- Some Objections Answered -
341
The strictures on this volume would condemn to
oblivion the truth, which is raising up thousands from helplessness to
strength and elevating them from a theoretical to a practical Christianity.
These criticisms are generally based on detached sentences or clauses
separated from their context. Even the Scriptures, which grow in beauty and
consistency from one grand root, appear contradictory when subjected to such
usage. Jesus said, "Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see
God" [Truth].
Supported
by facts 341
In Christian Science mere opinion is valueless.
Proof is essential to a due estimate of this subject. Sneers at the
application of the word Science
to Christianity cannot prevent that from being scientific which is based on
divine Principle, demonstrated according to a divine given rule, and subjected
to proof. The facts are so absolute and numerous in support of Christian
Science, that misrepresentation and denunciation cannot overthrow it. Paul
alludes to "doubtful disputations." " The hour has struck when
proof and demonstration, instead of opinion and dogma, are summoned to the
support of Christianity, "making wise the simple."
Commands
of Jesus 342
In the result of some unqualified condemnations
of scientific Mind-healing, one may see with sorrow the sad effects on the
sick of denying Truth. He that decries this Science does it presumptuously, in
the face of Bible history and in defiance of the direct command of Jesus,
"Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel," to which command
was added the promise that his students should cast out evils and heal the
sick. He bade the seventy disciples, as well as the twelve, heal the sick in
any town where they should be hospitably received.
Christianity
scientific 342
If Christianity is not scientific, and Science
is not of God, then there is no invariable law, and truth becomes an accident.
Shall it be denied that a system which works according to the Scriptures has
Scriptural authority?
Argument
of good works 342
Christian Science awakens the sinner, reclaims
the infidel, and raises from the couch of pain the helpless invalid. It speaks
to the dumb the words of Truth, and they answer with rejoicing. It causes the
deaf to hear, the lame to walk, and the blind to see. Who would be the first
to disown the Christliness of good works, when our Master says, "By their
fruits ye shall know them"?
If Christian Scientists were teaching or
practising pharmacy or obstetrics according to the common theories, no
denunciations would follow them, even if their treatment resulted in the death
of a patient. The people are taught in such cases to say, Amen. Shall I then
be smitten for healing and for teaching Truth as the Principle of healing, and
for proving my word by my deed? James said: "Show me thy faith without
thy works, and I will show thee my faith by my works."
Personal
experience 343
Is not finite mind ignorant of God's method?
This makes it doubly unfair to impugn and misrepresent the facts, although,
without this cross-bearing, one might not be able to say with the apostle,
"None of these things move me." The sick, the halt, and the blind
look up to Christian Science with blessings, and Truth will not be forever
hidden by unjust parody from the quickened sense of the people.
Proof
from miracles 343
Jesus strips all disguise from error, when his
teachings are fully understood. By parable and argument he explains the
impossibility of good producing evil; and he also scientifically demonstrates
this great fact, proving by what are wrongly called miracles, that sin,
sickness, and death are beliefs - illusive errors - which he could and did
destroy.
It would sometimes seem as if truth were
rejected because meekness and spirituality are the conditions of its
acceptance, while Christendom generally demands so much less.
Example
of the disciples 343
Anciently those apostles who were Jesus'
students, as well as Paul who was not one of his students, healed the sick and
reformed the sinner by their religion. Hence the mistake which allows words,
rather than works, to follow such examples! Whoever is the first meekly and
conscientiously to press along the line of gospel-healing, is often accounted
a heretic.
Strong
position 344
It is objected to Christian Science that it
claims God as the only absolute Life and Soul, and man to be His idea, - that
is, His image. It should be added that this is claimed to represent the
normal, healthful, and sinless condition of man in divine Science, and that
this claim is made because the Scriptures say that God has created man in His
own image and after His likeness. Is it sacrilegious to assume that God's
likeness is not found in matter, sin, sickness, and death?
