If one does not recognize and in some degree understand the relation of cause and effect, he cannot reasonably expect to succeed in any undertaking. Nothing comes by chance. There is a cause for all which really exists, and there is a belief in cause back of everything which even seems to be. The purpose of education is to enable the student to form correct conclusions as to cause and effect, and then to apply his knowledge in working out the various problems with which he is confronted. That he is often mistaken in these conclusions is a fact so evident that it is never seriously questioned. However, he learns from experience, and when he sees that his theory as to what has produced a certain effect is demonstrably incorrect, he realizes he must look elsewhere.
Because the law of cause and effect is in many respects more or less a mystery, it often transpires that human theories of today are the very opposite of what they were yesterday. When theory gives place to actual knowledge, the scientific method of correcting the inharmonies of human experience will be understood, and results will be satisfactory because they are effectual.
It is not generally understood how much Christian Science is accomplishing in this direction by giving men a definite, demonstrable teaching which makes it possible to distinguish between what is the work of God and what is not. In "Miscellaneous Writings" by Mrs. Eddy we read: "That God, good, creates evil, or aught that can result in evil,—or that Spirit creates its opposite, named matter,—are conclusions that destroy their premise and prove themselves invalid. Here is where Christian Science sticks to its text, and other systems of religion abandon their own logic. Here also is found the pith of the basal statement, the cardinal point in Christian Science, that matter and evil (including all inharmony, sin, disease, death) are unreal" (p. 27).
