FROM the beginning of time mankind has been in bondage to the fear of death. The "last enemy" has been regarded as the inevitable conclusion of so-called material life, and mankind has been pictured as helpless to resist or overcome it. This belief has been strengthened by theories of scholastic theology and medicine and has been accepted down the ages by all but a few spiritual thinkers. Christ Jesus challenged and rejected this materialistic view of life, for he recognized man as the child of God and therefore deathless, and he proved what he taught.
Through Christian Science Mrs. Eddy presents the true sense of life in full accord with the teachings of Jesus, showing that man as God's likeness was never under the curse of Adam's transgression, and that as human thought is purified, lifted out of a sense of existence in matter, the mortal is put off and man's immortality begins to be realized.
Once, when speaking in the temple, Jesus said, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am." In these words the Master proclaimed his eternality as the Son of God. On page 266 of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" Mrs. Eddy, in a statement which corresponds with these words of Christ Jesus, writes: "Man is deathless, spiritual. He is above sin or frailty. He does not cross the barriers of time into the vast forever of Life, but he coexists with God and the universe."