Efficacy
may be attested 344
Were it more fully understood that Truth heals
and that error causes disease, the opponents of a demonstrable Science would
perhaps mercifully withhold their misrepresentations, which harm the sick; and
until the enemies of Christian Science test its efficacy according to the
rules which disclose its merits or demerits, it would be just to observe the
Scriptural precept, "Judge not."
The one
divine method 344
There are various methods of treating disease,
which are not included in the commonly accepted systems; but there is only one
which should be presented to the whole world, and that is the Christian
Science which Jesus preached and practised and left to us as his rich legacy.
Why should one refuse to investigate this
method of treating disease? Why support the popular systems of medicine, when
the physician may perchance be an infidel and may lose ninety-and-nine
patients, while Christian Science cures its hundred? Is it because allopathy
and homoeopathy are more fashionable and less spiritual?
Omnipotence
set forth 344
In the Bible the word Spirit
is so commonly applied to Deity, that Spirit and God are often regarded as
synonymous terms; and it is thus they are uniformly used and understood in
Christian Science. As it is evident that the likeness of Spirit cannot be
material, does it not follow that God cannot be in His unlikeness and work
through drugs to heal the sick? When the omnipotence of God is preached and
His absoluteness is set forth, Christian sermons will heal the sick.
Contradictions
not found 345
It is sometimes said, in criticising Christian
Science, that the mind which contradicts itself neither knows itself nor what
it is saying. It is indeed no small matter to know one's self; but in this
volume of mine there are no contradictory statements, - at least none which
are apparent to those who understand its propositions well enough to pass
judgment upon them. One who understands Christian Science can heal the sick on
the divine Principle of Christian Science, and this practical proof is the
only feasible evidence that one does understand this Science.
Anybody, who is able to perceive the
incongruity between God's idea and poor humanity, ought to be able to discern
the distinction (made by Christian Science) between God's man, made in His
image, and the sinning race of Adam.
The apostle says: "For if a man think
himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceiveth himself." This
thought of human, material nothingness, which Science inculcates, enrages the
carnal mind and is the main cause of the carnal mind's antagonism.
God's
idea the ideal man 345
It is not the purpose of Christian Science to
"educate the idea of God, or treat it for disease," as is alleged by
one critic. I regret that such criticism confounds man
with Adam. When man is spoken of as made in God's image, it is not sinful and
sickly mortal man who is referred to, but the ideal man, reflecting God's
likeness.
Nothingness
of error 346
It is sometimes said that Christian Science
teaches the nothingness of sin, sickness, and death, and then teaches how this
nothingness is to be saved and healed. The nothingness of nothing is plain;
but we need to understand that error is
nothing, and that its nothingness is not saved, but must be demonstrated in
order to prove the somethingness - yea, the allness - of Truth. It is
self-evident that we are harmonious only as we cease to manifest evil or the
belief that we suffer from the sins of others. Disbelief in error destroys
error, and leads to the discernment of Truth. There are no vacuums. How then
can this demonstration be "fraught with falsities painful to
behold"?
Truth
antidotes error 346
We treat error through the understanding of
Truth, because Truth is error's antidote. If a dream ceases, it is
self-destroyed, and the terror is over. When a sufferer is convinced that
there is no reality in his belief of pain, - because matter has no sensation,
hence pain in matter is a false belief, - how can he suffer longer? Do you
feel the pain of tooth-pulling, when you believe that nitrous-oxide gas has
made you unconscious? Yet, in your concept, the tooth, the operation, and the
forceps are unchanged.
Serving
two masters 346
Material beliefs must be expelled to make room
for spiritual understanding. We cannot serve both God and mammon at the same
time; but is not this what frail mortals are trying to do? Paul says:
"The flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the
flesh." Who is ready to admit this?
It is said by one critic, that to verify this
wonderful philosophy Christian Science declares that whatever is mortal or
discordant has no origin, existence, nor realness. Nothing really has Life but
God, who is infinite Life; hence all is Life, and death has no dominion. This
writer infers that if anything needs to be doctored, it must be the one God,
or Mind. Had he stated his syllogism correctly, the conclusion would be that
there is nothing left to be doctored.
