# Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures (1906)/13 Teaching Christian Science

CHAPTER XIII
TEACHING CHRISTIAN SCIENCE
Give instruction to a wise man, and he will be yet wiser: teach a just man, and he will increase in learning. — Proverbs.
WHEN the discoverer of Christian Science is consulted by her followers as to the propriety, advantage, Study of medicine and consistency of systematic medical study, she tries to show them that under ordinary circumstances a resort to faith in corporeal means tends to deter those, who make such a compromise, from entire confidence in omnipotent Mind as really possessing all power. While a course of medical study is at times severely condemned by some Scientists, she feels, as she always has felt, that all are privileged to work out their own salvation according to their light, and that our motto should be the Master's counsel, “Judge not, that ye be not judged.”
If patients fail to experience the healing power of Christian Science, and think they can be benefited by Failure's lessons certain ordinary physical methods of medical treatment, then the Mind-physician should give up such cases, and leave invalids free to resort to whatever other systems they fancy will afford relief. Thus such invalids may learn the value of the apostolic precept: “Reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine.” If the sick find these material expedients ​unsatisfactory, and they receive no help from them, these very failures may open their blind eyes. In some way, sooner or later, all must rise superior to materiality, and suffering is oft the divine agent in this elevation. “All things work together for good to them that love God,” is the dictum of Scripture.
If Christian Scientists ever fail to receive aid from other Scientists, — their brethren upon whom they may Refuge and strength call, — God will still guide them into the right use of temporary and eternal means. Step by step will those who trust Him find that “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.”
Students are advised by the author to be charitable and kind, not only towards differing forms of religion Charity to those opposed and medicine, but to those who hold these differing opinions. Let us be faithlul in pointing the way through Christ, as we understand it, but let us also be careful always to “judge righteous judgment,” and never to condemn rashly. “Whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.” That is, Fear not that he will smite thee again for thy forbearance. If ecclesiastical sects or medical schools turn a deaf ear to the teachings of Christian Science, then part from these opponents as did Abraham when he parted from Lot, and say in thy heart: “Let there be no strife, I pray thee, between me and thee, and between my herdmen and thy herdmen; for we be brethren.” Immortals, or God's children in divine Science, are one harmonious family; but mortals, or the “children of men” in material sense, are discordant and ofttimes false brethren.
The teacher must make clear to students the Science of healing, especially its ethics, — that all is Mind, and ​that the Scientist must conform to God's requirements. Also the teacher must thoroughly fit his students to defend Conforming to explicit rules themselves against sin, and to guard against the attacks of the would-be mental assassin, who attempts to kill morally and physically. No hypothesis as to the existence of another power should interpose a doubt or fear to hinder the demonstration of Christian Science. Unfold the latent energies and capacities for good in your pupil. Teach the great possibilities of man endued with divine Science. Teach the dangerous possibility of dwarfing the spiritual understanding and demonstration of Truth by sin, or by recourse to material means for healing. Teach the meekness and might of life “hid with Christ in God,” and there will be no desire for other healing methods. You render the divine law of healing obscure and void, when you weigh the human in the scale with the divine, or limit in any direction of thought the omnipresence and omnipotence of God.
Christian Science silences human will, quiets fear with Truth and Love, and illustrates the unlabored motion Divine energy of the divine energy in healing the sick. Self-seeking, envy, passion, pride, hatred, and revenge are cast out by the divine Mind which heals disease. The human will which maketh and worketh a lie, hiding the divine Principle of harmony, is destructive to health, and is the cause of disease rather than its cure.
There is great danger in teaching Mind-healing indiscriminately, thus disregarding the morals of the student Blight of avarice and caring only for the fees. Recalling Jefferson's words about slavery, “I tremble, when I remember that God is just,” the author trembles whenever she sees a man, for the petty consideration of money, ​teaching his slight knowledge of Mind-power, — perhaps communicating his own bad morals, and in this way dealing pitilessly with a community unprepared for self-defence.
A thorough perusal of the author's publications heals sickness. If patients sometimes seem worse while reading this book, the change may either arise from the alarm of the physician, or it may mark the crisis of the disease. Perseverance in the perusal of the book has generally completely healed such cases.
