Article April 29, 1905 Issue

Spiritual Law

W. C.

What is the meaning law? If this question were asked of a student of the physical sciences, he might reply that law expresses a uniformity of action in connection with natural phenomena. The highest aim of such an investigator is to discover these generalizations. If the same question were propounded to a lawyer, he would give a different answer. His view of a law is essentially something which, subject to a penalty, may be broken. The analytical jurist says that his concept of law has no relation to that of the physical scientist; the laws of science being no more than those statements of uniformity which merely resemble commands in so far as they may be deemed to emanate from an intelligent source. The term law is thus used in two entirely different senses. The lawyer and the physical scientist now understand and tolerate each other's use of the term.

In Christian Science we acknowledge divine Principle and spiritual laws. These laws are expressions of absolute uniformity of action whereby all elements of chaos are eliminated. They spring from and exist in the divine Mind and manifest the essential harmony of that Mind whereby He is expressed in all His ideas, whatever may be their order and degree. All the activities of the divine Mind, of Life, Truth, and Love, are unfailing and invariable. The divine Mind cannot be self-inconsistent; the ideas of that Mind cannot act antagonistically to their cause, — the effects cannot contradict the cause. These laws or general commands are thus given by the superior to His inferiors. They resemble the concept of law held by the physicist in respect of uniformity, but differ from this judicial notion in that they cannot be destroyed or their operations suspended. These laws understood, explain all the so-called miracles and mighty works of the Wayshower and supply the key to the spiritual understanding of the Bible. Their existence is constantly demonstrated in the daily practice of Christian Science.

Blackstone, in his commentaries, before the days of close analytical investigation into the nature of municipal law. wrote of a Law of Nature as synonymous with the will of God. to which man must conform because of his physical dependence on his Creator, and to this law the Creator Himself conformed. If Blackstone, instead of writing of man's physical dependence, had written of man's spiritual dependence, he would have arrived at a clear statement of spiritual law. Hooker in his "Ecclesiastical Polity" wrote a passage famous for its beauty of expression :—

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