The goal of every Christian Scientist is that state of spiritual consciousness which knows God as Soul. Here an individual's consciousness of his own being directly and perfectly reflects divine consciousness. In this true state of consciousness there is no sin, no disease, no discord, no lack, no uncertainty, no death.
The opposite of Soul falsely claims to be the soul of man. It is physical sense, often called the carnal mind, or mortal mind. It is also called evil, or error, because it is directly contrary to good, which is God, Truth.
The journey from sense to Soul is symbolized in the Bible story of the Israelites leaving the bondage of Egypt and wandering forty years in the wilderness before arriving at the Promised Land of Canaan. Mrs. Eddy's definition of "wilderness" in the Glossary of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" includes these words: "The vestibule in which a material sense of things disappears, and spiritual sense unfolds the great facts of existence" (p. 597). The wilderness is where we seem to be.