Essential
element of Christianity 347
Critics should consider that the so-called
mortal man is not the reality of man. Then they would behold the signs of
Christ's coming. Christ, as the spiritual or true idea of God, comes now as of
old, preaching the gospel to the poor, healing the sick, and casting out
evils. Is it error which is restoring an essential element of Christianity, -
namely, apostolic, divine healing? No; it is the Science of Christianity which
is restoring it, and is the light shining in darkness, which the darkness
comprehends not.
If Christian Science takes away the popular
gods, - sin, sickness, and death, - it is Christ, Truth, who destroys these
evils, and so proves their nothingness.
The dream that matter and error are something
must yield to reason and revelation. Then mortals will behold the nothingness
of sickness and sin, and sin and sickness will disappear from consciousness.
The harmonious will appear real, and the inharmonious unreal. These critics
will then see that error is indeed the nothingness, which they chide us for
naming nothing and which we desire neither to honor nor to fear.
Medical theories virtually admit the
nothingness of hallucinations, even while treating them as disease; and who
objects to this? Ought we not, then, to approve any cure, which is effected by
making the disease appear to be - what it really is - an illusion?
All
disease a delusion 348
Here is the difficulty: it is not generally
understood how one disease can be just as much a delusion as another. It is a
pity that the medical faculty and clergy have not learned this, for Jesus
established this foundational fact, when devils, delusions, were cast out and
the dumb spake.
Elimination
of sickness 348
Are we irreverent towards sin, or imputing too
much power to God, when we ascribe to Him almighty Life and Love? I deny His
cooperation with evil, because I desire to have no faith in evil or in any
power but God, good. Is it not well to eliminate from so-called mortal mind
that which, so long as it remains in mortal mind, will show itself in forms of
sin, sickness, and death? Instead of tenaciously defending the supposed rights
of disease, while complaining of the suffering disease brings, would it not be
well to abandon the defence, especially when by so doing our own condition can
be improved and that of other persons as well?
Full
fruitage yet to come 348
I have never supposed the world would
immediately witness the full fruitage of Christian Science, or that sin,
disease, and death would not be believed for an indefinite time; but this I do
aver, that, as a result of teaching Christian Science, ethics and temperance
have received an impulse, health has been restored, and longevity increased.
If such are the present fruits, what will the harvest be, when this Science is
more generally understood?
Law and
gospel 349
As Paul asked of the unfaithful in ancient
days, so the rabbis of the present day ask concerning our healing and
teaching, "Through breaking the law, dishonorest thou God?" We have
the gospel, however, and our Master annulled material law by healing contrary
to it. We propose to follow the Master's example. We should subordinate
material law to spiritual law. Two essential points of Christian Science are,
that neither Life nor man dies, and that God is not the author of sickness.
Language
inadequate 349
The chief difficulty in conveying the teachings
of divine Science accurately to human thought lies in this, that like all
other languages, English is inadequate to the expression of spiritual
conceptions and propositions, because one is obliged to use material terms in
dealing with spiritual ideas. The elucidation of Christian Science lies in its
spiritual sense, and this sense must be gained by its disciples in order to
grasp the meaning of this Science. Out of this condition grew the prophecy
concerning the Christian apostles, "They shall speak with new
tongues."
Speaking of the things of Spirit while dwelling
on a material plane, material terms must be generally employed. Mortal thought
does not at once catch the higher meaning, and can do so only as thought is
educated up to spiritual apprehension. To a certain extent this is equally
true of all learning, even that which is wholly material.
Substance
spiritual 349
In Christian Science, substance is understood
to be Spirit, while the opponents of Christian Science believe substance to be
matter. They think of matter as something and almost the only thing, and of
the things which pertain to Spirit as next to nothing, or as very far removed
from daily experience. Christian Science takes exactly the opposite view.
Both
words and works 350
To understand all our Master's sayings as
recorded in the New Testament, sayings infinitely important, his followers
must grow into that stature of manhood in Christ Jesus which enables them to
interpret his spiritual meaning. Then they know how Truth casts out error and
heals the sick. His words were the offspring of his deeds, both of which must
be understood. Unless the works are comprehended which his words explained,
the words are blind.
