Watching Point 262

262 — WATCH lest you believe that, when Mrs. Eddy gave certain instructions to a student to enable him to extricate himself from some specific net of erroneous belief, you need such arguments when you are not caught in that same net. Certain errors and symptoms need specific arguments, when one is using arguments to meet them. Mrs. Eddy tells us that, when using arguments, we must extend them to every phase of the belief.

Once a student was sick with a disease which might be called Roman Catholitis, in the sense that she had made such a reality and bugbear of it, that she lived in constant fear of it, as if it were a group of wicked people who might do her harm.

Mrs. Eddy sent her a letter containing specific arguments calculated to enable her to find her way out of this net of superstitious fear, which took up the belief in detail. She wrote in part, “No Roman Catholic prayer, or prophecy, or anathema, or curse, can dim, deaden, darken or confuse your consciousness, nor blur the Christ image in your thought. There is no God in any prayer of condemnation — no Christ in it — no Truth in it, and, therefore, there is no power in it, and you cannot fear it. There is no power or rule or government or control apart from God. There is no power or belief of power that can hinder you from any right achievement. Remember, your efficiency and capacity are unlimited, and no effort of evil to reverse the words and works of Christian Science can hinder your success. All ability, all achievement, all accomplishment are possible to men because they are man’s. It is the law of man’s being, from which he cannot escape, even if he would — to know all that God, Mind, includes and is.”

It is evident that such arguments were needed by this student, because she was caught in the web of fear regarding Roman Catholicism. But certainly one should not adopt such arguments verbatim, if he has no specific need for them. He should adapt them to his need, since Mrs. Eddy teaches that, in using argument, we must conform it to meet the error, just as one must hit a nail on the head in order to drive it in.