"Science is absolute and final," we read on page 99 of "Miscellaneous Writings" by Mary Baker Eddy. She continues, "It is revolutionary in its very nature; for it upsets all that is not upright." Education looked at in the light of Science—absolute Science—is one of the areas in which many ideas which seem at first revolutionary are upsetting the old beliefs of mankind.
The root of the word "education" is from the Latin, educere, meaning to lead forth. It implies a bringing to light of that which is innate, of that which already exists. Yet in human experience what a different view is presented! Education has largely become a pouring-in process based on the assumption that man begins as a helpless infant, grows through phases of childhood, adolescence, maturity, age, eventually to reach an end in death. Each phase of mankind's growth has been studied and analyzed, and specific characteristics and limitations have been placed upon each of these periods. Moreover, while these general time divisions are accepted and adhered to in the educative process, many people also believe that each individual has a private mind which came to him at birth and that, depending upon heredity and various other factors, the individual's mind may turn out to be exceptionally intelligent, average, mediocre, or subnormal.
Happily, Science is upsetting all these mortal, limited views and replacing them with the right concept of education; that is, a drawing forth of that which already is true of man as God knows him. Thus Science is presenting to us a new idea of pedagogy. By definition Christian Science tells us in part that man is "that which has no separate mind from God," and also that "he is the compound idea of God, including all right ideas" (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mrs. Eddy, p. 475). These absolute facts deny the human belief of a mind in a brain and also deny the necessity of ideas being added to man, who, as God's spiritual likeness, already includes all right ideas.
