Chapter 15: 'Science and Health with Key to The Scriptures' by Mary Baker Eddy

Chapter XV - Genesis

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and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take

also of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever; therefore

the Lord God [Jehovah] sent him forth from the garden

of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken.

So He drove out the man: and He placed at the east

of the garden of Eden Cherubims, and a flaming sword

which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of

life.

Justice and recompense

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A knowledge of evil was never the essence of divin-

ity or manhood. In the first chapter of Genesis, evil

has no local habitation nor name. Crea-

tion is there represented as spiritual, entire,

and good. "Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he

also reap." Error excludes itself from harmony. Sin

is its own punishment. Truth guards the gateway

to harmony. Error tills its own barren soil and buries

itself in the ground, since ground and dust stand for

nothingness.

Inspired interpretation

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No one can reasonably doubt that the purpose of this

allegory – this second account in Genesis – is to depict

the falsity of error and the effects of error.

Subsequent Bible revelation is coordinate

with the Science of creation recorded in the

first chapter of Genesis. Inspired writers interpret the

Word spiritually, while the ordinary historian interprets

it literally. Literally taken, the text is made to appear

contradictory in some places, and divine Love, which

blessed the earth and gave it to man for a possession, is

represented as changeable. The literal meaning would

imply that God withheld from man the opportunity to

reform, lest man should improve it and become better;

but this is not the nature of God, who is Love always, –

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Love infinitely wise and altogether lovely, who "seeketh

not her own."

Spiritual gateway

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Truth should, and does, drive error out of all selfhood.

Truth is a two-edged sword, guarding and guiding.

Truth places the cherub wisdom at the gate

of understanding to note the proper guests.

Radiant with mercy and justice, the sword of Truth

gleams afar and indicates the infinite distance between

Truth and error, between the material and spiritual, –

the unreal and the real.

Contrasted testimony

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The sun, giving light and heat to the earth, is a figure

of divine Life and Love, enlightening and sustaining the

universe. The "tree of life" is significant of

eternal reality or being. The "tree of knowl-

edge" typifies unreality. The testimony of the serpent is

significant of the illusion of error, of the false claims that

misrepresent God, good. Sin, sickness, and death have

no record in the Elohistic introduction of Genesis, in which

God creates the heavens, earth, and man. Until that

which contradicts the truth of being enters into the arena,

evil has no history, and evil is brought into view only as

the unreal in contradistinction to the real and eternal.

538:23
Genesis iv. 1. And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she

conceived, and bare Cain, and said, I have gotten a man

from the Lord [Jehovah].

Erroneous conception

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This account is given, not of immortal man, but of mor-

tal man, and of sin which is temporal. As both mortal

man and sin have a beginning, they must

consequently have an end, while the sinless,

real man is eternal. Eve's declaration, "I have gotten

a man from the Lord," supposes God to be the author

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of sin and sin's progeny. This false sense of existence

is fratricidal. In the words of Jesus, it (evil, devil) is

"a murderer from the beginning." Error begins by

reckoning life as separate from Spirit, thus sapping the

foundations of immortality, as if life and immortality

were something which matter can both give and take

away.

Only one standard

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What can be the standard of good, of Spirit, of Life,

or of Truth, if they produce their opposites, such as evil,

matter, error, and death? God could never

impart an element of evil, and man possesses

nothing which he has not derived from God. How then

has man a basis for wrong-doing? Whence does he

obtain the propensity or power to do evil? Has Spirit

resigned to matter the government of the universe?

A type of falsehood

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The Scriptures declare that God condemned this lie as

to man's origin and character by condemning its symbol,

the serpent, to grovel beneath all the beasts

of the field. It is false to say that Truth and

error commingle in creation. In parable and argument,

this falsity is exposed by our Master as self-evidently

wrong. Disputing these points with the Pharisees and

arguing for the Science of creation, Jesus said: "Do men

gather grapes of thorns?" Paul asked: "What com-

munion hath light with darkness? And what concord

hath Christ with Belial?"

