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The wicked man is not the ruler of his upright 239:12 neighbor. Let it be understood that success in error is defeat in Truth. The watchword of Christian Science is Scriptural: “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the 239:15 unrighteous man his thoughts.”

Standpoint revealed

To ascertain our progress, we must learn where our affections are placed and whom we acknowledge and 239:18 obey as God. If divine Love is becoming nearer, dearer, and more real to us, matter is then submitting to Spirit. The objects we pursue and 239:21 the spirit we manifest reveal our standpoint, and show what we are winning.

Antagonistic sources

Mortal mind is the acknowledged seat of human mo- 239:24 tives. It forms material concepts and produces every discordant action of the body. If action pro- ceeds from the divine Mind, action is harmo- 239:27 nious. If it comes from erring mortal mind, it is discord- ant and ends in sin, sickness, death. Those two opposite sources never mingle in fount or stream. The perfect 239:30 Mind sends forth perfection, for God is Mind. Imper- fect mortal mind sends forth its own resemblances, of which the wise man said, “All is vanity.”

Some lessons from nature

240:1 Nature voices natural, spiritual law and divine Love, but human belief misinterprets nature. Arctic regions, 240:3 sunny tropics, giant hills, winged winds, mighty billows, verdant vales, festive flowers, and glorious heavens, – all point to Mind, the spiritual 240:6 intelligence they reflect. The floral apostles are hiero- glyphs of Deity. Suns and planets teach grand lessons. The stars make night beautiful, and the leaflet turns nat- 240:9 urally towards the light.

Perpetual motions

In the order of Science, in which the Principle is above what it reflects, all is one grand concord. Change this 240:12 statement, suppose Mind to be governed by matter or Soul in body, and you lose the key- note of being, and there is continual discord. Mind is 240:15 perpetual motion. Its symbol is the sphere. The rota- tions and revolutions of the universe of Mind go on eternally.

Progress demanded

240:18 Mortals move onward towards good or evil as time glides on. If mortals are not progressive, past failures will be repeated until all wrong work is ef- 240:21 faced or rectified. If at present satisfied with wrong-doing, we must learn to loathe it. If at present content with idleness, we must become dissatisfied with 240:24 it. Remember that mankind must sooner or later, either by suffering or by Science, be convinced of the error that is to be overcome.

240:27 In trying to undo the errors of sense one must pay fully and fairly the utmost farthing, until all error is finally brought into subjection to Truth. The divine method 240:30 of paying sin’s wages involves unwinding one’s snarls and learning from experience how to divide between sense and Soul.

241:1 “Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth.” He, who knows God’s will or the demands of divine Science and 241:3 obeys them, incurs the hostility of envy; and he who refuses obedience to God, is chastened by Love.

The doom of sin

Sensual treasures are laid up “where moth and rust 241:6 doth corrupt.” Mortality is their doom. Sin breaks in upon them, and carries off their fleeting joys. The sensualist’s affections are as imaginary, 241:9 whimsical, and unreal as his pleasures. Falsehood, envy, hypocrisy, malice, hate, revenge, and so forth, steal away the treasures of Truth. Stripped of its coverings, what 241:12 a mocking spectacle is sin!

Spirit transforms

The Bible teaches transformation of the body by the renewal of Spirit. Take away the spiritual signification 241:15 of Scripture, and that compilation can do no more for mortals than can moonbeams to melt a river of ice. The error of the ages is preaching without 241:18 practice.

The substance of all devotion is the reflection and demonstration of divine Love, healing sickness and 241:21 destroying sin. Our Master said, “If ye love me, keep my commandments.”

One’s aim, a point beyond faith, should be to find the 241:24 footsteps of Truth, the way to health and holiness. We should strive to reach the Horeb height where God is re- vealed; and the corner-stone of all spiritual building is 241:27 purity. The baptism of Spirit, washing the body of all the impurities of flesh, signifies that the pure in heart see God and are approaching spiritual Life and its 241:30 demonstration.

Spiritual baptism

It is “easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle,” than for sinful beliefs to enter the kingdom of 242:1 heaven, eternal harmony. Through repentance, spiritual baptism, and regeneration, mortals put off their material 242:3 beliefs and false individuality. It is only a question of time when “they shall all know Me [God], from the least of them unto the greatest.” 242:6 Denial of the claims of matter is a great step towards the joys of Spirit, towards human freedom and the final triumph over the body.

The one only way

242:9 There is but one way to heaven, harmony, and Christ in divine Science shows us this way. It is to know no other reality – to have no other conscious- 242:12 ness of life – than good, God and His reflec- tion, and to rise superior to the so-called pain and pleasure of the senses.

242:15 Self-love is more opaque than a solid body. In pa- tient obedience to a patient God, let us labor to dis- solve with the universal solvent of Love the adamant 242:18 of error, – self-will, self-justification, and self-love, – which wars against spirituality and is the law of sin and death.

Divided vestments

242:21 The vesture of Life is Truth. According to the Bible, the facts of being are commonly misconstrued, for it is written: “They parted my raiment among 242:24 them, and for my vesture they did cast lots.” The divine Science of man is woven into one web of consistency without seam or rent. Mere speculation or 242:27 superstition appropriates no part of the divine vesture, while inspiration restores every part of the Christly gar- ment of righteousness.

242:30 The finger-posts of divine Science show the way our Master trod, and require of Christians the proof which he gave, instead of mere profession. We may hide 243:1 spiritual ignorance from the world, but we can never succeed in the Science and demonstration of spiritual 243:3 good through ignorance or hypocrisy.

Ancient and modern miracles

The divine Love, which made harmless the poisonous viper, which delivered men from the boiling oil, from 243:6 the fiery furnace, from the jaws of the lion, can heal the sick in every age and triumph over sin and death. It crowned the demon- 243:9 strations of Jesus with unsurpassed power and love. But the same “Mind . . . which was also in Christ Jesus” must always accompany the letter of Science in order to 243:12 confirm and repeat the ancient demonstrations of prophets and apostles. That those wonders are not more com- monly repeated to-day, arises not so much from lack of 243:15 desire as from lack of spiritual growth.

Mental telegraphy

The clay cannot reply to the potter. The head, heart, lungs, and limbs do not inform us that they are dizzy, 243:18 diseased, consumptive, or lame. If this in- formation is conveyed, mortal mind conveys it. Neither immortal and unerring Mind nor matter, 243:21 the inanimate substratum of mortal mind, can carry on such telegraphy; for God is “of purer eyes than to behold evil,” and matter has neither intelligence nor 243:24 sensation.

Annihilation of error

Truth has no consciousness of error. Love has no sense of hatred. Life has no partnership 243:27 with death. Truth, Life, and Love are a law of annihilation to everything unlike themselves, because they declare nothing except God.

Deformity and perfection

243:30 Sickness, sin, and death are not the fruits of Life. They are inharmonies which Truth destroys. Perfection does not animate imperfection. Inasmuch as God is 244:1 good and the fount of all being, He does not produce moral or physical deformity; therefore such deformity is 244:3 not real, but is illusion, the mirage of error. Divine Science reveals these grand facts. On their basis Jesus demonstrated Life, never 244:6 fearing nor obeying error in any form.

If we were to derive all our conceptions of man from what is seen between the cradle and the grave, happi- 244:9 ness and goodness would have no abiding-place in man, and the worms would rob him of the flesh; but Paul writes: “The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath 244:12 made me free from the law of sin and death.”

Man never less than man

Man undergoing birth, maturity, and decay is like the beasts and vegetables, – subject to laws of decay. If 244:15 man were dust in his earliest stage of exist- ence, we might admit the hypothesis that he returns eventually to his primitive condition; 244:18 but man was never more nor less than man.

If man flickers out in death or springs from matter into being, there must be an instant when God is without His 244:21 entire manifestation, – when there is no full reflection of the infinite Mind.

Man not evolved

Man in Science is neither young nor old. He has 244:24 neither birth nor death. He is not a beast, a vegetable, nor a migratory mind. He does not pass from matter to Mind, from the mortal to the im- 244:27 mortal, from evil to good, or from good to evil. Such admissions cast us headlong into darkness and dogma. Even Shakespeare’s poetry pictures age as infancy, as 244:30 helplessness and decadence, instead of assigning to man the everlasting grandeur and immortality of development, power, and prestige.

245:1 The error of thinking that we are growing old, and the benefits of destroying that illusion, are illustrated in a 245:3 sketch from the history of an English woman, published in the London medical magazine called The Lancet.

