Article March 11, 1911 Issue

HAS MAN A DUAL NATURE?

CLARENCE W. CHADWICK.

Human belief says that man is both mortal and immortal, both human and divine, both evil and good. The highest ethical and moral teaching of the past has upheld the belief that man exists in a state of dualism. Popular theology has likewise done its part in bolstering up the supposition of a dual man. Back of all such contention lies a mistaken sense of God, and only as this mistaken sense gives place to the right idea of the creator, can the true nature of creation be discerned. The starting-point for all scientific and logical deductions is God. If one's concept of God proves to be erroneous, his concept of man must also be erroneous. Man being the image and likeness of his creator, if this creator is conceived to be possessed of a dual nature, so must man be. If good and evil blend in God, so must they blend in man.

Christian Science deals with this subject from the standpoint of demonstration. It accepts the Scriptural teaching that God is infinite Spirit, and from this premise it draws the only possible conclusion to be deduced, to wit, that man, to be God's image and likeness, must be just as spiritual as Spirit is. It does not stop here, but goes to work to prove its conclusion true. It reasons on this wise: Since Spirit is infinite, there can be but one Spirit, therefore Spirit is the only creator, power, or causation, and since Spirit is good and not evil, everything emanating from Spirit must be spiritual and good. This being true, whatever assumes to contradict this conclusion must be false.

The evidence before the physical senses contradicts both the premise and conclusion of Christian Science. These so-called senses declare that man is sick and a sinner. Such evidence being false, it must not and cannot be accepted or believed. He who reasons thus insists upon maintaining a correct mental attitude by refusing to accept false testimony, and the result is that the so-called evidence of disease and sin disappears. Physical and moral healing is thus proven to be the outcome of an all-good God, and man to be the spiritual image and likeness of this God. No other conclusion can be deduced from the evidence in hand, and thrice blessed and happy is he who reaches this point in demonstration of the omnipotence of Spirit and of the perfection of Spirit's creation. To him it is the crossing of the threshold of the kingdom of heaven on earth.

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