A blundering despatch, mistakenly announcing the death of a friend, occasions the same grief that the friend’s 386:18 real death would bring. You think that your anguish is occasioned by your loss. Another despatch, correcting the mistake, heals your grief, and 386:21 you learn that your suffering was merely the result of your belief. Thus it is with all sorrow, sickness, and death. You will learn at length that there is no cause 386:24 for grief, and divine wisdom will then be understood. Error, not Truth, produces all the suffering on earth.
Mourning causeless
If a Christian Scientist had said, while you were labor- 386:27 ing under the influence of the belief of grief, “Your sor- row is without cause,” you would not have understood him, although the correctness of 386:30 the assertion might afterwards be proved to you. So, when our friends pass from our sight and we lament, that lamentation is needless and causeless. We shall 387:1 perceive this to be true when we grow into the under- standing of Life, and know that there is no death.
Mind heals brain-disease
387:3 Because mortal mind is kept active, must it pay the penalty in a softened brain? Who dares to say that actual Mind can be overworked? When we reach 387:6 our limits of mental endurance, we conclude that intellectual labor has been carried sufficiently far; but when we realize that immortal Mind is ever active, 387:9 and that spiritual energies can neither wear out nor can so-called material law trespass upon God-given powers and resources, we are able to rest in Truth, refreshed by 387:12 the assurances of immortality, opposed to mortality.
Right never punishable
Our thinkers do not die early because they faithfully perform the natural functions of being. If printers and 387:15 authors have the shortest span of earthly ex- istence, it is not because they occupy the most important posts and perform the most vital functions in 387:18 society. That man does not pay the severest penalty who does the most good. By adhering to the realities of eternal existence, – instead of reading disquisitions on 387:21 the inconsistent supposition that death comes in obedience to the law of life, and that God punishes man for doing good, – one cannot suffer as the result of any labor of 387:24 love, but grows stronger because of it. It is a law of so- called mortal mind, misnamed matter, which causes all things discordant.
Christian history
387:27 The history of Christianity furnishes sublime proofs of the supporting influence and protecting power bestowed on man by his heavenly Father, omnipotent 387:30 Mind, who gives man faith and understanding whereby to defend himself, not only from temptation, but from bodily suffering.
388:1 The Christian martyrs were prophets of Christian Science. Through the uplifting and consecrating power 388:3 of divine Truth, they obtained a victory over the corpo- real senses, a victory which Science alone can explain. Stolidity, which is a resisting state of mortal mind, suffers 388:6 less, only because it knows less of material law.
The Apostle John testified to the divine basis of Chris- tian Science, when dire inflictions failed to destroy his 388:9 body. Idolaters, believing in more than one mind, had “gods many,” and thought that they could kill the body with matter, independently of mind.
Sustenance spiritual
388:12 Admit the common hypothesis that food is the nutri- ment of life, and there follows the necessity for another admission in the opposite direction, – that 388:15 food has power to destroy Life, God, through a deficiency or an excess, a quality or a quantity. This is a specimen of the ambiguous nature of all material 388:18 health-theories. They are self-contradictory and self-de- structive, constituting a “kingdom divided against itself,” which is “brought to desolation.” If food was prepared 388:21 by Jesus for his disciples, it cannot destroy life.
God sustains man
The fact is, food does not affect the absolute Life of man, and this becomes self-evident, when we learn that 388:24 God is our Life. Because sin and sickness are not qualities of Soul, or Life, we have hope in immortality; but it would be foolish to venture beyond 388:27 our present understanding, foolish to stop eating until we gain perfection and a clear comprehension of the living Spirit. In that perfect day of understanding, we shall 388:30 neither eat to live nor live to eat.
Diet and digestion
If mortals think that food disturbs the harmonious functions of mind and body, either the food or this thought 389:1 must be dispensed with, for the penalty is coupled with the belief. Which shall it be? If this decision be left 389:3 to Christian Science, it will be given in behalf of the control of Mind over this belief and every erroneous belief, or material condition. The less we 389:6 know or think about hygiene, the less we are predisposed to sickness. Recollect that it is not the nerves, not mat- ter, but mortal mind, which reports food as undigested. 389:9 Matter does not inform you of bodily derangements; it is supposed to do so. This pseudo-mental testimony can be destroyed only by the better results of Mind’s oppo- 389:12 site evidence.
Scripture rebukes
Our dietetic theories first admit that food sustains the life of man, and then discuss the certainty that food can 389:15 kill man. This false reasoning is rebuked in Scripture by the metaphors about the fount and stream, the tree and its fruit, and the kingdom di- 389:18 vided against itself. If God has, as prevalent theories maintain, instituted laws that food shall support human life, He cannot annul these regulations by an opposite 389:21 law that food shall be inimical to existence.
Ancient confusion
Materialists contradict their own statements. Their belief in material laws and in penalties for their infrac- 389:24 tion is the ancient error that there is fraternity between pain and pleasure, good and evil, God and Satan. This belief totters to its falling before the 389:27 battle-axe of Science.
A case of convulsions, produced by indigestion, came under my observation. In her belief the woman had 389:30 chronic liver-complaint, and was then suffering from a complication of symptoms connected with this belief. I cured her in a few minutes. One instant she spoke de- 390:1 spairingly of herself. The next minute she said, “My food is all digested, and I should like something more 390:3 to eat.”
Ultimate harmony
We cannot deny that Life is self-sustained, and we should never deny the everlasting harmony of Soul, sim- 390:6 ply because, to the mortal senses, there is seem- ing discord. It is our ignorance of God, the divine Principle, which produces apparent discord, and 390:9 the right understanding of Him restores harmony. Truth will at length compel us all to exchange the pleasures and pains of sense for the joys of Soul.
Unnecessary prostration
390:12 When the first symptoms of disease appear, dispute the testimony of the material senses with divine Science. Let your higher sense of justice destroy the false 390:15 process of mortal opinions which you name law, and then you will not be confined to a sick-room nor laid upon a bed of suffering in payment of the last far- 390:18 thing, the last penalty demanded by error. “Agree with thine adversary quickly, whiles thou art in the way with him.” Suffer no claim of sin or of sickness to grow upon 390:21 the thought. Dismiss it with an abiding conviction that it is illegitimate, because you know that God is no more the author of sickness than He is of sin. You have no 390:24 law of His to support the necessity either of sin or sick- ness, but you have divine authority for denying that neces- sity and healing the sick.
Treatment of disease
390:27 “Agree to disagree” with approaching symptoms of chronic or acute disease, whether it is cancer, consump- tion, or smallpox. Meet the incipient stages 390:30 of disease with as powerful mental opposi- tion as a legislator would employ to defeat the passage of an inhuman law. Rise in the conscious strength of the 391:1 spirit of Truth to overthrow the plea of mortal mind, _alias_ matter, arrayed against the supremacy of Spirit. 391:3 Blot out the images of mortal thought and its beliefs in sickness and sin. Then, when thou art delivered to the judgment of Truth, Christ, the judge will say, “Thou 391:6 art whole!”
Righteous rebellion
Instead of blind and calm submission to the incipient or advanced stages of disease, rise in rebellion against 391:9 them. Banish the belief that you can possi- bly entertain a single intruding pain which can- not be ruled out by the might of Mind, and in this way 391:12 you can prevent the development of pain in the body. No law of God hinders this result. It is error to suffer for aught but your own sins. Christ, or Truth, will de- 391:15 stroy all other supposed suffering, and real suffering for your own sins will cease in proportion as the sin ceases.
Contradict error
Justice is the moral signification of law. Injustice de- 391:18 clares the absence of law. When the body is supposed to say, “I am sick,” never plead guilty. Since matter cannot talk, it must be mortal mind 391:21 which speaks; therefore meet the intimation with a pro- test. If you say, “I am sick,” you plead guilty. Then your adversary will deliver you to the judge (mortal 391:24 mind), and the judge will sentence you. Disease has no intelligence to declare itself something and announce its name. Mortal mind alone sentences itself. Therefore 391:27 make your own terms with sickness, and be just to yourself and to others.
Sin to be overcome
Mentally contradict every complaint from the body, 391:30 and rise to the true consciousness of Life as Love, – as all that is pure, and bearing the fruits of Spirit. Fear is the fountain of sickness, 392:1 and you master fear and sin through divine Mind; hence it is through divine Mind that you overcome disease. 392:3 Only while fear or sin remains can it bring forth death. To cure a bodily ailment, every broken moral law should be taken into account and the error be rebuked. Fear, 392:6 which is an element of all disease, must be cast out to readjust the balance for God. Casting out evil and fear enables truth to outweigh error. The only course is to 392:9 take antagonistic grounds against all that is opposed to the health, holiness, and harmony of man, God’s image.
Illusions about nerves
The physical affirmation of disease should always be 392:12 met with the mental negation. Whatever benefit is pro- duced on the body, must be expressed men- tally, and thought should be held fast to this 392:15 ideal. If you believe in inflamed and weak nerves, you are liable to an attack from that source. You will call it neuralgia, but we call it a belief. If you think that con- 392:18 sumption is hereditary in your family, you are liable to the development of that thought in the form of what is termed pulmonary disease, unless Science shows you 392:21 otherwise. If you decide that climate or atmosphere is unhealthy, it will be so to you. Your decisions will mas- ter you, whichever direction they take.
