0.0 – Science & Health by Mary Baker Eddy Chapter 12 – Section 1 of 3 – Christian Science Practice – 1910 Edition

In answering the objections, by putting everything back into God and acknowledging that there is a divine plan where everything relates with everything else, we are in fact practising Christian Science. We are removing the objections of the human mind by working from the unbroken wholeness of being, seeing everything slotted back into its proper place and value in the divine purpose and plan.
"Christian Science Practice" is a long and very practical healing chapter, finishing with an allegorical account of  a law case. The prisoner on trial is accused of transgressing the laws of matter. He has watched with and tended a sick friend, but in doing this he has broken the laws of health that claim to govern the material body. This is his crime and he is condemned to death. But then permission is obtained for a retrial in the Court of Spirit. Christian Science, appearing as counsel for the defence, argues for man's freedom under the law of God. God's law liberates him from the bogus laws of mortality. The law case finishes with the commanding sentence, "Christian Scientists, be a law to yourselves that mental malpractice cannot harm you either when asleep or when awake" (442:30). Be a law to yourselves!
~ DISSOLVING BARRIERS, The Healing Work of Christian Science by John L. MorganSHOW ALL

     Chapter 12                                                                          362

  	Christian Science Practice 

  	Why art thou cast down, O my soul [sense]? 
  	And why art thou disquieted within me? 
  	Hope thou in God; for I shall yet praise Him,
  	Who is the health of my countenance and my God. — Psalms. 

  	And these signs shall follow them that believe:
  	In my name shall they cast out devils:
  	they shall speak with new tongues; they shall take up serpents;
  	and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them;
  	they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover. — Jesus. 

 1	    It is related in the seventh chapter  of Luke's Gospel
  	that Jesus was once the honored guest of a certain
 3	Pharisee, by name Simon, though he was quite unlike
  	Simon the disciple. While they were at meat, an unusual
  	incident occurred, as if to interrupt the scene	A gospel
 6	of Oriental festivity. A "strange woman"	narrative 
  	came in. Heedless of the fact that she was debarred from
  	such a place and such society, especially under the stern
 9	rules of rabbinical law, as positively as if she were a Hin-
  	doo pariah intruding upon the household of a high-caste
  	Brahman, this woman (Mary Magdalene, as she has
12	since been called) approached Jesus. According to the
  	custom of those days, he reclined on a couch with his
  	head towards the table and his bare feet away from it. 
15	It was therefore easy for the Magdalen to come behind
 
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 1	the couch and reach his feet. She bore an alabaster jar
  	containing costly and fragrant oil, — sandal oil perhaps,
 3	which is in such common use in the East. Breaking
  	the sealed jar, she perfumed Jesus' feet with the oil,
  	wiping them with her long hair, which hung loosely
 6	about her shoulders, as was customary with women of her
  	grade. 
  	    Did Jesus spurn the woman? Did he repel her adora-
 9	tion? No! He regarded her compassionately. Nor was
  	this all. Knowing what those around him	Parable of
  	were saying in their hearts, especially his host,	the creditor 
12	 — that they were wondering why, being a prophet, the
  	exalted guest did not at once detect the woman's immoral
  	status and bid her depart, — knowing this, Jesus rebuked
15	them with a short story or parable. He described two
  	debtors, one for a large sum and one for a smaller, who
  	were released from their obligations by their common
18	creditor. "Which of them will love him most?" was the
  	Master's question to Simon the Pharisee; and Simon re-
  	plied, "He to whom he forgave most." Jesus approved
21	the answer, and so brought home the lesson to all, follow-
  	ing it with that remarkable declaration to the woman,
  	"Thy sins are forgiven." 
24	    Why did he thus summarize her debt to divine Love? 
  	Had she repented and reformed, and did his insight
  	detect this unspoken moral uprising? She	Divine
27	bathed his feet with her tears before she	insight 
  	anointed them with the oil. In the absence of other
  	proofs, was her grief sufficient evidence to warrant the
30	expectation of her repentance, reformation, and growth
  	in wisdom? Certainly there was encouragement in the
  	mere fact that she was showing her affection for a man
 
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 1	of undoubted goodness and purity, who has since been
  	rightfully regarded as the best man that ever trod this
 3	planet. Her reverence was unfeigned, and it was mani-
  	fested towards one who was soon, though they knew it
  	not, to lay down his mortal existence in behalf of all
 6	sinners, that through his word and works they might be
  	redeemed from sensuality and sin. 
  	    Which was the higher tribute to such ineffable affec-
 9	tion, the hospitality of the Pharisee or the contrition of
  	the Magdalen? This query Jesus answered	Penitence or
  	by rebuking self-righteousness and declaring	hospitality 
12	the absolution of the penitent. He even said that this
  	poor woman had done what his rich entertainer had neg-
  	lected to do, — wash and anoint his guest's feet, a special
15	sign of Oriental courtesy. 
  	    Here is suggested a solemn question, a question indi-
  	cated by one of the needs of this age. Do Christian
18	Scientists seek Truth as Simon sought the Saviour, through
  	material conservatism and for personal homage? Jesus
  	told Simon that such seekers as he gave small reward
21	in return for the spiritual purgation which came through
  	the Messiah. If Christian Scientists are like Simon,
  	then it must be said of them also that they love
24	little. 
  	    On the other hand, do they show their regard for
  	Truth, or Christ, by their genuine repentance, by their
27	broken hearts, expressed by meekness and	Genuine
  	human affection, as did this woman? If	repentance 
  	so, then it may be said of them, as Jesus said of the
30	unwelcome visitor, that they indeed love much, because
  	much is forgiven them. 
  	    Did the careless doctor, the nurse, the cook, and the
 
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 1	brusque business visitor sympathetically know the thorns
  	they plant in the pillow of the sick and the heavenly
 3	homesick looking away from earth, — Oh, did	Compassion
  	they know! — this knowledge would do much	requisite 
  	more towards healing the sick and preparing their helpers
 6	for the "midnight call," than all cries of "Lord, Lord!" 
  	The benign thought of Jesus, finding utterance in such
  	words as "Take no thought for your life," would heal
 9	the sick, and so enable them to rise above the supposed
  	necessity for physical thought-taking and doctoring;
  	but if the unselfish affections be lacking, and common
12	sense and common humanity are disregarded, what men-
  	tal quality remains, with which to evoke healing from
  	the outstretched arm of righteousness? 
15	    If the Scientist reaches his patient through divine
  	Love, the healing work will be accomplished at one
  	visit, and the disease will vanish into its native	Speedy
18	nothingness like dew before the morning sun-	healing 
  	shine. If the Scientist has enough Christly affection to
  	win his own pardon, and such commendation as the Mag-
21	dalen gained from Jesus, then he is Christian enough to
  	practise scientifically and deal with his patients compas-
  	sionately; and the result will correspond with the spiritual
24	intent. 
  	    If hypocrisy, stolidity, inhumanity, or vice finds its
  	way into the chambers of disease through the would-be
27	healer, it would, if it were possible, convert	Truth
  	into a den of thieves the temple of the Holy	desecrated 
  	Ghost, — the patient's spiritual power to resuscitate him-
30	self. The unchristian practitioner is not giving to mind
  	or body the joy and strength of Truth. The poor suf-
  	fering heart needs its rightful nutriment, such as peace,
 
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 1	patience in tribulation, and a priceless sense of the dear
  	Father's loving-kindness. 
 3	    In order to cure his patient, the metaphysician
  	must first cast moral evils out of himself and thus
  	attain the spiritual freedom which will en-	Moral evils
 6	able him to cast physical evils out of his	to be cast out 
  	patient; but heal he cannot, while his own spiritual
  	barrenness debars him from giving drink to the thirsty
 9	and hinders him from reaching his patient's thought, — 
  	yea, while mental penury chills his faith and under-
  	standing. 
12	    The physician who lacks sympathy for his fellow-
  	being is deficient in human affection, and we have the
  	apostolic warrant for asking: "He that loveth	The true
15	not his brother whom he hath seen, how can	physician 
  	he love God whom he hath not seen?" Not having this
  	spiritual affection, the physician lacks faith in the divine
18	Mind and has not that recognition of infinite Love which
  	alone confers the healing power. Such so-called Scien-
  	tists will strain out gnats, while they swallow the camels
21	of bigoted pedantry. 
  	    The physician must also watch, lest he be over-
  	whelmed by a sense of the odiousness of sin and by the
24	unveiling of sin in his own thoughts. The	Source of
  	sick are terrified by their sick beliefs, and	calmness 
  	sinners should be affrighted by their sinful beliefs; but
27	the Christian Scientist will be calm in the presence of
  	both sin and disease, knowing, as he does, that Life is
  	God and God is All. 
30	    If we would open their prison doors for the sick, we
  	must first learn to bind up the broken-hearted. If we
  	would heal by the Spirit, we must not hide the talent
 
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 1	of spiritual healing under the napkin of its form, nor
  	bury the morale of Christian Science in the grave-clothes
 3	of its letter. The tender word and Christian	Genuine
  	encouragement of an invalid, pitiful patience	healing 
  	with his fears and the removal of them, are better than
 6	hecatombs of gushing theories, stereotyped borrowed
  	speeches, and the doling of arguments, which are but so
  	many parodies on legitimate Christian Science, aflame
 9	with divine Love. 
  	    This is what is meant by seeking Truth, Christ, not
  	"for the loaves and fishes," nor, like the Pharisee, with
12	the arrogance of rank and display of scholar-	Gratitude
  	ship, but like Mary Magdalene, from the sum-	and humility 
  	mit of devout consecration, with the oil of gladness and
15	the perfume of gratitude, with tears of repentance and
  	with those hairs all numbered by the Father. 
  	    A Christian Scientist occupies the place at this period
18	of which Jesus spoke to his disciples, when he said: "Ye
  	are the salt of the earth." "Ye are the light	The salt of
  	of the world. A city that is set on an hill can-	the earth 
21	not be hid." Let us watch, work, and pray that this salt
  	lose not its saltness, and that this light be not hid, but
  	radiate and glow into noontide glory. 
24	    The infinite Truth of the Christ-cure has come to this
  	age through a "still, small voice," through silent utter-
  	ances and divine anointing which quicken and increase
27	the beneficial effects of Christianity. I long to see the
  	consummation of my hope, namely, the student's higher
  	attainments in this line of light. 
30	    Because Truth is infinite, error should be known as
  	nothing. Because Truth is omnipotent in goodness,
  	error, Truth's opposite, has no might. Evil is but the
 
