Article March 2, 1968 Issue

Neutralizing and Destroying Error

ERIC W. CARR

On one of the beaches of Britain, since the last war, a live mine is sometimes washed up, becoming a danger to bathers and boatmen and to children playing on the sands. In such an event, the police notify the nearest naval or military depot to send a squad of men to remove the fuse and explosive charge. While the mine may now appear just as forbidding as before the removal of the charge, it has actually been neutralized and rendered ineffective to harm anyone.

When studying the weekly Lesson-Sermon one day from the Christian Science Quarterly, a sermon that was to be read in all Churches of Christ, Scientist, the following Sunday, the writer came across this passage from the Christian Science textbook, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science: "Science both neutralizes error and destroys it."^{Science and Health, p. 157;}

He had read this sentence many times before and was quite familiar with it, but on this occasion he felt the urge to look up the word "neutralize" in the Oxford Dictionary. He found the following definition: "Render ineffective by an opposite force or effect." The meaning of the word here given seemed to him to emphasize the importance of the above statement in its application to the handling of problems that appear particularly stubborn. With the help of Christian Science treatment erroneous conditions, both physical and mental, can be and often are met and overcome quickly. Nevertheless, if some situation or problem should seem not to be yielding as readily as had been hoped for, the difficulty can still be neutralized by one's realizing the truth of being. It can be rendered ineffective to hinder, harm, or discourage. Moreover, the condition having been neutralized, fear will have been eliminated, and the problem may be considered well on its way to destruction.

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