Perpetual youth

Disappointed in love in her early years, she became 245:6 insane and lost all account of time. Believing that she was still living in the same hour which parted her from her lover, taking no note of years, 245:9 she stood daily before the window watching for her lover’s coming. In this mental state she remained young. Having no consciousness of time, she literally grew no 245:12 older. Some American travellers saw her when she was seventy-four, and supposed her to be a young woman. She had no care-lined face, no wrinkles nor gray hair, but 245:15 youth sat gently on cheek and brow. Asked to guess her age, those unacquainted with her history conjectured that she must be under twenty.

245:18 This instance of youth preserved furnishes a useful hint, upon which a Franklin might work with more cer- tainty than when he coaxed the enamoured lightning 245:21 from the clouds. Years had not made her old, because she had taken no cognizance of passing time nor thought of herself as growing old. The bodily results of her belief 245:24 that she was young manifested the influence of such a be- lief. She could not age while believing herself young, for the mental state governed the physical.

245:27 Impossibilities never occur. One instance like the foregoing proves it possible to be young at seventy-four; and the primary of that illustration makes it plain that 245:30 decrepitude is not according to law, nor is it a necessity of nature, but an illusion.

Man reflects God

The infinite never began nor will it ever end. Mind 246:1 and its formations can never be annihilated. Man is not a pendulum, swinging between evil and good, joy and 246:3 sorrow, sickness and health, life and death. Life and its faculties are not measured by calendars. The perfect and immortal are the eternal 246:6 likeness of their Maker. Man is by no means a material germ rising from the imperfect and endeavoring to reach Spirit above his origin. The stream rises no higher than 246:9 its source.

The measurement of life by solar years robs youth and gives ugliness to age. The radiant sun of virtue and truth 246:12 coexists with being. Manhood is its eternal noon, un- dimmed by a declining sun. As the physical and mate- rial, the transient sense of beauty fades, the radiance of 246:15 Spirit should dawn upon the enraptured sense with bright and imperishable glories.

Undesirable records

Never record ages. Chronological data are no part 246:18 of the vast forever. Time-tables of birth and death are so many conspiracies against manhood and womanhood. Except for the error of meas- 246:21 uring and limiting all that is good and beautiful, man would enjoy more than threescore years and ten and still maintain his vigor, freshness, and promise. Man, 246:24 governed by immortal Mind, is always beautiful and grand. Each succeeding year unfolds wisdom, beauty, and holiness.

True life eternal

246:27 Life is eternal. We should find this out, and begin the demonstration thereof. Life and goodness are immortal. Let us then shape our views of existence into 246:30 loveliness, freshness, and continuity, rather than into age and blight.

Acute and chronic beliefs reproduce their own types. 247:1 The acute belief of physical life comes on at a remote period, and is not so disastrous as the chronic belief.

Eyes and teeth renewed

247:3 I have seen age regain two of the elements it had lost, sight and teeth. A woman of eighty-five, whom I knew, had a return of sight. Another woman at 247:6 ninety had new teeth, incisors, cuspids, bi- cuspids, and one molar. One man at sixty had retained his full set of upper and lower teeth without 247:9 a decaying cavity.

Eternal beauty

Beauty, as well as truth, is eternal; but the beauty of material things passes away, fading and fleeting as 247:12 mortal belief. Custom, education, and fashion form the transient standards of mortals. Im- mortality, exempt from age or decay, has a glory of its 247:15 own, – the radiance of Soul. Immortal men and women are models of spiritual sense, drawn by perfect Mind and reflecting those higher conceptions of loveliness 247:18 which transcend all material sense.

The divine loveliness

Comeliness and grace are independent of matter. Be- ing possesses its qualities before they are perceived hu- 247:21 manly. Beauty is a thing of life, which dwells forever in the eternal Mind and re- flects the charms of His goodness in expression, form, 247:24 outline, and color. It is Love which paints the petal with myriad hues, glances in the warm sunbeam, arches the cloud with the bow of beauty, blazons the night with 247:27 starry gems, and covers earth with loveliness.

The embellishments of the person are poor substitutes for the charms of being, shining resplendent and eternal 247:30 over age and decay.

The recipe for beauty is to have less illusion and more Soul, to retreat from the belief of pain or pleasure 248:1 in the body into the unchanging calm and glorious free- dom of spiritual harmony.

Love’s endowment

248:3 Love never loses sight of loveliness. Its halo rests upon its object. One marvels that a friend can ever seem less than beautiful. Men and women of riper 248:6 years and larger lessons ought to ripen into health and immortality, instead of lapsing into darkness or gloom. Immortal Mind feeds the body with supernal 248:9 freshness and fairness, supplying it with beautiful images of thought and destroying the woes of sense which each day brings to a nearer tomb.

Mental sculpture

248:12 The sculptor turns from the marble to his model in order to perfect his conception. We are all sculptors, working at various forms, moulding and chisel- 248:15 ing thought. What is the model before mortal mind? Is it imperfection, joy, sorrow, sin, suffering? Have you accepted the mortal model? Are you repro- 248:18 ducing it? Then you are haunted in your work by vicious sculptors and hideous forms. Do you not hear from all mankind of the imperfect model? The world is holding 248:21 it before your gaze continually. The result is that you are liable to follow those lower patterns, limit your life- work, and adopt into your experience the angular outline 248:24 and deformity of matter models.

Perfect models

To remedy this, we must first turn our gaze in the right direction, and then walk that way. We must form perfect 248:27 models in thought and look at them continually, or we shall never carve them out in grand and noble lives. Let unselfishness, goodness, mercy, justice, 248:30 health, holiness, love – the kingdom of heaven – reign within us, and sin, disease, and death will diminish until they finally disappear.

249:1 Let us accept Science, relinquish all theories based on sense-testimony, give up imperfect models and illusive 249:3 ideals; and so let us have one God, one Mind, and that one perfect, producing His own models of excellence.

Renewed selfhood

Let the “male and female” of God’s creating appear. 249:6 Let us feel the divine energy of Spirit, bringing us into newness of life and recognizing no mortal nor material power as able to destroy. Let us re- 249:9 joice that we are subject to the divine “powers that be.” Such is the true Science of being. Any other theory of Life, or God, is delusive and mythological.

249:12 Mind is not the author of matter, and the creator of ideas is not the creator of illusions. Either there is no omnipotence, or omnipotence is the only power. God is 249:15 the infinite, and infinity never began, will never end, and includes nothing unlike God. Whence then is soulless matter?

Illusive dreams

249:18 Life is, like Christ, “the same yesterday, and to-day, and forever.” Organization and time have nothing to do with Life. You say, “I dreamed last night.” 249:21 What a mistake is that! The I is Spirit. God never slumbers, and His likeness never dreams. Mortals are the Adam dreamers.

249:24 Sleep and apathy are phases of the dream that life, sub- stance, and intelligence are material. The mortal night- dream is sometimes nearer the fact of being than are the 249:27 thoughts of mortals when awake. The night-dream has less matter as its accompaniment. It throws off some material fetters. It falls short of the skies, but makes its 249:30 mundane flights quite ethereal.

Philosophical blunders

Man is the reflection of Soul. He is the direct oppo- site of material sensation, and there is but one Ego. We 250:1 run into error when we divide Soul into souls, multiply Mind into minds and suppose error to be mind, then mind 250:3 to be in matter and matter to be a lawgiver, unintelligence to act like intelligence, and mor- tality to be the matrix of immortality.

Spirit the one Ego

250:6 Mortal existence is a dream; mortal existence has no real entity, but saith “It is I.” Spirit is the Ego which never dreams, but understands all things; 250:9 which never errs, and is ever conscious; which never believes, but knows; which is never born and never dies. Spiritual man is the likeness of this Ego. 250:12 Man is not God, but like a ray of light which comes from the sun, man, the outcome of God, reflects God.

Mortal existence a dream

Mortal body and mind are one, and that one is called 250:15 man; but a mortal is not man, for man is immortal. A mortal may be weary or pained, enjoy or suffer, according to the dream he entertains in sleep. 250:18 When that dream vanishes, the mortal finds himself experiencing none of these dream-sensations. To the observer, the body lies listless, undisturbed, and sensa- 250:21 tionless, and the mind seems to be absent.

Now I ask, Is there any more reality in the waking dream of mortal existence than in the sleeping dream? 250:24 There cannot be, since whatever appears to be a mortal man is a mortal dream. Take away the mortal mind, and matter has no more sense as a man than it has as 250:27 a tree. But the spiritual, real man is immortal.

Upon this stage of existence goes on the dance of mortal mind. Mortal thoughts chase one another like snowflakes, 250:30 and drift to the ground. Science reveals Life as not being at the mercy of death, nor will Science admit that happi- ness is ever the sport of circumstance.

Error self-destroyed

251:1 Error is not real, hence it is not more imperative as it hastens towards self-destruction. The so-called 251:3 belief of mortal mind apparent as an abscess should not grow more painful before it suppu- rates neither should a fever become more severe before 251:6 it ends.

