Article January 24, 1914 Issue

I have read the letter signed George S. Hazlehurst, on...

Algernon Hervey-Bathurst

Birkenhead (England) News

I have read the letter signed George S. Hazlehurst, on the subject of Christian Science, in a recent issue. The critic's method of reasoning may appear logical enough to those who accept the premise from which he obviously starts. The fact, however, should not be overlooked that Christ Jesus came, as he said, not "to destroy, but to fulfil" the law of God. This he did by healing sickness, destroying sin and discord, and raising the dead. Would the Founder of Christianity, who had come to reveal the law of God, or absolute Truth, have done these works if in so doing he was destroying or even interfering with what God had created, with what was true or real? We are then forced to the conclusion that the discordant conditions which were healed through the understanding and application of the teaching of Christ Jesus were at that time, and consequently are now, unreal. We are equally compelled to admit that the best, and indeed the only, way these same conditions can be healed today, is through the application of those same teachings. Have Christians any more right to believe in the necessity or reality of evil today than Jesus did? Sickness, sin, and all evil do not now constitute God's creation, the only creation, any more than they did nineteen hundred years ago. It is for this reason that Mrs. Eddy writes, in Science and Health, "We acknowledge God's forgiveness of sin in the destruction of sin and the spiritual understanding that casts out evil as unreal" (p. 497).

It is unnecessary, I think, to refer to the impossibility of believing in the reality or power of evil without being subject to the effects of that belief, and surely the belief in two powers, good and evil, is none other than a "house divided against itself," which Jesus declared so emphatically could not stand. Reasoning with the irrefutable logic which permeated the teaching of the Founder of Christianity, and which was confirmed by the magnificent results accomplished, Christian Science is today healing the sick and destroying sin by identically the same method. Indeed, there is no other way whereby Christianity can be practised.

As to how the scientific practise of Christianity can be referred to as "making a new schism," is more than I can understand. There is one standard, and one alone, whereby Christians can be judged, namely, by their works, for, as Jesus declared, those who understand his teaching will do the works he did. That certain results are accomplished by other means, I do not deny, but I do know that Christian Science is the only system which is healing the sick and reforming the sinner in strict accordance with and in demonstration of the teaching of Christ Jesus. If history repeats itself, it has certainly done so with respect to Christian Science; for just as there were, during the first few years of the Christian era, those who preferred to endorse certain mental methods which were utterly at variance with the teaching of Christ Jesus, and which they denounced in terms it is unnecessary to repeat here, so today, the strict demands of Christian Science to cut off the right hand, and if necessary to pluck out the right eye, call forth the same accusations. Nevertheless, Christian Science continues to spread, for the sole reason that, as Mrs. Eddy writes, on page xi of the Preface of Science and Health: "Now, as then, these mighty works are not supernatural, but supremely natural. They are the sign of Immanuel, or 'God with us,'—a divine influence ever present in human consciousness and repeating itself, coming now as was promised aforetime,

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