Science and Health
with Key to The Scriptures
by Mary Baker Eddy
Chapter XII - Christian Science Practice

 

Matter is not inflamed
415:1
excited state of mortals which is not normal. Immor-
tal Mind is the only cause; therefore disease is neither a
cause nor an effect. Mind in every case is the
eternal God, good. Sin, disease, and death
have no foundations in Truth. Inflamation as a mor-
tal belief quickens or impedes the action of the system,
because thought moves quickly or slowly, leaps or halts
when it contemplates unpleasant things, or when the in-
dividual looks upon some object which he dreads. In-
flammation never appears in a part which mortal thought
does not reach. That is why opiates relieve inflammation.
They quiet the thought by inducing stupefaction and by
resorting to matter instead of to Mind. Opiates do not
remove the pain in any scientific sense. They only ren-
der mortal mind temporarily less fearful, till it can master
an erroneous belief.
Truth calms the thought
415:17
Note how thought makes the face pallid. It either re-
tards the circulation or quickens it, causing a pale or
flushed cheek. In the same way thought in-
creases or diminishes the secretions, the action
of the lungs, of the bowels, and of the heart. The mus-
cles, moving quickly or slowly and impelled or palsied by
thought, represent the action of all the organs of the hu-
man system, including brain and viscera. To remove
the error producing disorder, you must calm and instruct
mortal mind with immortal Truth.
Effects of etherization
415:27
Etherization will apparently cause the body to dis-
appear. Before the thoughts are fully at rest, the limbs
will vanish from consciousness. Indeed, the
whole frame will sink from sight along with
surrounding objects, leaving the pain standing forth as
distinctly as a mountain-peak, as if it were a separate
416:1
bodily member. At last the agony also vanishes. This
process shows the pain to be in the mind, for the inflam-
mation is not suppressed; and the belief of pain will
presently return, unless the mental image occasioning
the pain be removed by recognizing the truth of being.
Sedatives valueless
416:6
A hypodermic injection of morphine is administered
to a patient, and in twenty minutes the sufferer is qui-
etly asleep. To him there is no longer any
pain. Yet any physician – allopathic, homoe-
opathic, botanic, eclectic – will tell you that the trouble-
some material cause is unremoved, and that when the
soporific influence of the opium is exhausted, the pa-
tient will find himself in the same pain, unless the belief
which occasions the pain has meanwhile been changed.
Where is the pain while the patient sleeps?
The so-called physical ego
416:16
The material body, which you call me, is mortal mind,
and this mind is material in sensation, even as the body,
which has originated from this material sense
and been developed according to it, is mate-
rial. This materialism of parent and child is only in
mortal mind, as the dead body proves; for when the
mortal has resigned his body to dust, the body is no
longer the parent, even in appearance.
Evil thought depletes
416:24
The sick know nothing of the mental process by
which they are depleted, and next to nothing of the
metaphysical method by which they can be
healed. If they ask about their disease, tell
them only what is best for them to know. Assure them
that they think too much about their ailments, and
have already heard too much on that subject. Turn
their thoughts away from their bodies to higher ob-
jects. Teach them that their being is sustained by
417:1
Spirit, not by matter, and that they find health, peace,
and harmony in God, divine Love.
Helpful encouragement
417:3
Give sick people credit for sometimes knowing more
than their doctors. Always support their trust in the
power of Mind to sustain the body. Never
tell the sick that they have more courage
than strength. Tell them rather, that their strength
is in proportion to their courage. If you make the sick
realize this great truism, there will be no reaction from
over-exertion or from excited conditions. Maintain
the facts of Christian Science, – that Spirit is God, and
therefore cannot be sick; that what is termed matter
cannot be sick; that all causation is Mind, acting
through spiritual law. Then hold your ground with
the unshaken understanding of Truth and Love, and
you will win. When you silence the witness against your
plea, you destroy the evidence, for the disease disap-
pears. The evidence before the corporeal senses is not
the Science of immortal man.
Disease to be made unreal
417:20
To the Christian Science healer, sickness is a dream
from which the patient needs to be awakened. Dis-
ease should not appear real to the physician,
since it is demonstrable that the way to
cure the patient is to make disease unreal to him. To
do this, the physician must understand the unreality
of disease in Science.
