Perhaps nothing is more startling, as indicating change of consciousness, than the result when a Scientist takes up and undertakes to read one of the books over which, perhaps only a few months before, he hung all absorbed. The interests of the ordinary novel centre about personalities; the thought of Science works the destruction of the sense of personality, and interest in its conditions and adventures necessarily goes with it. But Edward Burton,Edward Burton: Lee & Shepard, Publishers, 299 pp., 12 mo the book that is the occasion of these lines, is not a novel. There is barely enough of incident and plot to serve as framework for reflections on ethical, social, and religious topics that are the motive of the book.
In the chapters " Burton's School Life," " Theological Education," " Illness and its Results," "The Down East Cruise," "A Pleasant Entertainment "—the footsteps by which a New England boy, reared in strict Orthodox beliefs, passes from them into the New Theology—are traced with much clearness. There is a charming realism in the narrative part, and the higher thought is brought out persuasively and with power. Reflections on current conventionalisms are woven into the story, which cannot fail to impress any reader.
" It is only pseudo-sconce which rakes over and over the mud of materialism, while it closes its eyes and ears to spiritual verities on every hand," are the words with which Miss Jenness ends an eloquent rebuke of Van Roden's conversational statement of the doctrine of evolution.
"All institutions and structures are but material duplicates of previous mental plans and specifications. Reform must have its basis in improved individual character, which results only from higher thinking." " The 'Divine Architect ' is the only creator of realities; but in a deep sense, men are also creators. They form the particular world in which they dwell." "When the average human mind becomes imbued with a ruling consciousness that God is Love, that He is our Life, that He is not a distant, but an ever-present God, then sin, selfishness, and even bodily infirmity .... will be overcome";—are sentences which read by a Scientist express Scientific thought. So with much of the thought in the chapters above referred to. The whole book, indeed, is a remarkable illustration of the spiritualization of mortal thought now manifesting itself. In reading it one realizes the feeling of Jesus when looking at the young man,—he " loved him," but Jesus' words to him: "One thing to thee is wanting: withdraw! As many things as thou hast, sell, and give to the destitute, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven; and come, be following me," are the words of Science to this mortal thought, so like Truth, and yet separated from it by the impassable gulf! For this thought has not accepted nor seen God as all; it claims the kingdom of heaven for the self that is, after all, only the creation of a more refined mortal sense.
Read now the following extracts from Edward Burton (the italics are ours) which are free from ambiguity:—
"Matter is utterly incapable, and is nothingness, except as it is acted upon by forces higher than itself. It is the external expression of what is behind it." .... "The physical senses are no more a part of man than is the pot of the earth a part of the blooming rose." .... "The mind hears, and the ear is only a natural trumpet." .... "Spiritual law is no less scientific than that which is material." .... "The spiritual domain has been denominated as supernatural. If this term be used to signify that which is higher than the material, it is well."
Hear, now, Science and Health:
"To Spirit there is no matter, even as to Truth no error, and to Good no evil..... At no point can these opposites mingle or unite, even though they seem to touch, one is still a curve, and the other remains a straight line."
These words of Science and Health are from the " realm above," those that go before are from the " realm below." Matter cannot express Spirit nor be acted upon by Spirit; neither matter nor its forces can become spiritual whatever the degree of attenuation. The devil of materiality may rail against evolution but it must continually uncover itself. Spirit, ... to this thought, is only a higher expression of matter: "the blooming rose "—Spirit—has, after all, come from "the pot of earth,"— matter and the ear is a "natural trumpet" for mind that hears! It is material law that is the criterion, and spiritual law is no less scientific! Thus material sense cannot open its mouth without violating the command "Have no other gods before Me"; thus it must prove that "it has caught and interpreted in its own way the echo of Spirit; and repeated it materially," but "that it has never produced a tone or sent forth a positive sound."
The material conception of man as opposed to the scientific is well shown in the following: "The fire upon the altar of Mr. Bowbright's inmost being had not long been kindled, but it burned brightly and its flame lighted up the whole apartment," what flame is it that lights up the house of material beliefs?
It is not matter, it is not self that the "new theology" abandons. Its own grossness revolts it, and it seeks—honestly it may be, as in this case to free itself. But it is only a higher form of material belief, and we know it can never see God.
