{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_12321/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_12321","id":"gutenberg_12321","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/12321","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Health & Medicine","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Christian Science","Christianity"],"text":"RUDIMENTAL DIVINE SCIENCE\n\nBy MARY BAKER EDDY\n\nPublished by The Trustees under the Will of Mary Baker G. Eddy\n\n1891, 1908\n\n\n  THIS LITTLE BOOK IS TENDERLY AND RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED TO ALL LOYAL\n  STUDENTS, WORKING AND WAITING FOR THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE SCIENCE OF\n  MIND-HEALING\n                                                    MARY BAKER EDDY\n\n\n\n\n  CONTENTS\n\n\n  DEFINITION OF CHRISTIAN SCIENCE\n\n  PRINCIPLE OF CHRISTIAN SCIENCE\n\n  PERSONALITY OF GOD\n\n  HEALING SICKNESS AND SIN\n\n  INDIVIDUALITY OF GOD\n\n  MATERIAL AND SPIRITUAL SCIENCE\n\n  NON-EXISTENCE OF MATTER\n\n  MATERIALITY INTANGIBLE\n\n  BASIS OF MIND-HEALING\n\n  MATERIAL AND SPIRITUAL MAN\n\n  DEMONSTRATION IN HEALING\n\n  MEANS AND METHODS\n\n  ONLY ONE SCHOOL\n\n\n\n\n_How would you define Christian Science?_\n\nAs the law of God, the law of good, interpreting and demonstrating the\ndivine Principle and rule of universal harmony.\n\n\n_What is the Principle of Christian Science?_\n\nIt is God, the Supreme Being, infinite and immortal Mind, the Soul of man\nand the universe. It is our Father which is in heaven. It is substance,\nSpirit, Life, Truth, and Love,--these are the deific Principle.\n\n_Do you mean by this that God is a person?_\n\nThe word _person_ affords a large margin for misapprehension, as well as\ndefinition. In French the equivalent word is _personne_. In Spanish,\nItalian, and Latin, it is _persona_. The Latin verb _personare_ is\ncompounded of the prefix _per_ (through) and _sonare_ (to sound).\n\nIn law, Blackstone applies the word _personal_ to _bodily presence_, in\ndistinction from one's appearance (in court, for example) by deputy or\nproxy.\n\nOther definitions of _person_, as given by Webster, are \"a living soul; a\nself-conscious being; a moral agent; especially, a living human being,\na corporeal man, woman, or child; an individual of the human race.\" He\nadds, that among Trinitarian Christians the word stands for one of the\nthree subjects, or agents, constituting the Godhead.\n\nIn Christian Science we learn that God is definitely individual, and\nnot a _person_, as that word is used by the best authorities, if our\nlexicographers are right in defining _person_ as especially a finite\n_human being_; but God is personal, if by _person_ is meant\ninfinite Spirit.\n\nWe do not conceive rightly of God, if we think of Him as less than\ninfinite. The human person is finite; and therefore I prefer to retain\nthe proper sense of Deity by using the phrase _an individual_ God, rather\nthan _a personal_ God; for there is and can be but one infinite individual\nSpirit, whom mortals have named God.\n\nScience defines the individuality of God as supreme good, Life, Truth,\nLove. This term enlarges our sense of Deity, takes away the trammels\nassigned to God by finite thought, and introduces us to higher definitions.\n\n\n_Is healing the sick the whole of Science?_\n\nHealing physical sickness is the smallest part of Christian Science. It\nis only the bugle-call to thought and action, in the higher range of\ninfinite goodness. The emphatic purpose of Christian Science is the\nhealing of sin; and this task, sometimes, may be harder than the cure\nof disease; because, while mortals love to sin, they do not love to be\nsick. Hence their comparative acquiescence in your endeavors to heal\nthem of bodily ills, and their obstinate resistance to all efforts to\nsave them from sin through Christ, spiritual Truth and Love, which redeem\nthem, and become their Saviour, through the flesh, from the flesh,--the\nmaterial world and evil.\n\nThis Life, Truth, and Love--this trinity of good--was individualized,\nto the perception of mortal sense, in the man Jesus. His history is\nemphatic in our hearts, and it lives more because of his spiritual\nthan his physical healing. His example is, to Christian Scientists,\nwhat the models of the masters in music and painting are to artists.\n\nGenuine Christian Scientists will no more deviate morally from that\ndivine digest of Science called the Sermon on the Mount, than they will\nmanipulate invalids, prescribe drugs, or deny God. Jesus' healing was\nspiritual in its nature, method, and design. He wrought the cure of\ndisease through the divine Mind, which gives all true volition, impulse,\nand action; and destroys the mental error made manifest physically, and\nestablishes the opposite manifestation of Truth upon the body in harmony\nand health.\n\n\n_By the individuality of God, do you mean that God has a finite form?