Illusion of death

Fright is so great at certain stages of mortal belief as to drive belief into new paths. In the illusion of 251:9 death, mortals wake to the knowledge of two facts: (1) that they are not dead; (2) that they have but passed the portals of a new belief. Truth 251:12 works out the nothingness of error in just these ways. Sickness, as well as sin, is an error that Christ, Truth, alone can destroy.

Mortal mind’s disappearance

251:15 We must learn how mankind govern the body, – whether through faith in hygiene, in drugs, or in will- power. We should learn whether they govern 251:18 the body through a belief in the necessity of sickness and death, sin and pardon, or govern it from the higher understanding that the divine Mind 251:21 makes perfect, acts upon the so-called human mind through truth, leads the human mind to relinquish all error, to find the divine Mind to be the only Mind, 251:24 and the healer of sin, disease, death. This process of higher spiritual understanding improves mankind until error disappears, and nothing is left which deserves to 251:27 perish or to be punished.

Spiritual ignorance

Ignorance, like intentional wrong, is not Science. Ignorance must be seen and corrected before we can at- 251:30 tain harmony. Inharmonious beliefs, which rob Mind, calling it matter, and deify their own notions, imprison themselves in what they create. 252:1 They are at war with Science, and as our Master said, “If a kingdom be divided against itself, that kingdom 252:3 cannot stand.”

Human ignorance of Mind and of the recuperative energies of Truth occasions the only skepticism regard- 252:6 ing the pathology and theology of Christian Science.

Eternal man recognized

When false human beliefs learn even a little of their own falsity, they begin to disappear. A knowledge of 252:9 error and of its operations must precede that understanding of Truth which destroys error, until the entire mortal, material error finally disappears, 252:12 and the eternal verity, man created by and of Spirit, is understood and recognized as the true likeness of his Maker.

252:15 The false evidence of material sense contrasts strikingly with the testimony of Spirit. Material sense lifts its voice with the arrogance of reality and says:

Testimony of sense

252:18 I am wholly dishonest, and no man knoweth it. I can cheat, lie, commit adultery, rob, murder, and I elude detection by smooth-tongued villainy. Ani- 252:21 mal in propensity, deceitful in sentiment, fraudulent in purpose, I mean to make my short span of life one gala day. What a nice thing is sin! How 252:24 sin succeeds, where the good purpose waits! The world is my kingdom. I am enthroned in the gorgeousness of matter. But a touch, an accident, the law of God, 252:27 may at any moment annihilate my peace, for all my fancied joys are fatal. Like bursting lava, I expand but to my own despair, and shine with the resplendency of 252:30 consuming fire.

Testimony of Soul

Spirit, bearing opposite testimony, saith:

I am Spirit. Man, whose senses are spiritual, is my 253:1 likeness. He reflects the infinite understanding, for I am Infinity. The beauty of holiness, the perfection of being, 253:3 imperishable glory, – all are Mine, for I am God. I give immortality to man, for I am Truth. I include and impart all bliss, for I am Love. 253:6 I give life, without beginning and without end, for I am Life. I am supreme and give all, for I am Mind. I am the substance of all, because I AM THAT I AM.

Heaven-bestowed prerogative

253:9 I hope, dear reader, I am leading you into the under- standing of your divine rights, your heaven-bestowed har- mony, – that, as you read, you see there is no 253:12 cause (outside of erring, mortal, material sense which is not power) able to make you sick or sinful; and I hope that you are conquering this false sense. 253:15 Knowing the falsity of so-called material sense, you can assert your prerogative to overcome the belief in sin, dis- ease, or death.

Right endeavor possible

253:18 If you believe in and practise wrong knowingly, you can at once change your course and do right. Matter can make no opposition to right endeavors against 253:21 sin or sickness, for matter is inert, mindless. Also, if you believe yourself diseased, you can alter this wrong belief and action without hindrance from 253:24 the body.

Do not believe in any supposed necessity for sin, dis- ease, or death, knowing (as you ought to know) that God 253:27 never requires obedience to a so-called material law, for no such law exists. The belief in sin and death is de- stroyed by the law of God, which is the law of Life in- 253:30 stead of death, of harmony instead of discord, of Spirit instead of the flesh.

Patience and final perfection

The divine demand, “Be ye therefore perfect,” is sci- 254:1 entific, and the human footsteps leading to perfection are indispensable. Individuals are consistent who, watching 254:3 and praying, can “run, and not be weary; . . . walk, and not faint,” who gain good rapidly and hold their position, or attain slowly and 254:6 yield not to discouragement. God requires perfection, but not until the battle between Spirit and flesh is fought and the victory won. To stop eating, drinking, or being 254:9 clothed materially before the spiritual facts of existence are gained step by step, is not legitimate. When we wait patiently on God and seek Truth righteously, He directs 254:12 our path. Imperfect mortals grasp the ultimate of spir- itual perfection slowly; but to _begin_ aright and to con- tinue the strife of demonstrating the great problem of 254:15 being, is doing much.

During the sensual ages, absolute Christian Science may not be achieved prior to the change called death, 254:18 for we have not the power to demonstrate what we do not understand. But the human self must be evangel- ized. This task God demands us to accept lovingly 254:21 to-day, and to abandon so fast as practical the material, and to work out the spiritual which determines the out- ward and actual.

254:24 If you venture upon the quiet surface of error and are in sympathy with error, what is there to disturb the waters? What is there to strip off error’s disguise?

The cross and crown

254:27 If you launch your bark upon the ever-agitated but healthful waters of truth, you will encounter storms. Your good will be evil spoken of. This is the 254:30 cross. Take it up and bear it, for through it you win and wear the crown. Pilgrim on earth, thy home is heaven; stranger, thou art the guest of God.

CHAPTER IX – CREATION

Thy throne is established of old
Thou art from everlasting. – PSALMS.

For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body. – PAUL.

Inadequate theories of creation

255:1 ETERNAL Truth is changing the universe. As mor- tals drop off their mental swaddling-clothes, thought 255:3 expands into expression. “Let there be light,” is the perpetual demand of Truth and Love, changing chaos into order and discord into the 255:6 music of the spheres. The mythical human theories of creation, anciently classified as the higher criticism, sprang from cultured scholars in Rome and in Greece, but they 255:9 afforded no foundation for accurate views of creation by the divine Mind.

Finite views of Deity

Mortal man has made a covenant with his eyes to be- 255:12 little Deity with human conceptions. In league with material sense, mortals take limited views of all things. That God is corporeal or material, no man 255:15 should affirm.

The human form, or physical finiteness, cannot be made the basis of any true idea of the infinite Godhead. 255:18 Eye hath not seen Spirit, nor hath ear heard His voice.

No material creation

256:1 Progress takes off human shackles. The finite must yield to the infinite. Advancing to a higher plane of ac- 256:3 tion, thought rises from the material sense to the spiritual, from the scholastic to the in- spirational, and from the mortal to the immortal. All 256:6 things are created spiritually. Mind, not matter, is the creator. Love, the divine Principle, is the Father and Mother of the universe, including man.

Tritheism impossible

256:9 The theory of three persons in one God (that is, a per- sonal Trinity or Tri-unity) suggests polythe- ism, rather than the one ever-present I AM. 256:12 “Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God is one Lord.”

No divine corporeality

The everlasting I AM is not bounded nor compressed within the narrow limits of physical humanity, nor can 256:15 He be understood aright through mortal con- cepts. The precise form of God must be of small importance in comparison with the sublime ques- 256:18 tion, What is infinite Mind or divine Love?

Who is it that demands our obedience? He who, in the language of Scripture, “doeth according to His will 256:21 in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth; and none can stay His hand, or say unto Him, What doest Thou?”

256:24 No form nor physical combination is adequate to rep- resent infinite Love. A finite and material sense of God leads to formalism and narrowness; it chills the spirit of 256:27 Christianity.

Limitless Mind

A limitless Mind cannot proceed from physical limita- tions. Finiteness cannot present the idea or the vast- 256:30 ness of infinity. A mind originating from a finite or material source must be limited and finite. Infinite Mind is the creator, and creation is the 257:1 infinite image or idea emanating from this Mind. If Mind is within and without all things, then all is Mind; 257:3 and this definition is scientific.

Matter is not substance

If matter, so-called, is substance, then Spirit, matter’s unlikeness, must be shadow; and shadow cannot produce 257:6 substance. The theory that Spirit is not the only substance and creator is pantheistic het- erodoxy, which ultimates in sickness, sin, and death; it is 257:9 the belief in a bodily soul and a material mind, a soul governed by the body and a mind in matter. This be- lief is shallow pantheism.

