BECAUSE of his relation to God, man's health, harmony, and peace are a spiritual inheritance, from which he cannot be separated. The fact that God created man in His own image and likeness precludes the possibility of his manifesting qualities or conditions unlike his divine Principle, God. As the likeness of God, man must of necessity be spiritual and eternally perfect, unaffected by the dreams of material existence. Understanding this, Mrs. Eddy on page 417 of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" has lovingly pointed out to the student of Christian Science, working to prove the truth of her teaching, that "to the Christian Science healer, sickness is a dream from which the patient needs to be awakened."
An important lesson lies in this admonition, a warning that, whatever the nature of the inharmony, it must be seen as a dream, not as a reality, and as not affecting in any way the divine idea. Though the tempter, mortal mind, urges the acceptance of belief in the reality of a mortal, material man and what he appears to be experiencing, all that is contrary to God's divine creation is but an illusion or dream, without reality.
The situation can be seen somewhat more clearly through illustration. A child is dreaming that a lion is in his room. He is terrified, and calls to his mother, who perceives that he is dreaming. She pays no heed to the supposed lion, but endeavors to awaken and quiet the child, knowing that as she succeeds in doing so the dream-lion will disappear.