Scientific offspring

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The divine origin of Jesus gave him more than human

power to expound the facts of creation, and demonstrate

the one Mind which makes and governs man

and the universe. The Science of creation,

so conspicuous in the birth of Jesus inspired his wisest

and least-understood sayings, and was the basis of his

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marvellous demonstrations. Christ is the offspring of

Spirit, and spiritual existence shows that Spirit creates

neither a wicked nor a mortal man, lapsing into sin, sick-

ness, and death.

Cleansing upheaval

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In Isaiah we read: "I make peace, and create evil. I

the Lord do all these things;" but the prophet referred to

divine law as stirring up the belief in evil to its

utmost, when bringing it to the surface and re-

ducing it to its common denominator, nothingness. The

muddy river-bed must be stirred in order to purify the

stream. In moral chemicalization, when the symptoms

of evil, illusion, are aggravated, we may think in our igno-

rance that the Lord hath wrought an evil; but we ought

to know that God's law uncovers so-called sin and its

effects, only that Truth may annihilate all sense of evil

and all power to sin.

Allegiance to Spirit

540:17
Science renders "unto Caesar the things which are

Caesar's; and unto God the things that are God's." It

saith to the human sense of sin, sickness, and

death, "God never made you, and you are a

false sense which hath no knowledge of God." The pur-

pose of the Hebrew allegory, representing error as assum-

ing a divine character, is to teach mortals never to believe

a lie.

540:25
Genesis iv. 3, 4. Cain brought of the fruit of the ground

an offering unto the Lord [Jehovah]. And Abel, he also

brought of the firstlings of his flock, and of the fat thereof.

Spiritual and material

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Cain is the type of mortal and material man, conceived

in sin and "shapen in iniquity;" he is not the

type of Truth and Love. Material in origin

and sense, he brings a material offering to God. Abel

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takes his offering from the firstlings of the flock. A lamb

is a more animate form of existence, and more nearly re-

sembles a mind-offering than does Cain's fruit. Jealous

of his brother's gift, Cain seeks Abel's life, instead of mak-

ing his own gift a higher tribute to the Most High.

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Genesis iv. 4, 5. And the Lord [Jehovah] had respect

unto Abel, and to his offering: but unto Cain, and to his

offering, He had not respect.

541:9
Had God more respect for the homage bestowed through

a gentle animal than for the worship expressed by Cain's

fruit? No; but the lamb was a more spiritual type of

even the human concept of Love than the herbs of the

ground could be.

541:14
Genesis iv. 8. Cain rose up against Abel his brother, and

slew him.

541:16
The erroneous belief that life, substance, and intelli-

gence can be material ruptures the life and brotherhood

of man at the very outset.

541:19
Genesis iv. 9. And the Lord [Jehovah] said unto Cain,

Where is Abel thy brother? And he said, I know not: Am

I my brother's keeper?

Brotherhood repudiated

541:22
Here the serpentine lie invents new forms. At first it

usurps divine power. It is supposed to say

in the first instance, "Ye shall be as gods."

Now it repudiates even the human duty of man towards

his brother.

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Genesis iv. 10, 11. And He [Jehovah] said, . . . The

voice of thy brother's blood crieth unto Me from the ground.

And now art thou cursed from the earth.

Murder brings its curse

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The belief of life in matter sins at every step. It in-

curs divine displeasure, and it would kill Jesus that it

might be rid of troublesome Truth. Material

beliefs would slay the spiritual idea when-

ever and wherever it appears. Though error hides

behind a lie and excuses guilt, error cannot forever be

concealed. Truth, through her eternal laws, unveils

error. Truth causes sin to betray itself, and sets upon

error the mark of the beast. Even the disposition to

excuse guilt or to conceal it is punished. The avoidance

of justice and the denial of truth tend to perpetuate sin,

invoke crime, jeopardize self-control, and mock divine

mercy.

542:14
Genesis iv. 15. And the Lord [Jehovah] said unto him

Therefore whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken

on him sevenfold. And the Lord [Jehovah] set a mark

upon Cain, lest any finding him should kill him.

