EVERY sincere student of Christian Science, as he gains an understanding of its teachings, is consoled thereby, and a great hope springs up within him. For this Science rends the veil of material sense, which obscures the true nature of man, and enables him to see his real selfhood, spiritual, perfect, and eternal. It is the concept of man as material which gives rise to all of mankind's doubts and fears, yea, to all of mankind's sorrows and afflictions. But as this false material concept is replaced by the true spiritual understanding of man, through the understanding which Christian Science gives, these doubts and fears disappear, as do sorrow and suffering also.
Christian Science teaches in the plainest of language that God is the perfect Principle of the universe, and that His creation, the universe including man, is perfect even as its creator is perfect. Christian Science teaches, further, that since God is Spirit, His creation, man, must be spiritual. Thus, in reality there is no material creation, no material man, that which seems to be a material man being but a concept of the carnal or mortal mind, itself a falsity. Strange doctrine this, the materialist may say. But there can be no denying it if it be admitted that God is infinite Spirit and man His image and likeness, even as the Scriptures affirm.
What happens when man is revealed to one as the image or reflection of God, spiritual and perfect? He becomes convinced of the unreality of matter and of a material selfhood. And to be convinced of the unreality of matter and of a material selfhood is to begin to have dominion over false material sense. Then comes the conviction that this understanding must ultimate in complete victory over all materiality. On page 304 of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" Mrs. Eddy writes, "The perfect man — governed by God, his perfect Principle — is sinless and eternal." That is the truth about man, the real man; and no effort of the so-called human mind can alter it. Our real spiritual selves are the sons of God now, even as the Apostle John declared.
