Truth's witness
What is termed material sense can report only a mor-298:9 tal temporary sense of things, whereas spiritual sense canbear witness only to Truth. To material sense,the unreal is the real until this sense is corrected298:12 by Christian Science.
Spiritual sense, contradicting the material senses, in-volves intuition, hope, faith, understanding, fruition, real-298:15 ity. Material sense expresses the belief that mind is inmatter. This human belief, alternating between a senseof pleasure and pain, hope and fear, life and death, never298:18 reaches beyond the boundary of the mortal or the unreal.When the real is attained, which is announced by Science,joy is no longer a trembler, nor is hope a cheat. Spirit-298:21 ual ideas, like numbers and notes, start from Principle,and admit no materialistic beliefs. Spiritual ideas leadup to their divine origin, God, and to the spiritual sense298:24 of being.
Thought-angels
Angels are not etherealized human beings, evolvinganimal qualities in their wings; but they are celestial298:27 visitants, flying on spiritual, not material,pinions. Angels are pure thoughts from God,winged with Truth and Love, no matter what their indi-298:30 vidualism may be. Human conjecture confers upon angelsits own forms of thought, marked with superstitious out-lines, making them human creatures with suggestive299:1 feathers; but this is only fancy. It has behind it no morereality than has the sculptor's thought when he carves299:3 his "Statue of Liberty," which embodies his concep-tion of an unseen quality or condition, but which hasno physical antecedent reality save in the artist's own ob-299:6 servation and "chambers of imagery."
Our Angelic messengers
My angels are exalted thoughts, appearing at the doorof some sepulchre, in which human belief has buried299:9 its fondest earthly hopes. With white fin-gers they point upward to a new and glo-rified trust, to higher ideals of life and its joys. Angels299:12 are God's representatives. These upward-soaring beingsnever lead towards self, sin, or materiality, but guide tothe divine Principle of all good, whither every real indi-299:15 viduality, image, or likeness of God, gathers. By givingearnest heed to these spiritual guides they tarry with us,and we entertain "angels unawares."
Knowledge and Truth
299:18 Knowledge gained from material sense is figurativelyrepresented in Scripture as a tree, bearing the fruits ofsin, sickness, and death. Ought we not then299:21 to judge the knowledge thus obtained to beuntrue and dangerous, since "the tree is known by hisfruit"?
299:24 Truth never destroys God's idea. Truth is spiritual,eternal substance, which cannot destroy the right reflec-tion. Corporeal sense, or error, may seem to hide Truth,299:27 health, harmony, and Science, as the mist obscures thesun or the mountain; but Science, the sunshine of Truth,will melt away the shadow and reveal the celestial299:30 peaks.
Old and new man
If man were solely a creature of the material senses,he would have no eternal Principle and would be mutable300:1 and mortal. Human logic is awry when it attemptsto draw correct spiritual conclusions regarding life from300:3 matter. Finite sense has no true apprecia-tion of infinite Principle, God, or of His infi-nite image or reflection, man. The mirage, which makes300:6 trees and cities seem to be where they are not, illustratesthe illusion of material man, who cannot be the imageof God.
300:9 So far as the scientific statement as to man is under-stood, it can be proved and will bring to light the truereflection of God - the real man, or the /new/ man (as300:12 St. Paul has it).
The tares and wheat
The temporal and unreal never touch the eternal andreal. The mutable and imperfect never touch the im-300:15 mutable and perfect. The inharmonious andself-destructive never touch the harmoniousand self-existent. These opposite qualities are the tares300:18 and wheat, which never really mingle, though (to mortalsight) they grow side by side until the harvest; then, Sci-ence separates the wheat from the tares, through the real-300:21 ization of God as ever present and of man as reflectingthe divine likeness.
The divine reflection
Spirit is God, Soul; therefore Soul is not in matter. If300:24 Spirit were in matter, God would have no representative,and matter would be identical with God.The theory that soul, spirit, intelligence, in-300:27 habits matter is taught by the schools. This theory isunscientific. The universe reflects and expresses the di-vine substance or Mind; therefore God is seen only in the300:30 spiritual universe and spiritual man, as the sun is seen inthe ray of light which goes out from it. God is re-vealed only in that which reflects Life, Truth, Love, -301:1 yea, which manifests God's attributes and power, evenas the human likeness thrown upon the mirror, repeats301:3 the color, form, and action of the person in front of themirror.
Few persons comprehend what Christian Science301:6 means by the word /reflection. /To himself, mortal andmaterial man seems to be substance, but his sense ofsubstance involves error and therefore is material,301:9 temporal.
On the other hand, the immortal, spiritual man is reallysubstantial, and reflects the eternal substance, or Spirit,301:12 which mortals hope for. He reflects the divine, whichconstitutes the only real and eternal entity. This reflectionseems to mortal sense transcendental, because the spiritual301:15 man's substantiality transcends mortal vision and is re-vealed only through divine Science.
Inverted images and ideas
As God is substance and man is the divine image and301:18 likeness, man should wish for, and in reality has, onlythe substance of good, the substance of Spirit,not matter. The belief that man has any other301:21 substance, or mind, is not spiritual and breaksthe First Commandment, Thou shalt have one God, oneMind. Mortal man seems to himself to be material sub-301:24 stance, while man is "image" (idea). Delusion, sin, dis-ease, and death arise from the false testimony of materialsense, which, from a supposed standpoint outside the301:27 focal distance of infinite Spirit, presents an inverted imageof Mind and substance with everything turned upsidedown.
301:30 This falsity presupposes soul to be an unsubstantialdweller in material forms, and man to be material insteadof spiritual. Immortality is not bounded by mortality.302:1 Soul is not compassed by finiteness. Principle is not tobe found in fragmentary ideas.
