympathy and charity would
  	afford. 
  	    Marriage should signify a union of hearts. Further-
18	more, the time cometh of which Jesus spake, when he
  	declared that in the resurrection there should	Progressive
  	be no more marrying nor giving in marriage,	development 
21	but man would be as the angels. Then shall Soul re-
  	joice in its own, in which passion has no part. Then
  	white-robed purity will unite in one person masculine wis-
24	dom and feminine love, spiritual understanding and per-
  	petual peace. 
  	    Until it is learned that God is the Father of all, mar-
27	riage will continue. Let not mortals permit a disregard
  	of law which might lead to a worse state of society than
  	now exists. Honesty and virtue ensure the stability of
30	the marriage covenant. Spirit will ultimately claim its
  	own, — all that really is, — and the voices of physical
  	sense will be forever hushed. 
 
 
     Science and Health – Marriage                                                  65 


1	    Experience should be the school of virtue, and human
  	happiness should proceed from man's highest nature. 
 3	May Christ, Truth, be present at every bridal	Blessing
  	altar to turn the water into wine and to give to	of Christ 
  	human life an inspiration by which man's spiritual and
 6	eternal existence may be discerned. 
  	    If the foundations of human affection are consistent
  	with progress, they will be strong and enduring. Divorces
 9	should warn the age of some fundamental error	Righteous
  	in the marriage state. The union of the sexes	foundations 
  	suffers fearful discord. To gain Christian Science and its
12	harmony, life should be more metaphysically regarded. 
  	    The broadcast powers of evil so conspicuous to-day
  	show themselves in the materialism and sensualism of
15	the age, struggling against the advancing	Powerless
  	spiritual era. Beholding the world's lack of	promises 
  	Christianity and the powerlessness of vows to make home
18	happy, the human mind will at length demand a higher
  	affection. 
  	    There will ensue a fermentation over this as over many
21	other reforms, until we get at last the clear straining of
  	truth, and impurity and error are left among	Transition
  	the lees. The fermentation even of fluids is	and reform 
24	not pleasant. An unsettled, transitional stage is never
  	desirable on its own account. Matrimony, which was once
  	a fixed fact among us, must lose its present slippery foot-
27	ing, and man must find permanence and peace in a more
  	spiritual adherence. 
  	    The mental chemicalization, which has brought con-
30	jugal infidelity to the surface, will assuredly throw off
  	this evil, and marriage will become purer when the scum
  	is gone. 
 

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 1	    Thou art right, immortal Shakespeare, great poet of
  	humanity:

 3	                  Sweet are the uses of adversity;
  	       Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous,
  	       Wears yet a precious jewel in his head. 

 6	    Trials teach mortals not to lean on a material staff, — 
  	a broken reed, which pierces the heart. We do not
  	half remember this in the sunshine of joy	Salutary
 9	and prosperity. Sorrow is salutary. Through	sorrow 
  	great tribulation we enter the kingdom. Trials are
  	proofs of God's care. Spiritual development germi-
12	nates not from seed sown in the soil of material hopes,
  	but when these decay, Love propagates anew the higher
  	joys of Spirit, which have no taint of earth. Each suc-
15	cessive stage of experience unfolds new views of divine
  	goodness and love. 
  	    Amidst gratitude for conjugal felicity, it is well to re-
18	member how fleeting are human joys. Amidst conjugal
  	infelicity, it is well to hope, pray, and wait patiently on
  	divine wisdom to point out the path. 
21	    Husbands and wives should never separate if there
  	is no Christian demand for it. It is better to await the
  	logic of events than for a wife precipitately	Patience
24	to leave her husband or for a husband to	is wisdom 
  	leave his wife. If one is better than the other, as must
  	always be the case, the other pre-eminently needs good
27	company. Socrates considered patience salutary under
  	such circumstances, making his Xantippe a discipline for
  	his philosophy. 
30	    Sorrow has its reward. It never leaves us	The gold
  	where it found us. The furnace separates	and dross 
  	the gold from the dross that the precious metal may
 

     Science and Health – Marriage                                                  67 