The Master often refused to explain his words,
because it was difficult in a material age to apprehend spiritual Truth. He
said: "This people's heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of
hearing, and their eyes they have closed; lest at any time they should see
with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and should understand with their
heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them."
The
divine life-link 350
"The Word was made flesh." Divine
Truth must be known by its effects on the body as well as on the mind, before
the Science of being can be demonstrated. Hence its embodiment in the
incarnate Jesus, - that life-link forming the connection through which the
real reaches the unreal, Soul rebukes sense, and Truth destroys error.
Truth a
present help 350
In Jewish worship the Word was materially
explained, and the spiritual sense was scarcely perceived. The religion which
sprang from half-hidden Israelitish history was pedantic and void of healing
power. When we lose faith in God's power to heal, we distrust the divine
Principle which demonstrates Christian Science, and then we cannot heal the
sick. Neither can we heal through the help of Spirit, if we plant ourselves on
a material basis.
The author became a member of the orthodox
Congregational Church in early years. Later she learned that her own prayers
failed to heal her as did the prayers of her devout parents and the church;
but when the spiritual sense of the creed was discerned in the Science of
Christianity, this spiritual sense was a present
help. It was the living, palpitating presence of Christ,
Truth, which healed the sick.
Fatal
premises 351
We cannot bring out the practical proof of
Christianity, which Jesus required, while error seems as potent and real to us
as Truth, and while we make a personal devil and an anthropomorphic God our
starting-points, - especially if we consider Satan as a being coequal in power
with Deity, if not superior to Him. Because such starting-points are neither
spiritual nor scientific, they cannot work out the Spirit-rule of Christian
healing, which proves the nothingness of error, discord, by demonstrating the
all-inclusiveness of harmonious Truth.
Fruitless
worship 351
The Israelites centred their thoughts on the
material in their attempted worship of the spiritual. To them matter was
substance, and Spirit was shadow. They thought to worship Spirit from a
material standpoint, but this was impossible. They might appeal to Jehovah,
but their prayer brought down no proof that it was heard, because they did not
sufficiently understand God to be able to demonstrate His power to heal, - to
make harmony the reality and discord the unreality.
Spirit
the tangible 352
Our Master declared that his material body was
not spirit, evidently considering it a mortal and material belief of flesh and
bones, whereas the Jews took a diametrically opposite view. To Jesus, not
materiality, but spirituality, was the reality of man's existence, while to
the rabbis the spiritual was the intangible and uncertain, if not the unreal.
Ghosts
not realities 352
Would a mother say to her child, who is
frightened at imaginary ghosts and sick in consequence of the fear: "I
know that ghosts are real. They exist, and are to be feared; but you must not
be afraid of them"?
Children, like adults, ought
to fear a reality which can harm them and which they do not understand, for at
any moment they may become its helpless victims; but instead of increasing
children's fears by declaring ghosts to be real, merciless, and powerful, thus
watering the very roots of childish timidity, children should be assured that
their fears are groundless, that ghosts are not realities, but traditional
beliefs, erroneous and man-made.
In short, children should be told not to
believe in ghosts, because there are no such things. If belief in their
reality is destroyed, terror of ghosts will depart and health be restored. The
objects of alarm will then vanish into nothingness, no longer seeming worthy
of fear or honor. To accomplish a good result, it is certainly not irrational
to tell the truth about ghosts.
The real
and the unreal 353
The Christianly scientific real is the sensuous
unreal. Sin, disease, whatever seems real to material sense, is unreal in
divine Science. The physical senses and Science have ever been antagonistic,
and they will so continue, till the testimony of the physical senses yields
entirely to Christian Science.
How can a Christian, having the stronger
evidence of Truth which contradicts the evidence of error, think of the latter
as real or true, either in the form of sickness or of sin? All must admit that
Christ is "the way, the truth, and the life," and that omnipotent
Truth certainly does destroy error.
