Scriptural records show the art of healing as practiced by the Hebrews to have been a very simple process. The Levites were the sole practitioners, and their form of practice consisted mainly of reminding their patients of God's promises of protection. Recognizing but one cause for disease or discord, namely, deviation from divine law, they administered but one remedy, a moral and mental one designed to turn the thought of the patient toward God. In the twenty-sixth verse of the fifteenth chapter of the book of Exodus is found a treatment that lifted Moses and his followers out of a sense of fear and lack. It is a simple statement stressing the necessity for obedience to divine law and promising exemption from disease as the result of this obedience. It reads: "If thou wilt diligently hearken to the voice of the Lord thy God, and wilt do that which is right in his sight, and wilt give ear to his commandments, and keep all his statutes, I will put none of these diseases upon thee, which I have brought upon the Egyptians: for I am the Lord that healeth thee."
In rather striking contrast to this simple procedure is the history of material medicine. In this connection it is interesting to remember that Æsculapius, the father of material medicine, was a student of Chiron the Centaur. Mythology shows the Centaurs to have had a great fondness for wine; also that Chiron, receiving a fatal wound as the indirect result of this fondness, found his best salve powerless to heal his injury. The statue of Æsculapius in the temple at Epidaurus was formed of ivory and gold, and represented him as an old man with a full beard, leaning on a staff round which a serpent was climbing, the serpent being the distinguishing symbol of this divinity. Hippocrates, who was possibly the first person to classify diseases, thereby gave a new impetus to the point of view of man as a material organism.
It is here, in a helpless and hopeless state, that the average person finds himself before he is willing to listen to the joyful message of Christian Science, which defines man as spiritual. When one is willing to listen to this message and to accept it as the truth, then he is ready to apprehend divine Mind as the power which heals. Giving ear to God's promises, he strives to shut out all thoughts of fear, worry, disease, and discord, which belong to the consciousness typified in the Scriptures as Egyptian; and then he finds that his body soon responds to his improved thinking. He now understands, in a measure at least, what Mrs. Eddy means when she says in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 197): "The less that is said of physical structure and laws, and the more that is thought and said about moral and spiritual law, the higher will be the standard of living and the farther mortals will be removed from imbecility or disease."
When the student of Christian Science is once convinced of the primary importance of obedience to moral law, he begins to search the Scriptures, finding there repeated evidence of the efficacy of the moral medicine administered by the great Hebrew prophets. He discovers that Hezekiah, even after Isaiah had pronounced his case fatal, continued in prayer and with tears of repentance, until the prophet, with higher vision, declared he would be healed. It was the moral law operating in the thought of the king which caused his repentance for wrong conduct, and an earnest desire to be obedient to the moral law that brought about his healing. In the account of Asa also, he who appealed to the physicians in his extremity is clearly shown the futility of depending upon material means and ignoring moral law. A thorough study of the Old Testament convinces one that only the false prophets attempted to heal by flattering men in their sins and encouraging them in a false hope of deliverance without moral regeneration.
By his words, "Sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee," Jesus showed the connection he recognized between morals and health. When his disciples, however, asked him concerning the man born blind, "Who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind?" Jesus replied: "Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that the works of God should be made manifest in him." That is to say, be careful not to hold sin as personal; but let us make manifest the works or law of God as being the law of health, holiness, and harmony. No doubt, many are sensitive when the fact is pointed out that sin is a prolific source of suffering, because they reason that if this be the case the worst sinners should be the greatest sufferers, whereas the reverse often seems apparent. Christian Science explains this seeming difficulty of the effects of sin. As used in Christian Science the word "sin" means the false belief that life is in matter. There can be no intelligent obedience to the divine or moral law until this false belief is exposed. This fact was indicated when Jesus asked, "Whether is easier, to say, Thy sins be forgiven thee; or to say, Arise, and walk?" and again when, in the highly figurative language of the Scriptures, it is recorded that Jesus spat on the ground, anointed the eyes of the blind man with clay, and then told him to go wash in the pool of Siloam. In both cases he was rebuking the sin of believing that there is life in matter, before he healed the case.
Jesus' attitude toward sin and sinners was the exact reverse of that of the world in general. Most people make little effort to free themselves entirely from sin; yet, toward certain classes of sinners they are intolerant and unbending. Jesus, however, while most intolerant of sin, was always ready to heal the sinner. In the case of Mary Magdalene, for instance, while his host and the other guests at the house of Simon were shrugging their shoulders, wrapping themselves in thoughts of self-righteousness, raising their eyebrows in scandalized disapproval of the woman and of the whole class for which she stood, Jesus alone was conscious of the possibility and necessity of healing her. He, therefore, in the form of a short parable about two debtors, gave a dose of moral medicine, not to the woman, whose tears showed her repentance, but to his host and to the other guests. At the end of his story he could say to the woman, "Thy sins are forgiven;" because she was, possibly, the only person present who sought forgiveness or desired to change her viewpoint of life. While she was keenly aware of her debt to God, and was seeking to redeem it by thoughts of gratitude and love, her critics, unmindful of any debt they owed to divine Love, had been drifting farther from that spiritual viewpoint which reveals the necessity for charity and compassion at all times.
