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Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures
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540:1marvellous demonstrations. Christ is the offspring of Spirit, and spiritual existence shows that Spirit creates 3neither a wicked nor a mortal man, lapsing into sin, sickness, and death.
In Isaiah we read: I make peace, and create evil. I 6the Lord do all these things;but the prophet referred to
Cleansing
upheaval
divine law as stirring up the belief in evil to its utmost, when bringing it to the surface and re9ducing it to its common denominator, nothingness.
The muddy river-bed must be stirred in order to purify the stream. In moral chemicalization, when the symptoms 12of evil, illusion, are aggravated, we may think in our ignorance that the Lord hath wrought an evil; but we ought to know that God’s law uncovers so-called sin and its 15effects, only that Truth may annihilate all sense of evil and all power to sin.
Science renders unto Cæsar the things which are 18Cæsar’s; and unto God the things that are God’s. It
Allegiance
to Spirit
saith to the human sense of sin, sickness, and death, God never made you, and you are a 21false sense which hath no knowledge of God.
The purpose of the Hebrew allegory, representing error as assuming a divine character, is to teach mortals never to believe 24a lie.
Genesis iv. 3, 4. Cain brought of the fruit of the ground an offering unto the Lord [Jehovah]. And Abel, he also 27brought of the firstlings of his flock, and of the fat thereof.
Cain is the type of mortal and material man, conceived
Spiritual and
material
in sin and shapen in iniquity;he is not the 30type of Truth and Love.
Material in origin and sense, he brings a material offering to God. Abel 541:1takes his offering from the firstlings of the flock. A lamb is a more animate form of existence, and more nearly re3sembles a mind-offering than does Cain’s fruit. Jealous of his brother’s gift, Cain seeks Abel’s life, instead of making his own gift a higher tribute to the Most High.
6 Genesis iv. 4, 5. And the Lord [Jehovah] had respect unto Abel, and to his offering: but unto Cain, and to his offering, He had not respect.
9Had God more respect for the homage bestowed through a gentle animal than for the worship expressed by Cain’s fruit? No; but the lamb was a more spiritual type of 12even the human concept of Love than the herbs of the ground could be.
Genesis iv. 8. Cain rose up against Abel his brother, and 15slew him.
The erroneous belief that life, substance, and intelligence can be material ruptures the life and brotherhood 18of man at the very outset.
Genesis iv. 9. And the Lord [Jehovah] said unto Cain, Where is Abel thy brother? And he said, I know not: Am 21I my brother’s keeper?
Here the serpentine lie invents new forms. At first it
Brotherhood
repudiated
usurps divine power.
It is supposed to say 24in the first instance, Ye shall be as gods. Now it repudiates even the human duty of man towards his brother.
27Genesis iv. 10, 11. And He [Jehovah] said, . . . The voice of thy brother’s blood crieth unto Me from the ground. And now art thou cursed from the earth.
542:1The belief of life in matter sins at every step. It incurs divine displeasure, and it would kill Jesus that it 3
Murder brings
its curse
might be rid of troublesome Truth.
Material beliefs would slay the spiritual idea whenever and wherever it appears. Though error hides 6behind a lie and excuses guilt, error cannot forever be concealed. Truth, through her eternal laws, unveils error. Truth causes sin to betray itself, and sets upon 9error the mark of the beast. Even the disposition to excuse guilt or to conceal it is punished. The avoidance of justice and the denial of truth tend to perpetuate sin, 12invoke crime, jeopardize self-control, and mock divine mercy.
Genesis iv. 15. And the Lord [Jehovah] said unto him, 15Therefore whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold. And the Lord [Jehovah] set a mark upon Cain, lest any finding him should kill him.
18They that take the sword shall perish with the sword. Let Truth uncover and destroy error in God’s
Retribution
and remorse
own way, and let human justice pattern the 21divine.
Sin will receive its full penalty, both for what it is and for what it does. Justice marks the sinner, and teaches mortals not to remove the 24waymarks of God. To envy’s own hell, justice consigns the lie which, to advance itself, breaks God’s commandments.
27Genesis iv. 16. And Cain went out from the presence of the Lord [Jehovah], and dwelt in the land of Nod.
The sinful misconception of Life as something less 543:1than God, having no truth to support it, falls back upon itself. This error, after reaching the climax of suffering, 3
Climax of
suffering
yields to Truth and returns to dust; but it is only mortal man and not the real man, who dies.
The image of Spirit cannot be effaced, since it 6is the idea of Truth and changes not, but becomes more beautifully apparent at error’s demise.
In divine Science, the material man is shut out from 9the presence of God. The five corporeal senses cannot
Dwelling in
dreamland
take cognizance of Spirit.