257:12 Mind creates His own likeness in ideas, and the sub- stance of an idea is very far from being the supposed sub- stance of non-intelligent matter. Hence the Father Mind 257:15 is not the father of matter. The material senses and human conceptions would translate spiritual ideas into material beliefs, and would say that an anthropomorphic 257:18 God, instead of infinite Principle, – in other words, divine Love, – is the father of the rain, “who hath begotten the drops of dew,” who bringeth “forth Mazzaroth in his sea- 257:21 son,” and guideth “Arcturus with his sons.”

Inexhaustible divine Love

Finite mind manifests all sorts of errors, and thus proves the material theory of mind in matter to be the 257:24 antipode of Mind. Who hath found finite life or love sufficient to meet the demands of human want and woe, – to still the desires, to satisfy the aspira- 257:27 tions? Infinite Mind cannot be limited to a finite form, or Mind would lose its infinite character as inexhaustible Love, eternal Life, omnipotent Truth.

Infinite physique impossible

257:30 It would require an infinite form to contain infinite Mind. Indeed, the phrase _infinite form_ involves a con- tradiction of terms. Finite man cannot be the image and 258:1 likeness of the infinite God. A mortal, corporeal, or finite conception of God cannot embrace the glories of 258:3 limitless, incorporeal Life and Love. Hence the unsatisfied human craving for something better, higher, holier, than is afforded by a 258:6 material belief in a physical God and man. The insuffi- ciency of this belief to supply the true idea proves the falsity of material belief.

Infinity’s reflection

258:9 Man is more than a material form with a mind inside, which must escape from its environments in order to be immortal. Man reflects infinity, 258:12 and this reflection is the true idea of God.

God expresses in man the infinite idea forever develop- ing itself, broadening and rising higher and higher from 258:15 a boundless basis. Mind manifests all that exists in the infinitude of Truth. We know no more of man as the true divine image and likeness, than we know of 258:18 God.

The infinite Principle is reflected by the infinite idea and spiritual individuality, but the material so-called senses 258:21 have no cognizance of either Principle or its idea. The human capacities are enlarged and perfected in propor- tion as humanity gains the true conception of man and 258:24 God.

Individual permanency

Mortals have a very imperfect sense of the spiritual man and of the infinite range of his thought. To him 258:27 belongs eternal Life. Never born and never dying, it were impossible for man, under the government of God in eternal Science, to fall from his 258:30 high estate.

God’s man discerned

Through spiritual sense you can discern the heart of divinity, and thus begin to comprehend in Science the 259:1 generic term _man. _Man is not absorbed in Deity, and man cannot lose his individuality, for he re- 259:3 flects eternal Life; nor is he an isolated, soli- tary idea, for he represents infinite Mind, the sum of all substance.

259:6 In divine Science, man is the true image of God. The divine nature was best expressed in Christ Jesus, who threw upon mortals the truer reflection of God and lifted 259:9 their lives higher than their poor thought-models would allow, – thoughts which presented man as fallen, sick, sinning, and dying. The Christlike understanding of 259:12 scientific being and divine healing includes a perfect Prin- ciple and idea, – perfect God and perfect man, – as the basis of thought and demonstration.

The divine image not lost

259:15 If man was once perfect but has now lost his perfection, then mortals have never beheld in man the reflex image of God. The _lost_ image is no image. The 259:18 true likeness cannot be lost in divine reflection. Understanding this, Jesus said: “Be ye there- fore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is 259:21 perfect.”

Immortal models

Mortal thought transmits its own images, and forms its offspring after human illusions. God, Spirit, works 259:24 spiritually, not materially. Brain or matter never formed a human concept. Vibration is not intelligence; hence it is not a creator. Immortal 259:27 ideas, pure, perfect, and enduring, are transmitted by the divine Mind through divine Science, which corrects error with truth and demands spiritual thoughts, divine 259:30 concepts, to the end that they may produce harmonious results.

Deducing one’s conclusions as to man from imperfec- 260:1 tion instead of perfection, one can no more arrive at the true conception or understanding of man, and make him- 260:3 self like it, than the sculptor can perfect his outlines from an imperfect model, or the painter can depict the form and face of Jesus, while holding in thought the character 260:6 of Judas.

Spiritual discovery

The conceptions of mortal, erring thought must give way to the ideal of all that is perfect and eternal. Through 260:9 many generations human beliefs will be attain- ing diviner conceptions, and the immortal and perfect model of God’s creation will finally be seen as 260:12 the only true conception of being.

Science reveals the possibility of achieving all good, and sets mortals at work to discover what God has already 260:15 done; but distrust of one’s ability to gain the goodness desired and to bring out better and higher results, often hampers the trial of one’s wings and ensures failure at the 260:18 outset.

Requisite change of our ideals

Mortals must change their ideals in order to improve their models. A sick body is evolved from 260:21 sick thoughts. Sickness, disease, and death proceed from fear. Sensualism evolves bad physical and moral conditions.

260:24 Selfishness and sensualism are educated in mortal mind by the thoughts ever recurring to one’s self, by conversation about the body, and by the expectation of 260:27 perpetual pleasure or pain from it; and this education is at the expense of spiritual growth. If we array thought in mortal vestures, it must lose its immortal 260:30 nature.

Thoughts are things

If we look to the body for pleasure, we find pain; for Life, we find death; for Truth, we find error; for Spirit, 261:1 we find its opposite, matter. Now reverse this action. Look away from the body into Truth and Love, 261:3 the Principle of all happiness, harmony, and immortality. Hold thought steadfastly to the endur- ing, the good, and the true, and you will bring these 261:6 into your experience proportionably to their occupancy of your thoughts.

Unreality of pain

The effect of mortal mind on health and happiness is 261:9 seen in this: If one turns away from the body with such absorbed interest as to forget it, the body experiences no pain. Under the strong im- 261:12 pulse of a desire to perform his part, a noted actor was accustomed night after night to go upon the stage and sustain his appointed task, walking about as actively 261:15 as the youngest member of the company. This old man was so lame that he hobbled every day to the theatre, and sat aching in his chair till his cue was spoken, – a signal 261:18 which made him as oblivious of physical infirmity as if he had inhaled chloroform, though he was in the full pos- session of his so-called senses.

Immutable identity of man

261:21 Detach sense from the body, or matter, which is only a form of human belief, and you may learn the meaning of God, or good, and the nature of the immu- 261:24 table and immortal. Breaking away from the mutations of time and sense, you will neither lose the solid objects and ends of life nor your own iden- 261:27 tity. Fixing your gaze on the realities supernal, you will rise to the spiritual consciousness of being, even as the bird which has burst from the egg and preens its wings for a 261:30 skyward flight.

Forgetfulness of self

We should forget our bodies in remembering good and the human race. Good demands of man every hour, in 262:1 which to work out the problem of being. Consecration to good does not lessen man’s dependence on God, but 262:3 heightens it. Neither does consecration di- minish man’s obligations to God, but shows the paramount necessity of meeting them. Christian 262:6 Science takes naught from the perfection of God, but it ascribes to Him the entire glory. By putting “off the old man with his deeds,” mortals “put on immortality.”

262:9 We cannot fathom the nature and quality of God’s creation by diving into the shallows of mortal belief. We must reverse our feeble flutterings – our efforts to find 262:12 life and truth in matter – and rise above the testimony of the material senses, above the mortal to the immortal idea of God. These clearer, higher views inspire the God- 262:15 like man to reach the absolute centre and circumference of his being.

The true sense

Job said: “I have heard of Thee by the hearing of the 262:18 ear: but now mine eye seeth Thee.” Mortals will echo Job’s thought, when the supposed pain and pleasure of matter cease to predominate. They 262:21 will then drop the false estimate of life and happiness, of joy and sorrow, and attain the bliss of loving unselfishly, working patiently, and conquering all that is unlike God. 262:24 Starting from a higher standpoint, one rises spontane- ously, even as light emits light without effort; for “where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”

Mind the only cause

262:27 The foundation of mortal discord is a false sense of man’s origin. To begin rightly is to end rightly. Every concept which seems to begin with the brain 262:30 begins falsely. Divine Mind is the only cause or Principle of existence. Cause does not exist in matter, in mortal mind, or in physical forms.

Human egotism

263:1 Mortals are egotists. They believe themselves to be independent workers, personal authors, and even privi- 263:3 leged originators of something which Deity would not or could not create. The creations of mortal mind are material. Immortal spiritual man 263:6 alone represents the truth of creation.

Mortal man a mis-creator

When mortal man blends his thoughts of existence with the spiritual and works only as God works, 263:9 he will no longer grope in the dark and cling to earth because he has not tasted heaven. Carnal beliefs defraud us. They make man an involun- 263:12 tary hypocrite, – producing evil when he would create good, forming deformity when he would outline grace and beauty, injuring those whom he would bless. He 263:15 becomes a general mis-creator, who believes he is a semi-god. His “touch turns hope to dust, the dust we all have trod.” He might say in Bible language: “The 263:18 good that I would, I do not: but the evil which I would not, _that I do._”

No new creation

There can be but one creator, who has created all. 263:21 Whatever seems to be a new creation, is but the discovery of some distant idea of Truth; else it is a new multiplication or self-division of mor- 263:24 tal thought, as when some finite sense peers from its cloister with amazement and attempts to pattern the infinite.

