There are many species of insanity. All sin is insanity in different degrees. Sin is spared from this classification, only because its method of madness is in consonance with common mortal belief. Every sort of sickness is error,--that is, sickness is loss of harmony. This view is not altered by the fact that sin is worse than sickness, and sickness is not acknowledged nor discovered to be error by many who are sick.
You command the situation if you understand that mortal existence is a state of self-deception and not the truth of being. Mortal mind is constantly producing on mortal body the results of false opinions; and it will continue to do so, until mortal error is deprived of its imaginary powers by Truth, which sweeps away the gossamer web of mortal illusion. The most Christian state is one of rectitude and spiritual understanding, and this is best adapted for healing the sick. Never conjure up some new discovery from dark forebodings regarding disease and then acquaint your patient with it.
The action of so-called mortal mind must be destroyed by the divine Mind to bring out the harmony of being.
Sometimes it is easy to confuse mortal mind and material senses with the physical form, since the erroneous belief says that they are inseparable. But Mary Baker Eddy reminds us:
The body seems to be self-acting, only because mortal mind is ignorant of itself, of its own actions, and of their results,--ignorant that the predisposing, remote, and exciting cause of all bad effects is a law of so-called mortal mind, not of matter.
Have no fear that matter can ache, swell, and be inflamed as the result of a law of any kind, when it is self-evident that matter can have no pain nor inflammation.
A false belief is both the tempter and the tempted, the sin and the sinner, the disease and its cause.
The sick unconsciously argue for suffering, instead of against it. They admit its reality, whereas they should deny it. They should plead in opposition to the testimony of the deceitful senses, and maintain man's immortality and eternal likeness to God.
The admission that any bodily condition is beyond the control of Mind disarms man, prevents him from helping himself, and enthrones matter through error.
We should remember that Life is God, and that God is omnipotent.
This thought of human, material nothingness, which Science inculcates, enrages the carnal mind and is the main cause of the carnal mind's antagonism.
Perfect and infinite Mind enthroned is heaven.
The evil beliefs which originate in mortals are hell.
On my recent trip to the Bible Belt of America, we discussed beliefs of Heaven and Hell. I wasn’t as eloquent as Mary Baker Eddy in the above quote – wish I had been.
The crude creations of mortal thought must finally give place to the glorious forms which we sometimes behold in the camera of divine Mind, when the mental picture is spiritual and eternal. Mortals must look beyond fading, finite forms, if they would gain the true sense of things.
As mortals gain more correct views of God and man, multitudinous objects of creation, which before were invisible, will become visible.
There can be but one creator, who has created all.
Mortal mind is the acknowledged seat of human motives. It forms material concepts and produces every discordant action of the body. If action proceeds from the divine Mind, action is harmonious. If it comes from erring mortal mind, it is discordant and ends in sin, sickness, death. Those two opposite sources never mingle in fount or stream. The perfect
Mind sends forth perfection, for God is Mind. Imperfect mortal mind sends forth its own resemblances, of which the wise man said, "All is vanity."
Question: Is there a list of all mini-treatments like this somewhere on the Internet?
Mortal mind and body are one. Neither exists without the other, and both must be destroyed by immortal Mind.
When the mechanism of the human mind gives place to the divine Mind, selfishness, and sin, disease, and death, will lose their foothold.
This reading explains Christian Science from a historical perspective. Jesus had to eventually explain it:
Christianity … [is] the demonstration of divine Love casting out error and healing the sick, not merely in the name of Christ, or Truth but in demonstration of Truth, as must be the case in the cycles of divine light.
He asked his disciples who or what he was? Simon replied:
Thou are the Christ, the Son of the living God!
His method for healing:
He showed that diseases were cast out neither by corporeality, by materia medica, nor by hygiene, but by the divine Spirit, casting out the errors of mortal mind.
Today’s testimony has a way with words. The first idea is:
I have been able to overcome many errors.
Other testimonies mention health or physical healings but this testimony is more accurate. Then the person had to move away from the East Coast for a change in climate. While he might have been thinking about moisture or cold, in truth, it was a new mental climate he was looking for. Then he read Mary Baker Eddy’s quote regarding food:
neither food nor the stomach, without the consent of mortal mind, can make one suffer
The consent of mortal mind is us, me. We have to consent to error in order for error to be effective. I’ve been watching my thinking very closely to see where it runs away from spirituality. Not pulling it back in is another form of consent.
