Science and Health, with Key to the Scriptures Part 52

How can a Christian, having the stronger evidence of Truth which contradicts the evidence of error, think of 353:9 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 353:12 does destroy error.

Superst.i.tion obsolete

The age has not wholly outlived the sense of ghostly beliefs. It still holds them more or less. Time has not 353:15 yet reached eternity, immortality, complete reality. All the real is eternal. Perfection underlies reality. Without perfection, nothing is wholly 353:18 real. All things will continue to disappear, until per- fection appears and reality is reached. We must give up the spectral at all points. We must not continue to admit 353:21 the somethingness of superst.i.tion, 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 353:24 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 353:27 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 353:30 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

354:1 Are the protests of Christian Science against the notion that there can be material life, substance, or mind "utter 354:3 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"?

354:6 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 354:9 this thought? The words of divine Science find their immortality in deeds, for their Principle heals the sick and spiritualizes humanity.

Healing omitted

354:12 On the other hand, the Christian opponents of Chris- tian Science neither give nor offer any proofs that their Master's religion can heal the sick. Surely 354:15 it is not enough to cleave to barren and desul- tory dogmas, derived from the traditions of the elders who thereunto have set their seals.

Scientific consistency

354:18 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 354:21 fail to express our deeds, G.o.d will redeem that weakness, and out of the mouth of babes He will perfect praise. The night of materiality is far spent, and with 354:24 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 354:27 inconsistent, a divided kingdom. Its supposed realism has no divine authority, and I rejoice in the apprehension of this grand verity.

Spiritual meaning

354:30 The opponents of divine Science must be charitable, if they would be Christian. If the letter of Christian Science appears inconsistent, they should 355:1 gain the spiritual meaning of Christian Science, and then the ambiguity will vanish.

Practical arguments

355:3 The charge of inconsistency in Christianly scientific methods of dealing with sin and disease is met by some- thing practical, - namely, the proof of the 355:6 utility of these methods; and proofs are better than mere verbal arguments or prayers which evince no spiritual power to heal.

355:9 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 355:12 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 the- 355:15 ories 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 355:18 has exercised any systematic healing power since the first century.

Conditions of criticism

The statement that the teachings of Christian Sci- 355:21 ence in this work are "absolutely false, and the most egregious fallacies ever offered for accept- ance," is an opinion wholly due to a misap- 355:24 prehension both of the divine Principle and practice of Christian Science and to a consequent inability to demon- strate this Science. Without this understanding, no one 355:27 is capable of impartial or correct criticism, because demon- stration and spiritual understanding are G.o.d's immortal keynotes, proved to be such by our Master and evidenced 355:30 by the sick who are cured and by the sinners who are reformed.

Weakness of material theories

Strangely enough, we ask for material theories in sup- 356:1 port of spiritual and eternal truths, when the two are so antagonistic that the material thought must become spir- 356:3 itualized before the spiritual fact is attained.

So-called material existence affords no evidence of spiritual existence and immortality. Sin, 356:6 sickness, and death do not prove man's ent.i.ty or immor- tality. Discord can never establish the facts of harmony.

Matter is not the vestibule of Spirit.

Irreconciliable differences

356:9 Jesus reasoned on this subject practically, and con- trolled sickness, sin, and death on the basis of his spir- ituality. Understanding the nothingness of 356:12 material things, he spoke of flesh and Spirit as the two opposites, - as error and Truth, not contrib- uting in any way to each other's happiness and existence.

356:15 Jesus knew, "It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing."

Copartners.h.i.+p impossible

There is neither a present nor an eternal copartner- 356:18 s.h.i.+p between error and Truth, between flesh and Spirit.

G.o.d is as incapable of producing sin, sick- ness, and death as He is of experiencing these 356:21 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?

356:24 Does G.o.d create a material man out of Himself, Spirit?

Does evil proceed from good? Does divine Love com- mit a fraud on humanity by making man inclined to sin, 356:27 and then punis.h.i.+ng him for it? Would any one call it wise and good to create the primitive, and then punish its derivative?