Identity not lost
302:3 The material body and mind are temporal, but thereal man is spiritual and eternal. The identity of thereal man is not lost, but found through this302:6 explanation; for the conscious infinitude ofexistence and of all identity is thereby discerned and re-mains unchanged. It is impossible that man should lose302:9 aught that is real, when God is all and eternally his. Thenotion that mind is in matter, and that the so-called pleas-ures and pains, the birth, sin, sickness, and death of302:12 matter, are real, is a mortal belief; and this belief is allthat will ever be lost.
Definition of man
Continuing our definition of/ man/, let us remember that302:15 harmonious and immortal man has existed forever, andis always beyond and above the mortal illu-sion of any life, substance and intelligence302:18 as existent in matter. This statement is based on fact,not fable. The Science of being reveals man as perfect,even as the Father is perfect, because the Soul, or Mind,302:21 of the spiritual man is God, the divine Principle of allbeing, and because this real man is governed by Soulinstead of sense, by the law of Spirit, not by the so-called302:24 laws of matter.
God is Love. He is therefore the divine, infinite Prin-ciple, called Person or God. Man's true consciousness302:27 is in the mental, not in any bodily or personal likenessto Spirit. Indeed, the body presents no proper likenessof divinity, though mortal sense would fain have us so302:30 believe.
Mental propagation
Even in Christian Science, reproduction by Spirit'sindividual ideas is but the reflection of the creative power303:1 of the divine Principle of those ideas. The reflection,through mental manifestation, of the multitudinous303:3 forms of Mind which people the realm ofthe real is controlled by Mind, the Principlegoverning the reflection. Multiplication of God's chil-303:6 dren comes from no power of propagation in matter, itis the reflection of Spirit.
The minutiae of lesser individualities reflect the one di-303:9 vine individuality and are comprehended in and formedby Spirit, not by material sensation. Whatever reflectsMind, Life, Truth, and Love, is spiritually conceived and303:12 brought forth; but the statement that man is conceivedand evolved both spiritually and materially, or by bothGod and man, contradicts this eternal truth. All the303:15 vanity of the ages can never make both these contrariestrue. Divine Science lays the axe at the root of the illu-sion that life, or mind, is formed by or is in the material303:18 body, and Science will eventually destroy this illusionthrough the self-destruction of all error and the beatifiedunderstanding of the Science of Life.
Error defined
303:21 The belief that pain and pleasure, life and death, holi-ness and unholiness, mingle in man, - thatmortal, material man is the likeness of God303:24 and is himself a creator, - is a fatal error.
Man's entity spiritual
God, without the image and likeness of Himself, wouldbe a nonentity, or Mind unexpressed. He would be303:27 without a witness or proof of His own na-ture. Spiritual man is the image or idea ofGod, an idea which cannot be lost nor sep-303:30 arated from its divine Principle. When the evidencebefore the material senses yielded to spiritual sense, theapostle declared that nothing could alienate him from304:1 God, from the sweet sense and presence of Life andTruth.
Man inseparable from Love
304:3 It is ignorance and false belief, based on a materialsense of things, which hide spiritual beauty and good-ness. Understanding this, Paul said: "Nei-304:6 ther death, nor life, . . . nor things present,nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, norany other creature, shall be able to separate us from304:9 the love of God." This is the doctrine of ChristianScience: that divine Love cannot be deprived of itsmanifestation, or object; that joy cannot be turned into304:12 sorrow, for sorrow is not the master of joy; that good cannever produce evil; that matter can never produce mindnor life result in death. The perfect man - governed304:15 by God, his perfect Principle - is sinless and eternal.
Harmony natural
Harmony is produced by its Principle, is controlled by it and abides with it. Divine Principle is the Life 304:18 of man. Man's happiness is not, therefore, at the disposal of physical sense. Truth is not contaminated by error. Harmony in man is as beautiful 304:21 as in music, and discord is unnatural, unreal.
The science of music governs tones. If mortals caughtharmony through material sense, they would lose har-304:24 mony, if time or accident robbed them of material sense.To be master of chords and discords, the science ofmusic must be understood. Left to the decisions304:27 of material sense, music is liable to be misappre-hended and lost in confusion. Controlled by belief,instead of understanding, music is, must be, imper-304:30 fectly expressed. So man, not understanding the Sci-ence of being, - thrusting aside his divine Principle asincomprehensible, - is abandoned to conjectures, left in305:1 the hands of ignorance, placed at the disposal of illusions,subjected to material sense which is discord. A discon-305:3 tented, discordant mortal is no more a /man/ than discordis music.
Human reflection
A picture in the camera or a face reflected in the mirror305:6 is not the original, though resembling it. Man, in thelikeness of his Maker, reflects the central lightof being, the invisible God. As there is no cor-305:9 poreality in the mirrored form, which is but a reflection,so man, like all things real, reflects God, his divine Prin-ciple, not in a mortal body.
305:12 Gender also is a quality, not of God, but a character-istic of mortal mind. The verity that God's image is nota creator, though he reflects the creation of Mind, God,305:15 constitutes the underlying reality of reflection. "Thenanswered Jesus and said unto them: Verily, verily I sayunto you, the Son can do nothing of himself, but what he305:18 seeth the Father do: for what things soever He doeth,these also doeth the Son likewise."
Inverted images
The inverted images presented by the senses, the de-305:21 flections of matter as opposed to the Science of spirit-ual reflection, are all unlike Spirit, God. Inthe illusion of life that is here to-day and305:24 gone to-morrow, man would be wholly mortal, wereit not that Love, the divine Principle that obtains indivine Science, destroys all error and brings immor-305:27 tality to light. Because man is the reflection of hisMaker, he is not subject to birth, growth, maturity, de-cay. These mortal dreams are of human origin, not305:30 divine.
