More than others, perhaps, Christian Scientists should be conscious of the importance of law. They recognize the law and order of the universe, and in their daily living they try to conform to the laws governing man—God's laws— and to the laws of the land. They are inspired by that divine invisible force which directs the lives of those who love God. In reverence they seek to submit to the government of the one all-wise God, from whom issues all true law, which is spiritual, supreme, and constant in its functions.

Contemplating the true sense of life, Christian Scientists open their hearts with joyous expectancy to consider the practice of divine law. They stand at the bar of justice, the court of Spirit. They understand that the creator, knowing all His creation individually and collectively, administers justice and equity to all through the law of Truth and Love.

To the question: "How would you define Christian Science?" Mary Baker Eddy answers in "Rudimental Divine Science" (p. 1), "As the law of God, the law of good, interpreting and demonstrating the divine Principle and rule of universal harmony." From this we learn that Christian Science gives the true interpretation of God and His creation, and sets forth the order and symmetry of the universe of Spirit. We see also from this definition that divine Principle must be demonstrated.

Before a lawyer goes into one of our local courts, he must first be prepared through study and character to be admitted to the bar to practice law. His duty, in coming before the judge, is to plead the case of his client for the purpose of securing for him a just and equitable settlement.

The Christian Science practitioner prepares himself for his practice through prayer and the study of the Christian Science textbooks, the Bible and the writings of Mrs. Eddy. He works for the spiritual understanding of the law of God and brings the spiritual truths of existence to bear on his case in order to prove the power of Truth to uncover and destroy error. God's law is eternally established and is not weighed in the balance of human opinion. Herein God's law and human law differ. Divine law is never deflected from right or justice. No arguments of mortal mind can ever change one iota of God's just law.

The diligent student of Christian Science dwelling with these truths of God's law sees that his perception or understanding of them can come only by spiritual inspiration and not by human interpretation. He then prays for God to guide him into the true understanding of this divine law. Humbly he retreats from his sense of personal ego and remembers the words of the great Way-shower, Christ Jesus (John 5:19), "The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do." He sees the true way of service as the practice of God's law and endeavors to conform his life with that exemplified by Christ Jesus, who said (Matt. 5:17), "Think not I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill."

A Christian Science practitioner often begins his treatment with the affirmation that man is God's image and likeness. With this fact firmly established in thought, he proceeds to declare the unreality of matter and the oneness of Mind or God. Through the demonstration of Christian Science the practitioner of God's law broadens his horizon and leads his patient into the realm of Truth. Evil gradually disappears, and the patient is healed. The practitioner can then say, as Jesus did just before he raised Lazarus from the dead (John 11:41,42): "Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me. And I knew that thou hearest me always."

The practitioner knows that the belief in sin is punished as long as it is believed, and he proceeds through logic, guided by spiritual inspiration and understanding, to destroy the belief through the utilization of God's law. He begins with mental causation to eliminate evil. He realizes that man is the son of God, created in His image and likeness. This conviction leads him to see that in the realm of divine Mind there is no evil. He convinces the patient that he must lose his belief in the pleasure of sin and stop sinning in order to experience freedom from evil. It is only then that punishment ceases.

Through such regenerating experiences we see the unfolding of real manhood, governed by God's law. A thing unfolded implies that it is not a new creation, though hidden from view. When the obstruction is taken away, man's true nature and completeness are seen, showing the fullness of the divine idea. Hence man, the son of God, exists now as a real entity, but this real man must be revealed to mankind. Christ Jesus, the Way-shower, came to point the way of salvation, to lead men to drop their narrow or limited concepts of man and to look at the spiritual idea, or the infinite concept, of man.

The inviolable law of God must be acknowledged by every true Christian Scientist, and the practitioner must demonstrate the great import of God's law in co-operation with his patients. It is clear that one of the important things to be accomplished by the practitioner is to get the patient to concur in the acknowledgment of this law and to continue to acknowledge it. When this is done, healing and regeneration follow.

From what has just been said, one can infer that every true Christian Scientist is in a sense a lawyer practicing the spiritual law of God. Through the realization of "one Lord, one faith, one baptism" (Eph. 4:5), he sees the immutable law of God expressed more fully in human consciousness. He sees greater manifestation of the changeless, perfect Principle by which "all things were made." The Bible tells us that "without him was not any thing made that was made" (John 1:3). The Christian Scientist deals with the false belief which causes the discordant physical manifestation. It must be seen that the outward appearance of a disease is not the product of matter, but is the evidence of a false belief originating in mortal mind, a false belief about God and man. And it is ruled out by God's law.

The Christian Scientist, practicing the divine law, has supreme confidence in God's law of adjustment. Thus his joy is in his realization that by practicing the divine law he is helping to heal and to save the world from sin, sickness, and death.