Whoever practises the Science the author teaches, through which Mind pours light and healing upon this Exclusion of malpractice generation, can practise on no one from sinister or malicious motives without destroying his own power to heal and his own health. Good must dominate in the thoughts of the healer, or his demonstration is protracted, dangerous, and impossible in Science. A wrong motive involves defeat. In the Science of Mind-healing, it is imperative to be honest, for victory rests on the side of immutable right. To understand God strengthens hope, enthrones faith in Truth, and verifies Jesus' word: “Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world.”
Resisting evil, you overcome it and prove its nothingness. Not human platitudes, but divine beatitudes, Iniquity overcome reflect the spiritual light and might which heal the sick. The exercise of will brings on a hypnotic state, detrimental to health and integrity of thought. This must therefore be watched and guarded against. Covering iniquity will prevent prosperity and the ultimate triumph of any cause. Ignorance of the error to be eradicated oftentimes subjects you to its abuse.
​The heavenly law is broken by trespassing upon man's individual right of self-government. We have no No trespass on human rights authority in Christian Science and no moral right to attempt to influence the thoughts of others, except it be to benefit them. In mental practice you must not forget that erring human opinions, conflicting selfish motives, and ignorant attempts to do good may render you incapable of knowing or judging accurately the need of your fellow-men. Therefore the rule is, heal the sick when called upon for aid, and save the victims of the mental assassins.
Ignorance, subtlety, or false charity does not forever conceal error; evil will in time disclose and punish Expose sin without believing in it itself. The recuperative action of the system, when mentally sustained by Truth, goes on naturally. When sin or sickness — the reverse of harmony — seems true to material sense, impart without frightening or discouraging the patient the truth and spiritual understanding, which destroy disease. Expose and denounce the claims of evil and disease in all their forms, but realize no reality in them. A sinner is not reformed merely by assuring him that he cannot be a sinner because there is no sin. To put down the claim of sin, you must detect it, remove the mask, point out the illusion, and thus get the victory over sin and so prove its unreality. The sick are not healed merely by declaring there is no sickness, but by knowing that there is none.
A sinner is afraid to cast the first stone. He may say, as a subterfuge, that evil is unreal, but to know it, he must demonstrate his statement. To assume that ​there are no claims of evil and yet to indulge them, is a moral offence. Blindness and self-righteousness cling Wicked evasions fast to iniquity. When the Publican's wail went out to the great heart of Love, it won his humble desire. Evil which obtains in the bodily senses, but which the heart condemns, has no foundation; but if evil is uncondemned, it is undenied and nurtured. Under such circumstances, to say that there is no evil, is an evil in itself. When needed tell the truth concerning the lie. Evasion of Truth cripples integrity, and casts thee down from the pinnacle.
Christian Science rises above the evidence of the corporeal senses; but if you have not risen above sin Truth's grand results yourself, do not congratulate yourself upon your blindness to evil or upon the good you know and do not. A dishonest position is far from Christianly scientific. “He that covereth his sins shall not prosper: but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy.” Try to leave on every student's mind the strong impress of divine Science, a high sense of the moral and spiritual qualifications requisite for healing, well knowing it to be impossible for error, evil, and hate to accomplish the grand results of Truth and Love. The reception or pursuit of instructions opposite to absolute Christian Science must always hinder scientific demonstration.
If the student adheres strictly to the teachings of Christian Science and ventures not to break its rules, he cannot Adherence to righteousness fail of success in healing. It is Christian Science to do right, and nothing short of right-doing has any claim to the name. To talk the right and live the wrong is foolish deceit, doing one's self the most harm. Fettered by sin yourself, it is difficult to free ​another from the fetters of disease. With your own wrists manacled, it is hard to break another's chains. A little leaven causes the whole mass to ferment. A grain of Christian Science does wonders for mortals, so omnipotent is Truth, but more of Christian Science must be gained in order to continue in well doing.
