A Christian Scientist may announce, "Now I am going to read the lesson." He will profit from this activity to the extent that he actually means by his remark, "Now I am going to study the Lesson Sermon."
The Bible Lesson, given in the Christian Science Quarterly, consists of citations from the Bible and from the textbook, Science and Health by Mrs. Eddy. To read this lesson by rote is to condemn oneself to spiritual penury. The daily repetition of such superficial reading, or simple scanning of citations, is apt to become an arduous, tedious, even frustrating task, leading either to chronic dissatisfaction or acute exasperation from which one may find himself seeking escape by curtailing his reading, by turning to the Bible Lesson only spasmodically, or perhaps by ceasing to read it altogether.
If the reading of the Lesson Sermon should ever become a burden, then one had better check to see if he has not acquired a habit of reading by rote—either hastily or dreamily skimming the surface of ideas rather than probing deeply their metaphysical content. Mrs. Eddy writes in the Manual of The Mother Church (Art. XVII, Sect. 1), "A Christian Scientist is not fatigued by prayer, by reading the Scriptures or the Christian Science textbook."
