Editorial December 7, 1929 Issue

The Rules of Christian Science

Violet Ker Seymer

On page 265 of "Miscellaneous Writings" Mrs. Eddy writes: "Whosoever understands a single rule in Science, and demonstrates its Principle according to rule, is master of the situation. Nobody can gainsay this." The Science of being cannot be reversed or, scientifically speaking, gainsaid; and no student of Christian Science is deprived of the reward of scientific obedience to these rules, establishing dominion in place of subjection. Further, as stated in the first chapter of Genesis, God has set spiritual light "to rule over the day and over the night." In human experience there is no mental darkness so dense but that the light of Truth, wherever it is reflected, rules out this darkness.

One aspect of the divine ruling has come to be known as the Golden Rule. Pleading with the Philippians for singlemindedness, Paul writes, "Let us walk by the same rule, let us mind the same thing." Obedience to the Golden Rule aligns one with wisdom, tact, compassion, spontaneity, and enables one to maintain a healing attitude toward human perversity. The Christian Scientist is neither blind to error, nor is he blinded by any of its manifold pretenses, for he knows that he must hold his gaze to the truth of being. The habit of thinking and talking disparagingly about one's self and others veils from sight the perfection of spiritual man; and our Leader, desiring to protect mortals from this demoralizing tendency, writes (ibid., p. 346), "It is a rule in Christian Science never to repeat error unless it becomes requisite to bring out Truth." True statements bear repetition and carry healing with them; but too often a gloomy comment or an unguarded look of dismay temporarily extinguishes the first faint glimmer of hope awakened in some sufferer. The mission of the Christian Scientist is to reflect the infinite God, good, and to prove Truth's mastery in every situation by himself becoming Truth's servant.

What peace comes to the divinely controlled consciousness! Paul, in whom tempests of self-will were gradually stilled, owing to his recognition that spiritual man is not born of the flesh or ruled by error, but is born of God and ruled of God, wrote feelingly to his converts in Colosse, "Let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to the which also ye are called in one body; and be ye thankful." This divine ruling is reflected by the elimination of unruly, ungovernable traits of the so-called carnal mind. The heart trained in gratitude becomes obedient, fearless, confident of the immanence of divine Principle. Thus, even though error's arguments may press hard and attempt to encroach upon one's health and harmony, the peace of God can still rule in our hearts and establish there its own calm. In God's kingdom, His reflected consciousness, disturbance is an impossibility. So the Christian Scientist must obey the divine rule of perfection in order to rule out mortal imperfection. The application of the rules of Christian Science will ultimately master every situation. Spiritual honesty and allegiance to divine Principle bid us rule out sin and pantheistic fears by holding courageously to the fact that man in God's likeness is conscious of God's ruling, and wholly amenable to it.

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