Scientific Testimony

WHEN the question of scientific testimony is considered, the angle from which the person unacquainted with Christian Science views the subject is the exact reverse of that of the student of divine metaphysics. All will agree that scientific testimony cannot be based on empiricism or mere quackery but must of necessity be accurate and reliable, a systematic deduction which to be effective must be provably true. To the average individual unversed in Christian Science, the assertion that the testimony of Spirit is scientific presents a paradox, for he lives in what appears a world of matter, sufficiently satisfied therewith to keep on accepting the testimony of the five physical senses without challenging its validity. Although familiar with the timeworn illusions of material medicine, false theology, physics, and psychology, all testifying to the human mind or matter, it is ordinarily not until forced through the failure of material means to remedy some discordant condition that a man is willing to turn from sense testimony to inquire into the meaning and availability of spiritual testimony. The beginner may at first find it difficult to admit that the testimony of material sense because of its relativity is constantly changing and therefore not scientific and to change his basis of reasoning from the material to the spiritual, but any one can satisfy himself even from a study of the history of the sciences that many deductions once accepted as inviolable truth are no longer susceptible of the slightest proof.

Now if the student wishes to prove for himself the exactness of spiritual testimony he has simply to put in practice knowing the facts of Spirit, which are a complete refutation of the claims of matter. If, for instance, one is confronted with some apparently inharmonious condition which to material sense testimony is insistently claiming reality one has but calmy and quietly to listen to the still, small voice of Spirit testifying to the fact that at this present moment man is the perfect expression of Soul manifesting the right activity of infinite Mind, free from the so-called laws of material medicine, whether of time, place, or heredity, because he is governed only by the law of Spirit. What does the student who listens to the testimony of Spirit instead of the testimony of matter find? That spiritual testimony is scientific, it is accurate, it is reliable, it is demonstrably true; for accepting it thus he finds that the seemingly discordant condition vanishes, leaving the proposed testimony of matter and the claims of materia medica without the scientific foundation which alone grants reality and permanence. On page 120 of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" Mrs. Eddy differentiates between scientific and untrue testimony when she says: "Science reverses the false testimony of the physical senses, and by this reversal mortals arrive at the fundamental facts of being," and later on the same page, "Health is not a condition of matter, but of Mind; nor can the material senses bear reliable testimony on the subject of health. The Science of Mind-healing shows it to be impossible for aught but Mind to testify truly or to exhibit the real status of man."

Man is always testifying to the perfectibility of Mind. One hears frequent reference to the counsel of Jesus to be perfect, that God demands perfection, but the expectation of expressing this perfection is generally put off for a more convenient season. It is even affirmed that perfection is not required of us immediately. Analysis of such a statement reveals the survival of the old theological teaching that at some future time heavenly perfection will be attained, though it is beyond realization in the present. Such an attitude of thought disregards the fact that the demand of Principle is immediate, that man is really now at the standpoint of perfection, a living testimony to Spirit. What else is there for man to testify to since Spirit is infinite? The suggestion that perfection is to be attained some years hence instead of proved to be here and now is an argument based on the relative and changing standards of the human mind. Man is the evidence that Spirit is, and as the proof or testimony of God's being he must now and here express the perfectness of God.