Guarding the door
392:24 Reverse the case. Stand porter at the door of thought. Admitting only such conclusions as you wish realized in bodily results, you will control yourself har- 392:27 moniously. When the condition is present which you say induces disease, whether it be air, exercise, heredity, contagion, or accident, then perform your office 392:30 as porter and shut out these unhealthy thoughts and fears. Exclude from mortal mind the offending errors; then the body cannot suffer from them. The issues of pain or 393:1 pleasure must come through mind, and like a watchman forsaking his post, we admit the intruding belief, forget- 393:3 ting that through divine help we can forbid this entrance.
The strength of Spirit
The body seems to be self-acting, only because mortal mind is ignorant of itself, of its own actions, and of their 393:6 results, – ignorant that the predisposing, re- mote, and exciting cause of all bad effects is a law of so-called mortal mind, not of matter. Mind is the 393:9 master of the corporeal senses, and can conquer sickness, sin, and death. Exercise this God-given authority. Take possession of your body, and govern its feeling and action. 393:12 Rise in the strength of Spirit to resist all that is unlike good. God has made man capable of this, and nothing can vitiate the ability and power divinely bestowed on 393:15 man.
No pain in matter
Be firm in your understanding that the divine Mind governs, and that in Science man reflects God’s govern- 393:18 ment. Have no fear that matter can ache, swell, and be inflamed as the result of a law of any kind, when it is self-evident that matter can have 393:21 no pain nor inflammation. Your body would suffer no more from tension or wounds than the trunk of a tree which you gash or the electric wire which you stretch, 393:24 were it not for mortal mind.
When Jesus declares that “the light of the body is the eye,” he certainly means that light depends upon Mind, 393:27 not upon the complex humors, lenses, muscles, the iris and pupil, constituting the visual organism.
No real disease
Man is never sick, for Mind is not sick and matter 393:30 cannot be. A false belief is both the tempter and the tempted, the sin and the sinner, the disease and its cause. It is well to be calm in sickness; 394:1 to be hopeful is still better; but to understand that sick- ness is not real and that Truth can destroy its seeming 394:3 reality, is best of all, for this understanding is the uni- versal and perfect remedy.
Recuperation mental
By conceding power to discord, a large majority of 394:6 doctors depress mental energy, which is the only real recuperative power. Knowledge that we can accomplish the good we hope for, stimu- 394:9 lates the system to act in the direction which Mind points out. The admission that any bodily condition is beyond the control of Mind disarms man, prevents him from 394:12 helping himself, and enthrones matter through error. To those struggling with sickness, such admissions are dis- couraging, – as much so as would be the advice to a man 394:15 who is down in the world, that he should not try to rise above his difficulties.
Experience has proved to the author the fallacy of 394:18 material systems in general, – that their theories are sometimes pernicious, and that their denials are better than their affirmations. Will you bid a man let evils 394:21 overcome him, assuring him that all misfortunes are from God, against whom mortals should not contend? Will you tell the sick that their condition is hopeless, unless it 394:24 can be aided by a drug or climate? Are material means the only refuge from fatal chances? Is there no divine permission to conquer discord of every kind with harmony, 394:27 with Truth and Love?
Arguing wrongly
We should remember that Life is God, and that God is omnipotent. Not understanding Christian 394:30 Science, the sick usually have little faith in it till they feel its beneficent influence. This shows that faith is not the healer in such cases. The sick 395:1 unconsciously argue for suffering, instead of against it. They admit its reality, whereas they should deny it. 395:3 They should plead in opposition to the testimony of the deceitful senses, and maintain man’s immortality and eternal likeness to God.
Divine authority
395:6 Like the great Exemplar, the healer should speak to disease as one having authority over it, leaving Soul to master the false evidences of the corporeal 395:9 senses and to assert its claims over mortal- ity and disease. The same Principle cures both sin and sickness. When divine Science overcomes faith in a car- 395:12 nal mind, and faith in God destroys all faith in sin and in material methods of healing, then sin, disease, and death will disappear.
Aids in sickness
395:15 Prayers, in which God is not asked to heal but is be- sought to take the patient to Himself, do not benefit the sick. An ill-tempered, complaining, or deceit- 395:18 ful person should not be a nurse. The nurse should be cheerful, orderly, punctual, patient, full of faith, – receptive to Truth and Love.
Mental quackery
395:21 It is mental quackery to make disease a reality – to hold it as something seen and felt – and then to attempt its cure through Mind. It is no less erroneous 395:24 to believe in the real existence of a tumor, a cancer, or decayed lungs, while you argue against their reality, than it is for your patient to feel these ills in 395:27 physical belief. Mental practice, which holds disease as a reality, fastens disease on the patient, and it may appear in a more alarming form.
Effacing images of disease
395:30 The knowledge that brain-lobes cannot kill a man nor affect the functions of mind would prevent the brain from becoming diseased, though a moral offence is indeed the 396:1 worst of diseases. One should never hold in mind the thought of disease, but should efface from 396:3 thought all forms and types of disease, both for one’s own sake and for that of the patient.
Avoid talking disease
Avoid talking illness to the patient. Make no unne- 396:6 cessary inquiries relative to feelings or disease. Never startle with a discouraging remark about re- covery, nor draw attention to certain symp- 396:9 toms as unfavorable, avoid speaking aloud the name of the disease. Never say beforehand how much you have to contend with in a case, nor encourage in the patient’s 396:12 thought the expectation of growing worse before a crisis is passed.
False testimony refuted
The refutation of the testimony of material sense is 396:15 not a difficult task in view of the conceded falsity of this testimony. The refutation becomes arduous, not because the testimony of sin or disease is 396:18 true, but solely on account of the tenacity of belief in its truth, due to the force of education and the overwhelm- ing weight of opinions on the wrong side, – all teaching 396:21 that the body suffers, as if matter could have sensation.
Healthful explanation
At the right time explain to the sick the power which their beliefs exercise over their bodies. Give them divine 396:24 and wholesome understanding, with which to combat their erroneous sense, and so efface the images of sickness from mortal mind. Keep distinctly in 396:27 thought that man is the offspring of God, not of man; that man is spiritual, not material; that Soul is Spirit, outside of matter, never in it, never giving the body life 396:30 and sensation. It breaks the dream of disease to under- stand that sickness is formed by the human mind, not by matter nor by the divine Mind.
Misleading methods
397:1 By not perceiving vital metaphysical points, not seeing how mortal mind affects the body, – acting beneficially 397:3 or injuriously on the health, as well as on the morals and the happiness of mortals, – we are misled in our conclusions and methods. We throw the 397:6 mental influence on the wrong side, thereby actually in- juring those whom we mean to bless.
Remedy for accidents
Suffering is no less a mental condition than is enjoy- 397:9 ment. You cause bodily sufferings and increase them by admitting their reality and continuance, as directly as you enhance your joys by be- 397:12 lieving them to be real and continuous. When an ac- cident happens, you think or exclaim, “I am hurt!” Your thought is more powerful than your words, more 397:15 powerful than the accident itself, to make the injury real.
Now reverse the process. Declare that you are not hurt 397:18 and understand the reason why, and you will find the ensuing good effects to be in exact proportion to your disbelief in physics, and your fidelity to divine meta- 397:21 physics, confidence in God as All, which the Scriptures declare Him to be.
Independent mentality
To heal the sick, one must be familiar with the great 397:24 verities of being. Mortals are no more material in their waking hours than when they act, walk, see, hear, enjoy, or suffer in dreams. We can 397:27 never treat mortal mind and matter separately, because they combine as one. Give up the belief that mind is, even temporarily, compressed within the skull, and 397:30 you will quickly become more manly or womanly. You will understand yourself and your Maker better than before.
Naming maladies
398:1 Sometimes Jesus called a disease by name, as when he said to the epileptic boy, “Thou dumb and deaf spirit, I 398:3 charge thee, come out of him, and enter no more into him.” It is added that “the spirit [error] cried, and rent him sore and came out of him, and 398:6 he was as one dead,” – clear evidence that the malady was not material. These instances show the concessions which Jesus was willing to make to the popular ignorance 398:9 of spiritual Life-laws. Often he gave no name to the distemper he cured. To the synagogue ruler’s daughter, whom they called dead but of whom he said, “she is not 398:12 dead, but sleepeth,” he simply said, “Damsel, I say unto thee, arise!” To the sufferer with the withered hand he said, “Stretch forth thine hand,” and it “was restored 398:15 whole, like as the other.”
The action of faith
Homoeopathic remedies, sometimes not containing a particle of medicine, are known to relieve the symptoms 398:18 of disease. What produces the change? It is the faith of the doctor and the patient, which reduces self-inflicted sufferings and produces a new effect 398:21 upon the body. In like manner destroy the illusion of pleasure in intoxication, and the desire for strong drink is gone. Appetite and disease reside in mortal mind, not 398:24 in matter.
