Science and Health, with Key to the Scriptures Part 41

274:27 Science and understanding, governed by the unerring and eternal Mind, destroy the imaginary copartners.h.i.+p, matter and mind, formed only to be destroyed in a manner and 274:30 at a period as yet unknown. This suppositional partner- s.h.i.+p is already obsolete, for matter, examined in the light of divine metaphysics, disappears.

Spirit the starting-point

275:1 Matter has no life to lose, and Spirit never dies. A partners.h.i.+p of mind with matter would ignore omnipres- 275:3 ent and omnipotent Mind. This shows that matter did not originate in G.o.d, Spirit, and is not eternal. Therefore matter is neither substantial, living, 275:6 nor intelligent. The starting-point of divine Science is that G.o.d, Spirit, is All-in-all, and that there is no other might nor Mind, - that G.o.d is Love, and therefore He 275:9 is divine Principle.

Divine synonyms

To grasp the reality and order of being in its Science, you must begin by reckoning G.o.d as the divine Principle 275:12 of all that really is. Spirit, Life, Truth, Love, combine as one, - and are the Scriptural names for G.o.d. All substance, intelligence, wisdom, being, im- 275:15 mortality, cause, and effect belong to G.o.d. These are His attributes, the eternal manifestations of the infinite divine Principle, Love. No wisdom is wise but His 275:18 wisdom; no truth is true, no love is lovely, no life is Life but the divine; no good is, but the good G.o.d bestows.

The divine completeness

Divine metaphysics, as revealed to spiritual understand- 275:21 ing, shows clearly that all is Mind, and that Mind is G.o.d, omnipotence, omnipresence, omniscience, - that is, all power, all presence, all Science.

275:24 Hence all is in reality the manifestation of Mind.

Our material human theories are dest.i.tute of Science.

The true understanding of G.o.d is spiritual. It robs the 275:27 grave of victory. It destroys the false evidence that mis- leads thought and points to other G.o.ds, or other so-called powers, such as matter, disease, sin, and death, superior 275:30 or contrary to the one Spirit.

Truth, spiritually discerned, is scientifically understood.

It casts out error and heals the sick.

Universal brotherhood

276:1 Having one G.o.d, one Mind, unfolds the power that heals the sick, and fulfils these sayings of Scripture, "I 276:3 am the Lord that healeth thee," and "I have found a ransom." When the divine precepts are understood, they unfold the foundation of fellows.h.i.+p, 276:6 in which one mind is not at war with another, but all have one Spirit, G.o.d, one intelligent source, in accordance with the Scriptural command: "Let this Mind be in you, 276:9 which was also in Christ Jesus." Man and his Maker are correlated in divine Science, and real consciousness is cognizant only of the things of G.o.d.

276:12 The realization that all inharmony is unreal brings objects and thoughts into human view in their true light, and presents them as beautiful and immortal. Harmony 276:15 in man is as real and immortal as in music. Discord is unreal and mortal.

Perfection requisite

If G.o.d is admitted to be the only Mind and Life, 276:18 there ceases to be any opportunity for sin and death.

When we learn in Science how to be perfect even as our Father in heaven is perfect, 276:21 thought is turned into new and healthy channels, - towards the contemplation of things immortal and away from materiality to the Principle of the universe, includ- 276:24 ing harmonious man.

Material beliefs and spiritual understanding never mingle. The latter destroys the former. Discord is the 276:27 _nothingness_ named error. Harmony is the _somethingness_ named Truth.

Like evolving like

Nature and revelation inform us that like produces 276:30 like. Divine Science does not gather grapes from thorns nor figs from thistles. Intelli- gence never produces non-intelligence; but matter is 277:1 ever non-intelligent and therefore cannot spring from intelligence. To all that is unlike unerring and eternal 277:3 Mind, this Mind saith, "Thou shalt surely die;" and else- where the Scripture says that dust returns to dust. The non-intelligent relapses into its own unreality. Matter 277:6 never produces mind. The immortal never produces the mortal. Good cannot result in evil. As G.o.d Himself is good and is Spirit, goodness and spirituality must be im- 277:9 mortal. Their opposites, evil and matter, are mortal error, and error has no creator. If goodness and spirit- uality are real, evil and materiality are unreal and can- 277:12 not be the outcome of an infinite G.o.d, good.

Natural history presents vegetables and animals as preserving their original species, - like reproducing like.

277:15 A mineral is not produced by a vegetable nor the man by the brute. In reproduction, the order of genus and species is preserved throughout the entire round of nature.

277:18 This points to the spiritual truth and Science of being.

Error relies upon a reversal of this order, a.s.serts that Spirit produces matter and matter produces all the ills 277:21 of flesh, and therefore that good is the origin of evil.

These suppositions contradict even the order of material so-called science.

Material error

277:24 The realm of the real is Spirit. The unlikeness of Spirit is matter, and the opposite of the real is not divine, - it is a human concept. Matter is an error of state- 277:27 ment. This error in the premise leads to errors in the conclusion in every statement into which it enters.