263:27 The multiplication of a human and mortal sense of per- sons and things is not creation. A sensual thought, like an atom of dust thrown into the face of spiritual im- 263:30 mensity, is dense blindness instead of a scientific eternal consciousness of creation.

Mind’s true camera

The fading forms of matter, the mortal body and ma- 264:1 terial earth, are the fleeting concepts of the human mind. They have their day before the permanent facts and their 264:3 perfection in Spirit appear. The crude crea- tions of mortal thought must finally give place to the glorious forms which we sometimes behold in the 264:6 camera of divine Mind, when the mental picture is spir- itual and eternal. Mortals must look beyond fading, finite forms, if they would gain the true sense of things. 264:9 Where shall the gaze rest but in the unsearchable realm of Mind? We must look where we would walk, and we must act as possessing all power from Him in whom we 264:12 have our being.

Self-completeness

As mortals gain more correct views of God and man, multitudinous objects of creation, which before were 264:15 invisible, will become visible. When we realize that Life is Spirit, never in nor of matter, this understanding will expand into self-com- 264:18 pleteness, finding all in God, good, and needing no other consciousness.

Spiritual proofs of existence

Spirit and its formations are the only realities of being. 264:21 Matter disappears under the microscope of Spirit. Sin is unsustained by Truth, and sickness and death were overcome by Jesus, who proved 264:24 them to be forms of error. Spiritual living and blessedness are the only evidences, by which we can recognize true existence and feel the unspeakable peace 264:27 which comes from an all-absorbing spiritual love.

When we learn the way in Christian Science and rec- ognize man’s spiritual being, we shall behold and under- 264:30 stand God’s creation, – all the glories of earth and heaven and man.

Godward gravitation

The universe of Spirit is peopled with spiritual beings, 265:1 and its government is divine Science. Man is the off- spring, not of the lowest, but of the highest qualities of 265:3 Mind. Man understands spiritual existence in proportion as his treasures of Truth and Love are enlarged. Mortals must gravitate Godward, 265:6 their affections and aims grow spiritual, – they must near the broader interpretations of being, and gain some proper sense of the infinite, – in order that sin and mortality 265:9 may be put off.

This scientific sense of being, forsaking matter for Spirit, by no means suggests man’s absorption into Deity 265:12 and the loss of his identity, but confers upon man en- larged individuality, a wider sphere of thought and action, a more expansive love, a higher and more permanent 265:15 peace.

Mortal birth and death

The senses represent birth as untimely and death as irresistible, as if man were a weed growing apace or a 265:18 flower withered by the sun and nipped by untimely frosts; but this is true only of a mortal, not of a man in God’s image and likeness. The 265:21 truth of being is perennial, and the error is unreal and obsolete.

Blessings from pain

Who that has felt the loss of human peace has not gained 265:24 stronger desires for spiritual joy? The aspiration after heavenly good comes even before we discover what belongs to wisdom and Love. The loss 265:27 of earthly hopes and pleasures brightens the ascending path of many a heart. The pains of sense quickly inform us that the pleasures of sense are mortal and that joy is 265:30 spiritual.

Decapitation of error

The pains of sense are salutary, if they wrench away false pleasurable beliefs and transplant the affections 266:1 from sense to Soul, where the creations of God are good, “rejoicing the heart.” Such is the sword of 266:3 Science, with which Truth decapitates error, materiality giving place to man’s higher individuality and destiny.

Uses of adversity

266:6 Would existence without personal friends be to you a blank? Then the time will come when you will be solitary, left without sympathy; but this 266:9 seeming vacuum is already filled with divine Love. When this hour of development comes, even if you cling to a sense of personal joys, spiritual Love will 266:12 force you to accept what best promotes your growth. Friends will betray and enemies will slander, until the lesson is sufficient to exalt you; for “man’s extremity 266:15 is God’s opportunity.” The author has experienced the foregoing prophecy and its blessings. Thus He teaches mortals to lay down their fleshliness and gain spirituality. 266:18 This is done through self-abnegation. Universal Love is the divine way in Christian Science.

The sinner makes his own hell by doing evil, and the 266:21 saint his own heaven by doing right. The opposite per- secutions of material sense, aiding evil with evil, would deceive the very elect.

Beatific presence

266:24 Mortals must follow Jesus’ sayings and his demonstra- tions, which dominate the flesh. Perfect and infinite Mind enthroned is heaven. The evil beliefs 266:27 which originate in mortals are hell. Man is the idea of Spirit; he reflects the beatific presence, illuming the universe with light. Man is deathless, spiritual. He 266:30 is above sin or frailty. He does not cross the barriers of time into the vast forever of Life, but he coexists with God and the universe.

The infinitude of God

267:1 Every object in material thought will be destroyed, but the spiritual idea, whose substance is in Mind, is eternal. 267:3 The offspring of God start not from matter or ephemeral dust. They are in and of Spirit, divine Mind, and so forever continue. God is one. The 267:6 allness of Deity is His oneness. Generically man is one, and specifically man means all men.

It is generally conceded that God is Father, eternal, self- 267:9 created, infinite. If this is so, the forever Father must have had children prior to Adam. The great I AM made all “that was made.” Hence man and the spiritual uni- 267:12 verse coexist with God.

Christian Scientists understand that, in a religious sense, they have the same authority for the appellative 267:15 mother, as for that of brother and sister. Jesus said: “For whosoever shall do the will of my Father which is in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and 267:18 mother.”

Waymarks to eternal Truth

When examined in the light of divine Science, mortals present more than is detected upon the surface, since 267:21 inverted thoughts and erroneous beliefs must be counterfeits of Truth. Thought is bor- rowed from a higher source than matter, and 267:24 by reversal, errors serve as waymarks to the one Mind, in which all error disappears in celestial Truth. The robes of Spirit are “white and glistering,” like the raiment 267:27 of Christ. Even in this world, therefore, “let thy gar- ments be always white.” “Blessed is the man that en- dureth [overcometh] temptation: for when he is tried, 267:30 [proved faithful], he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love him.” (James i. 12.)

CHAPTER X – SCIENCE OF BEING

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life, . . . That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ. – JOHN, First Epistle.

Here I stand. I can do no otherwise; so help me God! Amen! – MARTIN LUTHER.

Materialistic challenge

268:1 In the material world, thought has brought to light with great rapidity many useful wonders. With 268:3 like activity have thought’s swift pinions been rising towards the realm of the real, to the spiritual cause of those lower things which give im- 268:6 pulse to inquiry. Belief in a material basis, from which may be deduced all rationality, is slowly yielding to the idea of a metaphysical basis, looking away from 268:9 matter to Mind as the cause of every effect. Material- istic hypotheses challenge metaphysics to meet in final combat. In this revolutionary period, like the shep- 268:12 herd-boy with his sling, woman goes forth to battle with Goliath.

Confusion confounded

In this final struggle for supremacy, semi-metaphysi- 268:15 cal systems afford no substantial aid to scientific meta- physics, for their arguments are based on the false testimony of the material senses as 268:18 well as on the facts of Mind. These semi-metaphysical 269:1 systems are one and all pantheistic, and savor of Pan- demonium, a house divided against itself.

269:3 From first to last the supposed coexistence of Mind and matter and the mingling of good and evil have re- sulted from the philosophy of the serpent. Jesus’ demon- 269:6 strations sift the chaff from the wheat, and unfold the unity and the reality of good, the unreality, the nothing- ness, of evil.

Divine metaphysics

269:9 Human philosophy has made God manlike. Christian Science makes man Godlike. The first is error; the latter is truth. Metaphysics is above physics, and 269:12 matter does not enter into metaphysical prem- ises or conclusions. The categories of metaphysics rest on one basis, the divine Mind. Metaphysics resolves 269:15 things into thoughts, and exchanges the objects of sense for the ideas of Soul.

These ideas are perfectly real and tangible to spiritual 269:18 consciousness, and they have this advantage over the ob- jects and thoughts of material sense, – they are good and eternal.

Biblical foundations

269:21 The testimony of the material senses is neither abso- lute nor divine. I therefore plant myself unreservedly on the teachings of Jesus, of his apostles, of 269:24 the prophets, and on the testimony of the Science of Mind. Other foundations there are none. All other systems – systems based wholly or partly on 269:27 knowledge gained through the material senses – are reeds shaken by the wind, not houses built on the rock.

