Robert Stanley Ross, C.S.B.,
of New York, New York
Member of the Board of Lectureship of The
Mother Church,
The First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston, Massachusetts
A lecture on Christian Science was given under the auspices of Sixteenth Church of Christ, Scientist, of Chicago, in the church edifice, 7201 North Ashland Boulevard, Thursday evening, October 29, by Robert Stanley Ross, C.S.B., of New York City, member of the Board of Lectureship of The Mother Church, The First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston, Massachusetts.
The speaker was introduced by Harry C. Moore, First Reader, as follows:
It is my pleasant duty to welcome you, on behalf of this church, to hear a lecture on Christian Science.
We read in the Bible, in the fourth chapter of James, "Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you", and in Psalms, "The Lord is nigh unto all them that call upon him, to all that call upon him in truth." The great question then is, how can one draw nigh to God or call upon Him in truth so that he may really become conscious of God's nearness and realize the blessings and protection this knowledge brings?
The tender and compassionate message of Christian Science is bringing to all who will listen and heed it the answer to this vital question. It tells us how to draw nigh to God in thought and how to call upon Him in truth, and the fruitage of Christian Science today made manifest in the healing of disease and inharmony of every sort proves that its followers have been drawing nigh to God to a very considerable degree.
Our lecturer is a member of the Board of Lectureship of The Mother Church, The First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston, Massachusetts. He will tell us something of the loving message which Christian Science has for the world today. It is my pleasure to introduce to you Mr. Robert Stanley Ross of New York City.
The subject of the lecture was "Christian Science: Its Healing Mission." Mr. Ross spoke substantially as follows:
The religion of Christian Science is winning public approval because it both promises unlimited good and fulfills its promise by delivering from discord of every sort those who embrace its teaching and yield to its divine influence. In comforting words of the Master, Christian Science says to all mankind. "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest" — rest, not in a suppositional place called heaven accessible only through the doorway of death, but here and now; for it is not in future heaven, but in present experience, that humanity needs help. Knowing this, Christian Scientists declare with Paul that "now is the day of salvation."
Although she discovered Christian Science in 1866, it was not until 1875, through her now famous textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," that Mary Baker Eddy published a complete and comprehensive exposition of this Science. Nevertheless, after a lapse of little more than half a century since this book first made its appearance, Christian Science healing is being widely demonstrated; Christian Science churches and societies in ever increasing number and unity may be found throughout the length and breadth of the civilized world; and the revered Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science is recognized at home and abroad as one of the foremost benefactors of the race.
Within this period, Christian Science has healed perhaps millions of persons, many of whom were suffering from diseases which, from the ordinary medical point of view, were supposed to be incurable. It has restored the discouraged and hopeless to lives of joy and usefulness. It has rescued men and women from the vortex of false appetite, immorality, and vice. In place of fear and failure it has established assurance and success. Turning recently to a single issue of The Christian Science Journal, for example, I found recorded there healings of blood poisoning, deafness, chronic appendicitis, spinal deformity, internal hemorrhage, heart disease, nervous prostration, epilepsy, paralysis, brain fever, neuralgia, rheumatism, lumbago, asthma, pneumonia, tuberculosis, indigestion, gastritis, constipation, morphine habit, fear, melancholia, grief, resentment, criticism, and intolerance. Such as these were the "signs following" that made it possible and necessary for Mrs. Eddy "to organize a church designed to commemorate the word and works of our Master, which should reinstate primitive Christianity and its lost elements of healing" (Church Manual, p. 17).
In other words, Christian Science is demonstrable religion, a religion of works. This religion would have you accept its teachings not in mere belief or blind faith, but only when you have learned how to demonstrate its divine Principle, which is infinite good. Owing to its provable nature, Christian Science is attracting to its rank practically-minded, deliberate, thoughtful men and women from every walk of life — men and women who are moved not by appeals to mere religious sentiment, but by sound reason and answerable results. In most cases, these persons have turned to Christian Science because it has shown them how to think their way out of difficulties, whether mental or moral, physical or financial, and usually after other means and methods had failed to help them. Surely the Christianity of Jesus was no religion of forms and ceremonies, of creeds and dogmas! His ministry was a life of loving service to his fellowmen. The Scriptures tell us that the Master went from place to place doing good, and that his pulpit was a Galilean hillside or a fisherman's boat.