417:27
Explain audibly to your patients, as soon as they can
bear it, the complete control which Mind holds over the
body. Show them how mortal mind seems to induce
disease by certain fears and false conclusions, and how
divine Mind can cure by opposite thoughts. Give your
patients an underlying understanding to support them
418:1
and to shield them from the baneful effects of their own
conclusions. Show them that the conquest over sickness,
as well as over sin, depends on mentally destroying all
belief in material pleasure or pain.
Christian pleading
418:5
Stick to the truth of being in contradistinction to the
error that life, substance, or intelligence can be in matter.
Plead with an honest conviction of truth and
a clear perception of the unchanging, unerr-
ing, and certain effect of divine Science. Then, if your
fidelity is half equal to the truth of your plea, you will
heal the sick.
Truthful arguments
418:12
It must be clear to you that sickness is no more
the reality of being than is sin. This mortal dream
of sickness, sin, and death should cease
through Christian Science. Then one dis-
ease would be as readily destroyed as another. What-
ever the belief is, if arguments are used to destroy it,
the belief must be repudiated, and the negation must ex-
tend to the supposed disease and to whatever decides its
type and symptoms. Truth is affirmative, and confers
harmony. All metaphysical logic is inspired by this sim-
ple rule of Truth, which governs all reality. By the
truthful arguments you employ, and especially by the
spirit of Truth and Love which you entertain, you will
heal the sick.
Morality required
418:26
Include moral as well as physical belief in your efforts
to destroy error. Cast out all manner of evil. "Preach
the gospel to every creature." Speak the
truth to every form of error. Tumors, ulcers,
tubercles, inflammation, pain, deformed joints, are wak-
ing dream-shadows, dark images of mortal thought, which
flee before the light of Truth.
419:1
A moral question may hinder the recovery of the sick.
Lurking error, lust, envy, revenge, malice, or hate will
perpetuate or even create the belief in disease. Errors
of all sorts tend in this direction. Your true course is
to destroy the foe, and leave the field to God, Life, Truth,
and Love, remembering that God and His ideas alone
are real and harmonious.
Relapse unnecessary
419:8
If your patient from any cause suffers a relapse, meet
the cause mentally and courageously, knowing that
there can be no reaction in Truth. Neither
disease itself, sin, nor fear has the power to
cause disease or a relapse. Disease has no intelligence
with which to move itself about or to change itself from
one form to another. If disease moves, mind, not mat-
ter, moves it; therefore be sure that you move it off.
Meet every adverse circumstance as its master. Ob-
serve mind instead of body, lest aught unfit for develop-
ment enter thought. Think less of material conditions
and more of spiritual.
Conquer beliefs and fears
419:20
Mind produces all action. If the action proceeds from
Truth, from immortal Mind, there is harmony; but mor-
tal mind is liable to any phase of belief. A
relapse cannot in reality occur in mortals or
so-called mortal minds, for there is but one
Mind, one God. Never fear the mental malpractitioner,
the mental assassin, who, in attempting to rule mankind,
tramples upon the divine Principle of metaphysics, for God
is the only power. To succeed in healing, you must con-
quer your own fears as well as those of your patients, and
rise into higher and holier consciousness.
True government of man
419:31
If it is found necessary to treat against relapse, know
that disease or its symptoms cannot change forms, nor
420:1
go from one part to another, for Truth destroys disease.
There is no metastasis, no stoppage of harmonious
action, no paralysis. Truth not error, Love
not hate, Spirit not matter, governs man. If
students do not readily heal themselves, they should
early call an experienced Christian Scientist to aid
them. If they are unwilling to do this for themselves,
they need only to know that error cannot produce this
unnatural reluctance.
Positive reassurance
420:10
Instruct the sick that they are not helpless victims,
for if they will only accept Truth, they can resist disease
and ward it off, as positively as they can the
temptation to sin. This fact of Christian Sci-
ence should be explained to invalids when they are in a
fit mood to receive it, – when they will not array them-
selves against it, but are ready to become receptive to the
new idea. The fact that Truth overcomes both disease
and sin reassures depressed hope. It imparts a healthy
stimulus to the body, and regulates the system. It in-
creases or diminishes the action, as the case may require,
better than any drug, alterative, or tonic.