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 1	counterpoise of nothingness. The greatest wrong is
  	but a supposititious opposite of the highest right. The
 3	confidence inspired by Science lies in the fact	Real and
  	that Truth is real and error is unreal. Error	counterfeit 
  	is a coward before Truth. Divine Science insists that
 6	time will prove all this. Both truth and error have come
  	nearer than ever before to the apprehension of mortals,
  	and truth will become still clearer as error is self-
 9	destroyed. 
  	    Against the fatal beliefs that error is as real as Truth,
  	that evil is equal in power to good if not superior, and that
12	discord is as normal as harmony, even the hope	Results of
  	of freedom from the bondage of sickness and	faith in Truth 
  	sin has little inspiration to nerve endeavor. When we
15	come to have more faith in the truth of being than we have
  	in error, more faith in Spirit than in matter, more faith
  	in living than in dying, more faith in God than in man,
18	then no material suppositions can prevent us from healing
  	the sick and destroying error. 
  	    That Life is not contingent on bodily conditions is
21	proved, when we learn that life and man survive this
  	body. Neither evil, disease, nor death can be	Life
  	spiritual, and the material belief in them dis-	independent
24	appears in the ratio of one's spiritual growth. Because	of matter 
  	matter has no consciousness or Ego, it cannot act; its
  	conditions are illusions, and these false conditions are the
27	source of all seeming sickness. Admit the existence of
  	matter, and you admit that mortality (and therefore dis-
  	ease) has a foundation in fact. Deny the existence of
30	matter, and you can destroy the belief in material con-
  	ditions. When fear disappears, the foundation of disease
  	is gone. Once let the mental physician believe in the
 
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 1	reality of matter, and he is liable to admit also the reality
  	of all discordant conditions, and this hinders his de-
 3	stroying them. Thus he is unfitted for the successful
  	treatment of disease. 
  	    In proportion as matter loses to human sense all en-
 6	tity as man, in that proportion does man become its
  	master. He enters into a diviner sense of the	Man's 
  	facts, and comprehends the theology of Jesus	entity 
 9	as demonstrated in healing the sick, raising the dead,
  	and walking over the wave. All these deeds manifested
  	Jesus' control over the belief that matter is substance,
12	that it can be the arbiter of life or the constructor of any
  	form of existence. 
  	    We never read that Luke or Paul made a reality of
15	disease in order to discover some means of healing it. 
  	Jesus never asked if disease were acute or	The Christ
  	chronic, and he never recommended atten-	treatment 
18	tion to laws of health, never gave drugs, never prayed
  	to know if God were willing that a man should live. He
  	understood man, whose Life is God, to be immortal, and
21	knew that man has not two lives, one to be destroyed and
  	the other to be made indestructible. 
  	    The prophylactic and therapeutic (that is, the prevent-
24	ive and curative) arts belong emphatically to Christian
  	Science, as would be readily seen, if psychology,	Matter not
  	or the Science of Spirit, God, was understood. 	medicine 
27	Unscientific methods are finding their dead level. Lim-
  	ited to matter by their own law, what have they of the
  	advantages of Mind and immortality? 
30	    No man is physically healed in wilful error or by it,
  	any more than he is morally saved in or by sin. It is
  	error even to murmur or to be angry over sin. To be
 
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 1	every whit whole, man must be better spiritually as well
  	as physically. To be immortal, we must forsake the
 3	mortal sense of things, turn from the lie of false	No healing
  	belief to Truth, and gather the facts of being	in sin 
  	from the divine Mind. The body improves under the
 6	same regimen which spiritualizes the thought; and if
  	health is not made manifest under this regimen, this
  	proves that fear is governing the body. This is the law
 9	of cause and effect, or like producing like. 
  	    Homoeopathy furnishes the evidence to the senses, that
  	symptoms, which might be produced by a certain drug,
12	are removed by using the same drug which	Like curing
  	might cause the symptoms. This confirms	like 
  	my theory that faith in the drug is the sole factor in the
15	cure. The effect, which mortal mind produces through
  	one belief, it removes through an opposite belief, but it
  	uses the same medicine in both cases. 
18	    The moral and spiritual facts of health, whispered
  	into thought, produce very direct and marked effects on
  	the body. A physical diagnosis of disease — since mor-
21	tal mind must be the cause of disease — tends to induce
  	disease. 
  	    According to both medical testimony and individual
24	experience, a drug may eventually lose its supposed power
  	and do no more for the patient. Hygienic	Transient
  	treatment also loses its efficacy. Quackery	potency
27	likewise fails at length to inspire the credulity	of drugs 
  	of the sick, and then they cease to improve. These les-
  	sons are useful. They should naturally and genuinely
30	change our basis from sensation to Christian Science,
  	from error to Truth, from matter to Spirit. 
  	    Physicians examine the pulse, tongue, lungs, to dis-
 
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 1	cover the condition of matter, when in fact all is
  	Mind. The body is the substratum of mortal mind,
 3	and this so-called mind must finally yield	Diagnosis
  	to the mandate of immortal Mind. 	of matter 
  	    Disquisitions on disease have a mental effect similar
 6	to that produced on children by telling ghost-stories in
  	the dark. By those uninstructed in Christian	Ghost-stories
  	Science, nothing is really understood of material	inducing fear 
 9	existence. Mortals are believed to be here without their
  	consent and to be removed as involuntarily, not knowing
  	why nor when. As frightened children look everywhere
12	for the imaginary ghost, so sick humanity sees danger in
  	every direction, and looks for relief in all ways except the
  	right one. Darkness induces fear. The adult, in bond-
15	age to his beliefs, no more comprehends his real being
  	than does the child; and the adult must be taken out of
  	his darkness, before he can get rid of the illusive suffer-
18	ings which throng the gloaming. The way in divine
  	Science is the only way out of this condition. 
  	    I would not transform the infant at once into a
21	man, nor would I keep the suckling a lifelong babe. 
  	No impossible thing do I ask when urging	Mind imparts
  	the claims of Christian Science; but because	purity, health,
24	this teaching is in advance of the age, we	and beauty 
  	should not deny our need of its spiritual unfoldment. 
  	Mankind will improve through Science and Christi-
27	anity. The necessity for uplifting the race is father to
  	the fact that Mind can do it; for Mind can impart
  	purity instead of impurity, strength instead of weak-
30	ness, and health instead of disease. Truth is an altera-
  	tive in the entire system, and can make it "every whit
  	whole." 
 
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1	    Remember, brain is not mind. Matter cannot be sick,
  	and Mind is immortal. The mortal body is only an erro-
 3	neous mortal belief of mind in matter. What	Brain not
  	you call matter was originally error in solu-	intelligent 
  	tion, elementary mortal mind, — likened by Milton to
 6	"chaos and old night." One theory about this mortal
  	mind is, that its sensations can reproduce man, can form
  	blood, flesh, and bones. The Science of being, in which
 9	all is divine Mind, or God and His idea, would be clearer
  	in this age, but for the belief that matter is the medium
  	of man, or that man can enter his own embodied thought,
12	bind himself with his own beliefs, and then call his bonds
  	material and name them divine law. 
  	    When man demonstrates Christian Science absolutely,
15	he will be perfect. He can neither sin, suffer, be subject
  	to matter, nor disobey the law of God. There-	Veritable
  	fore he will be as the angels in heaven. Chris-	success 
18	tian Science and Christianity are one. How, then, in
  	Christianity any more than in Christian Science, can we
  	believe in the reality and power of both Truth and error,
21	Spirit and matter, and hope to succeed with contraries? 
  	Matter is not self-sustaining. Its false supports fail one
  	after another. Matter succeeds for a period only by
24	falsely parading in the vestments of law. 
  	    "Whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also
  	deny before my Father which is in heaven." In Chris-
27	tian Science, a denial of Truth is fatal, while	Recognition
  	a just acknowledgment of Truth and of what	of benefits 
  	it has done for us is an effectual help. If pride, super-
30	stition, or any error prevents the honest recognition of
  	benefits received, this will be a hindrance to the recovery
  	of the sick and the success of the student. 
 
