Christian Science is doing the greatest service to mankind by revealing the truth that God is not after off but actually omnipresent. One frequently hears such questions as these: Does God, after all, really exist? If He does, how can He become known in order that His aid may be obtained? The evil beliefs of the world so obscure the spiritual facts of being that skepticism takes the place of spiritual understanding and faith becomes lost in doubt, and then despair supervenes. Now the mission of Christian Science is to declare the truth about God, and thereby to establish the faith of men in Truth.

On page 471 of Science and Health, Mrs. Eddy writes: "God is infinite, therefore ever present, and there is no other power nor presence." As will be seen from this, Christian Science teaches that there does not exist anything real outside of the divine Mind; or, in other words, it proclaims the reality of Spirit and the unreality of matter. But, some one asks, does not this conflict with the experience of human beings? Does not the human mind feel itself convinced that matter is real? Christian Science answers that the truth does conflict with human experience, and it says further that all the experiences of the so-called human mind are unreal, that they are false beliefs and not the truth of being. Starting from the absolute truth that God exists as the one infinite Mind, Christian Science holds that all that can possibly exist as reality must be in Mind, or must be the manifestation of Mind.

It is obvious, then, that what is going on in the awakening human consciousness is a conflict between truth and error, between the facts of spiritual being and false material sense. The latter, appearing to be real to this consciousness, alienates from the truth, and the result is that human beings are subject to the storms that rage throughout mortal existence. But as they perceive the falsity of material belief through the spiritual understanding of the allness of God, they become less subject to the assaults of error, and realize more clearly man's at-one-ment with omnipresent, harmonious, divine Mind.

The fact of the inseparable union between God and man had been very clearly realized by the seer of Patmos when he wrote: "Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes." This realization could only have come about by the spiritual understanding, on the part of John, of the nature of God as infinite Mind and of man as the spiritual idea of Mind. Is it possible to doubt that John was sustained amid the hardships of his earthly career by his knowledge of spiritual things? Could he have endured the life of loneliness on the isle of Patmos without that knowledge? Instead of breaking down under the strain he found the leisure and possessed the composure necessary to write the most prophetical book in the Bible, in which is depicted the struggle against the divine Principle, good, of the false claim of evil belief to place and power, and the final and total destruction of that false belief of evil. Like the Master, John had seen through the illusion of matter by discerning the allness of Spirit, and simultaneously he had become aware of the entirely spiritual nature and perfection of man.

John perceived the truth about the perfect unity existing between God and man, and so did the Discoverer of Christian Science. On page 465 of Science and Health Mrs. Eddy writes: "Principle and its idea is one, and this one is God, omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent Being, and His reflection is man and the universe.' That statement is without ambiguity. It breaks through the incrustations of material belief which suggest that man is an intelligence in matter, subject to material environment and laws; and it enables one to behold man as he really is, indissolubly united to the source of his being, God. It is this perception of God and the real man which gives to human beings the certainty that "God is with men."

What a help it is for humanity to learn something of the true relationship existing between God and man. God is "omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent Being," and man is at one with this Being. What does this imply? It shows at once whence comes man's strength and intelligence. The general belief is that man is material, or partly material and partly spiritual, and this makes impossible any demonstration of man's divinely bestowed power. Christian Science teaches the true nature of God and man, drawing the firmest possible line of demarcation between the real and the unreal. As men assimilate these truths mankind will become assured of the presence of "God with us" and will better realize the true nature of God and man.

It is a matter of common knowledge that Christian Science heals disease and sin. All the healing which results from the practice of Christian Science comes through the spiritual understanding of God and of man, His spiritual idea. As the fact is discerned that man is never separated from God, the divine Principle of his being, disease and sin are recognized to be unreal, and then they disappear. It is like the dawning of the morning. As the sun's rays stream into the airy envelope surrounding the earth, they dispel the darkness of night. But darkness is a negative condition. It is the absence of something—the light; so that when the light dawns, nothing really is destroyed, but something is gained. This is analogous to the destruction of human error by truth. Error is a negative condition, a belief in the absence of divine Mind. As the spiritual facts of being are recognized they dispel error, with the result that there is experienced a truer and so more harmonious sense of existence. Thus the destruction through Truth of inharmony, whether of sin or disease, is the sign that "God is with men."