Rejected theories

The theories I combat are these: (1) that all is matter; 269:30 (2) that matter originates in Mind, and is as real as Mind, possessing intelligence and life. The first theory, that matter is everything, is quite as 270:1 reasonable as the second, that Mind and matter coexist and cooperate. One only of the following statements can 270:3 be true: (1) that everything is matter; (2) that every- thing is Mind. Which one is it?

Matter and Mind are opposites. One is contrary to 270:6 the other in its very nature and essence; hence both can- not be real. If one is real, the other must be unreal. Only by understanding that there is but one power, – not two 270:9 powers, matter and Mind, – are scientific and logical conclusions reached. Few deny the hypothesis that in- telligence, apart from man and matter, governs the uni- 270:12 verse; and it is generally admitted that this intelligence is the eternal Mind or divine principle, Love.

Prophetic ignorance

The prophets of old looked for something higher than 270:15 the systems of their times; hence their fore- sight of the new dispensation of Truth. But they knew not what would be the precise nature of the 270:18 teaching and demonstration of God, divine Mind, in His more infinite meanings, – the demonstration which was to destroy sin, sickness, and death, establish the definition 270:21 of omnipotence, and maintain the Science of Spirit.

The pride of priesthood is the prince of this world. It has nothing in Christ. Meekness and charity have divine 270:24 authority. Mortals think wickedly; consequently they are wicked. They think sickly thoughts, and so become sick. If sin makes sinners, Truth and Love alone can 270:27 unmake them. If a sense of disease produces suffering and a sense of ease antidotes suffering, disease is mental, not material. Hence the fact that the human mind alone 270:30 suffers, is sick, and that the divine Mind alone heals.

The life of Christ Jesus was not miraculous, but it was indigenous to his spirituality, – the good soil wherein the 271:1 seed of Truth springs up and bears much fruit. Christ’s Christianity is the chain of scientific being reappearing 271:3 in all ages, maintaining its obvious correspondence with the Scriptures and uniting all periods in the design of God. Neither emasculation, illusion, nor insubordination 271:6 exists in divine Science.

Jesus instructed his disciples whereby to heal the sick through Mind instead of matter. He knew that the phi- 271:9 losophy, Science, and proof of Christianity were in Truth, casting out all inharmony.

Studious disciples

In Latin the word rendered _disciple_ signifies student; 271:12 and the word indicates that the power of healing was not a supernatural gift to those learners, but the result of their cultivated spiritual understand- 271:15 ing of the divine Science, which their Master demonstrated by healing the sick and sinning. Hence the universal ap- plication of his saying: “Neither pray I for these alone, 271:18 but for them also which shall believe on me [understand me] through their word.”

New Testament basis

Our Master said, “But the Comforter . . . shall 271:21 teach you all things.” When the Science of Christianity appears, it will lead you into all truth. The Sermon on the Mount is the essence of this 271:24 Science, and the eternal life, not the death of Jesus, is its outcome.

Modern evangel

Those, who are willing to leave their nets or to cast 271:27 them on the right side for Truth, have the opportunity now, as aforetime, to learn and to practise Christian healing. The Scriptures contain it. 271:30 The spiritual import of the Word imparts this power. But, as Paul says, “How shall they hear without a preacher? and how shall they preach, except they be 272:1 sent?” If sent, how shall they preach, convert, and heal multitudes, except the people hear?

Spirituality of Scripture

272:3 The spiritual sense of truth must be gained before Truth can be understood. This sense is assimilated only as we are honest, unselfish, loving, and meek. 272:6 In the soil of an “honest and good heart” the seed must be sown; else it beareth not much fruit, for the swinish element in human nature uproots it. Jesus said: 272:9 “Ye do err, not knowing the Scriptures.” The spiritual sense of the Scriptures brings out the scientific sense, and is the new tongue referred to in the last chapter of Mark’s 272:12 Gospel.

Jesus’ parable of “the sower” shows the care our Master took not to impart to dull ears and gross hearts 272:15 the spiritual teachings which dulness and grossness could not accept. Reading the thoughts of the people, he said: “Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast 272:18 ye your pearls before swine.”

Unspiritual contrasts

It is the spiritualization of thought and Christianization of daily life, in contrast with the results of the ghastly farce 272:21 of material existence; it is chastity and purity, in contrast with the downward tendencies and earthward gravitation of sensualism and impurity, 272:24 which really attest the divine origin and operation of Chris- tian Science. The triumphs of Christian Science are re- corded in the destruction of error and evil, from which are 272:27 propagated the dismal beliefs of sin, sickness, and death.

God the Principle of all

The divine Principle of the universe must interpret the universe. God is the divine Principle of all that repre- 272:30 sents Him and of all that really exists. Chris- tian Science, as demonstrated by Jesus, alone reveals the natural, divine Principle of Science.

273:1 Matter and its claims of sin, sickness, and death are contrary to God, and cannot emanate from Him. There 273:3 is no _material_ truth. The physical senses can take no cognizance of God and spiritual Truth. Human belief has sought out many inventions, but not one of them 273:6 can solve the problem of being without the divine Prin- ciple of divine Science. Deductions from material hy- potheses are not scientific. They differ from real Science 273:9 because they are not based on the divine law.

Science _versus_ sense

Divine Science reverses the false testimony of the ma- terial senses, and thus tears away the foun- 273:12 dations of error. Hence the enmity between Science and the senses, and the impossibility of attaining perfect understanding till the errors of sense 273:15 are eliminated.

The so-called laws of matter and of medical science have never made mortals whole, harmonious, and immortal. 273:18 Man is harmonious when governed by Soul. Hence the importance of understanding the truth of being, which reveals the laws of spiritual existence.

Spiritual law the only law

273:21 God never ordained a material law to annul the spiritual law. If there were such a material law, it would oppose the supremacy of Spirit, God, and impugn the 273:24 wisdom of the creator. Jesus walked on the waves, fed the multitude, healed the sick, and raised the dead in direct opposition to material laws. His acts were 273:27 the demonstration of Science, overcoming the false claims of material sense or law.

Material knowledge illusive

Science shows that material, conflicting mortal opin- 273:30 ions and beliefs emit the effects of error at all times, but this atmosphere of mortal mind cannot be destructive to morals and health when it is opposed promptly and per- 274:1 sistently by Christian Science. Truth and Love antidote this mental miasma, and thus invigorate and sustain ex- 274:3 istence. Unnecessary knowledge gained from the five senses is only temporal, – the concep- tion of mortal mind, the offspring of sense, not 274:6 of Soul, Spirit, – and symbolizes all that is evil and perishable. _Natural science_, as it is commonly called, is not really natural nor scientific, because it is deduced from 274:9 the evidence of the material senses. Ideas, on the con- trary, are born of Spirit, and are not mere inferences drawn from material premises.

Five senses deceptive

274:12 The senses of Spirit abide in Love, and they demon- strate Truth and Life. Hence Christianity and the Sci- ence which expounds it are based on spiritual 274:15 understanding, and they supersede the so- called laws of matter. Jesus demonstrated this great verity. When what we erroneously term the five physical 274:18 senses are misdirected, they are simply the manifested beliefs of mortal mind, which affirm that life, substance, and intelligence are material, instead of spiritual. These 274:21 false beliefs and their products constitute the flesh, and the flesh wars against Spirit.

Impossible partnership

Divine Science is absolute, and permits no half-way 274:24 position in learning its Principle and rule – establishing it by demonstration. The conventional firm, called matter and mind, God never formed. 274:27 Science and understanding, governed by the unerring and eternal Mind, destroy the imaginary copartnership, matter and mind, formed only to be destroyed in a manner and 274:30 at a period as yet unknown. This suppositional partner- ship is already obsolete, for matter, examined in the light of divine metaphysics, disappears.

Spirit the starting-point

275:1 Matter has no life to lose, and Spirit never dies. A partnership of mind with matter would ignore omnipres- 275:3 ent and omnipotent Mind. This shows that matter did not originate in God, Spirit, and is not eternal. Therefore matter is neither substantial, living, 275:6 nor intelligent. The starting-point of divine Science is that God, Spirit, is All-in-all, and that there is no other might nor Mind, – that God is Love, and therefore He 275:9 is divine Principle.

Divine synonyms

To grasp the reality and order of being in its Science, you must begin by reckoning God as the divine Principle 275:12 of all that really is. Spirit, Life, Truth, Love, combine as one, – and are the Scriptural names for God. All substance, intelligence, wisdom, being, im- 275:15 mortality, cause, and effect belong to God. These are His attributes, the eternal manifestations of the infinite divine Principle, Love. No wisdom is wise but His 275:18 wisdom; no truth is true, no love is lovely, no life is Life but the divine; no good is, but the good God bestows.