Superstition
obsolete 353
The age has not wholly outlived the sense of
ghostly beliefs. It still holds them more or less. Time has not yet reached
eternity, immortality, complete reality. All the real is eternal. Perfection
underlies reality. Without perfection, nothing is wholly real. All things will
continue to disappear, until perfection appears and reality is reached. We
must give up the spectral at all points. We must not continue to admit the
somethingness of superstition, but we must yield up all belief in it and be
wise. When we learn that error is not real, we shall be ready for progress,
"forgetting those things which are behind."
The grave does not banish the ghost of
materiality. So long as there are supposed limits to Mind, and those limits
are human, so long will ghosts seem to continue. Mind is limitless. It never
was material. The true idea of being is spiritual and immortal, and from this
it follows that whatever is laid off is the ghost, some unreal belief. Mortal
beliefs can neither demonstrate Christianity nor apprehend the reality of
Life.
Christian
warfare 354
Are the protests of Christian Science against
the notion that there can be material life, substance, or mind "utter
falsities and absurdities," as some aver? Why then do Christians try to
obey the Scriptures and war against "the world, the flesh, and the
devil"? Why do they invoke the divine aid to enable them to leave all for
Christ, Truth? Why do they use this phraseology, and yet deny Christian
Science, when it teaches precisely this thought? The words of divine Science
find their immortality in deeds, for their Principle heals the sick and
spiritualizes humanity.
Healing
omitted 354
On the other hand, the Christian opponents of
Christian Science neither give nor offer any proofs that their Master's
religion can heal the sick. Surely it is not enough to cleave to barren and
desultory dogmas, derived from the traditions of the elders who thereunto have
set their seals.
Scientific
consistency 354
Consistency is seen in example more than in
precept. Inconsistency is shown by words without deeds, which are like clouds
without rain. If our words fail to express our deeds, God will redeem that
weakness, and out of the mouth of babes He will perfect praise. The night of
materiality is far spent, and with the dawn Truth will waken men spiritually
to hear and to speak the new tongue.
Sin should become unreal to every one. It is in
itself inconsistent, a divided kingdom. Its supposed realism has no divine
authority, and I rejoice in the apprehension of this grand verity.
Spiritual
meaning 354
The opponents of divine Science must be
charitable, if they would be Christian. If the letter of Christian Science
appears inconsistent, they should gain the spiritual meaning of Christian
Science, and then the ambiguity will vanish.
Practical
arguments 355
The charge of inconsistency in Christianly
scientific methods of dealing with sin and disease is met by something
practical, - namely, the proof of the utility of these methods; and proofs are
better than mere verbal arguments or prayers which evince no spiritual power
to heal.
As for sin and disease, Christian Science says,
in the language of the Master, "Follow me; and let the dead bury their
dead." Let discord of every name and nature be heard no more, and let the
harmonious and true sense of Life and being take possession of human
consciousness.
What is the relative value of the two
conflicting theories regarding Christian healing? One, according to the
commands of our Master, heals the sick. The other, popular religion, declines
to admit that Christ's religion has exercised any systematic healing power
since the first century.
Conditions
of criticism 355
The statement that the teachings of Christian
Science in this work are "absolutely false, and the most egregious
fallacies ever offered for acceptance," "is an opinion wholly due to
a misapprehension both of the divine Principle and practice of Christian
Science and to a consequent inability to demonstrate this Science. Without
this understanding, no one is capable of impartial or correct criticism,
because demonstration and spiritual understanding are God's immortal keynotes,
proved to be such by our Master and evidenced by the sick who are cured and by
the sinners who are reformed.
Weakness
of material theories 355
Strangely enough, we ask for material theories
in support of spiritual and eternal truths, when the two are so antagonistic
that the material thought must become spiritualized before the spiritual fact
is attained. So-called material existence affords no evidence of spiritual
existence and immortality. Sin, sickness, and death do not prove man's entity
or immortality. Discord can never establish the facts of harmony. Matter is
not the vestibule of Spirit.