The wrong done another reacts most heavily against one's self. Right adjusts the balance sooner or later. Right adjusts the balance Think it “easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle,” than for you to benefit yourself by injuring others. Man's moral mercury, rising or falling, registers his healing ability and fitness to teach. You should practise well what you know, and you will then advance in proportion to your honesty and fidelity, — qualities which insure success in this Science; but it requires a higher understanding to teach this subject properly and correctly than it does to heal the most difficult case.
The baneful effect of evil associates is less seen than felt. The inoculation of evil human thoughts ought to Inoculation of thought be understood and guarded against. The first impression, made on a mind which is attracted or repelled according to personal merit or demerit, is a good detective of individual character. Certain minds meet only to separate through simultaneous repulsion. They are enemies without the preliminary offence. The impure are at peace with the impure. Only virtue is a rebuke to vice. A proper teacher of Christian Science improves the health and the morals of his student if the student practises what he is taught, and unless this result follows, the teacher is a Scientist only in name.
​There is a large class of thinkers whose bigotry and conceit twist every fact to suit themselves. Their creed Three classes of neophytes teaches belief in a mysterious, supernatural God, and in a natural, all-powerful devil. Another class, still more unfortunate, are so depraved that they appear to be innocent. They utter a falsehood, while looking you blandly in the face, and they never fail to stab their benefactor in the back. A third class of thinkers build with solid masonry. They are sincere, generous, noble, and are therefore open to the approach and recognition of Truth. To teach Christian Science to such as these is no task. They do not incline longingly to error, whine over the demands of Truth, nor play the traitor for place and power.
Some people yield slowly to the touch of Truth. Few yield without a struggle, and many are reluctant to Touchstone of Science acknowledge that they have yielded; but unless this admission is made, evil will boast itself above good. The Christian Scientist has enlisted to lessen evil, disease, and death; and he will overcome them by understanding their nothingness and the allness of God, or good. Sickness to him is no less a temptation than is sin, and he heals them both by understanding God's power over them. The Christian Scientist knows that they are errors of belief, which Truth can and will destroy.
Who, that has felt the perilous beliefs in life, substance, and intelligence separated from God, can say that there False claims annihilated is no error of belief? Knowing the claim of animal magnetism, that all evil combines in the belief of life, substance, and intelligence in matter, electricity, animal nature, and organic life, who will deny ​that these are the errors which Truth must and will annihilate? Christian Scientists must live under the constant pressure of the apostolic command to come out from the material world and be separate. They must renounce aggression, oppression and the pride of power. Christianity, with the crown of Love upon her brow, must be their queen of life.
Students of Christian Science, who start with its letter and think to succeed without the spirit, will either make Treasure in heaven shipwreck of their faith or be turned sadly awry. They must not only seek, but strive, to enter the narrow path of Life, for “wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat.” Man walks in the direction towards which he looks, and where his treasure is, there will his heart be also. If our hopes and affections are spiritual, they come from above, not from beneath, and they bear as of old the fruits of the Spirit.
Every Christian Scientist, every conscientious teacher of the Science of Mind-healing, knows that human will Obligations of teachers is not Christian Science, and he must recognize this in order to defend himself from the influence of human will. He feels morally obligated to open the eyes of his students that they may perceive the nature and methods of error of every sort, especially any subtle degree of evil, deceived and deceiving. All mental malpractice arises from ignorance or malice aforethought. It is the injurious action of one mortal mind controlling another from wrong motives, and it is practised either with a mistaken or a wicked purpose.
Show your student that mental malpractice tends to blast moral sense, health, and the human life. Instruct ​him how to bar the door of his thought against this seeming power, — a task not difficult, when one Indispensable defence understands that evil has in reality no power. Incorrect reasoning leads to practical error. The wrong thought should be arrested before it has a chance to manifest itself.
Walking in the light, we are accustomed to the light and require it; we cannot see in darkness. But eyes Egotistic darkness accustomed to darkness are pained by the light. When outgrowing the old, you should not fear to put on the new. Your advancing course may provoke envy, but it will also attract respect. When error confronts you, withhold not the rebuke or the explanation which destroys error. Never breathe an immoral atmosphere, unless in the attempt to purify it. Better is the frugal intellectual repast with contentment and virtue, than the luxury of learning with egotism and vice.