Jewish traditions
The Sadducees reasoned falsely about the resurrec-tion, but not so blindly as the Pharisees, who believed306:1 error to be as immortal as Truth. The Pharisees thoughtthat they could raise the spiritual from the material. They306:3 would first make life result in death, and thenresort to death to reproduce spiritual life.Jesus taught them how death was to be overcome by306:6 spiritual Life, and demonstrated this beyond cavil.
Divinity not childless
Life demonstrates Life. The immortality of Soul makesman immortal. If God, who is Life, were parted for a306:9 moment from His reflection, man, during thatmoment there would be no divinity reflected.The Ego would be unexpressed, and the Father would be306:12 childless, - no Father.
If Life or Soul and its representative, man, unite fora period and then are separated as by a law of divorce to306:15 be brought together again at some uncertain future timeand in a manner unknown, - and this is the generalreligious opinion of mankind, - we are left without a306:18 rational proof of immortality. But man cannot be sep-arated for an instant from God, if man reflects God.Thus Science proves man's existence to be intact.
Thought-forms
306:21 The myriad forms of mortal thought, made manifestas matter, are not more distinct nor real to the mate-rial senses than are the Soul-created forms306:24 to spiritual sense, which cognizes Life as per-manent. Undisturbed amid the jarring testimony of thematerial senses, Science, still enthroned, is unfolding306:27 to mortals the immutable, harmonious, divine Principle,- is unfolding Life and the universe, ever present andeternal.
306:30 God's man, spiritually created, is not material and mortal.
The serpent's whisper
The parent of all human discord was the Adam-dream,307:1 the deep sleep, in which originated the delusion that lifeand intelligence proceeded from and passed into matter.307:3 This pantheistic error, or so-called /serpent/, in-sists still upon the opposite of Truth, saying,"Ye shall be as gods;" that is, I will make error as real307:6 and eternal as Truth.
Evil still affirms itself to be mind, and declares thatthere is more than one intelligence or God. It says:307:9 "There shall be lords and gods many. I declare that Godmakes evil minds and evil spirits, and that I aid Him.Truth shall change sides and be unlike Spirit. I will307:12 put spirit into what I call matter, and matter shall seemto have life as much as God, Spirit, who /is/ the only life."
Bad results from error
This error has proved itself to be error. Its life is found307:15 to be not Life, but only a transient, false sense of an ex-istence which ends in death. Error chargesits lie to Truth and says: "The Lord knows307:18 it. He has made man immortal and material, out of mat-ter instead of Spirit." Thus error partakes of its ownnature and utters its own falsities. If we regard matter307:21 as intelligent, and Mind as both good and evil, every sinor supposed material pain and pleasure seems normal,a part of God's creation, and so weighs against our course307:24 Spiritward.
Higher statutes
Truth has no beginning. The divine Mind is the Soulof man, and gives man dominion over all things. Man307:27 was not created from a material basis, norbidden to obey material laws which Spirit nevermade; his province is in spiritual statutes, in the higher307:30 law of Mind.
The great question
Above error's awful din, blackness, and chaos, the voiceof Truth still calls: "Adam, where art thou? Conscious-308:1 ness, where art thou? Art thou dwelling in the beliefthat mind is in matter, and that evil is mind, or art thou308:3 in the living faith that there is and can be butone God, and keeping His commandment?"Until the lesson is learned that God is the only Mind gov-308:6 erning man, mortal belief will be afraid as it was in thebeginning, and will hide from the demand, "Where artthou?" This awful demand, "Adam, where art thou?"308:9 is met by the admission from the head, heart, stomach,blood, nerves, etc.: "Lo, here I am, looking for happinessand life in the body, but finding only an illusion, a blend-308:12 ing of false claims, false pleasure, pain, sin, sickness, anddeath."
The Soul-inspired patriarchs heard the voice of Truth,308:15 and talked with God as consciously as man talks with man.
Wrestling of Jacob
Jacob was /alone/, wrestling with error, - strugglingwith a mortal sense of life, substance, and intelligence308:18 as existent in matter with its false pleasuresand pains, - when an angel, a message fromTruth and Love, appeared to him and smote the sinew,308:21 or strength, of his error, till he saw its unreality; andTruth, being thereby understood, gave him spiritualstrength in this Peniel of divine Science. Then said308:24 the spiritual evangel: "Let me go, for the day breaketh;"that is, the light of Truth and Love dawns upon thee.But the patriarch, perceiving his error and his need308:27 of help, did not loosen his hold upon this glorious lightuntil his nature was transformed. When Jacob wasasked, "What is thy name?" he straightway answered;308:30 and then his name was changed to Israel, for "as a prince"had he prevailed and had "power with God and withmen." Then Jacob questioned his deliverer, "Tell me,309:1 I pray thee, /thy/ name;" but this appellation was withheld,for the messenger was not a corporeal being, but a name-309:3 less, incorporeal impartation of divine Love to man, which,to use the word of the Psalmist, /restored /his Soul, - gavehim the spiritual sense of being and rebuked his material309:6 sense.
Israel the new name
The result of Jacob's struggle thus appeared. He hadconquered material error with the understanding of Spirit309:9 and of spiritual power. This changed the man.He was no longer called Jacob, but Israel, -a prince of God, or a soldier of God, who had fought309:12 a good fight. He was to become the father of those, whothrough earnest striving followed his demonstration of thepower of Spirit over the material senses; and the children309:15 of earth who followed his example were to be called thechildren of Israel, until the Messiah should rename them.If these children should go astray, and forget that Life309:18 is God, good, and that good is not in elements which arenot spiritual, - thus losing the divine power which healsthe sick and sinning, - they were to be brought back309:21 through great tribulation, to be renamed in ChristianScience and led to deny material sense, or mind in matter,even as the gospel teaches.
