John Randall Dunn, C.S., of St. Louis, Missouri
Member of the Board of Lectureship of The Mother
Church,
The First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston, Massachusetts
The widespread interest in the subject of Christian Science, in this and other lands, is traceable directly to the fact that enslaved mortals are finding in its spiritual teaching that liberator graphically pictured by Isaiah as sent "to preach good tidings unto the meek; . . . to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound." The attempts of some misinformed critics to prove that Christian Science is not this liberator, that the sick are not healed, the sinning reformed, nor the sorrowing comforted through its ministrations, are of course of little moment in the presence of an ever increasing host of witnesses testifying to the fact that whereas they were bound physically, mentally, or morally, now they are experiencing through the teachings of Christian Science a greater measure of health, freedom, and happiness than they have ever known.
What would those who fancy themselves opposed to this spiritual teaching have its students do? Would they ask the man who states, and whose family corroborates his statement, that he has been freed from the torments of alcoholism, to go back to his appetite and his bondage? Would they bid the infidel who through Christian Science has become a believer in and lover of the Bible, discard that holy volume, and tread again his cheerless, godless road? Would they bring back the pain and anguish which in the cases of thousands of men and women and little children have been banished by the touch of this healing evangel? Surely this is no time to oppose the coming to saddened humanity of a spiritual message the certain effect of which is the uplift and comfort of mankind. It might be recommended, therefore, to those who feel called upon to ridicule and revile the Christian Scientists, that perhaps the safest and most Christian attitude for them to assume is to be found in Gamaliel's sound advice to the would-be persecutors of the apostles, as recorded in the fifth chapter of Acts: "And now I say unto you, Refrain from these men, and let them alone: for if this counsel or this work be of men, it will come to nought: but if it be of God, ye cannot overthrow it; lest haply ye be found even to fight against God."
We are without doubt living in one of the most tragic moments in history. On all sides are evidences of the most terrific upheaval the world has ever witnessed. Nation has risen against nation, wars and rumors of wars abound, desolation and disturbances of nature seem to prevail, and want, woe, and discord stalk abroad in the earth. What does it mean? How are we to stand? Christian Science gives the only rational explanation of this mighty world-wide fermentation. It tells us not to be dismayed, but to realize that as the mud in a river's bed must be stirred and brought to the surface in order to purity the stream (see Science and Health, p. 540), just so must the latent errors of the earth, national as well as individual, be brought to the surface and carried off, in order that the kingdoms of this world may become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ. As Jesus says in the twenty-first chapter of Luke. "When these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh." A Christian Scientist cannot fail to read the signs of the times and realize with courage and without dismay that this mighty international upheaval means the blasting away of the rocks and stumps of tyranny and oppression and the preparing of the soil of the human consciousness for the seed of truth, the seed of scientific Christianity. Thus to say that the world is being made safe for democracy, means that the world is being prepared for scientific, liberating Christianity.
The question is asked frequently these days, "How does the Christian Scientist stand at this crisis? Is he one of these 'peace-at-any-price' men, or is he a loyal supporter of the Government?"
If you find a student of Christian Science who tells you that he cannot support the Allied governments in their stand for righteousness, you have found one who has not as yet awakened to the great fact, that if a man is loyal to the ideals of Christian Science he cannot help being loyal to the ideals of democracy; for, try as he may he cannot divorce the two. The Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science has written that Christian Science "stands for the inalienable, universal rights of men," and is ''essentially democratic" (The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, p. 254.) She has also stated as an article of her political faith that she believes in supporting a righteous government (page 276). And governments actuated by more righteous motives than the governments of the United Kingdom, France, Italy, and the United States, could not be found. Again Mrs. Eddy writes, "If our nation's rights or honor were seized, every citizen would be a soldier and woman would be armed with power girt for the hour" (page 277).
So you will find practically every student of Christian Science at this hour loyally doing his duty as a good citizen either on the battle front or at home, supporting the Government loans, contributing to war relief and camp welfare activities — in short, striving to be in every sense of the word a humanitarian; but when he has done his material "bit," he realizes that he has only just begun to serve his country and his fellow men. For one thing alone can save the stricken human race and that one thing is prayer. So the Christian Scientist knows that daily he must spend consecrated moments praying for the healing of the nations, if truly he would help in the solving of earth's problems. Did you hear that when the news of the defeat of the enemy at the battle of the Marne in 1914 was received in England, Lord Roberts said, "Only God Almighty could have done this!" General Kitchener, reading the dispatch, said, "Some one must have been praying." And General Foch, the present commander-in-chief of the Allied armies, has made the statement that "we shall be saved by prayer."
