Article March 12, 1949 Issue

A Christian Scientist reasons from the standpoint of perfection—perfect God and perfect man

"SPIRIT IS POSITIVE"

HILDA M. SPENCER

In 1866 Mary Baker Eddy, a lifelong student of the Bible, received an instantaneous healing of an injury pronounced fatal by the physicians. While lying on what her friends thought to be her deathbed she called for her Bible and read therein the account of the healing of the man sick of the palsy (Matt. 9). Catching a glimpse of the underlying spiritual law of God, she was healed. The result of her search for Truth during years of consecrated and persistent study and application of the Biblical truths she gave to the world in her textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," with its positive rules for demonstrating Christian Science. On page 275 of this book Mrs. Eddy writes, "The starting-point of divine Science is that God, Spirit, is All-in-all, and that there is no other might nor Mind,—that God is Love, and therefore He is divine Principle."

How prone we are in our human experiences to make the problem rather than Spirit, God, our starting point and to attempt through human reasoning to find the solution of that problem. Beginning with the premise that God is All-in-all, the student of Christian Science places his affairs under the government of Spirit. He solves his problems through the understanding of God and His spiritual laws and their application to human need. Mrs. Eddy also states (ibid., p. 173): "Neither the substance nor the manifestation of Spirit is obtainable through matter. Spirit is positive." Her writings reveal man, including all right ideas, as the perfect compound idea of the one perfect Mind. These ideas which constitute man's individuality are eternally active, purposeful, and complete, never inactive or aimless. Hence man is as positive as his creator.

Spirit includes no negative qualities, and therefore man, the immediate expression of Mind, does not embody beliefs of discouragement, frustration, lack, or failure, but manifests assurance, satisfaction, abundance, and success. His life and well-being are as fixed and permanent as his source, divine Principle, is invariable. Man exists as the living, positive witness of omniactive Truth, which knows no obstruction to purpose and fulfillment. The realization of these truths eliminates from one's experience false beliefs which mortal mind would impose upon him.

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