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 1	    If we are Christians on all moral questions, but are in
  	darkness as to the physical exemption which Christian-
 3	ity includes, then we must have more faith	Disease far
  	in God on this subject and be more alive to	more docile
  	His promises. It is easier to cure the most	than iniquity 
 6	malignant disease than it is to cure sin. The author has
  	raised up the dying, partly because they were willing to
  	be restored, while she has struggled long, and perhaps in
 9	vain, to lift a student out of a chronic sin. Under all
  	modes of pathological treatment, the sick recover more
  	rapidly from disease than does the sinner from his sin. 
12	Healing is easier than teaching, if the teaching is faithfully
  	done. 
  	    The fear of disease and the love of sin are the sources
15	of man's enslavement. "The fear of the Lord	Love frees
  	is the beginning of wisdom," but the Scriptures	from fear 
  	also declare, through the exalted thought of John, that
18	"perfect Love casteth out fear." 
  	    The fear occasioned by ignorance can be cured; but
  	to remove the effects of fear produced by sin, you must
21	rise above both fear and sin. Disease is expressed not
  	so much by the lips as in the functions of the body. Es-
  	tablish the scientific sense of health, and you relieve the
24	oppressed organ. The inflammation, decomposition, or
  	deposit will abate, and the disabled organ will resume its
  	healthy functions. 
27	    When the blood rushes madly through the veins or
  	languidly creeps along its frozen channels, we call these
  	conditions disease. This is a misconception. 	Mind circulates
30	Mortal mind is producing the propulsion or the	blood 
  	languor, and we prove this to be so when by mental means
  	the circulation is changed, and returns to that standard
 
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 1	which mortal mind has decided upon as essential for
  	health. Anodynes, counter-irritants, and depletion never
 3	reduce inflammation scientifically, but the truth of being,
  	whispered into the ear of mortal mind, will bring relief. 
  	    Hatred and its effects on the body are removed by
 6	Love. Because mortal mind seems to be conscious, the
  	sick say: "How can my mind cause a disease	Mind can
  	I never thought of and knew nothing about,	destroy all ills 
 9	until it appeared on my body?" The author has an-
  	swered this question in her explanation of disease as origi-
  	nating in human belief before it is consciously apparent
12	on the body, which is in fact the objective state of mortal
  	mind, though it is called matter. This mortal blindness
  	and its sharp consequences show our need of divine meta-
15	physics. Through immortal Mind, or Truth, we can
  	destroy all ills which proceed from mortal mind. 
  	    Ignorance of the cause or approach of disease is no
18	argument against the mental origin of disease. You con-
  	fess to ignorance of the future and incapacity to preserve
  	your own existence, and this belief helps rather than
21	hinders disease. Such a state of mind induces sickness. 
  	It is like walking in darkness on the edge of a precipice. 
  	You cannot forget the belief of danger, and your steps
24	are less firm because of your fear, and ignorance of mental
  	cause and effect. 
  	    Heat and cold are products of mortal mind. The body,
27	when bereft of mortal mind, at first cools, and after-
  	wards it is resolved into its primitive mortal	Temperature
  	elements. Nothing that lives ever dies, and	is mental 
30	vice versa. Mortal mind produces animal heat, and then
  	expels it through the abandonment of a belief, or in-
  	creases it to the point of self-destruction. Hence it is
 

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1	mortal mind, not matter, which says, "I die." Heat
  	would pass from the body as painlessly as gas dissipates
 3	into the air when it evaporates but for the belief that in-
  	flammation and pain must accompany the separation of
  	heat from the body. 
 6	    Chills and heat are often the form in which fever mani-
  	fests itself. Change the mental state, and the chills and
  	fever disappear. The old-school physician	Science
 9	proves this when his patient says, "I am better,"	versus
  	but the patient believes that matter, not mind,	hypnotism 
  	has helped him. The Christian Scientist demonstrates
12	that divine Mind heals, while the hypnotist dispossesses
  	the patient of his individuality in order to control him. 
  	No person is benefited by yielding his mentality to any
15	mental despotism or malpractice. All unscientific mental
  	practice is erroneous and powerless, and should be under-
  	stood and so rendered fruitless. The genuine Christian
18	Scientist is adding to his patient's mental and moral power,
  	and is increasing his patient's spirituality while restoring
  	him physically through divine Love. 
21	    Palsy is a belief that matter governs mortals, and can
  	paralyze the body, making certain portions of	Cure for
  	it motionless. Destroy the belief, show mortal	palsy 
24	mind that muscles have no power to be lost, for Mind is
  	supreme, and you cure the palsy. 
  	    Consumptive patients always show great hopeful-
27	ness and courage, even when they are supposed to be in
  	hopeless danger. This state of mind seems	Latent fear
  	anomalous except to the expert in Christian	diagnosed 
30	Science. This mental state is not understood, simply
  	because it is a stage of fear so excessive that it amounts
  	to fortitude. The belief in consumption presents to mor-
 

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 1	tal thought a hopeless state, an image more terrifying than
  	that of most other diseases. The patient turns involun-
 3	tarily from the contemplation of it, but though unacknowl-
  	edged, the latent fear and the despair of recovery remain
  	in thought. 
 6	    Just so is it with the greatest sin. It is the most subtle,
  	and does its work almost self-deceived. The diseases
  	deemed dangerous sometimes come from the	Insidious
 9	most hidden, undefined, and insidious beliefs. 	concepts 
  	The pallid invalid, whom you declare to be wasting away
  	with consumption of the blood, should be told that blood
12	never gave life and can never take it away, — that Life is
  	Spirit, and that there is more life and immortality in one
  	good motive and act, than in all the blood which ever
15	flowed through mortal veins and simulated a corporeal
  	sense of life. 
  	    If the body is material, it cannot, for that very reason,
18	suffer with a fever. Because the so-called material body
  	is a mental concept and governed by mortal	Remedy
  	mind, it manifests only what that so-called	for fever 
21	mind expresses. Therefore the efficient remedy is to
  	destroy the patient's false belief by both silently and au-
  	dibly arguing the true facts in regard to harmonious
24	being, — representing man as healthy instead of diseased,
  	and showing that it is impossible for matter to suffer, to
  	feel pain or heat, to be thirsty or sick. Destroy fear,
27	and you end fever. Some people, mistaught as to Mind-
  	science, inquire when it will be safe to check a fever. 
  	Know that in Science you cannot check a fever after ad-
30	mitting that it must have its course. To fear and admit
  	the power of disease, is to paralyze mental and scientific
  	demonstration. 
 

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 1	    If your patient believes in taking cold, mentally con-
  	vince him that matter cannot take cold, and that thought
 3	governs this liability. If grief causes suffering, convince
  	the sufferer that affliction is often the source of joy, and
  	that he should rejoice always in ever-present Love. 
 6	    Invalids flee to tropical climates in order to save their
  	lives, but they come back no better than when they went
  	away. Then is the time to cure them through	Climate
 9	Christian Science, and prove that they can	harmless 
  	be healthy in all climates, when their fear of climate is
  	exterminated. 
12	    Through different states of mind, the body becomes
  	suddenly weak or abnormally strong, showing mortal
  	mind to be the producer of strength or weak-	Mind
15	ness. A sudden joy or grief has caused what	governs body 
  	is termed instantaneous death. Because a belief origi-
  	nates unseen, the mental state should be continually
18	watched that it may not produce blindly its bad effects. 
  	The author never knew a patient who did not recover
  	when the belief of the disease had gone. Remove the
21	leading error or governing fear of this lower so-called mind,
  	and you remove the cause of all disease as well as the mor-
  	bid or excited action of any organ. You also remove in
24	this way what are termed organic diseases as readily as
  	functional difficulties. 
  	    The cause of all so-called disease is mental, a mortal
27	fear, a mistaken belief or conviction of the necessity and
  	power of ill-health; also a fear that Mind is helpless to
  	defend the life of man and incompetent to control it. With-
30	out this ignorant human belief, any circumstance is of it-
  	self powerless to produce suffering. It is latent belief in
  	disease, as well as the fear of disease, which associates sick-
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            378


 1	ness with certain circumstances and causes the two to
  	appear conjoined, even as poetry and music are repro-
 3	duced in union by human memory. Disease has no in-
  	telligence. Unwittingly you sentence yourself to suffer. 
  	The understanding of this will enable you to commute this
 6	self-sentence, and meet every circumstance with truth. 
  	Disease is less than mind, and Mind can control it. 
  	    Without the so-called human mind, there can be no
 9	inflammatory nor torpid action of the system. Remove
  	the error, and you destroy its effects. By	Latent
  	looking a tiger fearlessly in the eye, Sir Charles	power 
12	Napier sent it cowering back into the jungle. An ani-
  	mal may infuriate another by looking it in the eye, and
  	both will fight for nothing. A man's gaze, fastened
15	fearlessly on a ferocious beast, often causes the beast to
  	retreat in terror. This latter occurrence represents the
  	power of Truth over error, — the might of intelligence
18	exercised over mortal beliefs to destroy them; whereas
  	hypnotism and hygienic drilling and drugging, adopted
  	to cure matter, is represented by two material erroneous
21	bases. 
  	    Disease is not an intelligence to dispute the empire of
  	Mind or to dethrone Mind and take the government into
24	its own hands. Sickness is not a God-given,	Disease
  	nor a self-constituted material power, which	powerless 
  	copes astutely with Mind and finally conquers it. God
27	never endowed matter with power to disable Life or to
  	chill harmony with a long and cold night of discord. 
  	Such a power, without the divine permission, is incon-
30	ceivable; and if such a power could be divinely directed,
  	it would manifest less wisdom than we usually find dis-
  	played in human governments. 
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            379


 1	    If disease can attack and control the body without
  	the consent of mortals, sin can do the same, for both
 3	are errors, announced as partners in the be-	Jurisdiction
  	ginning. The Christian Scientist finds only	of Mind 
  	effects, where the ordinary physician looks for causes. 
 6	The real jurisdiction of the world is in Mind, controlling
  	every effect and recognizing all causation as vested in
  	divine Mind. 
 9	    A felon, on whom certain English students experi-
  	mented, fancied himself bleeding to death, and died be-
  	cause of that belief, when only a stream of	Power of
12	warm water was trickling over his arm. Had	imagination 
  	he known his sense of bleeding was an illusion, he would
  	have risen above the false belief. Let the despairing in-
15	valid, inspecting the hue of her blood on a cambric hand-
  	kerchief, think of the experiment of those Oxford boys,
  	who caused the death of a man, when not a drop of his
18	blood was shed. Then let her learn the opposite state-
  	ment of Life as taught in Christian Science, and she will
  	understand that she is not dying on account of the state of
21	her blood, but is suffering from her belief that blood is
  	destroying her life. The so-called vital current does not
  	affect the invalid's health, but her belief produces the
24	very results she dreads. 
  	    Fevers are errors of various types. The quickened
  	pulse, coated tongue, febrile heat, dry skin, pain in the
27	head and limbs, are pictures drawn on the	Fevers the
  	body by a mortal mind. The images, held in	effect of fear 
  	this disturbed mind, frighten conscious thought. Unless
30	the fever-picture, drawn by millions of mortals and im-
  	aged on the body through the belief that mind is in matter
  	and discord is as real as harmony, is destroyed through
  

