Chapter 12
_not recognize any, when He sent His Son to save from_ _sin, and the Bible is addressed to sinners? How can you_ _believe there is no sickness, when Jesus came healing the_ _sick? [5]_
To regard sin, disease, and death with less deference, and only as the woeful unrealities of being, is the only way to destroy them; Christian Science is proving this by healing cases of disease and sin after all other means have failed. The Nazarene Prophet could make the unreality [10]
of both apparent in a moment.
_Does it not limit the power of Mind to deny the possi-_ _bility of communion with departed friends-dead only in_ _belief?_
Does it limit the power of Mind to say that addition [15]
is not subtraction in mathematics? The Science of Mind reveals the impossibility of two individual sleepers, in different phases of thought, communicating, even if touch- ing each other corporeally; or for one who sleeps to communicate with another who is awake. Mind's possi- [20]
bilities are not lessened by being confined and conformed to the Science of being.
_If mortal mind and body are myths, what is the con-_ _nection between them and real ident.i.ty, and why are there_ _as many ident.i.ties as mortal bodies?_ [25]
Evil in the beginning claimed the power, wisdom, and utility of good; and every creation or idea of Spirit has its counterfeit in some matter belief. Every material be- lief hints the existence of spiritual reality; and if mortals are instructed in spiritual things, it will be seen that ma- [30]
[Page 61.]
terial belief, in all its manifestations, reversed, will be [1]
found the type and representative of verities priceless, eternal, and just at hand.
The education of the future will be instruction, in spir- itual Science, against the material symbolic counterfeit [5]
sciences. All the knowledge and vain strivings of mortal mind, that lead to death,-even when aping the wisdom and magnitude of immortal Mind,-will be swallowed up by the reality and omnipotence of Truth over error, and of Life over death. [10]
"_Dear Mrs. Eddy_:-In the October _Journal_ I read the following: "But the real man, who was created in the image of G.o.d, does not commit sin." _What then does sin?_ _What commits theft? Or who does murder?_ For instance, the man is held responsible for the crime; for I went once [15]
to a place where a man was said to be "hanged for mur- der"-and certainly I saw him, or his effigy, dangling at the end of a rope. This "man" was held responsible for the 'sin.' "
_What sins?_ [20]
According to the Word, man is the image and likeness of G.o.d. Does G.o.d's essential likeness sin, or dangle at the end of a rope? If not, what does? A culprit, a sinner, -anything but a man! Then, what is a sinner? A mortal; but man is _immortal_. [25]
Again: mortals are the embodiments (or bodies, if you please) of error, not of Truth; of sickness, sin, and death. Naming these His embodiment, can neither make them so nor overthrow the logic that man is G.o.d's like- ness. Mortals seem very
[Page 62.]
of Spirit is spiritual. Holding the _right_ idea of man in my [1]
mind, I can improve my own, and other people's individ- uality, health, and morals; whereas, the opposite image of man, a sinner, kept constantly in mind, can no more improve health or morals, than holding in thought the [5]
form of a boa-constrictor can aid an artist in painting a landscape.
Man is seen only in the true likeness of his Maker.
Believing a lie veils the truth from our vision; even as in mathematics, in summing up positive and negative [10]
quant.i.ties, the negative quant.i.ty offsets an equal positive quant.i.ty, making the aggregate positive, or true quant.i.ty, by that much, less available.
_Why do Christian Scientists hold that their theology is_ _essential to heal the sick, when the mind-cure claims to heal_ [15]
_without it?_
The theology of Christian Science is Truth; opposed to which is the error of sickness, sin, and death, that Truth destroys.
A "mind-cure" is a matter-cure. An adherent to this [20]
method honestly acknowledges this fact in her work ent.i.tled "Mind-cure on a Material Basis." In that work the author grapples with Christian Science, attempts to solve its divine Principle by the rule of human mind, fails, and ends in a parody on this Science which is amus- [25]
ing to astute readers,-especially when she tells them that she is practising this Science.
The theology of Christian Science is based on the action of the divine Mind over the human mind and body; whereas, "mind-cure" rests on the notion that the human [30]
mind can cure its own disease, or that which it causes,
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and the _sickness of matter_,-which is infidel in the one [1]
case, and anomalous in the other. It was said of old by Truth-traducers, that Jesus healed through Beelzebub; but the claim that one erring mind cures another one was at first gotten up to hinder his benign influence and to hide [5]
his divine power.
Our Master understood that Life, Truth, Love are the triune Principle of all pure theology; also, that this divine trinity is one infinite remedy for the opposite triad, sick- ness, sin, and death. [10]
_If there is no sin, why did Jesus come to save sinners?_
If there is no reality in sickness, why does a Chris- tian Scientist go to the bedside and address himself to the healing of disease, on the basis of its unreality?
Jesus came to seek and to save such as believe in the [15]
reality of the unreal; to save them from _this false belief_; that they might lay hold of eternal Life, the great reality that concerns man, and understand the final fact,-that G.o.d is omnipotent and omnipresent; yea, "that the Lord He is G.o.d; there is none else beside Him," as the Scrip- [20]
tures declare.
_If Christ was G.o.d, why did Jesus cry out, __"__My G.o.d,_ _why hast Thou forsaken me?__"_
Even as the struggling heart, reaching toward a higher goal, appeals to its hope and faith, Why failest thou [25]
me? Jesus as the son of man was human: Christ as the Son of G.o.d was divine. This divinity was reaching humanity through the crucifixion of the human,-that momentous demonstration of G.o.d, in which Spirit proved its supremacy over matter. Jesus a.s.sumed for mortals the [30]
[Page 64.]
weakness of flesh, that Spirit might be found "All-in-all." [1]
Hence, the human cry which voiced that struggle; thence, the way he made for mortals' escape. Our Master bore the cross to show his power over death; then relinquished his earth-task of teaching and dem- [5]
onstrating the nothingness of sickness, sin, and death, and rose to his native estate, man's indestructible eternal life in G.o.d.
_What can prospective students of the College take for_ _preliminary studies? Do you regard the study of litera-_ [10]
_ture and languages as objectionable?_
Persons contemplating a course at the Ma.s.sachusetts Metaphysical College, can prepare for it through no books except the Bible, and "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures." Man-made theories are nar- [15]
row, else extravagant, and are always materialistic.
The ethics which guide thought spiritually must bene- fit every one; for the only philosophy and religion that afford instruction are those which deal with facts and resist speculative opinions and fables. [20]
Works on science are profitable; for science is not human. It is spiritual, and not material. Literature and languages, to a limited extent, are aids to a student of the Bible and of Christian Science.
_Is it possible to know why we are put into this condition_ [25]
_of mortality?_
It is quite as possible to know wherefore man is thus conditioned, as to be certain that he _is_ in a state of mortality. The only evidence of the existence of a mor- tal man, or of a material state and universe, is gathered [30]
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from the five personal senses. This delusive evidence, [1]
Science has dethroned by repeated proofs of its falsity.
We have no more proof of human discord,-sin, sickness, disease, or death,-than we have that the earth's surface is flat, and her motions imaginary. If [5]