The denial of error is essential in the healing method of Christian Science. And the basic claim of error, or mortal mind, the claim that needs the most thorough and emphatic denial, is pantheism—the belief that life and intelligence arise from and depend upon matter. Until this belief, which is so deeply embedded in human thought, is understood as unreal, as sheer delusion, the healing of sickness and sin is likely to be protracted or unfinished.

Christ Jesus was virtually denying pantheism when he said (John 12:25), "He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal." In every healing he accomplished, the Master was proving the falsity of material life, or life in matter, and demonstrating the truth that man lives and has his full being in Spirit.

Mary Baker Eddy denied again and again the belief of pantheism. In fact, she made the first sentence in the vastly important "scientific statement of being" such a denial. This statement is found on page 468 of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," and the beginning sentence reads, "There is no life, truth, intelligence, nor substance in matter."

To believe that the use of this first sentence should be avoided in the practice of Christian healing is to believe that one of the most powerful arguments in such healing should be discarded. The importance of this denial of pantheism is shown in the position it is given in "the scientific statement of being." One sometimes hears that it is wrong to use this first sentence at the time of the birth of a child. Nothing could be farther from the fact. One who denies pantheism for the new infant is starting him off in human life with a definite release from the binding error that he is dependent upon flesh for his life, his substance, and his intelligence.

Mrs. Eddy says in unmistakable terms (ibid., p. 535), "Divine Science deals its chief blow at the supposed material foundations of life and intelligence." The well-grounded Scientist will not fail to deal this "chief blow" at error. He knows that he will not succeed in destroying error if he withholds the chief metaphysical blow, which embodies the power of Truth.

Physiology would make man a kind of machine with chemical and electrical action determining the state of his health, the degree of his intelligence, the measure of his strength, and the length of his life. Biology would make the brain the organ of thought, the center of motive power. But according to metaphysical, or spiritual, Science, divine Mind is the source of true thoughts, and the will of Mind is the motive power of man.

To understand that man is Mind's idea and to realize that idea cannot be separated from the Mind whose knowing gives it existence is to rule out pantheism and to become gradually conscious of one's real life in Mind, a life entirely apart from matter.

Pantheism is elemental materialism. It would discard the one Mind for the belief of many erring and struggling minds, each abiding in a brain. Paul must have understood the truth that man lives in Mind and not in flesh, for he said (Acts 17:28), "In him we live, and move, and have our being." In "Retrospection and Introspection," Mrs. Eddy quotes Paul's words, and she says (p. 93): "This statement is in substance identical with my own: 'There is no life, truth, substance, nor intelligence in matter.' It is quite clear that as yet this grandest verity has not been fully demonstrated, but it is nevertheless true." And she admonishes Christian Scientists to give convincing proof of the truth of her scientific statement.

Christian Science does not attempt to prolong the belief of life and intelligence in matter, although the effect of this Science is to bring about normal conditions of the human mind and body and thus to extend longevity. Normal conditions of health indicate the overcoming of pantheism, not the support of it. They show the extent to which human thought is conforming to the truth that life, substance, and intelligence are in Mind, Spirit, and nowhere else.

Denying pantheism, we advance spiritually, and we achieve moral freedom as well as dominion over the flesh and its claim to limit health and action. We give up the belief of pleasure in material sensation, and we delight in the pure qualities that characterize the real man.

One may claim to deny pantheism; but as long as sensation in matter seems to persist and life seems to depend upon conditions of the flesh, the demand of Jesus to give up "life in this world" is not being obeyed. There is work to be done, and dominion over the flesh will be furthered in the measure that we declare and prove that "there is no life, truth, intelligence, nor substance in matter."

Helen Wood Bauman