Editorial July 31, 1920 Issue

The Spirit and the Letter

Frederick Dixon

When Mrs. Eddy wrote, on page 468 of Science and Health, "All is infinite Mind and its infinite manifestation, for God is All-in-all," she made a statement so definite that it ought to be incapable of any misunderstanding. Divine Mind and its manifestation being infinite, there is no room necessarily for anything else to exist, except as a counterfeit of reality. Consequently, every phase of materiality, whether mental or apparently physical, is necessarily a lie about something existing in infinite Mind and its infinite manifestation. This being so, mortal mind itself, and everything proceeding from it, is merely an untrue suggestion, and has to be resisted as such. This suggestion varies in its intensity of evil, but it is always evil. The supposititious good of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is, that is to say, never really good, but only the human mind's concept of good, which it suggests as good to all those whose ears are sufficiently attuned to the knowledge of good and evil to accept it as good.

It is perfectly easy to see what this means, by the simplest of illustrations. That man needs physical food to sustain him is, in the philosophy of humanity, a wise suggestion, intended to preserve existence, and so a suggestion of good. But, as a matter of fact, the very suggestion that life is sustained by material food is a lie, and consequently a suggestion of evil. The mere fact that any man is convinced of the necessity for this food lays him open to the danger of starvation and to all the physical law that lies behind what is called the necessity of proper nutriment. An understanding of Principle begins to undermine this suggestion and this so-called law of matter, for in proportion as the individual grasps the fact that the necessity for food is a purely mental belief, the law of material sustenance is broken, and the emancipation of the individual from this particular law is commenced.

Now it is quite true that physical life is nearer Principle than physical death, therefore it is far nearer Principle for a man to eat and keep himself alive than for a man to lose his belief of physical life through starvation. Mrs. Eddy makes this perfectly clear on page 442 of Science and Health, where she writes, "Christ, Truth, gives mortals temporary food and clothing until the material, transformed with the ideal, disappears, and man is clothed and fed spiritually." This does not mean, it need scarcely be said, that the mortal should accept this apparent necessity for temporary food and clothing as anything but temporary. He should, on the contrary, set himself to work out his own salvation so as to destroy this belief, and gradually gain the dominion over the flesh which will raise him above the limitations of the flesh. Whilst, however, he is working out his salvation in this way, demonstrating his understanding of Principle to accomplish the end in view, he should beware of any temptation to go beyond his power to demonstrate Truth, which would lead him into the neglect of proper sustenance, and so render him guilty of listening to a malicious suggestion which would cause him to make himself sick or to risk his life by attempting something unscientific inasmuch as entirely beyond his power of proof.

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