Health is a major concern today. How to achieve a healthier body often appears to consume human thought. The matter-physician puts great emphasis on the chemistry of the body. The body is viewed as a compound of chemical properties that need to be balanced in order to achieve a healthy state. Only matter is under consideration. Very little attention is given to the patient's thoughts.
But in Christian Science, the approach to health is from exactly the opposite standpoint. Man is seen as the very expression of God, Spirit, sinless and pure. He is a compound, not of physical elements and chemical properties, but of right ideas, such as strength, health, purity, freedom, and joy. In the Science of Spirit, matter is not a factor. The Christian Scientist works only with thought, spiritualizing and purifying consciousness through prayer. The action of Spirit on human thought effects a moral and spiritual change from dependency on the evidence matter is presenting to the recognition of Spirit's allness— and this is actually the only universal remedy for disease.
Whereas the matter-physician seeks to balance the body chemistry with pills and medications, the metaphysician brings a correct balance to the human mind through the activity of Christ, Truth. The understanding of spiritual truths, firmly applied to the situation needing healing, routs out and destroys the impure elements in human thought, such as impatience, fear, faultfinding, and hatred. As thought is spiritualized, and a perception of the true nature of man begins to outweigh impure, or matter-based, thoughts, the human body is returned to health.