Irreconcilable
differences 356
Jesus reasoned on this subject practically, and
controlled sickness, sin, and death on the basis of his spirituality.
Understanding the nothingness of material things, he spoke of flesh and Spirit
as the two opposites, - as error and Truth, not contributing in any way to
each other's happiness and existence. Jesus knew, "It is the spirit that
quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing."
Copartnership
impossible 356
There is neither a present nor an eternal
copartnership between error and Truth, between flesh and Spirit. God is as
incapable of producing sin, sickness, and death as He is of experiencing these
errors. How then is it possible for Him to create man subject to this triad of
errors, - man who is made in the divine likeness?
Does God create a material man out of Himself,
Spirit? Does evil proceed from good? Does divine Love commit a fraud on
humanity by making man inclined to sin, and then punishing him for it? Would
any one call it wise and good to create the primitive, and then punish its
derivative?
Two
infinite creators absurd 356
Does subsequent follow its antecedent? It does.
Was there original self-creative sin? Then there must have been more than one
creator, more than one God. In common justice, we must admit that God will not
punish man for doing what He created man capable of doing, and knew from the
outset that man would do. God is "of purer eyes than to behold
evil." We sustain Truth, not by accepting, but by rejecting a lie.
Jesus said of personified evil, that it was
"a liar, and the father of it." Truth creates neither a lie, a
capacity to lie, nor a liar. If mankind would relinquish the belief that God
makes sickness, sin, and death, or makes man capable of suffering on account
of this malevolent triad, the foundations of error would be sapped and error's
destruction ensured; but if we theoretically endow mortals with the
creativeness and authority of Deity, how dare we attempt to destroy what He
hath made, or even to deny that God made man evil and made evil good?
Anthropomorphism
357
History teaches that the popular and false
notions about the Divine Being and character have originated in the human
mind. As there is in reality but one God, one Mind, wrong notions about God
must have originated in a false supposition, not in immortal Truth, and they
are fading out. They are false claims, which will eventually disappear,
according to the vision of St. John in the Apocalypse.
One
supremacy 357
If what opposes God is real, there must be two
powers, and God is not supreme and infinite. Can Deity be almighty, if another
mighty and self-creative cause exists and sways mankind? Has the Father
"Life in Himself," as the Scriptures say, and, if so, can Life, or
God, dwell in evil and create it? Can matter drive Life, Spirit, hence, and so
defeat omnipotence?
Matter
impotent 358
Is the woodman's axe, which destroys a tree's
so-called life, superior to omnipotence? Can a leaden bullet deprive a man of
Life, - that is, of God, who is man's Life? If God is at the mercy of matter,
then matter is omnipotent. Such doctrines are "confusion worse
confounded." If two statements directly contradict each other and one is
true, the other must be false. Is Science thus contradictory?
Scientific
and Biblical facts 358
Christian Science, understood, coincides with
the Scriptures, and sustains logically and demonstratively every point it
presents. Otherwise it would not be Science, and could not present its proofs.
Christian Science is neither made up of contradictory aphorisms nor of the
inventions of those who scoff at God. It presents the calm and clear verdict
of Truth against error, uttered and illustrated by the prophets, by Jesus, by
his apostles, as is recorded throughout the Scriptures.
Why are the words of Jesus more frequently
cited for our instruction than are his remarkable works? Is it not because
there are few who have gained a true knowledge of the great import to
Christianity of those works?
Personal
confidence 358
Sometimes it is said: "Rest assured that
whatever effect Christian Scientists may have on the sick, comes through
rousing within the sick a belief that in the removal of disease these healers
have wonderful power, derived from the Holy Ghost." Is it likely that
church-members have more faith in some Christian Scientist, whom they have
perhaps never seen and against whom they have been warned, than they have in
their own accredited and orthodox pastors, whom they have seen and have been
taught to love and to trust?
Let any clergyman try to cure his friends by
their faith in him. Will that faith heal them? Yet Scientists will take the
same cases, and cures will follow. Is this because the patients have more
faith in the Scientist than in their pastor? I have healed infidels whose only
objection to this method was, that I as a Christian Scientist believed in the
Holy Spirit, while they, the patients, did not.
