Читать книгу Miscellaneous Writings, 1883-1896 - Mary Baker Eddy - Страница 7
ОглавлениеDo you sometimes find it advisable to use medicine to
assist in producing a cure, when it is difficult to start the
patient's recovery?
You only weaken your power to heal through Mind,
by any compromise with matter; which is virtually ac- [15]
knowledging that under difficulties the former is not equal
to the latter. He that resorts to physics, seeks what is
below instead of above the standard of metaphysics;
showing his ignorance of the meaning of the term and
of Christian Science. [20]
If Christian Science is the same as Jesus taught, why is
it not more simple, so that all can readily understand it?
The teachings of Jesus were simple; and yet he found
it difficult to make the rulers understand, because of
their great lack of spirituality. Christian Science is [25]
simple, and readily understood by the children; only
the thought educated away from it finds it abstract or
difficult to perceive. Its seeming abstraction is the
mystery of godliness; and godliness is simple to the
godly; but to the unspiritual, the ungodly, it is dark [30]
[pg 054]
and difficult. The carnal mind cannot discern spiritual [1]
things.
Has Mrs. Eddy lost her power to heal?
Has the sun forgotten to shine, and the planets to
revolve around it? Who is it that discovered, dem- [5]
onstrated, and teaches Christian Science? That one,
whoever it be, does understand something of what can-
not be lost. Thousands in the field of metaphysical
healing, whose lives are worthy testimonials, are her
students, and they bear witness to this fact. Instead [10]
of losing her power to heal, she is demonstrating the
power of Christian Science over all obstacles that envy
and malice would fling in her path. The reading of her
book, “Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,”
is curing hundreds at this very time; and the sick, un- [15]
asked, are testifying thereto.
Must I study your Science in order to keep well all my
life? I was healed of a chronic trouble after one month's
treatment by one of your students.
When once you are healed by Science, there is no rea- [20]
son why you should be liable to a return of the disease
that you were healed of. But not to be subject again to
any disease whatsoever, would require an understanding
of the Science by which you were healed.
Because none of your students have been able to perform [25]
as great miracles in healing as Jesus and his disciples did,
does it not suggest the possibility that they do not heal on
the same basis?
You would not ask the pupil in simple equations to
solve a problem involving logarithms; and then, because [30]
[pg 055]
he failed to get the right answer, condemn the pupil [1]
and the science of numbers. The simplest problem
in Christian Science is healing the sick, and the least
understanding and demonstration thereof prove all its
possibilities. The ability to demonstrate to the extent [5]
that Jesus did, will come when the student possesses as
much of the divine Spirit as he shared, and utilizes its
power to overcome sin.
Opposite to good, is the universal claim of evil that
seeks the proportions of good. There may be those [10]
who, having learned the power of the unspoken thought,
use it to harm rather than to heal, and who are using
that power against Christian Scientists. This giant sin
is the sin against the Holy Ghost spoken of in Matt.
xii. 31, 32. [15]
Is Christian Science based on the facts of both Spirit
and matter?
Christian Science is based on the facts of Spirit and
its forms and representations, but these facts are the
direct antipodes of the so-called facts of matter; and [20]
the eternal verities of Spirit assert themselves over their
opposite, or matter, in the final destruction of all that
is unlike Spirit.
Man knows that he can have one God only, when
he regards God as the only Mind, Life, and substance. [25]
If God is Spirit, as the Scriptures declare, and All-in-
all, matter is mythology, and its laws are mortal
beliefs.
If Mind is in matter and beneath a skull bone, it is
in something unlike Him; hence it is either a godless and [30]
material Mind, or it is God in matter—which are theo-
[pg 056]
ries of agnosticism and pantheism, the very antipodes [1]
of Christian Science
What is organic life?
Life is inorganic, infinite Spirit; if Life, or Spirit,
were organic, disorganization would destroy Spirit and [5]
annihilate man.
If Mind is not substance, form, and tangibility, God
is substanceless; for the substance of Spirit is divine
Mind. Life is God, the only creator, and Life is im-
mortal Mind, not matter. [10]
Every indication of matter's constituting life is mortal,
the direct opposite of immortal Life, and infringes the
rights of Spirit. Then, to conclude that Spirit consti-
tutes or ever has constituted laws to that effect, is a mor-
tal error, a human conception opposed to the divine [15]
government. Mind and matter mingling in perpetual
warfare is a kingdom divided against itself, that shall be
brought to desolation. The final destruction of this
false belief in matter will appear at the full revelation
of Spirit—one God, and the brotherhood of man. [20]
Organic life is an error of statement that Truth destroys.
The Science of Life needs only to be understood; its dem-
onstration proves the correctness of my statements, and
brings blessings infinite.
