Throughout the Scriptures are to be found stirring accounts of mighty victories for the armies of righteousness. Interpreted from a purely material standpoint, this graphic record might well be calculated to lead the student to believe that material warfare constitutes at least a part of the divinely appointed means and plan of salvation. Such a view of Biblical narrative and history, however, is sharply rebuked by the unequivocal declaration of Paul, "For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh;" and continuing he adds, "For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds; casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ."

In Christian Science we learn that the weapons of our warfare are indeed "not carnal, but mighty through God," and that when we, as faithful soldiers in the army of Christ, make proper use of these weapons they are found adequate to the destruction of error of every sort. But, says the inquirer, if it be true, as Christian Science teaches, that God's universe, including man, is spiritual and perfect, where is the necessity or occasion for spiritual warfare? Our Leader, Mrs. Eddy, points out again and again that the universe as God created it is perfect, harmonious, and eternal. It is thus clear that in this eternal divine creation there neither is nor can be any warfare. God, Mind, creating and governing His infinite universe of spiritual ideas, cannot express aught unlike Himself.

But the picture of creation presented by material sense is quite the contrary. This false view, reversing and counterfeiting the real or true universe, would, if it were possible, "deceive the very elect." Christ and Belial, God and mammon, Spirit and matter, Truth and error, are mutually exclusive. Believing in the reality of both good and evil, and accepting the supposed mingling of these two opposites, human consciousness attempts to serve God and mammon. It is upon this battle ground that the enemy—error—would assert its supremacy over good and claim to dominate human consciousness.

And what of the warfare of righteousness, its achievements and results? Mrs. Eddy writes in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 111), "The Principle of divine metaphysics is God; the practice of divine metaphysics is the utilization of the power of Truth over error; its rules demonstrate its Science." In such warfare we find no guesswork, no uncertainty of results when the campaign is rightly conducted. "The utilization of the power of Truth over error" points to the absolute certainty of the effect of such power when correctly applied.

But in human experience we find that we must prove our way. Our task is that of demonstrating in our own lives the great facts of being. The warfare is indeed unto the extinction of evil beliefs through the discernment and demonstration of spiritual facts. To establish such proof in the individual consciousness may require time, and it certainly requires growth. Who has not found from experience that consecrated, continued effort to overcome error is requisite to success?

But, the inquirer may reiterate, why is this? If God is good and infinite, if He is Spirit and is All, what and where is error? Error is but a false, mesmeric sense asserting itself as consciousness and claiming to reverse, and repeat in counterfeit form,—that is, materially,—the true, spiritual fact. This false belief claims to become our thinking and to possess entity as intelligent matter with its attendant claims of sin, sickness, and mortality. To the extent of our acceptance of these falsities, we find them externalized in our experience.

The promise, however, is that of victory. Christian Science, as revealed through the pure, Christ-filled consciousness of our Leader, Mary Baker Eddy, points the way out of this unhappy dual condition. The way is more easily discerned and followed when, through spiritual unfoldment, we realize that the inevitable outcome of spiritual warfare is the complete annihilation of error. Our part in this warfare is, particularly, the overcoming of error in our own consciousness; and our vulnerability to error ceases in proportion as we guard our thinking from its erroneous claims. Righteous thinking, constant in its fidelity to the spiritual facts of existence, is a sure defense.

This assurance of ultimate victory brings also a sense of the availability of Truth to blot out error here and now. The spiritual idea—man and the universe—is forever the same. Healing is inevitable when metaphysical work is rightly done; for such work, in its affirmation of the truth of being and its consequent uncovering and denial of the errors of belief, brings to human consciousness the perception of spiritual facts. No lawless claim of destruction can ever impair or affect the man God knows; and to the consciousness which sees as the Father sees there is nothing that can disturb or destroy.

God's will for man is peace, health, joy, spiritual power; and the attributes of God are forever perfectly expressed by man in accordance with spiritual law. The operation of this law, which is God's expressed will, is ever just, merciful, kind, benevolent, and protective, for it enfolds man forever in the Father's love. This great truth is voiced with unmistakable clarity by Mrs. Eddy in the concluding sentence of "Unity of Good" (p. 64): "Mortals may climb the smooth glaciers, leap the dark fissures, scale the treacherous ice, and stand on the summit of Mont Blanc; but they can never turn back what Deity knoweth, nor escape from identification with what dwelleth in the eternal Mind." Our present task of spiritual warfare, therefore, as well as our responsibility for its conduct, is to see that sin and sickness are replaced by the true idea of man as God's image and likeness, for in this real sense of man is found "identification with what dwelleth in the eternal Mind."