Moreover, we should bear in mind that the Master accomplished his healings by recourse to spiritual means only. Although the age had its material methods of treatment, Jesus neither used them nor recommended their use to others. By a process that was evidently unfailing, he healed — in most cases instantaneously — both functional and organic diseases, overcame poverty and other phases of limitation, and raised the dead. So inseparable were his precepts and practice that Jesus declared that his true followers would be known, characterized, or distinguished, not by accepting and adhering to mere doctrinal beliefs, but only by doing the works that he did, saying, "He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also;" and, "Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils." Accordingly, on page 138 of Science and Health, Mrs. Eddy says: "Jesus established in the Christian era the precedent for all Christianity, theology, and healing. Christians are under as direct orders now, as they were then, to be Christlike, to possess the Christ-spirit, to follow the Christ-example, and to heal the sick as well as the sinning."
Nevertheless, in the face of all this, there are those who contend that the works of our Master were the result of miraculous interpositions of divine power peculiar to him alone and that even the aspiration to follow his healing example would be little short of blasphemy. Over against this point of view, however, we have not only the Master's own injunctions, two of which have already been quoted, but we have the book of Acts and later evidence to prove that the immediate disciples and others obediently demonstrated this healing power. How, then, are we to reconcile these facts to the claim that Christian healing was a supernatural power available only to Christ Jesus? Is it not more reasonable to conclude that Jesus' healings were accomplished by the application of a divine law which he understood far better than others, which he made known in a general way to his disciples, and which they, in turn, made known to others? Is it not more reasonable to conclude that he and they dealt not with that which was the infraction or setting aside of divine law, but with that which was the very fulfillment or demonstration of divine law? Granting this, we must admit also that a divine law which healed the sick in the first century is equally capable of healing the sick in the twentieth century.
Furthermore, the word translated "miracle" in the New Testament does not in the original Greek signify that which is supernatural. According to one dictionary, it means "a mighty work," "an act of power," "a sign." We find also that the Scriptural Greek word translated "sign" is identical with the Greek word that in other parts of the New Testament is translated "miracle." Plainly, therefore, "miracles" were never intended to signify supernatural occurrences, but were to be signs, indications, or evidences of divine law operating in human experience. Accordingly, with her unfailing insight and clarity, Mrs. Eddy, on page 591 of Science and Health, defines "Miracle" as "that which is divinely natural, but must be learned humanly; a phenomenon of Science," and on page 135 she writes, "The miracle introduces no disorder, but unfolds the primal order, establishing the Science of God's unchangeable law."
By consulting the New Testament records you will find that, without drugs or surgery, manipulations or mesmerism, Jesus healed blindness, deafness, dropsy, epilepsy, fever, hemorrhage, insanity, leprosy, paralysis, and raised from the dead not only Lazarus but also the daughter of Jairus and the son of the widow of Nain. The same records show that Peter, who was one of the immediate disciples, healed a man who was born lame, cured another person of paralysis, and raised Dorcas from the dead. They show that Philip, who was an immediate disciple also, healed insanity, paralysis, and lameness. They show that Paul, who was not one of the twelve, healed deformity, fever, hemorrhage, serpent bite and restored Eutychus to life. Moreover, history shows that healing by spiritual means characterized Christian discipleship for more than two hundred years. It was upon this sure basis, this firm foundation of spiritual understanding, this petros, or rock of demonstration, and not upon the personal Peter, that Jesus said his church, the church that would truly represent his teachings, would be built.
In the third century, however, the Roman Emperor Constantine, out of gratitude for his healing from a supposedly incurable disease, became an enthusiastic adherent of Christianity, whereupon the new religion immediately became popular. All Rome embraced it. To profess Christianity was the expedient thing to do. The Romans, however, were too fond of image worship to turn whole-heartedly to Him who must be worshiped "in spirit and in truth." Consequently they merely shifted from statutes of Roman gods to images of Christian notables as their objects of religious devotion. Acclaimed by a superficial and self-indulgent society which little understood its teachings and practiced them less; lacking the support of a unified organization; and having no written directions to which its faithful adherents could refer for guidance, the primitive church lost its hold upon divine Principle, and Christian healing, as Jesus taught and demonstrated it, ceased.
