Article August 2, 1913 Issue

One of the greatest of European statesmen, speaking of...

Frederick Dixon—Barbados, British West Indies.

Barbados Standard

One of the greatest of European statesmen, speaking of the Bourbons after the Restoration of 1815, declared that they had learned nothing, and they had forgotten nothing. The same may be said with emphasis of the sectarian critic. He recollects that for centuries it has been the portion of every orthodox church to persecute the heretic and the dissenter. He has not learned, and he is apparently incapable of learning, that the heretic and the dissenter have thriven on persecution, and that so far as their influence may have declined, it has always been when, like Jeshurun, they have in prosperity waxed fat and kicked at the heretic or dissenter of their day.

A contributor who calls himself "A Christian but not a Christian Scientist," is no exception to the rule. He poses as a Jupiter Tonans from behind the mask of anonymity. He begins by saying that Christian Science "is calculated to mislead the unlearned." It can only be said that if scholarship is a man's ballast against false religious teaching, the bulk of humanity must be in a parlous condition, a prey to the scholars of the churches. The critic appears to have overlooked the fact that the bulk of the New Testament was written by a publican, three fishermen, and a tent-maker, to say nothing of the fact that it was one of the complaints of the Epicurean Celsus that the pioneers of the culture of imperial Rome were weavers and cobblers. In modern times the story has been just the same. The history of dissent in England has been the revolt again of the cobblers and weavers against the scholars. "The Pilgrim's Progress," a book which has influenced religious thought more, perhaps, than any other except the Bible, was written, not by a bishop, but by a tinker.

The critic next explains that Christian Science teaches that Jesus' healing power was derived from God and not from himself as God, equal to the Father. He might be asked to explain, if this is so, why Jesus said, "I can of mine own self do nothing." Writing of this, a famous bishop and scholar says, "The very idea of sonship involves (in some sense) that of dependence." The comment is not important, though it is interesting. The difference of opinion is, however, one which the critic must settle with the bishop, and not with a Christian Scientist. He then goes on to explain that Christian Science teaches that "believers in God can by prayer procure the working of miracles equal to those wrought by Jesus." The statement is not very exactly put, but if Christian Scientists do, they have the authority of Jesus for it. It was he, and no other than he, who said, "He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father."

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