Article February 10, 1917 Issue

No Contagion in Evil

GERTRUDE SUTTON

On page 226 of Science and Health Mrs. Eddy says, "I saw before me the sick, wearing out years of servitude to an unreal master in the belief that the body governed them, rather than Mind." When we who have been healed in this wonderful truth, and who have gained a faint understanding of the unreality of that one-time master, the error which held us in bondage, look about us and see our brothers still in that sad but needless condition, how we long to save them from the misery which all false belief entails.

Of all the taxes which the children of men today contribute to the support of that cruel taskmaster, the belief of life and intelligence in matter, none is more pathetic, more needless, more exacting, than submission to the asserted law of contagion. The writer remembers that years ago she visited a lady who refused to eat strawberries because of a belief that they caused hives. She had never heard of such a thing and asked her hostess to describe the condition. The description was obligingly given, and until the writer became a student of Christian Science and learned the falsity of all such beliefs, the eating of this fruit was always followed by the appearance of the unpleasant eruption which had been described.

Mrs. Eddy says (Science and Health, p. 376), "Because the so-called material body is a mental concept and governed by mortal mind, it manifests only what that so-called mind expresses." Nothing can be manifested on the body which is not first accepted mentally. If one takes cold while sitting in a draft, it is because it is believed that this could give one a cold. If he manifests this ailment, he has merely brought a belief into visibility. When he learns in Christian Science that God is divine Principle and that he need not suffer for anything but his own sins, and that this suffering should cease when the sin ceases, he need no longer have colds from drafts or from any other material circumstance.

Enjoy 1 free Sentinel article or audio program each month, including content from 1898 to today.

Send a comment to the editors
NEXT IN THIS ISSUE
Article
Testimony Giving
February 10, 1917
Contents

We'd love to hear from you!

Easily submit your testimonies, articles, and poems online.

Submit