Article February 1, 1913 Issue

MORTAL OR IMMORTAL?

CLARENCE W. CHADWICK.

Ask the average person whether he is mortal or immortal, and he will usually admit that he is mortal. His fathers and forefathers were mortal, consequently he must be. The only excuse offered for such an assumption is that his physical senses uphold him in it. This fact betrays the weakest point in the consciousness of humanity, an innate or inherited tendency to accept the dictum of the physical senses, to admit that man is material and in consequence mortal, a tendency which is only intensified by the educational systems of the present day.

Christian Science comes to "replace mortality with immortality" (Science and Health, p. 495), and in doing so it uncovers to humanity the great mistake of accepting sense testimony in place of the supersensible evidence of Spirit or Mind. It makes demonstrably clear the fact that physical sense never has seen and never will see God, and consequently that obedience to such sense means human bondage instead of "the glorious liberty of the children of God." From this bondage, regardless of what form it may assume, humanity must sooner or later be emancipated. Some are leaning on the thought of time and death to bring the desired haven of rest, while others are waiting patiently on the Lord to reveal to them here and now a fuller meaning of the deathless Christ, Truth, which comes to abolish death and to bring to light immortality. How shall belief in death be abolished?

The abolition of the arch enemy must necessarily take place in each individual consciousness. It will be accomplished only as humanity learn to think true scientific thoughts, thoughts of Life, Truth, and Love. This cannot be done from a material basis; hence the necessary first step of recognizing and admitting that man is spiritual. The individual who presumes to approach God with the thought that he is a poor helpless mortal, and who wants God to use him as an instrument for good, is doomed to disappointment, for God has no use for any belief in mortality, nor does He ever make Himself known through any such belief. God must be approached with the scientific recognition that man is immortal, and through this understanding God makes Himself known to His creation; and He will continue to do so. Christ Jesus declared that his mission was to bring life "more abundantly" to all who were willing to accept his teachings, and Christian Science shows us how we may avail ourselves today of all that he taught and demonstrated.

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