Many years ago the writer was traveling with friends by automobile over an unfamiliar part of the country. Toward evening we came to an unpaved and muddy strip of the highway. The going was difficult. Presently to the right we saw a graveled road. It appeared to have a solid foundation, and this road was followed; but it took us down to a ravine and a stream, over which we must cross on a precarious bridge. We then had to make the climb up over a narrow rocky road. It was getting dark, and much fear was expressed, but through earnest prayer we finally reached the highway. Deep gratitude was expressed for the safety experienced, but the detour was recognized as a foolish venture.
Perhaps many in their advancement from material sense testimony up to the spiritual evidence of all things come to a place in their journey where the going seems difficult. It may be that the problem confronting the traveler is one of sickness, and though there has been good work done by both patient and practitioner, the healing has not been effected. Then because of the urge of some well-intentioned friend, or a member of the family, the patient has yielded to the temptation to see a doctor because of the suggestion that a diagnosis would help him to know how to meet the difficulty.
Christian Science emphatically teaches that a physical diagnosis of disease inevitably tends to induce disease, for mortal mind itself is the cause of disease. If one unwittingly yields to this temptation, he need not be surprised if he finds that the road upon which he is now traveling, which seems at first to have a solid foundation, leads him down into the ravine of mortal mind. Many fears stem from materia medica beliefs, accompanied by the suggestion that man possesses a mortal body and lives in it and that the only way to cure the sick matter, alias a sick body, is through administering to it some other form of matter which is believed to be a curative agent. But this procedure does not solve the problem, and the deep waters of mortal mind's beliefs and fears are spanned by a precarious bridge of speculative theories and conjectures which do not heal.