_\n\nNo. I mean the infinite and divine Principle of all being, the\never-present I AM, filling all space, including in itself all Mind,\nthe one Father-Mother God. Life, Truth, and Love are this trinity\nin unity, and their universe is spiritual, peopled with perfect beings,\nharmonious and eternal, of which our material universe and men are the\ncounterfeits.\n\n\n_Is God the Principle of all science, or only of Divine or\nChristian Science?_\n\nScience is Mind manifested. It is not material; neither is it of\nhuman origin.\n\nAll true Science represents a moral and spiritual force, which holds\nthe earth in its orbit. This force is Spirit, that can \"bind the sweet\ninfluences of the Pleiades,\" and \"loose the bands of Orion.\"\n\nThere is no material science, if by that term you mean material\nintelligence. God is infinite Mind, hence there is no other Mind.\nGood is Mind, but evil is not Mind. Good is not in evil, but in\nGod only. Spirit is not in matter, but in Spirit only. Law is not\nin matter, but in Mind only.\n\n\n_Is there no matter?_\n\nAll is Mind. According to the Scriptures and Christian Science, all is\nGod, and there is naught beside Him. \"God is Spirit;\" and we can only\nlearn and love Him through His spirit, which brings out the fruits of\nSpirit and extinguishes forever the works of darkness by His marvellous\nlight.\n\nThe five material senses testify to the existence of matter. The\nspiritual senses afford no such evidence, but deny the testimony of\nthe material senses. Which testimony is correct? The Bible says:\n\"Let God be true, and every man a liar.\" If, as the Scriptures imply,\nGod is All-in-all, then all must be Mind, since God is Mind. Therefore\nin divine Science there is no material mortal man, for man is spiritual\nand eternal, he being made in the image of Spirit, or God.\n\nThere is no material sense. Matter is inert, inanimate, and\nsensationless,--considered apart from Mind. Lives there a man who\nhas ever found Soul in the body or in matter, who has ever seen\nspiritual substance with the eye, who has found sight in matter,\nhearing in the material ear, or intelligence in non-intelligence?\nIf there is any such thing as matter, it must be either mind which\nis called matter, or matter without Mind.\n\nMatter without Mind is a moral impossibility. Mind in matter is pantheism.\nSoul is the only real consciousness which cognizes being. The body does\nnot see, hear, smell, or taste. Human belief says that it does; but destroy\nthis belief of seeing with the eye, and we could not see materially; and\nso it is with each of the physical senses.\n\nAccepting the verdict of these material senses, we should believe man\nand the universe to be the football of chance and sinking into oblivion.\nDestroy the five senses as organized matter, and you must either become\nnon-existent, or exist in Mind only; and this latter conclusion is the\nsimple solution of the problem of being, and leads to the equal inference\nthat there is no matter.\n\n\n_The sweet sounds and glories of earth and sky, assuming manifold forms\nand colors,--are they not tangible and material?_\n\nAs Mind they are real, but not as matter. All beauty and goodness are\nin and of Mind, emanating from God; but when we change the nature of\nbeauty and goodness from Mind to matter, the beauty is marred, through\na false conception, and, to the material senses, evil takes the place\nof good.\n\nHas not the truth in Christian Science met a response from Prof.\nS.P. Langley, the young American astronomer? He says that \"color\nis in _us_,\" not \"in the rose;\" and he adds that this is not \"any\nmetaphysical subtlety,\" but a fact \"almost universally accepted,\nwithin the _last few years_, by physicists.\"\n\n\n_Is not the basis of Mind-healing a destruction of the evidence of the\nmaterial senses, and restoration of the true evidence of spiritual sense?_\n\nIt is, so far as you perceive and understand this predicate and postulate\nof Mind-healing; but the Science of Mind-healing is best understood in\npractical demonstration. The proof of what you apprehend, in the simplest\ndefinite and absolute form of healing, can alone answer this question of\nhow much you understand of Christian Science Mind-healing. Not that all\nhealing is Science, by any means; but that the simplest case, healed in\nScience, is as demonstrably scientific, in a small degree, as the most\ndifficult case so treated.\n\nThe infinite and subtler conceptions and consistencies of Christian Science\nare set forth in my work Science and Health.\n\n\n_Is man material or spiritual?_\n\nIn Science, man is the manifest reflection of God, perfect and immortal\nMind. He is the likeness of God; and His likeness would be lost if inverted\nor perverted.\n\nAccording to the evidence of the so-called physical senses, man is\nmaterial, fallen, sick, depraved, mortal. Science and spiritual sense\ncontradict this, and they afford the only true evidence of the being\nof God and man, the material evidence being wholly false.