To show the superiority of moral over material medicine let us suppose a case of a man suffering from some dread disease who is continually watching his body, trying to ascertain the effect upon it of various medicines, foods, and climates, while constantly fearing that something that he may do or eat will prove fatal. Meanwhile he is engaged in a business the methods of which are such that many of his fellow-men are being defrauded by them. Finally, this man turns to Christian Science for relief; and as soon as he learns something about the divine Principle of this Science he begins to watch his physical condition less and his conduct and motives more. What is the result? Even this, that, whereas his nerves had been racked and his temper on a strain lest he lose his life or something of value, he now knows that according to God's law he has and is entitled to every good thing, provided he obeys God's law of right thinking and right living. Learning to separate the sheep from the goats,—honest from dishonest thoughts,—he sees that what he gives of love, compassion, honesty, justice, forgiveness, to his fellow-men he gives to God. Like one who deposits everything he can in a bank so as to make it possible to draw upon that bank as he needs it, he now seeks to bless his brother in all ways, knowing that this alone increases his ability to realize God's presence in health and harmony. Thus, we see that not only this one himself is benefited by moral medicine, but all with whom he has any dealings are profited. Another instance which shows the advantage of moral medicine is that of a woman whose physical condition is such that she fears the consequences of waiting upon her family. Learning through Science that unselfish service is synonymous with the true sense of life, her fears are eliminated, her health is restored, and her entire family likewise blessed.
Here it might be well to state that Christian Scientists who take moral medicine regularly, watching their motives carefully, thereby often avoid too frequent reliance upon the mental work of another. If they will remember that treatment in Christian Science can never take the place of obedience to the moral law, they will strive to correct all evil habits of thinking, however carefully concealed, and thus effect a healing that a long course of treatment might not bring about. While Christian Science treatment does lift one out of the belief of heredity and any belief in the necessity for sinning, its purpose is not, as some profess to believe, to provide a way to live at perfect ease without making any struggle to overcome evil. Christian Science demands of its followers that they prepare themselves mentally and morally for mighty wrestlings over every form of sin. It insists that, although this warfare is on a purely mental plane, it is, nevertheless, a warfare to the finish of all evil—every phase of human passion, appetite, disloyalty, and dishonesty. Its moral medicine gives strength, courage, and wisdom with which successfully to combat and defeat sin in every form. On page 166 of "Miscellaneous Writings" Mrs. Eddy calls to mind the fact that "this spiritual idea, or Christ, entered into the minutiae of the life of the personal Jesus. It made him an honest man, a good carpenter, and a good man, before it could make him the glorified."
The word "moral" comes from the Latin word mos meaning conduct; and Christian Science shows that conduct and health are both regulated entirely by thought. Hence, any remedy that brings really improved health must mean improved conduct or morals; and, vice versa, whatever scientifically improves morals must improve health. Christian Science, because it unfolds the spiritual viewpoint of the allness of God, upon which to base every thought and act, inspires in its adherents the desire to be obedient to the very highest sense of moral law in their every relation to their fellow-men. Every earnest student knows that any wrong done to a brother must result in so blurring his own spiritual viewpoint that it becomes difficult to use this viewpoint for physical healing. Clean conduct must keep the spiritual viewpoint clear in order to insure health and harmony.
It is to this fact that our Leader refers on page 460 of Science and Health when she states: "Our system of Mind-healing rests on the apprehension of the nature and essence of all being,—on the divine Mind and Love's essential qualities. Its pharmacy is moral, and its medicine is intellectual and spiritual, though used for physical healing." And this is the reason, no doubt, that in pointing the way out of all human ills Mrs. Eddy was careful to give the definition of the moral stage which must precede the purely spiritual state of consciousness (see Science and Health, p. 115). By reason of their Leader's pure life as well as through her writings, Christian Scientists find encouragement to conquer all unrighteousness. They are grateful that Mrs. Eddy gave to them a Church Manual, a moral code, which, like the pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night, is leading a host of loyal hearts into the understanding described by Isaiah, where death will be swallowed up in victory, "and the Lord God will wipe away tears from off all faces; and the rebuke of his people shall he take away from off all the earth: for the Lord hath spoken it."
