WHEN we think about ourselves, what kind of man do we behold? Is he spiritual, that is, the creation of the divine Mind? Or is he material, that is, a formation of matter? Christian Science teaches us how to distinguish between the two and to acknowledge as our true selfhood the man that God, Mind, made and maintains.
The book of Genesis presents two accounts, utterly opposed to each other, of the origin and nature of man. In the first, or spiritual, record we read (1:27), "God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him." In the second record, or allegory, we find this (2:7): "The Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life."
In the scientific record man derives his life and intelligence from God, the only Life and Mind; in the supposititious myth, man is dependent upon inert mindless matter for existence and consciousness. The first account instructs us in the truth of being; the second alerts us to the falsity of the material sense of existence. The first is our authority for claiming spiritual identity; the second is our authority for repudiating material selfhood.