Is it not significant that the Master never reduced his teachings to writing? All that we know about his words and works has been handed down to us in the writings of others. That Jesus was the supreme Exemplar of Truth's dominion over error there is no room for doubt. So closely did his earthly life conform to Christ, the divine ideal, that he became known as Jesus the Christ, or Jesus the Godlike man. Had the age been prepared to assimilate divine healing as a Science, God would certainly have made it possible for the Master, above all others, to record it. But in the very fact that Jesus himself looked definitely to the future for the Comforter or "Spirit of truth" (plainly not a person) who would abide forever and lead into "all truth," — in this, I say, we have clear indication that the final revelation of Truth, symbolized in the Apocalypse as an angel with a "little book" and as "a woman clothed with the sun," was yet to come.
In her brief autobiography entitled, "Retrospection and Introspection," Mrs. Eddy tells us that for twenty years by medical and other experiments she had been trying to trace all physical effects to a mental cause and that finally her recovery from the effects of a supposedly fatal accident was the falling apple that led to her great discovery. To be sure, others, both before and since the apostolic era, had experienced divine healing, but Mrs. Eddy was the first person in all history to discover the underlying Principle of such healing and to make it known to the world. In order to do this, Mrs. Eddy, who had always been a close student of the Bible, withdrew from society and for three years devoted herself to a more systematic and prayerful study of the Scriptures. After proving, by healing the sick quickly and permanently, that this divine Principle is demonstrable, Mrs. Eddy named her discovery Christian Science, saying on page 147 of Science and Health: "Our Master healed the sick, practised Christian healing, and taught the generalities of its divine Principle to his students; but he left no definite rule for demonstrating this Principle of healing and preventing disease. This rule remained to be discovered in Christian Science."
Putting it simply, then, Christian Science is the discovery and scientific exposition of the divine Principle by which Christ Jesus performed his mighty works. Mrs. Eddy named her discovery Christian because it is compassionate and helpful. She named it Science because it is based upon divine Principle, God, and requires exact knowledge. It follows, therefore, that a Christian Scientist is one who aims, in so far as he understands them, to illustrate the teachings of Christ Jesus in his daily life, and that a Christian Science practitioner is one who understands this Science well enough to invoke its divine Principle successfully not only in his own behalf, but in behalf of those who may call upon him for aid. Writing on page 141 of Science and Health, Mrs. Eddy says: "In healing the sick and sinning, Jesus elaborated the fact that the healing effect followed the understanding of the divine Principle and of the Christ-spirit which governed the corporeal Jesus. For this Principle there is no dynasty, no ecclesiastical monopoly. Its only crowned head is immortal sovereignty. Its only priest is the spiritualized man."
At this point, however, the question may arise, What is the divine Principle of Christian Science to which you refer so frequently? In order to answer this question satisfactorily, let us turn to that momentous record of spiritual creation which will be found in the first chapter of Genesis. There we read, "And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good." Commenting thereupon, Mrs. Eddy writes on page 521 of Science and Health: "All that is made is the work of God, and all is good. We leave this brief, glorious history of spiritual creation (as stated in the first chapter of Genesis) in the hands of God, not of man, in the keeping of Spirit, not of matter, — joyfully acknowledging now and forever God's supremacy, omnipotence, and omnipresence."
Therefore, in Christian Science, we begin with God, infinite good, perfection, as the divine Principle of true thought and demonstration. According to this Science, all that really exists is included in this infinite, ever present, perfect creation, in which there can be no fear, nothing to be afraid of, and no one susceptible to fear or any other frailty. In infinite good, existence must be always peaceful, joyous, and confident. It is the realm, not of material persons, circumstances, and things, but of spiritual ideas, living, moving, and having their being in the clear unclouded consciousness of divine Mind, and aware now of their immortality in God, who is infinite Life. Consequently, the Christian Scientist prays, not for God to do more than He has already done, but for the faith, humility, and love that will enable him to lift thought above the mesmerism of sense-testimony and joyfully recognize the glorious fact that God's work is finished, that creation is fully accomplished, that divine Love is infinite.
Surely, infinite good knows nothing about a mist of evil or error that is supposed to have arisen in the midst of primeval harmony, obscured spiritual consciousness, and recreated the universe, including man, upon a material basis! Surely, the so-called carnal mind, otherwise known as Satan, adversary, or devil, has never walked to and fro in the realm of reality seeking whom it could devour! To scientific, inspired thought, that is, to thought conscious only of God, infinite good, there is not and never has been any sin, disease, and death. If the mist of error seems to be holding mesmeric sway over human consciousness, it can never interfere with nor alter the eternal fact that perfection is. Mankind needs only to be awakened from its baseless belief in a power opposed to God, infinite good, in order to throw off, as unreal and untrue, the shackles of sin, disease, and death; for, notwithstanding this human, finite sense of things to the contrary, all is well, and God's universe is now and forever spiritual, harmonious, and intact, a universe altogether lovely and lovable.
