To make the assertion that the limits to human accomplishment are imposed by ignorance of absolute law, is to raise at once the much debated question of what constitutes reality. Through many centuries the human mind has grappled with this problem, now scaling the heights of idealism, now falling back upon the plains of materialism, but never ceasing in its endeavor to attain the highlands of scientific knowledge. Whether in the darkness of a Babylonian bondage or the midday of a promised land occupation, the twilight of Roman sensualism or the ascendant hour of Greek intellectualism, whatever the time and wherever the place, always there has stood forth some fearless champion to rescue the banner of idealism from its neglected position and advance it to a place of view and vantage in the field of human endeavor. Down through all the ages have sounded clarion calls of seer and sage, priest and prophet, student and philosopher, the faith of whom pierced the veil of matter and saw beyond, about, and underneath the physical universe the outlines, sometimes vague and sometimes clear, of a greater universe, of which the tangible things of the physical senses are but shadows and counterfeits. Their reassuring notes and solemn warnings have again and again turned back the night of materialism and brought new hope and aspiration to disheartened humanity.
The history of ancient times as it has to do with the conflict between idealism and materialism repeats itself in medieval times, and medieval history repeats itself in modern times, except that with the passage of the years the idea of a sustaining power beyond the range of physical perception has gathered weight and impetus, until today it is no longer an isolated belief held by a handful of ascetics and idealists, but the solid conviction of a vast number of scientists and scholars who speak every tongue and lead thought in many lands. Today, as never before, new and higher knowledge of spiritual things is being attained, under the impulse of Christian Science teaching, which has its devotees in every corner of the world, and the result is a holier, healthier, happier people. With this larger view and better understanding of the nature and dominion of absolute divine law, has come a corresponding larger vision of man's true nature and dominion, reflecting itself in higher aspiration and greater achievement.
The age-long quest of the natural philosopher for the origin of matter long since took him out of the realm of so-called natural science into the domain of metaphysics, and here he claims to have discovered the object of his search in the ion, a manifestation of energy which he can neither classify nor understand, and which cannot be perceived in any possible manner by the physical senses. Notwithstanding his amazing discovery is incapable of proof by natural means, he exultingly declares that the basis and structure of matter is at last established and its reality fixed for all time! However the natural philosopher may have satisfied his own intellectual demands, he is confronted by a rapidly increasing company of those of equal intelligence with himself who find his conclusions unconvincing and void of absolute proof, and who catch ever growing gleams of "ways higher than our own," having foundation in a reality which supersedes physical science and lies wholly within the metaphysical realm.