Why did God command, “Be fruitful, and multiply, [25]
and replenish the earth,” if all minds (men) have existed
from the beginning, and have had successive stages of
existence to the present time?
Your question implies that Spirit, which first spirit-
ually created the universe, including man, created man [30]
[pg 057]
over again materially; and, by the aid of mankind, all [1]
was later made which He had made. If the first record
is true, what evidence have you—apart from the evi-
dence of that which you admit cannot discern spiritual
things—of any other creation? The creative “Us” [5]
made all, and Mind was the creator. Man originated
not from dust, materially, but from Spirit, spiritually.
This work had been done; the true creation was finished,
and its spiritual Science is alluded to in the first chapter
of Genesis. [10]
Jesus said of error, “That thou doest, do quickly.”
By the law of opposites, after the truth of man had been
demonstrated, the postulate of error must appear. That
this addendum was untrue, is seen when Truth, God,
denounced it, and said: “I will greatly multiply thy [15]
sorrow.” “In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt
surely die.” The opposite error said, “I am true,” and
declared, “God doth know … that your eyes shall be
opened, and ye shall be as gods,” creators. This was false;
and the Lord God never said it. This history of a falsity [20]
must be told in the name of Truth, or it would have no
seeming. The Science of creation is the universe with man
created spiritually. The false sense and error of creation
is the sense of man and the universe created materially.
Why does the record make man a creation of the sixth [25]
and last day, if he was coexistent with God?
In its genesis, the Science of creation is stated in mathe-
matical order, beginning with the lowest form and ascend-
ing the scale of being up to man. But all that really is,
always was and forever is; for it existed in and of the Mind [30]
that is God, wherein man is foremost.
[pg 058]
If one has died of consumption, and he has no remem- [1]
brance of that disease or dream, does that disease have any
more power over him?
Waking from a dream, one learns its unreality; then
it has no power over one. Waking from the dream of [5]
death, proves to him who thought he died that it was a
dream, and that he did not die; then he learns that con-
sumption did not kill him. When the belief in the power
of disease is destroyed, disease cannot return.
How does Mrs. Eddy know that she has read and studied [10]
correctly, if one must deny the evidences of the senses?
She had to use her eyes to read.
Jesus said, “Having eyes, see ye not?” I read the in-
spired page through a higher than mortal sense. As
matter, the eye cannot see; and as mortal mind, it is a [15]
belief that sees. I may read the Scriptures through a
belief of eyesight; but I must spiritually understand
them to interpret their Science.
Does the theology of Christian Science aid its heal-
ing? [20]
Without its theology there is no mental science, no
order that proceeds from God. All Science is divine,
not human, in origin and demonstration. If God does
not govern the action of man, it is inharmonious: if He
does govern it, the action is Science. Take away the [25]
theology of mental healing and you take away its science,
leaving it a human “mind-cure,” nothing more nor less,
—even one human mind governing another; by which,
if you agree that God is Mind, you admit that there is
[pg 059]
more than one government and God. Having no true [1]
sense of the healing theology of Mind, you can neither
understand nor demonstrate its Science, and will prac-
tise your belief of it in the name of Truth. This is the
mortal “mind-cure” that produces the effect of mes- [5]
merism. It is using the power of human will, instead
of the divine power understood, as in Christian Science;
and without this Science there had better be no “mind-
cure,”—in which the last state of patients is worse than
the first. [10]
Is it wrong to pray for the recovery of the sick?
Not if we pray Scripturally, with the understanding
that God has given all things to those who love Him;
but pleading with infinite Love to love us, or to restore
health and harmony, and then to admit that it has been [15]
lost under His government, is the prayer of doubt and
mortal belief that is unavailing in divine Science.
Is not all argument mind over mind?
The Scriptures refer to God as saying, “Come now, and
let us reason together.” There is but one right Mind, and [20]
that one should and does govern man. Any copartnership
with that Mind is impossible; and the only benefit in
speaking often one to another, arises from the success that
one individual has with another in leading his thoughts
away from the human mind or body, and guiding them [25]
with Truth. That individual is the best healer who as-
serts himself the least, and thus becomes a transparency
for the divine Mind, who is the only physician; the divine
Mind is the scientific healer.
[pg 060]
How can you believe there is no sin, and that God does [1]
not recognize any, when He sent His Son to save from
sin, and the Bible is addressed to sinners? How can you
believe there is no sickness, when Jesus came healing the
sick? [5]
To regard sin, disease, and death with less deference,
and only as the woeful unrealities of being, is the only
way to destroy them; Christian Science is proving this by
healing cases of disease and sin after all other means have
failed. The Nazarene Prophet could make the unreality [10]
of both apparent in a moment.