Right is radical. The teacher must know the truth himself. He must live it and love it, or he cannot impart Unwarranted expectations it to others. We soil our garments with conservatism, and afterwards we must wash them clean. When the spiritual sense of Truth unfolds its harmonies, you take no risks in the policy of error. Expect to heal simply by repeating the author's words, by right talking and wrong acting, and you will be disappointed. Such a practice does not demonstrate the Science by which divine Mind heals the sick.
Acting from sinful motives destroys your power of healing from the right motive. On the other hand, if Reliable authority you had the inclination or power to practise wrongly and then should adopt Christian Science, the wrong power would be destroyed. You do ​not deny the mathematician's right to distinguish the correct from the incorrect among the examples on the blackboard, nor disbelieve the musician when he distinguishes concord from discord. In like manner it should be granted that the author understands what she is saying.
Right and wrong, truth and error, will be at strife in the minds of students, until victory rests on the side of Winning the field invincible truth. Mental chemicalization follows the explanation of Truth, and a higher basis is thus won; but with some individuals the morbid moral or physical symptoms constantly reappear. I have never witnessed so decided effects from the use of material remedies as from the use of spiritual.
Teach your student that he must know himself before he can know others and minister to human needs. Knowledge and honesty Honesty is spiritual power. Dishonesty is human weakness, which forfeits divine help. You uncover sin, not in order to injure, but in order to bless the corporeal man; and a right motive has its reward. Hidden sin is spiritual wickedness in high places. The masquerader in this Science thanks God that there is no evil, yet serves evil in the name of good.
You should treat sickness mentally just as you would sin, except that you must not tell the patient that he is Metaphysical treatment sick nor give names to diseases, for such a course increases fear, the foundation of disease, and impresses more deeply the wrong mind-picture. A Christian Scientist's medicine is Mind, the divine Truth that makes man free. A Christian Scientist never recommends material hygiene, never manipulates. He does not trespass on the rights of mind nor can he practise ​animal magnetism or hypnotism. It need not be added that the use of tobacco or intoxicating drinks is not in harmony with Christian Science.
Teach your students the omnipotence of Truth, which illustrates the impotence of error. The understanding, Impotence of hate even in a degree, of the divine All-power destroys fear, and plants the feet in the true path, — the path which leads to the house built without hands “eternal in the heavens.” Human hate has no legitimate mandate and no kingdom. Love is enthroned. That evil or matter has neither intelligence nor power, is the doctrine of absolute Christian Science, and this is the great truth which strips all disguise from error.
He, who understands in a sufficient degree the Principle of Mind-healing, points out to his student error as Love the incentive well as truth, the wrong as well as the right practice. Love for God and man is the true is incentive in both healing and teaching. Love inspires, illumines, designates, and leads the way. Right motives give pinions to thought, and strength and freedom to speech and action. Love is priestess at the altar of Truth. Wait patiently for divine Love to move upon the waters of mortal mind, and form the perfect concept. Patience must “have her perfect work.”
Do not dismiss students at the close of a class term, feeling that you have no more to do for them. Let your Continuity of interest loving care and counsel support all their feeble footsteps, until your students tread firmly in the straight and narrow way. The superiority of spiritual power over sensuous is the central point of Christian Science. Remember that the letter and mental argument are only human auxiliaries to aid in bringing ​thought into accord with the spirit of Truth and Love, which heals the sick and the sinner.
A mental state of self-condemnation and guilt or a faltering and doubting trust in Truth are unsuitable Weakness and guilt conditions for healing the sick. Such mental states indicate weakness instead of strength. Hence the necessity of being right yourself in order to teach this Science of healing. You must utilize the moral might of Mind in order to walk over the waves of error and support your claims by demonstration. If you are yourself lost in the belief and fear of disease or sin, and if, knowing the remedy, you fail to use the energies of Mind in your own behalf, you can exercise little or no power for others' help. “First cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye.”
