IT is well worth the while of every Christian Scientist occasionally to ask himself, How am I regarding disease? To what extent do my preconceived opinions about it occupy my thought and influence the harmony of my life today? To what extent do they hamper my 'successful handling of it when I encounter it?
Mrs. Eddy, by her fidelity to revelation and by demonstration, has made it possible for all of us to recognize the one true fact about disease, viz., that it has no truth in it; and she has given us in the text-book of Christian Science, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," a practical statement of the Science of true being, and a positive rule of Mind-healing which will enable each one of us. if we follow her example of fidelity and demonstration, to acquire a sense of health which is scientific, and so enter on the fruition of true health ourselves and convey the like to others. Are we making the best use of which we are capable, of this statement and rule which our Leader has put within our comprehension?
Not a tithe of the freedom, or dominion, or joy, or confidence which Christian Science holds for us comes to our experience until we have set about living our lives as masters of our bodies, instead of their slaves as heretofore, and meet our sicknesses and troubles when they come upon us as if we knew we were masters. We have 'become so accustomed to more or less helpless submission to what has been so long taught and believed about disease, that it has become almost second nature to us to look on it as one of the hard but unpreventable facts of existence; and as we have thought in our hearts, so it has been, and we have had perforce to be content with a sense of health which presupposed liability to disease at some time or other, because it was the only sense of health we knew.
This being so. as a sort of safeguard mortals have equipped themselves with a certain superficial knowledge of the supposed fads of disease, so that they might know, when sickness came upon them, whether it was such as they could deal with themselves or whether they would need the help of a physician. All this has seemed necessary, in view of the apparently inherent defects in the physical composition; but, although we have come to know in Christian Science that man is wholly spiritual, the knowledge and recognition of disease which we had acquired, and the presupposition of liability to disease which we have consequently entertained, have meanwhile also become second nature to us; and unless we make very decided efforts to efface all this false knowledge, the true sense of health will remain unknown to us, and disease will continue to appear a hard, unpreventable fact.
It is not enough to sit down contentedly and wait for an accumulation of evidence of Christian Science healing to establish a true sense of health for us, for this will never do it. It is only as we lose the sense of disease and of sin that we gain the sense of health, and only as the scientific sense of health becomes rooted in consciousness shall we begin to lay hold on freedom from liability to disease, or gain confidence in our ability to carry that freedom to others.
Can a man manifest strength of limb merely by knowing of it intellectually? Human thought stands just as much in need of regular, healthful mental exercise in the scientific truths of being to equip it for its work, as we have been in the habit of thinking that our bodies need health-giving exercise in fresh, pure air to keep us fit for our daily task. To become masters of disease, and to get rid of submissiveness to it, we must make ourselves exponents of true health, we must become students of that system of health which does not admit that there is any power equal to the Principle of being in overcoming disease; we must deny disease in toto, not treat its details. To be able to do this with understanding, or faith, we must consciously handle our own sense of health, quite independently of doing it while helping others to overcome disease; we must watch our habits of thinking about disease, and we must correct those habits until it has become our unconscious habit to think and talk in terms of health.
How easy it is to go on recognizing a certain set of symptoms as indications of a specified disease; how easy to recall all that experience has taught us goes to make up certain forms of disease; how familiar we are with all the more common manifestations of it; how tempted we are to form a diagnosis of disease directly a patient who has come to us for Christian Science treatment has recited his symptoms. But, do these conclusions guide us to the fundamental error which is the cause of the trouble? What is it that prompts us to think that they do? What except habit, animal magnetism,—which acts on the basis that there is sensation in matter. What is guiding us when we allow them to enter our reasoning about treatment? What except knowledge,—knowledge of the kind our text-book describes as evidence obtained from the corporeal senses; about human beliefs and opinions, the things which are mortal.
Mrs. Eddy's work for mankind would have been comparatively unimportant had she merely discovered a more potent antidote for a discordant reality. This is the mistake which most critics make in their estimate of Christian Science; but the very essence of its value and appeal to humanity is the scientific proof of the unreality of matter, and consequently of so-called disease, else on what ground is Mrs. Eddy able to say with confident assurance to us, "One should never hold in mind the thought of disease, but should efface from thought all forms and types of disease, both for one's own sake and for that of the patient" (Science and Health, p.39). How would our understanding of geography now stand if men had not abandoned all their conclusions and supposed knowledge arising out of the assumption that the earth is flat? How shall we learn more of the facts of life, if we do not banish theories and conclusions about disease, however plausible, from our work in the study of Mind-healing?
Has the reader ever paused to think what medical classification of symptoms, leading up to diagnosis of disease, is based upon? What else but the assumption that there is intelligence and substance in matter? Medical science, it may be here recalled, is, broadly speaking, two-sided. First, there is that part which deals with the body and bodily functions in health, and includes anatomy, chemistry, biology, and physiology. This part defines the normal standard of health required by each branch so far as it enters into the construction or functions of the body and its various subdivisions, and corresponds to that which in metaphysics is termed ontology. Second, there is that part which deals with the body when one or more of its organs or functions are affected by disease, the nature of which, its causes, symptoms, etc., is elaborately explained. This explanation of diseased conditions is included in what is known as pathology; consequently, in this respect pathology has no counterpart in divine metaphysics; classification of symptoms and diagnosis of disease belong essentially to materia medica and not to Christian Science.
