The Monticellonian., 1916-06-08


sickness, sufferings. and death.
This belief of the deitfie origin OF
disease and death they carried with
them into Christianity, just as they
carried with them some of their pa
gan ceremonials and holidays We
need not wonder so much at this
when we note how men are always
showing disposition to shift to other
shoulders than their own the RESPONSE
bility for their own faults. This dis
position manifested itself when Adam
said it was Eve who tempted him,
and Eve said it was the serpent that
tempted her That convenient way o.
trying to dodge the responsibility for
our own faults has been in quite con
slant evidence ever since. The major.
their consciences to attribute their
sins to the temptations of the devil
and their sicknesses to God If you
should sWindle some widow out of her
property, how nice it is for you 70
say to yourself that you were tempted
TO do it through the influence of Sa-
tan, instead of confessing to yourself
that you are a disreputable sharper
If a boy eats green apples and, accord
ing to the prevailing notion about
such things, he should suffer from
appendicitis" (it was called by diff
ferent name when was a boy). and a
surgical operation can be paid for,
and the boy fails to recover therefrom,
how nice and comfortable it is for
the whole affair to be disposed of at
the funeral by the statement that
sickness and death are mysterious
dispensations of divine Providence''
This smooth and convenient phrase
has for it's parentage the old mytho-
logical belief that some evil-minded
deity visited sickness and death on
human beings. But the old pagan no.
ton was more logical than its modern
offspring, which imputes human ills
to a good minded deity.
Jesus taught and reason teaches,
the very opposite of the dogma which
imputes sickness and death to a de-
fife origin He declared that his works,
referring TO the overcoming of sick
ness and other human ills, were
the works of the Father, not of him
self. and that of himslf he could do
nothing. These words describe God
as the very opposite of a Supreme Be
ing who afflicts His children with
sickness. suffering, and death. The
words of Jesus plainly show us that
he regarded God as He is described
to be in the Old Testament, the great
Physician" and as He who "healeth
all thy diseases" Then take the
words of Jesus, Eye shall know the
truth, and the truth shall make you
free" The office of truth is to free
US from falsehood, not from what is
true If sickness or any phase of evil
were consequent to the will and gov
eminent of God, then such sickness or
other phase of evil would be the
truth of mans being, and the truth
could not free him therefrom.
Let us look at the matter from the
viewpoint of plain reasoning for a
moment If sickness were "a dispen-
sation of divine Providence" what
would be the use of trying to get
well? You would be trying TO thwart
the divine purpose in trying to get
well yourself, or in seeking to restore
any one else from sickness. Surely,
you cannot reason that God causes
you to be sick, unless he wishes you
to be sick. If you really believe that
God, either through some law of ma
ture (and there are no laws of ma
ture apart and distinct from the laws
of God, or by some special divine in
terposition in your case, causes you
to be sick or to suffer in any way,
for any divine purpose whatsoever, is
it not both Supremacy wicked and a
very foolish thing for you to do to
turn a rebel against God and seek to
defeat the divine will and desire? Or,
do you try to reason that God is in
finitely good. and vet sends sickness
and death upon His children just to
see whether or not they will escape
the grave for few days? Did you
ever see a cat playing with a captured
mouse, pretending to let the miserably
frightened little creature escape for
while, only to crush it remorselessly
at last? Is that your idea of God2
Surely, Jesus never taught such a God
as that when he brought to mankind
his gospel of divine lovei
81 kness, like sin, is of human and
not of deific origin. Sickness. like
sin, is man-made, not God-made. Sick
ness. like sin, not being any part of
Gods creation, is not a truth, but a
falsehood in Gods universe, not re-
ality, but false human conscious
ness. Sickness, like sin, comes to
men when they separate themselves
in their consciousness from divine
truth. Therefore, Jesus taught the
true and depenS lie remedy for sick
ness, as well as sin, when he prom
ised to us the power of truth to make
us free. And the facts in the first
three centuries of our Christian era
unite with the facts of this age in the
history of Christian Science. to prove
that the remedy taught by Jesus is
the true and dependable remedy both
for sin and sickness-the selfsame
remedy for both, the divine truth
cure.
Our Christian churches of other de-
nominations recognize that sin is of
human origin and has nothing divine
about it. May the time soon arrive
when they will teach the same truth
in respect TO sickness and other