Retribution and remorse

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"They that take the sword shall perish with the

sword." Let Truth uncover and destroy error in God's

own way, and let human justice pattern the

divine. Sin will receive its full penalty, both

for what it is and for what it does. Justice marks

the sinner, and teaches mortals not to remove the

waymarks of God. To envy's own hell, justice con-

signs the lie which, to advance itself, breaks God's

commandments.

542:27
Genesis iv. 16. And Cain went out from the presence of

the Lord [Jehovah], and dwelt in the land of Nod.

Climax of suffering

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The sinful misconception of Life as something less

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than God, having no truth to support it, falls back upon

itself. This error, after reaching the climax of suffering,

yields to Truth and returns to dust; but it

is only mortal man and not the real man,

who dies. The image of Spirit cannot be effaced, since it

is the idea of Truth and changes not, but becomes more

beautifully apparent at error's demise.

Dwelling in dreamland

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In divine Science, the material man is shut out from

the presence of God. The five corporeal senses cannot

take cognizance of Spirit. They cannot come

into His presence, and must dwell in dream‑

land, until mortals arrive at the understanding that ma-

terial life, with all its sin, sickness, and death, is an illu-

sion, against which divine Science is engaged in a warfare

of extermination. The great verities of existence are

never excluded by falsity.

Man springs from Mind

543:17
All error proceeds from the evidence before the mate-

rial senses. If man is material and originates in an

egg, who shall say that he is not primarily

dust? May not Darwin be right in think-

ing that apehood preceded mortal manhood? Minerals

and vegetables are found, according to divine Science,

to be the creations of erroneous thought, not of matter.

Did man, whom God created with a word, originate

in an egg? When Spirit made all, did it leave aught

for matter to create? Ideas of Truth alone are reflected

in the myriad manifestations of Life, and thus it is

seen that man springs solely from Mind. The belief

that matter supports life would make Life, or God,

mortal.

Material inception

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The text, "In the day that the Lord God [Jehovah

God] made the earth and the heavens," introduces the

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record of a material creation which followed the spiritual,

– a creation so wholly apart from God's, that Spirit

had no participation in it. In God's creation

ideas became productive, obedient to Mind.

There was no rain and "not a man to till the ground."

Mind, instead of matter, being the producer, Life was

self-sustained. Birth, decay, and death arise from the

material sense of things, not from the spiritual, for in

the latter Life consisteth not of the things which a man

eateth. Matter cannot change the eternal fact that

man exists because God exists. Nothing is new to the

infinite Mind.

First evil suggestion

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In Science, Mind neither produces matter nor does

matter produce mind. No mortal mind has the might

or right or wisdom to create or to destroy.

All is under the control of the one Mind,

even God. The first statement about evil, – the first

suggestion of more than the one Mind, – is in the fable

of the serpent. The facts of creation, as previously re-

corded, include nothing of the kind.

Material personality

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The serpent is supposed to say, "Ye shall be as gods,"

but these gods must be evolved from materiality and be

the very antipodes of immortal and spiritual

being. Man is the likeness of Spirit, but a

material personality is not this likeness. Therefore man,

in this allegory, is neither a lesser god nor the image and

likeness of the one God.

544:28
Material, erroneous belief reverses understanding and

truth. It declares mind to be in and of matter, so-called

mortal life to be Life, infinity to enter man's nostrils

so that matter becomes spiritual. Error begins with

corporeality as the producer instead of divine Prin-

545:1
ciple, and explains Deity through mortal and finite con-

ceptions.

545:3
"Behold, the man is become as one of us." This could

not be the utterance of Truth or Science, for according

to the record, material man was fast degenerating and

never had been divinely conceived.

Mental tillage

545:7
The condemnation of mortals to till the ground means

this, – that mortals should so improve material belief

by thought tending spiritually upward as to

destroy materiality. Man, created by God,

was given dominion over the whole earth. The notion

of a material universe is utterly opposed to the theory

of man as evolved from Mind. Such fundamental errors

send falsity into all human doctrines and conclusions,

and do not accord infinity to Deity. Error tills the

whole ground in this material theory, which is entirely a

false view, destructive to existence and happiness. Out-

side of Christian Science all is vague and hypothetical, the

opposite of Truth; yet this opposite, in its false view of

God and man, impudently demands a blessing.