So also faith, cooperating with a belief in the healing effects of time and medication, will soothe fear and change 398:27 the belief of disease to a belief of health. Even a blind faith removes bodily ailments for a season, but hypnotism changes such ills into new and more difficult forms of dis- 398:30 ease. The Science of Mind must come to the rescue, to work a radical cure. Then we understand the process. The great fact remains that evil is not mind. Evil has 399:1 no power, no intelligence, for God is good, and therefore good is infinite, is All.
Corporeal combinations
399:3 You say that certain material combinations produce disease; but if the material body causes disease, can matter cure what matter has caused? Mortal 399:6 mind prescribes the drug, and administers it. Mortal mind plans the exercise, and puts the body through certain motions. No gastric gas accumulates, not a se- 399:9 cretion nor combination can operate, apart from the action of mortal thought, _alias_ mortal mind.
Automatic mechanism
So-called mortal mind sends its despatches over its 399:12 body, but this so-called mind is both the service and message of this telegraphy. Nerves are un- able to talk, and matter can return no an- 399:15 swer to immortal Mind. If Mind is the only actor, how can mechanism be automatic? Mortal mind perpetuates its own thought. It constructs a machine, manages it, 399:18 and then calls it material. A mill at work or the action of a water-wheel is but a derivative from, and continua- tion of, the primitive mortal mind. Without this force 399:21 the body is devoid of action, and this deadness shows that so-called mortal life is mortal mind, not matter.
Mental strength
Scientifically speaking, there is no mortal mind out of 399:24 which to make material beliefs, springing from illusion. This misnamed mind is not an entity. It is only a false sense of matter, since matter is not 399:27 sensible. The one Mind, God, contains no mortal opin- ions. All that is real is included in this immortal Mind.
Confirmation in a parable
Our Master asked: “How can one enter into a strong 399:30 man’s house and spoil his goods, except he first bind the strong man?” In other words: How can I heal the body, without beginning with so-called 400:1 mortal mind, which directly controls the body? When disease is once destroyed in this so-called mind, the fear 400:3 of disease is gone, and therefore the disease is thor- oughly cured. Mortal mind is “the strong man,” which must be held in subjection before its influence upon health 400:6 and morals can be removed. This error conquered, we can despoil “the strong man” of his goods, – namely, of sin and disease.
Eradicate error from thought
400:9 Mortals obtain the harmony of health, only as they forsake discord, acknowledge the supremacy of divine Mind, and abandon their material beliefs. 400:12 Eradicate the image of disease from the per- turbed thought before it has taken tangible shape in conscious thought, _alias_ the body, and you pre- 400:15 vent the development of disease. This task becomes easy, if you understand that every disease is an error, and has no character nor type, except what mortal mind assigns to 400:18 it. By lifting thought above error, or disease, and con- tending persistently for truth, you destroy error.
Mortal mind controlled
When we remove disease by addressing the disturbed 400:21 mind, giving no heed to the body, we prove that thought alone creates the suffering. Mortal mind rules all that is mortal. We see in the body 400:24 the images of this mind, even as in optics we see painted on the retina the image which becomes visible to the senses. The action of so-called mortal mind must be 400:27 destroyed by the divine Mind to bring out the harmony of being. Without divine control there is discord, mani- fest as sin, sickness, and death.
Mortal mind not a healer
400:30 The Scriptures plainly declare the baneful influence of sinful thought on the body. Even our Master felt this. It is recorded that in certain localities he did not many 401:1 mighty works “because of their unbelief” in Truth. Any human error is its own enemy, and works against itself; 401:3 it does nothing in the right direction and much in the wrong. If so-called mind is cherishing evil passions and malicious purposes, it is not a healer, 401:6 but it engenders disease and death.
Effect of opposites
If faith in the truth of being, which you impart men- tally while destroying error, causes chemicalization (as 401:9 when an alkali is destroying an acid), it is be- cause the truth of being must transform the error to the end of producing a higher manifestation. 401:12 This fermentation should not aggravate the disease, but should be as painless to man as to a fluid, since matter has no sensation and mortal mind only feels and sees 401:15 materially.
What I term _chemicalization_ is the upheaval produced when immortal Truth is destroying erroneous mortal be- 401:18 lief. Mental chemicalization brings sin and sickness to the surface, forcing impurities to pass away, as is the case with a fermenting fluid.
Medicine and brain
401:21 The only effect produced by medicine is dependent upon mental action. If the mind were parted from the body, could you produce any effect upon the brain 401:24 or body by applying the drug to either? Would the drug remove paralysis, affect organization, or restore will and action to cerebrum and cerebellum?
Skilful surgery
401:27 Until the advancing age admits the efficacy and suprem- acy of Mind, it is better for Christian Scientists to leave surgery and the adjustment of broken bones 401:30 and dislocations to the fingers of a surgeon, while the mental healer confines himself chiefly to mental reconstruction and to the prevention of inflammation. 402:1 Christian Science is always the most skilful surgeon, but surgery is the branch of its healing which will be last 402:3 acknowledged. However, it is but just to say that the author has already in her possession well-authenticated records of the cure, by herself and her students through 402:6 mental surgery alone, of broken bones, dislocated joints, and spinal vertebrae.
Indestructible life of man
The time approaches when mortal mind will forsake 402:9 its corporeal, structural, and material basis, when im- mortal Mind and its formations will be appre- hended in Science, and material beliefs will 402:12 not interfere with spiritual facts. Man is indestructible and eternal. Sometime it will be learned that mortal mind constructs the mortal body with this mind’s own 402:15 mortal materials. In Science, no breakage nor dislocation can really occur. You say that accidents, injuries, and disease kill man, but this is not true. The life of man is 402:18 Mind. The material body manifests only what mortal mind believes, whether it be a broken bone, disease, or sin.
The evil of mesmerism
We say that one human mind can influence another and 402:21 in this way affect the body, but we rarely remember that we govern our own bodies. The error, mes- merism – or hypnotism, to use the recent term 402:24 – illustrates the fact just stated. The operator would make his subjects believe that they cannot act voluntarily and handle themselves as they should do. If they yield 402:27 to this influence, it is because their belief is not better instructed by spiritual understanding. Hence the proof that hypnotism is not scientific; Science cannot produce 402:30 both disorder and order. The involuntary pleasure or pain of the person under hypnotic control is proved to be a belief without a real cause.
Wrong-doer should suffer
403:1 So the sick through their beliefs have induced their own diseased conditions. The great difference between vol- 403:3 untary and involuntary mesmerism is that vol- untary mesmerism is induced consciously and should and does cause the perpetrator to suffer, while self- 403:6 mesmerism is induced unconsciously and by his mistake a man is often instructed. In the first instance it is under- stood that the difficulty is a mental illusion, while in the 403:9 second it is believed that the misfortune is a material effect. The human mind is employed to remove the illusion in one case, but matter is appealed to in the other. In real- 403:12 ity, both have their origin in the human mind, and can be healed only by the divine Mind.
Error’s power imaginary
You command the situation if you understand that 403:15 mortal existence is a state of self-deception and not the truth of being. Mortal mind is constantly producing on mortal body the results of false 403:18 opinions; and it will continue to do so, until mortal error is deprived of its imaginary powers by Truth, which sweeps away the gossamer web of mortal illusion. 403:21 The most Christian state is one of rectitude and spir- itual understanding, and this is best adapted for heal- ing the sick. Never conjure up some new discovery from 403:24 dark forebodings regarding disease and then acquaint your patient with it.
Disease-production
The mortal so-called mind produces all that is unlike 403:27 the immortal Mind. The human mind determines the nature of a case, and the practitioner improves or injures the case in proportion to the truth 403:30 or error which influences his conclusions. The mental conception and development of disease are not under- stood by the patient, but the physician should be familiar 404:1 with mental action and its effect in order to judge the case according to Christian Science.
Appetites to be abandoned
404:3 If a man is an inebriate, a slave to tobacco, or the special servant of any one of the myriad forms of sin, meet and destroy these errors with the truth of being, – 404:6 by exhibiting to the wrong-doer the suffering which his submission to such habits brings, and by con- vincing him that there is no real pleasure in false appe- 404:9 tites. A corrupt mind is manifested in a corrupt body. Lust, malice, and all sorts of evil are diseased beliefs, and you can destroy them only by destroying the wicked 404:12 motives which produce them. If the evil is over in the repentant mortal mind, while its effects still remain on the individual, you can remove this disorder as God’s law is 404:15 fulfilled and reformation cancels the crime. The healthy sinner is the hardened sinner.
Temperance reform
The temperance reform, felt all over our land, results 404:18 from metaphysical healing, which cuts down every tree that brings not forth good fruit. This con- viction, that there is no real pleasure in sin, 404:21 is one of the most important points in the theology of Christian Science. Arouse the sinner to this new and true view of sin, show him that sin confers no pleasure, 404:24 and this knowledge strengthens his moral courage and increases his ability to master evil and to love good.
Sin or fear the root of sickness
Healing the sick and reforming the sinner are one and 404:27 the same thing in Christian Science. Both cures require the same method and are inseparable in Truth. Hatred, envy, dishonesty, fear, and so forth, 404:30 make a man sick, and neither material medi- cine nor Mind can help him permanently, even in body, unless it makes him better mentally, and so delivers him 405:1 from his destroyers. The basic error is mortal mind. Hatred inflames the brutal propensities. The indulgence 405:3 of evil motives and aims makes any man, who is above the lowest type of manhood, a hopeless sufferer.