Nothing we can say or believe regarding matter is immor- 277:30 tal, for matter is temporal and is therefore a mortal phe- nomenon, a human concept, sometimes beautiful, always erroneous.

Substance _versus_ supposition

278:1 Is Spirit the source or creator of matter? Science re- veals nothing in Spirit out of which to create matter.

278:3 Divine metaphysics explains away matter.

Spirit is the only substance and consciousness recognized by divine Science. The material 278:6 senses oppose this, but there are no material senses, for matter has no mind. In Spirit there is no matter, even as in Truth there is no error, and in good no evil. It is 278:9 a false supposition, the notion that there is real substance- matter, the opposite of Spirit. Spirit, G.o.d, is infinite, all. Spirit can have no opposite.

One cause supreme

278:12 That matter is substantial or has life and sensation, is one of the false beliefs of mortals, and exists only in a supposit.i.tious mortal consciousness. Hence, 278:15 as we approach Spirit and Truth, we lose the consciousness of matter. The admission that there can be material substance requires another admission, - 278:18 namely, that Spirit is not infinite and that matter is self- creative, self-existent, and eternal. From this it would follow that there are two eternal causes, warring forever 278:21 with each other; and yet we say that Spirit is supreme and all-presence.

The belief of the eternity of matter contradicts the 278:24 demonstration of life as Spirit, and leads to the conclu- sion that if man is material, he originated in matter and must return to dust, - logic which would prove his an- 278:27 nihilation.

Substance is Spirit

All that we term sin, sickness, and death is a mortal belief. We define matter as error, because it is the oppo- 278:30 site of life, substance, and intelligence. Mat- ter, with its mortality, cannot be substantial if Spirit is substantial and eternal. Which ought to 279:1 be substance to us, - the erring, changing, and dying, the mutable and mortal, or the unerring, immutable, 279:3 and immortal? A New Testament writer plainly de- scribes faith, a quality of mind, as "the _substance_ of things hoped for."

Material mortality

279:6 The doom of matter establishes the conclusion that matter, slime, or protoplasm never originated in the immortal Mind, and is therefore not 279:9 eternal. Matter is neither created by Mind nor for the manifestation and support of Mind.

Spiritual tangibility

Ideas are tangible and real to immortal consciousness, 279:12 and they have the advantage of being eternal.

Spirit and matter can neither coexist nor co- operate, and one can no more create the other than 279:15 Truth can create error, or _vice versa_.

In proportion as the belief disappears that life and in- telligence are in or of matter, the immortal facts of 279:18 being are seen, and their only idea or intelligence is in G.o.d. Spirit is reached only through the understand- ing and demonstration of eternal Life and Truth and 279:21 Love.

Pantheistic tendencies

Every system of human philosophy, doctrine, and medicine is more or less infected with the pantheistic 279:24 belief that there is mind in matter; but this belief contradicts alike revelation and right reasoning. A logical and scientific conclusion is reached 279:27 only through the knowledge that there are not two bases of being, matter and mind, but one alone, - Mind.

279:30 Pantheism, starting from a material sense of G.o.d, seeks cause in effect, Principle in its idea, and life and intelligence in matter.

The things of G.o.d are beautiful

280:1 In the infinitude of Mind, matter must be unknown.

Symbols and elements of discord and decay are not prod- 280:3 ucts of the infinite, perfect, and eternal _All_.

From Love and from the light and harmony which are the abode of Spirit, only reflections 280:6 of good can come. All things beautiful and harmless are ideas of Mind. Mind creates and multiplies them, and the product must be mental.

280:9 Finite belief can never do justice to Truth in any direc- tion. Finite belief limits all things, and would compress Mind, which is infinite, beneath a skull bone. Such be- 280:12 lief can neither apprehend nor wors.h.i.+p the infinite; and to accommodate its finite sense of the divisibility of Soul and substance, it seeks to divide the one Spirit into per- 280:15 sons and souls.

Belief in many G.o.ds

Through this error, human belief comes to have "G.o.ds many and lords many." Moses declared as Jehovah's 280:18 first command of the Ten: "Thou shalt have no other G.o.ds before me!" But behold the zeal of belief to establish the opposite error of many 280:21 minds. The argument of the serpent in the allegory, "Ye shall be as G.o.ds," urges through every avenue the belief that Soul is in body, and that infinite Spirit, and Life, is 280:24 in finite forms.

Sensationless body

Rightly understood, instead of possessing a sentient material form, man has a sensationless body; and G.o.d, 280:27 the Soul of man and of all existence, being perpetual in His own individuality, harmony, and immortality, imparts and perpetuates these qualities 280:30 in man, - through Mind, not matter. The only excuse for entertaining human opinions and rejecting the Science of being is our mortal ignorance of Spirit, - ignorance 281:1 which yields only to the understanding of divine Science, the understanding by which we enter into the kingdom 281:3 of Truth on earth and learn that Spirit is infinite and supreme. Spirit and matter no more commingle than light and darkness. When one appears, the other dis- 281:6 appears.

G.o.d and His image