Editorial June 23, 1923 Issue

True Substance

Duncan Sinclair

Mrs. Eddy, on page 468 of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," asks the question, "What is substance?" and straightway answers it metaphysically in the most illuminating manner. She says, "Substance is that which is eternal and incapable of discord and decay;" and a few lines farther on she adds, "Spirit, the synonym of Mind, Soul, or God, is the only real substance." There is no hesitancy about the reply. Spirit is real substance, "the only real substance;" and as if anticipating the correlative question, What is the substance of the universe and man? she answers it almost in the same breath: "The spiritual universe, including individual man, is a compound idea, reflecting the divine substance of Spirit."

Mrs. Eddy could not have answered differently. The whole system of Christian Science hangs upon the fundamental proposition that God, Spirit or Mind, is All-in-all; and the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, taking it for granted, deduced her irrefutable conclusions therefrom. Spirit is infinite. Therefore, there exists nothing real outside of Spirit. Consequently, Spirit alone is substantial, alone is substance. The understanding of spiritual substance strikes an irresistible blow at the belief of material substance, holding such to be an entirely erroneous concept of real substance or reality. The so-called material senses look upon matter as substantial, concrete, tangible, real; whereas spiritual sense shows Spirit to be the only reality. Thus Christian Science entirely reverses the testimony of physical sense, discovering to mankind that Spirit and its creation of spiritual ideas alone are substantial, concrete, tangible. Matter, to divine Science, is thus an utter abstraction. In Mrs. Eddy's own words (Science and Health, p. 312): "That which material sense calls intangible, is found to be substance. What to material sense seems substance, becomes nothingness, as the sense-dream vanishes and reality appears."

From the above it must be obvious that the universe of reality is a purely mental one. That does not, however, detract from its tangibility. Spirit is omnipresent; and this true substance is reflected by the real or spiritual universe, in which is included individual spiritual man. It ought not, therefore, to be a difficult task to reflect or know true substance; indeed, quite the reverse. It is the real man's nature to do so; it is the law of man's being to do so, because "the kingdom of heaven is at hand." What effect must this knowledge of true substance have on mankind? It is bound to be very far-reaching, gradually but surely changing the whole human outlook. The world has been enslaved from its infancy by the belief that matter is real substance. That false belief has been the cause of every disease, of every sin, of every pang of human suffering; disappointment, sorrow,—evil of every description,—has resulted from the belief that matter is real substance. Think, then, what must happen as the fact becomes generally accepted by the human race that Spirit alone is real substance, and that so-called matter is but a dream of material sense. It does not require great prophetic vision to foretell the coming of brighter and happier days for humanity; for with ever increasing spiritual understanding the mastery will assuredly be gained over so-called material conditions and over so-called material law. This will mean liberation from disease, sin,—all inharmony,—in precisely the same ratio as the increase in the knowledge of true substance.

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