"Neither do I condemn thee." What blessed release from the heartaches and heaviness that human vicissitudes may have engendered, these words of the Master import! For personal condemnation conveys a sense of burden and affliction. According to the allegorical account in Genesis, Adam was driven from Eden and condemned to till the ground. A dire and dismal prospect! But Christian Science distinguishes between the mortal sense of man, as subject to both good and evil influences, and the veritable or real man of God's creating, responsive only to the will of God, or good. It shows that Truth condemns the error or evil that would obscure the true view of God's man.
As man's spiritual status is comprehended, the false claims of evil to power and reality are exposed, and their destruction is assured. In the real man, thus brought to light, there is nothing to accuse or condemn. Condemnation is for error alone. We avert the consequences of yielding to error by parting from error. It is put off in proportion as we accept the Master's gracious invitation: "Come unto me, . . . and I will give you rest. . . . For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."
Who has ever found self-condemnation the road to peace, assurance, poise? On the contrary, how blundering and ineffectual it makes us seem! When self-condemnation is eliminated by spiritual understanding, what a measure of freedom and positive happiness such liberation brings! After years of suffering from the discouraging and disquieting but, thank God, provably unreal beliefs of self-consciousness, self-condemnation, and their ilk, the writer found herself protesting aloud one day the nothingness of these errors: "But I've done nothing wrong." No one had accused her of having done any wrong. And it seemed that with that statement the self-imposed burdens dropped away. She learned to face the world with a certain degree of composure and confidence, and with the indwelling peace—the peace of God—that truly exceeds all human understanding. This sense of detachment from unreal worries increased effectually through the continued study and application of Christian Science.
