Oneness

As we gain understanding of God, if we are not the same Mind, having the same understanding of individual Being, our being, God is still a theory. What is the difference between theory and reality? A theory is something believed, but not necessarily used or lived. Reality is being what one understands. It is realistic Being.

In Christian Science it means understanding, thus demonstrating I AM individually, instead of merely believing in God. Mrs. Eddy says, “If God were understood instead of being merely believed, this understanding would establish health.” (S&H 203:7)

Much may be accomplished for the Cause of Christian Science, and the world today, by the individual who is knowing, and being the one Mind. Because he understands his being to be the individual appearing or manifesting of God, this individual works effectively, with power. He loses a sense of himself as having a mind separate from God. He feels sure of his work, and he speaks with authority, whether it is a belief of sin, disease, death, or warring nations, he is handling. One does not feel that his work is futile, if the suggestion should come, “What can your thinking do among so many?” He knows better than that, because he is gaining a new meaning of “One with God is a majority.” For he knows his consciousness is God.

What cannot God do? Mrs. Eddy says (Mis. 189:15), “The supposition that Soul, or Mind, is breathed into matter, is a pantheistic doctrine that presents a false sense of existence, and the quickening spirit takes it away: revealing, in place thereof, the power and perfection of a released sense of Life in God and Life as God. The Scriptures declare Life to be the infinite I AM, not a dweller in matter.” She continues, “For man to know Life as it is, namely God, the eternal good, gives him not merely a sense of existence, but an accompanying consciousness of spiritual power that subordinates matter and destroys sin, disease, and death.” And further, “This, Jesus demonstrated; insomuch that St. Matthew wrote, ‘The people were astonished at his doctrine: for he taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes.’ This spiritual power, healing sin and sickness, was not confined to the first century; it extends to all time, inhabits eternity, and demonstrates Life without beginning or end.”

If we know this of ourselves, we know that we are good, because God is the only good. We know we are intelligent, because God is the only intelligence. We are harmonious, because God is the only harmony. We are the very presence of these things. We no longer feel that our demonstration lies in an appeal to a power outside of ourselves, to do this or that; but that we are the very presence of these things, even the presence of something that may seem to be lacking.

A fog can be dispelled only by the clear shining of the sun; that is, it takes the presence of the sun to do so. No more can we disperse an error, but by being the very presence or power called God.

We easily accept the fact that an error in mathematics, or discord in music, can only be dissipated by the presence of the true or concord. So in Christian Science practice we must see clearly, and more clearly, that we are the presence of God, and in this presence there is no sin, disease, death, or inharmony of any kind. What else could Mrs. Eddy have meant in these words, “Felt ye the power of the Word?” (Mis. 398:23)

The world for centuries has been educating man to believe that his life is a life of existence, supply, health, separate from God. And so when he seemed to lack any of these things, he was told to go outside of himself to get them; and he has gone to climate, surgery, money, and position, to find them. He is even taught to find God separate from himself, a good God afar off. But a Christian Scientist is taught there is nothing he desires or hopes for, from the infinitesimal to the infinite, that is not to be found within himself. Not only is he taught this, but that it is the only place these things are to be found, because God is his Mind, and Mind is, and includes, all things.

All of the wonderful statements of the oneness of Being, that we see in Science and Health and the Bible, and the ones that we ourselves unfold, because of our deep conviction that Principle and its idea is one, and this one is God, are of no avail, if we allow ourselves at the same time to feel a sense of depression and insecurity. The oneness of Being can be accomplished in but one way, and this is to BE it, and DO it. Be the perfection of Mind, and body, that is our oneness with God.

We must never think of ourselves as human beings. We are only being human beings, if we are thinking of God and His ideas objectively, or outside of ourselves. On the other hand, when we know ourselves to be divine, and are being and doing these things SUBJECTIVELY, our own divinity appears, no matter what seems to be the occupation for the moment.

We speak of divine consciousness. What does this mean? It could only mean the consciousness of the divine Mind. Therefore, if this oneness with God is a reality, it can only be by our being and doing. This is the living God, omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent. Thus we have seen how Jesus accomplished his wonderful works. His life was a constant subjective experience, that is, conscious knowing of his oneness with God made his experience, whether the need was to heal the sick, raise the dead, feed the five thousand, or produce the money for the taxes, subject to the divinity of his being. It was all within himself, true subjectivity. He did not think of something relative, objective, outside of himself, but he knew that his very being was God; in other words, HE WAS IT AND HE DID IT.

When an error seemingly confronted him, he did not think it was something “out there,” with which he needed to argue, or something he had to change. He healed subjectively within himself, reducing it to nothingness at the door of his own thought. This understanding gives us dominion, for we find that all we have to do, is to take care of our own wheatfield, in our own consciousness.

Healing in a Christian Science treatment is not the result of a wand magically waved by God in our behalf, and a delayed healing is not the result of a devil shaking a stick at us. In Christian Science treatment, a healing is the effect of knowing that the oneness of God and man is the present fact, KNOWING OR BEING IT ON THE PART OF EACH ONE OF US. A delayed healing is nothing but the failing to be, or do, this scientific KNOWING, know God and His idea subjectively, instead of objectively.

Each one’s individuality is God. As Mrs. Eddy says, “He sustains my individuality. Nay, more—He is my individuality and my Life.” (Unity 48:7) God is All and there is none else; therefore the belief in evil cannot keep God from appearing individually. God is Mind, and Mrs. Eddy tells us that He is individual Mind. (Mis. 101:31) When Jesus said, “And I, if I be lifted up will draw all men unto me,” he practically stated this same thought, understanding himself to be the individualized understanding of God, instead of a human being.

If one understands himself to be the individual appearing of Mind, the one I or Ego “goes to the Father,” is found in Mind, and so is lifted up, and also with him is lifted up every idea of which he is conscious. Or, as Jesus said, “I will draw all men unto me.”

One can see why the healing of sin, sickness and death, in Christian Science, is a necessity, because it is a step in the direction of the demonstration of Mind, in which appears the perfection, allness, and goodness of God individually understood and lived. It begins here.

