Article September 14, 1912 Issue

An article in a late issue entitled "Mental Healing as a...

Alfred Farlow

Toronto (Ont.) World

An article in a late issue entitled "Mental Healing as a Science" gives a somewhat interesting, and we think authentic, description of the ancient use of magnetism as a curative agent, but it is altogether too sweeping when it includes Christian Science as one of the many systems of treating disease by "mental suggestion." It is not difficult to understand that whatever apparent results attend certain systems are produced wholly by means of suggestion, in view of the fact that the sole dependence of these systems is upon suggestion and that oftentimes a suggestion employed has per se no curative power; but Christian Science treatment is a very different thing. It depends upon the power of God, which is utilized by means of prayer in accordance with the method that was employed by the Master. It heals through a consciousness of the divine presence and power, even as the light dispels the darkness. It relies wholly upon the power of God, Truth, as distinctive from human sense. It eschews the power of blind human will, which is the sole dependence of mental suggestion.

Possibly the term "mental suggestion" has been ignorantly applied to Christian Science from the simple fact that a Christian Scientist does employ arguments of truth in his method, but it should be noted that although Jesus affirmed the truth and rebuked error in exactly the same manner employed by Mrs. Eddy, he did not advocate the power of suggestion. He said, "Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." It would be impossible to coin a definition of the term "suggestion" broad enough to include Christian Science, from the simple fact that there is no kinship whatever between Christian Science and what is ordinarily called suggestion. But these points will not be understood until students of psychology learn to "compare spiritual things with spiritual," until they reason consistently from the spiritual premise of Christian Science. We have no quarrel with those who believe in suggestion, but it seems proper to insist that Christian Science shall have its distinct individuality and not be confounded with theories which are totally different from it.

The charge that Christian Science "smothers sense" in the insistence that "all is mind; there is no matter," will no longer be made when critics are ready to accept the Scriptural teaching that God, Spirit, the infinite good, is the only cause. Consistently with this premise is the generally accepted truism that "like begets like," which is corroborated by the Scriptural teaching that all of God's creation was "very good." Materiality, sin, sickness, and death are no part of the "very good" things which God created, and inasmuch as they have no deific origin and standing it must be admitted that they have only a seeming existence, and when we have gained a further understanding that the material concept is but the false concept of the spiritual universe, that where the material universe seems to exist is the spiritual universe of Spirit's creation, it will not be difficult to understand Christian Science, nor will it longer be thought that it "smothers" anything more than a false sense. Christian Science does not teach that the universe itself is an illusion, but insists that the immature human sense must be corrected by spiritual understanding in order that mortals may see God's creation as it really is.

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