\n\nJesus said of personal evil, that \"the truth abode not in him,\" because\nthere is no material sense. Matter, as matter, has neither sensation nor\npersonal intelligence. As a pretension to be Mind, matter is a lie, and\n\"the father of lies;\" Mind is not in matter, and Spirit cannot originate\nits opposite, named matter.\n\nAccording to divine Science, Spirit no more changes its species, by\nevolving matter from Spirit, than natural science, so-called, or material\nlaws, bring about alteration of species by transforming minerals into\nvegetables or plants into animals,--thus confusing and confounding the\nthree great kingdoms. No rock brings forth an apple; no pine-tree produces\na mammal or provides breast-milk for babes.\n\nTo sense, the lion of to-day is the lion of six thousand years ago; but\nin Science, Spirit sends forth its own harmless likeness.\n\n\n_How should I undertake to demonstrate Christian Science in healing\nthe sick?_\n\nAs I have given you only an epitome of the Principle, so I can give you\nhere nothing but an outline of the practice. Be honest, be true to thyself,\nand true to others; then it follows thou wilt be strong in God, the eternal\ngood. Heal through Truth and Love; there is no other healer.\n\nIn all moral revolutions, from a lower to a higher condition of thought\nand action, Truth is in the minority and error has the majority. It is\nnot otherwise in the field of Mind-healing. The man who calls himself a\nChristian Scientist, yet is false to God and man, is also uttering\nfalsehood about good. This falsity shuts against him the Truth and the\nPrinciple of Science, but opens a way whereby, through will-power, sense\nmay say the unchristian practitioner can heal; but Science shows that he\nmakes morally worse the invalid whom he is supposed to cure.\n\nBy this I mean that mortal mind should not be falsely impregnated. If by\nsuch lower means the health is seemingly restored, the restoration is not\nlasting, and the patient is liable to a relapse,--\"The last state of that\nman is worse than the first.\"\n\nThe teacher of Mind-healing who is not a Christian, in the highest sense,\nis constantly sowing the seeds of discord and disease. Even the truth he\nspeaks is more or less blended with error; and this error will spring\nup in the mind of his pupil. The pupil's imperfect knowledge will lead\nto weakness in practice, and he will be a poor practitioner, if not a\nmalpractitioner.\n\nThe basis of malpractice is in erring human will, and this will is an\noutcome of what I call _mortal mind_,--a false and temporal sense\nof Truth, Life, and Love. To heal, in Christian Science, is to base your\npractice on immortal Mind, the divine Principle of man's being; and this\nrequires a preparation of the heart and an answer of the lips from the\nLord.\n\nThe Science of healing is the Truth of healing. If one is untruthful, his\nmental state weighs against his healing power; and similar effects come\nfrom pride, envy, lust, and all fleshly vices.\n\nThe spiritual power of a scientific, right thought, without a direct\neffort, an audible or even a mental argument, has oftentimes healed\ninveterate diseases.\n\nThe thoughts of the practitioner should be imbued with a clear conviction\nof the omnipotence and omnipresence of God; that He is All, and that there\ncan be none beside Him; that God is good, and the producer only of good;\nand hence, that whatever militates against health, harmony, or holiness,\nis an unjust usurper of the throne of the controller of all mankind. Note\nthis, that if you have power in error, you forfeit the power that Truth\nbestows, and its salutary influence on yourself and others.\n\nYou must feel and know that God alone governs man; that His government\nis harmonious; that He is too pure to behold iniquity, and divides His\npower with nothing evil or material; that material laws are only human\nbeliefs, which govern mortals wrongfully. These beliefs arise from the\nsubjective states of thought, producing the beliefs of a mortal material\nuniverse,--so-called, and of material disease and mortality. Mortal ills\nare but errors of thought,--diseases of mortal mind, and not of matter;\nfor matter cannot feel, see, or report pain or disease.\n\nDisease is a thing of thought manifested on the body; and fear is the\nprocurator of the thought which causes sickness and suffering. Remove\nthis fear by the true sense that God is Love,--and that Love punishes\nnothing but sin,--and the patient can then look up to the loving God,\nand know that He afflicteth not willingly the children of men, who are\npunished because of disobedience to His spiritual law. His law of Truth,\nwhen obeyed, removes every erroneous physical and mental state. The belief\nthat matter can master Mind, and make you ill, is an error which Truth\nwill destroy.