The Secret of the Power of Christian Science
By G. D. Ballou
There exists in every normal mind a desire to know the hidden things of life. Curiosity concerning mystical, occult things is a prevailing trait in almost every character. All will not admit this by word of mouth, but they are almost sure to confess it by actions when occasion presents the opportunity. The Creator provided for the full exercise of this feature of the human mind in the works of his hands. From the tiniest atom to the giant suns and worlds, all creation is veiled in impenetrable mystery. “There is an infinite field of inquiry in every individual part of creation and in every component element of each part. The microscope opens the door just far enough into the infinite minutiae to set the searcher wondering, and wakens hungry cravings for a knowledge of what is hidden within. And the telescope enlarges the outside5view of our surroundings until we are utterly lost in astonishment at the overwhelming floods of thought that sweep in upon us like the resistless waves of an infinite ocean. Infinity bounds us on every side, and within the confines of this infinity are boundless fields for human research.” Just to notice two very practical items in this field, suppose you study for thirty days the question of how the Creator can take sun energy, air, water, and earth, and with them produce plant life, grains, fruits, and vegetables, besides all the poisonous herbs; and all growing side by side. How are the different flavors of the fruits and grains developed by the same natural processes? How can our Creator develop and perfect the apricot, plum, prune, and nectarine from the same peach root?—a fact of immense commercial value to the nurseryman. The writer has seen, and so have others, these fruits all budded in and growing on the same tree. Study these items in nature for thirty days, and then take another thirty-day course studying how the same Creator takes these food substances and transforms them into flesh and blood, and tell, if you can, the secrets of that power that changes wheat and fruits and vegetables into this wonderful human mechanism. When you have this matter all cleared up satisfactorily, then inquire, How does God produce feelings, emotions, and thoughts from these food substances? and how does he use water to aid in keeping both body and mind in perfect running order? These and kindred topics are sufficient to keep mankind busy for a lifetime here and for an eternal lifetime hereafter. It is love for the study of God and his works that constitutes the spiritual element in us. This spiritual nature was given man to lead him out into the study of these things, that through them he might be brought to a knowledge of the eternal power and divine nature of the Creator. See Rom. 1:20. Men must study these lines of infinite thought if they would be kept from false systems of religion which are based on a false appeal to this same spiritual nature. But the world has forgotten God and his work to such an extent that a special call is made in the judgment hour for men to “worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of water.” Rev. 14:6, 7. In this time of the judgment the world is gone mad after artificial mysteries. Fiction, mysticism, occultism, hypnotism, everything strange and wonderful, except the deep things of God, is being exploited to catch those souls that are in a sense spiritually hungry. If men were busy studying the infinite things of God, they would have no appetite for the artificial things. Take the student who is delving into the study of electricity: he has no taste for novel reading, and very little use for the juggler and the faker. The human mysticisms do not attract him. Systems of religion that are built on an appeal to the marvelous and mystical become attractive because men and women have forgotten the things of God. Occultism and mysticism have no need of compulsion, they furnish the most attractive elements in any new system because they have in them a perversion of the true appeal to man’s spiritual nature. They constitute a force in themselves, and to one who knows little or nothing of the study of the infinite works of God their appeal is almost irresistible. It does not matter how vague and uncertain or how far from the facts of everyday experience any new creed may be; if it is strange, mystifying, and marvelous, it takes men’s minds away from their former adverse moods. The doubt and fear and remorse being removed, there is a wonderful field opened to confidence; and when this element prevails, rest and peace are sure to follow. It does not matter what is the basis of the confidence, the mind is liberated, at least temporarily. The adverse moods sap the vital energies, really use up nerve force, so that the bodily functions are interfered with and diseases result. Sometimes the shock of the agony of disappointment prostrates the individual to death’s door. Remove the sorrow, restore the confidence, and the symptoms will promptly disappear. A long list of diseases due to mental causes are eradicated when the mind comes to a state of rest. A very large proportion of human ailments in the ultimate analysis may be traced to mental causes. Worry and anxiety put a tension on the nervous system which restrains the breathing, lessens the appetite for food and water, robs the subject of sleep, and thus interferes with every function of nutrition, depuration, and circulation. Agony of mind affects the heart action directly. These are just hints that lead to a host of facts about which we know little or nothing. The cause of the worry may have been imaginary, but the diseases resulting are just as real as those due to physical causes. Anything which will remove the worry and anxiety will restore the health, if the damage is not too serious. We set out to compare the workings of the system of Christian Science, so called, with the facts we have just set forth. This cult, first of all, professes to possess the same healing power exercised by Jesus of Nazareth, or rather, its advocates would like the world to understand that Jesus used the same power as is now being used through Christian Science. Compare their long-drawn-out system of mental diversion for relief of the distressed, with