While the objective of Christian Scientists extends beyond the living of moral lives, yet it must always be remembered that Christian Science demands the highest, most impeccable morality of its adherents. Morals are the mores, as the Latin language designated them, that is, the customs which cannot be violated without repercussions in the relationships of mankind. As we know them today, morals are commitments which everyone accepts by virtue of membership in human society. They derive their authority from necessity, for society cannot function without morals. Any attempt to ignore them is a breach of integrity, an unkept agreement.
Morals are based upon intelligence. When Moses gave his sanitary and ethical rules to the children of Israel, he did so in furtherance of sound judgment on their part regarding their conduct. In Deuteronomy (4:6) the fact is stated this way: "Keep therefore and do them [these statutes]; for this is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the nations, which shall hear all these statutes, and say, Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people."
When Christ Jesus, many centuries later, enunciated moral considerations for human contact, he often stated that he was pointing the way to wise and strategic conduct on the part of his disciples. "For I," he said, on one occasion (Luke 21:15), "will give you a mouth and wisdom, which all your adversaries shall not be able to gainsay nor resist."