The divine completeness

Divine metaphysics, as revealed to spiritual understand- 275:21 ing, shows clearly that all is Mind, and that Mind is God, omnipotence, omnipresence, omniscience, – that is, all power, all presence, all Science. 275:24 Hence all is in reality the manifestation of Mind.

Our material human theories are destitute of Science. The true understanding of God is spiritual. It robs the 275:27 grave of victory. It destroys the false evidence that mis- leads thought and points to other gods, or other so-called powers, such as matter, disease, sin, and death, superior 275:30 or contrary to the one Spirit.

Truth, spiritually discerned, is scientifically understood. It casts out error and heals the sick.

Universal brotherhood

276:1 Having one God, one Mind, unfolds the power that heals the sick, and fulfils these sayings of Scripture, “I 276:3 am the Lord that healeth thee,” and “I have found a ransom.” When the divine precepts are understood, they unfold the foundation of fellowship, 276:6 in which one mind is not at war with another, but all have one Spirit, God, one intelligent source, in accordance with the Scriptural command: “Let this Mind be in you, 276:9 which was also in Christ Jesus.” Man and his Maker are correlated in divine Science, and real consciousness is cognizant only of the things of God.

276:12 The realization that all inharmony is unreal brings objects and thoughts into human view in their true light, and presents them as beautiful and immortal. Harmony 276:15 in man is as real and immortal as in music. Discord is unreal and mortal.

Perfection requisite

If God is admitted to be the only Mind and Life, 276:18 there ceases to be any opportunity for sin and death. When we learn in Science how to be perfect even as our Father in heaven is perfect, 276:21 thought is turned into new and healthy channels, – towards the contemplation of things immortal and away from materiality to the Principle of the universe, includ- 276:24 ing harmonious man.

Material beliefs and spiritual understanding never mingle. The latter destroys the former. Discord is the 276:27 _nothingness_ named error. Harmony is the _somethingness_ named Truth.

Like evolving like

Nature and revelation inform us that like produces 276:30 like. Divine Science does not gather grapes from thorns nor figs from thistles. Intelli- gence never produces non-intelligence; but matter is 277:1 ever non-intelligent and therefore cannot spring from intelligence. To all that is unlike unerring and eternal 277:3 Mind, this Mind saith, “Thou shalt surely die;” and else- where the Scripture says that dust returns to dust. The non-intelligent relapses into its own unreality. Matter 277:6 never produces mind. The immortal never produces the mortal. Good cannot result in evil. As God Himself is good and is Spirit, goodness and spirituality must be im- 277:9 mortal. Their opposites, evil and matter, are mortal error, and error has no creator. If goodness and spirit- uality are real, evil and materiality are unreal and can- 277:12 not be the outcome of an infinite God, good.

Natural history presents vegetables and animals as preserving their original species, – like reproducing like. 277:15 A mineral is not produced by a vegetable nor the man by the brute. In reproduction, the order of genus and species is preserved throughout the entire round of nature. 277:18 This points to the spiritual truth and Science of being. Error relies upon a reversal of this order, asserts that Spirit produces matter and matter produces all the ills 277:21 of flesh, and therefore that good is the origin of evil. These suppositions contradict even the order of material so-called science.

Material error

277:24 The realm of the real is Spirit. The unlikeness of Spirit is matter, and the opposite of the real is not divine, – it is a human concept. Matter is an error of state- 277:27 ment. This error in the premise leads to errors in the conclusion in every statement into which it enters. Nothing we can say or believe regarding matter is immor- 277:30 tal, for matter is temporal and is therefore a mortal phe- nomenon, a human concept, sometimes beautiful, always erroneous.

Substance _versus_ supposition

278:1 Is Spirit the source or creator of matter? Science re- veals nothing in Spirit out of which to create matter. 278:3 Divine metaphysics explains away matter. Spirit is the only substance and consciousness recognized by divine Science. The material 278:6 senses oppose this, but there are no material senses, for matter has no mind. In Spirit there is no matter, even as in Truth there is no error, and in good no evil. It is 278:9 a false supposition, the notion that there is real substance- matter, the opposite of Spirit. Spirit, God, is infinite, all. Spirit can have no opposite.

One cause supreme

278:12 That matter is substantial or has life and sensation, is one of the false beliefs of mortals, and exists only in a supposititious mortal consciousness. Hence, 278:15 as we approach Spirit and Truth, we lose the consciousness of matter. The admission that there can be material substance requires another admission, – 278:18 namely, that Spirit is not infinite and that matter is self- creative, self-existent, and eternal. From this it would follow that there are two eternal causes, warring forever 278:21 with each other; and yet we say that Spirit is supreme and all-presence.

The belief of the eternity of matter contradicts the 278:24 demonstration of life as Spirit, and leads to the conclu- sion that if man is material, he originated in matter and must return to dust, – logic which would prove his an- 278:27 nihilation.

Substance is Spirit

All that we term sin, sickness, and death is a mortal belief. We define matter as error, because it is the oppo- 278:30 site of life, substance, and intelligence. Mat- ter, with its mortality, cannot be substantial if Spirit is substantial and eternal. Which ought to 279:1 be substance to us, – the erring, changing, and dying, the mutable and mortal, or the unerring, immutable, 279:3 and immortal? A New Testament writer plainly de- scribes faith, a quality of mind, as “the _substance_ of things hoped for.”

Material mortality

279:6 The doom of matter establishes the conclusion that matter, slime, or protoplasm never originated in the immortal Mind, and is therefore not 279:9 eternal. Matter is neither created by Mind nor for the manifestation and support of Mind.

Spiritual tangibility

Ideas are tangible and real to immortal consciousness, 279:12 and they have the advantage of being eternal. Spirit and matter can neither coexist nor co- operate, and one can no more create the other than 279:15 Truth can create error, or _vice versa_.

In proportion as the belief disappears that life and in- telligence are in or of matter, the immortal facts of 279:18 being are seen, and their only idea or intelligence is in God. Spirit is reached only through the understand- ing and demonstration of eternal Life and Truth and 279:21 Love.

Pantheistic tendencies

Every system of human philosophy, doctrine, and medicine is more or less infected with the pantheistic 279:24 belief that there is mind in matter; but this belief contradicts alike revelation and right reasoning. A logical and scientific conclusion is reached 279:27 only through the knowledge that there are not two bases of being, matter and mind, but one alone, – Mind.

279:30 Pantheism, starting from a material sense of God, seeks cause in effect, Principle in its idea, and life and intelligence in matter.

The things of God are beautiful

280:1 In the infinitude of Mind, matter must be unknown. Symbols and elements of discord and decay are not prod- 280:3 ucts of the infinite, perfect, and eternal _All_. From Love and from the light and harmony which are the abode of Spirit, only reflections 280:6 of good can come. All things beautiful and harmless are ideas of Mind. Mind creates and multiplies them, and the product must be mental.

280:9 Finite belief can never do justice to Truth in any direc- tion. Finite belief limits all things, and would compress Mind, which is infinite, beneath a skull bone. Such be- 280:12 lief can neither apprehend nor worship the infinite; and to accommodate its finite sense of the divisibility of Soul and substance, it seeks to divide the one Spirit into per- 280:15 sons and souls.

Belief in many gods

Through this error, human belief comes to have “gods many and lords many.” Moses declared as Jehovah’s 280:18 first command of the Ten: “Thou shalt have no other gods before me!” But behold the zeal of belief to establish the opposite error of many 280:21 minds. The argument of the serpent in the allegory, “Ye shall be as gods,” urges through every avenue the belief that Soul is in body, and that infinite Spirit, and Life, is 280:24 in finite forms.

Sensationless body

Rightly understood, instead of possessing a sentient material form, man has a sensationless body; and God, 280:27 the Soul of man and of all existence, being perpetual in His own individuality, harmony, and immortality, imparts and perpetuates these qualities 280:30 in man, – through Mind, not matter. The only excuse for entertaining human opinions and rejecting the Science of being is our mortal ignorance of Spirit, – ignorance 281:1 which yields only to the understanding of divine Science, the understanding by which we enter into the kingdom 281:3 of Truth on earth and learn that Spirit is infinite and supreme. Spirit and matter no more commingle than light and darkness. When one appears, the other dis- 281:6 appears.

God and His image

Error presupposes man to be both mind and matter. Divine Science contradicts the corporeal senses, rebukes 281:9 mortal belief, and asks: What is the Ego, whence its origin and what its destiny? The Ego-man is the reflection of the Ego-God; the Ego-man 281:12 is the image and likeness of perfect Mind, Spirit, divine Principle.

The one Ego, the one Mind or Spirit called God, is 281:15 infinite individuality, which supplies all form and come- liness and which reflects reality and divinity in individual spiritual man and things.