Although they may not have understood clearly how to meet the error, it is noteworthy that patriarchs, prophets, and apostles urged upon mankind to be not afraid. And why? Because they could see that fear is the chief obstacle to human progress, brooding more or less ominously over all mankind. They knew that fear underlies practically all the sin and sickness, sorrow and suffering, failure and disaster that seems to beset the race. Mortals have been taught to be afraid of the air they breathe and the food they eat. They have been taught to be afraid to live and afraid to die. They have been taught to be so afraid of God that most of them have preferred to stay where they are rather than to take a chance with the heaven of old-school theology with its promise of enduring health and happiness only beyond the grave.
Some time ago, for example, while motoring with some friends, I passed a cemetery and to my astonishment read these words carved in granite arch over the entrance, "Gate to heaven." Here was the mistaken admission, commonly made by Christian people (and I say this respectfully), that one must die by so-called natural or by violent means in order to win one's way into God's presence, the kingdom of heaven! If, however, God were responsible for sin, disease, and death, would He not be our worst enemy instead of our best friend? Would it not make heaven a place to be carefully avoided instead of joyfully anticipated? Who could truly love such a God? And who could truly long for such a heaven? Ah! but true Christianity tells us that God is Love, not hate; that He is a God of the living, not of the dead; that the kingdom of heaven is at hand and within us — an harmonious state of thought to be gained here by continuous, active, spiritual living, and not by lapsing into unconsciousness and death.
Therefore, Christian Science comes to you and me as the heavenly message came to the prophet-shepherds of old, saying, "Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people." It tells us that we may learn here, tonight, now, and begin the demonstration thereof, that good is infinite, and that in God's estimation we are His beloved sons and daughters in whom He is "well pleased." It tells us that all cause and effect, all presence and substance, all power and law are good and that they are always exerted in our behalf, never against us. If we have believed otherwise, this fearful, unreal, untrue point of view, not God, is responsible for our difficulties; for our divine Father-Mother God is more desirous of promoting our health, our happiness, and our success than are the fondest earthly parents in promoting the welfare of their children. Accordingly, you may be sure that you do not need longer to be afraid of God, who is infinite Love, and from whom only bestowals of good can come.
Nevertheless, some of you may be saying to yourselves in effect, Well, even though we do not need to be afraid of God, we seem still to be afraid. What is fear and how are we to get rid of it? Christian Science replies that fear is based upon the erroneous supposition that, although God is infinite good, evil has a place in this infinity. It declares that this erring, false, deluded point of view is responsible for all the discord and suffering on earth, and that discord and suffering will disappear from our lives in the proportion that we recognize the mesmeric imposition by which we have been deceived, rebuke it as unreal, and claim our spiritual freedom. It exhorts us to declare for ourselves and others that we are not afraid of the mesmeric obsession calling itself sense-testimony, because we know that we live and move and have our being at this very moment in God's infinite, ever present, ever available Love; hence the assurance of John that "There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear."
By way of illustration, let us suppose that a person in a dream believes he is going through frightful experiences. So long as the dream continues these experiences seem to him to be real and terrifying. Then let us suppose that you would save this person from his suffering. In order to do so, would you make a reality of, sympathize with, be afraid of, the dream? Would you save him from real experiences? No; you would merely awaken him from an erroneous mental state which is causing him to believe in the reality of the utterly unreal. Likewise, Christian Science has come to arouse mankind from this mesmeric imposition, this day-dream, of life, substance, and intelligence in matter, which declares that man is an unhappy, diseased, wrong-doing, poverty-stricken, dying mortal instead of the spiritual image and likeness of God, infinite good. Obviously, therefore, Christian Science healing is not a material process, but a spiritual awakening in accordance with the Scriptural command, "Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light."
Here let us be reminded that in and of itself the physical body, like all that is material or mortal, is incapable of experiencing either heat or cold, weakness or strength, sickness or health. Indeed, we know that, save for the so-called fleshly or carnal mind, which is unreal and untrue, the physical body would have no sense of persons, circumstances, and things. How evident it is, therefore, that our human experiences are never physical (though seeming to be), but always mortal and mental, and that the only way by which we can truly solve what seem to be our own and others' problems is by approaching them as mental problems! Accordingly, a Christian Science treatment deals not with matter, time, and space, but always with present material belief calling itself matter, time, and space.