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            380


1	Science, it may rest at length on some receptive thought,
  	and become a fever case, which ends in a belief called
 3	death, which belief must be finally conquered by eternal
  	Life. Truth is always the victor. Sickness and sin fall
  	by their own weight. Truth is the rock of ages, the head-
 6	stone of the corner, "but on whomsoever it shall fall, it
  	will grind him to powder." 
  	    Contending for the evidence or indulging the demands
 9	of sin, disease, or death, we virtually contend against
  	the control of Mind over body, and deny the	Misdirected
  	power of Mind to heal. This false method	contention 
12	is as though the defendant should argue for the plaintiff
  	in favor of a decision which the defendant knows will
  	be turned against himself. 
15	    The physical effects of fear illustrate its illusion. Gaz-
  	ing at a chained lion, crouched for a spring, should not
  	terrify a man. The body is affected only with	Benefits of
18	the belief of disease produced by a so-called	metaphysics 
  	mind ignorant of the truth which chains disease. Noth-
  	ing but the power of Truth can prevent the fear of
21	error, and prove man's dominion over error. 
  	    Many years ago the author made a spiritual discov-
  	ery, the scientific evidence of which has accumulated to
24	prove that the divine Mind produces in man	A higher
  	health, harmony, and immortality. Gradu-	discovery 
  	ally this evidence will gather momentum and clearness,
27	until it reaches its culmination of scientific statement and
  	proof. Nothing is more disheartening than to believe
  	that there is a power opposite to God, or good, and that
30	God endows this opposing power with strength to be used
  	against Himself, against Life, health, harmony. 
  	    Every law of matter or the body, supposed to govern
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            381


 1	man, is rendered null and void by the law of Life, God. 
  	Ignorant of our God-given rights, we submit to unjust
 3	decrees, and the bias of education enforces	Ignorance
  	this slavery. Be no more willing to suffer the	of our rights 
  	illusion that you are sick or that some disease is develop-
 6	ing in the system, than you are to yield to a sinful temp-
  	tation on the ground that sin has its necessities. 
  	    When infringing some supposed law, you say that
 9	there is danger. This fear is the danger and induces the
  	physical effects. We cannot in reality suffer	No laws
  	from breaking anything except a moral or	of matter 
12	spiritual law. The so-called laws of mortal belief are
  	destroyed by the understanding that Soul is immortal,
  	and that mortal mind cannot legislate the times, periods,
15	and types of disease, with which mortals die. God is the
  	lawmaker, but He is not the author of barbarous codes. 
  	In infinite Life and Love there is no sickness, sin, nor
18	death, and the Scriptures declare that we live, move, and
  	have our being in the infinite God. 
  	    Think less of the enactments of mortal mind, and you
21	will sooner grasp man's God-given dominion. You must
  	understand your way out of human theories	God-given
  	relating to health, or you will never believe	dominion 
24	that you are quite free from some ailment. The har-
  	mony and immortality of man will never be reached
  	without the understanding that Mind is not in matter. 
27	Let us banish sickness as an outlaw, and abide by the
  	rule of perpetual harmony, — God's law. It is man's
  	moral right to annul an unjust sentence, a sentence never
30	inflicted by divine authority. 
  	    Christ Jesus overruled the error which would impose
  	penalties for transgressions of the physical laws of  

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            382


1	health; he annulled supposed laws of matter, opposed
  	to the harmonies of Spirit, lacking divine au-	Begin
 3	thority and having only human approval for	rightly 
  	their sanction. 
  	    If half the attention given to hygiene were given to the
 6	study of Christian Science and to the spiritualization of
  	thought, this alone would usher in the millen-	Hygiene
  	nium. Constant bathing and rubbing to alter	excessive 
 9	the secretions or to remove unhealthy exhalations from
  	the cuticle receive a useful rebuke from Jesus' precept,
  	"Take no thought . . . for the body." We must beware
12	of making clean merely the outside of the platter. 
  	    He, who is ignorant of what is termed hygienic law, is
  	more receptive of spiritual power and of faith in one
15	God, than is the devotee of supposed hygienic	Blissful
  	law, who comes to teach the so-called igno-	ignorance 
  	rant one. Must we not then consider the so-called law
18	of matter a canon "more honored in the breach than
  	the observance"? A patient thoroughly booked in medi-
  	cal theories is more difficult to heal through Mind than
21	one who is not. This verifies the saying of our Master:
  	"Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a
  	little child, shall in no wise enter therein." 
24	    One whom I rescued from seeming spiritual oblivion,
  	in which the senses had engulfed him, wrote to me: "I
  	should have died, but for the glorious Principle you teach,
27	 — supporting the power of Mind over the body and show-
  	ing me the nothingness of the so-called pleasures and pains
  	of sense. The treatises I had read and the medicines I
30	had taken only abandoned me to more hopeless suffering
  	and despair. Adherence to hygiene was useless. Mortal
  	mind needed to be set right. The ailment was not bodily,
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            383


 1	but mental, and I was cured when I learned my way in
  	Christian Science." 
 3	    We need a clean body and a clean mind, — a body
  	rendered pure by Mind as well as washed by water. 
  	One says: "I take good care of my body." 	A clean mind
 6	To do this, the pure and exalting influence of	and body 
  	the divine Mind on the body is requisite, and the Christian
  	Scientist takes the best care of his body when he leaves
 9	it most out of his thought, and, like the Apostle Paul, is
  	"willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be pres-
  	ent with the Lord." 
12	    A hint may be taken from the emigrant, whose filth
  	does not affect his happiness, because mind and body
  	rest on the same basis. To the mind equally gross, dirt
15	gives no uneasiness. It is the native element of such a
  	mind, which is symbolized, and not chafed, by its sur-
  	roundings; but impurity and uncleanliness, which do
18	not trouble the gross, could not be borne by the refined. 
  	This shows that the mind must be clean to keep the body
  	in proper condition. 
21	    The tobacco-user, eating or smoking poison for half a
  	century, sometimes tells you that the weed preserves
  	his health, but does this make it so? Does his	Beliefs
24	assertion prove the use of tobacco to be a salu-	illusive 
  	brious habit, and man to be the better for it? Such in-
  	stances only prove the illusive physical effect of a false
27	belief, confirming the Scriptural conclusion concerning a
  	man, "As he thinketh in his heart, so is he." 
  	    The movement-cure — pinching and pounding the poor
30	body, to make it sensibly well when it ought to be in-
  	sensibly so — is another medical mistake, resulting from
  	the common notion that health depends on inert matter
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            384


 1	instead of on Mind. Can matter, or what is termed
  	matter, either feel or act without mind? 
 3	    We should relieve our minds from the depressing thought
  	that we have transgressed a material law and must of
  	necessity pay the penalty. Let us reassure	Corporeal
 6	ourselves with the law of Love. God never	penalties 
  	punishes man for doing right, for honest labor, or for
  	deeds of kindness, though they expose him to fatigue,
 9	cold, heat, contagion. If man seems to incur the penalty
  	through matter, this is but a belief of mortal mind, not
  	an enactment of wisdom, and man has only to enter his
12	protest against this belief in order to annul it. Through
  	this action of thought and its results upon the body, the
  	student will prove to himself, by small beginnings, the
15	grand verities of Christian Science. 
  	    If exposure to a draught of air while in a state of
  	perspiration is followed by chills, dry cough, influenza,
18	congestive symptoms in the lungs, or hints of	Not matter,
  	inflammatory rheumatism, your Mind-remedy	but Mind 
  	is safe and sure. If you are a Christian Scientist, such
21	symptoms are not apt to follow exposure; but if you
  	believe in laws of matter and their fatal effects when
  	transgressed, you are not fit to conduct your own case or
24	to destroy the bad effects of your belief. When the fear
  	subsides and the conviction abides that you have broken
  	no law, neither rheumatism, consumption, nor any other
27	disease will ever result from exposure to the weather. In
  	Science this is an established fact which all the evidence
  	before the senses can never overrule. 
30	    Sickness, sin, and death must at length quail before
  	the divine rights of intelligence, and then the power
  	of Mind over the entire functions and organs of the
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            385


 1	human system will be acknowledged. It is proverbial
  	that Florence Nightingale and other philanthropists en-
 3	gaged in humane labors have been able to	Benefit of
  	undergo without sinking fatigues and expo-	philanthropy 
  	sures which ordinary people could not endure. The ex-
 6	planation lies in the support which they derived from
  	the divine law, rising above the human. The spiritual
  	demand, quelling the material, supplies energy and en-
 9	durance surpassing all other aids, and forestalls the
  	penalty which our beliefs would attach to our best
  	deeds. Let us remember that the eternal law of right,
12	though it can never annul the law which makes sin its
  	own executioner, exempts man from all penalties but
  	those due for wrong-doing. 
15	    Constant toil, deprivations, exposures, and all untow-
  	ard conditions, if without sin, can be experienced with-
  	out suffering. Whatever it is your duty to do,	Honest toil
18	you can do without harm to yourself. If you	has no
  	sprain the muscles or wound the flesh, your	penalty 
  	remedy is at hand. Mind decides whether or not the
21	flesh shall be discolored, painful, swollen, and inflamed. 
  	    You say that you have not slept well or have overeaten. 
  	You are a law unto yourself. Saying this and believing
24	it, you will suffer in proportion to your belief	Our sleep
  	and fear. Your sufferings are not the penalty	and food 
  	for having broken a law of matter, for it is a law of mortal
27	mind which you have disobeyed. You say or think, be-
  	cause you have partaken of salt fish, that you must be
  	thirsty, and you are thirsty accordingly, while the oppo-
30	site belief would produce the opposite result. 
  	    Any supposed information, coming from the body or
  	from inert matter as if either were intelligent, is an illu-
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            386


