The importance to all students of Christian Science of a clear understanding of divine or true metaphysics is apparent from a single paragraph in the Christian Science textbook. On page 111 of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," Mrs. Eddy says, "The Principle of divine metaphysics is God; the practice of divine metaphysics is the utilization of the power of Truth over error; its rules demonstrate its Science. Divine metaphysics reverses perverted and physical hypotheses as to Deity, even as the explanation of optics rejects the incidental or inverted image and shows what this inverted image is meant to represent." Here are stated in terms both clear and cogent the fundamentals of Christian Science. In what striking contrast does our Leader place the true and the false, the divinely true and the materially false! The categories of divine metaphysics are set forth in the Christian Science textbook in scientific terms, expressed as self-evident propositions upon which rests the entire field of demonstration of this Science. These categories present the facts of true being, the truth about God and the spiritual universe, including man, in the one true Science.
The better to discriminate between true metaphysics and false, let us for a moment examine the situation as to the systems of metaphysics promulgated by the learned men of the ages. "Metaphysics" is derived from two Greek words which signify "beyond the material,"—that is, it deals wholly with mind and its phenomena; albeit, until Mrs. Eddy made her discovery, clarity of distinction was lacking between the divine Mind, the only Mind, and its supposititious opposite, the mortal, carnal, or human mind. The use of the word "metaphysics" has varied greatly through the ages. With some philosophers, it has related only to ontology, the science of being; with others it has taken on a meaning closely akin to that of psychology, the so-called science of mind; while others have conceived its chief meaning to be epistemology, or the science of knowledge.
In general, it may be said, metaphysics posits the universe as mental, and conceives the natural or material universe to be the objective state of the physical senses. This was, in brief, Aristotle's theory, for, apparently, he had no concept, or at least no adequate idea, of God as divine Mind. On the other hand, Bishop Berkeley, introducing Deity into his scheme of philosophy, saw God in all, including the material universe, thus not only hypothetically materializing Deity, but thereby making God responsible for the ills of the flesh, and likewise for the sins of humanity. Later idealistic philosophers made no clearer distinction between the divine Mind and the human mind, in which they saw the subjective state of mortal existence and the material universe. These philosophies, manifestly impossible of demonstration, were so many speculative theories, with no possibility of establishing that degree of proof which would entitle them to admission into the realm of true Science, which deals only with facts and proofs.
