According to the Scriptures—St. Paul declares astutely,
“For of Him, and through Him, and to Him, are all
things,”—man is incapable of originating; nothing can [25]
be formed apart from God, good, the all-knowing Mind.
What seems to be of human origin is the counterfeit
of the divine—even human concepts, mortal shadows
flitting across the dial of time.
Whatever is real is right and eternal; hence the im- [30]
mutable and just law of Science, that God is good only,
[pg 072]
and can transmit to man and the universe nothing evil, [1]
or unlike Himself. For the innocent babe to be born a
lifelong sufferer because of his parents' mistakes or sins,
were sore injustice. Science sets aside man as a creator,
and unfolds the eternal harmonies of the only living and [5]
true origin, God.
According to the beliefs of the flesh, both good and
bad traits of the parents are transmitted to their help-
less offspring, and God is supposed to impart to man
this fatal power. It is cause for rejoicing that this belief [10]
is as false as it is remorseless. The immutable Word
saith, through the prophet Ezekiel, “What mean ye, that
ye use this proverb concerning the land of Israel, saying,
The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children's
teeth are set on edge? As I live, saith the Lord God, [15]
ye shall not have occasion any more to use this proverb
in Israel.”
Are material things real when they are harmonious, and
do they disappear only to the natural sense? Does this
Scripture, “Your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have [20]
need of all these things” imply that Spirit takes note of
matter?
The Science of Mind, as well as the material unii
verse, shows that nothing which is material is in
perpetual harmony. Matter is manifest mortal mind, [35]
and it exists only to material sense. Real sensation
is not material; it is, and must be, mental: and Mind
is not mortal, it is immortal. Being is God, infinite
Spirit; therefore it cannot cognize aught material, or
outside of infinity. [30]
The Scriptural passage quoted affords no evidence of
[pg 073]
the reality of matter, or that God is conscious of it. [1]
The so-called material body is said to suffer, but this
supposition is proven erroneous when Mind casts out
the suffering. The Scripture saith, “Whom the Lord
loveth He chasteneth;” and again, “He doth not [5]
afflict willingly.” Interpreted materially, these pas-
sages conflict; they mingle the testimony of immor-
tal Science with mortal sense; but once discern their
spiritual meaning, and it separates the false sense from
the true, and establishes the reality of what is spiritual, [10]
and the unreality of materiality.
Law is never material: it is always mental and moral,
and a commandment to the wise. The foolish disobey
moral law, and are punished. Human wisdom therefore
can get no farther than to say, He knoweth that we have [15]
need of experience. Belief fulfils the conditions of a be-
lief, and these conditions destroy the belief. Hence the
verdict of experience: We have need of these things; we
have need to know that the so-called pleasures and pains
of matter—yea, that all subjective states of false sensa- [20]
tion—are unreal.
“And Jesus said unto them, Verily I say unto you,
That ye which have followed me, in the regeneration when
the Son of man shall sit in the throne of his glory,
ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the [25]
twelve tribes of Israel.” (Matt. xix. 28.) What is meant
by regeneration?
It is the appearing of divine law to human under-
standing; the spiritualization that comes from spiritual
sense in contradistinction to the testimony of the so- [30]
called material senses. The phenomena of Spirit in
[pg 074]
Christian Science, and the divine correspondence of [1]
noumenon and phenomenon understood, are here signi-
fied. This new-born sense subdues not only the false
sense of generation, but the human will, and the un-
natural enmity of mortal man toward God. It quickly [5]
imparts a new apprehension of the true basis of being,
and the spiritual foundation for the affections which en-
throne the Son of man in the glory of his Father; and
judges, through the stern mandate of Science, all human
systems of etiology and teleology. [10]
If God does not recognize matter, how did Jesus, who was
“the way, the truth, and the life,” cognize it?
Christ Jesus' sense of matter was the opposite of that
which mortals entertain: his nativity was a spiritual and
immortal sense of the ideal world. His earthly mission [15]
was to translate substance into its original meaning,
Mind. He walked upon the waves; he turned the water
into wine; he healed the sick and the sinner; he raised
the dead, and rolled away the stone from the door of his
own tomb. His demonstration of Spirit virtually van- [20]
quished matter and its supposed laws. Walking the
wave, he proved the fallacy of the theory that matter is
substance; healing through Mind, he removed any sup-
position that matter is intelligent, or can recognize or
express pain and pleasure. His triumph over the grave [25]
was an everlasting victory for Life; it demonstrated the
lifelessness