Mental conspirators
Christian Science commands man to master the pro- 405:6 pensities, – to hold hatred in abeyance with kindness, to conquer lust with chastity, revenge with charity, and to overcome deceit with hon- 405:9 esty. Choke these errors in their early stages, if you would not cherish an army of conspirators against health, happiness, and success. They will deliver you 405:12 to the judge, the arbiter of truth against error. The judge will deliver you to justice, and the sentence of the moral law will be executed upon mortal mind and 405:15 body. Both will be manacled until the last farthing is paid, – until you have balanced your account with God. “Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also 405:18 reap.” The good man finally can overcome his fear of sin. This is sin’s necessity, – to destroy itself. Im- mortal man demonstrates the government of God, good, 405:21 in which is no power to sin.
Cumulative repentence
It were better to be exposed to every plague on earth than to endure the cumulative effects of a guilty con- 405:24 science. The abiding consciousness of wrong- doing tends to destroy the ability to do right. If sin is not regretted and is not lessening, then it is 405:27 hastening on to physical and moral doom. You are con- quered by the moral penalties you incur and the ills they bring. The pains of sinful sense are less harmful than its 405:30 pleasures. Belief in material suffering causes mortals to retreat from their error, to flee from body to Spirit, and to appeal to divine sources outside of themselves.
The leaves of healing
406:1 The Bible contains the recipe for all healing. “The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.” 406:3 Sin and sickness are both healed by the same Principle. The tree is typical of man’s divine Principle, which is equal to every emergency, offering 406:6 full salvation from sin, sickness, and death. Sin will submit to Christian Science when, in place of modes and forms, the power of God is understood and demonstrated 406:9 in the healing of mortals, both mind and body. “Per- fect Love casteth out fear.”
Sickness will abate
The Science of being unveils the errors of sense, and 406:12 spiritual perception, aided by Science, reaches Truth. Then error disappears. Sin and sickness will abate and seem less real as we approach the 406:15 scientific period, in which mortal sense is subdued and all that is unlike the true likeness disappears. The moral man has no fear that he will commit a murder, and he 406:18 should be as fearless on the question of disease.
Resist to the end
Resist evil – error of every sort – and it will flee from you. Error is opposed to Life. We can, and ultimately 406:21 shall, so rise as to avail ourselves in every direc- tion of the supremacy of Truth over error, Life over death, and good over evil, and this growth will go 406:24 on until we arrive at the fulness of God’s idea, and no more fear that we shall be sick and die. Inharmony of any kind involves weakness and suffering, – a loss of 406:27 control over the body.
Morbid cravings
The depraved appetite for alcoholic drinks, tobacco, tea, coffee, opium, is destroyed only by Mind’s mastery 406:30 of the body. This normal control is gained through divine strength and understanding. There is no enjoyment in getting drunk, in becoming a 407:1 fool or an object of loathing; but there is a very sharp remembrance of it, a suffering inconceivably terrible to 407:3 man’s self-respect. Puffing the obnoxious fumes of to- bacco, or chewing a leaf naturally attractive to no crea- ture except a loathsome worm, is at least disgusting.
Universal panacea
407:6 Man’s enslavement to the most relentless masters – passion, selfishness, envy, hatred, and revenge – is con- quered only by a mighty struggle. Every 407:9 hour of delay makes the struggle more severe. If man is not victorious over the passions, they crush out happiness, health, and manhood. Here Christian 407:12 Science is the sovereign panacea, giving strength to the weakness of mortal mind, – strength from the immortal and omnipotent Mind, – and lifting humanity above 407:15 itself into purer desires, even into spiritual power and good-will to man.
Let the slave of wrong desire learn the lessons of Chris- 407:18 tian Science, and he will get the better of that desire and ascend a degree in the scale of health, happiness, and existence.
Immortal memory
407:21 If delusion says, “I have lost my memory,” contra- dict it. No faculty of Mind is lost. In Science, all being is eternal, spiritual, perfect, harmoni- 407:24 ous in every action. Let the perfect model be present in your thoughts instead of its demoralized op- posite. This spiritualization of thought lets in the light, 407:27 and brings the divine Mind, Life not death, into your consciousness.
Sin a form of insanity
There are many species of insanity. All sin is insan- 407:30 ity in different degrees. Sin is spared from this classification, only because its method of madness is in consonance with common mortal belief. 408:1 Every sort of sickness is error, – that is, sickness is loss of harmony. This view is not altered by the fact 408:3 that sin is worse than sickness, and sickness is not ac- knowledged nor discovered to be error by many who are sick.
408:6 There is a universal insanity of so-called health, which mistakes fable for fact throughout the entire round of the material senses, but this general craze cannot, in a scien- 408:9 tific diagnosis, shield the individual case from the special name of insanity. Those unfortunate people who are committed to insane asylums are only so many distinctly 408:12 defined instances of the baneful effects of illusion on mor- tal minds and bodies.
Drugs and brain-lobes
The supposition that we can correct insanity by the use 408:15 of purgatives and narcotics is in itself a mild species of insanity. Can drugs go of their own accord to the brain and destroy the so-called inflam- 408:18 mation of disordered functions, thus reaching mortal mind through matter? Drugs do not affect a corpse, and Truth does not distribute drugs through the blood, and 408:21 from them derive a supposed effect on intelligence and sen- timent. A dislocation of the tarsal joint would produce insanity as perceptibly as would congestion of the brain, 408:24 were it not that mortal mind thinks that the tarsal joint is less intimately connected with the mind than is the brain. Reverse the belief, and the results would be perceptibly 408:27 different.
Matter and animate error
The unconscious thought in the corporeal substra- tum of brain produces no effect, and that condition of 408:30 the body which we call sensation in matter is unreal. Mortal mind is ignorant of it- self, – ignorant of the errors it includes and of their 409:1 effects. Intelligent matter is an impossibility. You may say: “But if disease obtains in matter, why do 409:3 you insist that disease is formed by mortal mind and not by matter?” _Mortal mind _and body combine as one, and the nearer matter approaches its final state- 409:6 ment, – animate error called nerves, brain, mind, – the more prolific it is likely to become in sin and disease- beliefs.
Dictation of error
409:9 Unconscious mortal mind – _alias _matter, brain – can- not dictate terms to consciousness nor say, “I am sick.” The belief, that the unconscious substratum 409:12 of mortal mind, termed the body, suffers and reports disease independently of this so-called conscious mind, is the error which prevents mortals from knowing 409:15 how to govern their bodies.
So-called superiority
The so-called conscious mortal mind is believed to be superior to its unconscious substratum, matter, and 409:18 the stronger never yields to the weaker, ex- cept through fear or choice. The animate should be governed by God alone. The real man is 409:21 spiritual and immortal, but the mortal and imperfect so-called “children of men” are counterfeits from the beginning, to be laid aside for the pure reality. This 409:24 mortal is put off, and the new man or real man is put on, in proportion as mortals realize the Science of man and seek the true model.
Death no benefactor
409:27 We have no right to say that life depends on matter now, but will not depend on it after death. We cannot spend our days here in ignorance of the Science 409:30 of Life, and expect to find beyond the grave a reward for this ignorance. Death will not make us harmonious and immortal as a recompense for ignorance. 410:1 If here we give no heed to Christian Science, which is spiritual and eternal, we shall not be ready for spiritual 410:3 Life hereafter.
Life eternal and present
“This is life eternal,” says Jesus, – _is_, not _shall be_; and then he defines everlasting life as a present knowledge 410:6 of his Father and of himself, – the knowledge of Love, Truth, and Life. “This is life eter- nal, that they might know Thee, the only true God, and 410:9 Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent.” The Scriptures say, “Man shall not live by bread _alone_, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God,” show- 410:12 ing that Truth is the actual life of man; but mankind objects to making this teaching practical.
Love casteth out fear
Every trial of our faith in God makes us stronger. 410:15 The more difficult seems the material condition to be overcome by Spirit, the stronger should be our faith and the purer our love. The Apostle 410:18 John says: “There is no fear in Love, but perfect Love casteth out fear. . . . He that feareth is not made per- fect in Love.” Here is a definite and inspired proclama- 410:21 tion of Christian Science.
MENTAL TREATMENT ILLUSTRATED
Be not afraid
The Science of mental practice is susceptible of no 410:24 misuse. Selfishness does not appear in the practice of Truth or Christian Science. If mental prac- tice is abused or is used in any way except to 410:27 promote right thinking and doing, the power to heal mentally will diminish, until the practitioner’s healing ability is wholly lost. Christian scientific practice be- 410:30 gins with Christ’s keynote of harmony, “Be not afraid!” 411:1 Said Job: “The thing which I greatly feared is come upon me.”
Naming diseases
411:3 My first discovery in the student’s practice was this: If the student silently called the disease by name, when he argued against it, as a general rule the body 411:6 would respond more quickly, – just as a per- son replies more readily when his name is spoken; but this was because the student was not perfectly attuned to 411:9 divine Science, and needed the arguments of truth for reminders. If Spirit or the power of divine Love bear witness to the truth, this is the ultimatum, the scientific 411:12 way, and the healing is instantaneous.
