Science and Health, with Key to the Scriptures Part 55

Cure for palsy

375:21 Palsy is a belief that matter governs mortals, and can paralyze the body, making certain portions of it motionless. Destroy the belief, show mortal 375:24 mind that muscles have no power to be lost, for Mind is supreme, and you cure the palsy.

Latent fear diagnosed

Consumptive patients always show great hopeful- 375:27 ness and courage, even when they are supposed to be in hopeless danger. This state of mind seems anomalous except to the expert in Christian 375:30 Science. This mental state is not understood, simply because it is a stage of fear so excessive that it amounts to fort.i.tude. The belief in consumption presents to mor- 376:1 tal thought a hopeless state, an image more terrifying than that of most other diseases. The patient turns involun- 376:3 tarily from the contemplation of it, but though unacknowl- edged, the latent fear and the despair of recovery remain in thought.

Insidious concepts

376:6 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 376:9 most hidden, undefined, and insidious beliefs.

The pallid invalid, whom you declare to be wasting away with consumption of the blood, should be told that blood 376:12 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 376:15 flowed through mortal veins and simulated a corporeal sense of life.

Remedy for fever

If the body is material, it cannot, for that very reason, 376:18 suffer with a fever. Because the so-called material body is a mental concept and governed by mortal mind, it manifests only what that so-called 376:21 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 376:24 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, 376:27 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- 376:30 mitting that it must have its course. To fear and admit the power of disease, is to paralyze mental and scientific demonstration.

377:1 If your patient believes in taking cold, mentally con- vince him that matter cannot take cold, and that thought 377:3 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.

Climate harmless

377:6 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 377:9 Christian Science, and prove that they can be healthy in all climates, when their fear of climate is exterminated.

Mind governs body

377:12 Through different states of mind, the body becomes suddenly weak or abnormally strong, showing mortal mind to be the producer of strength or weak- 377:15 ness. A sudden joy or grief has caused what is termed instantaneous death. Because a belief origi- nates unseen, the mental state should be continually 377:18 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 377:21 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 377:24 this way what are termed organic diseases as readily as functional difficulties.

The cause of all so-called disease is mental, a mortal 377:27 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- 377:30 out this ignorant human belief, any circ.u.mstance is of it- self powerless to produce suffering. It is latent belief in disease, as well as the fear of disease, which a.s.sociates sick- 378:1 ness with certain circ.u.mstances and causes the two to appear conjoined, even as poetry and music are repro- 378:3 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 378:6 self-sentence, and meet every circ.u.mstance with truth.

Disease is less than mind, and Mind can control it.

Latent power

Without the so-called human mind, there can be no 378:9 inflammatory nor torpid action of the system. Remove the error, and you destroy its effects. By looking a tiger fearlessly in the eye, Sir Charles 378:12 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 378:15 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 378:18 exercised over mortal beliefs to destroy them; whereas hypnotism and hygienic drilling and drugging, adopted to cure matter, is represented by two material erroneous 378:21 bases.

Disease powerless

Disease is not an intelligence to dispute the empire of Mind or to dethrone Mind and take the government into 378:24 its own hands. Sickness is not a G.o.d-given, nor a self-const.i.tuted material power, which copes astutely with Mind and finally conquers it. G.o.d 378:27 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- 378:30 ceivable; and if such a power could be divinely directed, it would manifest less wisdom than we usually find dis- played in human governments.

Jurisdiction of Mind

379:1 If disease can attack and control the body without the consent of mortals, sin can do the same, for both 379:3 are errors, announced as partners in the be- ginning. The Christian Scientist finds only effects, where the ordinary physician looks for causes.

379:6 The real jurisdiction of the world is in Mind, controlling every effect and recognizing all causation as vested in divine Mind.

Power of imagination

379:9 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 379:12 warm water was trickling over his arm. Had he known his sense of bleeding was an illusion, he would have risen above the false belief. Let the despairing in- 379:15 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 379:18 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 379:21 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 379:24 very results she dreads.