They cannot come into His presence, and must dwell in dream12land, until mortals arrive at the understanding that material life, with all its sin, sickness, and death, is an illusion, against which divine Science is engaged in a warfare 15of extermination. The great verities of existence are never excluded by falsity.
All error proceeds from the evidence before the mate18rial senses. If man is material and originates in an
Man springs
from Mind
egg, who shall say that he is not primarily dust?
May not Darwin be right in think21ing that apehood preceded mortal manhood? Minerals and vegetables are found, according to divine Science, to be the creations of erroneous thought, not of matter. 24Did man, whom God created with a word, originate in an egg? When Spirit made all, did it leave aught for matter to create? Ideas of Truth alone are reflected 27in the myriad manifestations of Life, and thus it is seen that man springs solely from Mind. The belief that matter supports life would make Life, or God, 30mortal.
The text, In the day that the Lord God [Jehovah God] made the earth and the heavens,introduces the 544:1record of a material creation which followed the spiritual, a creation so wholly apart from God’s, that Spirit 3
Material
inception
had no participation in it.
In God’s creation ideas became productive, obedient to Mind. There was no rain and not a man to till the ground. 6Mind, instead of matter, being the producer, Life was self-sustained. Birth, decay, and death arise from the material sense of things, not from the spiritual, for in 9the latter Life consisteth not of the things which a man eateth. Matter cannot change the eternal fact that man exists because God exists. Nothing is new to the 12infinite Mind.
In Science, Mind neither produces matter nor does matter produce mind. No mortal mind has the might 15
First evil
suggestion
or right or wisdom to create or to destroy.
All is under the control of the one Mind, even God. The first statement about evil, the first 18suggestion of more than the one Mind, is in the fable of the serpent. The facts of creation, as previously recorded, include nothing of the kind.
21The serpent is supposed to say, Ye shall be as gods,but these gods must be evolved from materiality and be
Material
personality
the very antipodes of immortal and spiritual 24being.
Man is the likeness of Spirit, but a material personality is not this likeness. Therefore man, in this allegory, is neither a lesser god nor the image and 27likeness of the one God.
Material, erroneous belief reverses understanding and truth. It declares mind to be in and of matter, so-called 30mortal life to be Life, infinity to enter man’s nostrils so that matter becomes spiritual. Error begins with corporeality as the producer instead of divine Prin545:1ciple, and explains Deity through mortal and finite conceptions.
3Behold, the man is become as one of us. This could not be the utterance of Truth or Science, for according to the record, material man was fast degenerating and 6never had been divinely conceived.
The condemnation of mortals to till the ground means this, that mortals should so improve material belief 9
Mental
tillage
by thought tending spiritually upward as to destroy materiality.
Man, created by God, was given dominion over the whole earth. The notion 12of a material universe is utterly opposed to the theory of man as evolved from Mind. Such fundamental errors send falsity into all human doctrines and conclusions, 15and do not accord infinity to Deity. Error tills the whole ground in this material theory, which is entirely a false view, destructive to existence and happiness. Out18side of Christian Science all is vague and hypothetical, the opposite of Truth; yet this opposite, in its false view of God and man, impudently demands a blessing.
21The translators of this record of scientific creation entertained a false sense of being. They believed in
Erroneous
standpoint
the existence of matter, its propagation and 24power.
From that standpoint of error, they could not apprehend the nature and operation of Spirit. Hence the seeming contradiction in that Scripture, which 27is so glorious in its spiritual signification. Truth has but one reply to all error, to sin, sickness, and death: Dust [nothingness] thou art, and unto dust [nothingness] 30shalt thou return.
As in Adam [error] all die, even so in Christ [Truth] shall all be made alive. The mortality of man is a 546:1myth, for man is immortal. The false belief that spirit is now submerged in matter, at some future time to be eman3
Mortality
mythical
cipated from it, this belief alone is mortal.
Spirit, God, never germinates, but is the same yesterday, and to-day, and forever. If Mind, God, cre6ates error, that error must exist in the divine Mind, and this assumption of error would dethrone the perfection of Deity.
9Is Christian Science contradictory? Is the divine Principle of creation misstated? Has God no Science to
No truth
from a
material basis
declare Mind, while matter is governed by un12erring intelligence?
There went up a mist from the earth. This represents error as starting from an idea of good on a material basis. It 15supposes God and man to be manifested only through the corporeal senses, although the material senses can take no cognizance of Spirit or the spiritual idea.
18Genesis and the Apocalypse seem more obscure than other portions of the Scripture, because they cannot possibly be interpreted from a material standpoint. To 21the author, they are transparent, for they contain the deep divinity of the Bible.