Evils cast out
It is recorded that once Jesus asked the name of a dis- ease, – a disease which moderns would call _dementia_. 411:15 The demon, or evil, replied that his name was Legion. Thereupon Jesus cast out the evil, and the insane man was changed and straightway be- 411:18 came whole. The Scripture seems to import that Jesus caused the evil to be self-seen and so destroyed.
Fear as the foundation
The procuring cause and foundation of all sickness is 411:21 fear, ignorance, or sin. Disease is always induced by a false sense mentally entertained, not destroyed. Disease is an image of thought externalized. 411:24 The mental state is called a material state. Whatever is cherished in mortal mind as the physical condition is imaged forth on the body.
Unspoken pleading
411:27 Always begin your treatment by allaying the fear of patients. Silently reassure them as to their exemp- tion from disease and danger. Watch the re- 411:30 sult of this simple rule of Christian Science, and you will find that it alleviates the symptoms of every disease. If you succeed in wholly removing the fear, 412:1 your patient is healed. The great fact that God lovingly governs all, never punishing aught but sin, is your stand- 412:3 point, from which to advance and destroy the human fear of sickness. Mentally and silently plead the case scien- tifically for Truth. You may vary the arguments to meet 412:6 the peculiar or general symptoms of the case you treat, but be thoroughly persuaded in your own mind concern- ing the truth which you think or speak, and you will be 412:9 the victor.
Eloquent silence
You may call the disease by name when you mentally deny it; but by naming it audibly, you are liable under 412:12 some circumstances to impress it upon the thought. The power of Christian Science and divine Love is omnipotent. It is indeed adequate to un- 412:15 clasp the hold and to destroy disease, sin, and death.
Insistence requisite
To prevent disease or to cure it, the power of Truth, of divine Spirit, must break the dream of the material 412:18 senses. To heal by argument, find the type of the ailment, get its name, and array your mental plea against the physical. Argue at first men- 412:21 tally, not audibly, that the patient has no disease, and conform the argument so as to destroy the evidence of disease. Mentally insist that harmony is the fact, and 412:24 that sickness is a temporal dream. Realize the presence of health and the fact of harmonious being, until the body corresponds with the normal conditions of health 412:27 and harmony.
The cure of infants
If the case is that of a young child or an infant, it needs to be met mainly through the parent’s thought, silently 412:30 or audibly on the aforesaid basis of Christian Science. The Scientist knows that there can be no hereditary disease, since matter is not intelligent 413:1 and cannot transmit good or evil intelligence to man, and God, the only Mind, does not produce pain in matter. 413:3 The act of yielding one’s thoughts to the undue contem- plation of physical wants or conditions induces those very conditions. A single requirement, beyond what is neces- 413:6 sary to meet the simplest needs of the babe is harmful. Mind regulates the condition of the stomach, bowels, and food, the temperature of children and of men, and matter 413:9 does not. The wise or unwise views of parents and other persons on these subjects produce good or bad effects on the health of children.
Ablutions for cleanliness
413:12 The daily ablutions of an infant are no more natural nor necessary than would be the process of taking a fish out of water every day and covering it with dirt 413:15 in order to make it thrive more vigorously in its own element. “Cleanliness is next to godliness,” but washing should be only for the purpose of keeping the 413:18 body clean, and this can be effected without scrubbing the whole surface daily. Water is not the natural habitat of humanity. I insist on bodily cleanliness within and with- 413:21 out. I am not patient with a speck of dirt; but in caring for an infant one need not wash his little body all over each day in order to keep it sweet as the new-blown flower.
Juvenile ailments
413:24 Giving drugs to infants, noticing every symptom of flatulency, and constantly directing the mind to such signs, – that mind being laden with illusions 413:27 about disease, health-laws, and death, – these actions convey mental images to children’s budding thoughts, and often stamp them there, making it probable 413:30 at any time that such ills may be reproduced in the very ailments feared. A child may have worms, if you say so, or any other malady, timorously held in the beliefs con- 414:1 cerning his body. Thus are laid the foundations of the belief in disease and death, and thus are children educated 414:3 into discord.
Cure of insanity
The treatment of insanity is especially interesting. However obstinate the case, it yields more readily than 414:6 do most diseases to the salutary action of truth, which counteracts error. The argu- ments to be used in curing insanity are the same as in 414:9 other diseases: namely, the impossibility that matter, brain, can control or derange mind, can suffer or cause suffering; also the fact that truth and love will establish 414:12 a healthy state, guide and govern mortal mind or the thought of the patient, and destroy all error, whether it is called dementia, hatred, or any other discord.
414:15 To fix truth steadfastly in your patients’ thoughts, ex- plain Christian Science to them, but not too soon, – not until your patients are prepared for the explanation, – 414:18 lest you array the sick against their own interests by troub- ling and perplexing their thought. The Christian Scien- tist’s argument rests on the Christianly scientific basis of 414:21 being. The Scripture declares, “The Lord He is God [good]; there is none else beside Him.” Even so, harmony is universal, and discord is unreal. Christian Science de- 414:24 clares that Mind is substance, also that matter neither feels, suffers, nor enjoys. Hold these points strongly in view. Keep in mind the verity of being, – that man is 414:27 the image and likeness of God, in whom all being is painless and permanent. Remember that man’s perfec- tion is real and unimpeachable, whereas imperfection is 414:30 blameworthy, unreal, and is not brought about by divine Love.
Matter is not inflamed
Matter cannot be inflamed. Inflammation is fear, an 415:1 excited state of mortals which is not normal. Immor- tal Mind is the only cause; therefore disease is neither a 415:3 cause nor an effect. Mind in every case is the eternal God, good. Sin, disease, and death have no foundations in Truth. Inflamation as a mor- 415:6 tal belief quickens or impedes the action of the system, because thought moves quickly or slowly, leaps or halts when it contemplates unpleasant things, or when the in- 415:9 dividual looks upon some object which he dreads. In- flammation never appears in a part which mortal thought does not reach. That is why opiates relieve inflammation. 415:12 They quiet the thought by inducing stupefaction and by resorting to matter instead of to Mind. Opiates do not remove the pain in any scientific sense. They only ren- 415:15 der mortal mind temporarily less fearful, till it can master an erroneous belief.
Truth calms the thought
Note how thought makes the face pallid. It either re- 415:18 tards the circulation or quickens it, causing a pale or flushed cheek. In the same way thought in- creases or diminishes the secretions, the action 415:21 of the lungs, of the bowels, and of the heart. The mus- cles, moving quickly or slowly and impelled or palsied by thought, represent the action of all the organs of the hu- 415:24 man system, including brain and viscera. To remove the error producing disorder, you must calm and instruct mortal mind with immortal Truth.
Effects of etherization
415:27 Etherization will apparently cause the body to dis- appear. Before the thoughts are fully at rest, the limbs will vanish from consciousness. Indeed, the 415:30 whole frame will sink from sight along with surrounding objects, leaving the pain standing forth as distinctly as a mountain-peak, as if it were a separate 416:1 bodily member. At last the agony also vanishes. This process shows the pain to be in the mind, for the inflam- 416:3 mation is not suppressed; and the belief of pain will presently return, unless the mental image occasioning the pain be removed by recognizing the truth of being.
Sedatives valueless
416:6 A hypodermic injection of morphine is administered to a patient, and in twenty minutes the sufferer is qui- etly asleep. To him there is no longer any 416:9 pain. Yet any physician – allopathic, homoe- opathic, botanic, eclectic – will tell you that the trouble- some material cause is unremoved, and that when the 416:12 soporific influence of the opium is exhausted, the pa- tient will find himself in the same pain, unless the belief which occasions the pain has meanwhile been changed. 416:15 Where is the pain while the patient sleeps?
The so-called physical ego
The material body, which you call _me_, is mortal mind, and this mind is material in sensation, even as the body, 416:18 which has originated from this material sense and been developed according to it, is mate- rial. This materialism of parent and child is only in 416:21 mortal mind, as the dead body proves; for when the mortal has resigned his body to dust, the body is no longer the parent, even in appearance.
Evil thought depletes
416:24 The sick know nothing of the mental process by which they are depleted, and next to nothing of the metaphysical method by which they can be 416:27 healed. If they ask about their disease, tell them only what is best for them to know. Assure them that they think too much about their ailments, and 416:30 have already heard too much on that subject. Turn their thoughts away from their bodies to higher ob- jects. Teach them that their being is sustained by 417:1 Spirit, not by matter, and that they find health, peace, and harmony in God, divine Love.
Helpful encouragement
417:3 Give sick people credit for sometimes knowing more than their doctors. Always support their trust in the power of Mind to sustain the body. Never 417:6 tell the sick that they have more courage than strength. Tell them rather, that their strength is in proportion to their courage. If you make the sick 417:9 realize this great truism, there will be no reaction from over-exertion or from excited conditions. Maintain the facts of Christian Science, – that Spirit is God, and 417:12 therefore cannot be sick; that what is termed matter cannot be sick; that all causation is Mind, acting through spiritual law. Then hold your ground with 417:15 the unshaken understanding of Truth and Love, and you will win. When you silence the witness against your plea, you destroy the evidence, for the disease disap- 417:18 pears. The evidence before the corporeal senses is not the Science of immortal man.
