IN obeying the promptings to think or act wickedly, that appear to spring from within themselves, mortals become victims of the false sense which they entertain of God as having created man upon a sinful basis ; that is, with natural proclivities for evil. This belief, which has been perpetuated throughout the human order of generation, leads them to regard their idiosyncrasies of disposition, defects of character, or faults of temperament as inherent in their individuality or identity. This sinful material concept of man's origin and reproduction perpetrates continuous injustice upon mankind, by bringing one generation into sin and suffering for bearing the fruit of the seed sown by its predecessor. The mistake of believing that man originates or exists materially may be seen in the suffering and mortality that inevitably attend such a belief; while the opposite truth of man's spiritual origin and being enabled Jesus to destroy all the discords of materiality, and to overcome its supposed law of death.
Jesus' injunction to "call no man father" is pregnant with deepest meaning for mankind. It not only confirms the spiritual nature of God's creation, as alluded to in the first chapter of Genesis, but implies that it alone expresses the truth of being in all ages. Although human history had recorded the coming and going of many generations of mortals, he declared that the reality of man's origin is not in material parentage, but in spiritual sonship with the "Father which is in heaven." This was pronounced true, not as referring to the hereafter only, but "upon the earth" as well. This teaching of the Master should forever dispose of the iniquitous doctrine of heredity, which for so long has lain like a terrible nightmare on the heart of humanity.
Christian Science is abundantly blessing mankind in its revelation of divine Principle as the infinite Father-Mother of man ; as "God giving all and man having all that God gives" (Mrs. Eddy's Dedicatory Message, June, 1906). It is evident that evil can neither proceed from God, nor from His likeness or idea, spiritual man. It is also evident that like begets like ad infinitum. Although infinitely multiplied, the product of good must be good in the last instance as in the first. An infinitely good creator could not exhaust infinite goodness in the making of the first man, and then permit a sense of evil to become joint-creator with Him in "replenishing the earth." In the human concept of man good and evil may seem to blend in one nature, and to point to a common source, but their contrary influence over mankind designates one as false and unnatural to the ideal man, not in the beginning only but through the eternal course of creation.