Proper stimulus
420:22
Mind is the natural stimulus of the body, but erro-
neous belief, taken at its best, is not promotive of health
or happiness. Tell the sick that they can
meet disease fearlessly, if they only realize
that divine Love gives them all power over every physical
action and condition.
Awaken the patient
420:28
If it becomes necessary to startle mortal mind to break
its dream of suffering, vehemently tell your patient that
he must awake. Turn his gaze from the false
evidence of the senses to the harmonious facts
of Soul and immortal being. Tell him that he suffers
421:1
only as the insane suffer, from false beliefs. The only
difference is, that insanity implies belief in a diseased
brain, while physical ailments (so-called) arise from the
belief that other portions of the body are deranged. De-
rangement, or disarrangement, is a word which conveys
the true definition of all human belief in ill-health, or dis-
turbed harmony. Should you thus startle mortal mind
in order to remove its beliefs, afterwards make known
to the patient your motive for this shock, showing him
that it was to facilitate recovery.
How to treat a crisis
421:11
If a crisis occurs in your treatment, you must treat
the patient less for the disease and more for the mental
disturbance or fermentation, and subdue the
symptoms by removing the belief that this
chemicalization produces pain or disease. Insist vehe-
mently on the great fact which covers the whole ground,
that God, Spirit, is all, and that there is none beside
Him. There is no disease. When the supposed suffer-
ing is gone from mortal mind, there can be no pain; and
when the fear is destroyed, the inflammation will sub-
side. Calm the excitement sometimes induced by chemi-
calization, which is the alterative effect produced by
Truth upon error, and sometimes explain the symptoms
and their cause to the patient.
No perversion of Mind-science
421:25
It is no more Christianly scientific to see disease than
it is to experience it. If you would destroy the sense
of disease, you should not build it up by
wishing to see the forms it assumes or by
employing a single material application for
its relief. The perversion of Mind-science is like as-
serting that the products of eight multiplied by five, and
of seven by ten, are both forty, and that their combined
422:1
sum is fifty, and then calling the process mathematics.
Wiser than his persecutors, Jesus said: "If I by Beelze-
bub cast out devils, by whom do your children cast them
out?"
Effect of this book
422:5
If the reader of this book observes a great stir through-
out his whole system, and certain moral and physical
symptoms seem aggravated, these indications
are favorable. Continue to read, and the book
will become the physician, allaying the tremor which
Truth often brings to error when destroying it.
Disease neutralized
422:11
Patients, unfamiliar with the cause of this commotion
and ignorant that it is a favorable omen, may be alarmed.
If such be the case, explain to them the law
of this action. As when an acid and alkali
meet and bring out a third quality, so mental and moral
chemistry changes the material base of thought, giving
more spirituality to consciousness and causing it to depend
less on material evidence. These changes which go on
in mortal mind serve to reconstruct the body. Thus
Christian Science, by the alchemy of Spirit, destroys sin
and death.
Bone-healing by surgery
422:22
Let us suppose two parallel cases of bone-disease, both
similarly produced and attended by the same symptoms.
A surgeon is employed in one case, and a
Christian Scientist in the other. The sur-
geon, holding that matter forms its own conditions and
renders them fatal at certain points, entertains fears and
doubts as to the ultimate outcome of the injury. Not
holding the reins of government in his own hands, he
believes that something stronger than Mind – namely,
matter – governs the case. His treatment is therefore
tentative. This mental state invites defeat. The belief
423:1
that he has met his master in matter and may not be
able to mend the bone, increases his fear; yet this belief
should not be communicated to the patient, either ver-
bally or otherwise, for this fear greatly diminishes the
tendency towards a favorable result. Remember that the
unexpressed belief oftentimes affects a sensitive patient
more strongly than the expressed thought.
Scientific corrective
423:8
The Christian Scientist, understanding scientifically
that all is Mind, commences with mental causation, the
truth of being, to destroy the error. This cor-
rective is an alterative, reaching to every part
of the human system. According to Scripture, it searches
"the joints and marrow," and it restores the harmony of
man.
