Editorial April 9, 1910 Issue

CLEANNESS

Annie M. Knott

At the present time as never before, the most strenuous efforts are being made not merely to lessen disease and vice, but to annihilate them, and for this evidence of human progress Christian Scientists rejoice, even though the methods employed may not be those which they consider the best. While they are at least heartily in sympathy with every honest and unselfish endeavor to cleanse our cities morally and physically, they know that more than outward cleanliness is needed in order to overcome disease in any true sense and to establish a health that is worth while. Jesus admitted that the Pharisees of his time obeyed rigidly the Mosaic law relative to outward cleanliness, but he said of them, "Your inward part is full of ravening and wickedness." (Luke says that they had criticized Jesus because he had not "washed before dinner," and this was part of his comment.)

All through the Old Testament we find many references to ceremonial purification, much of which was undoubtedly symbolic of the true purification that establishes health, wholeness, or holiness. The psalmist tells us that the one who shall stand in the "holy place" is "he that hath clean hands, and a pure heart and Christian Science is daily demonstrating the fact that such an one is safe from all evil,—"from the snare of the fowler, and from the noisome pestilence."

One of the most impressive pictures in Revelation is that of the "great multitude, which no man could number," of those who had "washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb." These had not always been pure, but the greatest of all changes had come to them, whereby material sense with its impurity was given up for spiritual sense with its purity, its peace, and its joy, recalling to us Paul's words, "The life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God." Mrs. Eddy tells us that "we need a clean body and a clean mind," and she adds that "the pure and exalting influence of the divine Mind on the body is requisite" (Science and Health, p. 383). All who respond to this influence will strive after absolute purity within and without, and their lives will be a ceaseless demand for clean homes, clean morals, clean politics, clean literature, and above all, clean men and women.

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