The following opportune and instructive message from the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science was read at the regular Wednesday evening meeting of the First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Concord, on the date which it bears:—
First Church of Christ, Scientist, Concord, N. H.
My Beloved Brethren:—We learn from the Scriptures that the Baalites or sun-worshipers failed to look "through nature up to nature's God," thus missing the discovery of all cause and effect. They were content to look no higher than the symbol. This departure from Spirit, this worshiping of matter in the name of nature, was idolatry then, and is idolatry now. When human thought discerned its idolatrous tendencies, it took a step higher; but it immediately turned to another form of idolatry, and, worshiping person instead of Principle, anchored its faith in troubled waters. At that period the touch of Jesus' robe, and the handkerchief of St. Paul, were supposed to heal the sick; and our Master declared, "Thy faith hath made thee whole;" and the medicine-man, far lower in the scale of thought, said, "My material tonic has strengthened you." By reposing faith in man and in matter the human race has not yet reached the understanding of God, the conception of Spirit and its all-power.
