THE prevalent beliefs that man has a mortal beginning, a mind and life of his own separate from God, and that He lives on a material earth governed by material laws, are a false foundation, from which proceed fear, disaster, sin, sickness, and death. To deny these beliefs, and to maintain persistently that Spirit is man's origin, and that he always has lived and always will live in God, divine Mind, brings an ever increasing degree of freedom from materiality, and a corresponding ability to demonstrate spiritual power.
According to the Biblical allegory contained in the second chapter of Genesis, at a certain period an evil suggestion presented itself to Adam and was accepted by him, instead of being rejected. From this erring sense he formulated the notion of promoting his own will and desire, independently of God. But the characters Adam and Eve do not present the character of God's children: they symbolize an ignorant and false sense of man. The divine impulsion of Christian Science is awakening its students and others from the Adamdream, which includes the garden of Eden with its false claim of material necessity and desire, the land of Egypt with its determination to hold mankind in bondage to materiality, and the habitation of Sodom with its obnoxious idolatry.
Our present privilege is to understand that a material sense of world is not real, is not the true world, and that the new heaven and the new earth — the real, the spiritual — will become more and more apparent to us as our thought is spiritualized. Daniel discerned, in part at least, the ideal world, when he proved that there were in reality no cruel, ravenous lions seeking to devour him. Jesus understood the false, mental cause which stirred the Sea of Galilee; for he silenced the storm with but an understanding word. He worked in accordance with God's will, not contrary thereto; therefore he did not silence an act of God. God's government is not made manifest in any destructive element.
