Article January 10, 1914 Issue

Knowledge of Absolute Truth

FRANK H. SPRAGUE

The tide had reached the full and was beginning to ebb. Far out in the cove lay a dull object which at first sight seemed to be floating in the water, but which on further scrutiny proved to be a rock protruding above the surface. As the water continued to recede another jagged bit of rock became visible at a little distance from the first, then another, and so on until a broad reef was exposed to view; and before the tide had reached low ebb it was seen that each rocky projection which, when isolated by the water, had seemed independent of the rest, rose from an underlying ledge or bed of rock which extended out from the mainland where the observer was seated.

This incident illustrates certain phases of experience encountered by the student of Christian Science. Although the ledge had been there all the while, no indication of its presence appeared so long as it remained submerged; but when left bare by the outgoing tide, its characteristic features stood forth in bold relief. Thus it is with the reality of spiritual or absolute being. As the miracles, so styled, of early Christianity had come to be viewed from the standpoint of modern religious thought across the intervening centuries of material belief and theological dogmatism, they seemed to stand out like special exhibitions of a supernatural order with no common ground to connect them with present experience. In process of time, however, a reaction of thought set in; the tide which had given materialistic interpretations the ascendency turned and began to seek more spiritual levels.

The subsidence of this material element in human concepts reached the point at length where Mrs. Eddy, who had long been pondering the question of metaphysical causation, was led in the course of experience to discover that all real phenomena of being have a common basis in divine Principle. The recognition of this fact gave assurance that the conditions which made possible the "mighty works" of apostolic times were not unique or sporadic but constant and law-governed. This assurance, substantiated by repeated demonstrations, enabled her later on to declare with authority: "Christ's Christianity is the chain of scientific being reappearing in all ages, maintaining its obvious correspondence with the Scriptures and uniting all periods in the design of God" (Science and Health, p. 271). Today, the restless, surging tide of material beliefs, human opinions and impulses, so obscures the reality of spiritual being that many are ready to deny even the existence of such a reality, while still more who recognize its existence theoretically regard it as quite beyond the range of concrete experience.

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