 1	be graven with the image of God. The cup our Father
  	hath given, shall we not drink it and learn the lessons
 3	He teaches? 
  	    When the ocean is stirred by a storm, then the clouds
  	lower, the wind shrieks through the tightened shrouds,
 6	and the waves lift themselves into mountains. 	Weathering
  	We ask the helmsman: "Do you know your	the storm 
  	course? Can you steer safely amid the storm?" He
 9	answers bravely, but even the dauntless seaman is not
  	sure of his safety; nautical science is not equal to the
  	Science of Mind. Yet, acting up to his highest under-
12	standing, firm at the post of duty, the mariner works on
  	and awaits the issue. Thus should we deport ourselves
  	on the seething ocean of sorrow. Hoping and work-
15	ing, one should stick to the wreck, until an irresistible
  	propulsion precipitates his doom or sunshine gladdens
  	the troubled sea. 
18	    The notion that animal natures can possibly give force
  	to character is too absurd for consideration, when we
  	remember that through spiritual ascendency	Spiritual
21	our Lord and Master healed the sick, raised	power 
  	the dead, and commanded even the winds and waves to
  	obey him. Grace and Truth are potent beyond all other
24	means and methods. 
  	    The lack of spiritual power in the limited demonstration
  	of popular Christianity does not put to silence the labor
27	of centuries. Spiritual, not corporeal, consciousness is
  	needed. Man delivered from sin, disease, and death
  	presents the true likeness or spiritual ideal. 
30	    Systems of religion and medicine treat of physical pains
  	and pleasures, but Jesus rebuked the suffering from any
  	such cause or effect. The epoch approaches when the
 

     Science and Health – Marriage                                                  68 


 1	understanding of the truth of being will be the basis of
  	true religion. At present mortals progress slowly for
 3	fear of being thought ridiculous. They are	Basis of true
  	slaves to fashion, pride, and sense. Some-	religion 
  	time we shall learn how Spirit, the great architect, has
 6	created men and women in Science. We ought to weary
  	of the fleeting and false and to cherish nothing which
  	hinders our highest selfhood. 
 9	    Jealousy is the grave of affection. The presence of
  	mistrust, where confidence is due, withers the flowers
  	of Eden and scatters love's petals to decay. Be not
12	in haste to take the vow "until death do us part." 
  	Consider its obligations, its responsibilities, its rela-
  	tions to your growth and to your influence on other
15	lives. 
  	    I never knew more than one individual who believed
  	in agamogenesis; she was unmarried, a lovely charac-
18	ter, was suffering from incipient insanity, and	Insanity and
  	a Christian Scientist cured her. I have named	agamogenesis 
  	her case to individuals, when casting my bread upon
21	the waters, and it may have caused the good to ponder
  	and the evil to hatch their silly innuendoes and lies, since
  	salutary causes sometimes incur these effects. The per-
24	petuation of the floral species by bud or cell-division is
  	evident, but I discredit the belief that agamogenesis
  	applies to the human species. 
27	    Christian Science presents unfoldment, not accretion;
  	it manifests no material growth from molecule to mind,
  	but an impartation of the divine Mind to man	God's
30	and the universe. Proportionately as human	creation intact 
  	generation ceases, the unbroken links of eternal, har-
  	monious being will be spiritually discerned; and man,
 
 

     Science and Health – Marriage                                                  69 


1	not of the earth earthly but coexistent with God, will
  	appear. The scientific fact that man and the universe
 3	are evolved from Spirit, and so are spiritual, is as fixed in
  	divine Science as is the proof that mortals gain the sense
  	of health only as they lose the sense of sin and disease. 
 6	Mortals can never understand God's creation while believ-
  	ing that man is a creator. God's children already created
  	will be cognized only as man finds the truth of being. 
 9	Thus it is that the real, ideal man appears in proportion
  	as the false and material disappears. No longer to marry
  	or to be "given in marriage" neither closes man's con-
12	tinuity nor his sense of increasing number in God's in-
  	finite plan. Spiritually to understand that there is but
  	one creator, God, unfolds all creation, confirms the Scrip-
15	tures, brings the sweet assurance of no parting, no pain,
  	and of man deathless and perfect and eternal. 
  	    If Christian Scientists educate their own offspring
18	spiritually, they can educate others spiritually and not
  	conflict with the scientific sense of God's creation. Some
  	day the child will ask his parent: "Do you keep the First
21	Commandment? Do you have one God and creator, or
  	is man a creator?" If the father replies, "God creates
  	man through man," the child may ask, "Do you teach
24	that Spirit creates materially, or do you declare that
  	Spirit is infinite, therefore matter is out of the ques-
  	tion?" Jesus said, "The children of this world marry,
27	and are given in marriage:  But they which shall be ac-
  	counted worthy to obtain that world, and the resur-
  	rection from the dead, neither marry, nor are given in
30   marriage."SHOW ALL