Life never structural
309:24 The Science of being shows it to be impossible for in-finite Spirit or Soul to be in a finite body or for man tohave an intelligence separate from his Maker.309:27 It is a self-evident error to suppose that therecan be such a reality as organic animal or vegetable life,when such so-called life always ends in death. Life is309:30 never for a moment extinct. Therefore it is never struc-tural nor organic, and is never absorbed nor limited by itsown formations.
Thought seen as substance
310:1 The artist is not in his painting. The picture is theartist's thought objectified. The human belief fancies310:3 that it delineates thought on matter, but whatis matter? Did it exist prior to thought?Matter is made up of supposititious mortal mind-force;310:6 but all might is divine Mind. Thought will finally beunderstood and seen in all form, substance, and color, butwithout material accompaniments. The potter is not in310:9 the clay; else the clay would have power over the potter.God is His own infinite Mind, and expresses all.
The central intelligence
Day may decline and shadows fall, but darkness flees310:12 when the earth has again turned upon its axis. The sunis not affected by the revolution of the earth.So Science reveals Soul as God, untouched310:15 by sin and death, - as the central life and intelligencearound which circle harmoniously all things in the sys-tems of Mind.
Soul imperishable
310:18 Soul changeth not. We are commonly taught that thereis a human soul which sins and is spiritually lost, - thatsoul may be lost, and yet be immortal. If310:21 Soul could sin, Spirit, Soul, would be flesh in-stead of Spirit. It is the belief of the flesh and of mate-rial sense which sins. If Soul sinned, Soul would die.310:24 Sin is the element of self-destruction, and spiritual deathis oblivion. If there was sin in Soul, the annihilation ofSpirit would be inevitable. The only Life is Spirit, and310:27 if Spirit should lose Life as God, good, then Spirit, whichhas no other existence, would be annihilated.
Mind is God, and God is not seen by material sense,310:30 because Mind is Spirit, which material sense cannot dis-cern. There is neither growth, maturity, nor decay inSoul. These changes are the mutations of material sense,311:1 the varying clouds of mortal belief, which hide the truthof being.
311:3 What we term mortal mind or carnal mind, dependenton matter for manifestation, is not Mind. God is Mind:all that Mind, God, is, or hath made, is good, and He311:6 made all. Hence evil is not made and is not real.
Sin only of the flesh
Soul is immortal because it is Spirit, which has no ele-ment of self-destruction. is man lost spiritually? No,311:9 he can only lose a sense material. All sin isof the flesh. It cannot be spiritual. Sin existshere or hereafter only so long as the illusion of mind in311:12 matter remains. It is a sense of sin, and not a sinful soul,which is lost. Evil is destroyed by the sense of good.
Soul impeccable
Through false estimates of soul as dwelling in sense311:15 and of mind as dwelling in matter, belief strays into asense of temporary loss or absence of soul, spir-itual truth. This state of error is the mortal311:18 dream of life and substance as existent in matter, and isdirectly opposite to the immortal reality of being. So longas we believe that soul can sin or that immortal Soul is in311:21 mortal body, we can never understand the Science of be-ing. When humanity does understand this Science, itwill become the law of Life to man, - even the higher law311:24 of Soul, which prevails over material sense through har-mony and immortality.
The objects cognized by the physical senses have not311:27 the reality of substance. They are only what mortalbelief calls them. Matter, sin, and mortality lose allsupposed consciousness or claim to life or existence, as311:30 mortals lay off a false sense of life, substance, and intelli-gence. but the spiritual, eternal man is not touched bythese phases of mortality.
Sense-dreams
312:1 How true it is that whatever is learned through materialsense must be lost because such so-called knowledge is312:3 reversed by the spiritual facts of being inScience. That which material sense callsintangible, is found to be substance. What to material312:6 sense seems substance, becomes nothingness, as the sense-dream vanishes and reality appears.
The senses regard a corpse, not as man, but simply as312:9 matter. People say, "Man is dead;" but this death isthe departure of a mortal's mind, not of matter. Thematter is still there. The belief of that mortal that he312:12 must die occasioned his departure; yet you say thatmatter has caused his death.
Vain ecstasies
People go into ecstasies over the sense of a corporeal312:15 Jehovah, though with scarcely a spark of love in theirhearts; yet God /is/ love, and without Love,God, immortality cannot appear. Mortals try312:18 to believe without understanding Truth; yet God /is/Truth. Mortals claim that death is inevitable; but man'seternal Principle is ever-present life. Mortals believe in312:21 a finite personal God; while God is infinite Love, whichmust be unlimited.
Man-made theories
Our theories are based on finite premises, which can-312:24 not penetrate beyond matter. A personal sense of Godand of man's capabilities necessarily limitsfaith and hinders spiritual understanding. It312:27 divides faith and understanding between matter and Spirit,the finite and the infinite, and so turns away from theintelligent and divine healing Principle to the inanimate312:30 drug.
The one anointed
Jesus' spiritual origin and his demonstration of divinePrinciple richly endowed him and entitled him to sonship313:1 in Science. He was the son of a virgin. The termChrist Jesus, or Jesus the Christ (to give the full and313:3 proper translation of the Greek), may be ren-dered "Jesus the anointed," Jesus the God-crowned or the divinely royal man, as it is said of him in313:6 the first chapter of Hebrews: -Therefore God, even thy God, hath anointed theeWith the oil of gladness above thy fellows.
313:9 With this agrees another passage in the same chapter,which refers to the Son as "the brightness of His [God's]glory, and the express [expressed] image of His person313:12 [infinite Mind]." It is noteworthy that the phrase "ex-press image" in the Common Version is, in the GreekTestament, /character/. Using this word in its higher mean-313:15 ing, we may assume that the author of this remarkableepistle regarded Christ as the Son of God, the royalreflection of the infinite; and the cause given for the ex-313:18 altation of Jesus, Mary's son, was that he "loved right-eousness and hated iniquity." The passage is madeeven clearer in the translation of the late George R.313:21 Noyes, D.D.: "Who, being a brightness from His glory,and an image of His being."
