IF proof were wanting of the unreality of evil, the fallaciousness of its asserted claims to place and power, we need but recall that from the beginning it has promised that which it could not fulfil, has tried to delude even itself with the belief that it could in some way circumvent omnipotence. But from the time it beguiled the dwellers in the garden of Eden with that seductive phrase, "Ye shall be as gods;" when it promised Jesus the pomp and glory of the kingdoms of this world if he would but fall down and worship it; until today, when it would persuade mortals that the lusts of the flesh, the pride of place and power, are more to be desired than the love of God,—in each and every instance evil has contracted for what it could not deliver, because evil, or the devil, as Jesus declared, "is a liar, and the father of it;" "and abode not in the truth."
It is on this basis that Christian Science declares for the unreality and powerlessness of evil. If as professed Christians we declare for the infinitude and omnipotence of God, good, He who was "in the beginning," before the world was, then in the very logic of events evil has no standing whatever. Mrs. Eddy puts this very clearly in "No and Yes," where she says (p. 24): "There was never a moment in which evil was real. This great fact concerning all error brings with it another and more glorious truth, that good is supreme. As there is none beside Him, and He is all good, there can be no evil."
Once we have gained this vantage-ground, we can bid defiance to the foe in open or covert attacks. "Resist the devil," James says, "and he will flee from you." This was the line of tactics Jesus adopted when he was "tempted of the devil;" he met every specious argument with an unflinching declaration of the supremacy of God, good,—"him only shalt thou serve;" and we read that, the devil left him "for a season." With a persistence worthy of a better cause, evil returns again and again to the siege, hoping to catch us off guard; that, lulled to sleep by fancied security, we shall put aside for the moment "the sword of the Spirit," lay down "the shield of faith" which is our defense against "the fiery darts of the wicked," and thus afford the enemy an opportunity to creep upon us unawares.