 1	sion of mortal mind, — one of its dreams. Realize that
  	the evidence of the senses is not to be accepted	Doubtful
 3	in the case of sickness, any more than it is in	evidence 
  	the case of sin. 
  	    Expose the body to certain temperatures, and belief
 6	says that you may catch cold and have catarrh; but no
  	such result occurs without mind to demand	Climate
  	it and produce it. So long as mortals declare	and belief 
 9	that certain states of the atmosphere produce catarrh,
  	fever, rheumatism, or consumption, those effects will
  	follow, — not because of the climate, but on account of
12	the belief. The author has in too many instances healed
  	disease through the action of Truth on the minds of mor-
  	tals, and the corresponding effects of Truth on the body,
15	not to know that this is so. 
  	    A blundering despatch, mistakenly announcing the
  	death of a friend, occasions the same grief that the friend's
18	real death would bring. You think that your	Erroneous
  	anguish is occasioned by your loss. Another	despatch 
  	despatch, correcting the mistake, heals your grief, and
21	you learn that your suffering was merely the result of
  	your belief. Thus it is with all sorrow, sickness, and
  	death. You will learn at length that there is no cause
24	for grief, and divine wisdom will then be understood. 
  	Error, not Truth, produces all the suffering on earth. 
  	    If a Christian Scientist had said, while you were labor-
27	ing under the influence of the belief of grief, "Your sor-
  	row is without cause," you would not have	Mourning
  	understood him, although the correctness of	causeless 
30	the assertion might afterwards be proved to you. So,
  	when our friends pass from our sight and we lament,
  	that lamentation is needless and causeless. We shall
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            387


 1	perceive this to be true when we grow into the under-
  	standing of Life, and know that there is no death. 
 3	    Because mortal mind is kept active, must it pay the
  	penalty in a softened brain? Who dares to say that actual
  	Mind can be overworked? When we reach	Mind heals
 6	our limits of mental endurance, we conclude	brain-disease 
  	that intellectual labor has been carried sufficiently far;
  	but when we realize that immortal Mind is ever active,
 9	and that spiritual energies can neither wear out nor can
  	so-called material law trespass upon God-given powers
  	and resources, we are able to rest in Truth, refreshed by
12	the assurances of immortality, opposed to mortality. 
  	    Our thinkers do not die early because they faithfully
  	perform the natural functions of being. If printers and
15	authors have the shortest span of earthly ex-	Right never
  	istence, it is not because they occupy the most	punishable 
  	important posts and perform the most vital functions in
18	society. That man does not pay the severest penalty
  	who does the most good. By adhering to the realities of
  	eternal existence, — instead of reading disquisitions on
21	the inconsistent supposition that death comes in obedience
  	to the law of life, and that God punishes man for doing
  	good, — one cannot suffer as the result of any labor of
24	love, but grows stronger because of it. It is a law of so-
  	called mortal mind, misnamed matter, which causes all
  	things discordant. 
27	    The history of Christianity furnishes sublime proofs
  	of the supporting influence and protecting power bestowed
  	on man by his heavenly Father, omnipotent	Christian
30	Mind, who gives man faith and understanding	history 
  	whereby to defend himself, not only from temptation, but
  	from bodily suffering. 
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            388


 1	    The Christian martyrs were prophets of Christian
  	Science. Through the uplifting and consecrating power
 3	of divine Truth, they obtained a victory over the corpo-
  	real senses, a victory which Science alone can explain. 
  	Stolidity, which is a resisting state of mortal mind, suffers
 6	less, only because it knows less of material law. 
  	    The Apostle John testified to the divine basis of Chris-
  	tian Science, when dire inflictions failed to destroy his
 9	body. Idolaters, believing in more than one mind, had
  	"gods many," and thought that they could kill the body
  	with matter, independently of mind. 
12	    Admit the common hypothesis that food is the nutri-
  	ment of life, and there follows the necessity for another
  	admission in the opposite direction, — that	Sustenance
15	food has power to destroy Life, God, through	spiritual 
  	a deficiency or an excess, a quality or a quantity. This
  	is a specimen of the ambiguous nature of all material
18	health-theories. They are self-contradictory and self-de-
  	structive, constituting a "kingdom divided against itself,"
  	which is "brought to desolation." If food was prepared
21	by Jesus for his disciples, it cannot destroy life. 
  	    The fact is, food does not affect the absolute Life of
  	man, and this becomes self-evident, when we learn that
24	God is our Life. Because sin and sickness are	God
  	not qualities of Soul, or Life, we have hope in	sustains man 
  	immortality; but it would be foolish to venture beyond
27	our present understanding, foolish to stop eating until
  	we gain perfection and a clear comprehension of the living
  	Spirit. In that perfect day of understanding, we shall
30	neither eat to live nor live to eat. 
  	    If mortals think that food disturbs the harmonious
  	functions of mind and body, either the food or this thought
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            389


 1	must be dispensed with, for the penalty is coupled with
  	the belief. Which shall it be? If this decision be left
 3	to Christian Science, it will be given in behalf	Diet and
  	of the control of Mind over this belief and every	digestion 
  	erroneous belief, or material condition. The less we
 6	know or think about hygiene, the less we are predisposed
  	to sickness. Recollect that it is not the nerves, not mat-
  	ter, but mortal mind, which reports food as undigested. 
 9	Matter does not inform you of bodily derangements; it
  	is supposed to do so. This pseudo-mental testimony can
  	be destroyed only by the better results of Mind's oppo-
12	site evidence. 
  	    Our dietetic theories first admit that food sustains the
  	life of man, and then discuss the certainty that food can
15	kill man. This false reasoning is rebuked in	Scripture
  	Scripture by the metaphors about the fount	rebukes 
  	and stream, the tree and its fruit, and the kingdom di-
18	vided against itself. If God has, as prevalent theories
  	maintain, instituted laws that food shall support human
  	life, He cannot annul these regulations by an opposite
21	law that food shall be inimical to existence. 
  	    Materialists contradict their own statements. Their
  	belief in material laws and in penalties for their infrac-
24	tion is the ancient error that there is fraternity	Ancient
  	between pain and pleasure, good and evil, God	confusion 
  	and Satan. This belief totters to its falling before the
27	battle-axe of Science. 
  	    A case of convulsions, produced by indigestion, came
  	under my observation. In her belief the woman had
30	chronic liver-complaint, and was then suffering from a
  	complication of symptoms connected with this belief. I
  	cured her in a few minutes. One instant she spoke de-
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            390


 1	spairingly of herself. The next minute she said, "My
  	food is all digested, and I should like something more
 3	to eat." 
  	    We cannot deny that Life is self-sustained, and we
  	should never deny the everlasting harmony of Soul, sim-
 6	ply because, to the mortal senses, there is seem-	Ultimate
  	ing discord. It is our ignorance of God, the	harmony 
  	divine Principle, which produces apparent discord, and
 9	the right understanding of Him restores harmony. Truth
  	will at length compel us all to exchange the pleasures and
  	pains of sense for the joys of Soul. 
12	    When the first symptoms of disease appear, dispute the
  	testimony of the material senses with divine Science. Let
  	your higher sense of justice destroy the false	Unnecessary
15	process of mortal opinions which you name	prostration 
  	law, and then you will not be confined to a sick-room nor
  	laid upon a bed of suffering in payment of the last far-
18	thing, the last penalty demanded by error. "Agree with
  	thine adversary quickly, whiles thou art in the way with
  	him." Suffer no claim of sin or of sickness to grow upon
21	the thought. Dismiss it with an abiding conviction that
  	it is illegitimate, because you know that God is no more
  	the author of sickness than He is of sin. You have no
24	law of His to support the necessity either of sin or sick-
  	ness, but you have divine authority for denying that neces-
  	sity and healing the sick. 
27	    "Agree to disagree" with approaching symptoms of
  	chronic or acute disease, whether it is cancer, consump-
  	tion, or smallpox. Meet the incipient stages	Treatment
30	of disease with as powerful mental opposi-	of disease 
  	tion as a legislator would employ to defeat the passage of
  	an inhuman law. Rise in the conscious strength of the
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            391


 1	spirit of Truth to overthrow the plea of mortal mind,
  	alias matter, arrayed against the supremacy of Spirit. 
 3	Blot out the images of mortal thought and its beliefs in
  	sickness and sin. Then, when thou art delivered to the
  	judgment of Truth, Christ, the judge will say, "Thou
 6	art whole!" 
  	    Instead of blind and calm submission to the incipient
  	or advanced stages of disease, rise in rebellion against
 9	them. Banish the belief that you can possi-	Righteous
  	bly entertain a single intruding pain which can-	rebellion 
  	not be ruled out by the might of Mind, and in this way
12	you can prevent the development of pain in the body. 
  	No law of God hinders this result. It is error to suffer
  	for aught but your own sins. Christ, or Truth, will de-
15	stroy all other supposed suffering, and real suffering for
  	your own sins will cease in proportion as the sin ceases. 
  	    Justice is the moral signification of law. Injustice de-
18	clares the absence of law. When the body is supposed
  	to say, "I am sick," never plead guilty. Since	Contradict
  	matter cannot talk, it must be mortal mind	error 
21	which speaks; therefore meet the intimation with a pro-
  	test. If you say, "I am sick," you plead guilty. Then
  	your adversary will deliver you to the judge (mortal
24	mind), and the judge will sentence you. Disease has
  	no intelligence to declare itself something and announce
  	its name. Mortal mind alone sentences itself. Therefore
27	make your own terms with sickness, and be just to yourself
  	and to others. 
  	    Mentally contradict every complaint from the body,
30	and rise to the true consciousness of Life as	Sin to be
  	Love, — as all that is pure, and bearing the	overcome 
  	fruits of Spirit. Fear is the fountain of sickness,
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            392