281:18 The mind supposed to exist in matter or beneath a skull bone is a myth, a misconceived sense and false conception as to man and Mind. When we put off the 281:21 false sense for the true, and see that sin and mortality have neither Principle nor permanency, we shall learn that sin and mortality are without actual origin or right- 281:24 ful existence. They are native nothingness, out of which error would simulate creation through a man formed from dust.

The true new idea

281:27 Divine Science does not put new wine into old bottles, Soul into matter, nor the infinite into the finite. Our false views of matter perish as we grasp 281:30 the facts of Spirit. The old belief must be cast out or the new idea will be spilled, and the in- spiration, which is to change our standpoint, will be 282:1 lost. Now, as of old, Truth casts out evils and heals the sick.

Figures of being

282:3 The real Life, or Mind, and its opposite, the so-called material life and mind, are figured by two geometrical symbols, a circle or sphere and a straight 282:6 line. The circle represents the infinite with- out beginning or end; the straight line represents the finite, which has both beginning and end. The sphere 282:9 represents good, the self-existent and eternal individuality or Mind; the straight line represents evil, a belief in a self-made and temporary material existence. Eternal 282:12 Mind and temporary material existence never unite in figure or in fact.

Opposite symbols

A straight line finds no abiding-place in a curve, and a 282:15 curve finds no adjustment to a straight line. Similarly, matter has no place in Spirit, and Spirit has no place in matter. Truth has no home in 282:18 error, and error has no foothold in Truth. Mind cannot pass into non-intelligence and matter, nor can non-intel- ligence become Soul. At no point can these opposites 282:21 mingle or unite. Even though they seem to touch, one is still a curve and the other a straight line.

There is no inherent power in matter; for all that is 282:24 material is a material, human, mortal thought, always governing itself erroneously.

Truth is the intelligence of immortal Mind. Error is 282:27 the so-called intelligence of mortal mind.

Truth is not inverted

Whatever indicates the fall of man or the opposite of God or God’s absence, is the Adam-dream, which is neither 282:30 Mind nor man, for it is not begotten of the Father. The rule of inversion infers from error its opposite, Truth; but Truth is the light which 283:1 dispels error. As mortals begin to understand Spirit, they give up the belief that there is any true existence 283:3 apart from God.

Source of all life and action

Mind is the source of all movement, and there is no inertia to retard or check its perpetual and harmonious 283:6 action. Mind is the same Life, Love, and wis- dom “yesterday, and to-day, and forever.” Matter and its effects – sin, sickness, and 283:9 death – are states of mortal mind which act, react, and then come to a stop. They are not facts of Mind. They are not ideas, but illusions. Principle is absolute. It 283:12 admits of no error, but rests upon understanding.

But what say prevalent theories? They insist that Life, or God, is one and the same with material life so- 283:15 called. They speak of both Truth and error as _mind_, and of good and evil as _spirit_. They claim that to be life which is but the objective state of material sense, – 283:18 such as the structural life of the tree and of material man, – and deem this the manifestation of the one Life, God.

Spiritual structure

283:21 This false belief as to what really constitutes life so detracts from God’s character and nature, that the true sense of His power is lost to all who cling to 283:24 this falsity. The divine Principle, or Life, can- not be practically demonstrated in length of days, as it was by the patriarchs, unless its Science be accurately 283:27 stated. We must receive the divine Principle in the under- standing, and live it in daily life; and unless we so do, we can no more demonstrate Science, than we can teach and 283:30 illustrate geometry by calling a curve a straight line or a straight line a sphere.

Are mentality, immortality, consciousness, resident in 284:1 matter? It is not rational to say that Mind is infinite, but dwells in finiteness, – in matter, – or that matter is 284:3 infinite and the medium of Mind.

Mind never limited

If God were limited to man or matter, or if the infinite could be circumscribed within the finite, God would be 284:6 corporeal, and unlimited Mind would seem to spring from a limited body; but this is an impossibility. Infinite Mind can have no starting-point, 284:9 and can return to no limit. It can never be in bonds, nor be fully manifested through corporeality.

Material recognition impossible

Is God’s image or likeness matter, or a mortal, sin, 284:12 sickness, and death? Can matter recognize Mind? Can infinite Mind recognize matter? Can the infinite dwell in the finite or know aught un- 284:15 like the infinite? Can Deity be known through the material senses? Can the material senses, which re- ceive no direct evidence of Spirit, give correct testimony 284:18 as to spiritual life, truth, and love?

The answer to all these questions must forever be in the negative.

Our physical insensibility to Spirit

284:21 The physical senses can obtain no proof of God. They can neither see Spirit through the eye nor hear it through the ear, nor can they feel, taste, or smell Spirit. 284:24 Even the more subtile and misnamed ma- terial elements are beyond the cognizance of these senses, and are known only by the effects com- 284:27 monly attributed to them.

According to Christian Science, the only real senses of man are spiritual, emanating from divine Mind. 284:30 Thought passes from God to man, but neither sensation nor report goes from material body to Mind. The in- tercommunication is always from God to His idea, man. 285:1 Matter is not sentient and cannot be cognizant of good or of evil, of pleasure or of pain. Man’s individu- 285:3 ality is not material. This Science of being obtains not alone hereafter in what men call Paradise, but here and now; it is the great fact of being for time and 285:6 eternity.

The human counterfeit

What, then, is the material personality which suffers, sins, and dies? It is not man, the image and likeness 285:9 of God, but man’s counterfeit, the inverted likeness, the _unlikeness_ called sin, sickness, and death. The unreality of the claim that a mortal is 285:12 the true image of God is illustrated by the opposite na- tures of Spirit and matter, Mind and body, for one is intelligence while the other is non-intelligence.

Material misconceptions

285:15 Is God a physical personality? Spirit is not physical. The belief that a material body is man is a false con- ception of man. The time has come for a 285:18 finite conception of the infinite and of a ma- terial body as the seat of Mind to give place to a diviner sense of intelligence and its manifestations, 285:21 to the better understanding that Science gives of the Supreme Being, or divine Principle, and idea.

Salvation is through reform

By interpreting God as a corporeal Saviour but not as 285:24 the saving Principle, or divine Love, we shall continue to seek salvation through pardon and not through reform, and resort to matter instead 285:27 of Spirit for the cure of the sick. As mortals reach, through knowledge of Christian Science, a higher sense, they will seek to learn, not from matter, but from 285:30 the divine Principle, God, how to demonstrate the Christ, Truth, as the healing and saving power.

It is essential to understand, instead of believe, what 286:1 relates most nearly to the happiness of being. To seek Truth through belief in a human doctrine is not to un- 286:3 derstand the infinite. We must not seek the immutable and immortal through the finite, mutable, and mortal, and so depend upon belief instead of demonstration, for 286:6 this is fatal to a knowledge of Science. The understand- ing of Truth gives full faith in Truth, and spiritual un- derstanding is better than all burnt offerings.

286:9 The Master said, “No man cometh unto the Father [the divine Principle of being] but by me,” Christ, Life, Truth, Love; for Christ says, “I am the way.” 286:12 Physical causation was put aside from first to last by this original man, Jesus. He knew that the divine Principle, Love, creates and governs all that 286:15 is real.

Goodness a portion of God

In the Saxon and twenty other tongues _good_ is the term for God. The Scriptures declare all that He 286:18 made to be good, like Himself, – good in Principle and in idea. Therefore the spiritual universe is good, and reflects God as He is.

Spiritual thoughts

286:21 God’s thoughts are perfect and eternal, are substance and Life. Material and temporal thoughts are human, involving error, and since God, Spirit, is the 286:24 only cause, they lack a divine cause. The temporal and material are not then creations of Spirit. They are but counterfeits of the spiritual and eternal. 286:27 Transitory thoughts are the antipodes of everlasting Truth, though (by the supposition of opposite qualities) error must also say, “I am true.” But by this saying 286:30 error, the lie, destroys itself.

Sin, sickness, and death are comprised in human ma- terial belief, and belong not to the divine Mind. They 287:1 are without a real origin or existence. They have neither Principle nor permanence, but belong, with all that is 287:3 material and temporal, to the nothingness of error, which simulates the creations of Truth. All creations of Spirit are eternal; but creations of matter must return to dust. 287:6 Error supposes man to be both mental and material. Divine Science contradicts this postulate and maintains man’s spiritual identity.

Divine allness

287:9 We call the absence of Truth, _error_. Truth and error are unlike. In Science, Truth is divine, and the _infinite_ God can have no unlikeness. Did God, Truth, 287:12 create error? No! “Doth a fountain send forth at the same place sweet water and bitter?” God being everywhere and all-inclusive, how can He be absent 287:15 or suggest the absence of omnipresence and omnipotence? How can there be more than _all_?

Neither understanding nor truth accompanies error,