LECTURE IN THE MOTHER CHURCH OF CHRIST, SCIENTIST

An appreciative audience which not only filled the five thousands seats of the new auditorium of The First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston, but likewise all the available standing-room, listened with close attention to the lecture delivered Tuesday evening, Oct. 16, by Prof. Hermann S. Hering, C.S.B. The seats on the main floor were filled before quarter past seven, and quarter of an hour later every seat in the gaileries had been taken. Many persons who could not obtain even standing-room went away. The lecturer was introduced by William D. McCrackan, M.A., C.S.B., First Reader of The Mother Church of Christ, Scientist, who spoke as follows:—

Ladies and Gentlemen, Friends:—I suppose it is fair to assume that most of us would like to be better, healthier, and happier,—in a word, more harmonious than we now find ourselves to be. Among the five thousand and more persons present here to-night it is likely that the majority at least feel that there is room for improvement in themselves or in their surrounding conditions of life. Some of us, I have no doubt, feel the need of a change for the better to be urgent, if not desperate.

It is a significant fact that whatever may be the differences among men as to ancestry, race, temperament, or education, all are, nevertheless, in search of the same greatly desired goal. While this person or that may believe the goal to be wealth, or fame, or power, or praise, or personal adulation, or any one of the great number of forms assumed by human ambition, yet everybody when closely questioned will gladly acknowledge that the real goal is what we call happiness,—a condition of thought, a mental attitude.

Christianity teaches that happiness is to be found only in the consciousness of our unity with God, and Christian Science proves that this happiness depends upon no illusive, visionary expectation to be realized after death, but is attainable and available here and now, in the measure of our understanding of the only true God and of His Son, Christ Jesus.

There is nothing sensational about Christian Science, unless one chooses to call the fruits of the Spirit and the works of faith sensational. Christian Science is at work in this work-a-day world of ours, making better men and women out of the ordinary material which is to be found here. Christian Science is no strange or supposedly incomprehensible process by which mortals are suddenly translated into the realm of pure Spirit, having no trials nor tribulations to test their faith and charity, their mercy and long-suffering. The effects of Christian Science are made manifest in improved mental, moral, and physical conditions. It is making better Christians, better Bible students, better fathers and mothers, husbands, wives, and children, better friends and citizens, better employers and employees. God's guidance and God's blessing mark this growing body of Christian people as they march along the road from "sense to Soul," trusting in the omnipotence of God to save from every ill, woe, and sorrow.

For one reason or another Christian Science seems to have been quite frequently misunderstood and thus misrepresented. Christian Scientists do not complain particularly of this, because they know that every great truth has received treatment of this kind since history began, but it is obviously unfair to the millions of unprejudiced persons who are in need of the ministrations of Christian Science to permit such misconceptions to go uncorrected. Much has been corrected in the public prints, and the lectures of the Christian Science Board of Lectureship are doing much to meet the popular demand for correct information about Christian Science and its revered Discoverer and Founder. Mrs. Eddy, the author of its text-book, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, and Pastor Emeritus of this Church.

It is now my sincere pleasure to introduce to you the lecturer of the evening, known to many in this audience as a former First Reader of this Church, Prof, Hermann S. Hering, C. S. B., a member of the Christian Science Board of Lectureship.

Professor Hering's subject was "Christian Science: Humanity's Helper," and the full text of his lecture will be published in the November issue of The Christian Science Journal.

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THE WORLDLY-WISE STEWARD

October 20, 1906

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