Now it is self-evident that the study of disease, the abnormal, must start where the science of the normal stops, and that it must depend entirely for its truth, and consequently for its effective utility to mankind, on the truth of the normal. It can also now be seen that the symptoms which a patient presents are not necessarily evidence of a specified disease; the conceptions formed of his symptoms are arguments for or against a theory of disease, but they evidence disease only if the theory and the premise on which it rests are sound. If life, 'truth, intelligence, and substance in matter were fundamental facts of being, and if predisposition to disease were one of the inherent qualities of man, then disease theories would be true, and classification of physical symptoms and diagnosis of disease would be a matter of vital importance.
If, however, one is a Christian Scientist, he has taken his stand on the scientific statement of being, which denies that there is either life, intelligence, or substance in matter. Remove the premise that so-called matter is substance, then what have medical theories of disease to rest upon? How now are we to regard the phenomena which have been described as changes in matter? How regard disease? Of what value are these phenomena now as evidence of the disease which materia medica has named from them? Conversely, what will diagnosis of a specified disease and knowledge of its laws now tell us of the actual cause of the disease? Materia medica can only answer these questions if the body actually is what anatomy and physiology have declared it to be. Christian Science declares that the body is but a false human concept; hence pathological changes, so called, resolve themselves into the phenomena -of this fundamental misconception of the nature of life and substance. Instead of being, the expressions of pathological laws of cause and effect put into operation in respect to substantial organs, these phenomena become the elaborations first of the fundamental misconception of mortal mind as to the nature of life and substance, second of the dependent and therefore necessarily fallacious anatomical and physiological theories of health, which have described organs and set up laws for their functions, and third of the Adam-error which deems the knowledge of evil to be a necessary part of man's equipment, and thereby gives to it its power and sphere of influence. This so-called mortal mind, therefore, is the cause, either near or remote, of all suffering.
To the Christian Scientist, therefore, the chief significance in the diagnosis of a diseased organ lies, not in the disease, but in specifying the organ or function involved. The disease itself is an entire illusion, and one's aim is to annihilate all trace of it while seeking to know the truth about all that which is real and which is misapprehended by material sense. In the right apprehension of man health is automatically and necessarily brought to pass. Let us, therefore, as consistent Christian Scientists, work to exclude from contemplation and reasoning all our preconceived knowledge of the theories and nomenclature of disease; let us take more to heart our Leader's practical advice when she says "we should prevent the images of disease from taking form in thought, and we should efface the outlines of disease already formulated in the minds of mortals" (Science and Health, p. 17), for, as a basis for our work, we have Scriptural support for the statement that the God-created man was forbidden to acquire a knowledge of evil. Let us study to resolve the things of material sense into thoughts, and to illumine human thought with the spiritual understanding of ontology, for, as Mrs. Eddy has told us, this is the basis of all metaphysical practice. Let our study and our joy be in the facts of being, not in illusions based on misconceptions of life and its processes.; let us work our way out of human theories through the acquisition of a diviner sense of health, not a more extensive knowledge of disease with a corresponding mental pathology.
To do this does not by any means imply, when a patient comes to us presenting conditions which we have been in the habit of recognizing as symptoms of disease, that these conditions are henceforward to be disregarded and neglected; on the contrary, they are to be noted. We are there to cure them, and we must handle them, specifically or generally as the circumstances of the case demand, but this must be done according to the science we profess, not according to the theories which we deny. We have no right, as healers, to undertake the treatment of a patient and neglect any discordant symptom which he may present, whether the discord is expressed in the sensations he describes or in physical signs of which he may be unaware; both are externalized images of the errors which are holding him; he has come to us to be healed of them, and it is our duty to discern the error which is the underlying cause of his disease, so that we may present to his consciousness the truth which will heal him.
When, through surrender of the human mind to the divine Mind, illumination of the spiritual understanding has demonstrated man's spiritual capacity, we shall be able to read, at once, the human mind through a divine sense, and thus discern the error we would destroy. While we are acquiring this sense we are permitted by the Manual of The Mother Church (Article VIII., Sect. 23) to consult with a doctor on "the anatomy involved" in our patient's case, and on "ontology"; we need not therefore hesitate to do this if through exceptional circumstances it becomes necessary in the interest of our patient, but let us be careful that the subject of the consultation is confined to these two topics, otherwise we shall find that it has often hindered where it would have helped.
Finally, let us remember that because health is real and substantial, and the Christian Scientist's work is positive, in that it destroys disease by establishing the true sense of health, he is therefore in a position to give to his patient that which a doctor cannot. If the practitioner works aright, he not only removes disease but places his patient in a position to gain for himself, day by day, more of true health and therewith ever-increasing immunity from disease in the future. Nay, he can do much more, even, than this, for he can not only take relief and freedom to the individual he treats, but he can share in the total eradication of disease, and thereby in the victory over death, for he will be doing his part in elevating the whole of human thought to a diviner sense of life.
Love—it is heaven. And hate?
Hate is hell. And conscience?
Conscience is the eye of God in the soul of men.
