Article December 15, 1906 Issue

People generally believe that death is the gateway to...

George Shaw Cook

Quincy (Ill.) Journal

People generally believe that death is the gateway to immortality, but Christian Science teaches that immortality is attained not through dying, but by gaining an understanding of God as the life of man. Jesus said, "I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly;" and "this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent."

The Christian Scientist does not say, "I am never sick." He says, "I am not sick so often as I formerly was. When I am sick I recover more quickly than formerly, because I now depend upon Mind to heal me, whereas I formerly depended upon matter. My experience teaches me that the new way is the better way." Furthermore, no case of disease is healed in Christian Science without effecting a corresponding change in the patient's mental and moral condition. Its effect is always to build up, never to tear down. Recognizing fear, worry, hate, malice, envy, and all other forms of sin as direct causes of disease, it also shows that complete bodily health can only be attained through the abandonment of these errors, and consequently that through the gradual destruction of human error, disease and its ultimate, death, will finally disappear. Thus the present experience of the Christian Scientists convinces them that they are in the direct line of ultimate victory over death, "the last enemy that shall be destroyed." No Christian Scientist claims to be at this point of growth now, but they all hope and expect to attain perfection sooner or later, and they say with David, "As for me, I will behold thy face in righteousness: I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with thy likeness."

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