Coping with difficulties
423:15
The matter-physician deals with matter as both his foe
and his remedy. He regards the ailment as weakened or
strengthened according to the evidence which
matter presents. The metaphysician, making
Mind his basis of operation irrespective of matter and
regarding the truth and harmony of being as superior to
error and discord, has rendered himself strong, instead
of weak, to cope with the case; and he proportionately
strengthens his patient with the stimulus of courage and
conscious power. Both Science and consciousness are
now at work in the economy of being according to the law
of Mind, which ultimately asserts its absolute supremacy.
Formation from thought
423:27
Ossification or any abnormal condition or derange-
ment of the body is as directly the action of mortal
mind as is dementia or insanity. Bones have
only the substance of thought which forms
them. They are only phenomena of the mind of mor-
tals. The so-called substance of bone is formed first
424:1
by the parent's mind, through self-division. Soon the
child becomes a separate, individualized mortal mind,
which takes possession of itself and its own thoughts of
bones.
Accidents unknown to God
424:5
Accidents are unknown to God, or immortal Mind,
and we must leave the mortal basis of belief
and unite with the one Mind, in order to
change the notion of chance to the proper sense
of God's unerring direction and thus bring out harmony.
Opposing mentality
424:10
Under divine Providence there can be no accidents,
since there is no room for imperfection in perfection.
424:12
In medical practice objections would be raised if one
doctor should administer a drug to counteract the work-
ing of a remedy prescribed by another doctor.
It is equally important in metaphysical prac-
tice that the minds which surround your patient should
not act against your influence by continually expressing
such opinions as may alarm or discourage, – either by
giving antagonistic advice or through unspoken thoughts
resting on your patient. While it is certain that the
divine Mind can remove any obstacle, still you need the
ear of your auditor. It is not more difficult to make your-
self heard mentally while others are thinking about your
patients or conversing with them, if you understand
Christian Science – the oneness and the allness of divine
Love; but it is well to be alone with God and the sick
when treating disease.
Mind removes scrofula
424:28
To prevent or to cure scrofula and other so-called he-
reditary diseases, you must destroy the belief in these ills
and the faith in the possibility of their trans-
mission. The patient may tell you that he
has a humor in the blood, a scrofulous diathesis. His
425:1
parents or some of his progenitors farther back have so
believed. Mortal mind, not matter, induces this con-
clusion and its results. You will have humors, just so
long as you believe them to be safety-valves or to be
ineradicable.
Nothing to consume
425:6
If the case to be mentally treated is consumption, take
up the leading points included (according to belief) in
this disease. Show that it is not inherited;
that inflammation, tubercles, hemorrhage, and
decomposition are beliefs, images of mortal thought su-
perimposed upon the body; that they are not the truth
of man; that they should be treated as error and put out
of thought. Then these ills will disappear.
The lungs re-formed
425:14
If the body is diseased, this is but one of the beliefs of
mortal mind. Mortal man will be less mortal, when he
learns that matter never sustained existence
and can never destroy God, who is man's Life.
When this is understood, mankind will be more spiritual
and know that there is nothing to consume, since Spirit,
God, is All-in-all. What if the belief is consumption?
God is more to a man than his belief, and the less we ac-
knowledge matter or its laws, the more immortality we
possess. Consciousness constructs a better body when
faith in matter has been conquered. Correct material
belief by spiritual understanding, and Spirit will form
you anew. You will never fear again except to offend
God, and you will never believe that heart or any por-
tion of the body can destroy you.
Soundness maintained
425:29
If you have sound and capacious lungs and want
them to remain so, be always ready with the
mental protest against the opposite belief in
heredity. Discard all notions about lungs, tubercles, in-
426:1
herited consumption, or disease arising from any cir-
cumstance, and you will find that mortal mind, when
instructed by Truth, yields to divine power, which steers
the body into health.