The understanding that the I, or Ego, or consciousness, is God, establishes the same divinity for all the ideas of which it is conscious. Evidently, Jesus never thought of himself as just a man, for he said, “I and my Father are one.” He thought as the Father; he did not think as son about the Father. Neither can we think as man about God, for then the demonstration of the infinitely good God would be an objective experience, something outside of one’s self.

There is nothing factual, actual, but God and man’s existence, true existence. Knowing that God sees, speaks, knows, as man, demonstrates the truth of Mrs. Eddy’s statement, “In Science, Mind is one, including noumenon and phenomena, God and His thoughts.” (S&H 114:10) Another well-known statement in our textbook (210:11) sustains this: “Knowing that Soul and its attributes were forever manifested through man, the Master healed the sick, gave sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, feet to the lame. . .” Have you noted, she says, “Soul and its attributes were forever manifested through man”? She does not say just attributes, but Soul. Thus we find, we cannot separate cause from effect, cause and effect, God and man. Where cause is, there is effect. Where effect is, there is cause. Give up all belief in a life separate from God, or that we are living humans, and human beings.

Again, Mrs. Eddy says (S&H 561:22): “The woman in the Apocalypse symbolizes generic man, the spiritual idea of God; she illustrates the coincidence of God and man as the divine Principle and divine idea.” A study of this text, shows that individual being expresses both Principle and idea, also because the woman symbolizes generic man, the Truth she portrays and illustrates, is the Truth every man, woman, and child represents, because generic is a term signifying one. Now what does she portray? John says, she was clothed with the sun, and Mrs. Eddy says, John symbolizes Spirit by the sun. This means, then, that the consciousness of man is Spirit, and that man and Spirit is one.

We should never think of ourselves just as man, with God afar off, governing us in some take-for-granted way. Jesus never spoke of himself as man, but as one with the Father. WE MUST LEARN TO DO THIS. We must know why we do this. Jesus, by his life and works, presented to the world the Life which is God, but of that very life itself Jesus said, “I am the light of the world: . . .” (John 8:12) We must know that we are that light (intelligence) of the world.

When Jesus said, “I and my Father are one” (John 10:30), he made a statement which is the basis of existence, and which Christian Scientists must understand. Was Jesus thinking of himself as a spiritual man, when he said that? If so, then where was the Father, with whom he said he was one? To say, “Well, I can’t exactly answer that question, but I believe he was one with the Father,” cannot demonstrate that fact for us. We must know what he means. We cannot go on forever just believing.

After all, Christian Science is not just a religion, although it is generally regarded that way. It is also a science, as its title indicates, and that is where the knowing comes in. A science is something we must know. Therefore, we must know actually what Jesus meant when he said, “I and my Father are one.” The reason this is possible for us, is because God is Mind, the ONLY MIND: THEREFORE, OUR MIND. For this reason, there can be revealed to every one of us the Science of such truths. The question is, where and how was he one with the Father? Because God is Mind, the answer is: It is Mind as Mind, or consciousness that man is; that God is our Mind; this is how and where this oneness takes place.

Jesus said to the Pharisees, “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father; . . .” (John 14:10) He also said, “the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works.” At this point we must see clearly that it is not man conscious of God. For if man were conscious of God, he would include God, a logic unthinkable. So we ask ourselves: Then what? Why, of course, it is God; Mind, conscious of its own ideas. This is why Jesus spoke with authority. It is why you and I speak with authority.

The only meekness, the only humility, is acknowledging no power or Mind, but God. Then that oneness of Being must be my being, and it must partake of the nature of God, as well as of man. Thus we are reminded of the statement (S&H 333:23), “Abraham, Jacob, Moses, and the prophets caught glorious glimpses of the Messiah, or Christ, which baptized these seers in the divine nature, the essence of Love.” Such statements illustrate the oneness of Being, that each individual consciousness is the consciousness of GOD AND MAN, PRINCIPLE AND IDEA. This is true reflection. As I reflect upon God, and thereby know that God is, what His nature and character are, what His law and idea are, consciousness finds itself to be the unfoldment of Principle and idea, or God and man, and it is God doing the unfolding.

Again, in S&H (485:14), we find, “Emerge gently from matter into Spirit.” Note the capital “S” for Spirit, and that the emergence is not to spiritual man, but to Spirit. This understanding of the oneness of being, which Mrs. Eddy has revealed in the textbook, shows why and how this work is the key to the Scriptures. This knowledge of the Science of oneness is a key, which unlocks the inspired pages of the Bible and the textbook. The illumination which Mrs. Eddy threw upon the Scriptures reminds us why she chose to write as the first tenet of our faith: “As adherents of Truth . . .” This revelation of God and man as one, is indeed sufficient for all things.

In Genesis, it reads: “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.” In the beginning God created the understanding and consciousness of Principle and idea as one. In another statement, Jesus said: “I am the root and the offspring of David, . . .” (Rev. 22:16) He did not say, “I am the root only,” or “I am the offspring only,” but “I am the root and the offspring of David,” or Principle-and-idea or God-and-man. According to John 1:1, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” And in Genesis, “And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.” In other words, this understanding of ONENESS with God brings light.

From this standpoint of the oneness of God and man, begins the revelation of divine creation and being. Next follows what naturally takes place in the consciousness of the individual. He begins to understand things divinely, instead of humanly, and so a firmament appears, for God said, “Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters,” which Mrs. Eddy interprets thus: “Spiritual understanding, by which human conception, material sense, is separated from Truth, is the firmament. The divine Mind, not matter, creates all identities, and they are forms of Mind, the ideas of Spirit, apparent only as Mind, never as mindless matter, nor the so-called material senses.” (S&H 505:7) This firmament is the understanding that there is only one Mind, and that there is no other intelligence; that all being is divine, which does away with the belief that we are human beings. “Behold, now is the accepted time,” to live this one and only life which is God.

The Christian Science treatment is the conscious realization (utilization) of God’s power by the individual giving the treatment, because Christian Science treatment is the operation of the divine Mind. It is absolutely necessary, therefore, for the individual to know what constitutes the divine. We know the divine Mind, because it is divine, is wholly good. So the first point is, that a treatment by the divine Mind must be good for all concerned. First, establish that divine Mind gives the treatment.

