Article September 2, 1950 Issue

DISEASE "NEITHER MIND NOR MATTER"

HERBERT E. RIEKE

NUMBERS of individuals believe in ghosts, but spiritually enlightened thinkers smile at the foolishness of that belief, knowing that ghosts do not exist. Not many decades hence all enlightened people will smile at other illusions of our age. There are many today who believe in evil—sin, disease, and death—as having presence and power, when God, good, alone is omnipresence and all-power. Mankind is awakening to see through the study of Christian Science that sickness, like ghosts, is not physical, but is only superstition and ignorance.

Some people do not readily give up their belief in ghosts. Instead, they argue for their reality, and as a result they are troubled by fear of such apparitions. Just so, there are those who argue for the reality of disease and therefore spend their days in fear of it. Through Christian Science, however, individuals lose their fear of disease by challenging and proving false its claim to reality. Then its phantomlike appearance vanishes into its basic nothingness.

On page 352 of the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," Mary Baker Eddy writes: "Would a mother say to her child, who is frightened at imaginary ghosts and sick in consequence of the fear: 'I know that ghosts are real. They exist, and are to be feared; but you must not be afraid of them'?" She then goes on to say, "In short, children should be told not to believe in ghosts, because there are no such things." Following this, Mrs. Eddy compares belief in disease and materiality with ghosts.

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