Christian Science is dawning upon a material age. 24The great spiritual facts of being, like rays of light, shine
Dawning of
spiritual facts
in the darkness, though the darkness, comprehending them not, may deny their reality.
27The proof that the system stated in this book is Christianly scientific resides in the good this system accomplishes, for it cures on a divine demonstrable Principle 30which all may understand.
If mathematics should present a thousand different examples of one rule, the proving of one example would 547:1authenticate all the others. A simple statement of Christian Science, if demonstrated by healing, contains the 3
Proof given
in healing
proof of all here said of Christian Science.
If one of the statements in this book is true, every one must be true, for not one departs from the stated sys6tem and rule. You can prove for yourself, dear reader, the Science of healing, and so ascertain if the author has given you the correct interpretation of Scripture.
9The late Louis Agassiz, by his microscopic examination of a vulture’s ovum, strengthens the thinker’s conclusions
Embryonic
evolution
as to the scientific theory of creation.
Agassiz 12was able to see in the egg the earth’s atmosphere, the gathering clouds, the moon and stars, while the germinating speck of so-called embryonic life seemed a 15small sun. In its history of mortality, Darwin’s theory of evolution from a material basis is more consistent than most theories. Briefly, this is Darwin’s theory, that 18Mind produces its opposite, matter, and endues matter with power to recreate the universe, including man. Material evolution implies that the great First Cause must 21become material, and afterwards must either return to Mind or go down into dust and nothingness.
The Scriptures are very sacred. Our aim must be to 24have them understood spiritually, for only by this under
True theory
of the
universe
standing can truth be gained.
The true theory of the universe, including man, is not in 27material history but in spiritual development. Inspired thought relinquishes a material, sensual, and mortal theory of the universe, and adopts the spiritual and 30immortal.
It is this spiritual perception of Scripture, which lifts humanity out of disease and death and inspires faith. 548:1The Spirit and the bride say, Come! . . . and whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely. Christian 3
Scriptural
perception
Science separates error from truth, and breathes through the sacred pages the spiritual sense of life, substance, and intelligence.
In this Science, we dis6cover man in the image and likeness of God. We see that man has never lost his spiritual estate and his eternal harmony.
9How little light or heat reach our earth when clouds cover the sun’s face! So Christian Science can be seen
The clouds
dissolving
only as the clouds of corporeal sense roll away.
12Earth has little light or joy for mortals before Life is spiritually learned. Every agony of mortal error helps error to destroy error, and so aids the apprehension 15of immortal Truth. This is the new birth going on hourly, by which men may entertain angels, the true ideas of God, the spiritual sense of being.
18Speaking of the origin of mortals, a famous naturalist says: It is very possible that many general statements
Prediction of
a naturalist
now current, about birth and generation, will 21be changed with the progress of information.
Had the naturalist, through his tireless researches, gained the diviner side in Christian Science, so far apart from 24his material sense of animal growth and organization, he would have blessed the human race more abundantly.
Natural history is richly endowed by the labors and 27genius of great men. Modern discoveries have brought
Methods of
reproduction
to light important facts in regard to so-called embryonic life.
Agassiz declares (Methods 30of Study in Natural History,page 275): Certain animals, besides the ordinary process of generation, also increase their numbers naturally and constantly by self-549:1division. This discovery is corroborative of the Science of Mind, for this discovery shows that the multiplication 3of certain animals takes place apart from sexual conditions. The supposition that life germinates in eggs and must decay after it has grown to maturity, if not before, 6is shown by divine metaphysics to be a mistake, a blunder which will finally give place to higher theories and demonstrations.
9Creatures of lower forms of organism are supposed to have, as classes, three different methods of reproduc
The three
processes
tion and to multiply their species sometimes 12through eggs, sometimes through buds, and sometimes through self-division.
According to recent lore, successive generations do not begin with the birth of 15new individuals, or personalities, but with the formation of the nucleus, or egg, from which one or more individualities subsequently emerge; and we must therefore look 18upon the simple ovum as the germ, the starting-point, of the most complicated corporeal structures, including those which we call human. Here these material researches 21culminate in such vague hypotheses as must necessarily attend false systems, which rely upon physics and are devoid of metaphysics.
24In one instance a celebrated naturalist, Agassiz, discovers the pathway leading to divine Science, and beards
Deference to
material law
the lion of materialism in its den.
At that 27point, however, even this great observer mistakes nature, forsakes Spirit as the divine origin of creative Truth, and allows matter and material law to 30usurp the prerogatives of omnipotence. He absolutely drops from his summit, coming down to a belief in the material origin of man, for he virtually affirms that

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