However, if the teacher is the parent, and the child is young and still at home, Mason suddenly makes the parents' role as teachers immensely important, claiming it is they who determine their child's thoughts and actions, which Mason believes to be based all on habit. Habit, in the hands of the mother, is as his wheel to the potter, his knife to the carver the instrument by means of which she turns out the design she has already conceived in her brain. . . . Physiologists tell us of the adaptation of brain structures to habitual lines of thought i.e., to our habits. It is this second sentence that warrants special attention. Man's character is the result of his habits, which are a result of his thoughts, and his thoughts he has no control over, she says.
Today is the day of salvation, physically speaking, because a habit . . .
We perceive that conversion, however sudden, is no miracle at all. . . Truly His commandment is exceeding broad, and grows broader day by day with each new revelation of Science. While Mason's emphasis on the formation of good habits may seem fine on the surface, once it is penetrated, one sees how Mason perceives that even man's conversion, salvation, hinges upon or is the result of his forming good habits based upon good thoughts based upon good ideas. Mason's teaching reflects belief more in the words of man than a belief in The Word, our Lord Jesus, and the power of His redeeming blood for our salvation. Mason's philosophy diminishes our need for a new life, not through our efforts, but through the work of Christ alone.