 1	and you master fear and sin through divine Mind; hence
  	it is through divine Mind that you overcome disease. 
 3	Only while fear or sin remains can it bring forth death. 
  	To cure a bodily ailment, every broken moral law should
  	be taken into account and the error be rebuked. Fear,
 6	which is an element of all disease, must be cast out to
  	readjust the balance for God. Casting out evil and fear
  	enables truth to outweigh error. The only course is to
 9	take antagonistic grounds against all that is opposed to
  	the health, holiness, and harmony of man, God's image. 
  	    The physical affirmation of disease should always be
12	met with the mental negation. Whatever benefit is pro-
  	duced on the body, must be expressed men-	Illusions
  	tally, and thought should be held fast to this	about nerves 
15	ideal. If you believe in inflamed and weak nerves, you
  	are liable to an attack from that source. You will call it
  	neuralgia, but we call it a belief. If you think that con-
18	sumption is hereditary in your family, you are liable to
  	the development of that thought in the form of what is
  	termed pulmonary disease, unless Science shows you
21	otherwise. If you decide that climate or atmosphere is
  	unhealthy, it will be so to you. Your decisions will mas-
  	ter you, whichever direction they take. 
24	    Reverse the case. Stand porter at the door of thought. 
  	Admitting only such conclusions as you wish realized in
  	bodily results, you will control yourself har-	Guarding
27	moniously. When the condition is present	the door 
  	which you say induces disease, whether it be air, exercise,
  	heredity, contagion, or accident, then perform your office
30	as porter and shut out these unhealthy thoughts and fears. 
  	Exclude from mortal mind the offending errors; then the
  	body cannot suffer from them. The issues of pain or
  

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            393


1	pleasure must come through mind, and like a watchman
  	forsaking his post, we admit the intruding belief, forget-
 3	ting that through divine help we can forbid this entrance. 
  	    The body seems to be self-acting, only because mortal
  	mind is ignorant of itself, of its own actions, and of their
 6	results, — ignorant that the predisposing, re-	The strength
  	mote, and exciting cause of all bad effects is a	of Spirit 
  	law of so-called mortal mind, not of matter. Mind is the
 9	master of the corporeal senses, and can conquer sickness,
  	sin, and death. Exercise this God-given authority. Take
  	possession of your body, and govern its feeling and action. 
12	Rise in the strength of Spirit to resist all that is unlike
  	good. God has made man capable of this, and nothing
  	can vitiate the ability and power divinely bestowed on
15	man. 
  	    Be firm in your understanding that the divine Mind
  	governs, and that in Science man reflects God's govern-
18	ment. Have no fear that matter can ache,	No pain
  	swell, and be inflamed as the result of a law	in matter 
  	of any kind, when it is self-evident that matter can have
21	no pain nor inflammation. Your body would suffer no
  	more from tension or wounds than the trunk of a tree
  	which you gash or the electric wire which you stretch,
24	were it not for mortal mind. 
  	    When Jesus declares that "the light of the body is the
  	eye," he certainly means that light depends upon Mind,
27	not upon the complex humors, lenses, muscles, the iris
  	and pupil, constituting the visual organism. 
  	    Man is never sick, for Mind is not sick and matter
30	cannot be. A false belief is both the tempter	No real
  	and the tempted, the sin and the sinner, the	disease 
  	disease and its cause. It is well to be calm in sickness;
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            394


 1	to be hopeful is still better; but to understand that sick-
  	ness is not real and that Truth can destroy its seeming
 3	reality, is best of all, for this understanding is the uni-
  	versal and perfect remedy. 
  	    By conceding power to discord, a large majority of
 6	doctors depress mental energy, which is the only real
  	recuperative power. Knowledge that we	Recuperation
  	can accomplish the good we hope for, stimu-	mental 
 9	lates the system to act in the direction which Mind points
  	out. The admission that any bodily condition is beyond
  	the control of Mind disarms man, prevents him from
12	helping himself, and enthrones matter through error. To
  	those struggling with sickness, such admissions are dis-
  	couraging, — as much so as would be the advice to a man
15	who is down in the world, that he should not try to rise
  	above his difficulties. 
  	    Experience has proved to the author the fallacy of
18	material systems in general, — that their theories are
  	sometimes pernicious, and that their denials are better
  	than their affirmations. Will you bid a man let evils
21	overcome him, assuring him that all misfortunes are from
  	God, against whom mortals should not contend? Will
  	you tell the sick that their condition is hopeless, unless it
24	can be aided by a drug or climate? Are material means
  	the only refuge from fatal chances? Is there no divine
  	permission to conquer discord of every kind with harmony,
27	with Truth and Love? 
  	    We should remember that Life is God, and that God
  	is omnipotent. Not understanding Christian	Arguing
30	Science, the sick usually have little faith in	wrongly 
  	it till they feel its beneficent influence. This shows
  	that faith is not the healer in such cases. The sick
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            395


 1	unconsciously argue for suffering, instead of against it. 
  	They admit its reality, whereas they should deny it. 
 3	They should plead in opposition to the testimony of the
  	deceitful senses, and maintain man's immortality and
  	eternal likeness to God. 
 6	    Like the great Exemplar, the healer should speak to
  	disease as one having authority over it, leaving Soul to
  	master the false evidences of the corporeal	Divine
 9	senses and to assert its claims over mortal-	authority 
  	ity and disease. The same Principle cures both sin and
  	sickness. When divine Science overcomes faith in a car-
12	nal mind, and faith in God destroys all faith in sin and in
  	material methods of healing, then sin, disease, and death
  	will disappear. 
15	    Prayers, in which God is not asked to heal but is be-
  	sought to take the patient to Himself, do not benefit the
  	sick. An ill-tempered, complaining, or deceit-	Aids in
18	ful person should not be a nurse. The nurse	sickness 
  	should be cheerful, orderly, punctual, patient, full of
  	faith, — receptive to Truth and Love. 
21	    It is mental quackery to make disease a reality — to
  	hold it as something seen and felt — and then to attempt
  	its cure through Mind. It is no less erroneous	Mental
24	to believe in the real existence of a tumor, a	quackery 
  	cancer, or decayed lungs, while you argue against their
  	reality, than it is for your patient to feel these ills in
27	physical belief. Mental practice, which holds disease
  	as a reality, fastens disease on the patient, and it may
  	appear in a more alarming form. 
30	    The knowledge that brain-lobes cannot kill a man nor
  	affect the functions of mind would prevent the brain from
  	becoming diseased, though a moral offence is indeed the
 
      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            396

 1	worst of diseases. One should never hold in mind
  	the thought of disease, but should efface from	Effacing
 3	thought all forms and types of disease, both for	images of
  	one's own sake and for that of the patient. 	disease 
  	    Avoid talking illness to the patient. Make no unne-
 6	cessary inquiries relative to feelings or disease. Never
  	startle with a discouraging remark about re-	Avoid talking
  	covery, nor draw attention to certain symp-	disease 
 9	toms as unfavorable, avoid speaking aloud the name of
  	the disease. Never say beforehand how much you have
  	to contend with in a case, nor encourage in the patient's
12	thought the expectation of growing worse before a crisis
  	is passed. 
  	    The refutation of the testimony of material sense is
15	not a difficult task in view of the conceded falsity of this
  	testimony. The refutation becomes arduous,	False testimony
  	not because the testimony of sin or disease is	refuted 
18	true, but solely on account of the tenacity of belief in its
  	truth, due to the force of education and the overwhelm-
  	ing weight of opinions on the wrong side, — all teaching
21	that the body suffers, as if matter could have sensation. 
  	    At the right time explain to the sick the power which
  	their beliefs exercise over their bodies. Give them divine
24	and wholesome understanding, with which to	Healthful
  	combat their erroneous sense, and so efface the	explanation 
  	images of sickness from mortal mind. Keep distinctly in
27	thought that man is the offspring of God, not of man;
  	that man is spiritual, not material; that Soul is Spirit,
  	outside of matter, never in it, never giving the body life
30	and sensation. It breaks the dream of disease to under-
  	stand that sickness is formed by the human mind, not by
  	matter nor by the divine Mind. 
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            397


 1	    By not perceiving vital metaphysical points, not seeing
  	how mortal mind affects the body, — acting beneficially
 3	or injuriously on the health, as well as on the	Misleading
  	morals and the happiness of mortals, — we are	methods 
  	misled in our conclusions and methods. We throw the
 6	mental influence on the wrong side, thereby actually in-
  	juring those whom we mean to bless. 
  	    Suffering is no less a mental condition than is enjoy-
 9	ment. You cause bodily sufferings and increase them
  	by admitting their reality and continuance,	Remedy for
  	as directly as you enhance your joys by be-	accidents 
12	lieving them to be real and continuous. When an ac-
  	cident happens, you think or exclaim, "I am hurt!" 
  	Your thought is more powerful than your words, more
15	powerful than the accident itself, to make the injury
  	real. 
  	    Now reverse the process. Declare that you are not hurt
18	and understand the reason why, and you will find the
  	ensuing good effects to be in exact proportion to your
  	disbelief in physics, and your fidelity to divine meta-
21	physics, confidence in God as All, which the Scriptures
  	declare Him to be. 
  	    To heal the sick, one must be familiar with the great
24	verities of being. Mortals are no more material in their
  	waking hours than when they act, walk, see,	Independent
  	hear, enjoy, or suffer in dreams. We can	mentality 
27	never treat mortal mind and matter separately, because
  	they combine as one. Give up the belief that mind
  	is, even temporarily, compressed within the skull, and
30	you will quickly become more manly or womanly. You
  	will understand yourself and your Maker better than
  	before. 
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            398


