Article April 12, 1924 Issue

Salvation Made Easy!

W. CYPRIAN BRIDGE

It is a common practice with men to endeavor to gain their ends by what suggest themselves as the easiest possible methods; that is to say, by the smallest expenditure of exertion. So true is this that it was said of one that he would always take a great amount of trouble in order to avoid taking a little trouble—a saying by no means so singular as it may at first seem. This tendency recognized, it is not surprising that error often suggests to the beginner in Christian Science that there may be an easier way to the goal which all followers of Mrs. Eddy aspire to reach than through the patient study of her works in conjunction with the Bible, coupled with the endeavor to put the divine precepts into increasingly perfect practice. This often happens, moreover, in the case of students who are sincerely desirous of being loyal and consistent followers of our Leader, and who, when adopting ways which suggest themselves as short cuts to grace, are quite unconscious that they are doing that which is not in consonance with right intention.

Thus error often advances the insidious suggestion that certain points which appear difficult to understand in the writings of the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science are made clearer in those of some one else; or that such and such a rule of conduct, which Mrs. Eddy indicates as an essential to the Christian, but which to mortal sense seems irksome or transcendental, need not necessarily be taken too seriously. Some years ago, the writer noticed on the table of an acquaintance a small, thin book bearing the title "Christian Science Taught in Six Lessons." Availing himself of an opportunity for a cursory glance at it, he found it presented physical healing as the chief raison d'etre for the use of Christian Science, rather than the attainment of spirituality and moral betterment. It professed, in a few small pages, to help the inquirer to become a healer, in the first instance, of what were termed the ordinary forms of common indisposition, and then by a few swift and easy stages to the overcoming of disease and sickness of a serious nature. Now, it was beyond dispute that the owner of this book was genuinely desirous of acquiring a knowledge of unadulterated Christian Science. In fact, it was precisely her wish to do this that prompted her to try to gain her end by a short cut, just as one preparing for an examination in some subject within a limited period of time might seek to obtain a superficial knowledge of it by means of condensed "tips" and memoria technica, in the hope that thereby he might satisfy the examiner and win success.

The only sort of deception, however, which can remain undetected, and that only for a time, is self-deception; and those who disregard Mrs. Eddy's injunction in the textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 495), "Study thoroughly the letter and imbibe the spirit," will find themselves eventually compelled, as a result of painful experience, to take steps to make good their deficiencies. There are those who, while diligently studying the Christian

Send a comment to the editors

NEXT IN THIS ISSUE

Article

The Uncovering and Destruction of Error