The divine Mind has no personal aggrandizement, no lifting up of self above something, or someone, because it includes within itself all good. Mind knows the perfection of its own ideas, and to Mind there is nothing but perfection. The divine Mind has no false ambitions, no selfish aims, but is, and maintains, the universal harmony for all its ideas. The divine Mind can recognize no evil to be punished or destroyed. The sunshine knows no fog. In like manner, God, good, knows no evil. The divine Mind destroys the belief in evil, by being utterly unconscious of it, not by knowing it, and then making it a reality. As a belief in evil is to be destroyed, the Mind that is the treatment, destroys the belief, by maintaining man and the universe in an eternal law of harmony.

Where is this Mind? Are we talking about this Mind, or is this Mind being us? Are we being the one and only Mind? Mrs. Eddy tells us to, for she says (S&H 216:30): “Give up your material belief of mind in matter, and have but one Mind, even God; for this Mind forms its own likeness.” This is our Mind and our standpoint. I am discussing these things with you, because I sometimes have the question put to me: When and how may I know that this Mind is doing the treating?

Well, we say, “Is there good and evil?” The good to be blessed, and evil to be punished? Is there matter and Spirit? Are there persons, places, and things? All is Mind, knowing its own ideas. Mrs. Eddy uses two terms, which help us to see more clearly what an actual Christian Science treatment is. They are divine Science, and Christian Science. Of course they mean one and the same thing, essentially. Divine Science means the understanding of the divinity of God, man, and the universe, wholly good, spiritually mental, perfect, eternal, infinite, without blemish of any kind, the conscious individual being of this state of perfection. Christian Science is the application of this understanding of Being. (It heals what seems to be a life separate from God, Mind, which involves the belief of evil.)

Let us ask ourselves: What is a Christian Science treatment? Mrs. Eddy was asked to define a Christian Science treatment. “The acknowledgment of present perfection,” was her answer. That which acknowledges perfection could only be in Mind, because Mind knows the perfection of its own Being. The Christian Science treatment is Mind in full operation and power. Anything less than that, is talking about God and His creation. The Christian Science treatment is the conscious operation of Mind, the Mind and power that is God, on the part of the practitioner, otherwise from whence does one have the authority to say to the proud wave, “Thus far and no farther”? Certainly not from man, for there is no such thing as man-intelligence. Intelligence is a quality of divine Mind. “It is the primal and eternal quality of infinite Mind, of the triune Principle,—Life, Truth, and Love,—named God.” (S&H 469:9)

Jesus never thought of speaking of himself as man, even spiritual man. He spoke and thought as the Father, for he understood the oneness of Being. He said, “I and my Father are one.” Looking out from the perfection of God, or Principle and idea, is the Christian Science treatment. Attempting to demonstrate from the outlook of man to God, does not constitute an actual Christian Science treatment.

When Jesus said, “The kingdom of God is within you,” he gave the basis for the Christian Science treatment. So did Paul, when he said, “For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.” And Mrs. Eddy said (S&H 465:17): “Principle and its idea is one, and this one is God, omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent Being, and His reflection is man and the universe.”

When once we begin to unfold this oneness of Being, we see it everywhere in our books. “The Christlike understanding of scientific being and divine healing includes a perfect Principle and idea,—perfect God and perfect man,—as the basis of thought and demonstration.” (S&H 259:11) Please note that Mrs. Eddy says, “as the basis of thought and demonstration.” Then the basis of the work you do, must be the understanding you have of your oneness with Principle, your oneness with God, this one divine Being. A good way to establish your oneness with God, your oneness with Being, in daily life, is to say often to yourself, “What would God do about this?”

Mrs. Eddy says (S&H 370:2): “To be immortal, we must forsake the mortal sense of things, turn from the lie of false belief to Truth, and gather the facts of being from the divine Mind.” We must remember, we are not human beings. The individual mentality is not man, but God, because God is the Mind of man.

The belief that we are mortals, or human beings, is not Christian Science treatment. What authority over sin, sickness, disease, and death would a human being have? None. What authority would what we call spiritual man have, if he believed his thinking was separate from God? None.

As we know what this Mind knows, what is taking place? We find Mind taking place, we find Mind in full operation. We find THAT MIND being ourselves. We find the oneness of Being taking place, Principle and its idea operating as One, not two. And here is the great point of departure, whether we are giving the Christian Science treatment, which is Mind in full operation and expression, consciously understood, or whether the treatment is that of a man, even a spiritual man, thinking about God and the universe. This does not constitute the Christian Science treatment. Man cannot give a treatment, a Christian Science treatment. When we fail to see that God is our Mind, then the thinking we do, is necessarily about that Mind or God, something outside of ourselves. It still suggests old theological theories. The only treatment there is, is Mind in full operation and power. This is the great point of departure, whether or not we have dominion with the moon under our feet, as it is under the feet of the woman clothed with the sun (with the Spirit), as John said.

A Christian Science treatment never endeavors to right something that is wrong. That is not a Christian Science treatment. The consciousness of one’s divine body, based upon the fact that God is the Mind of man, begins to reveal what the universe and man are, and this is a Christian Science treatment. Jesus healed Lazarus, because he knew that he, being one with God, reflected that oneness which made Lazarus one with him in God. “As thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us . . .” Looking out from Mind, he was able to know there was no such thing as a dead man. A dead man was not one with his Mind, which is God. From his divine outlook, Jesus rejected this finity, and said to Lazarus, “Come forth.”

Mrs. Eddy tells in S&H (405:1): “The basic error is mortal mind.” And from this we can prove that we are never dealing with persons, places, or things. We are dealing with supposititious mortal mind, and the erroneous condition which seems to be in error. The practitioner needs to be lifted up, as Jesus said of himself, “And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me.” This, and other sayings of Jesus, such as, “The kingdom of God is within you,” illustrate the need of the practitioner to eliminate the belief of the patient, that he has a mortal mind to see the universe materially. The demonstration takes place in the consciousness of the individual doing the work. How else could he have dominion over one’s own thinking, dominion over the belief that we are human beings, one of many of the earth?

We are not dealing with persons, places, things. We are dealing with consciousness, and because we are dealing with consciousness, we have to begin with ourselves.

