The credibility and value of the religious belief of any class of men, so far as they are considered rational beings, will always bear a due proportion to the efforts they make to investigate every feature, and to submit the problems involved therewith to the tribunal of reason. This explains the devotion of most of those who have espoused the cause of Christian Science. In attaining their belief, they have not been actuated by impulse, resulting from environment and early training, or from some prevailing religious excitement: they have come to their understanding—and often only after reasoning and overcoming strong opposition from without and from within — as the reason has been satisfied by the testimony of the sacred Scriptures, by the irresistible force of logic, and by the beautiful, joy-giving results of practical demonstration.
Truth, when it is thus apprehended, becomes subjective— personal. We not merely become possessed of it, but it lays hold on us. It comes home to us. It becomes transfused with our sense of personality. It mingles with our every-day thought and feeling. The question of the day, despite the prevalent notions, is not as to matters of trade, or of state, or of society; but it is still that which was asked by Pilate, "What is truth?" The old systems of theology, which were long viewed and reverenced as containing the sum and substance of all moral and religious truth, are found sadly lacking, and today they retain what respect they have largely through their historical associations, superstition, prejudice, and wilful opinion.
Here, it is not amiss to say that the Reformation of the sixteenth century, considered as a religious movement, seems to have long since spent its force, and that the world has grown ripe for another revival period, or progressive religious impulse,—an epoch which many believe has been inaugurated by Christian Science. It can but prove a disability to religious progress, in so far as it is believed or assumed that past creeds and confessions are infallible, or that they are adequate interpretations of the Scriptures. Such assumption is sure to foster hypocrisy within the churches on the part of those who have questions of doubt, but who lack the courage of their convictions to protest or to withdraw; while outside, those who are capable of discerning the arrogance of the claim often, in their revolt, swing to an extreme, like the pendulum of a clock, going from faith to doubt or even infidelity.