\n\nYou must learn to acknowledge God in all His ways. It is only a lack of\nunderstanding of the allness of God, which leads you to believe in the\nexistence of matter, or that matter can frame its own conditions, contrary\nto the law of Spirit.\n\nSickness is the schoolmaster, leading you to Christ; first to faith\nin Christ; next to belief in God as omnipotent; and finally to the\n_understanding_ of God and man in Christian Science, whereby you\nlearn that God is good, and in Science man is His likeness, the forever\nreflection of goodness. Therefore good is one and All.\n\nThis brings forward the next proposition in Christian Science,--namely,\nthat there are no sickness, sin, and death in the divine Mind. What\nseem to be disease, vice, and mortality are illusions of the physical\nsenses. These illusions are not real, but unreal. Health is the\nconsciousness of the unreality of pain and disease; or, rather,\nthe absolute consciousness of harmony and of nothing else. In a moment\nyou may awake from a night-dream; just so you can awake from the dream\nof sickness; but the demonstration of the Science of Mind-healing by\nno means rests on the strength of human belief. This demonstration is\nbased on a true understanding of God and divine Science, which takes\naway every human belief, and, through the illumination of spiritual\nunderstanding, reveals the all-power and ever-presence of good, whence\nemanate health, harmony, and Life eternal.\n\nThe lecturer, teacher, or healer who is indeed a Christian Scientist,\nnever introduces the subject of human anatomy; never depicts the muscular,\nvascular, or nervous operations of the human frame. He never talks about\nthe structure of the material body. He never lays his hands on the patient,\nnor manipulates the parts of the body supposed to be ailing. Above all, he\nkeeps unbroken the Ten Commandments, and practises Christ's Sermon on the\nMount.\n\nWrong thoughts and methods strengthen the sense of disease, instead of\ncure it; or else quiet the fear of the sick on false grounds, encouraging\nthem in the belief of error until they hold stronger than before the belief\nthat they are first made sick by matter, and then restored through its\nagency. This fosters infidelity, and is mental quackery, that denies the\nPrinciple of Mind-healing. If the sick are aided in this mistaken fashion,\ntheir ailments will return, and be more stubborn because the relief is\nunchristian and unscientific.\n\nChristian Science erases from the minds of invalids their mistaken belief\nthat they live in or because of matter, or that a so-called material\norganism controls the health or existence of mankind, and induces rest\nin God, divine Love, as caring for all the conditions requisite for the\nwell-being of man. As power divine is the healer, why should mortals\nconcern themselves with the chemistry of food? Jesus said: \"Take no\nthought what ye shall eat.\"\n\nThe practitioner should also endeavor to free the minds of the healthy\nfrom any sense of subordination to their bodies, and teach them that the\ndivine Mind, not material law, maintains human health and life.\n\nA Christian Scientist knows that, in Science, disease is unreal; that\nMind is not in matter; that Life is God, good; hence Life is not\nfunctional, and is neither matter nor mortal mind; knows that pantheism\nand theosophy are not Science. Whatever saps, with human belief, this\nbasis of Christian Science, renders it impossible to demonstrate the\nPrinciple of this Science, even in the smallest degree.\n\nA mortal and material body is not the actual individuality of man made\nin the divine and spiritual image of God. The material body is not the\nlikeness of Spirit; hence it is not the truth of being, but the likeness\nof error--the human belief which saith there is more than one God,--there\nis more than one Life and one Mind.\n\nIn Deuteronomy (iv. 35) we read: \"The Lord, He is God; there is none\nelse beside Him.\" In John (iv. 24) we may read: \"God is Spirit.\" These\npropositions, understood in their Science, elucidate my meaning.\n\nWhen treating a patient, it is not Science to treat every organ in the\nbody. To aver that harmony is the real and discord is the unreal, and\nthen give special attention to what according to their own belief is\ndiseased, is scientific; and if the _healer realizes_ the truth, it\nwill free his patient.\n\n\n_What are the means and methods of trustworthy Christian Scientists?_\n\nThese people should not be expected, more than others, to give all their\ntime to Christian Science work, receiving no wages in return, but left to\nbe fed, clothed, and sheltered by charity. Neither can they serve two\nmasters, giving only a portion of their time to God, and still be Christian\nScientists. They must give Him all their services, and \"owe no man.\" To do\nthis, they must at present ask a suitable price for their services, and\nthen _conscientiously earn their wages_, strictly practising Divine\nScience, and healing the sick.