Because mortal mind is the basic error, we see clearly that divine Mind is the basic Truth, and being basic, we begin there. The Christian Science treatment is, and always must be, the conscious operation of the divine Mind on the part of the practitioner. He must understand himself to be the functioning of that Mind, which was also in Christ Jesus.

The Mind, knowing its own idea, is WHY WE ARE CONSCIOUS OF OUR OWN EXISTENCE. Mind, knowing the perfection of its own ideas, is a Christian Science treatment, and is why a Christian Science treatment heals. In other words, Mind, conscious of its own perfect self, is a Christian Science treatment. The treatment, or demonstration, takes place in the consciousness of the practitioner, and this is as it should be. Remember the old saying, “Charity begins at home.” When we are called upon to work for others, it is important to understand this. Now we are reminded of a statement in our textbook (S&H 29:1), “Christians must take up arms against error at home and abroad. They must grapple with sin in themselves and in others, and continue this warfare until they have finished their course.” We must have a definite scientific knowledge, if this is to be accomplished. How may I grapple with sin and sickness in someone else? What is my authority, and how is this done? Have I dominion over dishonesty, seemingly manifested by someone else? Can I have dominion over something “out there”? You cannot.

So long as it remains “out there,” separate from here, where I am, there can be no dominion. How can one go from here to there? How can one think from here over there? You cannot. Healing is a subjective experience, what we experience within the divine Mind. There is no objective experience. Beginning “there,” is all there is to the claim or object. Thus we realize, that we must reduce the claim of dishonesty, which seems to be over there, in the thought of someone, to a false belief appearing at the door of our own thought, that we think there is someone to be dishonest. Through this, we have absolute authority. We can refuse to give it reality in our own consciousness. One can know, because to know is a quality of God. There is no quality of anything evil, of which God is conscious. If one knows himself to be divine consciousness, he knows he is not conscious of dishonesty.

Mrs. Eddy says (S&H 20:14): “Jesus bore our infirmities; he knew the error of mortal belief and ‘with his stripes (the rejection of error) we are healed’.” This is true of us also; by our stripes we are healed; by our rejecting of error, claiming to be there; by not imputing their errors to be there, but by taking the error as our own belief. As we destroy it at the door of our own thought, we are enabled to have dominion. We are not handling the patient’s thought; we are handling mortal mind; all evil’s suggestive beliefs.

Persons are not suffering from actual belief. The whole proposition is belief in evil, from there to believing that man is sick, sinning or dying. In Mis. Wr. 332:18, “Where Art Thou?”, Mrs. Eddy says: “A sense of evil is supposed to have spoken, been listened to, and afterwards to have formed an evil sense that blinded the eyes of reason, masked with deformity the glories of revelation, and shamed the face of mortals.

“What was this sense? Error versus Truth: first, a supposition; second, a false belief; third, suffering; fourth, death.” Let us illustrate. Some day a suggestion appears at the door of thought and says, “You have a headache;” this is suggestion. If you do not detect it there, you may say, “I have a headache.” And then it becomes a belief, and if you do not detect it there, you suffer from it. If you detect it at the beginning and say, “I do not have a headache,” it stops at the supposition, and never goes through the other three beliefs. Here is the corrected belief, and scientific knowledge which comes from knowing there is only one Mind, not minds many; not my mind, and your mind, but one Mind. Thus man has the authority and power to destroy the beliefs of evil in himself, and others, because he knows God is his Mind, and because he realizes there is nothing out there being healed; Mind is not conscious of any evil, therefore, could not make evil. A lady, calling upon Mrs. Eddy, complained because her husband, who had a lovely healing, still smoked. Mrs. Eddy said, “My dear, haven’t you been healed of smoking?” If, as Mrs. Eddy says in Pulpit and Press 4:21, ours is “an individual kingdom,” we look out from God, and a kingdom begins to be a kingdom of God, right in the midst of what seems to be what isn’t a kingdom of God. Mrs. Eddy raised up the Christian Science movement. There was one Christian Scientist in the world at that time. Looking out from God, she was able to see that God saw His own kingdom. You can do that, and I can do that, because that really is the perfection of individual being appearing. And what of one who goes for treatment in Christian Science? What should his attitude be? We students who come for the first time, come by faith. But let the student seeking treatment do so scientifically; that is, when going to a practitioner, to know that God is the Mind of man, let him expect the Science of that Mind to operate on his behalf. Let him not think of the practitioner as a good human being, who knows something about God and man, but let him think of the experience as a divine event, which is an actual fact, because God is the Law.

Let us be scientific in all we do. It is much simpler, and the results are satisfactory and lasting. The real and only practice is the practice of divine Mind, realizing the perfection of its own idea, man and the universe. This enables us to see what Jesus meant, when he asked his disciples, “Whom do men say that I, the son of man, am?” He wanted to be understood, not only for his own sake, but for the sake of others. Peter’s answer to that question brought out what he wanted to know, “Thou art the Christ, the son of the living God.” Jesus told Peter, it was the Father who had revealed that to him, and not flesh and blood. In this understanding was the conscious realization of Principle and idea, or God and man, demonstrated. Jesus went on to tell Peter that, “Upon this rock, I will build my church.” Upon this understanding of Principle and idea, or God and man, this oneness of being (not two-ness), is the Science of existence based, and the very worst beliefs in people shall not overcome it. As you read Mrs. Eddy’s works, search for statements of oneness of being.

“As a divine student he unfolded God to man, illustrating and demonstrating Life and Truth in himself and by his power over the sick and sinning.” (S&H 117:16) In unfolding God to man, he illustrated Life and Truth in himself (note that Life and Truth are capitalized, which means God), and he demonstrated God within himself. IT TAKES GOD TO UNFOLD GOD TO MAN. Any attempt to do it otherwise, would be a misapprehension of the Science of living. In all things we must begin with God to find the correct solution. Note the two conditions: illustrating, and demonstrating. Because Jesus illustrated Life and Truth in himself, he was the form by which we could see it; and because he demonstrated Life and Truth in himself, he showed it to us by his work, thus proving his power over the sick and sinning. Because Jesus was the “wayshower,” that indicates his way must be our way. Hence, we need to understand scientific being; for all of us, some time, must be able to do the work of the Master and Mrs. Eddy.