Jesus the Scientist
Jesus of Nazareth was the most scientific man that313:24 ever trod the globe. He plunged beneath the materialsurface of things, and found the spiritualcause. To accommodate himself to imma-313:27 ture ideas of spiritual power, - for spirituality was possessed only in a limited degree even by his disciples, -Jesus called the body, which by spiritual power he313:30 raised from the grave, "flesh and bones." To showthat the substance of himself was Spirit and the body314:1 no more perfect because of death and no less materialuntil the ascension (his further spiritual exaltation),314:3 Jesus waited until the mortal or fleshly sense had re-linquished the belief of substance-matter, and spiritualsense had quenched all earthly yearnings. Thus he found314:6 the eternal Ego, and proved that he and the Father wereinseparable as God and His reflection or spiritual man.Our Master gained the solution of being, demonstrating314:9 the existence of but one Mind without a second or equal.
The bodily resurrection
The Jews, who sought to kill this man of God, showedplainly that their material views were the parents of their314:12 wicked deeds. When Jesus spoke of repro-ducing his body, - knowing, as he did, thatMind was the builder, - and said, "Destroy this temple,314:15 and in three days I will raise it up," they thought that hemeant their material temple instead of his body. To suchmaterialists, the real man seemed a spectre, unseen and314:18 unfamiliar, and the body, which they laid in a sepulchre,seemed to be substance. This materialism lost sight ofthe true Jesus; but the faithful Mary saw him, and he314:21 presented to her, more than ever before, the true idea ofLife and substance.
Opposition of materialists
Because of mortals' material and sinful belief, the314:24 spiritual Jesus was imperceptible to them. The higherhis demonstration of divine Science carriedthe problem of being, and the more dis-314:27 tinctly he uttered the demands of its divine Principle,Truth and Love, the more odious he became to sinnersand to those who, depending on doctrines and material314:30 laws to save them from sin and sickness, were submis-sive to death as being in supposed accord with theinevitable law of life. Jesus proved them wrong by315:1 his resurrection, and said: "Whosoever liveth and be-lieveth in me shall never die."
Hebrew theology
315:3 That saying of our Master, "I and my Father are one,"separated him from the scholastic theology of the rabbis.His better understanding of God was a rebuke315:6 to them. He knew of but one Mind and laidno claim to any other. He knew that the Ego was Mindinstead of body and that matter, sin, and evil were not315:9 Mind; and his understanding of this divine Sciencebrought upon him the anathemas of the age.
The true sonship
The opposite and false views of the people hid from315:12 their sense Christ's sonship with God. They could notdiscern his spiritual existence. Their carnalminds were at enmity with it. Their thoughts315:15 were filled with mortal error, instead of with God's spirit-ual idea as presented by Christ Jesus. The likeness ofGod we lose sight of through sin, which beclouds the spir-315:18 itual sense of Truth; and we realize this likeness onlywhen we subdue sin and prove man's heritage, the libertyof the sons of God.
Immaculate conception
315:21 Jesus' spiritual origin and understanding enabled himto demonstrate the facts of being, - to prove irrefutablyhow spiritual Truth destroys material error,315:24 heals sickness, and overcomes death. Thedivine conception of Jesus pointed to this truth and pre-sented an illustration of creation. The history of Jesus315:27 shows him to have been more spiritual than all otherearthly personalities.
Jesus as mediator
Wearing in part a human form (that is, as it seemed315:30 to mortal view), being conceived by a human mother,Jesus was the mediator between Spirit and the flesh,between Truth and error. Explaining and demonstrat-316:1 ing the way of divine Science, he became the way ofsalvation to all who accepted his word. From him mor-316:3 tals may learn how to escape from evil. Thereal man being linked by Science to his Maker,mortals need only turn from sin and lose sight of mortal316:6 selfhood to find Christ, the real man and his relation toGod, and to recognize the divine sonship. Christ, Truth,was demonstrated through Jesus to prove the power of316:9 Spirit over the flesh, - to show that Truth is mademanifest by its effects upon the human mind and body,healing sickness and destroying sin.
Spiritual government
316:12 Jesus represented Christ, the true idea of God. Hencethe warfare between this spiritual idea and perfunctoryreligion, between spiritual clear-sightedness316:15 and the blindness of popular belief, which ledto the conclusion that the spiritual idea could be killedby crucifying the flesh. The Christ-idea, or the Christ-316:18 man, rose higher to human view because of the crucifixion,and thus proved that truth was the master of death.Christ presents the indestructible man, whom Spirit cre-316:21 ates, constitutes, and governs. Christ illustrates thatblending with God, his divine Principle, which gives mandominion over all the earth.
Deadness in sin
316:24 The spiritual idea of God, as presented by Jesus, wasscourged in person, and its Principle was rejected. Thatman was accounted a criminal who could316:27 prove God's divine power by healing thesick, casting out evils, spiritualizing materialistic beliefs,and raising the dead, - those dead in trespasses and316:30 sins, satisfied with the flesh, resting on the basis of mat-ter, blind to the possibilities of Spirit and its correla-tive truth.317:1 Jesus uttered things which had been "secret from thefoundation of the world," - since material knowledge317:3 usurped the throne of the creative divine Principle, insistedon the might of matter, the force of falsity, the insignifi-cance of spirit, and proclaimed an anthropomorphic God.