Now the Christian Scientist knows that the prayer which heals a sick man or a sick nation cannot be a mere petition or supplication, nor can it be a prayer of blind faith. It must be a prayer of joyous confidence in the certain triumph of right, a realization of the all-power and protection of God, good — such a prayer as Jesus prayed at the tomb of Lazarus, when he said: "Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me. And I knew that thou hearest me always!" Against the power of such a mighty realization the gates of hell cannot prevail, and at this critical hour Christian Science warns us not to lean too much on "horses and chariots," but to look to Him to be "saved, all the ends of the earth."
The Christian Science Monitor, the international daily newspaper published by The Christian Science Publishing Society, is conceded even by many non-Scientists to be one of the great forces for righteousness in human affairs today. Its object, Mrs. Eddy has stated, "is to injure no man, but to bless all mankind" (Miscellany, p. 353), and it is ever the champion of lofty patriotism, good government, and high civic ideals. It is doing more to awaken humanity to a clear metaphysical view of earth's problems than any other news journal on the globe. It is bringing to the very doorstep of the reader's heart the problems, the hopes, the trials, and the achievements of his brethren overseas and over-continents. In other words, as it has been well said, the Monitor is teaching mortals "to think in hemispheres." Thus it is laying a sure foundation for a true co-operation and lasting fellowship among men and nations; and when the smoke of this great conflict lifts, the Christian Scientists in all parts of the world will be found offering a cup of cold water in Christ's name, as they have been offering it for the past generation to the receptive thought, healing the sick, comforting the sorrowing, and wiping out unhappy memories, enmities, and hates.
Certainly it must be recognized by every thinking person that the signing of a treaty of peace favorable to human interests as it may be, will not alone usher in the millenium. To be sure, the yielding of autocracy to democracy, the ordaining of humanly good governments, and the establishment of equal rights and privileges among men are absolutely necessary steps toward the ultimate liberation of the race. But the great battle of Armageddon is not ended, for this battle is the conflict between the flesh and Spirit, between Truth and error, the struggle whereby mortals finally shall be freed from the bondage of material sense, from sickness, hate, animality, limitation, imperfection, old age, death. Down through the centuries enslaved mortals have echoed Jeremiah's plaint: "Is there no balm in Gilead; is there no physician there? why then is not the health of the daughter of my people recovered?"
Now it has been proven in the world's experience, that every great human crisis has witnessed the appearance of some courageous God-prepared teacher or leader proclaiming a remedy, publishing deliverance, or pointing a way of escape.
The enslaved and children of Israel yearned for deliverance, and a Moses, and later a Joshua, appeared to lead them from bondage. Out of the night of religious ignorance, superstition, and error shone the light of a Martin Luther. From the shores where then thrived the hampering weeds of religious intolerance and bigotry, sailed the Pilgrim Fathers. And when the freedom of their descendants was at stake in 1776 and their unity threatened in 1861, there stepped forth a George Washington and an Abraham Lincoln to meet the human need. And now in this age, this material mammon worshiping age, which in spite of its wonderful material inventions and achievements is so hungering after spirituality, after healing, bodily and mental, in this age that Love divine which "always has met and always will meet every human need" (Science and Health, p. 494) has spoken again, proclaiming to the sons of men that there is balm in Gilead, and that Gilead is not afar off, but within our very reach, here and now. And should it be surprising that it was the gentle voice of a woman that was appointed to bring this message, assuring the saddened and fearful children of earth, with all the tenderness of the mother, that God is indeed able to care for His creation, to heal and to save?
We have only to remember the pure Jewish maiden whose uplifted sense beheld and brought into demonstration the fatherhood of God; the repentance and gratitude of the magdalen; the faithfulness of the women "last at the cross and first at the sepulchre"; and likewise the fidelity and devotion of the woman-thought through all the centuries, to that which points to faith and purity — we have only to remember these, should the human mind find it difficult to accept the fact that Truth has spoken to this age through a woman.
I regret to confess the fact that before I knew anything about Christian Science, before I had read a line of its authorized literature, or attempted to prove by demonstration its truth or its error, I was one of that now rapidly diminishing number of persons who seem to take a special delight in making flippant and unchristian remarks about Mrs. Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, and in laughing at the movement in general. I was quite sure that Christian Scientists worshiped Mrs. Eddy, and that her system of healing was based upon will power, or the human mind over matter. In fact my fund of information as to what Christian Science did not teach, reminds me of the man who was endeavoring to impress his pastor with his extraordinary familiarity with the Holy Scripture. "Why, parson," he exclaimed, ''I know that Bible from Genesis to Exodus!"
But when at last I read the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health With Key to the Scriptures," and when I had attended a few services, I found that which no impartial investigator could fail to discover, that Christian Scientists worship the supreme and only God, and entertain for the revered Leader of their movement only sentiments of affection and deep gratitude. I found, instead of a system of material philosophy, dealing with the action of will power and suggestion, the purest Christian metaphysics, based upon a spiritual sense of the Scriptures. Well may we rejoice that Mrs. Eddy during her search after Truth had investigated so-called magnetic healing, and mind cure based upon hypnotic control, and found such systems not only devoid of spirituality, but positively iniquitous. And even a casual glance through the pages of the textbook must convince any fair-minded person that Christian Science is as far from hypnotism and suggestion as is Christ from Belial.
As to that revered gentlewoman, through whose spiritual vision the simple, healing truths of the Bible are today made available for those who sit in darkness, I may say only this: Her character needs no defense at human hands. By her fruits shall she be known. History is replete with annals wherein are recorded the unreasoning and unfounded misrepresentation which has inevitably pursued the apostle of a new idea. Even the immaculate Jesus did not escape. Think of it! Blind, perverted material sense said of him, "He is a winebibber, a glutton, a friend of publicans and sinners!" Mrs. Eddy writes in Science and Health (p. 28): "Remember, thou Christian martyr, it is enough if thou art found worthy to unloose the sandals of thy Master's feet! To suppose that persecution for righteousness' sake belongs to the past, and that Christianity to-day is at peace with the world because it is honored by sects and societies, is to mistake the very nature of religion. Error repeats itself. The trials encountered by prophet, disciple, and apostle, 'of whom the world was not worthy,' await, in some form, every pioneer of truth."
Christian Scientists know that Mrs. Eddy did not originate Christian Science; she dis-covered it, brought it to light. The balm of Gilead which she has revealed for the healing of the nations is not of her creating, nor is it a restatement of ancient or modern material philosophy. It is the simple, unadulterated spiritual teaching of Jesus and the prophets who preceded him. To this assertion some may say, "But I believe, and have been endeavoring to follow, the teachings of Jesus all my life." Yes, this is unfortunately the remarkable predicament of Christian peoples to-day; hundreds of different sects acknowledge Jesus as their guide and their king, and then proceed to place their human interpretation upon his words and works. This leads to endless diversity of opinion and the sad differences among Christians, causing one to say, "I believe this," another, "My belief is that." Yet the plain fact of the matter is this: It matters not what any man or set of men believes about Jesus' teaching. The all-important point is, What was Jesus' actual teaching? What did he believe and teach? Is there to be found in his word a practical present day salvation for you and me?
I once asked a woman seeking help in Christian Science if she understood the meaning of the word "salvation." "Indeed I do," was her response, "I was saved when I was eighteen." "From what were you saved?" I ventured to inquire. "Why, I was saved," she explained. "You know Jesus died to save me." "To save you from what?" I persisted. "Have you been saved from sin all these years?" "No," she admitted honestly, "I cannot say that I have." "Have you been saved from sickness?" "No," she replied sadly; "I have been a terrible sufferer for years." "Did your salvation include deliverance from heartache, from fear, from worry, from poverty?" "No," she said; "I suppose my salvation was reserved entirely for the future life."
It is not strange, this seemingly universal misunderstanding among professing Christians regarding the teachings of Jesus upon this vital point. Many Christian denominations unite in teaching the attainment of heaven and of spirituality through death, well as the possibility of an eternal punishment for those who have strayed. Now the fact of the matter is that such motions have absolutely no connection with Jesus' teachings. Before his coming the Jews believed that the faithful were gathered to Abraham's bosom. Jesus would have brought no new message had he taught the gaining of heaven through dying. The Chinese have always believed in an after life, and even the Indians have clung to a hope in a happy hunting ground. Let us examine the instructions given by Jesus to his students, as recorded in the tenth chapter of Matthew: "Go . . . to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And as ye go, preach, saying, The kingdom of heaven is at hand. Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils: freely ye have received, freely give. Provide neither gold, nor silver, nor brass in your purses, . . . for the workman is worthy of his meat."
"The kingdom of heaven is at hand"! In the Christian Science textbook we read that heaven is harmony. Therefore the message of the Savior, which indeed is good tidings of great joy to the bound and afflicted of earth, is that harmony, deliverance, salvation, are at hand, and are to be realized in the proportion that we lift our thought from the material and lay hold on the spiritual facts of being.
The notion of a place of eternal torment is absolutely foreign to the teachings of him whose keynote was Love divine. In the parable of the Prodigal son Christ Jesus shows that the suffering and punishment of the wayward boy were not inflicted by the father, but were the results of sin, and lasted only while the sin lasted.
You remember, do you not, that the young man goes into a far country and there wastes his substance "with riotous living." And we read that "when he had spent all, there arose a mighty famine in that land; and he begun to be in want. And he went and joined himself to a citizen of that country; and he sent him into his fields to feed swine. And he would fain have filled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat; and no man gave unto him."
It has been my privilege to address the prisoners in several penitentiaries this last year, and on each occasion I have read to the men this parable of the prodigal son. When I have come to the words just quoted, I have stopped, and said to the prisoners, "Men, where was that man?" On each occasion, absolutely unprompted, has come this one response, "In hell!" Yes, he was in hell. He was in the only hell there was and those poor prisoners knew all about it. They recognized it the moment they heard it. But, I said to them, here is a feature of Jesus' teachings which has apparently escaped many of us all these years: Here is a man who was able to get out of hell. We read that "when he came to himself" — in other words, when he had suffered enough to wake him up, when he had had torment enough to turn him from his sin with loathing, he said: "How many hired servants of my father's have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger! I will arise and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before thee, and am no more worthy to be called thy son; make me as one of thy hired servants. And he arose, and came to his father."
Now had Jesus meant to teach the idea of a place of everlasting punishment, of a torment or hell-fire from which there was no possible escape, here would have been his opportunity to have shown the father's gate closed to the erring child, and the father standing there saying, "No, son — no! It is too late, too late! The sin has been too grievous, the stain is too deep. Depart from me, depart from me!" And haven't we heard just that, just that, preached in the name of a compassionate Christianity. But what do we find in the Scriptures? "But when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him. And . . . the father said to his servants, Bring forth the best robe, and put it on him; and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet: . . . for this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found." This is the God of Christ Jesus, the God of infinite Love and compassion and justice, a God who is not the author of suffering or sickness or sin; and it is this God which Christian Science is revealing to the world after, lo, these many weary heartsick years!
Have you ever heard the story that is told of the man who was such a never failing optimist that he met every recital of calamity with the comforting words, "Well, well, it might have been worse"? This custom of his aroused the ire of one of his friends, an avowed pessimist, who resolved to put an end to it. Meeting him soon after, said the pessimist to his friend, "I dreamed about you last night — a most horrible dream — and when you have heard it, I know you cannot say that it might have been worse." And then he told of his supposed dream, graphically picturing his friend perishing in the torments of everlasting fire, and making the story as horrible as possible. When he finished, the other thought for a moment, and then said, "Well, that might have been worse." "How might it have been worse?" echoed his astonished friend. "It might have been true," said the other.
And so we think about the theory of everlasting punishment. How terrible, unthinkable, it would be if it were true. Christian Science, however, revealing an all-powerful creator who is ever-present Love, shows that such a concept is too bad to be true.
"So," says some one, "the Christian Scientists do not believe in hell?" Unfortunately most of them do, and they are trying hard to get out of it. Let us read the Christianly scientific definition of hell: "Mortal belief; error; lust. remorse; hatred; revenge; sin; sickness; death; suffering and self-destruction; self-imposed agony; effects of sin; that which 'worketh abomination or maketh a lie'" (Science and Health, p. 588). Now most of us find ourselves in one or more of the conditions of thought just described, and the insistent yearning of all mankind is for deliverance, for harmony, for heaven. How is this to be attained? By will power? By forcing ourselves to think thoughts of health, rather than thoughts of sickness? By no means. Would a teacher say to a class in school, "Children, clench your fists, close your teeth hard, use all the determination and will power at your command, and say, 'Five times five must equal twenty-five'"? Never. A teacher imparts to his class the truth about arithmetic, and that truth quietly enters the pupils' thought and gently displaces the ignorance which before held sway. Will power has absolutely nothing to do with it. Nor can will power or suggestion or any action of the carnal mind carry us from hell to heaven, from discord to harmony. The remedy lies in the simple rule left by the Master. "This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent." Salvation then is a matter of knowing the truth about God and the son of God, and as Jesus says in another place, when you know the truth, the truth shall make you free.
Let no one think, however, that the working out of one's salvation through knowing the truth is always along a path of flowers. Spiritual unfoldment, like a child's material education, involves wrestlings with self-will, battlings with discouragement, and even the encountering of temporary defeats until the human is brought into subjection to the divine. But in our spiritual education we have the comforting assurance that it is not human will but God that worketh in us both to will and to do of His good pleasure.
Let us now consider the basis of Christian Science; let us find the truth about God and man which it reveals — that truth which is destined to liberate the race. Science and Health in a few words sums up the remarkable discovery of the truth of being. We read: "The Christlike understanding of scientific being and divine healing includes a perfect Principle and idea, — perfect God and perfect man, — as the basis of thought and demonstration" (p. 259).
This teaching is founded squarely on the opening chapter of the Bible, the first chapter of Genesis. It will be remembered that this chapter contains a record of God's creation. This creation is depicted by successive steps of unfoldment, symbolized by the appearing of light, the heavens, the earth, the growing things upon the earth, the heavenly bodies, the fowl of the air, the fish of the sea, the creatures that move upon the earth, and lastly, God's noblest work, His highest creation, man. At the close of each step in the progression we read, "And God saw that it was good." Then to emphasize this momentous fact, the chapter closes with this statement: "And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. . . .Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them."
What a wonderful record is this first chapter of Genesis! How beautiful is God's creation, how thoroughly in keeping with a good and loving creator. No evil has been created, no sickness, sin, nor death. Do you realize, also, that the man of this first record of creation is not material, not made of dust? The record states that God made man in His image, after His likeness. In other words, man was created Godlike, and as God is Spirit, the man of His fashioning must have been like Spirit, or spiritual. This spiritual man is not cursed, but blessed. As the textbook says (Science and Health, p. 518), "His birthright is dominion, not subjection. He is lord of the belief in earth and heaven, — himself subordinate alone to his Maker."
Now, had I been asked before studying Christian Science as to what was the first mention of man in the Bible, I should promptly have referred the inquirer to Adam, in the garden of Eden. But Christian Science shows that the Adam, or material man of the second chapter of Genesis, does not appear until the first mention of discord, in the second chapter of Genesis. We have read that God's creation is good, is finished, divine law and perfection reign, and the Creator rests from His work. Then occurs this significant statement in the second chapter: "But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground." And then came a man made from dust, not in the likeness of Spirit, and apparently not given dominion over all the earth. In fact, the earth seems to have dominion over him, for he promptly yields to the enslavement of materiality, being loyally assisted by a woman fashioned from one of his ribs. Surely this man made from dust and this woman from a rib, depicting as they do the weakness, frailty, disobedience, and lawlessness of materiality, cannot present the deathless, perfect, spiritual handiwork of the Most High. Far indeed is material man from the image and likeness of the One "altogether lovely."
In fact, as indicated before, this material sense of man appeared only with the coming of a mist. What was this mist? In the textbook we read (Science and Health, p. 523): "The creations of matter arise from a mist or false claim, or from mystification, and not from the firmament, or understanding, which God erects between the true and false." Mystification, then, may be said to be the opposite of understanding, and the opposite of understanding can mean only this — ignorance. Ignorance of God, Spirit; ignorance of the spiritual facts of being; ignorance of spiritual sense which results in a material view of creation — this, then, is the mist which seems to go up from the earth. And from this ignorance, this false sense or material view, — and never from Him who is infinite Love, — comes discordant materiality with its Adams and Eves, its wars and woes and germs, its sick nations, sick men and sick businesses. Thus a just and good God cannot be charged with the creation of discordant materiality, sickness, sin and death.
As mistakes in a mathematical problem cannot be laid at the door of the perfect principle of arithmetic, so the errors in problems of being cannot be charged to the infinitely perfect Mind, with whom is no variableness nor shadow of turning. Ignorance of God, a mistaken sense of things, a material view, this is all there is to evil; this is the only devil there is. And the Bible says that the mission of Christ is to destroy the works of the devil.
So Jesus came to destroy ignorance of God, to roll back the mists of error and to reveal the truth about God, man, and the universe — that great truth of spiritual being which he declared would make man free.
But, says some one, if you say that the man of God's creating is spiritual, where did this material sense of things come from? Why is it not correct to say that man is both spiritual and material? Christian Science rests absolutely on the great fact that there is one creator and one creation, one God and one man, and that man spiritual, upright and perfect. Let us here consider a simple illustration (although all material comparisons are necessarily inadequate) in the effort better to understand the great truth that there cannot be two men, one spiritual and the other material.
Let us suppose that a child born in the United States, whose parents are American citizens, is taken to China at an early age, and left there. Living for years under the hot sun in the rice fields, the little fellow becomes as tanned as a native. He speaks the Chinese language, adopts the Chinese mode of dress. He forgets his American antecedents, because kept in ignorance as to his parentage. And, for all intents and purposes, there you have a Chinaman. He looks like one, and believes himself to be one.
Some years later a friend institutes a search for him, and finds him. "Do you know the truth about yourself? Do you know who you are?" he asks him, through an interpreter. The young man gives a Chinese name. To his great astonishment the friend replies, "But that is not your real name. You have an English name, for you are, in truth, a native-born citizen of the United States, and because of this fact, you should not be under the laws of China." "Now let me understand this," says the young man. "You mean that while I am a Chinaman now, I can become after awhile an American citizen?" "No," says the friend, "now you are an American citizen." "But," suppose the young man says, "if what you say is true, there must be two of me — a Chinaman here and an American somewhere else." "No," still insists the friend, "there is only one of you, and that one was born in America." "Well," rejoins the other, and he thinks this question will settle it, "if I am an American, where did this Chinaman come from?" What will the friend say? "My dear young man, I refuse to discuss this Chinaman with you. Haven't I just assured you that you are not a Chinaman and have never been a Chinaman? The only place a Chinaman seems to exist, in your case, is in your ignorance, your misconception of your origin. For the only you there is, or ever has been, is a native-born citizen of the United States."
But what is liable to happen? That young man will probably keep looking at his material Chinese appearance, keep accepting as truth that which has been erroneously taught, and will say, "Well, it doesn't sound like common sense to me! Anyone can see that I'm a Chinaman, and, what is more, I know I am one!" Ah, but does he actually know this? Can a man know a mistake? No, he can only believe a mistake.
And so it is with us. Victimized by ignorance of the true God and true man, the true Father and the true son, mortals have accepted this material, Adam-view of creation. They speak the language of materiality. They adopt the customs of the race of Adam in expecting and experiencing sin, sickness, trouble, imperfection, old age, and death. And when Christian Science, the best friend mortal man ever had, finds him and says with infinite compassion: "Let me tell you the truth about yourself — the truth about your real selfhood. You are a citizen of the kingdom of Mind. You are in truth God's spiritual creation, whose office is to express harmony, perfect action, and unchanging law. You are in fact not that which you seem to be, but the deathless, perfect image of your Maker," — when this awakening message is given, the mortal generally looks at his mortality, accepts as real and true that which he sees with his eyes, and hears with his ears, and says with conviction: "No, you are mistaken. The truth about man is that he is material, sick, poverty-stricken, unhappy, and what is more, he knows it."
Now it is quite evident in both the case of the American boy in China and the mortal, that in order to ascertain the truth of things, he must look away from the physical appearance, and discern the fact, rather than the seeming. And because he showed how this could be done, Jesus became the practical Savior and Way-shower of humanity. Foretelling the coming of the saving Christ, Isiah wrote, "He shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of his ears: but with righteousness shall he judge . . ." Then Jesus, epitomizing his mighty message in unmistakable language said, "Judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment," and Christian Science is to-day making available this vital but long overlooked Christian teaching.
Let me read from the textbook a few of the instructions there given as to the treatment of disease, which instructions are in strict accord with the statement of Jesus just read: —
"When the first symptoms of disease appear, dispute the testimony of material senses with divine Science. Let your higher sense of justice destroy the false 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 farthing, the last penalty demanded by error. . . . Suffer no claim of sin or sickness to grow upon 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." (Science and Health, p. 390).
"Keep in mind the verity of being, — that man is the image and likeness of God, in whom all being is painless and permanent. Remember that man's perfection is real and unimpeachable, whereas imperfection is blameworthy, unreal, and is not brought about by divine Love" (Science and Health, p. 414).
"Rise in the conscious strength of the spirit of Truth to overthrow the plea of mortal mind, alias matter, arrayed against the supremacy of Spirit. . . . Then, when thou art delivered to the judgment of Truth, Christ, the judge will say, 'Thou art whole!'" (Science and Health, pp. 390, 391.)
It should be plainly discerned at this point that there is a great difference between this system of spiritual healing and methods of suggestion, hypnotism, the so-called Immanuel movement and others. In the simile of the American boy in China, it can be seen that he did not need to will himself to be an American, did not need to suggest that he was an American; he merely had to look away from the material evidence, and realize and know that in truth he was an American. And so through Christian knowing, not carnal-minded suggestion, the sick and weary ones of earth are learning to lift their eyes from the Adamist, from the material view of creation, to the harmonious facts of being, that creation which a loving Father has pronounced "very good."
Let us now consider a Christian Scientist's treatment of sin. Suppose a man victimized by drink, or by the tobacco habit, seeks healing in Christian Science. He is not condemned by his practitioner, nor told how wicked he is, nor is he urged to fight evil with his human will. If a child tells you that Canada is situated south of the Hawaiian Islands, does he need punishment, a scolding, or does he need education? Just so it is with the man who has made a mistake in his problem of being. He needs enlightenment, not censure, and spiritual awakening, not material condemnation.
A man sadly victimized by the drug and liquor habit once sought out a Christian Science practitioner. He told the Scientist of his unhappy plight, of his degradation, and the loss of money, friends, and self-respect, and then said: "In fact, there is only one person in all the world who thinks that there is any good in me, and that is my little two-year-old child, and she doesn't know any better." Then said the practitioner, "If that is the case, your little girl is the only one who has caught a glimpse of the real you; for in God's sight, the man of His creating, your real spiritual selfhood, is just as good, just as beautiful, just as undefiled us that child says he is." And I want to report that this revolutionary message so startled the material dreamer, and so clearly revealed has real spiritual manhood, that from that very day he found his tormenting desire gone, never to return; and he realized with joy that his little girl was not deceived after all, and that in truth God's man is pure and free.
Let no one be discouraged, however, if he does not seem able instantly to shake off the fetters of false appetite, as did this man. Many times this process seems slow, just as some children are slower than others in mastering arithmetic. But the results are certain if the student perseveres. The constant effort to look beyond the mist of mortal misconceptions, to separate evil, weakness, and false desire from man, and to see and claim man's spotless, sinless individuality as the image of God, is to make victory an absolute certainty.
Now let us take the case of a man "financially sick," or who may be said to have a "sick" business. Can it be, you ask, that his tribulations are caused by a material view of God, man, and the universe? Even so. For if he would see and understand God's creation, he would learn that God never ordained lack, limitation, business failure, "bad luck," or hard times. If he is encountering these errors in his daily walk and conversation, it is because he is wearing the distorting glasses of material sense, and is not comprehending being as it is in God's sight.
Have you ever read in the Bible the story of Hagar, Sarah's bondmaid, whom Abraham cast out? The unhappy woman took her little child and wandered out into the wilderness, where it seemed that starvation would surely overtake her. Soon, the record states, the water was spent in her bottle, and she cast the child under some shrubs where she could not see it die, and hopelessly resigned herself to her hopeless fate. There seemed no way out. Ah, but there was a way, and such a simple way. For we read that an angel, which Science and Health describes as a "spiritual intuition (s)" (p. 581), said to her, "Fear not," and then it is recorded that God opened her eyes and she saw a well of water. The well had apparently been there all the time, but she, like so many of earth's blinded ones, had closed her thought and her heart to the angel messages which ever point outward and upward, and which ever find a way.
Is it not true that a man blinded by self-pity, immersed in the argument of lack, and mesmerized by fear and the limitations of sense testimony, can look straight at an avenue of escape and not see it? Is not the need of the business Hagars of to-day a more spiritual view, a higher sense of things, which will banish fear and limitation and open the doors of thought for the reception of right, saving ideas? Do you not know men and women who spend valuable moments bewailing the fact, Hagar-like, that there is nothing but ruin ahead, and that there is no possible way out? To one looking through Hagar's spectacles, a splendid business opportunity, or other solution of the problem, might come right up to him and yet be unseen.
The fearsome task of sustaining being does not rest upon man. No ray of light proceeding from the sun can be said to sustain itself. The sun supplies all the heat, light and power of each ray. Just so it is with our Maker. Do we really believe this? Are we acting as though we believed it? Do we realize that truth is dropping manna from the sky, bringing water from the rock, breaking the limitation of sense testimony in causing a pittance to reach even to four thousand needs, and revealing tribute in fishes' mouths — do we realize that Truth is operating thus today as surely as it did on the Judean slopes centuries ago? And do we see that our only need is Hagar's need, and pray "the prayer of fervent desire for growth in grace, expressed in patience, meekness, love, and good deeds" (Science and Health, p. 4), knowing that when our eyes are thus opened to spiritual sense all that we humanly need will be found at hand?
Some may say, "But I have been striving so long, and yet do not seem able to gain this spiritual view." Yes, some persons seem to be heavier sleepers than others, and so require more time to be awakened. But this furnishes no excuse for self-condemnation or discouragement. As a child, whenever I was ill and had a fever, even though such experiences were years apart, I would have this nightmare: I seemed to be picked up by a mighty hand and carried out over the sea, farther and farther from the shore, never knowing at what moment I would be dropped into the depths. The picture was so terrifying that invariably I would cry aloud in my sleep. This would bring my mother speedily to my side. And than, right through the awful dream pictures, long before they faded from thought, I would hear my mother's voice saying, "Why, my little child, I am here. Everything is all right — see, it was only a dream!" and O, such a wave of gratitude would sweep over me. And while the waking was not always speedily accomplished, there was nevertheless the blessed dawning sense that the unhappy vision was not true. And right now, to you and to me, in the midst of our Adam-dream of sickness, of heartache, of fear, of limitation, and of ignorance, sounds the voice of the Father-Mother God gently saying: "Fear thou not; for I am with thee. Thou art my beloved child in whom I am well pleased. All is good! Awake thou that sleepest!"
What if the awakening does seem slow? Thank God we have heard that materiality with its ills and woes does not constitute the truth of being, and are we being truly grateful for that? It is well to realize that gratitude is the sure symptom of an awakening; but ingratitude, impatience, and discouragement can mean only a prolonged slumber.
To earth's material dreamers, to the dream-troubled nations, Christian Science, the liberator of mankind, echoes the great call of Scripture: "Awake, awake; put on thy strength, O Zion; put on thy beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city: . . . Shake thyself from the dust; . . . loose thyself from the bands of thy neck, O captive daughter of Zion. . . . Break forth into joy, sing together, ye waste places of Jerusalem." "For the Lord God omnipotent reigneth."
[1918. The story of "practically every student of Christian Science . . . loyally doing his duty as a good citizen either on the battle front or at home, supporting the Government loans, contributing to war relief and camp welfare activities — in short, striving to be in every sense of the word a humanitarian," as mentioned at the beginning of this lecture, is told in part in the book Christian Science War Time Activities, The Christian Science Publishing Society, 1922.]