Day 264: Genesis iii.1-5

529:13-531:7

The history of error is a dream-narrative. The dream has no reality, no intelligence, no mind; therefore the dreamer and dream are one, for neither is true nor real. First, this narrative supposes that something springs from nothing, that matter precedes mind. Second, it supposes that mind enters matter, and matter becomes living, substantial, and intelligent. The order of this allegory--the belief that everything springs from dust instead of from Deity--has been maintained in all the subsequent forms of belief. This is the error,--that mortal man starts materially, that non-intelligence becomes intelligence, that mind and soul are both right and wrong.

2010

Day 211: Identity & Illusion in Healing

416:16-418:11

The whole reading today grabbed me. My thoughts have been racing toward this all week.

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 material. 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.

To the Christian Science healer, sickness is a dream from which the patient needs to be awakened. Disease 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.

2010

Day 209: To Heal By Argument

412:16-414:14

To prevent disease or to cure it, the power of Truth, of divine Spirit, must break the dream of the material senses. To heal by argument, find the type of the ailment, get its name, and array your mental plea against the physical. Argue at first mentally, not audibly, that the patient has no disease, and conform the argument so as to destroy the evidence of disease. Mentally insist that harmony is the fact, and that sickness is a temporal dream. Realize the presence of health and the fact of harmonious being, until the body corresponds with the normal conditions of health and harmony.

2010

Day 247: Man, Dreams, and Death

491:17-493:8

This reading is so far down the line that I had to go back to page 488 to see that the question was: Do the five corporeal senses constitute man? The very first idea of the reading was Mary Baker Eddy saying it as plain as day:

The belief that matter and mind are one, – that matter is awake at one time and asleep at another, sometimes presenting no appearance of mind, – this belief culminates in another belief, that man dies. Science reveals material man as never the real being. The dream or belief goes on, whether our eyes are closes or open.

Then another formula:

God is Mind, and God is infinite; hence all is Mind.

Or:

[God is Mind] + [God is infinite] = [all is Mind]

And who are we:

Being is [1] holiness, [2] harmony, [3] immortality.

Day 128: Dreams

249:12-251:27

Dreams have always been a topic between my mother and I. Discussing them but not really diving in to their meaning or beyond. I think it was an easy conversation.I've always had very vivid and action-packed dreams. Sleep is important but if I don't dream during the night, I might as well have not slept at all. So these pages have a special meaning to me, namely that I'm giving something power that shouldn't have power.

The first thing I underlined was:

Sleep and apathy are phases of the dream that life, substance, and intelligence are material.

It's interesting that Mary Baker Eddy would equate sleep and apathy. As though being asleep is the same as not caring. There is probably a lot of truth to that statement.

The second thing:

Mortal existence is a dream; mortal existence has no real entity, but saith "It is I." Spirit is the Ego which never dreams, but understands all things; Spirit the one Ego which never errs, and is ever conscious; which never believes, but knows; which is never born and never dies.

This passage was already marked in the book when I got to this page. The page was also dog-eared. Ever conscious and understands all. I'll have to think more on that.

And lastly:

Is there any more reality in the waking dream of mortal existence than in the sleeping dream?

 No, I don't think so. But I think there is some freedom from materiality in dreams that is useful in a spiritual way. It almost as if shedding my waking state allows me to be brave in some areas of my spirituality. I don't know how to be more specific.