The student, who receives his knowledge of Christian Science, or metaphysical healing, from a human teacher, The trust of the All-wise may be mistaken in judgment and demonstration, but God cannot mistake. God selects for the highest service one who has grown into such a fitness for it as renders any abuse of the mission an impossibility. The All-wise does not bestow His highest trusts upon the unworthy. When He commissions a messenger, it is one who is spiritually near Himself. No person can misuse this mental power, if he is taught of God to discern it.
This strong point in Christian Science is not to be overlooked, — that the same fountain cannot send forth Integrity assured both sweet waters and bitter. The higher your attainment in the Science of mental healing and teaching, the more impossible it will ​become for you intentionally to influence mankind adverse to its highest hope and achievement.
Teaching or practising in the name of Truth, but contrary to its spirit or rules, is most dangerous quackery. Chicanery impossible Strict adherence to the divine Principle and rules of the scientific method has secured the only success of the students of Christian Science. This alone entitles them to the high standing which most of them hold in the community, a reputation experimentally justified by their efforts. Whoever affirms that there is more than one Principle and method of demonstrating Christian Science greatly errs, ignorantly or intentionally, and separates himself from the true conception of Christian Science healing and from its possible demonstration.
Any dishonesty in your theory and practice betrays a gross ignorance of the method of the Christ-cure. Science No dishonest concessions makes no concessions to persons or opinions, One must abide in the morale of truth or he cannot demonstrate the divine Principle. So long as matter is the basis of practice, illness cannot be efficaciously treated by the metaphysical process. Truth does the work, and you must both understand and abide by the divine Principle of your demonstration.
A Christian Scientist requires my work Science and Health for his textbook, and so do all his students and This volume indispensable patients. Why? First: Because it is the voice of Truth to this age, and contains the full statement of Christian Science, or the Science of healing through Mind. Second: Because it was the first book known, containing a thorough statement of Christian Science. Hence it gave the first rules for demonstrating ​this Science, and registered the revealed Truth uncontaminated by human hypotheses. Other works, which have borrowed from this book without giving it credit, have adulterated the Science. Third: Because this book has done more for teacher and student, for healer and patient, than has been accomplished by other books.
Since the divine light of Christian Science first dawned upon the author, she has never used this newly discovered Purity of science power in any direction which she fears to have fairly understood. Her prime object, since entering this field of labor, has been to prevent suffering, not to produce it. That we cannot scientifically both cure and cause disease is self-evident. In the legend of the shield, which led to a quarrel between two knights because each of them could see but one face of it, both sides were beautiful according to their degree; but to mental malpractice, prolific of evil, there is no good aspect, either silvern or golden.
Christian Science is not an exception to the general rule, that there is no excellence without labor in a direct Backsliders and mistakes line. One cannot scatter his fire, and at the same time hit the mark. To pursue other vocations and advance rapidly in the demonstration of this Science, is not possible. Departing from Christian Science, some learners commend diet and hygiene. They even practise these, intending thereby to initiate the cure which they mean to complete with Mind, as if the non-intelligent could aid Mind! The Scientist's demonstration rests on one Principle, and there must and can be no opposite rule. Let this Principle be applied to the cure of disease without exploiting other means.
​Mental quackery rests on the same platform as all other quackery. The chief plank in this platform is the Mental charlatanism doctrine that Science has two principles in partnership, one good and the other evil, — one spiritual, the other material, — and that these two may be simultaneously at work on the sick. This theory is supposed to favor practice from both a mental and a material standpoint. Another plank in the platform is this, that error will finally have the same effect as truth.
It is anything but scientifically Christian to think of aiding the divine Principle of healing or of trying to Divinity ever ready sustain the human body until the divine Mind is ready to take the case. Divinity is always ready. Semper paratus is Truth's motto. Having seen so much suffering from quackery, the author desires to keep it out of Christian Science. The two-edged sword of Truth must turn in every direction to guard “the tree of life.”
Sin makes deadly thrusts at the Christian Scientist as ritualism and creed are summoned to give place to higher The panoply of wisdom law, but Science will ameliorate mortal malice. The Christianly scientific man reflects the divine law, thus becoming a law unto himself. He does violence to no man. Neither is he a false accuser. The Christian Scientist wisely shapes his course, and is honest and consistent in following the leadings of divine Mind. He must prove, through living as well as healing and teaching, that Christ's way is the only one by which mortals are radically saved from sin and sickness.
