Chapter X - Science Of Being
327:1
Reform comes by understanding that there is no abid-
Reform comes by understanding that there is no abid-
ing pleasure in evil, and also by gaining an affection for
good according to Science, which reveals the immortal
fact that neither pleasure nor pain, appetite nor passion,
can exist in or of matter, while divine Mind can and does
destroy the false beliefs of pleasure, pain, or fear and all
the sinful appetites of the human mind.
Image of the beast
327:8
What a pitiful sight is malice, finding pleasure in re-
What a pitiful sight is malice, finding pleasure in re-
venge! Evil is sometimes a man's highest conception
of right, until his grasp on good grows stronger.
Then he loses pleasure in wickedness, and it
becomes his torment. The way to escape the misery of
sin is to cease sinning. There is no other way. Sin is
the image of the beast to be effaced by the sweat of agony.
It is a moral madness which rushes forth to clamor with
midnight and tempest.
Peremptory demands
327:17
To the physical senses, the strict demands of Christian
To the physical senses, the strict demands of Christian
Science seem peremptory; but mortals are has-
tening to learn that Life is God, good, and that
evil has in reality neither place nor power in the human or
the divine economy.
Moral courage
327:22
Fear of punishment never made man truly honest.
Fear of punishment never made man truly honest.
Moral courage is requisite to meet the wrong and to
proclaim the right. But how shall we re-
form the man who has more animal than
moral courage, and who has not the true idea of good?
Through human consciousness, convince the mortal of
his mistake in seeking material means for gaining hap-
piness. Reason is the most active human faculty. Let
that inform the sentiments and awaken the man's dor-
mant sense of moral obligation, and by degrees he will
learn the nothingness of the pleasures of human sense
328:1
and the grandeur and bliss of a spiritual sense, which
and the grandeur and bliss of a spiritual sense, which
silences the material or corporeal. Then he not only will
be saved, but is saved.
Final destruction of error
328:4
Mortals suppose that they can live without goodness,
Mortals suppose that they can live without goodness,
when God is good and the only real Life. What is the
result? Understanding little about the divine
Principle which saves and heals, mortals get
rid of sin, sickness, and death only in belief. These errors
are not thus really destroyed, and must therefore cling
to mortals until, here or hereafter, they gain the true un-
derstanding of God in the Science which destroys human
delusions about Him and reveals the grand realities of
His allness.
Promise perpetual
328:14
This understanding of man's power, when he is
This understanding of man's power, when he is
equipped by God, has sadly disappeared from Christian
history. For centuries it has been dormant, a
lost element of Christianity. Our missionaries
carry the Bible to India, but can it be said that they
explain it practically, as Jesus did, when hundreds of
persons die there annually from serpent-bites? Under-
standing spiritual law and knowing that there is no mate-
rial law, Jesus said: "These signs shall follow them that
believe, . . . they shall take up serpents, and if they
drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them. They
shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover." It
were well had Christendom believed and obeyed this
sacred saying.
328:28
Jesus' promise is perpetual. Had it been given only
Jesus' promise is perpetual. Had it been given only
to his immediate disciples, the Scriptural passage would
read you, not they. The purpose of his great life-work
extends through time and includes universal humanity.
Its Principle is infinite, reaching beyond the pale of a