Our footsteps heavenward
426:5
The discoverer of Christian Science finds the path less
difficult when she has the high goal always before her
thoughts, than when she counts her footsteps
in endeavoring to reach it. When the desti-
nation is desirable, expectation speeds our progress. The
struggle for Truth makes one strong instead of weak,
resting instead of wearying one. If the belief in death
were obliterated, and the understanding obtained that
there is no death, this would be a "tree of life," known
by its fruits. Man should renew his energies and en-
deavors, and see the folly of hypocrisy, while also learn-
ing the necessity of working out his own salvation. When
it is learned that disease cannot destroy life, and that
mortals are not saved from sin or sickness by death, this
understanding will quicken into newness of life. It will
master either a desire to die or a dread of the grave,
and thus destroy the great fear that besets mortal
existence.
Christian standard
426:23
The relinquishment of all faith in death and also of
the fear of its sting would raise the standard of health
and morals far beyond its present elevation,
and would enable us to hold the banner of
Christianity aloft with unflinching faith in God, in Life
eternal. Sin brought death, and death will disappear
with the disappearance of sin. Man is immortal, and
the body cannot die, because matter has no life to sur-
render. The human concepts named matter, death, dis-
ease, sickness, and sin are all that can be destroyed.
Life not contingent on matter
427:1
If it is true that man lives, this fact can never change
in Science to the opposite belief that man dies. Life is
the law of Soul, even the law of the spirit of
Truth, and Soul is never without its represent-
ative. Man's individual being can no more
die nor disappear in unconsciousness than can Soul, for
both are immortal. If man believes in death now, he
must disbelieve in it when learning that there is no reality
in death, since the truth of being is deathless. The be-
lief that existence is contingent on matter must be met
and mastered by Science, before Life can be understood
and harmony obtained.
Mortality vanquished
427:13
Death is but another phase of the dream that exist-
ence can be material. Nothing can interfere with the
harmony of being nor end the existence of
man in Science. Man is the same after as
before a bone is broken or the body guillotined. If man
is never to overcome death, why do the Scriptures say,
"The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death"? The
tenor of the Word shows that we shall obtain the victory
over death in proportion as we overcome sin. The great
difficulty lies in ignorance of what God is. God, Life,
Truth, and Love make man undying. Immortal Mind,
governing all, must be acknowledged as supreme in the
physical realm, so-called, as well as in the spiritual.
No death nor inaction
427:26
Called to the bed of death, what material remedy has
man when all such remedies have failed? Spirit is his
last resort, but it should have been his first
and only resort. The dream of death must
be mastered by Mind here or hereafter. Thought
will waken from its own material declaration, "I am
dead," to catch this trumpet-word of Truth, "There
428:1
is no death, no inaction, diseased action, overaction, nor
reaction."
Vision opening
428:3
Life is real, and death is the illusion. A demonstra-
tion of the facts of Soul in Jesus' way resolves the dark
visions of material sense into harmony and
immortality. Man's privilege at this supreme
moment is to prove the words of our Master: "If a man
keep my saying, he shall never see death." To divest
thought of false trusts and material evidences in order
that the spiritual facts of being may appear, – this is
the great attainment by means of which we shall sweep
away the false and give place to the true. Thus we may
establish in truth the temple, or body, "whose builder
and maker is God."
Intelligent consecration
428:15
We should consecrate existence, not "to the unknown
God" whom we "ignorantly worship," but to the eternal
builder, the everlasting Father, to the Life
which mortal sense cannot impair nor mortal
belief destroy. We must realize the ability of mental
might to offset human misconceptions and to replace them
with the life which is spiritual, not material.
The present immortality
428:22
The great spiritual fact must be brought out that man
is, not shall be, perfect and immortal. We must hold
forever the consciousness of existence, and
sooner or later, through Christ and Christian
Science, we must master sin and death. The evidence
of man's immortality will become more apparent, as ma-
terial beliefs are given up and the immortal facts of being
are admitted.
Careful guidance
428:30
The author has healed hopeless organic disease, and
raised the dying to life and health through the under-
standing of God as the only Life. It is a sin to believe
429:1
that aught can overpower omnipotent and eternal Life,
and this Life must be brought to light by the understand-
ing that there is no death, as well as by other
graces of Spirit. We must begin, however,
with the more simple demonstrations of control, and
the sooner we begin the better. The final demonstration
takes time for its accomplishment. When walking, we
are guided by the eye. We look before our feet, and if
we are wise, we look beyond a single step in the line of
spiritual advancement.
