Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1917-09-26

mental status Of many of us as re |gards the deep things of life? Chris.
 tian Science bids us awake from this
 lethargy and accept the divine invita-.
 tion chronicled in Isaiah, "Come now and let us reason together, said the Lord."
 How to Read Science and Health. On the first page of the Preface o1 iScienca and Health we are told that "the time for thinkers has come" Ano
 as only those can understand this
 mighty revelation who think rightly ol
 are willing to be taught so to do, it rot infrequently follows that one hears
 this remark: "I have read Science
 and health; in fact I have read it many times, but can get nothing from it. 7 Yes, one might go to the sagebrush deserts of our western country and SOW seed and then SOW more seed, and
 never have a flower. If one is wise
 he will not SOW until in some measure he has prepared the soil. There is irrigating to be done and the obstruc- 1tive sage-brush must be rooted out. Is
 it not possible, you who may have read
 and can find nothing, that your mental
 areas are cumbereG with the stubborn
 growth of bias and criticism and self satisfaction, or parched with the un-
 lovely alkali of a purely material view point?
 ! Ruskin gives the following useful hints as to the proper way to arrive
 at the full meaning of book. He says
 that we should study books: "First
 with a desire to be taught by them,
 and to enter into their thoughts. To
 enter into theirs, observe; not find your own expressed by them. If the person who wrote the book is not wiser than you. you need not read it; if he
 be, he will think differently from you
 in many respects. Very ready we are
 to say of book: How good this is!
 that's exactly what I think But the right feeling is: How strange that is I never thought of that before, and yet I see it is true: or if I do not now, hope I shall some day. But whether thus "submissively or not, at least be
 sure that you go to the author to get
 Judge it afterwards, if you think your self qualified to do so, but ascertain
 it first"
 So let us approach this unique volume with an open heart and a sin
 cere desire to be taught. And if we persist in it's study, nothing can with.
 hold from us the joy of it's message. To analyze or attempt even re- sume of the seventeen chapters o1 Science and Health would require g :, period of time far greater than that :, allotted for this lecture. It is our pur pose therefore to consider briefly but
 few phases of Mrs. Eddy's discovery especially those relating to the mis' !, sion and teachings. of Jesus and the l possibility of repeating his healing f work.
 ; Prayer.
 Q The chapter on Prayer" with which f the textbook opens, is to the human mind surcharged with the murkines: of materiality, as cooling breeze waiting gently away the oppression l of midsummer's day. Through it' pages thought is quietly led from thu
 finite material conception of God. te the apprehension of Him as everpres ent Love, as infinite unchanging good who needs no reminders from frai [ mortality as to the proper conduct o1 His universe. True prayer is seen therefore, not as petition, nor the eff fort to change the all-knowing Mind
 but as that hungering after righteous s ness, that "habitual struggle to be al ways good" Science and Health. p F Al, which brings human conscious I mess into relation with the divine ant : lifts thought to the realization that '. a loving Father has already done al t things we'll.
 :, AtOnement and Eucharist. Il The second chapter of the text book is entitled "Atonement and Flu ] charist," and in clear, forceful state }. ment deals with the great life-purpose of the Master. It has been said that : this chapter may be ranked with the g choicest of English prose classics. Il
 breathes a spirit of deepest rever g ence, and only he who clings to a ma S terial viewpoint and avoids the au = thor's up-lifted spiritual sense vii g quarrel with it's statements. s The chapter opens with trumpet I call to thinkers; to those who may bt l willing, temporarily at least, to put t behind them preconceived theological j. opinions, and to reason. The life ant . mission of Jesus the Christ are in t stantly taken from the realm of tho r mystical, the supernatural, and art g shown to be intensely practical ane l divinely natural. Hear these clear
 intelligible utterances: Jesus of Nag
 areth taught and demonstrated mans . oneness with the Father, and for this n we owe him endless homage. His mis l sion was both individual and collec. , tive. He did, life's work alright not < only in justice to himself. but in mercy !. to mortals-to show them how to dc theirs, but not to do it for them no1 5 to relieve them of a single responsi. , bility." "His mission was to revea the Science of celestial being, to prove what God is and what He does fol
 man." "The divinity of the Christ was
 made manifest in the humanity o1
 Jesus" (Science and Health, pp. 18 l26, 25).
 Ignorance of Jesus Mission.
 Without doubt, the great error of
 Christian history lies in mankind's ignorance of Jesus mission. Mrs
 Eddy's spiritual Interpretation of his
 x,xo,.Jc ox,J ysovoo1c him QS hr-