WHERE shall we look for substance that is safe—safe from what are called the ravages of time, safe from theft, from decay and diminution? The answer to this question is indicated in Christ Jesus' familiar command: "Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal." Christian Science teaches us the true meaning of these words and their supreme practicality.
The so-called human mind looks upon its own mental phenomena as substance— something apart from itself—and calls that substance matter. It then attributes this matter substance to a mysterious unknown cause generally called God. It gives to matter, the expression of its own suppositional thinking, fearsome and unpronouncable names and attributes to it mysterious elements and forces which it seeks to understand and control. Mankind thus finds itself ignorantly worshiping a myth, imprisoned in its own beliefs, and in subjection to its own laws, which are inimical to its own being.
Under this mesmerism mortal mind is found chasing the reflection of itself around in a circle of contradictory activities. It busies itself constructing defenses in defiance of its own elements of destruction. It indulges itself in pleasures that result in pain. Its suppositional creation is life that ends in death. The illogical nature of this process indicates its unreality, the impossibility of its existence in truth as an expression of intelligence. Surely it was of this pseudo-intelligent mind Jesus said, "If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!"
