Mortals have a very imperfect sense of the spiritual man and of the infinite range of his thought. To him 27Individual permanencybelongs eternal Life. Never born and never dying, it were impossible for man, under the government of God in eternal Science, to fall from his 30high estate.

    Through spiritual sense you can discern the heart of divinity, and thus begin to comprehend in Science the 259 259:1generic term man. Man is not absorbed in Deity, and God’s man discernedman cannot lose his individuality, for he re-3flects eternal Life; nor is he an isolated, soli-tary idea, for he represents infinite Mind, the sum of all substance.

6    In divine Science, man is the true image of God.

    When man is governed by God, the ever-present Mind who understands all things, man knows that with 27God all things are possible. The only way to this living Truth, which heals the sick, is found in the Science of divine Mind as taught and demonstrated by Christ 30Jesus.

    To reduce inflammation, dissolve a tumor, or cure or-ganic disease, I have found divine Truth more potent than 181 181:1all lower remedies. And why not, since Mind, God, is the source and condition of all existence? Before decid-3The important decisioning that the body, matter, is disordered, one should ask, “Who art thou that repliest to Spirit? Can matter speak for itself, or does 6it hold the issues of life?” Matter, which can neither suffer nor enjoy, has no partnership with pain and pleas-ure, but mortal belief has such a partnership.

Which, then, are we to accept as legitimate and capable of producing 9the highest human good? We cannot obey both physi-ology and Spirit, for one absolutely destroys the other, and one or the other must be supreme in the affections. 12It is impossible to work from two standpoints. If we attempt it, we shall presently “hold to the one, and despise the other.”

15    The hypotheses of mortals are antagonistic to Science and cannot mix with it.

18    Mind’s government of the body must supersede the so-called laws of matter. Obedience to material law pre-No material lawvents full obedience to spiritual law, — the law 21which overcomes material conditions and puts matter under the feet of Mind. Mortals entreat the di-vine Mind to heal the sick, and forthwith shut out the aid 24of Mind by using material means, thus working against themselves and their prayers and denying man’s God-given ability to demonstrate Mind’s sacred power.

30    To admit that sickness is a condition over which God has no control, is to presuppose that omnipotent power is powerless on some occasions. The law of Christ, or 183 183:1Truth, makes all things possible to Spirit; but the so-called laws of matter would render Spirit of no avail, and 3demand obedience to materialistic codes, thus departing from the basis of one God, one lawmaker. To suppose that God constitutes laws of inharmony is a mistake; dis-6cords have no support from nature or divine law, however much is said to the contrary.

    The supposed laws which result in weariness and dis-ease are not His laws, for the legitimate and only possible 18Laws of nature spiritualaction of Truth is the production of harmony.

    Truth casts out all evils and materialistic methods 27with the actual spiritual law, — the law which gives Belief and understandingsight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, voice to the dumb, feet to the lame.

6    Belief produces the results of belief, and the penal-ties it affixes last so long as the belief and are insepara-ble from it. The remedy consists in probing the trouble 9to the bottom, in finding and casting out by denial the error of belief which produces a mortal disorder, never honoring erroneous belief with the title of law nor yield-12ing obedience to it. Truth, Life, and Love are the only legitimate and eternal demands on man, and they are spiritual lawgivers, enforcing obedience through divine 15statutes.

    Controlled by the divine intelligence, man is harmoni-ous and eternal. We say man suffers from the effects of cold, heat, fatigue. This is human belief, not the truth of being, for matter cannot 21suffer. Mortal mind alone suffers, — not because a law of matter has been transgressed, but because a law of this so-called mind has been disobeyed.

    Evil is self-assertive. It says: “I am a real entity, over-18mastering good.” This falsehood should strip evil of all pretensions. The only power of evil is to destroy itself. It can never destroy one iota of good.

If the eyes see no sun for a week, we still believe that there is solar light and heat. Science (in this instance named natural) raises 6the human thought above the cruder theories of the human mind, and casts out a fear.

    The human thought must free itself from self-imposed Spiritual freedommateriality and bondage. It should no longer 18ask of the head, heart, or lungs: What are man’s prospects for life? Mind is not helpless. Intelli-gence is not mute before non-intelligence.

21    By its own volition, not a blade of grass springs up, not a spray buds within the vale, not a leaf unfolds its fair outlines, not a flower starts from its cloistered cell.

The belief that a pulpy substance under the skull is mind is a mockery of intelli-3gence, a mimicry of Mind.

In Science, you can have no power opposed to God, and the physi-21cal senses must give up their false testimony. Your in-fluence for good depends upon the weight you throw into the right scale. The good you do and embody gives you 24the only power obtainable.

Whatever holds human thought in line with unselfed love, receives directly the divine power.

21The devotion of thought to an honest achievement makes the achievement possible. Exceptions only confirm this rule, proving that failure is occasioned by a too feeble 24faith.

    The great truth in the Science of being, that the real man was, is, and ever shall be perfect, is incontrovertible; 18for if man is the image, reflection, of God, he is neither inverted nor subverted, but upright and Godlike.

17:1Enable us to know, — as in heaven, so on earth, — God is 3omnipotent, supreme.