Editorial July 16, 1932 Issue

"No real disease"

Duncan Sinclair

A marginal heading to a paragraph on page 393 of the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mary Baker Eddy, reads, "No real disease"—an assertion which, while it may have aroused the skepticism of some of those ignorant of the truth on which it is based, has called forth the gratitude of thousands. In the paragraph referred to Mrs. Eddy says: "Man is never sick, for Mind is not sick and matter cannot be. A false belief is both the tempter and the tempted, the sin and the sinner, the disease and its cause." In these two brief sentences is embodied the reason for the declaration that sickness is unreal, a declaration which is gradually yet surely changing the thought of mankind throughout the world on the question of disease.

"No real disease"! How did the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science arrive at this conclusion? Mrs. Eddy, who was a devoted student of the Bible and a faithful follower of Christ Jesus, accepted the fact of God's allness, the fact that God is infinite good. She did more, however; she drew from the fact that God is infinite good the conclusion that evil is unreal, that evil in its every seeming form or guise is without reality. And as disease is a seeming mode of evil, she further concluded that disease is but a dream of material sense, an illusion of so-called mortal mind. Consequently, Mrs. Eddy could write on page 396 of Science and Health, "It breaks the dream of disease to understand that sickness is formed by the human mind, not by matter nor by the divine Mind."

The Christian Scientist, then, regards every form of disease as unreal because it is not of Spirit, God; because it is not created by God. And his endeavor as a Christian Science practitioner is to enlist on the side of Truth whomsoever he may be helping—whoever may come to him for treatment. Here wisdom is required, for the patient may have but the slightest knowledge of real being. He must therefore be lovingly guided into an understanding of God as infinite good in order that he may see the illusory nature of evil, including disease. To bring this about he may be asked to study Science and Health prayerfully; or certain passages in the textbook may be pointed out to him for his consideration, passages which the practitioner deems specially suited to counteract the erroneous beliefs which the patient is entertaining. In this way, and by the treatment he receives, his understanding of and faith in good increase, while his belief in the reality of disease diminishes until it finally disappears

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