We must be “Be-ers” and “Do-ers.” What are we to do about the traditions and difficulties of the world today? Are we just so many others, waiting for something to happen, or are we feeling and being the power of the one Mind, knowing its presence, our presence, dispelling erroneous beliefs, and not waiting for, but being that something needed to heal. Mrs. Eddy says (Ret. 86:4): “There is but one way of doing good, and that is to do it! There is but one way of being good, and that is to be good!” Unless the individual is a be-er and do-er of the Science he knows, it is of little avail. To know ourselves divinely, is a necessity. We are not human beings at all, and never have been.

If we accept, right now, the fact that there is nothing “out there” with which to contend, that we are only dealing with belief of supposititious mind, wouldn’t we be overjoyed, and relieved, to know there is no sick man to be well, no sinning man to be made good, nothing to be diminished or erased; just mortal mind to be eliminated, and that at the door of our thought? Well, that is true, and it never will be more true than it is now. We must awake from the belief that we are dealing with persons, places, or things, and that there is a claim of mortal thinking. We have to demonstrate over it, because God is our Mind.

Understanding this way of working, knowing it is not person, place, or thing, it is important to the demonstration to be made by every individual, in regard to the Church. What is Church? And what are we being and doing with regard to the Church? How are we working for the movement, in the midst of these seeming difficult conditions? Are we just joining, as the saying goes, or are we scientific Be-ers and Do-ers? Let no one believe that wars and depressions, and such things as follow in their wake, will not claim their toll within our movement. They certainly will. The Church, seen humanly, will suffer. Seeing Church divinely, preserves it. “Upon this rock . . .” We have to go back to the record in the Bible of the crucifixion, to see how the disciples handled that error. They slept. Had they not slept, but kept knowing that Christ, Truth, God, was not crucified, might not history have been different?

We have evidence already, that in the countries in which fascism, communism, Nazi-ism, socialism, are operating, the activities of the movement are feeling the attack on the individual freedom, going on in Europe, in this fantastical way. When you are critical of your Church, feel inclined not to share in its maintenance, go to the services, what is taking place? Is it your concept of Church? Are you really thinking of Mrs. Eddy’s demonstration for the evangelization of the world? Are you coming under the belief of world disturbance? Are you tempted to do these things through seeming world effects? Shall we sleep as did the disciples, or shall we stay awake, and see the nothingness of evil, and the allness of God? There is only one way for anything to happen along this line of endeavor, and that is, for the individual to do something about it. Then the Church will be saved, not only in Boston, but in the whole world, and the second half of the definition will be gloriously proved; “that institution, which affords proof of its utility . . .” (S&H 583:14)

War-waging between good and evil, that is, between suppositional forces of evil and the forces of good, must be understood. For centuries the world has pictured to us the result of war-waging between good and evil, as if evil was real. As a result, eventually, one side claims itself victorious, and the other realizes itself defeated, with all the resentment and injustices that go with it, until eventually it springs up again. It is not possible to shoot, kill, or blow up aggression, greed, dishonesty, human will. These and other things, which are the basis of war, are not exterminated in this way. No one believes that any more. The way these beliefs can be exterminated, is by scientific consciousness, that “Principle and its idea is one, and this one is God, . . .” (S&H 465:17)

Omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent Being leaves no power, no science, no presence, other than God. The prayer for England must be a prayer for Germany, but if we want those things to cease, they will only be stamped out by persistent and constant knowing that there is no evil in God, and therefore none in His idea, man. The only way to end war among nations, is to see as unreal the desires of the aggressors, and destroy the things which seem to create war, such as selfishness, greed, dishonesty, aggression, hatred. Whether they be expressed by Germans, the English, Italians, Americans, or any other nationality, God never gave such mental characteristics to His idea.

When we realize that man has no other Mind than God, we see that the individual mentality is God. Now this proves that the errors of the aggressors are unreal. It is impossible to make Nazi-ism, communism, socialism, out of individual being, for individual Being is God. In other words, these -isms and -ologies can’t be. There is no one to be there and make them active.

The wisdom of Mrs. Eddy in insisting that physical healing be the proof of God and man, is more and more apparent to the understanding of Christian Scientists, for in order to learn and understand how to do this, he finds he must carry this same reasoning into world affairs. As an illustration, let us say a practitioner is asked to heal someone. He begins with the basic truth, that it isn’t true and he hasn’t got it, because of his oneness with God. The world today presents a picture of being very ill with totalitarian belief. The same belief, which applies to physical ills, must apply to world conditions.

One can no more credit the German nation, or any other nation, with aggression, cruelty, greed, than one could credit an individual with disease and wrong characteristics, and then expect to heal them. No matter what human footsteps we may seem to have to take, our mental stand must be ever the same. The error is not true, because God did not make it, and God made all.

Mr. Kimball said, the treatment error is afraid of is not the hammer and tongs, but the one that makes nothing of it, not enough to hammer. I am afraid of the destruction of myself by the one who knows I am nothing. There is the story of Mr. Kimball, driving to a lecture; the horses became frightened and ran away. As soon as he saw what was happening, he said, “They can’t do it,” and they stopped running. Of course, the denial, “They can’t do it,” was based upon his understanding of the goodness and oneness of God and His idea. He did not credit the horses with willfulness, or fright. In like manner we should not credit man with injustice, greed, aggression, cruelty, duplicity, etc. Persistence and consistent work of this kind will accomplish something. Let no one think, this means condoning error. But it does mean the scientific way, which sees the nothingness of evil, no matter what we have to do, because we know the allness of God and His idea.

