Many writers have tried, both by argument and ridicule, to oppose the correctness of Christian Science in its claim that sin, disease, and death are human delusions. I have never known a critic of Christian Science to use the word "delusion" in the same sense that the Christian Scientist does, nor indeed in its true etymological sense.
Delusion, as defined by Webster, is "deception from want of knowledge." It is also further defined as "an erroneous view of something which exists indeed, but which has by no means the qualities or attributes ascribed to it." This is the sense in which the term is used in Christian Science, and there is no other definition which conflicts with it. Because Christian Science teaches that the mortal sense of the real tree as it is in fact, is delusive, it by no means follows that a tree is a delusion. The tree is not a delusion, but the human, mortal sense of it is a delusion. Mortal man's knowledge of a tree is short of, or less than, the true, divine knowledge of it as it exists in the realm of eternal Truth. Any knowledge that is less than true is erroneous, and hence delusive to the exact extent of the ignorance with which this knowledge is imbued. That the definition as given is a correct one, is self-evident to every careful thinker; because an ignorant sense of anything, not being the right one, must ascribe to that which is wrongly viewed, qualities that do not really and rightly belong to it. Again, if through ignorance we ascribe qualities to man that do not belong to him, then these wrongly ascribed qualities must be unlike those that really and divinely belong to him, and these unlike qualities must be the very opposite in nature of the real ones. Qualities unlike Life must partake of the nature and essence of sin and disease, which culminate in death. Nothing can be unlike good but evil, and nothing unlike light but darkness. God and His universe, including man, must include all there is or ever will be. Then ignorance of this All must ascribe thereto qualities that do not, in fact or reality, belong to it, and the qualities so wrongly ascribed must be unlike the real ones. If life is a quality of this All, the qualities which ignorance must ascribe to it would be unlike Life; namely, sin, disease, and death; and if life is not a real quality of this All, then the universe and its Creator would be a mere delusion, for without Life there would be nothing, as death is oblivion. Moreover, there could be no delusion if there were no real thing to be deluded about. That which is deluded is that stage of human consciousness which sees the unreal as real, error as fact, as an inherent attribute of Truth.
The first conscious step, and the most important one, out of error or ignorance, is to discern it as such. The origin of ignorance can never be explained, for the wisdom that explains ignorance, explains it away, it can know no ignorance.
Delusion stands in human thought to-day as a seeming fact, because of the false supposition that causation can be less than infinite in quantity and quality, and that law and effect can have qualities unlike their primal origin. In other words, that the Creator can be finite in quality or quantity, and His creation independent of and unlike Himself. In the human mind, mathematics or the science of numbers most closely symbolizes the Truth of being, it affords the sole exception to the human rule that a limited knowledge of anything ascribes to it what does not belong to it. The reason why this is so, is found in the fact that human reason accepts the verity that the science of mathematics is limitless and absolutely perfect, without a single taint of error; that as a basic, and universal truth, all its rules and statements partake of its perfection and absoluteness. Each problem and rule is recognized to be as perfect as any other, and indispensable to the whole. Human reason steadfastly contends that if an error could become a fact in one rule or problem, this would involve every rule and problem in error. If these human contentions for the science of numbers should be universally made for the Science of Life, marked results would immediately obtain. When an error in the conclusion of a mathematical solution is found, the student at once reviews his work to find the source of the error, and when found, he casts it out. This should be a conclusive lesson to every thinker, and lead him to see, that only by adopting this rule of the absoluteness of cause, law, and effect, and their indivisible and inseparable relation to each other, can correct results be obtained.
Christian Science accepts and insists that there is but one primal cause, and this is the one infinite, divine, intelligent, conscious Principle of the universe, including man, and hence of all form, law, and action; that the universe of this divine Principle or God, and the law governing the same, are as perfect as their Principle; that each form or identity partakes of the nature, immortality, and absoluteness of its source. As God, or divine Principle, is Spirit, the universe must be spiritual, since it is in His likeness, and therefore materiality must be included in His unlikeness.
It must be apparent to the reasoner that harmonious and immortal man can be brought to light on no other basis, and that from this beginning the honest student must and will, work out the small problems of being correctly and thereby grow in the understanding of God and the true man, whereby the larger problems are grappled with and solved. In the degree that little errors are destroyed each day in thought, in that degree a higher and clearer perception of the truth or reality appears.
It is self-evident that the ignorant sense which ascribes to God qualities that do not belong to Him, must have a defective and imperfect perception of His real qualities and nature, and of those of His universe. The Christian believer who criticises Christian Science for maintaining that sin is a human delusion, seems unmindful that from his own standpoint of Christianity he really adopts the Christian Science view, for the sinner believes that he derives pleasure or profit in the course which the Christian rightly regards as sinful. The Christian knows that the belief of real pleasure or profit in sin is a delusion, which must be destroyed before the sinner will turn from his evil way. If the sin is not given up, the sinner sooner or later must reap the tares he sows. He must learn what Christianity teaches: that sin terminates in misery and shame; that the parable of the prodigal son is not an exception, but a universal rule. If the sinner is not moved by a delusion, and is not following it, then the Christian religion and human experience are delusions. Christianity and sin cannot both be true and real, for they are forever opposite and hostile. Sin is the result of ignorance of the great teaching of Christ Jesus, and disease is its lesser but sure companion.
As explained in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mrs. Eddy, Christian Science unlocks the mystery of evil through a true explanation of God, or infinite good; and this explanation of good explains away evil as a fact. This book also points the way whereby evil, even as a false claim, may be demonstrated away.
