Article May 7, 1910 Issue

In the critic's opinion much that Christian Science claims...

Alfred Farlow

Fall River (Mass.) Globe

In the critic's opinion much that Christian Science claims at the present time is beyond the bounds of reason. We insist that the teaching of Christian Science is entirely consistent. If the gentleman can accept any one fundamental proposition of this Science, he is in line to accept all that it teaches. The premises of this Science are Scriptural, in strict accord with the teachings of Jesus Christ, and all its deductions are entirely consistent. Whether they are in the bounds of reason depends upon the premises employed in the reason. If the gentleman will accept the premise of Christian Science that God is Spirit and Spirit made all that was made and behold it was very good, we assure him that he will find Christian Science within the bounds of reason. On the contrary, if he undertakes to harmonize the reasoning of Christian Science with the material seeming, and to disregard spiritual understanding, he will find it impossible to become reconciled; but in so doing he will be compelled to violate the Scriptural admonition in respect to comparing "spiritual things with spiritual." We grant that spiritual understanding and the evidence of the material senses are contradictory and irreconcilable. Paul said, "The flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other." We may add here that Christians at this particular age are called upon to choose which they will serve.

The gentleman declares that "for the world to adopt Christian Science as a whole, would be to ignore many of the laws of God relating to the physical world." On the contrary, upon the closer study of this Science, he will discover that Christian Science restores the knowledge of "the laws of God relating to the physical world" which have heretofore been ignored.

We venture the assertion that our clerical critic might dispute the healings of Jesus and his apostles on the same ground that he brushes aside the healings of Christian Science. There is just as much ground upon which to assume that the Master did not heal organic diseases as there is to assume that Christian Science does not heal such cases. To insist that it is not possible to heal organic cases is to insist that Jesus did not heal organic cases, or that when he urged his disciples and all Christians to "heal the sick," he meant only to heal those who simply "thought they were sick" and yet were not sick. To insist upon the impossibility of curing real disease by the divine power is to limit the divine power and amounts to an implication that Jesus and his disciples did not heal real diseases. We insist that God has never changed, and His laws have never changed, but His power is as capable of demonstration now as it was in the early days of primitive Christianity.

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