Disease to be made unreal
To the Christian Science healer, sickness is a dream 417:21 from which the patient needs to be awakened. Dis- ease should not appear real to the physician, since it is demonstrable that the way to 417:24 cure the patient is to make disease unreal to him. To do this, the physician must understand the unreality of disease in Science.
417:27 Explain audibly to your patients, as soon as they can bear it, the complete control which Mind holds over the body. Show them how mortal mind seems to induce 417:30 disease by certain fears and false conclusions, and how divine Mind can cure by opposite thoughts. Give your patients an underlying understanding to support them 418:1 and to shield them from the baneful effects of their own conclusions. Show them that the conquest over sickness, 418:3 as well as over sin, depends on mentally destroying all belief in material pleasure or pain.
Christian pleading
Stick to the truth of being in contradistinction to the 418:6 error that life, substance, or intelligence can be in matter. Plead with an honest conviction of truth and a clear perception of the unchanging, unerr- 418:9 ing, and certain effect of divine Science. Then, if your fidelity is half equal to the truth of your plea, you will heal the sick.
Truthful arguments
418:12 It must be clear to you that sickness is no more the reality of being than is sin. This mortal dream of sickness, sin, and death should cease 418:15 through Christian Science. Then one dis- ease would be as readily destroyed as another. What- ever the belief is, if arguments are used to destroy it, 418:18 the belief must be repudiated, and the negation must ex- tend to the supposed disease and to whatever decides its type and symptoms. Truth is affirmative, and confers 418:21 harmony. All metaphysical logic is inspired by this sim- ple rule of Truth, which governs all reality. By the truthful arguments you employ, and especially by the 418:24 spirit of Truth and Love which you entertain, you will heal the sick.
Morality required
Include moral as well as physical belief in your efforts 418:27 to destroy error. Cast out all manner of evil. “Preach the gospel to every creature.” Speak the truth to every form of error. Tumors, ulcers, 418:30 tubercles, inflammation, pain, deformed joints, are wak- ing dream-shadows, dark images of mortal thought, which flee before the light of Truth.
419:1 A moral question may hinder the recovery of the sick. Lurking error, lust, envy, revenge, malice, or hate will 419:3 perpetuate or even create the belief in disease. Errors of all sorts tend in this direction. Your true course is to destroy the foe, and leave the field to God, Life, Truth, 419:6 and Love, remembering that God and His ideas alone are real and harmonious.
Relapse unnecessary
If your patient from any cause suffers a relapse, meet 419:9 the cause mentally and courageously, knowing that there can be no reaction in Truth. Neither disease itself, sin, nor fear has the power to 419:12 cause disease or a relapse. Disease has no intelligence with which to move itself about or to change itself from one form to another. If disease moves, mind, not mat- 419:15 ter, moves it; therefore be sure that you move it off. Meet every adverse circumstance as its master. Ob- serve mind instead of body, lest aught unfit for develop- 419:18 ment enter thought. Think less of material conditions and more of spiritual.
Conquer beliefs and fears
Mind produces all action. If the action proceeds from 419:21 Truth, from immortal Mind, there is harmony; but mor- tal mind is liable to any phase of belief. A relapse cannot in reality occur in mortals or 419:24 so-called mortal minds, for there is but one Mind, one God. Never fear the mental malpractitioner, the mental assassin, who, in attempting to rule mankind, 419:27 tramples upon the divine Principle of metaphysics, for God is the only power. To succeed in healing, you must con- quer your own fears as well as those of your patients, and 419:30 rise into higher and holier consciousness.
True government of man
If it is found necessary to treat against relapse, know that disease or its symptoms cannot change forms, nor 420:1 go from one part to another, for Truth destroys disease. There is no metastasis, no stoppage of harmonious 420:3 action, no paralysis. Truth not error, Love not hate, Spirit not matter, governs man. If students do not readily heal themselves, they should 420:6 early call an experienced Christian Scientist to aid them. If they are unwilling to do this for themselves, they need only to know that error cannot produce this 420:9 unnatural reluctance.
Positive reassurance
Instruct the sick that they are not helpless victims, for if they will only accept Truth, they can resist disease 420:12 and ward it off, as positively as they can the temptation to sin. This fact of Christian Sci- ence should be explained to invalids when they are in a 420:15 fit mood to receive it, – when they will not array them- selves against it, but are ready to become receptive to the new idea. The fact that Truth overcomes both disease 420:18 and sin reassures depressed hope. It imparts a healthy stimulus to the body, and regulates the system. It in- creases or diminishes the action, as the case may require, 420:21 better than any drug, alterative, or tonic.
Proper stimulus
Mind is the natural stimulus of the body, but erro- neous belief, taken at its best, is not promotive of health 420:24 or happiness. Tell the sick that they can meet disease fearlessly, if they only realize that divine Love gives them all power over every physical 420:27 action and condition.
Awaken the patient
If it becomes necessary to startle mortal mind to break its dream of suffering, vehemently tell your patient that 420:30 he must awake. Turn his gaze from the false evidence of the senses to the harmonious facts of Soul and immortal being. Tell him that he suffers 421:1 only as the insane suffer, from false beliefs. The only difference is, that insanity implies belief in a diseased 421:3 brain, while physical ailments (so-called) arise from the belief that other portions of the body are deranged. De- rangement, or _disarrangement_, is a word which conveys 421:6 the true definition of all human belief in ill-health, or dis- turbed harmony. Should you thus startle mortal mind in order to remove its beliefs, afterwards make known 421:9 to the patient your motive for this shock, showing him that it was to facilitate recovery.
How to treat a crisis
If a crisis occurs in your treatment, you must treat 421:12 the patient less for the disease and more for the mental disturbance or fermentation, and subdue the symptoms by removing the belief that this 421:15 chemicalization produces pain or disease. Insist vehe- mently on the great fact which covers the whole ground, that God, Spirit, is all, and that there is none beside 421:18 Him. There is _no disease_. When the supposed suffer- ing is gone from mortal mind, there can be no pain; and when the fear is destroyed, the inflammation will sub- 421:21 side. Calm the excitement sometimes induced by chemi- calization, which is the alterative effect produced by Truth upon error, and sometimes explain the symptoms 421:24 and their cause to the patient.
No perversion of Mind-science
It is no more Christianly scientific to see disease than it is to experience it. If you would destroy the sense 421:27 of disease, you should not build it up by wishing to see the forms it assumes or by employing a single material application for 421:30 its relief. The perversion of Mind-science is like as- serting that the products of eight multiplied by five, and of seven by ten, are both forty, and that their combined 422:1 sum is fifty, and then calling the process mathematics. Wiser than his persecutors, Jesus said: “If I by Beelze- 422:3 bub cast out devils, by whom do your children cast them out?”
Effect of this book
If the reader of this book observes a great stir through- 422:6 out his whole system, and certain moral and physical symptoms seem aggravated, these indications are favorable. Continue to read, and the book 422:9 will become the physician, allaying the tremor which Truth often brings to error when destroying it.
Disease neutralized
Patients, unfamiliar with the cause of this commotion 422:12 and ignorant that it is a favorable omen, may be alarmed. If such be the case, explain to them the law of this action. As when an acid and alkali 422:15 meet and bring out a third quality, so mental and moral chemistry changes the material base of thought, giving more spirituality to consciousness and causing it to depend 422:18 less on material evidence. These changes which go on in mortal mind serve to reconstruct the body. Thus Christian Science, by the alchemy of Spirit, destroys sin 422:21 and death.
Bone-healing by surgery
Let us suppose two parallel cases of bone-disease, both similarly produced and attended by the same symptoms. 422:24 A surgeon is employed in one case, and a Christian Scientist in the other. The sur- geon, holding that matter forms its own conditions and 422:27 renders them fatal at certain points, entertains fears and doubts as to the ultimate outcome of the injury. Not holding the reins of government in his own hands, he 422:30 believes that something stronger than Mind – namely, matter – governs the case. His treatment is therefore tentative. This mental state invites defeat. The belief 423:1 that he has met his master in matter and may not be able to mend the bone, increases his fear; yet this belief 423:3 should not be communicated to the patient, either ver- bally or otherwise, for this fear greatly diminishes the tendency towards a favorable result. Remember that the 423:6 unexpressed belief oftentimes affects a sensitive patient more strongly than the expressed thought.
Scientific corrective
The Christian Scientist, understanding scientifically 423:9 that all is Mind, commences with mental causation, the truth of being, to destroy the error. This cor- rective is an alterative, reaching to every part 423:12 of the human system. According to Scripture, it searches “the joints and marrow,” and it restores the harmony of man.
Coping with difficulties
423:15 The matter-physician deals with matter as both his foe and his remedy. He regards the ailment as weakened or strengthened according to the evidence which 423:18 matter presents. The metaphysician, making Mind his basis of operation irrespective of matter and regarding the truth and harmony of being as superior to 423:21 error and discord, has rendered himself strong, instead of weak, to cope with the case; and he proportionately strengthens his patient with the stimulus of courage and 423:24 conscious power. Both Science and consciousness are now at work in the economy of being according to the law of Mind, which ultimately asserts its absolute supremacy.