The cup of Jesus
317:6 Whosoever lives most the life of Jesus in this ageand declares best the power of Christian Science, willdrink of his Master's cup. Resistance to317:9 Truth will haunt his steps, and he will in-cur the hatred of sinners, till "wisdom is justified ofher children." These blessed benedictions rest upon317:12 Jesus' followers: "If the world hate you, ye know thatit hated me before it hated you;" "Lo, I am with youalway," - that is, not only in all time, but in /all ways/317:15 and conditions.
The individuality of man is no less tangible becauseit is spiritual and because his life is not at the mercy of317:18 matter. The understanding of his spiritual individualitymakes man more real, more formidable in truth, and en-ables him to conquer sin, disease, and death. Our Lord317:21 and Master presented himself to his disciples after hisresurrection from the grave, as the self-same Jesus whomthey had loved before the tragedy on Calvary.
Material skepticism
317:24 To the materialistic Thomas, looking for the idealSaviour in matter instead of in Spirit and to the testi-mony of the material senses and the body,317:27 more than to Soul, for an earnest of immor-tality, - to him Jesus furnished the proof that he wasunchanged by the crucifixion. To this dull and doubt-317:30 ing disciple Jesus remained a fleshly reality, so long asthe Master remained an inhabitant of the earth. Noth-ing but a display of matter could make existence real318:1 to Thomas. For him to believe in matter was no task,but for him to conceive of the substantiality of Spirit -318:3 to know that nothing can efface Mind and immortality, inwhich Spirit reigns - was more difficult.
What the senses originate
Corporeal senses define diseases as realities; but the318:6 Scriptures declare that God made all, even while the cor-poreal senses are saying that matter causesdisease and the divine Mind cannot or will318:9 not heal it. The material senses originate andsupport all that is material, untrue, selfish, or debased.They would put soul into soil, life into limbo, and doom318:12 all things to decay. We must silence this lie of materialsense with the truth of spiritual sense. We must causethe error to cease that brought the belief of sin and death318:15 and would efface the pure sense of omnipotence.
Sickness as discord
Is the sick man sinful above all others? No! butso far as he is discordant, he is not the image of God.318:18 Weary of their material beliefs, from whichcomes so much suffering, invalids grow morespiritual, as the error - or belief that life is in matter -318:21 yields to the reality of spiritual Life.
The Science of Mind denies the error of sensation inmatter, and heals with Truth. Medical science treats318:24 disease as though disease were real, therefore right, andattempts to heal it with matter. If disease is right it iswrong to heal it. Material methods are temporary, and318:27 are not adapted to elevate mankind.
The governor is not subjected to the governed. InScience man is governed by God, divine Principle, as318:30 numbers are controlled and proved by His laws. Intelli-gence does not originate in numbers, but is manifestedthrough them. The body does not include soul, but man-319:1 ifests mortality, a false sense of soul. The delusion thatthere is life in matter has no kinship with the Life supernal.
Unscientific introspection
319:3 Science depicts disease as error, as matter /versus/Mind, and error reversed as subserving the facts ofhealth. To calculate one's life-prospects319:6 from a material basis, would infringe uponspiritual law and misguide human hope. Having faithin the divine Principle of Health and spiritually under-319:9 standing God, sustains man under all circumstances;whereas the lower appeal to the general faith in materialmeans (commonly called nature) must yield to the all-319:12 might of infinite Spirit.
Throughout the infinite cycles of eternal existence,Spirit and matter neither concur in man nor in the universe.
God the only Mind
319:15 The varied doctrines and theories which presupposelife and intelligence to exist in matter are so many ancientand modern mythologies. Mystery, miracle,319:18 sin, and death will disappear when it becomesfairly understood that the divine Mind controls man andman has no Mind but God.
Scriptures misinterpreted
319:21 The divine Science taught in the original languageof the Bible came through inspiration, and needs inspi-ration to be understood. Hence the misappre-319:24 hension of the spiritual meaning of the Bible,and the misinterpretation of the Word insome instances by uninspired writers, who only wrote319:27 down what an inspired teacher had said. A misplacedword changes the sense and misstates the Science ofthe Scriptures, as, for instance, to name Love as merely319:30 an attribute of God; but we can by special and propercapitalization speak of the love of Love, meaning by thatwhat the beloved disciple meant in one of his epistles,320:1 when he said, "God is love." Likewise we can speak ofthe truth of Truth and of the life of Life, for Christ plainly320:3 declared, "I am the way, the truth, and the life."
Interior meaning
Metaphors abound in the Bible, and names are oftenexpressive of spiritual ideas. The most distinguished320:6 theologians in Europe and America agree thatthe Scriptures have both a spiritual and lit-eral meaning. In Smith's Bible Dictionary it is said:320:9 "The spiritual interpretation of Scripture must restupon both the literal and moral;" and in the learnedarticle on Noah in the same work, the familiar text,320:12 Genesis vi. 3, "And the Lord said, My spirit shall notalways strive with man, for that he also is flesh," is quotedas follows, from the original Hebrew: "And Jehovah320:15 said, My spirit shall not forever rule [or be humbled] inmen, seeing that they are [or, in their error they are]but flesh." Here the original text declares plainly the320:18 spiritual fact of being, even man's eternal and harmo-nious existence as image, idea, instead of matter (how-ever transcendental such a thought appears), and avers320:21 that this fact is not forever to be humbled by the beliefthat man is flesh and matter, for according to that errorman is mortal.
Job, on the resurrection
320:24 The one important interpretation of Scripture is thespiritual. For example, the text, "In my flesh shall Isee God," gives a profound idea of the di-320:27 vine power to heal the ills of the flesh, andencourages mortals to hope in Him who healeth all ourdiseases; whereas this passage is continually quoted320:30 as if Job intended to declare that even if disease andworms destroyed his body, yet in the latter days he shouldstand in celestial perfection before Elohim, still clad321:1 in material flesh, - an interpretation which is just the op-posite of the true, as may be seen by studying the book321:3 of Job. As Paul says, in his first epistle to the Corin-thians, "Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom ofGod."
