Article March 10, 1928 Issue

Supply

JOHN MILLIGAN

The question of supply occupies a great deal of attention and demands much effort. This is inevitable, since if one believes man to be material, he must believe that man's needs are material also, and therefore capable of satisfaction through material means alone. Yet the history of mankind in general, and of each one of us in particular, has shown that lasting satisfaction cannot be attained through material means or methods. The material so-called needs of mankind have not been lessened by the progress of civilization; on the contrary, as mankind has progressed along certain material lines and developed new sources of supply along those lines, it has almost seemed to become more enslaved to matter, and its needs have often appeared to be just so much greater.

Obviously, therefore, there is no solution to the question of supply along material lines. What, then, is the solution? Mrs. Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, has given it to us in various passages in the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures;" but perhaps in none more definitely than in these words of hers on page 492: "For right reasoning there should be but one fact before the thought, namely, spiritual existence." Man, the image and likeness of God, Mind, Spirit, is of necessity spiritual. Being spiritual, it follows that his needs and their supply are spiritual, also. Being spiritual, it follows that his needs and their supply are spiritual, also. Regardless of the testimony of the physical senses, this is the absolute fact; and for right reasoning we must begin from this standpoint.

It will be recalled that Jesus dealt with this question in precisely this manner at the time of the temptation in the wilderness. When the suggestion that man's needs are material attempted to enter his consciousness, he refuted it with the reply, "It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but they by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God." In other words, reasoning from the fact of spiritual existence as the only real existence, Jesus denied the claim of the physical senses that matter could supply his need, and declared that man's real subsistence consists of spiritual ideas emanating from God, the divine Mind.

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