Christianity causes men to turn naturally from matter ​to Spirit, as the flower turns from darkness to light, Man then appropriates those things which “eye hath Advancement by sacrifice not seen nor ear heard,” Paul and John had a clear apprehension that, as mortal man achieves no worldly honors except by sacrifice, so he must gain heavenly riches by forsaking all worldliness. Then he will have nothing in common with the worldling's affections, motives, and aims. Judge not the future advancement of Christian Science by the steps already taken, lest you yourself be condemned for failing to take the first step.
Any attempt to heal mortals with erring mortal mind, instead of resting on the omnipotence of the divine Dangerous knowledge Mind, must prove abortive. Committing the bare process of mental healing to frail mortals, untaught and unrestrained by Christian Science, is like putting a sharp knife into the hands of a blind man or a raging maniac, and turning him loose in the crowded streets of a city. Whether animated by malice or ignorance, a false practitioner will work mischief, and ignorance is more harmful than wilful wickedness, when the latter is distrusted and thwarted in its incipiency.
To mortal sense Christian Science seems abstract, but the process is simple and the results are sure if the Science Certainty of results is understood. The tree must be good, which produces good fruit. Guided by divine Truth and not guesswork, the theologus (that is, the student — the Christian and scientific expounder — of the divine law) treats disease with more certain results than any other healer on the globe. The Christian Scientist should understand and adhere strictly to the rules of divine ​metaphysics as laid down in this work, and rest his demonstration on this sure basis.
Ontology is defined as “the science of the necessary constituents and relations of all beings,” and it underlies Ontology defined all metaphysical practice. Our system of Mind-healing rests on the apprehension of the nature and essence of all being, — on the divine Mind and Love's essential qualities. Its pharmacy is moral, and its medicine is intellectual and spiritual, though used for physical healing. Yet this most fundamental part of metaphysics is the one most difficult to understand and demonstrate, for to the material thought all is material, till such thought is rectified by Spirit.
Sickness is neither imaginary nor unreal, — that is, to the frightened, false sense of the patient. Sickness Mischievous imagination is more than fancy; it is solid conviction. It is therefore to be dealt with through right apprehension of the truth of being. If Christian healing is abused by mere smatterers in Science, it becomes a tedious mischief-maker. Instead of scientifically effecting a cure, it starts a petty crossfire over every cripple and invalid, buffeting them with the superficial and cold assertion, “Nothing ails you.”
When the Science of Mind was a fresh revelation to the author, she had to impart, while teaching its grand Author's early instructions facts, the hue of spiritual ideas from her own spiritual condition, and she had to do this orally through the meagre channel afforded by language and by her manuscript circulated among the students. As former beliefs were gradually expelled from her thought, the teaching became clearer, until finally the shadow of old errors was no longer cast upon divine Science.
​I do not maintain that anyone can exist in the flesh without food and raiment; but I do believe that the Proof by induction real man is immortal and that he lives in Spirit, not matter. Christian Science must be accepted at this period by induction. We admit the whole, because a part is proved and that part illustrates and proves the entire Principle. Christian Science can be taught only by those who are morally advanced and spiritually endowed, for it is not superficial, nor is it. discerned from the standpoint of the human senses. Only by the illumination of the spiritual sense, can the light of understanding be thrown upon this Science, because Science reverses the evidence before the material senses and furnishes the eternal interpretation of God and man.
If you believe that you are sick, should you say, “I am sick”? No, but you should tell your belief sometimes, if this be requisite to protect others. If you commit a crime, should you acknowledge to yourself that you are a criminal? Yes. Your responses should differ because of the different effects they produce. Usually to admit that you are sick, renders your case less curable, while to recognize your sin, aids in destroying it. Both sin and sickness are error, and Truth is their remedy. The truth regarding error is, that error is not true, hence it is unreal. To prove scientifically the error or unreality of sin, you must first see the claim of sin, and then destroy it. Whereas, to prove scientifically the error or unreality of disease, you must mentally unsee the disease; then you will not feel it, and it is destroyed.