Formation from thought
423:27 Ossification or any abnormal condition or derange- ment of the body is as directly the action of mortal mind as is dementia or insanity. Bones have 423:30 only the substance of thought which forms them. They are only phenomena of the mind of mor- tals. The so-called substance of bone is formed first 424:1 by the parent’s mind, through self-division. Soon the child becomes a separate, individualized mortal mind, 424:3 which takes possession of itself and its own thoughts of bones.
Accidents unknown to God
Accidents are unknown to God, or immortal Mind, 424:6 and we must leave the mortal basis of belief and unite with the one Mind, in order to change the notion of chance to the proper sense 424:9 of God’s unerring direction and thus bring out harmony.
Opposing mentality
Under divine Providence there can be no accidents, since there is no room for imperfection in perfection.
424:12 In medical practice objections would be raised if one doctor should administer a drug to counteract the work- ing of a remedy prescribed by another doctor. 424:15 It is equally important in metaphysical prac- tice that the _minds_ which surround your patient should not act against your influence by continually expressing 424:18 such opinions as may alarm or discourage, – either by giving antagonistic advice or through unspoken thoughts resting on your patient. While it is certain that the 424:21 divine Mind can remove any obstacle, still you need the ear of your auditor. It is not more difficult to make your- self heard mentally while others are thinking about your 424:24 patients or conversing with them, if you understand Christian Science – the oneness and the allness of divine Love; but it is well to be alone with God and the sick 424:27 when treating disease.
Mind removes scrofula
To prevent or to cure scrofula and other so-called he- reditary diseases, you must destroy the belief in these ills 424:30 and the faith in the possibility of their trans- mission. The patient may tell you that he has a humor in the blood, a scrofulous diathesis. His 425:1 parents or some of his progenitors farther back have so believed. Mortal mind, not matter, induces this con- 425:3 clusion and its results. You will have humors, just so long as you believe them to be safety-valves or to be ineradicable.
Nothing to consume
425:6 If the case to be mentally treated is consumption, take up the leading points included (according to belief) in this disease. Show that it is not inherited; 425:9 that inflammation, tubercles, hemorrhage, and decomposition are beliefs, images of mortal thought su- perimposed upon the body; that they are not the truth 425:12 of man; that they should be treated as error and put out of thought. Then these ills will disappear.
The lungs re-formed
If the body is diseased, this is but one of the beliefs of 425:15 mortal mind. Mortal man will be less mortal, when he learns that matter never sustained existence and can never destroy God, who is man’s Life. 425:18 When this is understood, mankind will be more spiritual and know that there is nothing to consume, since Spirit, God, is All-in-all. What if the belief is consumption? 425:21 God is more to a man than his belief, and the less we ac- knowledge matter or its laws, the more immortality we possess. Consciousness constructs a better body when 425:24 faith in matter has been conquered. Correct material belief by spiritual understanding, and Spirit will form you anew. You will never fear again except to offend 425:27 God, and you will never believe that heart or any por- tion of the body can destroy you.
Soundness maintained
If you have sound and capacious lungs and want 425:30 them to remain so, be always ready with the mental protest against the opposite belief in heredity. Discard all notions about lungs, tubercles, in- 426:1 herited consumption, or disease arising from any cir- cumstance, and you will find that mortal mind, when 426:3 instructed by Truth, yields to divine power, which steers the body into health.
Our footsteps heavenward
The discoverer of Christian Science finds the path less 426:6 difficult when she has the high goal always before her thoughts, than when she counts her footsteps in endeavoring to reach it. When the desti- 426:9 nation is desirable, expectation speeds our progress. The struggle for Truth makes one strong instead of weak, resting instead of wearying one. If the belief in death 426:12 were obliterated, and the understanding obtained that there is no death, this would be a “tree of life,” known by its fruits. Man should renew his energies and en- 426:15 deavors, and see the folly of hypocrisy, while also learn- ing the necessity of working out his own salvation. When it is learned that disease cannot destroy life, and that 426:18 mortals are not saved from sin or sickness by death, this understanding will quicken into newness of life. It will master either a desire to die or a dread of the grave, 426:21 and thus destroy the great fear that besets mortal existence.
Christian standard
The relinquishment of all faith in death and also of 426:24 the fear of its sting would raise the standard of health and morals far beyond its present elevation, and would enable us to hold the banner of 426:27 Christianity aloft with unflinching faith in God, in Life eternal. Sin brought death, and death will disappear with the disappearance of sin. Man is immortal, and 426:30 the body cannot die, because matter has no life to sur- render. The human concepts named matter, death, dis- ease, sickness, and sin are all that can be destroyed.
Life not contingent on matter
427:1 If it is true that man lives, this fact can never change in Science to the opposite belief that man dies. Life is 427:3 the law of Soul, even the law of the spirit of Truth, and Soul is never without its represent- ative. Man’s individual being can no more 427:6 die nor disappear in unconsciousness than can Soul, for both are immortal. If man believes in death now, he must disbelieve in it when learning that there is no reality 427:9 in death, since the truth of being is deathless. The be- lief that existence is contingent on matter must be met and mastered by Science, before Life can be understood 427:12 and harmony obtained.
Mortality vanquished
Death is but another phase of the dream that exist- ence can be material. Nothing can interfere with the 427:15 harmony of being nor end the existence of man in Science. Man is the same after as before a bone is broken or the body guillotined. If man 427:18 is never to overcome death, why do the Scriptures say, “The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death”? The tenor of the Word shows that we shall obtain the victory 427:21 over death in proportion as we overcome sin. The great difficulty lies in ignorance of what God is. God, Life, Truth, and Love make man undying. Immortal Mind, 427:24 governing all, must be acknowledged as supreme in the physical realm, so-called, as well as in the spiritual.
No death nor inaction
Called to the bed of death, what material remedy has 427:27 man when all such remedies have failed? Spirit is his last resort, but it should have been his first and only resort. The dream of death must 427:30 be mastered by Mind here or hereafter. Thought will waken from its own material declaration, “I am dead,” to catch this trumpet-word of Truth, “There 428:1 is no death, no inaction, diseased action, overaction, nor reaction.”
Vision opening
428:3 Life is real, and death is the illusion. A demonstra- tion of the facts of Soul in Jesus’ way resolves the dark visions of material sense into harmony and 428:6 immortality. Man’s privilege at this supreme moment is to prove the words of our Master: “If a man keep my saying, he shall never see death.” To divest 428:9 thought of false trusts and material evidences in order that the spiritual facts of being may appear, – this is the great attainment by means of which we shall sweep 428:12 away the false and give place to the true. Thus we may establish in truth the temple, or body, “whose builder and maker is God.”
Intelligent consecration
428:15 We should consecrate existence, not “to the unknown God” whom we “ignorantly worship,” but to the eternal builder, the everlasting Father, to the Life 428:18 which mortal sense cannot impair nor mortal belief destroy. We must realize the ability of mental might to offset human misconceptions and to replace them 428:21 with the life which is spiritual, not material.
The present immortality
The great spiritual fact must be brought out that man _is_, not _shall be_, perfect and immortal. We must hold 428:24 forever the consciousness of existence, and sooner or later, through Christ and Christian Science, we must master sin and death. The evidence 428:27 of man’s immortality will become more apparent, as ma- terial beliefs are given up and the immortal facts of being are admitted.
Careful guidance
428:30 The author has healed hopeless organic disease, and raised the dying to life and health through the under- standing of God as the only Life. It is a sin to believe 429:1 that aught can overpower omnipotent and eternal Life, and this Life must be brought to light by the understand- 429:3 ing that there is no death, as well as by other graces of Spirit. We must begin, however, with the more simple demonstrations of control, and 429:6 the sooner we begin the better. The final demonstration takes time for its accomplishment. When walking, we are guided by the eye. We look before our feet, and if 429:9 we are wise, we look beyond a single step in the line of spiritual advancement.
Clay replying to the potter
The corpse, deserted by thought, is cold and decays, 429:12 but it never suffers. Science declares that man is sub- ject to Mind. Mortal mind affirms that mind is subordinate to the body, that the body is 429:15 dying, that it must be buried and decomposed into dust; but mortal mind’s affirmation is not true. Mortals waken from the dream of death with bodies un- 429:18 seen by those who think that they bury the body.
Continuity of existence
If man did not exist before the material organization began, he could not exist after the body is disintegrated. 429:21 If we live after death and are immortal, we must have lived before birth, for if Life ever had any beginning, it must also have an ending, even ac- 429:24 cording to the calculations of natural science. Do you believe this? No! Do you understand it? No! This is why you doubt the statement and do not demonstrate 429:27 the facts it involves. We must have faith in all the say- ings of our Master, though they are not included in the teachings of the schools, and are not understood gener- 429:30 ally by our ethical instructors.
