UNINSTRUCTED by Christian Science, mortals find few points of agreement as to what constitutes fundamental truth or error. Fortunately, however, some conclusions involved in human existence are so obvious that upon them all are agreed. Perhaps the chief of these may be found in the fact that as a race we are not as happy or harmonious as we would like to be. The history of all human effort is but a record of the attempt of mortals to preserve their own existence and to make it satisfactory. I need not recount the methods employed; let it suffice to say that they have not yet succeeded, nor is there any more prospect of their doing so now than formerly. El Dorado remains undiscovered, Elysium unknown.
Christian Science is not a magic cure-all, it provides no means whereby inert and indifferent humanity may find peace or happiness without any legitimate effort to gain them: but it is a system of pure Christianity. Through its practice, those who desire harmony, peace, and satisfaction may ultimately obtain them, and may even now have a foretaste of their joys. Jesus the Christ taught and exemplified this way, which was and is his way. It is this way, the Christ-way, that we shall here consider, and see if we may not, even in the brief space allotted to us, learn something definite in regard to it and begin to walk in it with assurance and gladness.
Prevailing systems of education have not understood the teaching and life of Jesus. Religious and scientific schools have equally failed to grasp the true meaning of that God-ordained and God-sustained career. His miracles have been considered impossible by science and wholly personal by theology. Christian Science inculcates better views. It shows that the works which Jesus and his disciples performed were not really miracles, but were on the contrary natural phenomena attendant upon accurate knowledge of God and of His law; knowledge which all may gain, and which Jesus implied that all must gain when he said, "I am the way." What is the nature of this knowledge? Can we obtain it now? Christian Science answers all such questions fully and affirmatively. It is an educational system in the highest meaning of the term. It explains itself fully and simply. All who desire may begin to understand it now, and enter upon a progressive Christian and scientific experience which shall continue until the kingdom of God shall come upon earth.