Erroneous standpoint

545:21
The translators of this record of scientific creation

entertained a false sense of being. They believed in

the existence of matter, its propagation and

power. From that standpoint of error, they

could not apprehend the nature and operation of Spirit.

Hence the seeming contradiction in that Scripture, which

is so glorious in its spiritual signification. Truth has

but one reply to all error, – to sin, sickness, and death:

"Dust [nothingness] thou art, and unto dust [nothingness]

shalt thou return."

Mortality mythical

545:31
"As in Adam [error] all die, even so in Christ [Truth]

shall all be made alive." The mortality of man is a

546:1
myth, for man is immortal. The false belief that spirit is

now submerged in matter, at some future time to be eman-

cipated from it, – this belief alone is mortal.

Spirit, God, never germinates, but is "the same

yesterday, and to-day, and forever." If Mind, God, cre-

ates error, that error must exist in the divine Mind, and

this assumption of error would dethrone the perfection

of Deity.

No truth from a material basis

546:9
Is Christian Science contradictory? Is the divine

Principle of creation misstated? Has God no Science to

declare Mind, while matter is governed by un-

erring intelligence? "There went up a mist

from the earth." This represents error as

starting from an idea of good on a material basis. It

supposes God and man to be manifested only through

the corporeal senses, although the material senses can

take no cognizance of Spirit or the spiritual idea.

Genesis and the Apocalypse seem more obscure than

other portions of the Scripture, because they cannot

possibly be interpreted from a material standpoint. To

the author, they are transparent, for they contain the deep

divinity of the Bible.

Dawning of spiritual facts

546:23
Christian Science is dawning upon a material age.

The great spiritual facts of being, like rays of light, shine

in the darkness, though the darkness, com-

prehending them not, may deny their reality.

The proof that the system stated in this book is Chris-

tianly scientific resides in the good this system accom-

plishes, for it cures on a divine demonstrable Principle

which all may understand.

Proof given in healing

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If mathematics should present a thousand different

examples of one rule, the proving of one example would

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authenticate all the others. A simple statement of Chris-

tian Science, if demonstrated by healing, contains the

proof of all here said of Christian Science. If

one of the statements in this book is true, every

one must be true, for not one departs from the stated sys-

tem and rule. You can prove for yourself, dear reader,

the Science of healing, and so ascertain if the author has

given you the correct interpretation of Scripture.

Embryonic evolution

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The late Louis Agassiz, by his microscopic examination

of a vulture's ovum, strengthens the thinker's conclusions

as to the scientific theory of creation. Agassiz

was able to see in the egg the earth's atmos-

phere, the gathering clouds, the moon and stars, while the

germinating speck of so-called embryonic life seemed a

small sun. In its history of mortality, Darwin's theory

of evolution from a material basis is more consistent than

most theories. Briefly, this is Darwin's theory, – that

Mind produces its opposite, matter, and endues matter

with power to recreate the universe, including man. Ma-

terial evolution implies that the great First Cause must

become material, and afterwards must either return to

Mind or go down into dust and nothingness.

True theory of the universe

547:23
The Scriptures are very sacred. Our aim must be to

have them understood spiritually, for only by this under-

standing can truth be gained. The true the-

ory of the universe, including man, is not in

material history but in spiritual development.

Inspired thought relinquishes a material, sensual, and

mortal theory of the universe, and adopts the spiritual and

immortal.

Scriptural perception

547:31
It is this spiritual perception of Scripture, which lifts

humanity out of disease and death and inspires faith.

548:1
"The Spirit and the bride say, Come! . . . and whoso-

ever will, let him take the water of life freely." Christian

Science separates error from truth, and breathes

through the sacred pages the spiritual sense of

life, substance, and intelligence. In this Science, we dis-

cover man in the image and likeness of God. We see that

man has never lost his spiritual estate and his eternal

harmony.

The clouds dissolving

548:9
How little light or heat reach our earth when clouds

cover the sun's face! So Christian Science can be seen

only as the clouds of corporeal sense roll away.