In Revelation, where John describes the city foursquare, he says, “There shall be no night there, neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain.” What is this “there,” where there shall be no night? Is it a locality, here or distant? We have been told in Christian Science, that the place where there shall be no night, is in individual consciousness, through understanding the oneness of God and man. Here is that individual consciousness, where is no evil, war or darkness; none in God, nor in the idea which expresses Him. We cannot wait, hope, and pray for it to take place anywhere else; just here, where we are thinking. In every deed, we are the temple of the living God, for temple is where we dwell, and we know consciousness is our dwelling place. This is equivalent to saying our consciousness is the living God. Then in order for God to be made manifest, this is the way, the place where it is to occur. Here in this God-consciousness, there shall be no night, no belief in evil, sin, sickness, death, sorrow, poverty, dissension, hatred, jealousy, war, or the etceteras of mortal belief. The gates of this city, divine consciousness, are never shut, and nothing enters it which “defileth or maketh a lie,” and the nations of them that are saved, shall walk in the light of it, and the kings of the earth do bring their glory and honor into it. You, each one of you, is this city, and this is our work. Then shall come to pass, as stated in the book of Revelation, the end of all error. There was found on the back of an ancient measuring instrument this inscription: “Jesus saith, ‘Let not him who seeks, cease until he find, and when he finds, he shall be astonished. Astonished, he shall reach the kingdom; he shall find rest.’ (Logio from Osyrinchus.) The kingdom of heaven is within you, and whosoever shall know himself shall find it. Strive, therefore, to know yourself, and ye shall know that ye are the sons of the Father, and that ye are in the city of God and ye are the city.” Body. Treatment, as we have unfolded it, has brought out, that the operation of divine Mind constitutes the Christian Science treatment. That which is revealed by the divine Mind, constitutes the divine man. Principle. “All is infinite Mind and its infinite manifestation” (S&H 468:10), is a statement of divine Mind and body. (That which is revealed by the divine Mind, constitutes the divine body.) The first chapter of Genesis is the unfoldment of divine body, because it reveals the universe and man as the expression of God. We, man, know the divine Mind and divine body constitute individual being. EACH ONE OF US IS MIND AND BODY. We know this is true, first, because God manifests Himself. In the study of our textbook, and Mrs. Eddy’s other writings, we find that body, consciousness, man, universe, are all synonymous terms. In developing and demonstrating the idea body, this is necessary to know, for it makes clear that body is the idea of God, and is one with Him, for consciousness, man, universe, are one with God, His idea, the expression of Himself.

It seems in demonstrating divine body, of which Mrs. Eddy speaks in the chapter on the Apocalypse, as follows (S&H 559:23): “When you approach nearer and nearer to this divine Principle, when you eat the divine body of this Principle,—thus partaking of the nature, or primal elements, of Truth and Love,—do not be surprised nor discontented because you must share the hemlock cup and eat the bitter herbs; for the Israelites of old at the Paschal meal thus prefigured this perilous passage out of bondage into the El Dorado of faith and hope.” The student often goes from one extreme to the other.

First, he may believe he has a material body which he must deny, and yet at the same time accept the fact of divine body, as something invisible, spiritual, abstract. When these two extremes fail to accomplish the demonstration of a healthy, whole body, he finds he must seek further for the understanding of it, and then he finds that body is consciousness, and not more harmonious than his consciousness. Besides this, it is necessary to see that man has not got a body; he is the body of God. The difficulty of demonstration of divine body seems to be what to do with what seems to be the finite sense of body, and yet there is the record Jesus left us. After the crucifixion he ate, saw, talked and walked with his disciples, with the same body that seemed to have been crucified on Calvary. If that was the same body, the crucifixion would have destroyed it; but there it was, functioning as before. What are we to understand about this? It shows conclusively that body is entirely mental, and the more divinely mental we understand ourselves to be, the more harmonious and indestructible is the body. It proves that at no time do we lose anything, but gain the true sense of that which we already are, by knowing better the divinity of our own being. What we call our body, is not confined to just what seems to identify us, but is actually comprised of everything of which we are conscious. This is the infinite body of God. The world, and all that constitutes the world, is the body. Hence the need to see things as they are: the ideas of God. This is generic man, not something outside of ourselves, but the capacity within each one of us to understand THE UNIVERSALITY OF BEING. When we speak of generic man, we do not mean many men, for oneness of being applies to generic man, as well as individual man. The more we understand generic man, that is, the more we understand the universality of being, the more generic man appears. God being One, His idea is one; that is, there is divine man, one body, one flower, etc. Here I think the word “universality” is helpful. It means to TURN INTO ONE. This is, all things seen as expressing one. This keeps your understanding of generic man from seeming plural. When we look out from Mind, we do not see many men, we see the one idea, man, infinitely expressed, individually expressed. Oneness is the basis of generic man, the same as it is of individual man. Mrs. Eddy says, “The allness of Deity is His oneness. Generically man is one, and specifically man means all men.” (S&H 267:5)

Here is a statement from our textbook (502:24), in which Mrs. Eddy interprets Genesis 1: “This word beginning is employed to signify the only, — that is, the eternal verity and unity of God and man, including the universe.” Webster gives this definition of the word “only” as one, and “O” and “ly” from the word meaning body; so as Mrs. Eddy says, “the unity of God and man.” God expressed is man, and man is therefore the body of God. Man has not got a body; he is body. Our understanding of the oneness of being will never allow us to think of ourselves just as a body, animated by God afar off, but this oneness of being teaches us that we are expressions both of Principle and idea, or God and man.

Understanding that God is our Mind, begins to bring into view the divine body, because it takes God or Mind to know body; man could not reveal it. Intelligence is not a quality of man; it is a quality of divine Mind. As Mrs. Eddy says (S&H 469:9): “It is the primal and eternal quality of infinite Mind, of the triune Principle—Life, Truth, and Love,—named God.” In the demonstration of divine body is the exemption from all evil, because it takes divine Mind to accomplish it, and thus we have perfect cause and perfect effect.

A student called upon a great philosopher of olden times to question him, concerning what he was. He took the young man to the window, and told him to look out, saying, “That is you.” Thus we begin to exchange the limited sense of body, for the unlimited one of infinity, and find, as Mrs. Eddy says (S&H 476:17): “Mortality is finally swallowed up in immortality.” This understanding of body perfects the functions of the body, both in substance and capacity. Mrs. Eddy says (S&H 258:13): “God expresses in man the infinite idea forever developing itself, broadening and rising higher and higher from a boundless basis.” But GOD DOES THE EXPRESSING, not man. Because it is in this way only that the correct body, the idea of body, is gained. It must be this way, for this is the way of immortality. The words expression, manifestation, and reflection, are words meaning body, and are synonymous because they bring out the ideas of God.