It follows, therefore, that if we accept as real the testimony of mortal mind alias the material senses, we are apt to find ourselves contending on all sides with more or less discordant circumstances and things; whereas, if we judge according to spiritual sense, we shall see that we and others "live, and move, and have our being" in the wholly good universe of infinite Mind, divine reality, which contains no discordant persons, circumstances, and things, but is peopled by spiritual beings, divine ideas, under the government of divine Principle, Love. By refusing to accept sense-testimony and entertaining steadfastly the true idea of the universe and man, we shall find ourselves experiencing kindness and cooperation on every hand. Referring to this process, Mrs. Eddy writes on page 428 of Science and Health, "A demonstration of the facts of Soul in Jesus' way resolves the dark visions of material sense into harmony and immortality."
When, for example, the Syrian hordes, bent upon capturing him, surrounded Elisha at Dothan, Elisha's servant cried out in fear and trembling, saying, "Alas, my master! how shall we do?" With spiritual assurance Elisha answered, "Fear not: for they that be with us are more than they that be with them." Having quieted his servant's fear, Elisha prayed that the young man's eyes should be opened to see spiritually instead of materially. He then bade his servant to look again, "and, behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire round about Elisha." The record then tells us that Elisha overcame the Syrians without the use of material means, rebuked the Israelites who would have employed military force, and sent the captives home provisioned and unharmed. It closes with the statement that the invaders came no more into Israel. Like Elisha, all of us, sooner or later, must learn through loving alertness how to recognize and deny the mesmerism of sense-testimony, which would, through suggestion, have us accept its false claims to presence and power, and turn with childlike confidence to spiritual reality, which is ever present, ever available good, and to which fear and doubt, sin and suffering, disease and death are unknown.
Instead of trying to make the real man spiritual and perfect, Christian Science declares that man is truly spiritual and perfect now. It teaches us how to take our stand on the side of God, Spirit, Mind, and to hold our ground fearlessly and steadfastly in the assurance that the only real universe is the spiritual universe, which will stand forever. It is belief in a material world and mortal man that will come to an end. Because matter is but another name for mortal mind, the material world will cease to be, here or hereafter, only when human belief yields entirely and disappears before infinite, all-inclusive, divine Mind, called God, even as darkness recedes and eventually disappears before the rising sun. By this process a mortal does not become spiritual any more than darkness becomes light, but through spiritual understanding one demonstrates that the real man, the only man there is, has always been spiritual. No doubt Jesus meant this when he said, "No man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven."
If it were wrong, however, to claim that man, your true selfhood, is perfect now, would it not be wrong also to claim that God is perfect now? But whatever is true about God must be true about the real man. Were it otherwise, God would have no likeness, and man would be forever in a state of inferiority and self-condemnation. So long as we entertain a sense of inferiority, at-one-ment with God will be always beyond our reach. This mistaken point of view promotes discouragement and confirms the belief of imperfection.
We cannot demonstrate our unity with God so long as we cling to a mortal, inferior sense of existence — so long as we see the universe and man materially instead of spiritually. John makes all this plain in his first epistle, where he writes: "Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is. And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he [God] is pure." Accordingly, it should be understood that a Christian Scientist does not presume to heal man; for man is the image and likeness of God, Spirit, Mind, hence spiritual and perfect and in no need of healing. The patient is not even a man who believes he is sick or a sinner, but a mesmeric state of human belief calling itself a sick man or a sinner. Hence, a Christian Science treatment is a metaphysical treatment. It includes neither a personal patient nor a personal healer. For this reason, Christian Science healing cannot be explained understandingly from the basis of one human personality trying to heal another human personality. The explanation becomes simple, however, when, according to the foregoing, healing is seen as the effect of spiritual, scientific thinking, whereby we help ourselves and others by rejecting and dispelling the mesmerism claiming to be a sick person or a sinner and affirming to human consciousness the eternal fact that the universe and man are harmonious and perfect, here and now. "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect."
