Mary Baker Eddy writes in "No and Yes" (p. 17): "In Science there is no fallen state of being; for therein is no inverted image of God, no escape from the focal radiation of the infinite. Hence the unreality of error, and the truth of the Scripture, that there is 'none beside Him.'"
"The focal radiation of the infinite," enlightening human consciousness as it does, reveals that which Deity comprehends and embraces within His focus, that which is included in the radiation of infinite Truth, Life, and Love, God. Logically, whatever Deity comprehends and embraces, and He understands and includes all that is real, is forever spiritual and perfect.
Obviously, whatever is not within the range of infinite comprehension and inclusion is not within the realm of spiritual factuality. Thus sin, disease, and death, all that is not divinely created, can only seem to be. Evil, error, abnormalities of all sorts, are hypothetical falsities, regardless of how real they may seem to afflicted humanity.
Mrs. Eddy points out this truth in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures." There she writes (p. 301), "Delusion, sin, disease, and death arise from the false testimony of material sense, which, from a supposed standpoint outside the focal distance of infinite Spirit, presents an inverted image of Mind and substance with everything turned upside down." But these errors are never real or true and actually have no power.
Nothing which Deity knows and includes can ever be beyond the comprehension and utilization of man, the exact expression of God. Humanity discovers this to be the case when it turns from finite materiality to infinite spirituality. The knowledge of spiritual facts enables students of Christian Science to demonstrate God's perfection increasingly, even as it also enables students to handle the claims of evil or error effectively. Knowing God's allness and evil's impotency permits students to resist and thwart evil's deceptions that would mislead them.
Many years ago a student of Christian Science was faced with a sudden demand for what seemed to him an overwhelming sum of money, a demand which at first he believed impossible to meet. He had been faced with smaller demands which had always been met; but now the belief of insufficiency seemed to present itself. This belief of insufficiency, he realized, needed to be nullified and obliterated. To that end, he searched his thought honestly and prayerfully for whatever was ungodlike in it. He was surprised to discover a great lack of humility. A false sense of pride had caused him to be more concerned than he should be about what others thought of him. He resolved to concern himself less with what others thought and more with that which is pleasing in God's sight.
He asked himself, "Just what do I
want?"
The answer came, "God."
Then the question arose in thought, "Just
what do I need?"
The same answer came, "God."
Then he reasoned, "I have God; so I
have all that I want and all that I need."
With the elimination of the false sense of pride, he was able to think clearly as well as to earn and receive within a couple of days much more than was required to pay the debt. Having discovered and destroyed the error which had deluded him and having enriched his thought and life with increased humility, he has never been plagued again by insufficiency and lack during the many years which have followed. "The focal radiation of the infinite" had met his human need.
Healing in Christian Science is primarily mental, even though the seeming need be for physical, financial, or social readjustment. It may well be said to be the correction of focus, turning one's mental gaze away from that which is materially mutable, imperfect, and mortal to the spiritually immutable, perfect, and immortal— to God and His infinite creation. Healing in Christian Science is never variable; it is always the successful, scientific result of praying effectively, of realizing God's unchanging perfection.
Mrs. Eddy tells us in "Unity of Good" (p. 6), "Sooner or later the whole human race will learn that, in proportion as the spotless selfhood of God is understood, human nature will be renovated, and man will receive a higher selfhood, derived from God, and the redemption of mortals from sin, sickness, and death be established on everlasting foundations."
God and man are one in being; infinite individuality is evidenced multifariously in infinite variety of expression. Thus man, not the so-called mortal man, but the spiritual image of God, is, by reflection and as reflection, eternally healthy, happy, successful, fearless, sinless, painless, pure, and holy; and he knows it.
Humanity in general believes that everything begins and ends, is variable and uncertain. Actually, whatever truly exists is spiritually real, and must be and is eternal, without beginning and without end. Likewise, whatever truly exists, exists everywhere, because spiritual reality is everywhere present and powerful. Logically, then, whatever does not exist everywhere does not exist anywhere, actually. Since reality never began, it can never terminate.
That is why the writer of Ecclesiastes could say (1:9,) "The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun." Then he asked, "Is there any thing whereof it may be said, See, this is new?" And he answered, "It hath been already of old time, which was before us."
"The focal radiation of the infinite" reveals the power of God as the only power; hence the unreality of evil in its insidious phases. The Christ, Truth, the radiance of God, touches human experience as mortals open their thought obediently to God for guidance and support.
As human misconceptions of God and man are corrected and the truth regarding God and man is clearly seen, Truth replaces human vagaries with spiritual actuality. Truth lightens with divine intelligence dark places of ignorance, breaks with unselfed love the fetters of superstitions and fears. In "the focal radiation of the infinite," health is seen to be divinely natural to man, success his unalterable prerogative, and happiness the perpetual state of his well-being.