Does it not limit the power of Mind to deny the possi-
bility of communion with departed friends—dead only in
belief?
Does it limit the power of Mind to say that addition [15]
is not subtraction in mathematics? The Science of Mind
reveals the impossibility of two individual sleepers, in
different phases of thought, communicating, even if touch-
ing each other corporeally; or for one who sleeps to
communicate with another who is awake. Mind's possi- [20]
bilities are not lessened by being confined and conformed
to the Science of being.
If mortal mind and body are myths, what is the con-
nection between them and real identity, and why are there
as many identities as mortal bodies? [25]
Evil in the beginning claimed the power, wisdom, and
utility of good; and every creation or idea of Spirit has
its counterfeit in some matter belief. Every material be-
lief hints the existence of spiritual reality; and if mortals
are instructed in spiritual things, it will be seen that ma- [30]
[pg 061]
terial belief, in all its manifestations, reversed, will be [1]
found the type and representative of verities priceless,
eternal, and just at hand.
The education of the future will be instruction, in spir-
itual Science, against the material symbolic counterfeit [5]
sciences. All the knowledge and vain strivings of mortal
mind, that lead to death—even when aping the wisdom
and magnitude of immortal Mind—will be swallowed
up by the reality and omnipotence of Truth over error,
and of Life over death. [10]
“Dear Mrs. Eddy:—In the October Journal I read
the following: “But the real man, who was created in the
image of God, does not commit sin.” What then does sin?
What commits theft? Or who does murder? For instance,
the man is held responsible for the crime; for I went once [15]
to a place where a man was said to be “hanged for mur-
der”—and certainly I saw him, or his effigy, dangling
at the end of a rope. This “man” was held responsible
for the ‘sin.’ ”
What sins? [20]
According to the Word, man is the image and likeness
of God. Does God's essential likeness sin, or dangle at
the end of a rope? If not, what does? A culprit, a sinner,
—anything but a man! Then, what is a sinner? A
mortal; but man is immortal. [25]
Again: mortals are the embodiments (or bodies, if
you please) of error, not of Truth; of sickness, sin, and
death. Naming these His embodiment, can neither make
them so nor overthrow the logic that man is God's like-
ness. Mortals seem very material; man in the likeness [30]
[pg 062]
of Spirit is spiritual. Holding the right idea of man in my [1]
mind, I can improve my own, and other people's individ-
uality, health, and morals; whereas, the opposite image
of man, a sinner, kept constantly in mind, can no more
improve health or morals, than holding in thought the [5]
form of a boa-constrictor can aid an artist in painting a
landscape.
Man is seen only in the true likeness of his Maker.
Believing a lie veils the truth from our vision; even as
in mathematics, in summing up positive and negative [10]
quantities, the negative quantity offsets an equal positive
quantity, making the aggregate positive, or true quantity,
by that much, less available.
Why do Christian Scientists hold that their theology is
essential to heal the sick, when the mind-cure claims to heal [15]
without it?
The theology of Christian Science is Truth; opposed
to which is the error of sickness, sin, and death, that
Truth destroys.
A “mind-cure” is a matter-cure. An adherent to this [20]
method honestly acknowledges this fact in her work
entitled “Mind-cure on a Material Basis.” In that
work the author grapples with Christian Science, attempts
to solve its divine Principle by the rule of human mind,
fails, and ends in a parody on this Science which is amus- [25]
ing to astute readers—especially when she tells them
that she is practising this Science.
The theology of Christian Science is based on the action
of the divine Mind over the human mind and body;
whereas, “mind-cure” rests on the notion that the human [30]
mind can cure its own disease, or that which it causes,
[pg 063]
and the sickness of matter—which is infidel in the one [1]
case, and anomalous in the other. It was said of old by
Truth-traducers, that Jesus healed through Beelzebub;
but the claim that one erring mind cures another one was
at first gotten up to hinder his benign influence and to hide [5]
his divine power.
Our Master understood that Life, Truth, Love are the
triune Principle of all pure theology; also, that this divine
trinity is one infinite remedy for the opposite triad, sick-
ness, sin, and death. [10]
If there is no sin, why did Jesus come to save sinners?
If there is no reality in sickness, why does a Chris-
tian Scientist go to the bedside and address himself to
the healing of disease, on the basis of its unreality?
Jesus came to seek and to save such as believe in the [15]
reality of the unreal; to save them from this false belief;
that they might lay hold of eternal Life, the great reality
that concerns man, and understand the final fact—that
God is omnipotent and omnipresent; yea, “that the Lord
He is God; there is none else beside Him,” as the Scrip- [20]
tures declare.
If Christ was God, why did Jesus cry out, “My God,
why hast Thou forsaken me?”
