Article January 27, 1951 Issue

THE ART OF PREVENTION

[Original article in French]

CHRISTIANE R. PANTET

Two Christian Scientists were exchanging viewpoints one day on the subject of medicine. One concluded that God did not create it. But the other recalled this sentence by Mary Baker Eddy in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 142): "God being All-in-all, He made medicine; but that medicine was Mind."

So-called material medicine is of two types: curative and preventive. The spiritual healing in Christian Science—exclusively spiritual—is also curative and preventive. Mrs. Eddy, who searched deeply the modes of human thought, writes (ibid., p. 369), "The prophylactic: and therapeutic (that is, the preventive and curative) arts belong emphatically to Christian Science, as would be readily seen, if psychology, or the Science of Spirit, God, was understood."

We are frequently inclined to emphasize the fact that Christian Science is curative and to neglect its preventive aspects. We say that it heals, but we sometimes forget that it also prevents sickness. Since the prophylactic art also belongs to Christian Science, it is helpful to know how we can make use of it, since it is always available for our protection. It has, however, nothing in common with preventive material medicine. It is spiritual armor, which the individual puts on to protect him from any belief in the reality of evil.

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