In Christian Science, then, we learn that the real man (and this includes your true self) is always spiritual and intact, the reflection or idea of God, infinite good. He has never been ill, has never acquired any false appetites, has never lost any of his faculties. In fact, the real man has never had any material faculties to lose, because real faculties are spiritual and indestructible. Such experiences might seem to come to the human counterfeit of man called a mortal, but this would be due fundamentally to the erroneous supposition that man could, temporarily at least, lapse from spiritual perfection into mortality. If, however, human faculties should seem to be impaired or lost, a right or spiritual recognition of man's sinless, harmonious, indissoluble relationship to his divine Principle, God, would restore these faculties to the normal standard which human belief has established for itself. Consequently, when he was asked regarding the man whom he healed of blindness, whether the affliction was due to the man's own wrongdoing or to that of his parents, Jesus answered, "Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that the works of God should be made manifest in him."
About a year ago, for example, I met a woman who, at more than sixty years of age, was nearly blind. Turning to Christian Science for help, she learned joyfully for the first time that, instead of sending blindness and other forms of affliction, God's only will is to set mankind free mentally, morally, and physically. Presently, her sight began to return. This enabled her with the aid of glasses to read, write, and make the wonderful laces for which the women of her country are noted. In the course of time, she became a member of the local Christian Science church, was elected First Reader, and without the aid of glasses served the usual term of three years. During the period of recovery, this woman visited an optometrist from time to time. During one of these visits the optometrist told her that instead of prescribing stronger lenses each time she came, he was, to his astonishment, prescribing them weaker and weaker. Her sight is now normal. Verily, God's power to heal and regenerate is as available at sixty as it is at six.
Again, a devoted wife found herself confronted by what seemed to be the problem of a drunken husband. Because of this, the wife had permitted herself to become full of resentment and condemnation. A Christian Science practitioner whom she consulted pointed out to her that she was accepting as real that which would have to become unreal to her and that, accordingly, she as well as her husband needed to be healed. The practitioner reminded her that Christian Science heals such cases by condemning, not the victim, but the belief of false appetite, and that, if she would help her husband, she would have to rebuke and throw off the error which was telling her to look upon man as a sensual, self-indulgent, sinful mortal, and prayerfully, confidently, persistently hold to the divine ideal that man is spiritual, Godlike, free, and that he knows it. This scientific, right point of view so illumined the woman's consciousness that very soon thereafter she found that her husband was healed of the liquor habit.
By the same token, Christian Science declares to every child, man, and woman in this audience that God has placed no human limitations upon you. It declares that you are under no law of evil predestination, condemnation, or destruction at the hands of a wrathful deity. It declares that because God is infinite good, it is your divine right to experience immediate, spontaneous recovery from whatever may seem to be holding you in bondage. It declares that all that ever was and all that ever will be necessary to accomplish a complete salvation is available to every one of you here and now. Therefore, why not begin to exercise your divine right? Why not begin to claim fearlessly that, rightly considered, you are spiritual, Godlike, perfect, and be free? We have been confident enough of our ability to be sick, to be unhappy, and to fail. Now let us be equally confident of our divine right to be healthy, happy, and successful. On page 260 of Science and Health Mrs. Eddy writes, "Science reveals the possibility of achieving all good, and sets mortals at work to discover what God has already done."
However, for one to do justice in an hour to a theme that is infinite, is obviously an impossibility. Nevertheless, in the period at my disposal I have endeavored to show you (1) that original Christianity was essentially a religion of works and that, accordingly, true Christianity must always be distinguished by spiritual healing; (2) that spiritual healing characterized the Christian religion for probably three centuries, after which it was obscured — temporarily lost to human apprehension — by the materialism of pagan Rome; (3) that, after a lapse of nearly sixteen centuries, the divine Principle of Christian healing was discovered and demonstrated by Mary Baker Eddy and by her, peculiarly, alone, and in the face of bitter opposition from persons, pulpit, and press, made available through the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures;" (4) that, through this discovery and this book, Mrs. Eddy has established the Christian church on a spiritual, scientific, demonstrable basis and named it the Church of Christ, Scientist, of which The First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston, Massachusetts, is The Mother Church. Surely only one who was walking hand-in-hand with God could have accomplished such a work!
Mrs. Eddy has restored the Master's teaching to its rightful place as a living, practical healing influence in human affairs. For this the Christian world owes her a debt of gratitude which it can never repay. To Mrs. Eddy belongs the commendation, "Well done, good and faithful servant; . . . enter thou into the joy of thy Lord."
[Probably delivered in 1931. From a Chicago newspaper clipping.]