Reflection is one word often misunderstood. Mrs. Eddy says (S&H 301:5): “Few persons comprehend what Christian Science means by the word reflection.” A good expression of this word is to say, THE REFLECTION OF GOD IS THE CONSCIOUSNESS THAT GOD IS ALL. It is the consciousness that God is my Mind, the consciousness that I and my Father are one. This takes away the sense of twoness, which often accompanies the effort to understand reflection, and it is the reason we do not comprehend what the word means. We cannot gain a correct sense of reflection from a dual standpoint. It absolutely requires an understanding of the ONENESS of Being to comprehend what is meant by reflection.

Because God is the Mind of man, reflection is what that Mind knows about His idea: man and the universe. Putting that into practice, means to BE IT; individually. We look out from Mind, and know and see that Mind, GOD, DOES THE REFLECTING, not man. Reflecting in this way, means the activity of Mind, the “I,” reflecting upon man. Thought dwells upon, or expresses, an idea. This is why the activity of thought is God, even though we see Him as man.

What about the functions of our body, called eyes, ears, etc.? In the Glossary we learn that ears are spiritual understanding, eyes spiritual discernment (S&H 585, 586). In Psalm 94:9, we read: “He that planted the ear, shall he not hear? He that formed the eye, shall he not see?” From these statements, we know that God is the hearer and see-er, and not man separate from God. GOD SEES HIS MAN, AND GOD HEARS HIS MAN, and this gives the true concept of function. If this is true of ears and eyes, what shall we say of the circulation, etc.? Are these material?

Remember, Jesus both walked and talked with his disciples after the crucifixion. Those functions of his body operated as before. Could they have been material? And if they were, would they not have been destroyed during Jesus’ experience on Calvary? Could there be two eyesights, two ears, two digestions; one spiritual and the other material? Could there be such a thing? No, there could not, for all is infinite Mind and its infinite manifestation. Therefore, the only functions there are, are the manifestations of Mind. Then, when something seems to be wrong with eyesight, for instance, we do not have to get rid of anything, only gain a spiritual understanding of eyesight, or lose a material concept of that which is originally and eternally the function of Mind.

We say that the true body appears, only as we understand Mind, or God, as its source. Reasoning thus, we gain a correct understanding of what reflection is. THE CONSCIOUSNESS THAT GOD DOES THE REFLECTING. A statement in S&H verifies this (223:3): “Sooner or later we shall learn that the fetters of man’s finite capacity are forged by the illusion that he lives in body instead of in Soul, in matter instead of Spirit.” What a great and inspiring work is ours. No matter what it is, or where we are, there is always the opportunity and necessity of revealing “the form divinely fair,” as one of our hymns says.

What of your universe? What constitutes your home, your church, your business? Are these things outside of your consciousness? Outside of your individual environment of good? These, too, are to be understood and demonstrated as body, as they are part of body or consciousness. We do not have to put up with just any kind of church, any kind of home, or any kind of business, thinking they are something outside of ourselves, over which we have no control, for that is not scientific. We have only to turn back the record left us by Jesus, to see that while he seemingly lived in a hard and troubled age, still his universe expressed God. Because his Mind was God, he knew wherever he went, the forms of perfection appeared. He knew the Science of existence, that he and the Father were one. The record Mrs. Eddy left us is like that, too, but her record goes farther.

Both Jesus and Mrs. Eddy recorded for us the embodiment of their own understanding of their oneness with God: Jesus in the healing of sin, disease, and death; Mrs. Eddy also healing body, gave us the form of the Christian Science Movement. What are we bringing out individually of the form divinely fair? What of our body, universe, church, home, business? Each one is responsible for the appearing of his own existence, the oneness of Principle and idea. This is, as we have been taught, the underlying reality of our own, and each one’s existence.

Principle and idea is one, and His reflection is man and the universe; man and the universe then, is the embodiment of Principle and idea. This is comparable to saying, that Mind and thought comprise the whole of Being, expressed as man and the universe. All this relates to body, in fact is body, the appearing of the embodiment of God’s idea, based on the knowing that GOD IS YOUR MIND.

Science teaches us that there is only one Mind, Spirit, Soul, Principle, Life, Truth, Love, or God, and therefore this Supreme Being, interpreted by these seven synonyms, is the being of man. We may see that God, being the Mind of man, this Mind forms its own likeness or body, its own expression. “Give up your material belief of mind in matter, and have but one Mind, even God; for this Mind forms its own likeness.” (S&H 216:30)

I suppose that most of us have read this statement and accepted it, as seeming to go outside of ourselves, but the time comes, when every individual must experience this as his own divine Being. The woman of the Apocalypse, clothed with Spirit, is depicted as giving birth to a child, which indicates that this oneness of God, understood, brings out its own embodiment. This symbolism must be understood, else it becomes just a story in the Bible.

Just as Jesus iterated and reiterated his oneness with the Father, thus giving him the power to go out and do his great healing work, so the right interpretation of woman clothed with the Spirit, has given us the same power. To make it simpler, we are told to know that as we accept God as our Mind, with it comes the power of Mind to produce its own ideas, in accordance with its own understanding of goodness and immortality. More and more must the form divinely fair appear.

All Mrs. Eddy’s books have on the cover the cross, crown, and circle. We know she did all these things with deep thought. This circle represents the city four-square, the sacred city, described in Revelation as one that lieth four-square. In this way, the square is as perfect as the circle, the perfect individual.

Our book clears this point, by showing us that the city four-square is a symbol of divine consciousness, and is expressed by this seal on our books. The demonstration of this divine consciousness casts out demons and brings out the divine body, or embodiment of God. This is the new heaven and earth of which John speaks. Working with this understanding in individual experience, as each individual understands his consciousness to be God, he casts out demons, which is the cross, and by this understanding does the divine embodiment of God’s idea appear, in new and radiant form divinely spiritual; and this is the crown.

Every minute of every day it is possible to see the embodiment of God appearing. On page 51 of S&H, Mrs. Eddy says: “Jesus could have withdrawn himself from his enemies. He had power to lay down a human sense of life,” that is, he allowed men to attempt the destruction of the mortal body, which is equivalent to saying, it could not be destroyed. He proved that they could not destroy his body. He showed it to them after his crucifixion on Calvary, functioning as before. The only body there is, expresses the only Soul there is, therefore, it must be as indestructible as God is, as perfect and completely good. Mrs. Eddy says (S&H 400:12): “Eradicate the image of disease from the perturbed thought before it has taken tangible shape in conscious thought, alias the body, and you prevent the development of disease.”

