In the realm of human thinking the search for antidotes for both disease and sin has been long and devious. No sooner has one been found for some specific ill, and its virtues widely advertised, than its failures and sometimes its harmful effects begin to make news. A modern example is that of the vitamin pills. The suggestion that a normal amount of varied food must be supplemented by some alphabetical pill has been offered to a gullible public. It is heartening to find that at last some honest and disinterested investigators have disclosed the fact that no difference could be found in the health of a certain number of persons who had, and who had not, been given these pills over a certain period of time.
As the Christian Scientist notes the rise and fall in popular favor of material nostrums (Nostrum: A medicine recommended by its preparer—Webster), he is more and more grateful that there is one unfailing divine antidote for all the ills and evils of the flesh, and it is to be found in the study and application of his Godinspired textbooks. These books, the Bible, and "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mary Baker Eddy, instruct the student to look away from matter and to turn to Spirit, God, for healing. Hundreds of years before the Christian era, one finds this succinct statement regarding the unwisdom of trusting to material means instead of to God (II Chron. 16:12, 13): "Asa . . . sought not to the Lord, but to the physicians. And Asa slept with his fathers."
Tatian, a Christian writer of the second century, A. D., writing on the subject of Christian healing and against the use of material remedies, says: "If anyone is healed by matter, through trusting to it, much more will he be healed by having recourse to the power of God. . . . Why is he who trusts in the system of matter not willing to trust in God?" (Ante-Nicene Series, Edinburgh Edition, 1867.) His is a simple, straightforward plea to the Christians of the second century to adhere to the instructions of their Master and his disciples.