Systematic teaching and the student's spiritual growth and experience in practice are requisite for a thorough ​comprehension of Christian Science. Some individuals assimilate truth more readily than others, but any Rapidity of assimilation student, who adheres to the divine rules of Christian Science and imbibes the spirit of Christ, can demonstrate Christian Science, cast out error, heal the sick, and add continually to his store of spiritual understanding, potency, enlightenment, and success.
If the student goes away to practise Truth's teachings only in part, dividing his interests between God and Divided loyalty mammon and substituting his own views for Truth, he will inevitably reap the error he sows. Whoever would demonstrate the healing of Christian Science must abide strictly by its rules, heed every statement, and advance from the rudiments laid down. There is nothing difficult nor toilsome in this task, when the way is pointed out; but self-denial, sincerity, Christianity, and persistence alone win the prize, as they usually do in every department of life.
Anatomy, when conceived of spiritually, is mental self-knowledge, and consists in the dissection of thoughts to Anatomy defined discover their quality, quantity, and origin. Are thoughts divine or human? That is the important question. This branch of study is indispensable to the excision of error. The anatomy of Christian Science teaches when and how to probe the self-inflicted wounds of selfishness, malice, envy, and hate. It teaches the control of mad ambition. It unfolds the hallowed influences of unselfishness, philanthropy, spiritual love. It urges the government of the body both in health and in sickness. The Christian Scientist, through understanding mental anatomy, discerns and ​deals with the real cause of disease. The material physician gropes among phenomena, which fluctuate every instant under influences not embraced in his diagnosis, and so he may stumble and fall in the darkness.
Teacher and student should also be familiar with the obstetrics taught by this Science. To attend properly Scientific obstetrics the birth of the new child, or divine idea, you should so detach mortal thought from its material conceptions, that the birth will be natural and safe. Though gathering new energy, this idea cannot injure its useful surroundings in the travail of spiritual birth. A spiritual idea has not a single element of error, and this truth removes properly whatever is offensive. The new idea, conceived and born of Truth and Love, is clad in white garments. Its beginning will be meek, its growth sturdy, and its maturity undecaying. When this new birth takes place, the Christian Science infant is born of the Spirit, born of God, and can cause the mother no more suffering. By this we know that Truth is here and has fulfilled its perfect work.
To decide quickly as to the proper treatment of error — whether error is manifested in forms of sickness, sin, Unhesitating decision or death — is the first step towards destroying error. Our Master treated error through Mind. He never enjoined obedience to the laws of nature, if by these are meant laws of matter, nor did he use drugs. There is a law of God applicable to healing, and it is a spiritual law instead of material. The sick are not healed by inanimate matter or drugs, as they believe that they are. Such seeming medical effect or action is that of so-called mortal mind.
It has been said to the author, “The world is ​benefited by you, but it feels your influence without seeing you. Why do you not make yourself more widely Seclusion of the author known?” Could her friends know how little time the author has had, in which to make herself outwardly known except through her laborious publications, — and how much time and toil are still required to establish the stately operations of Christian Science, — they would understand why she is so secluded. Others could not take her place, even if willing so to do. She therefore remains unseen at her post, seeking no self-aggrandizement but praying, watching, and working for the redemption of mankind.
If from an injury or from any cause, a Christian Scientist were seized with pain so violent that he could not treat himself mentally, — and the Scientists had failed to relieve him, — the sufferer could call a surgeon, who would give him a hypodermic injection, then, when the belief of pain was lulled, he could handle his own case mentally. Thus it is that we “prove all things; [and] hold fast that which is good.”
In founding a pathological system of Christianity, the author has labored to expound divine Principle, and not The right motive and its reward to exalt personality. The weapons of bigotry, ignorance, envy, fall before an honest heart. Adulterating Christian Science, makes it void. Falsity has no foundation. “The hireling fleeth, because he is an hireling, and careth not for the sheep.” Neither dishonesty nor ignorance ever founded, nor can they overthrow a scientific system of ethics.