CONSCIOUS THOUGHT, BEING THE BODY, the body is that of which we are conscious. In order to have a healthy, harmonious body, we must understand our infinite body in a scientific way. To be conscious of war as actual, is unhealthy. To believe we have enemies is unhealthy. Injustice is unhealthy, and it is not to be tolerated, because such things mean an unhealthy body. We are not dealing with persons, places, or things, and it is necessary to rid ourselves of this belief.

ATONEMENT. While the atonement has to do with man’s relation to God, yet we can see, by the division of the word, Mrs. Eddy meant us to understand this relationship of God and man to be, not two, but onement. This is the underlying teaching of Christian Science, and is shown by the following fact. The first chapter of S&H is “Prayer.” Prayer is the subject that appeals to all persons. Mrs. Eddy showed wisdom in introducing her Science through this inexhaustible avenue. The second chapter is “Atonement and Eucharist,” and in the first six lines she gives us a statement of Science in her book. S&H 18:1: “Atonement is the exemplification of man’s unity with God, whereby man reflects divine Truth, Life, and Love. Jesus of Nazareth taught and demonstrated man’s oneness with the Father, and for this we owe him endless homage. His mission was both individual and collective.”

The atonement is an exact science. Therefore, to be understood, it must be demonstrated, and that means individually. It becomes clearer and clearer to every student, that he must progressively gain a better understanding of what atonement is, and individually prove it. The atonement teaches us the Science of our oneness with God, and because it is Science, we must demonstrate it in our daily lives, by overcoming sin, sickness and death, and over all suggestions which would claim an existence apart from God. Jesus did not say, “My Father and I are two,” but ONE. In speaking of this oneness with God, Jesus could not have meant twoness; otherwise he would have said, “I and my Father are two.” He was impressing thought with the fact that there was only one Being, not two. God being God-being and man-being.

God manifested, is what man means, his oneness with God. This verified in S&H, page 114:10: “In Science, Mind is one, including noumenon and phenomena, God and His thoughts.” God is within and without all things. Mrs. Eddy used to put the following in the front of S&H:

“I, I, I, I itself, I, The inside and outside, the what and the why, The when and the where, the low and the high. All I, I, I, I itself, I.”

The I itself expresses the idea of oneness. We know that I, or Ego, is God, as Mrs. Eddy says in S&H (588:9): “I, or EGO. Divine Principle; Spirit; Soul; incorporeal, unerring, immortal, and eternal Mind. There is but one I, or US, but one divine Principle, or Mind, governing all existence; man and woman unchanged forever in their individual characters, even as numbers which never blend with each other, though they are governed by one Principle.” That is the I, or Ego, we are. This definition, then, demands that we see the individual mentality as God, rather than man. We are not human beings, endeavoring to demonstrate God. Actually, that is an impossibility. God alone can know Himself, understand Himself, touch Himself. Why? BECAUSE GOD IS ALL. We are endeavoring to understand this Science, not for aggrandizement, but because the world’s problems require it. It takes the allness of God to handle world problems. Human beings cannot accomplish them, for there are no human beings. WE ARE NOT HUMAN, BUT DIVINE. “As thou Father art in me and I in Thee, that they may be one in us.” This is the authority, that says to the proud wave, “Thus far and no farther.” There is not, as old theology teaches us, a good God afar off, and a good or sinning man trying to find Him. In the beginning we use it, Christian Science, as a tool, but as we progress, we see that more is required of us. Today we are deific Science, a knowing Science, and we are beginning to understand existence. The only reason existence seems to be chaotic, is because we do not understand it aright. The Book of John is conceded to be the book of great spiritual meaning, especially the thirteenth to seventeenth chapters, which are devoted to one subject: THE LAST SUPPER. These chapters are of great importance to the students of Christian Science.

It is recorded by John, that Jesus was teaching his disciples, by example and statement, the Science of God and man. It impresses you with the import of one outstanding idea: the oneness of God and man. He did not speak to his disciples from the standpoint of spiritual man, but from the standpoint of Principle and idea, God and man.

“In my Father’s house are many mansions.” “I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman,” etc. The seventeenth chapter seems to be the climax of his teaching of the Oneness of being. (Vine and husbandman: fruition; Father’s house and mansions: oneness.)

He thought of himself always as one with the Father, and so he spoke. The basis of Being is not just Principle, but Principle and idea. The appeal of Jesus on the cross was not made to God alone, but to himself. In the ceremony of washing the disciples’ feet, he said, “If I wash them not, thou hast no part in me.” He washed away the belief that they were human beings. We must do this with our friends. In answer to Philip’s inquiry, “Show me the Father,” he replied, “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father.” The Father expressed as me, is what he meant. The oneness of Being leaves nothing outside of itself.

Parable of the vine and the branches. The Life of the idea is Principle.

As spiritual man alone, we could not find God, for in the consciousness that we are just man, we would be looking for God outside of ourselves. “That they all may be one, as Thou, Father, art in me, and I in Thee.” In that verse, if we leave out “in” (See Glossary, page 588:22), it becomes, “That they may be one, as Thou, Father, art me and I Thee.”

My family, church, friends, business, must be one in me and harmonious, because I know that I am one with God, and that understanding will lead the world to believe that, “Thou hast sent me.”

There is only one kingdom, not three, and that one is the kingdom of God within you, and you are looking out from God, who could not see a kingdom unlike Himself.

SUBJECTIVE-OBJECTIVE. Jesus gave us the Christian era. Mrs. Eddy gave us the Science of Christianity, or the Science era. Jesus walked on the water; Peter sank. Water was subjective to Jesus, but objective to Peter. Lazarus’ dying was objective to his sisters, but subjective to Jesus, who saw only Life. Lazarus seemed to have died to the consciousness of his household. To the consciousness of Jesus, he lived and never died. That which is objective to mortal mind, is really also subjective to mortal mind, because it must appear first in mortal thought, before it is manifested outside of that thought.