Fevers the effect of fear

Fevers are errors of various types. The quickened pulse, coated tongue, febrile heat, dry skin, pain in the 379:27 head and limbs, are pictures drawn on the body by a mortal mind. The images, held in this disturbed mind, frighten conscious thought. Unless 379:30 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 380:1 Science, it may rest at length on some receptive thought, and become a fever case, which ends in a belief called 380:3 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- 380:6 stone of the corner, "but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder."

Misdirected contention

Contending for the evidence or indulging the demands 380:9 of sin, disease, or death, we virtually contend against the control of Mind over body, and deny the power of Mind to heal. This false method 380:12 is as though the defendant should argue for the plaintiff in favor of a decision which the defendant knows will be turned against himself.

Benefits of metaphysics

380:15 The physical effects of fear ill.u.s.trate its illusion. Gaz- ing at a chained lion, crouched for a spring, should not terrify a man. The body is affected only with 380:18 the belief of disease produced by a so-called mind ignorant of the truth which chains disease. Noth- ing but the power of Truth can prevent the fear of 380:21 error, and prove man's dominion over error.

A higher discovery

Many years ago the author made a spiritual discov- ery, the scientific evidence of which has acc.u.mulated to 380:24 prove that the divine Mind produces in man health, harmony, and immortality. Gradu- ally this evidence will gather momentum and clearness, 380:27 until it reaches its culmination of scientific statement and proof. Nothing is more disheartening than to believe that there is a power opposite to G.o.d, or good, and that 380:30 G.o.d endows this opposing power with strength to be used against Himself, against Life, health, harmony.

Ignorance of our rights

Every law of matter or the body, supposed to govern 381:1 man, is rendered null and void by the law of Life, G.o.d.

Ignorant of our G.o.d-given rights, we submit to unjust 381:3 decrees, and the bias of education enforces this slavery. Be no more willing to suffer the illusion that you are sick or that some disease is develop- 381:6 ing in the system, than you are to yield to a sinful temp- tation on the ground that sin has its necessities.

No laws of matter

When infringing some supposed law, you say that 381:9 there is danger. This fear is the danger and induces the physical effects. We cannot in reality suffer from breaking anything except a moral or 381:12 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, 381:15 and types of disease, with which mortals die. G.o.d is the lawmaker, but He is not the author of barbarous codes.

In infinite Life and Love there is no sickness, sin, nor 381:18 death, and the Scriptures declare that we live, move, and have our being in the infinite G.o.d.

G.o.d-given dominion

Think less of the enactments of mortal mind, and you 381:21 will sooner grasp man's G.o.d-given dominion. You must understand your way out of human theories relating to health, or you will never believe 381:24 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.

381:27 Let us banish sickness as an outlaw, and abide by the rule of perpetual harmony, - G.o.d's law. It is man's moral right to annul an unjust sentence, a sentence never 381:30 inflicted by divine authority.

Begin rightly

Christ Jesus overruled the error which would impose penalties for transgressions of the physical laws of 382:1 health; he annulled supposed laws of matter, opposed to the harmonies of Spirit, lacking divine au- 382:3 thority and having only human approval for their sanction.

Hygiene excessive

If half the attention given to hygiene were given to the 382:6 study of Christian Science and to the spiritualization of thought, this alone would usher in the millen- inium. Constant bathing and rubbing to alter 382:9 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 382:12 of making clean merely the outside of the platter.

Blissful ignorance

He, who is ignorant of what is termed hygienic law, is more receptive of spiritual power and of faith in one 382:15 G.o.d, than is the devotee of supposed hygienic law, who comes to teach the so-called igno- rant one. Must we not then consider the so-called law 382:18 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 382:21 one who is not. This verifies the saying of our Master: "Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of G.o.d as a little child, shall in no wise enter therein."

382:24 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, 382:27 - 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 382:30 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, 383:1 but mental, and I was cured when I learned my way in Christian Science."

A clean mind and body

383:3 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."