Editorial July 15, 1916 Issue

The Word "Neutrality"

William D. McCrackan

Doubtless many a student of Christian Science has asked himself what particular application the word "neutrality" can have in the teaching and practice of his beloved Science. The natural impulse, when a question of this kind presents itself, is to turn to the two concordances which record all the words contained in the writings of the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science. It may have been a surprise to many students to find that neither "neutrality" nor "neutral" is even mentioned in those writings. This absence is very significant, in view of the constant use which is being made of these words in public and private discussion.

Turning to Webster's Collegiate Dictionary we find "neutrality" defined as "quality or state of being neutral; indifference." This definition would indicate a passive or negative condition of thought, wherein the mental activities of discernment, differentiation, and judgment between good and evil must be in abeyance. The conviction quickly forces itself upon one's thought that such a mental condition of inertia can have no place in practical, operative Christian Science, which is a religion of works and cannot be held passively. In Science and Health (p. 143) Mrs. Eddy once coupled the two adjectives "inert and unintelligent," and she also states (p. 253), "Matter is inert, mindless." Inertia is then unmasked as a characteristic of matter. Hence it is comprehensible that according to the teaching of Christian Science an inert, passive, indifferent, or neutral state of mind is also materially inclined, and lacks the spiritual perception which is always active and spontaneous.

In Mrs. Eddy's Message to The Mother Church for 1900 we read, "Mental idleness or apathy is always egotism and animality" (p. 8). From this it would appear that animal magnetism, or the false belief of life in matter, finds the mental condition of neutrality or indifference a most propitious environment for its supposititious influence. This becomes even clearer when we remember that another names for this same false belief of life in matter is hypnotism, a word derived from the Greek hypnos, meaning sleep. To be mentally asleep is to be carnally minded, to be absent from that Mind "which was also in Christ Jesus," and which is positive and intelligently active in good works.

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