Arizona republican., 1920-11-08
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE LECTURE D....u

unscientific, but irreligious, and in the list analysis even sacrilegious.
 I have asked you to follow along in this course of reasoning for certain purpose, and that purpose l believe now begins to appear. It is that you may learn the naturalness of health and life and the unnaturalness of dis ease and death. Perceiving, as be- heve you must have done, as we have gone on here thinking this out to- gether, that God does not and cannot include or conceive of a single deStruc- tive element or quality, you can see
 that better understanding of God will mean more of the presence of God, and will tend to remove destructive ele-
 ments and incidents from our lives.
 Thereby health and life will not only be more general. but more permanent.
 We have taken a step in the Science of Life within these few minutes. and
 l wish to call your attention to the fact that it has been a pleasant step, ana
 none of us has suffered in taking It.
 have not urged you to believe in
 Christian Science, and I promise you
 that I will not urge you to believe any
 thing. The most that I ask of you,
 anywhere, at any time, in considerlng
 this subject, is to think. It goes with
 out saying that thinking requires logic,
 for without consistency, without Prin
 ciple or basis of thinking. and con
 clusions drawn by reason, there is no
 real thinking going on. Just here,
 however, some who have turned thelr
 faces toward the light of Christian
 Science find themselves asSailed by
 questions as to the reason for the ex-
 istence, or seeming existence. Of dis
 ease and sin and the rest of the train or
 destructive and affective human ex-
 periences. They accept the inevitable logic of Christian Science, which have
 briefly and altogether inadequately touched upon here, but they naturally wonder about human experiences that, according to Christian Science, could
 not be either God ordained or God sus- tained. It is not strange that they
 should do so, but let it be said that Christian Science is like other sciences in at least one respect: if 1t is to be demonstrated its rules must be fol-
 lowed. Its Principle must be perceived and maintained under all circum- stances.
 Even in the study of art and music, we find that progress depends upon al-
 legiance to certain ideals which have sprung from standards established by the most cultured men and women ot
 the world. The mistakes that we make | in the study of art do not, or should | not engage our attention any longer | than is required to correct them. Let us then take that same attitude toward ! the affective experiences of human existence. They are not of God, con
 sequently they are not scientific, and not true in the highest sense. They are only true to our limited powers of ob- | ond hopanSa of nIIr in2dA- quate education. For example, certain mechanical improvements which today are commonly understood and usec could not have been conceived of by | our forefathers. If enlightenment has I enabled us to discover them, an6 | thereby to avail ourselves of such i'm. provements, and thereby also to de away with some devices which were
 crude and perhaps unscientific, may
 not greater enlightenment enable u: to do away with the experiences of sir and disease and when they are abol. lished shall we have any interest 1T | asking how it was that they came about? An afflictive experience, giv- 1 ing way to health and peace, or a crude l invention, giving way to an intelli I gent discovery, need not be inquired into. It's day is past, and as it hat no permanent value, 1t had no req 1 being. The best and only explanation
 of error is to show it's unreality, ant ask you to consider this sufficient an' final explanation. Permanent valu
 must be the criterion by which VI judge. With this criterion in view
 greater improvements than are ye !, dreamed of will come to light and b. the same token, things that are nov accepted as natural will vanish unde . the revelation of the true naturalnes , of an existence that has its being. func
 Is wholly good.
 Consider also that an eternal caus or creator cannot be conceived of t be personality, consequently the req . personality of God, or the real char } acter and being of God. must be MinC 5 There is no other word that so full enlightens us and enables us to see tn t perfect relationship existing betwee 3 the creator and his creation. Beside sl this the word Mind satisfies our intel 3 lectual cravings in another direction It explains what we call thinking. Eve though much of what is called fumal
 t thinking is wholly unworthy of ma 3 and utterly unknown to God, yet eve that semblance of thinking implie l mentality, and mentality means tha somewhere in the universe, and. indeed , everywhere in the universe, is Mind, tn ! cause and creator of all things and tn ultimate explanation of our power think, which becomes more Christlik S as God is better understood.
 k When we perceive that divine Min . is the sole Cause of all things, we be t gin to perceive what Life really is, an y how Life and its Science may be mol