Article July 23, 1927 Issue

Spiritual Law versus Material Law

SADIE H. PENDLETON

It is thought by some Christian Scientists that it is necessary for one to know all about the so-called material laws believed to govern certain claims of disease, in order that these may be destroyed. Now, Christian Science teaches that all is God and His ideas; that Mind is wholly good, and therefore that the ideas or thoughts emanating from it must also be as good, harmonious, and perfect as their divine source. Therefore matter, which is the supposititious opposite of divine Mind, is simply the outcome of a belief in another mind apart from God, good. Consequently, it has no intelligence, no substance, no place, presence, or power.

It necessarily follows that the material laws believed to govern matter must originate in this same false belief of a carnal mind. Therefore they can have no source, no foundation or Principle to support them. "The basic error is mortal mind," Mrs. Eddy says in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 405). Then why should it be thought necessary to know every phase or claim of these laws that mortal mind puts forth, in order to destroy them? On the contrary, it is most important that we get the facts clearly established in our consciousness that God's law is the only real law, the only law that can operate, and that this law annihilates everything unlike itself.

We are all practitioners in so far as we are demonstrating Christian Science. Someone may ask, If a practitioner does not heal a case, is it because he does not know the material laws regarding the specific claim? If a practitioner does not readily heal a belief, is it because he is ignorant concerning material law, or is it because he does not know enough about God's law? Mrs. Eddy's answer is on page 149 of Science and Health: "If you fail to succeed in any case, it is because you have not demonstrated the life of Christ, Truth, more in your own life,—because you have not obeyed the rule and proved the Principle of divine Science."

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