Fear of the serpent overcome
321:6 The Hebrew Lawgiver, slow of speech, despaired ofmaking the people understand what should be revealedto him. When, led by wisdom to cast down his321:9 rod, he saw it become a serpent, Moses fled be-fore it; but wisdom bade him come back andhandle the serpent, and then Moses' fear departed. In321:12 this incident was seen the actuality of Science. Matterwas shown to be a belief only. The serpent, evil, underwisdom's bidding, was destroyed through understanding321:15 divine Science, and this proof was a staff upon which tolean. The illusion of Moses lost its power to alarm him,when he discovered that what he apparently saw was really321:18 but a phase of mortal belief.
Leprosy healed
It was scientifically demonstrated that leprosy was acreation of mortal mind and not a condition of matter,321:21 when Moses first put his hand into his bosomand drew it forth white as snow with the dreaddisease, and presently restored his hand to its natural con-321:24 dition by the same simple process. God had lessenedMoses' fear by this proof in divine Science, and the in-ward voice became to him the voice of God, which said:321:27 "It shall come to pass, if they will not believe thee, neitherhearken to the voice of the first sign, that they will believethe voice of the latter sign." And so it was in the coming321:30 centuries, when the Science of being was demonstratedby Jesus, who showed his students the power of Mind bychanging water into wine, and taught them how to handle322:1 serpents unharmed, to heal the sick and cast out evils inproof of the supremacy of Mind.
Standpoints changed
322:3 When understanding changes the standpoints of life andintelligence from a material to a spiritual basis, we shallgain the reality of Life, the control of Soul over322:6 sense, and we shall perceive Christianity, orTruth, in its divine Principle. This must be the climaxbefore harmonious and immortal man is obtained and his322:9 capabilities revealed. It is highly important - in viewof the immense work to be accomplished before this recog-nition of divine Science can come - to turn our thoughts322:12 towards divine Principle, that finite belief may be pre-pared to relinquish its error.
Saving the inebriate
Man's wisdom finds no satisfaction in sin, since God322:15 has sentenced sin to suffer. The necromancy of yester-day foreshadowed the mesmerism and hypno-tism of to-day. The drunkard thinks he enjoys322:18 drunkenness, and you cannot make the inebriate leavehis besottedness, until his physical sense of pleasure yieldsto a higher sense. Then he turns from his cups, as322:21 the startled dreamer who wakens from an incubus in-curred through the pains of distorted sense. A man wholikes to do wrong - finding pleasure in it and refraining322:24 from it only through fear of consequences - is neithera temperate man nor a reliable religionist.
Uses of suffering
The sharp experiences of belief in the supposititious life322:27 of matter, as well as our disappointments and ceaselesswoes, turn us like tired children to the armsof divine Love. Then we begin to learn Life322:30 in divine Science. Without this process of weaning,"Canst thou by searching find out God?" It is easierto desire Truth than to rid one's self of error. Mortals323:1 may seek the understanding of Christian Science, but theywill not be able to glean from Christian Science the facts323:3 of being without striving for them. This strife consistsin the endeavor to forsake error of every kind and to pos-sess no other consciousness but good.
A bright outlook
323:6 Through the wholesome chastisements of Love, weare helped onward in the march towards righteousness,peace, and purity, which are the landmarks323:9 of Science. Beholding the infinite tasks oftruth, we pause, - wait on God. Then we push onward,until boundless thought walks enraptured, and concep-323:12 tion unconfined is winged to reach the divine glory.
Need and supply
In order to apprehend more, we must put into prac-tice what we already know. We must recollect that323:15 Truth is demonstrable when understood, andthat good is not understood until demonstrated.If "faithful over a few things," we shall be made rulers323:18 over many; but the one unused talent decays and is lost.When the sick or the sinning awake to realize their needof what they have not, they will be receptive of divine323:21 Science, which gravitates towards Soul and away frommaterial sense, removes thought from the body, and ele-vates even mortal mind to the contemplation of some-323:24 thing better than disease or sin. The true idea of Godgives the true understanding of Life and Love, robs thegrave of victory, takes away all sin and the delusion that323:27 there are other minds, and destroys mortality.
Childlike receptivity
The effects of Christian Science are not so much seenas felt. It is the "still, small voice" of Truth323:30 uttering itself. We are either turning awayfrom this utterance, or we are listening to it and goingup higher. Willingness to become as a little child and324:1 to leave the old for the new, renders thought receptive ofthe advanced idea. Gladness to leave the false landmarks324:3 and joy to see them disappear, - this disposition helpsto precipitate the ultimate harmony. The purificationof sense and self is a proof of progress. "Blessed are the324:6 pure in heart: for they shall see God."
Narrow pathway
Unless the harmony and immortality of man are be-coming more apparent, we are not gaining the true idea324:9 of God; and the body will reflect what gov-erns it, whether it be Truth or error,understanding or belief, Spirit or matter. Therefore324:12 "acquaint now thyself with Him, and be at peace."Be watchful, sober, and vigilant. The way is straightand narrow, which leads to the understanding that God324:15 is the only Life. It is a warfare with the flesh, in whichwe must conquer sin, sickness, and death, either hereor hereafter, - certainly before we can reach the goal324:18 of Spirit, or life in God.
Paul's enlightenment
Paul was not at first a disciple of Jesus but a perse-cutor of Jesus' followers. When the truth first appeared324:21 to him in Science, Paul was made blind,and his blindness was felt; but spirituallight soon enabled him to follow the example and teach-324:24 ings of Jesus, healing the sick and preaching Christian-ity throughout Asia Minor, Greece, and even in imperialRome.