Two infinite creators absurd

356:30 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 G.o.d.

357:1 In common justice, we must admit that G.o.d will not punish man for doing what He created man 357:3 capable of doing, and knew from the outset that man would do. G.o.d is "of purer eyes than to behold evil." We sustain Truth, not by accept- 357:6 ing, 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 357:9 to lie, nor a liar. If mankind would relinquish the belief that G.o.d makes sickness, sin, and death, or makes man capable of suffering on account of this malevolent triad, 357:12 the foundations of error would be sapped and error's de- struction ensured; but if we theoretically endow mortals with the creativeness and authority of Deity, how dare we 357:15 attempt to destroy what He hath made, or even to deny that G.o.d made man evil and made evil good?

Anthropomorphism

History teaches that the popular and false notions 357:18 about the Divine Being and character have originated in the human mind. As there is in reality but one G.o.d, one Mind, wrong notions about G.o.d 357:21 must have originated in a false supposition, not in im- mortal Truth, and they are fading out. They are false claims, which will eventually disappear, according to the 357:24 vision of St. John in the Apocalypse.

One supremacy

If what opposes G.o.d is real, there must be two powers, and G.o.d is not supreme and infinite. Can 357:27 Deity be almighty, if another mighty and self-creative cause exists and sways man- kind? Has the Father "Life in Himself," as the Scrip- 357:30 tures say, and, if so, can Life, or G.o.d, dwell in evil and create it? Can matter drive Life, Spirit, hence, and so defeat omnipotence?

Matter impotent

358:1 Is the woodman's axe, which destroys a tree's so-called life, superior to omnipotence? Can a leaden bullet de- 358:3 prive a man of Life, - that is, of G.o.d, who is man's Life? If G.o.d is at the mercy of matter, then matter is omnipotent. Such doctrines are "confu- 358:6 sion worse confounded." If two statements directly con- tradict each other and one is true, the other must be false.

Is Science thus contradictory?

Scientific and Biblical facts

358:9 Christian Science, understood, coincides with the Scriptures, and sustains logically and demonstratively every point it presents. Otherwise it would 358:12 not be Science, and could not present its proofs. Christian Science is neither made up of contra- dictory aphorisms nor of the inventions of those who scoff 358:15 at G.o.d. It presents the calm and clear verdict of Truth against error, uttered and ill.u.s.trated by the prophets, by Jesus, by his apostles, as is recorded throughout the 358:18 Scriptures.

Why are the words of Jesus more frequently cited for our instruction than are his remarkable works? Is 358:21 it not because there are few who have gained a true knowledge of the great import to Christianity of those works?

Personal confidence

358:24 Sometimes it is said; "Rest a.s.sured that whatever effect Christian Scientists may have on the sick, comes through rousing within the sick a belief 358:27 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 358:30 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 359:1 pastors, whom they have seen and have been taught to love and to trust?

359:3 Let any clergyman try to cure his friends by their faith in him. Will that faith heal them? Yet Scien- tists will take the same cases, and cures will follow.

359:6 Is this because the patients have more faith in the Scien- tist than in their pastor? I have healed infidels whose only objection to this method was, that I as a Chris- 359:9 tian Scientist believed in the Holy Spirit, while they, the patients, did not.

Even though you aver that the material senses are 359:12 indispensable to man's existence or ent.i.ty, you must change the human concept of life, and must at length know yourself spiritually and scientifically. The evi- 359:15 dence 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.

359:18 True Christianity is to be honored wherever found, but when shall we arrive at the goal which that word implies? From Puritan parents, the discov- 359:21 erer of Christian Science early received her religious education. In childhood, she often listened with joy to these words, falling from the lips of her 359:24 saintly mother, "G.o.d is able to raise you up from sick- ness;" and she pondered the meaning of that Scripture she so often quotes: "And these signs shall follow them 359:27 that believe; ... they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover."