Peter V. Ross, C.S.B., of San Francisco, California
Member of the Board of Lectureship of The
Mother Church,
The First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston, Massachusetts
The following lecture, entitled, "Christian Science: The Divine Immanence," was given under the auspices of Tenth Church of Christ, Scientist, of Chicago, in the church edifice, 5640 Blackstone Avenue, Tuesday evening, February 11, 1936, by Peter V. Ross, C.S.B., of San Francisco, California, member of the Board of Lectureship of The Mother Church, The First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston, Massachusetts. The lecture is reprinted from a previous issue of the Leader.
If you and I were to glance out over the vast arena in which is taking place the struggle of mortals to reach the light of understanding, we might well wonder whether, among the innumerable problems confronting different individuals, there could be found one single problem common to all mankind and engaging the attention of every individual. But if we were to take more than a casual survey of the situation, and enter, if such were permitted, the inner consciousness of men, we should no longer wonder or speculate, we should see and know that bearing in upon the mind of every human being, at some time or another and with greater or less insistence, comes the question, What is the true nature of Deity? Who or what is God?
The man absorbed with the cares of this world may give little heed to this inquiry; the man at ease or in pleasure to whom the evil days have not yet come, may ignore it entirely; the man in the pride of intellect or in the exultation of worldly success may even affect to despise it; but come the question will, and every individual in his better moments, will seriously meditate upon it, and some time sooner or later, bitter experience will wring from him Job's pathetic cry, "Oh that I knew where I might find him!"
It may be said, perhaps, that this question does not occupy the thought of the infidel or the atheist, since he rejects altogether the idea of a Supreme Being. It will be found, however, that the man who proclaims that he does not believe in God means nothing more than that he does not believe in the kind of a God that has commonly been taught or portrayed. It is hardly conceivable that any thinking person would contend that the earth and the fullness thereof is an act of chance or accident, and that there is no law or intelligence back of and directing the universe. It can safely be affirmed that whatever difficulties may beset the search for a Supreme Being, the belief that He exists and the desire to know Him are universal among mankind; and this confidence in the existence of God and this longing to understand Him indicate the transcendent importance to man of a correct concept of Deity, and remind us of Jesus' statement, "This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God."
All down the centuries the Bible has taught and men have supposed they have believed in a Deity who is not only all-powerful, all-knowing, and everywhere present, but who is benign and good, who, as St. John has said, is Love, and who, moreover, is available in time of trouble; and yet, in spite of this, disease and all the hosts of evil have seemed to hold almost undisputed sway. Evidently there must, after all, be a lack of appreciation of the true nature of God and of our relation to Him, otherwise the complete supremacy of good would be apparent, and evil would not seem to occupy the commanding place which it boasts in human affairs.
The trouble has been that, notwithstanding our professions and beliefs, we have regarded God as a sort of abstraction, far removed from our actual life and unavailable in times of distress. We have not fully accepted the assurance that His "hand is not shortened, that it cannot save." Whatever we may have said as to the nearness and goodness and availability of God, we have actually considered Him as separated from us and reluctant to supply our needs. We have pleaded with Him to come, instead of seeing that He is always with us: we have entreated Him to give, instead of knowing that already He has bestowed everything good and needful; we have besought Him to heal us and save our lives from destruction, when we should have realized that, as Paul says, He "giveth to all life, and breath, and all things."
What is needed, if men are to escape from the thralldom of evil and attain that fullness of liberty to which they are entitled, is a clearer discernment of the omnipresence, omnipotence and omniscience of God — a fuller sense of the divine immanence. On a subject of such supreme importance, holding as it does the issues of life itself, inquiry should not and cannot rest short of exact knowledge. Blind faith or vacillating belief is entirely inadequate. "Ye shall know the truth," said Christ Jesus, "and the truth shall make you free."
This was the conviction which came to Mary Baker Eddy, when, something like half a century ago, the truth of being burst upon her thought at a time when a supposedly incurable malady was fast bearing her life away, and suddenly, while reading her Bible, she found herself restored to health and strength. Speaking of her experience on that occasion and of the cures effected in the early Christian era, she says on pages 109 and 110 of Science and Health: "I must know the Science of this healing, and I won my way to absolute conclusions through divine revelation, reason, and demonstration." "In following these leadings of scientific revelation, the Bible was my only textbook."
Having discovered the Science of spiritual healing through her search of the Scriptures and her consecration to the teachings of Christ Jesus, Mrs. Eddy was most naturally led to name her discovery "Christian Science." And since the time she discovered this Science, demonstrated it, and gave it to the world, men have had access to that exact and practical knowledge of the nature of Deity which enables them to appropriate the perfect gifts of health and happiness to which all people instinctively feel that they have a right as the sons and daughters of a God who is good.
Being founded upon the Bible, Christian Science necessarily accepts the Bible definition of God as omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniscient; that is, having all power, all presence, all knowledge. But Science does more than merely recognize the accuracy of this idea of Deity, it awakens us to the practical import and significance of that idea, and teaches us how to make it operative in human affairs and in our tribulations. As showing this, let us take, to begin with, the concept of God as omniscient, and see to what conclusions, in the light of Christian Science, we are led.
For Deity to be omniscient is for Deity to have all wisdom, all knowledge, all intelligence. Now what is the one short, everyday word which expresses all these? You at once answer, "Mind"; and Mind is one of the names which Christian Science gives to God. It is one of the names by which Christian Scientists frequently address Him. In short, Mind is God. Since Mind is God, or God is Mind, and there is only one God, it follows that there really is only one Mind, one consciousness; and God, being good and infinite, that Mind and that consciousness must be good and infinite. Manifestly, then, this Mind cannot know or experience disease or any other of the many supposed forms of evil. Therefore they are not in fact known or experienced since there is no other mind and no other consciousness to entertain their false pretensions.
Here is where Christian Science takes its high and at the same time practical position, and affirms that the ills of the flesh, and all else that makes for human limitation and suffering, have no actual existence. True, they may appear real to human sense, which sees through a glass darkly, but for the time being let us cling fast, if we may, to the absolute truth and "judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment." So judging, we are irresistibly driven to the conclusion that divine Mind takes cognizance only of the good, the harmonious, the perfect, and does not cognize the imperfect, the discordant, the distressful. Hence you and I, the real you and I, do not cognize or experience them, because we cannot know anything unknown to infinite Mind.
What, then, do we know and of what are we conscious? Man exists as a state of consciousness, and as there is but one Mind, one consciousness, man radiates or reflects that Mind or consciousness. Herein is the secret of man's dominion. Infinite intelligence is at hand, and not only is it available to man, but it is actually expressed by him. The mental forces and faculties of divine Mind are operative through the real man. Hence he is conscious of good, of health, of harmony, of peace, of power, of liberty; and the presence of these thoughts in consciousness necessarily excludes their opposites, namely, suffering, sorrow, sensuality, strife, and such like. The real man thinks what God thinks, knows what God knows, experiences what God experiences; and he thinks, knows, and experiences nothing else.
Now we begin to discern the
unlimited range of the real man's mentality, for he is endowed with nothing
less than divine intelligence. Therefore he is not lacking in the mental
capacity necessary to perform any task that may be allotted him; he is not
wanting in ability to see that human ills have no real hold upon him; he is
able to realize that there is no actual affinity between himself and sinful
desires and propensities; he rises to a sense of his true selfhood as an idea in
divine Mind, embodying the qualities of that Mind, among which are health,
harmony, and holiness.
In speaking of the divine Mind, Paul refers to it as that Mind "which was also in Christ Jesus," and he counsels us to have that Mind, to the end that we may enjoy the perfection, liberty, and supremacy over the powers of darkness which Jesus enjoyed. But Paul also speaks of another mentality, which he styles the "carnal mind" and which he declares "is enmity against God." Mrs. Eddy refers to that mentality as "mortal mind."
The phrases "carnal mind" and "mortal mind" have not been coined to designate a real mentality, but rather to designate a false or supposititious mind; for in our present imperfect sense of things it is sometimes convenient to give names to the illusory and counterfeit in order that we may more certainly detect their invalidity and guard against deception.
This false mind, this mortal or carnal mentality, sends forth the appetites of the flesh, and with them disease and death. Its suggestions and insinuations are constantly clamoring for admission into consciousness. As a result we are continually experiencing the temptation to do wrong, to feel the pains of human ills, and to suffer the thousand and one forms of restriction and discomfort common to humanity. This silent, persistent influence is personified in the Bible as the devil, and James admonishes us to "resist the devil, and he will flee." But our resistance has seldom been more than partially successful, with the result that sin and suffering have too often apparently gained the ascendancy.
Our failure to make a good defense has been due to our inability to resist intelligently. We have supposed that sorrow and suffering are the common lot and destiny of man; we have believed that disease and evil are inevitable and invincible, and we have feared them. In this mental condition we have been doomed to defeat from the outset. Here it is that Mrs. Eddy has rendered an inestimable service to humanity by differentiating between the divine Mind and mortal mind, making it plain that healthful and wholesome thoughts come from the divine Mind and have the quality of reality and permanence, while sick and unwholesome thoughts come from mortal mind and have only such seeming power or influence as we are misled into conceding.
Evil approaches us and asks to be admitted into our thoughts and lives, but it cannot enter unless we consent. It is in itself inert, non-intelligent. When we close the door of thought against it, as we have the ability to do, evil vanishes and ceases to be. It is only by opening the door and inviting evil to come in that we are brought under its sway. By our own act of acceptance or rejection we elevate evil to temporary power or return it to the realm of nothingness from whence it came.
A well-known writer, describing his visit to an institution for the care of people of deranged minds, says that he found there one man, a guard, in charge of 70 to 80 inmates. Addressing himself to the guard, the visitor inquired, "Are you not afraid to be alone with all those people?" "Afraid? No, I'm not afraid," was the reply. "But don't you know," continued the visitor, "they might get together and make way with you?" "Get together!" said the guard, "They can't get together. That's why they're here."
The forces of evil cannot get together to accomplish any wrongful or vicious purpose. They lack the intelligence, the energy, the ability to initiate or organize any effort or movement. They cannot, in the presence of an understanding of Christian Science, be effectively assembled or set in motion. By bearing this truth in mind, we can disarm and nullify sinister or wicked schemes and organizations. All the supposed activities and possibilities of evil depend upon our fear of or belief in evil. When we boldly, intelligently, and persistently challenge it with the assertion and realization that good is the only power and presence, evil commences to shrink into nothingness.
And what has been said of the supposed forces of evil is equally true of the supposed forces of disease. They have not the intelligence whereby to attack successfully mankind. In Christian Science they are scattered and annihilated by the calm realization that health is the actual, the all-pervading, the all-embracing.
Taking this vantage ground which Christian Science has won for us, we begin to see that mortal mind, with its embodiment of evil, is entirely foreign to true mentality and real selfhood, and is therefore without actual existence, because divine Mind is ever active and everywhere present. With vision thus clarified we can cope with human ills and infirmities successfully, expelling from consciousness the thoughts which produce or believe sickness, or, better still, closing the avenues to consciousness against the entrance of sick thoughts in the first instance.
Thus are we brought to realize that the omniscience of God means that a right state of mind — a consciousness of health, of harmony, of happiness — is now and everywhere present, even where sick or sinful thoughts may claim to be. This perfect state of mind, which is for every one to acquire, is heaven. Its enjoyment need not be postponed to a future world, but is attainable here and now by the mental or spiritual process which rejects the false and embraces the good and the true. Thereby may we all be "delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God."
Christian Science constantly reminds us of the importance of shutting out of our mental home wrong thoughts of every description, and of welcoming good thoughts only, for everything has its inception in thought. The harsh word would not have been spoken if the hateful thought had not been harbored; the evil deed would not have been committed if it had not first been thought or planned; disease had never made its appearance if mortal mind had not first conceived and pictured it.
But someone may ask, "How can this be true in my case, for I never thought of this ailment of mine until it came upon me?" In reply to this question it may be said that we know very little of what the human or mortal mind is thinking, for the things and the happenings which we see about us are expressions not only of the conscious but of the unconscious thoughts of humanity. When we desire to move the hand, we consciously give the mental order and the resulting movement is visible. We have no difficulty in observing the mental cause and effect. But that same mentality which directs and compels the hand to move also directs and compels the heart to beat, yet we are not conscious of the fact. Illustrations of this kind can be multiplied in connection with other organs and functions of the body, and as they are, it becomes apparent that we recognize only a small portion of what is actually going on in the human mind, for there is unconscious as well as conscious mental action.
It is not necessary for a man to think specifically of rheumatism, for example, in order to have that ailment. All he need to do is to hate his neighbor, and rheumatism or some other painful disorder will eventually fasten its hold upon him. It is not necessary that he should hate anybody or anything. Let him give way to fear or worry, and the human mind, thus distracted, will in time derange the functions of the body which it is directing. He need not even be fearful or worried. All that is required is for him to depart from the truth that he lives in divine Mind and accept the mistaken notion that he lives in a material body. Then, at some time or another, the images of disease inhabiting mortal mind are liable to take up their abode with him.
Whereas holding thought in line with the great truth that man is spiritual and perfect, because he is an expression of God, lifts consciousness out of the mortal channel of disease into the realm of health, safety, and harmonious being.
Another may ask, "How is it, if mortal mind with its content of evil is mythical and unreal, that it seems to exert such an influence and to so disturb the equilibrium of things?" This is the old question of the origin of evil, which no one has so satisfactorily answered as did Jesus when, personifying evil as the devil, after the fashion of the Orient, the Master declared, "He is a liar, and the father of it." It is hardly worth while to search for the origin of a lie or to seek an explanation of it. Any such attempt is likely to result in imparting to the lie some semblance of truth or reality — the very condition which must be overcome if the pretended reign of evil is to be brought to a close.
The wise thing to do, now that the evils of mortal mind have been found to be false and really nonexistent, is to repudiate them and allow the truths and harmonies of divine Mind to flow in and replace them. As this mental transformation goes on we find that wrong thoughts become less and less frequent and insistent, and we have confidence that as progress is made in the understanding of Christian Science, wrong thoughts will cease entirely to arrest our attention or influence the course of our lives. Realizing then that mortal mind with its train of evils is passing out of experience, giving place to divine Mind with its expression of good, we can well afford to restrain our desire for an explanation of the source or mysteries of evil.
Searching for the origin of evil is, to adopt a happy comparison from a popular author, "like hunting in a dark cellar at midnight for a black cat that isn't there."
From the consideration of Deity as Mind it is only a step, and a very short one, to the consideration of Deity as Life. The Bible plainly implies, if it does not expressly declare, that God is Life. Moses, in exhorting the Israelites to obedience to God, said to them, "He is thy life, and the length of thy days." John said, speaking of God in relation to creation and the beginning, "In him was life; and the life was the light of men." Paul, standing on Mars' hill and noting the Athenians' ignorance of God, proclaimed, He is "not far from every one of us: for in him we live, and move, and have our being." And again, in his letter to the Ephesians, the renowned apostle writes of "one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all."
Abiding thus in God and He in us, our life cannot be less than full, free, joyous, immune from disease, out of danger, and safe from destruction. In the past we have been too much inclined to conceive of God as absent from His creatures, and His creation. We have declared, "Thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory," while we have all but overlooked His very presence and His intimate relation to ourselves. Now through the teachings of Christian Science is our vision opening to His nearness, His immanence, His oneness with man; and we are no longer content to view Him simply as the Supreme Being, but rather as Being itself; not alone as the source of life, but as Life itself, the only Life of man and the universe.
It were almost sacrilegious to speak of disease in this connection. Yet humanity seems so borne down with suffering and misery that disease cannot be ignored. Indeed, Christian Scientists are not ignoring it, but are coping with and overcoming it to an extent which compels the attention of all thinking people. They are accomplishing this by discerning that with God as Life, and consequently that Life perfect and everywhere expressed, there is no place or possibility for disease. Their method of healing is prayer, by which "more things are wrought," as Tennyson says, "than this world dreams of."
But prayer, as understood in Christian Science, is much more than merely asking God to give us the good things we seem to lack, whether of health or happiness or what not. It consists, rather, in silently realizing that already we possess all needed good and that the seeming presence of sickness or distress or want is not a fact but a false appearance. This mental attitude whereby we reject thoughts of fear and hate and disease, and entertain thoughts of health and love and confidence that "underneath are the everlasting arms," draws us nigh to God. Indeed it brings us into that oneness with Him where all that the Father has is seen to be ours.
Right thoughts are invested with power and energy, for they come from the divine Mind. By clinging to them we ally ourselves with omnipotent good. They are the word of God, quick and powerful to heal and to save. And every man, woman, and child can, in large measure, think rightly, that is, insist that good and health are the actual and true, while disease and evil, whatever form they may try to assume, are illusions and falsities. In the presence of such thinking, sickness and suffering lose their place in human consciousness and pass out of experience. They can be no part of true existence, and multitudes of people are today proving this through scientific, intelligent prayer, that is, through right thinking and doing, which lifts them into that consciousness of Life harmonious which is God.
Throughout her writings Mrs. Eddy uses the word "Life" as synonymous with God, and she maintains, in unmistakable language and with flawless logic, that God is man's life. But in so doing she makes it clear that she is referring to spiritual man, not to the material concept. She affirms that life is not in matter and does not reside in the material body. In fact, she finally disposes of matter in that wonderful statement, familiar to all Christian Scientists and found on page 468 of Science and Health: "There is no life, truth, intelligence, nor substance in matter. All is infinite Mind and its infinite manifestation, for God is All-in-all."
It is admitted that matter seems intensely real to the human senses, and that the material universe appears substantial beyond peradventure. But even physicists now explain matter by explaining it away. Some of them define it as particles of electricity, negative at that, while others define it as bubbles or holes in the ether, which might be more satisfying if they did not follow up their definition with the statement that there is no ether, thus leaving nothing but holes in nothing.
When physics treats matter in this disrespectful way, Christian metaphysics may be pardoned for insisting that matter is simply a mistaken concept of that which is spiritual and real. The human mind does not see things as they are. It takes a distorted or perverted view of everything, and this perversion or distortion constitutes what is called material existence.
The mistaken supposition that matter is real and that man has a material body is the source of mortal man's difficulties. With that false notion begin his limitations, his sinfulness, his suffering. Believing himself incased in a body of matter, mortal man is confined to the limited area occupied by that body, instead of enjoying the boundless freedom which belongs to the real self as a spiritual idea or child of God, Spirit. Because of the belief that he inhabits a body of flesh and bones, he is in constant jeopardy, the sport of accident and the lodging place of disease, instead of realizing that man actually is an idea in infinite Mind, as exempt from disease and as assured from injury as God Himself.
There need be no apprehension that through the renunciation of material belief the foundation of things will slip away or that man will lose his identity. Christian Science teaches that man's individual entity persists throughout eternity, never to be absorbed in Deity nor yet to be disintegrated and lost among the shifting sands of time. And experience in the practice of Christian Science proves that the more one dwells in the spiritual sense of existence, the more do beauty and perfection and permanence become apparent, for the false concept of things, which has obscured the real, passes away. The world of nature begins to appear "appareled in celestial light," the world of humanity commences to lose its blemishes of mind and body, and the individual finds himself growing "unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ."
Closely related to the idea of Deity as Life is the concept of Deity as Love. Christianity has always associated love with the Supreme Being, though perhaps more as a characteristic or attribute than as a synonym. But Christian Science recognizes that while in one sense love is an attribute of God, yet in a fuller sense Love is God, or as St. John puts it, "God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him."
The deductions to be drawn from the conception of Deity as Love are most inspiring and liberating to suffering humanity. Take all the sickness, sorrow, and misery that appear to run riot in the world about us. Could they be imposed upon mankind by a Supreme Being who is Love? "Unthinkable and impossible," you reply. Could such things be made or countenanced by a creator who is Love? The response is an emphatic "No." Whence then are they and by whom created? Christian Science replies that they have not in fact been created and that they have no actual foundation or existence, because the one and only creator, power, and presence is Love. The same is true of all the hate, malice, and strife that seem to infest society. They are the very antitheses of Love and hence can have no actual place or power when Love is universal and omnipotent.
Anyone who chooses can begin at once to prove this momentous truth; and having demonstrated, though perhaps only in minor details, that discord, whether in the form of bodily ailments or of mental disturbances, can be put out of experience, he will be able to see that the sum total of human wretchedness can be disposed of on the basis of its unreality and nonexistence. This can be done by intelligently and industriously giving place in thought to the good, the righteous, the things of Love, and in rejecting from thought the evil, the sensual, the things of the devil. Every one has it within his power to demonstrate that as he permits Love to fill his consciousness and expel Love's opposites, he loses his sense of evil and his suffering from its plagues.
It has always been understood that the harboring of malicious and malevolent thoughts is destructive of character and peace of mind. It is now being realized that this same unhappy and abnormal state of thought is disastrous to health, resulting in bodily and mental derangements of the most serious nature. The world is largely indebted to Christian Science for this enlightenment, and is fast learning that righteous thinking and righteous living are essential not only to good character, but to good health as well.
The man who knowingly continues in wrong-doing cannot reasonably expect good health to remain with him indefinitely. On the other hand, the man who seems to be in ill health, notwithstanding his efforts to lead a life of righteousness, may be assured that in due season he will be delivered from his suffering if he presses on in the study and application of divine law as taught in Christian Science.
Mind, Life, and Love are not the only synonyms or appellations for Deity recognized by Christian Science. Spirit, Soul, Truth, and Principle are also synonymous or identical with God. The use of the word "Principle" in this holy office may, at first impression, be questioned, but as its meaning is more fully comprehended, it will be seen to be no less apposite than the terms already considered. In fact its immutable and enduring quality runs through them all. Everything good, true, or permanent is founded upon Principle. All right action, energy, intelligence, or life has its vitality and operation by virtue of indwelling Principle. Mind, Life, and Love could not be such, if Principle were not their basis, substance, and animating impulse.
The boundless universe which we look out upon moves in perfect accord with what is called the law of gravitation. No place or point of which we can conceive, however distant or remote, is outside the operation of that law. Not a particle of dust so mean, not a heavenly body so splendid, but yields glad obedience to that unseen, unerring, irresistible influence.
This reign of law in the so-called material universe is typical of the invisible action of Principle in the real universe — the universe of Mind, Life, and Love in which we have our actual being. The human senses would have us believe that confusion and turmoil abound on all sides, but reason protests against such apparent absence of law and order, while spiritual sense discerns that since omnipotent Principle is everywhere operative, discord is an illusion and harmony is all-in-all.
Once it is realized that the divine Principle, Love, is everywhere in operation and effect, the tyranny of hate and strife is broken, and "on earth peace, good will toward men" is seen to be a present reality. Fear, superstition, and ignorance lose their fancied power of deception, when it is discovered that the divine Principle, Mind, "lighteth every man that cometh into the world" and guides and governs all things from the least unto the greatest. Disease, which is ordinarily either too much or too little action in some part of the human system, either an undue acceleration or obstruction of the bodily functions, is healed when it is recognized that God's law of Life is never obstructed nor accelerated, but is everywhere in constant, normal, unlabored, uninterrupted operation.
Jesus referred to Principle as the Father, when, having in mind his healing of the sick and his resuscitation of the dead, he said, "The Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works." And Jesus made clear the availability of Principle to every man when he further declared, "He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also." Today it is being demonstrated in Christian Science that anyone who will try to understand the Master's teachings and live up to them, can, at least in some degree, feel the presence, the contact, the power of Principle, which heals the sick and reforms the sinner as certainly now and here as when Jesus walked the streets of Jerusalem or taught on the hillsides of Galilee.
Thus in our own generation has come the day, prophesied by the poet, "When God is seen with men to dwell." It has come through the discovery of Christian Science by Mary Baker Eddy. She has brought God down from His throne beyond the clouds and made His presence a conscious reality in the minds and lives of men. Here and there throughout the ages individuals in moments of inspiration have discerned the nearness of God, indeed have felt their oneness with the divine nature, but however distinct may have been the vision to them, they could not clearly define or impart it to others. It remained for Mrs. Eddy not only to glimpse the divine immanence, but to retain what she saw and to portray it in such unmistakable terms that henceforth humanity should have no excuse for not apprehending the truth of being. She has established by actual proof that the same power which Jesus employed to relieve human distress centuries ago has never departed from the earth, but is an ever-present law to be invoked by any one who will make the effort to understand Christian Science.
If there has been any event of modern history more remarkable than the discovery of Christian Science, that event has been the successful establishment of Christian Science on an enduring foundation. To discover this Science required rare spiritual insight; to so establish it that the vital truths of Christianity should not again be lost to sight, required unsurpassed sagacity, resolution, courage, and devotion. These qualities were possessed in a superlative degree by Mary Baker Eddy, which answers the oft-repeated question, Why did Christian Science come through a woman?
To a world sick with its belief in materialism, intellectualism, and skepticism, as well as sick with sin and disease, Mrs. Eddy has brought a workable means of regeneration. For the suffering and the sorrowing she has made known the divinely prepared way of escape. Those who are availing themselves of the opportunity thus provided, hold her name in love and reverence, while people the world over are coming to recognize her as one of the foremost benefactors of the race. She has fulfilled Emerson's prophecy: "When a faithful thinker, resolute to detach every object from personal relations and see it in the light of thought, shall at the same time kindle science with the fires of the holiest affection, then God will go forth anew into creation."
[Delivered Feb. 11, 1936, in Tenth Church of Christ, Scientist, 5640 Blackstone Avenue, Chicago, Illinois, and published in The Chicago Leader, Sept. 9, 1938.]