Earth has little light or joy for mortals before

Life is spiritually learned. Every agony of mortal error

helps error to destroy error, and so aids the apprehension

of immortal Truth. This is the new birth going on

hourly, by which men may entertain angels, the true

ideas of God, the spiritual sense of being.

Prediction of a naturalist

548:18
Speaking of the origin of mortals, a famous naturalist

says: "It is very possible that many general statements

now current, about birth and generation, will

be changed with the progress of information."

Had the naturalist, through his tireless researches, gained

the diviner side in Christian Science, – so far apart from

his material sense of animal growth and organization, –

he would have blessed the human race more abundantly.

Methods of reproduction

548:26
Natural history is richly endowed by the labors and

genius of great men. Modern discoveries have brought

to light important facts in regard to so-called

embryonic life. Agassiz declares ("Methods

of Study in Natural History,") "Certain ani-

mals, besides the ordinary process of generation, also

increase their numbers naturally and constantly by self‑

549:1
division." This discovery is corroborative of the Science

of Mind, for this discovery shows that the multiplication

of certain animals takes place apart from sexual condi-

tions. The supposition that life germinates in eggs and

must decay after it has grown to maturity, if not before,

is shown by divine metaphysics to be a mistake, – a

blunder which will finally give place to higher theories

and demonstrations.

The three processes

549:9
Creatures of lower forms of organism are supposed

to have, as classes, three different methods of reproduc-

tion and to multiply their species sometimes

through eggs, sometimes through buds, and

sometimes through self-division. According to recent

lore, successive generations do not begin with the birth of

new individuals, or personalities, but with the formation

of the nucleus, or egg, from which one or more individu-

alities subsequently emerge; and we must therefore look

upon the simple ovum as the germ, the starting-point, of

the most complicated corporeal structures, including those

which we call human. Here these material researches

culminate in such vague hypotheses as must necessarily

attend false systems, which rely upon physics and are de-

void of metaphysics.

Deference to material law

549:24
In one instance a celebrated naturalist, Agassiz, dis-

covers the pathway leading to divine Science, and beards

the lion of materialism in its den. At that

point, however, even this great observer mis-

takes nature, forsakes Spirit as the divine origin of

creative Truth, and allows matter and material law to

usurp the prerogatives of omnipotence. He absolutely

drops from his summit, coming down to a belief in the

material origin of man, for he virtually affirms that

550:1
the germ of humanity is in a circumscribed and non‑

intelligent egg.

Deep-reaching interrogations

550:3
If this be so, whence cometh Life, or Mind, to the

human race? Matter surely does not possess Mind.

God is the Life, or intelligence, which forms

and preserves the individuality and identity

of animals as well as of men. God cannot

become finite, and be limited within material bounds.

Spirit cannot become matter, nor can Spirit be developed

through its opposite. Of what avail is it to investigate

what is miscalled material life, which ends, even as it be-

gins, in nameless nothingness? The true sense of being

and its eternal perfection should appear now, even as it

will hereafter.

Stages of existence

550:15
Error of thought is reflected in error of action. The

continual contemplation of existence as material and cor-

poreal – as beginning and ending, and with

birth, decay, and dissolution as its component

stages – hides the true and spiritual Life, and causes

our standard to trail in the dust. If Life has any starting‑

point whatsoever, then the great I AM is a myth. If Life

is God, as the Scriptures imply, then Life is not embry-

onic, it is infinite. An egg is an impossible enclosure for

Deity.

550:25
Embryology supplies no instance of one species pro-

ducing its opposite. A serpent never begets a bird, nor

does a lion bring forth a lamb. Amalgamation is deemed

monstrous and is seldom fruitful, but it is not so hideous

and absurd as the supposition that Spirit – the pure and

holy, the immutable and immortal – can originate the

impure and mortal and dwell in it. As Christian Science

repudiates self-evident impossibilities, the material senses

551:1
must father these absurdities, for both the material senses

and their reports are unnatural, impossible, and unreal.

The real producer

551:3
Either Mind produces, or it is produced. If Mind is

first, it cannot produce its opposite in quality and quantity,

called matter. If matter is first, it cannot pro-

duce Mind. Like produces like. In natural

history, the bird is not the product of a beast. In spiritual

history, matter is not the progenitor of Mind.