 1	    Sometimes Jesus called a disease by name, as when he
  	said to the epileptic boy, "Thou dumb and deaf spirit, I
 3	charge thee, come out of him, and enter no	Naming
  	more into him." It is added that "the spirit	maladies 
  	[error] cried, and rent him sore and came out of him, and
 6	he was as one dead," — clear evidence that the malady
  	was not material. These instances show the concessions
  	which Jesus was willing to make to the popular ignorance
 9	of spiritual Life-laws. Often he gave no name to the
  	distemper he cured. To the synagogue ruler's daughter,
  	whom they called dead but of whom he said, "she is not
12	dead, but sleepeth," he simply said, "Damsel, I say unto
  	thee, arise!" To the sufferer with the withered hand
  	he said, "Stretch forth thine hand," and it "was restored
15	whole, like as the other." 
  	    Homoeopathic remedies, sometimes not containing a
  	particle of medicine, are known to relieve the symptoms
18	of disease. What produces the change? It is	The action
  	the faith of the doctor and the patient, which	of faith 
  	reduces self-inflicted sufferings and produces a new effect
21	upon the body. In like manner destroy the illusion of
  	pleasure in intoxication, and the desire for strong drink
  	is gone. Appetite and disease reside in mortal mind, not
24	in matter. 
  	    So also faith, cooperating with a belief in the healing
  	effects of time and medication, will soothe fear and change
27	the belief of disease to a belief of health. Even a blind
  	faith removes bodily ailments for a season, but hypnotism
  	changes such ills into new and more difficult forms of dis-
30	ease. The Science of Mind must come to the rescue,
  	to work a radical cure. Then we understand the process. 
  	The great fact remains that evil is not mind. Evil has
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            399


 1	no power, no intelligence, for God is good, and therefore
  	good is infinite, is All. 
 3	    You say that certain material combinations produce
  	disease; but if the material body causes disease, can
  	matter cure what matter has caused? Mortal	Corporeal
 6	mind prescribes the drug, and administers it. 	combinations 
  	Mortal mind plans the exercise, and puts the body through
  	certain motions. No gastric gas accumulates, not a se-
 9	cretion nor combination can operate, apart from the
  	action of mortal thought, alias mortal mind. 
  	    So-called mortal mind sends its despatches over its
12	body, but this so-called mind is both the service and
  	message of this telegraphy. Nerves are un-	Automatic
  	able to talk, and matter can return no an-	mechanism 
15	swer to immortal Mind. If Mind is the only actor, how
  	can mechanism be automatic? Mortal mind perpetuates
  	its own thought. It constructs a machine, manages it,
18	and then calls it material. A mill at work or the action
  	of a water-wheel is but a derivative from, and continua-
  	tion of, the primitive mortal mind. Without this force
21	the body is devoid of action, and this deadness shows
  	that so-called mortal life is mortal mind, not matter. 
  	    Scientifically speaking, there is no mortal mind out of
24	which to make material beliefs, springing from illusion. 
  	This misnamed mind is not an entity. It is	Mental
  	only a false sense of matter, since matter is not	strength 
27	sensible. The one Mind, God, contains no mortal opin-
  	ions. All that is real is included in this immortal Mind. 
  	    Our Master asked: "How can one enter into a strong
30	man's house and spoil his goods, except he first	Confirmation
  	bind the strong man?" In other words:  How	in a parable 
  	can I heal the body, without beginning with so-called
  

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            400


1	mortal mind, which directly controls the body? When
  	disease is once destroyed in this so-called mind, the fear
 3	of disease is gone, and therefore the disease is thor-
  	oughly cured. Mortal mind is "the strong man," which
  	must be held in subjection before its influence upon health
 6	and morals can be removed. This error conquered, we
  	can despoil "the strong man" of his goods, — namely, of
  	sin and disease. 
 9	    Mortals obtain the harmony of health, only as they
  	forsake discord, acknowledge the supremacy of divine
  	Mind, and abandon their material beliefs. 	Eradicate
12	Eradicate the image of disease from the per-	error from
  	turbed thought before it has taken tangible	thought 
  	shape in conscious thought, alias the body, and you pre-
15	vent the development of disease. This task becomes easy,
  	if you understand that every disease is an error, and has
  	no character nor type, except what mortal mind assigns to
18	it. By lifting thought above error, or disease, and con-
  	tending persistently for truth, you destroy error. 
  	    When we remove disease by addressing the disturbed
21	mind, giving no heed to the body, we prove that thought
  	alone creates the suffering. Mortal mind	Mortal mind
  	rules all that is mortal. We see in the body	controlled 
24	the images of this mind, even as in optics we see painted
  	on the retina the image which becomes visible to the
  	senses. The action of so-called mortal mind must be
27	destroyed by the divine Mind to bring out the harmony
  	of being. Without divine control there is discord, mani-
  	fest as sin, sickness, and death. 
30	    The Scriptures plainly declare the baneful influence of
  	sinful thought on the body. Even our Master felt this. 
  	It is recorded that in certain localities he did not many
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            401


 1	mighty works "because of their unbelief" in Truth. Any
  	human error is its own enemy, and works against itself;
 3	it does nothing in the right direction and much	Mortal mind
  	in the wrong. If so-called mind is cherishing	not a healer 
  	evil passions and malicious purposes, it is not a healer,
 6	but it engenders disease and death. 
  	    If faith in the truth of being, which you impart men-
  	tally while destroying error, causes chemicalization (as
 9	when an alkali is destroying an acid), it is be-	Effect of
  	cause the truth of being must transform the	opposites 
  	error to the end of producing a higher manifestation. 
12	This fermentation should not aggravate the disease, but
  	should be as painless to man as to a fluid, since matter
  	has no sensation and mortal mind only feels and sees
15	materially. 
  	    What I term chemicalization is the upheaval produced
  	when immortal Truth is destroying erroneous mortal be-
18	lief. Mental chemicalization brings sin and sickness to
  	the surface, forcing impurities to pass away, as is the case
  	with a fermenting fluid. 
21	    The only effect produced by medicine is dependent upon
  	mental action. If the mind were parted from the body,
  	could you produce any effect upon the brain	Medicine
24	or body by applying the drug to either? Would	and brain 
  	the drug remove paralysis, affect organization, or restore
  	will and action to cerebrum and cerebellum? 
27	    Until the advancing age admits the efficacy and suprem-
  	acy of Mind, it is better for Christian Scientists to leave
  	surgery and the adjustment of broken bones	Skilful
30	and dislocations to the fingers of a surgeon,	surgery 
  	while the mental healer confines himself chiefly to mental
  	reconstruction and to the prevention of inflammation. 
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            402


 1	Christian Science is always the most skilful surgeon, but
  	surgery is the branch of its healing which will be last
 3	acknowledged. However, it is but just to say that the
  	author has already in her possession well-authenticated
  	records of the cure, by herself and her students through
 6	mental surgery alone, of broken bones, dislocated joints,
  	and spinal vertebrae. 
  	    The time approaches when mortal mind will forsake
 9	its corporeal, structural, and material basis, when im-
  	mortal Mind and its formations will be appre-	Indestructible
  	hended in Science, and material beliefs will	life of man 
12	not interfere with spiritual facts. Man is indestructible
  	and eternal. Sometime it will be learned that mortal
  	mind constructs the mortal body with this mind's own
15	mortal materials. In Science, no breakage nor dislocation
  	can really occur. You say that accidents, injuries, and
  	disease kill man, but this is not true. The life of man is
18	Mind. The material body manifests only what mortal
  	mind believes, whether it be a broken bone, disease, or sin. 
  	    We say that one human mind can influence another and
21	in this way affect the body, but we rarely remember that
  	we govern our own bodies. The error, mes-	The evil of
  	merism — or hypnotism, to use the recent term	mesmerism 
24	 — illustrates the fact just stated. The operator would
  	make his subjects believe that they cannot act voluntarily
  	and handle themselves as they should do. If they yield
27	to this influence, it is because their belief is not better
  	instructed by spiritual understanding. Hence the proof
  	that hypnotism is not scientific; Science cannot produce
30	both disorder and order. The involuntary pleasure or
  	pain of the person under hypnotic control is proved to be
  	a belief without a real cause. 
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            403


1	    So the sick through their beliefs have induced their own
  	diseased conditions. The great difference between vol-
 3	untary and involuntary mesmerism is that vol-	Wrong-doer
  	untary mesmerism is induced consciously and	should suffer 
  	should and does cause the perpetrator to suffer, while self-
 6	mesmerism is induced unconsciously and by his mistake
  	a man is often instructed. In the first instance it is under-
  	stood that the difficulty is a mental illusion, while in the
 9	second it is believed that the misfortune is a material effect. 
  	The human mind is employed to remove the illusion in
  	one case, but matter is appealed to in the other. In real-
12	ity, both have their origin in the human mind, and can be
  	healed only by the divine Mind. 
  	    You command the situation if you understand that
15	mortal existence is a state of self-deception and not the
  	truth of being. Mortal mind is constantly	Error's power
  	producing on mortal body the results of false	imaginary 
18	opinions; and it will continue to do so, until mortal
  	error is deprived of its imaginary powers by Truth,
  	which sweeps away the gossamer web of mortal illusion. 
21	The most Christian state is one of rectitude and spir-
  	itual understanding, and this is best adapted for heal-
  	ing the sick. Never conjure up some new discovery from
24	dark forebodings regarding disease and then acquaint
  	your patient with it. 
  	    The mortal so-called mind produces all that is unlike
27	the immortal Mind. The human mind determines the
  	nature of a case, and the practitioner improves	Disease-
  	or injures the case in proportion to the truth	production 
30	or error which influences his conclusions. The mental
  	conception and development of disease are not under-
  	stood by the patient, but the physician should be familiar
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            404


 1	with mental action and its effect in order to judge the case
  	according to Christian Science. 
 3	    If a man is an inebriate, a slave to tobacco, or the special
  	servant of any one of the myriad forms of sin, meet and
  	destroy these errors with the truth of being, — 	Appetites to
 6	by exhibiting to the wrong-doer the suffering	be abandoned 
  	which his submission to such habits brings, and by con-
  	vincing him that there is no real pleasure in false appe-
 9	tites. A corrupt mind is manifested in a corrupt body. 
  	Lust, malice, and all sorts of evil are diseased beliefs, and
  	you can destroy them only by destroying the wicked
12	motives which produce them. If the evil is over in the
  	repentant mortal mind, while its effects still remain on the
  	individual, you can remove this disorder as God's law is
15	fulfilled and reformation cancels the crime. The healthy
  	sinner is the hardened sinner. 
  	    The temperance reform, felt all over our land, results
18	from metaphysical healing, which cuts down every tree
  	that brings not forth good fruit. This con-	Temperance
  	viction, that there is no real pleasure in sin,	reform 
21	is one of the most important points in the theology of
  	Christian Science. Arouse the sinner to this new and
  	true view of sin, show him that sin confers no pleasure,
24	and this knowledge strengthens his moral courage and
  	increases his ability to master evil and to love good. 
  	    Healing the sick and reforming the sinner are one and
27	the same thing in Christian Science. Both cures require
  	the same method and are inseparable in Truth. 	Sin or fear
  	Hatred, envy, dishonesty, fear, and so forth,	the root of
30	make a man sick, and neither material medi-	sickness 
  	cine nor Mind can help him permanently, even in body,
  	unless it makes him better mentally, and so delivers him
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            405


