Editorial October 1, 1910 Issue

"LIKE AS A FATHER PITIETH"

Archibald McLellan

The Mosaic law of "an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth," carries with it the thought of vengeance as well as retribution, whereas the law of Christ brings the healing touch which cleanses from all sin; the law which, as Mrs. Eddy writes in "No and Yes," "will not let sin go until it is destroyed,—until nothing is left to be forgiven, to suffer, or to be punished" (p. 30).

Christian Scientists are coming to understand, in proportion as they apprehend the teachings of their text-book, Science and Health, that sin and disease have one and the same basis, namely, a false sense of God and man; and that the sinner is no more to be condemned than is the mortal whose physical condition excites the sympathy of all who come in contact with him. The sin which besets one person is no more real than the sickness which besets another, and the object of those who are endeavoring to fulfil the commandment to love their neighbor is to set him free, whether he be bound by sickness or sin.

The teaching of Christian Science in regard to sin is most forcefully set forth in the third tenet of Christian Science, on page 497 of Science and Health, as follows: "We acknowledge God's forgiveness of sin in the destruction of sin and the spiritual understanding that casts out evil as unreal. But the belief in sin is punished so long as the belief lasts." The healing of the sinner through the destruction of the sin of which he is the exponent, is the one great thing to be accomplished, and probably no example of this healing of sin is so constantly before Bible students as is the case of Paul, who through a mistaken sense of duty had persecuted the followers of Jesus without mercy. But when his eyes were opened to his sin in all its enormity, his zeal to show the genuineness of his repentance knew no bounds. Even the earlier disciples, who at first demurred against accepting him as of their company, could but believe when they saw that the promised "signs" followed him.

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