324:27 Paul writes, "If Christ [Truth] be not risen, then isour preaching vain." That is, if the idea of the suprem-acy of Spirit, which is the true conception of being,324:30 come not to your thought, you cannot be benefited bywhat I say.
Abiding in Life
Jesus said substantially, "He that believeth in me325:1 shall not see death." That is, he who perceives thetrue idea of Life loses his belief in death. He who has325:3 the true idea of good loses all sense of evil,and by reason of this is being ushered into theundying realities of Spirit. Such a one abideth in Life, -325:6 life obtained not of the body incapable of supporting life,but of Truth, unfolding its own immortal idea. Jesusgave the true idea of being, which results in infinite bless-325:9 ings to mortals.
Indestructible being
In Colossians (iii. 4) Paul writes: "When Christ, whois our life, shall appear [be manifested], then shall ye also325:12 appear [be manifested] with him in glory."When spiritual being is understood in all itsperfection, continuity, and might, then shall man be found325:15 in God's image. The absolute meaning of the apostolicwords is this: Then shall man be found, in His likeness,perfect as the Father, indestructible in Life, "hid with325:18 Christ in God," - with Truth in divine Love, wherehuman sense hath not seen man.
Consecration required
Paul had a clear sense of the demands of Truth upon325:21 mortals physically and spiritually, when he said: "Pre-sent your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, ac-ceptable unto God, which is your reasonable325:24 service." But he, who is begotten of the beliefs of theflesh and serves them, can never reach in this world thedivine heights of our Lord. The time cometh when325:27 the spiritual origin of man, the divine Science whichushered Jesus into human presence, will be understoodand demonstrated.
325:30 When first spoken in any age, Truth, like the light,"shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehendedit not." A false sense of life, substance, and mind326:1 hides the divine possibilities, and conceals scientificdemonstration.
Loving God supremely
326:3 If we wish to follow Christ, Truth, it must be in theway of God's appointing. Jesus said, "He that believethon me, the works that I do shall he do also."326:6 He, who would reach the source and find thedivine remedy for every ill, must not try to climb the hillof Science by some other road. All nature teaches God's326:9 love to man, but man cannot love God supremely and sethis whole affections on spiritual things, while loving thematerial or trusting in it more than in the spiritual.
326:12 We must forsake the foundation of material systems,however time-honored, if we would gain the Christ asour only Saviour. Not partially, but fully, the great326:15 healer of mortal mind is the healer of the body.
The purpose and motive to live aright can be gainednow. This point won, you have started as you should.326:18 You have begun at the numeration-table of ChristianScience, and nothing but wrong intention can hinder youradvancement. Working and praying with true motives,326:21 your Father will open the way. "Who did hinder you,that ye should not obey the truth?"
Conversion of Saul
Saul of Tarsus beheld the way - the Christ, or Truth326:24 - only when his uncertain sense of right yielded to aspiritual sense, which is always right. Thenthe man was changed. Thought assumed a326:27 nobler outlook, and his life became more spiritual. Helearned the wrong that he had done in persecuting Chris-tians, whose religion he had not understood, and in hu-326:30 mility he took the new name of Paul. He beheld for thefirst time the true idea of Love, and learned a lesson indivine Science.
327:1 Reform comes by understanding that there is no abid-ing pleasure in evil, and also by gaining an affection for327:3 good according to Science, which reveals the immortalfact that neither pleasure nor pain, appetite nor passion,can exist in or of matter, while divine Mind can and does327:6 destroy the false beliefs of pleasure, pain, or fear and allthe sinful appetites of the human mind.
Image of the beast
What a pitiful sight is malice, finding pleasure in re-327:9 venge! Evil is sometimes a man's highest conceptionof right, until his grasp on good grows stronger.Then he loses pleasure in wickedness, and it327:12 becomes his torment. The way to escape the misery ofsin is to cease sinning. There is no other way. Sin isthe image of the beast to be effaced by the sweat of agony.327:15 It is a moral madness which rushes forth to clamor withmidnight and tempest.
Peremptory demands
To the physical senses, the strict demands of Christian327:18 Science seem peremptory; but mortals are has-tening to learn that Life is God, good, and thatevil has in reality neither place nor power in the human or327:21 the divine economy.
Moral courage
Fear of punishment never made man truly honest.Moral courage is requisite to meet the wrong and to327:24 proclaim the right. But how shall we re-form the man who has more animal thanmoral courage, and who has not the true idea of good?327:27 Through human consciousness, convince the mortal ofhis mistake in seeking material means for gaining hap-piness. Reason is the most active human faculty. Let327:30 that inform the sentiments and awaken the man's dor-mant sense of moral obligation, and by degrees he willlearn the nothingness of the pleasures of human sense328:1 and the grandeur and bliss of a spiritual sense, whichsilences the material or corporeal. Then he not only will328:3 be saved, but /is/ saved.
Final destruction of error
Mortals suppose that they can live without goodness,when God is good and the only real Life. What is the328:6 result? Understanding little about the divinePrinciple which saves and heals, mortals getrid of sin, sickness, and death only in belief. These errors328:9 are not thus really destroyed, and must therefore clingto mortals until, here or hereafter, they gain the true un-derstanding of God in the Science which destroys human328:12 delusions about Him and reveals the grand realities ofHis allness.
Promise perpetual
This understanding of man's power, when he is328:15 equipped by God, has sadly disappeared from Christianhistory. For centuries it has been dormant, alost element of Christianity. Our missionaries328:18 carry the Bible to India, but can it be said that theyexplain it practically, as Jesus did, when hundreds ofpersons die there annually from serpent-bites? Under-328:21 standing spiritual law and knowing that there is no mate-rial law, Jesus said: "These signs shall follow them thatbelieve, . . . they shall take up serpents, and if they328:24 drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them. Theyshall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover." Itwere well had Christendom believed and obeyed this328:27 sacred saying.