In the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," Mary Baker Eddy asks this stupendous question (p. 469): "What is Mind?" And with summary directness she replies in part: "Mind is God. The exterminator of error is the great truth that God, good, is the only Mind, and that the supposititious opposite of infinite Mind—called devil or evil—is not Mind, is not Truth, but error, without intelligence or reality." This absolute statement concerning Mind is one we must adhere to closely in order to demonstrate Christian Science.
Mind and memory—memory in the sense of knowledge or awareness—are inseparable. Proof of our oneness with Mind necessarily includes our ability to memorize. There is no bad mind, therefore no bad memory. If an imperfect mind seems to exist outside the one supreme, divine, infinite intelligence, it is an illusion. The degree to which we can prove the oneness, wholeness, and allness of Mind measures our understanding of God and man and ensures our dominion over any supposed loss of mind or memory.
Mind is not an abstraction. It includes all faculties through which man comprehends and apprehends creation. The entire creation is included in Mind because God's creation is the only creation and God is the only Mind. Whatever denies the perfect and spiritual creation, whatever places man outside God's perfect and intelligent universe, is hypothetical and can be proved so through Christian Science.
The functions of Mind are always retained by man. If it were not so, a separation would exist between God and man; but this is impossible. Man is the reflection of God. The light is not separate from its source. Without Mind, God, existence would be a vacuity. If the assumption of loss of memory is accepted on account of beliefs of decrepitude, ignorance, apathy, fear, or sin, then these erroneous beliefs of a mind opposed to the one Mind must be denied and uprooted. Mrs. Eddy writes (Science and Health, p. 407): "No faculty of Mind is lost. In Science, all being is eternal, spiritual, perfect, harmonious in every action."
The facts here recorded concerning true being should be pondered. Since the faculties of Mind are eternal, they cannot deteriorate with age, be blunted by use, or become lost through the apathy of an unthinking existence. The faculties of Mind are always unimpaired and remain immediately available. The illusion of minds many and of brain as the source of intelligence has, however, educated mankind to believe in a supposititious evil mind. Christian Science demonstrates that the fullness of Mind and its glorious and perfect intelligence is ever present and available.
Our acceptance of Christian Science brings us into an understanding of the one Mind. The moment we learn the great fact that God is Mind we step into an arena of illimitable interests and achievement. We quickly discern through Christian Science that all reliance must be placed on God and that all the "many inventions" which express matter's opposition to Mind must be denied and discarded.
"Immortal memory"—to quote a marginal heading on page 407 of Science and Health—is that which is mindful of facts. Paul admonishes (Phil. 2:5), "Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus." We cannot believe our Master would be forgetful. He knew that man lives and moves in God; and thus Jesus exercised the faculties of intelligence by destroying the belief in intelligent evil, ignorance, lack, sin, disease, and death. He defeated opposition to the one Mind, as expressed in the thoughts of the Pharisees, and revealed to his listeners the power of spiritual intelligence and the glorious enlightenment of Love.
According to mortals a carnal or mortal mentality is believed to exist and to possess the faculty of memory. This belief results in a finite sense of mind that accepts the errors of limitation concerning mind and memory. Mortal mind claims that we can forget harmony and remember discord; that we can be aware of sorrow but forgetful of joy. Harmony and happiness, however, are spiritual and therefore indelible. They are an inseparable portion of spiritual existence and can no more be extinguished than can their origin, God.
The facts concerning God, good, are unfailingly clear to man. Immortal memory is mindful, and it is spiritual. It expresses Mind, and through our expression of this faculty we have the ability to retain and identify every idea of Mind correctly and immediately. A step toward this desirable demonstration of Mind is a habitual desire to lay aside self-will and all that claims a mind apart from God and, in the words of the prophet Micah (6:8), "to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God."
In the degree that we allow divine Mind to hold control we shall have a good memory. Mrs. Eddy writes (Science and Health, p. 407), "If delusion says, 'I have lost my memory,' contradict it." If this delusion appears, let us pause and instead of admitting, "I cannot remember," or "I have forgotten," let us firmly declare the truth, in some such manner as this: "The Ego or I, is unerring Mind. I live in Mind; therefore I am mindful of ideas and their identities." A momentary pause to realize this fact will furnish thought with the idea needed, and on every recurring occasion the faculty of memory will be seen as changeless and perpetual.
The belief that memory is dim or can be lost is an admission that Mind is not ever present. Christian Science has come to restore all things, including memory. Our knowledge of God as one ever-present Mind includes all the faculties of Mind: comprehension, apprehension, classification, and the ability to retain and identify ideas. Every day, yes, every hour, prayer should go out in humble gratitude for the great spiritual fact that Mind is One and All, that no intelligence exists apart from Mind's knowledge of its own creation, the perfect spiritual creation.
When pondering the beauties and wonders of Mind we become aware of the perfection and beauty of man. Thus we are freed from the limitations of material sense and find it natural to understand Mind and immortal memory.