The ascent of species

551:9
One distinguished naturalist argues that mortals spring

from eggs and in races. Mr. Darwin admits this, but he

adds that mankind has ascended through all

the lower grades of existence. Evolution de-

scribes the gradations of human belief, but it does not

acknowledge the method of divine Mind, nor see that ma-

terial methods are impossible in divine Science and that

all Science is of God, not of man.

Transmitted peculiarities

551:17
Naturalists ask: "What can there be, of a material

nature, transmitted through these bodies called eggs, –

themselves composed of the simplest material

elements, – by which all peculiarities of an-

cestry, belonging to either sex, are brought down from

generation to generation?" The question of the natu-

ralist amounts to this: How can matter originate or trans-

mit mind? We answer that it cannot. Darkness and

doubt encompass thought, so long as it bases creation on

materiality. From a material standpoint, "Canst thou

by searching find out God?" All must be Mind, or

else all must be matter. Neither can produce the other.

Mind is immortal; but error declares that the material

seed must decay in order to propagate its species, and

the resulting germ is doomed to the same routine.

Causation not in matter

551:32
The ancient and hypothetical question, Which is first,

552:1
the egg or the bird? is answered, if the egg produces the

parent. But we cannot stop here. Another question

follows: Who or what produces the parent of

the egg? That the earth was hatched from the

"egg of night" was once an accepted theory. Heathen

philosophy, modern geology, and all other material hy-

potheses deal with causation as contingent on matter

and as necessarily apparent to the corporeal senses, even

where the proof requisite to sustain this assumption is un-

discovered. Mortal theories make friends of sin, sickness,

and death; whereas the spiritual scientific facts of exist-

ence include no member of this dolorous and fatal triad.

Emergence of mortals

552:13
Human experience in mortal life, which starts from an

egg, corresponds with that of Job, when he says, "Man

that is born of a woman is of few days, and

full of trouble." Mortals must emerge from

this notion of material life as all-in-all. They must peck

open their shells with Christian Science, and look outward

and upward. But thought, loosened from a material

basis but not yet instructed by Science, may become wild

with freedom and so be self-contradictory.

Persistence of species

552:22
From a material source flows no remedy for sorrow,

sin, and death, for the redeeming power, from the ills

they occasion, is not in egg nor in dust. The

blending tints of leaf and flower show the

order of matter to be the order of mortal mind. The

intermixture of different species, urged to its utmost

limits, results in a return to the original species. Thus

it is learned that matter is a manifestation of mortal

mind, and that matter always surrenders its claims when

the perfect and eternal Mind is understood.

Better basis than embryology

552:32
Naturalists describe the origin of mortal and material

553:1
existence in the various forms of embryology, and ac-

company their descriptions with important observations,

which should awaken thought to a higher and

purer contemplation of man's origin. This

clearer consciousness must precede an under-

standing of the harmony of being. Mortal thought must

obtain a better basis, get nearer the truth of being, or

health will never be universal, and harmony will never

become the standard of man.

553:10
One of our ablest naturalists has said: "We have no

right to assume that individuals have grown or been

formed under circumstances which made material con-

ditions essential to their maintenance and reproduction,

or important to their origin and first introduction."

Why, then, is the naturalist's basis so materialistic,

and why are his deductions generally material?

All nativity in thought

553:17
Adam was created before Eve. In this instance, it is

seen that the maternal egg never brought forth Adam.

Eve was formed from Adam's rib, not from a

foetal ovum. Whatever theory may be adopted

by general mortal thought to account for human origin,

that theory is sure to become the signal for the appear-

ance of its method in finite forms and operations. If con-

sentaneous human belief agrees upon an ovum as the

point of emergence for the human race, this potent belief

will immediately supersede the more ancient supersti-

tion about the creation from dust or from the rib of our

primeval father.

Being is immortal

553:29
You may say that mortals are formed before they

think or know aught of their origin, and you

may also ask how belief can affect a result

which precedes the development of that belief. It can

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