Even though you aver that the material senses
are indispensable to man's existence or entity, you must change the human
concept of life, and must at length know yourself spiritually and
scientifically. The evidence of the existence of Spirit, Soul, is palpable
only to spiritual sense, and is not apparent to the material senses, which
cognize only that which is the opposite of Spirit.
Author's
parentage 359
True Christianity is to be honored wherever
found, but when shall we arrive at the goal which that word implies? From
Puritan parents, the discoverer of Christian Science early received her
religious education. In childhood, she often listened with joy to these words,
falling from the lips of her saintly mother, "God is able to raise you up
from sickness;" "and she pondered the meaning of that Scripture she
so often quotes: "And these signs shall follow them that believe; . . .
they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover."
Two
different artists 359
A Christian Scientist and an opponent are like
two artists. One says: "I have spiritual ideals, indestructible and
glorious. When others see them as I do, in their true light and loveliness, -
and know that these ideals are real and eternal because drawn from Truth, -
they will find that nothing is lost, and all is won, by a right estimate of
what is real."
The other artist replies: "You wrong my
experience. I have no mind-ideals except those which are both mental and
material. It is true that materiality renders these ideals imperfect and
destructible; yet I would not exchange mine for thine, for mine give me such
personal pleasure, and they are not so shockingly transcendental. They require
less self-abnegation, and keep Soul well out of sight. Moreover, I have no
notion of losing my old doctrines or human opinions."
Choose
ye today 360
Dear reader, which mind-picture or externalized
thought shall be real to you, - the material or the spiritual? Both you cannot
have. You are bringing out your own ideal. This ideal is either temporal or
eternal. Either Spirit or matter is your model. If you try to have two models,
then you practically have none. Like a pendulum in a clock, you will be thrown
back and forth, striking the ribs of matter and swinging between the real and
the unreal.
Hear the wisdom of Job, as given in the
excellent translation of the late Rev. George R. Noyes, D.D.:-
Shall mortal man be more just than God?
Shall man be more pure than his Maker?
Behold, He putteth no trust in His ministering
spirits,
And His angels He chargeth with frailty.
Of old, the Jews put to death the Galilean
Prophet, the best Christian on earth, for the truth he spoke and demonstrated,
while to-day, Jew and Christian can unite in doctrine and denomination on the
very basis of Jesus' words and works. The Jew believes that the Messiah or
Christ has not yet come; the Christian believes that Christ is God. Here
Christian Science intervenes, explains these doctrinal points, cancels the
disagreement, and settles the question. Christ, as the true spiritual idea, is
the ideal of God now and forever, here and everywhere. The Jew who believes in
the First Commandment is a monotheist; he has one omnipresent God. Thus the
Jew unites with the Christian's doctrine that God is come and is present now
and forever. The Christian who believes in the First Commandment is a
monotheist. Thus he virtually unites with the Jew's belief in one God, and
recognizes that Jesus Christ is not God, as Jesus himself declared, but is the
Son of God. This declaration of Jesus, understood, conflicts not at all with
another of his sayings: "I and my Father are one," - that is, one in
quality, not in quantity. As a drop of water is one with the ocean, a ray of
light one with the sun, even so God and man, Father and son, are one in being.
The Scripture reads: "For in Him we live, and move, and have our
being."
I have revised SCIENCE AND HEALTH only to give
a clearer and fuller expression of its original meaning. Spiritual ideas
unfold as we advance. A human perception of divine Science, however limited,
must be correct in order to be Science and subject to demonstration. A germ of
infinite Truth, though least in the kingdom of heaven, is the higher hope on
earth, but it will be rejected and reviled until God prepares the soil for the
seed. That which when sown bears immortal fruit, enriches mankind only when it
is understood, - hence the many readings given the Scriptures, and the
requisite revisions of SCIENCE AND HEALTH WITH KEY TO THE SCRIPTURES.
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