 1	from his destroyers. The basic error is mortal mind. 
  	Hatred inflames the brutal propensities. The indulgence
 3	of evil motives and aims makes any man, who is above the
  	lowest type of manhood, a hopeless sufferer. 
  	    Christian Science commands man to master the pro-
 6	pensities, — to hold hatred in abeyance with kindness,
  	to conquer lust with chastity, revenge with	Mental
  	charity, and to overcome deceit with hon-	conspirators 
 9	esty. Choke these errors in their early stages, if you
  	would not cherish an army of conspirators against
  	health, happiness, and success. They will deliver you
12	to the judge, the arbiter of truth against error. The
  	judge will deliver you to justice, and the sentence of
  	the moral law will be executed upon mortal mind and
15	body. Both will be manacled until the last farthing
  	is paid, — until you have balanced your account with
  	God. "Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also
18	reap." The good man finally can overcome his fear of
  	sin. This is sin's necessity, — to destroy itself. Im-
  	mortal man demonstrates the government of God, good,
21	in which is no power to sin. 
  	    It were better to be exposed to every plague on earth
  	than to endure the cumulative effects of a guilty con-
24	science. The abiding consciousness of wrong-	Cumulative
  	doing tends to destroy the ability to do right. 	repentance 
  	If sin is not regretted and is not lessening, then it is
27	hastening on to physical and moral doom. You are con-
  	quered by the moral penalties you incur and the ills they
  	bring. The pains of sinful sense are less harmful than its
30	pleasures. Belief in material suffering causes mortals to
  	retreat from their error, to flee from body to Spirit, and
  	to appeal to divine sources outside of themselves. 
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            406


1	    The Bible contains the recipe for all healing. "The
  	leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations." 
 3	Sin and sickness are both healed by the same	The leaves
  	Principle. The tree is typical of man's divine	of healing 
  	Principle, which is equal to every emergency, offering
 6	full salvation from sin, sickness, and death. Sin will
  	submit to Christian Science when, in place of modes and
  	forms, the power of God is understood and demonstrated
 9	in the healing of mortals, both mind and body. "Per-
  	fect Love casteth out fear." 
  	    The Science of being unveils the errors of sense, and
12	spiritual perception, aided by Science, reaches Truth. 
  	Then error disappears. Sin and sickness will	Sickness
  	abate and seem less real as we approach the	will abate 
15	scientific period, in which mortal sense is subdued and
  	all that is unlike the true likeness disappears. The moral
  	man has no fear that he will commit a murder, and he
18	should be as fearless on the question of disease. 
  	    Resist evil — error of every sort — and it will flee from
  	you. Error is opposed to Life. We can, and ultimately
21	shall, so rise as to avail ourselves in every direc-	Resist to
  	tion of the supremacy of Truth over error, Life	the end 
  	over death, and good over evil, and this growth will go
24	on until we arrive at the fulness of God's idea, and no
  	more fear that we shall be sick and die. Inharmony of
  	any kind involves weakness and suffering, — a loss of
27	control over the body. 
  	    The depraved appetite for alcoholic drinks, tobacco,
  	tea, coffee, opium, is destroyed only by Mind's mastery
30	of the body. This normal control is gained	Morbid
  	through divine strength and understanding. 	cravings 
  	There is no enjoyment in getting drunk, in becoming a
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            407


 1	fool or an object of loathing; but there is a very sharp
  	remembrance of it, a suffering inconceivably terrible to
 3	man's self-respect. Puffing the obnoxious fumes of to-
  	bacco, or chewing a leaf naturally attractive to no crea-
  	ture except a loathsome worm, is at least disgusting. 
 6	    Man's  enslavement to the most relentless masters — 
  	passion, selfishness, envy, hatred, and revenge — is con-
  	quered only by a mighty struggle. Every	Universal
 9	hour of delay makes the struggle more severe. 	panacea 
  	If man is not victorious over the passions, they crush
  	out happiness, health, and manhood. Here Christian
12	Science is the sovereign panacea, giving strength to the
  	weakness of mortal mind, — strength from the immortal
  	and omnipotent Mind, — and lifting humanity above
15	itself into purer desires, even into spiritual power and
  	good-will to man. 
  	    Let the slave of wrong desire learn the lessons of Chris-
18	tian Science, and he will get the better of that desire,
  	and ascend a degree in the scale of health, happiness,
  	and existence. 
21	    If delusion says, "I have lost my memory," contra-
  	dict it. No faculty of Mind is lost. In Science, all
  	being is eternal, spiritual, perfect, harmoni-	Immortal
24	ous in every action. Let the perfect model be	memory 
  	present in your thoughts instead of its demoralized op-
  	posite. This spiritualization of thought lets in the light,
27	and brings the divine Mind, Life not death, into your
  	consciousness. 
  	    There are many species of insanity. All sin is insan-
30	ity in different degrees. Sin is spared from	Sin a form
  	this classification, only because its method of	of insanity 
  	madness is in consonance with common mortal belief. 
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            408


 1	Every sort of sickness is error, — that is, sickness is
  	loss of harmony. This view is not altered by the fact
 3	that sin is worse than sickness, and sickness is not ac-
  	knowledged nor discovered to be error by many who are
  	sick. 
 6	    There is a universal insanity of so-called health, which
  	mistakes fable for fact throughout the entire round of the
  	material senses, but this general craze cannot, in a scien-
 9	tific diagnosis, shield the individual case from the special
  	name of insanity. Those unfortunate people who are
  	committed to insane asylums are only so many distinctly
12	defined instances of the baneful effects of illusion on mor-
  	tal minds and bodies. 
  	    The supposition that we can correct insanity by the use
15	of purgatives and narcotics is in itself a mild species of
  	insanity. Can drugs go of their own accord	Drugs and
  	to the brain and destroy the so-called inflam-	brain-lobes 
18	mation of disordered functions, thus reaching mortal
  	mind through matter? Drugs do not affect a corpse, and
  	Truth does not distribute drugs through the blood, and
21	from them derive a supposed effect on intelligence and sen-
  	timent. A dislocation of the tarsal joint would produce
  	insanity as perceptibly as would congestion of the brain,
24	were it not that mortal mind thinks that the tarsal joint is
  	less intimately connected with the mind than is the brain. 
  	Reverse the belief, and the results would be perceptibly
27	different. 
  	    The unconscious thought in the corporeal substra-
  	tum of brain produces no effect, and that condition of
30	the body which we call sensation in matter	Matter and
  	is unreal. Mortal mind is ignorant of it-	animate error 
  	self, — ignorant of the errors it includes and of their
 

      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            409


 1	effects. Intelligent matter is an impossibility. You
  	may say: "But if disease obtains in matter, why do
 3	you insist that disease is formed by mortal mind and
  	not by matter?" Mortal mind and body combine as
  	one, and the nearer matter approaches its final state-
 6	ment, — animate error called nerves, brain, mind, — the
  	more prolific it is likely to become in sin and disease-
  	beliefs. 
 9	    Unconscious mortal mind — alias matter, brain — can-
  	not dictate terms to consciousness nor say, "I am sick." 
  	The belief, that the unconscious substratum	Dictation
12	of mortal mind, termed the body, suffers and	of error 
  	reports disease independently of this so-called conscious
  	mind, is the error which prevents mortals from knowing
15	how to govern their bodies. 
  	    The so-called conscious mortal mind is believed to be
  	superior to its unconscious substratum, matter, and
18	the stronger never yields to the weaker, ex-	So-called
  	cept through fear or choice. The animate	superiority 
  	should be governed by God alone. The real man is
21	spiritual and immortal, but the mortal and imperfect
  	so-called "children of men" are counterfeits from the
  	beginning, to be laid aside for the pure reality. This
24	mortal is put off, and the new man or real man is put
  	on, in proportion as mortals realize the Science of man
  	and seek the true model. 
27	    We have no right to say that life depends on matter
  	now, but will not depend on it after death. We cannot
  	spend our days here in ignorance of the Science	Death no
30	of Life, and expect to find beyond the grave	benefactor 
  	a reward for this ignorance. Death will not make us
  	harmonious and immortal as a recompense for ignorance. 
 
      Science and Health – Christian Science Practice                            410

 1	If here we give no heed to Christian Science, which is
  	spiritual and eternal, we shall not be ready for spiritual
 3	Life hereafter. 
  	    "This is life eternal," says Jesus, — is, not shall be;
  	and then he defines everlasting life as a present knowledge
 6	of his Father and of himself, — the knowledge	Life eternal
  	of Love, Truth, and Life. "This is life eter-	and present 
  	nal, that they might know Thee, the only true God, and
 9	Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent." The Scriptures
  	say, "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every
  	word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God," show-
12	ing that Truth is the actual life of man; but mankind
  	objects to making this teaching practical. 
  	    Every trial of our faith in God makes us stronger. 
15	The more difficult seems the material condition to be
  	overcome by Spirit, the stronger should be our	Love casteth
  	faith and the purer our love. The Apostle	out fear 
18	John says: "There is no fear in Love, but perfect Love
  	casteth out fear. . . . He that feareth is not made per-
  	fect in Love." Here is a definite and inspired proclama-
21	tion of Christian Science. SHOW ALL