Clay replying to the potter
429:11
The corpse, deserted by thought, is cold and decays,
but it never suffers. Science declares that man is sub-
ject to Mind. Mortal mind affirms that mind
is subordinate to the body, that the body is
dying, that it must be buried and decomposed
into dust; but mortal mind's affirmation is not true.
Mortals waken from the dream of death with bodies un-
seen by those who think that they bury the body.
Continuity of existence
429:19
If man did not exist before the material organization
began, he could not exist after the body is disintegrated.
If we live after death and are immortal, we
must have lived before birth, for if Life ever
had any beginning, it must also have an ending, even ac-
cording to the calculations of natural science. Do you
believe this? No! Do you understand it? No! This
is why you doubt the statement and do not demonstrate
the facts it involves. We must have faith in all the say-
ings of our Master, though they are not included in the
teachings of the schools, and are not understood gener-
ally by our ethical instructors.
Life all-inclusive
429:31
Jesus said (John viii. 51), "If a man keep my saying,
he shall never see death." That statement is not con-
430:1
fined to spiritual life, but includes all the phenomena of
existence. Jesus demonstrated this, healing the dying
and raising the dead. Mortal mind must part
with error, must put off itself with its deeds,
and immortal manhood, the Christ ideal, will appear.
Faith should enlarge its borders and strengthen its base
by resting upon Spirit instead of matter. When man
gives up his belief in death, he will advance more rapidly
towards God, Life, and Love. Belief in sickness and
death, as certainly as belief in sin, tends to shut out the
true sense of Life and health. When will mankind wake
to this great fact in Science?
430:13
I here present to my readers an allegory illustrative
of the law of divine Mind and of the supposed laws of mat-
ter and hygiene, an allegory in which the plea of Christian
Science heals the sick.
A mental court case
430:17
Suppose a mental case to be on trial, as cases are tried
in court. A man is charged with having committed liver‑
complaint. The patient feels ill, ruminates,
and the trial commences. Personal Sense is
the plaintiff. Mortal Man is the defendant. False Belief
is the attorney for Personal Sense. Mortal Minds, Ma-
teria Medica, Anatomy, Physiology, Hypnotism, Envy,
Greed and Ingratitude, constitute the jury. The court-
room is filled with interested spectators, and Judge
Medicine is on the bench.
The evidence for the prosecution being called for, a
witness testifies thus: –
430:29
I represent Health-laws. I was present on certain nights
when the prisoner, or patient, watched with a sick friend.
Although I have the superintendence of human affairs, I
was personally abused on those occasions. I was told that
431:1
I must remain silent until called for at this trial, when I
would be allowed to testify in the case. Notwithstanding
my rules to the contrary, the prisoner watched with the sick
every night in the week. When the sick mortal was thirsty,
the prisoner gave him drink. During all this time the pris-
oner attended to his daily labors, partaking of food at ir-
regular intervals, sometimes going to sleep immediately
after a heavy meal. At last he committed liver-complaint,
which I considered criminal, inasmuch as this offence is
deemed punishable with death. Therefore I arrested Mor-
tal Man in behalf of the state (namely, the body) and cast
him into prison.
431:13
At the time of the arrest the prisoner summoned Physi-
ology, Materia Medica, and Hypnotism to prevent his pun-
ishment. The struggle on their part was long. Materia
Medica held out the longest, but at length all these assist-
ants resigned to me, Health-laws, and I succeeded in get-
ting Mortal Man into close confinement until I should
release him.
431:20
The next witness is called:-
431:21
I am Coated Tongue. I am covered with a foul fur,
placed on me the night of the liver-attack. Morbid Secre-
tion hypnotized the prisoner and took control of his mind,
making him despondent.
431:25
Another witness takes the stand and testifies:-
431:26
I am Sallow Skin. I have been dry, hot, and chilled by
turns since the night of the liver-attack. I have lost my
healthy hue and become unsightly, although nothing on my
part has occasioned this change. I practise daily ablutions
and perform my functions as usual, but I am robbed of my
good looks.
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