\n\nThe author never sought charitable support, but gave fully seven-eighths\nof her time without remuneration, except the bliss of doing good. The only\npay taken for her labors was from classes, and often those were put off\nfor months, in order to do gratuitous work. She has never taught a Primary\nclass without several, and sometimes seventeen, free students in it; and\nhas endeavored to take the full price of tuition only from those who were\nable to pay. The student who pays must of necessity do better than he\nwho does not pay, and yet will expect and require others to pay him. No\ndiscount on tuition was made on higher classes, because their first classes\nfurnished students with the means of paying for their tuition in the higher\ninstruction, and of doing charity work besides. If the Primary students\nare still impecunious, it is their own fault, and this ill-success of\nitself leaves them unprepared to enter higher classes.\n\nPeople are being healed by means of my instructions, both in and out\nof class. Many students, who have passed through a regular course of\ninstruction from me, have been invalids and were healed in the class;\nbut experience has shown that this defrauds the scholar, though it heals\nthe sick.\n\nIt is seldom that a student, if healed in a class, has left it\nunderstanding sufficiently the Science of healing to immediately\nenter upon its practice. Why? Because the glad surprise of suddenly\nregained health is a shock to the mind; and this holds and satisfies\nthe thought with exuberant joy.\n\nThis renders the mind less inquisitive, plastic, and tractable; and deep\nsystematic thinking is impracticable until this impulse subsides.\n\nThis was the principal reason for advising diseased people not to enter\na class. Few were taken besides invalids for students, until there were\nenough practitioners to fill in the best possible manner the department\nof healing. Teaching and healing should have separate departments, and\nthese should be fortified on all sides with suitable and thorough\nguardianship and grace.\n\nOnly a very limited number of students can advantageously enter a class,\ngrapple with this subject, and well assimilate what has been taught them.\nIt is impossible to teach thorough Christian Science to promiscuous and\nlarge assemblies, or to persons who cannot be addressed individually, so\nthat the mind of the pupil may be dissected more critically than the body\nof a subject laid bare for anatomical examination. Public lectures cannot\nbe such lessons in Christian Science as are required to empty and to fill\nanew the individual mind.\n\nIf publicity and material control are the motives for teaching, then\npublic lectures can take the place of private lessons; but the former\ncan never give a thorough knowledge of Christian Science, and a Christian\nScientist will never undertake to fit students for practice by such means.\nLectures in public are needed, but they must be subordinate to thorough\nclass instruction in any branch of education.\n\nNone with an imperfect sense of the spiritual signification of the Bible,\nand its scientific relation to Mind-healing, should attempt overmuch in\ntheir translation of the Scriptures into the \"new tongue;\" but I see that\nsome novices, in the truth of Science, and some impostors are committing\nthis error.\n\n\n_Is there more than one school of scientific healing?_\n\nIn reality there is, and can be, but one school of the Science of\nMind-healing. Any departure from Science is an irreparable loss\nof Science. Whatever is said and written correctly on this Science\noriginates from the Principle and practice laid down in Science and\nHealth, a work which I published in 1875. This was the first book,\nrecorded in history, which elucidates a pathological Science purely\nmental.\n\nMinor shades of difference in Mind-healing have originated with certain\nopposing factions, springing up among unchristian students, who, fusing\nwith a class of aspirants which snatch at whatever is progressive, call\nit their first-fruits, or else _post mortem_ evidence.\n\nA slight divergence is fatal in Science. Like certain Jews whom St. Paul\nhad hoped to convert from mere motives of self-aggrandizement to the love\nof Christ, these so-called schools are clogging the wheels of progress by\nblinding the people to the true character of Christian Science,--its moral\npower, and its divine efficacy to heal.\n\nThe true understanding of Christian Science Mind-healing never originated\nin pride, rivalry, or the deification of self. The Discoverer of this\nScience could tell you of timidity, of self-distrust, of friendlessness,\ntoil, agonies, and victories under which she needed miraculous vision to\nsustain her, when taking the first footsteps in this Science.\n\nThe ways of Christianity have not changed. Meekness, selflessness, and\nlove are the paths of His testimony and the footsteps of His flock.","title":"Rudimental Divine Science","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":4003}