Life all-inclusive
Jesus said (John viii. 51), “If a man keep my saying, he shall never see death.” That statement is not con- 430:1 fined to spiritual life, but includes all the phenomena of existence. Jesus demonstrated this, healing the dying 430:3 and raising the dead. Mortal mind must part with error, must put off itself with its deeds, and immortal manhood, the Christ ideal, will appear. 430:6 Faith should enlarge its borders and strengthen its base by resting upon Spirit instead of matter. When man gives up his belief in death, he will advance more rapidly 430:9 towards God, Life, and Love. Belief in sickness and death, as certainly as belief in sin, tends to shut out the true sense of Life and health. When will mankind wake 430:12 to this great fact in Science?
I here present to my readers an allegory illustrative of the law of divine Mind and of the supposed laws of mat- 430:15 ter and hygiene, an allegory in which the plea of Christian Science heals the sick.
A mental court case
Suppose a mental case to be on trial, as cases are tried 430:18 in court. A man is charged with having committed liver- complaint. The patient feels ill, ruminates, and the trial commences. Personal Sense is 430:21 the plaintiff. Mortal Man is the defendant. False Belief is the attorney for Personal Sense. Mortal Minds, Ma- teria Medica, Anatomy, Physiology, Hypnotism, Envy, 430:24 Greed and Ingratitude, constitute the jury. The court- room is filled with interested spectators, and Judge Medicine is on the bench.
430:27 The evidence for the prosecution being called for, a witness testifies thus: –
I represent Health-laws. I was present on certain nights 430:30 when the prisoner, or patient, watched with a sick friend. Although I have the superintendence of human affairs, I was personally abused on those occasions. I was told that 431:1 I must remain silent until called for at this trial, when I would be allowed to testify in the case. Notwithstanding 431:3 my rules to the contrary, the prisoner watched with the sick every night in the week. When the sick mortal was thirsty, the prisoner gave him drink. During all this time the pris- 431:6 oner attended to his daily labors, partaking of food at ir- regular intervals, sometimes going to sleep immediately after a heavy meal. At last he committed liver-complaint, 431:9 which I considered criminal, inasmuch as this offence is deemed punishable with death. Therefore I arrested Mor- tal Man in behalf of the state (namely, the body) and cast 431:12 him into prison.
At the time of the arrest the prisoner summoned Physi- ology, Materia Medica, and Hypnotism to prevent his pun- 431:15 ishment. The struggle on their part was long. Materia Medica held out the longest, but at length all these assist- ants resigned to me, Health-laws, and I succeeded in get- 431:18 ting Mortal Man into close confinement until I should release him.
The next witness is called:-
431:21 I am Coated Tongue. I am covered with a foul fur, placed on me the night of the liver-attack. Morbid Secre- tion hypnotized the prisoner and took control of his mind, 431:24 making him despondent.
Another witness takes the stand and testifies:-
I am Sallow Skin. I have been dry, hot, and chilled by 431:27 turns since the night of the liver-attack. I have lost my healthy hue and become unsightly, although nothing on my part has occasioned this change. I practise daily ablutions 431:30 and perform my functions as usual, but I am robbed of my good looks.
432:1 The next witness testifies: –
I am Nerve, the State Commissioner for Mortal Man. 432:3 I am intimately acquainted with the plaintiff, Personal Sense, and know him to be truthful and upright, whereas Mortal Man, the prisoner at the bar, is capable of false- 432:6 hood. I was witness to the crime of liver-complaint. I knew the prisoner would commit it, for I convey messages from my residence in matter, alias brain, to body.
432:9 Another witness is called for by the Court of Error and says: –
I am Mortality, Governor of the Province of Body, in 432:12 which Mortal Man resides. In this province there is a stat- ute regarding disease, – namely, that he upon whose per- son disease is found shall be treated as a criminal and 432:15 punished with death.
The Judge asks if by doing good to his neighbor, it is possible for man to become diseased, transgress the laws, 432:18 and merit punishment, and Governor Mortality replies in the affirmative.
Another witness takes the stand and testifies: –
432:21 I am Death. I was called for, shortly after the report of the crime, by the officer of the Board of Health, who pro- tested that the prisoner had abused him, and that my pres- 432:24 ence was required to confirm his testimony. One of the prisoner’s friends, Materia Medica, was present when I arrived, endeavoring to assist the prisoner to escape from 432:27 the hands of justice, _alias_ nature’s so-called law; but my appearance with a message from the Board of Health changed the purpose of Materia Medica, and he decided at 432:30 once that the prisoner should die.
Judge Medicine charges the jury
433:1 The testimony for the plaintiff, Personal Sense, being closed, Judge Medicine arises, and with great solemnity 433:3 addresses the jury of Mortal Minds. He an- alyzes the offence, reviews the testimony, and explains the law relating to liver-complaint. 433:6 His conclusion is, that laws of nature render disease homicidal. In compliance with a stern duty, his Honor, Judge Medicine, urges the jury not to allow their judg- 433:9 ment to be warped by the irrational, unchristian sugges- tions of Christian Science. The jury must regard in such cases only the evidence of Personal Sense against Mortal 433:12 Man.
As the Judge proceeds, the prisoner grows restless. His sallow face blanches with fear, and a look of despair and 433:15 death settles upon it. The case is given to the jury. A brief consultation ensues, and the jury returns a verdict of “Guilty of liver-complaint in the first degree.”
Mortal Man sentenced
433:18 Judge Medicine then proceeds to pronounce the solemn sentence of death upon the prisoner. Because he has loved his neighbor as himself, Mortal Man has 433:21 been guilty of benevolence in the first degree, and this has led him into the commission of the second crime, liver-complaint, which material laws condemn as 433:24 homicide. For this crime Mortal Man is sentenced to be tortured until he is dead. “May God have mercy on your soul,” is the Judge’s solemn peroration.
433:27 The prisoner is then remanded to his cell (sick-bed), and Scholastic Theology is sent for to prepare the fright- ened sense of Life, God, – which sense must be immortal, 433:30 – for _death_.
Appeal to a higher tribunal
Ah! but Christ, Truth, the spirit of Life and the friend of Mortal Man, can open wide those prison doors 434:1 and set the captive free. Swift on the wings of divine Love, there comes a despatch: “Delay the execution; 434:3 the prisoner is not guilty.” Consternation fills the prison-yard. Some exclaim, “It is con- trary to law and justice.” Others say, 434:6 “The law of Christ supersedes _our_ laws; let us follow Christ.”
Counsel for defence
After much debate and opposition, permission is ob- 434:9 tained for a trial in the Court of Spirit, where Christian Science is allowed to appear as counsel for the unfortunate prisoner. Witnesses, judges 434:12 and jurors, who were at the previous Court of Error, are now summoned to appear before the bar of Justice and eternal Truth.
434:15 When the case for Mortal Man _versus_ Personal Sense is opened, Mortal Man’s counsel regards the prisoner with the utmost tenderness. The counsel’s earnest, 434:18 solemn eyes, kindling with hope and triumph, look up- ward. Then Christian Science turns suddenly to the supreme tribunal, and opens the argument for the 434:21 defence: –
The prisoner at the bar has been unjustly sentenced. His trial was a tragedy, and is morally illegal. Mortal 434:24 Man has had no proper counsel in the case. All the test- mony has been on the side of Personal Sense, and we shall unearth this foul conspiracy against the liberty and life of 434:27 Man. The only valid testimony in the case shows the alleged crime never to have been committed. The pris- oner is not proved “worthy of death, or of bonds.”
434:30 Your Honor, the lower court has sentenced Mortal Man to die, but God made Man immortal and amenable to Spirit only. Denying justice to the body, that court com- 435:1 mended man’s immortal Spirit to heavenly mercy, – Spirit which is God Himself and Man’s only lawgiver! Who or 435:3 what has sinned? Has the body or has Mortal Mind committed a criminal deed? Counsellor False Belief has argued that the body should die, while Reverend Theology 435:6 would console conscious Mortal Mind, which alone is capa- ble of sin and suffering. The body committed no offence. Mortal Man, in obedience to higher law, helped his fellow- 435:9 man, an act which should result in good to himself as well as to others.
The law of our Supreme Court decrees that whosoever 435:12 _sinneth_ shall die; but good deeds are immortal, bringing joy instead of grief, pleasure instead of pain, and life instead of death. If liver-complaint was committed by 435:15 trampling on Laws of Health, this was a good deed, for the agent of those laws is an outlaw, a destroyer of Mortal Man’s liberty and rights. Laws of Health should be sen- 435:18 tenced to die.
Watching beside the couch of pain in the exercise of a love that “is the fulfilling of the law,” – doing “unto 435:21 others as ye would that they should do unto you,” – this is no infringement of law, for no demand, human or divine, renders it just to punish a man for acting justly. If mor- 435:24 tals sin, our Supreme Judge in equity decides what penalty is due for the sin, and Mortal Man can suffer only for his sin. For naught else can he be punished, according to the 435:27 law of Spirit, God.
Then what jurisdiction had his Honor, Judge Medicine, in this case? To him I might say, in Bible language, “Sit- 435:30 test thou to judge . . . after the law, and commandest . . . to be smitten contrary to the law?” The only jurisdiction to which the prisoner can submit is that of Truth, Life, and 435:33 Love. If they condemn him not, neither shall Judge Medi- cine condemn him; and I ask that the prisoner be restored