the direct, instantaneous method used by Jesus. He spoke, and it was done. His word of command had in it the control of everything in nature. He spoke as one having authority, and all nature obeyed him. O, the vain assumptions of misguided humanity! If this generation only knew the laws concerning mental causes and remedies, they would not gap and wonder and go astray after whimsical follies as they do just because there is something in them that they do not understand. The merest novice who has not read half the Gospel accounts will agree with us that it is belittling the work of Christ and pouring contempt on the doctrine of divine healing to liken the work of these professed scientists to his manifestations of creative power. Not a miracle he wrought but bears the stamp of creative energy. Where are the cases of leprosy they have healed? Where are the maimed they have made whole? Recite one case where the bread and fish have been multiplied in the hands of the science practitioner to feed the hungry. Rather, look in their coffers and see the money gathered through the influence of their presumptuous claims. Do you say, “But this work in our day is progressive; they will soon be able to perform these greater works”? Do not be deceived; no one who denies the workings of creative energy and substitutes an evolutionary process in its stead will ever be endowed with creative power. Christ’s work began with creating wine from water. But they do through mental diversion change the mental moods from adverse to favorable conditions, and some rally from illness due to mental causes, and get well. The notion prevails in nearly every human mind that whatever is accomplished for the sick without visible means must be done by some miraculous, divine power. The human mind, through hate, fear, doubt, unbelief, worry, anxiety, remorse, and despair, wastes, yes, verily destroys, so much energy in many cases that there is not enough left to keep the physical functions in healthy operation, and disease follows. Sometimes the agony of fear or sorrow or some disappointment smites the physical being down to death. If the individual does not quite succumb, confidence and courage and hope and joyful expectation may almost as suddenly restore the individual to normal conditions. Christian Science from the start to the finish is a system of denial. It denies the evidence of the senses, the reality of physical things, the conclusions of reason. It denies everything but what Mrs. Eddy has taught. It teaches that life is not dependent on our behavior here toward natural law, for natural law is but a myth; that all suffering, pain, and sickness are but errors of mortal mind. Christ cast out the devils. But Mrs. Eddy denies their existence, and yet she had to create an ethereal demon on whom she could lay the blame for all the failures of her system. She called the name of this demon “Malicious Animal Magnetism.” She found this devil fully as hard to manage as Satan himself, whom she had already relegated to the shades. And there is no God but the great pantheistic “All Soul” that the heathen nations of Asia invented long ages ago, of whom they say you and I and everything are but parts and parcels. In this philosophy everything is shadowy and ethereal. So we have before our minds a system6of religion, apart from everything that has a semblance of reason, which consists of the most mystical negations and abstractions ever foisted on mankind; which explains the Bible until it means all the way from nothing up to just the opposite of what it says, and yet can enable its devotees to say truly, Therefore having by denial freed myself from all sense of sin and all sense of responsibility for it, I have peace with myself through Christian Science. It is this false appeal to the spiritual nature through mysticism and occultism that removes the adverse mental causes, and makes this the most dangerous counterfeit ever passed upon mankind. A counterfeit does not have to be all base metal. A piece of metal stamped to look like a twenty-dollar gold piece might contain ten dollars’ worth of gold and still be a counterfeit, because it is not what it purports on its face to be. Lack of knowledge concerning mental causes and mental remedies makes it possible to pass this dangerous counterfeit. The results obtained through the mental rest secured bring in the enchantment of ancient times, and thousands are becoming mad devotees of this occult, mystical philosophy. There is nothing in all nature outside the study of God’s works that will so soon change the mental moods as curiosity, wonder, and astonishment. The world does not sense this truth. The inspirer of Christian Science literature has caught the world napping. Very few can promptly grasp an appreciation of the facts we have set forth. The human mind has not been thinking along these lines, and is not prepared for these sleight-of-mind performances. It is the perverted spiritual faculties to which the appeal has been made; so it is not difficult to make such natures think they are dealing with divine things; and this is where the sleight-of-mind performance comes in. It is not a question of honesty or sincerity on the part of the recipient; it is simply a question of being controlled by the mysticisms of which Mrs. Eddy has become the inspired prophet and chief apostle. There is an inspiration in them, but how can it be from above? Those who are in love with the study of the works of God in nature will have their minds so filled with a sense of the divine nature that the vaporings of Christian Science leaders will seem cheap and vapid. Those who have never seen the divine nature of God through the study of his works, and those who have received a false impression of God through some of the doctrines of the old creeds, will be the most likely to fall victims to this new form of ancient-modern heathen occultism. The cure for this spiritual malady lies in returning to the study of the things of God as outlined in the first paragraphs of this article. A fearful doom awaits those who will not learn of God through his works. Read Ps. 28:5: “Because they regard not the works of the Lord, nor the operation of his hands, he shall destroy them, and not build them up.” A picture is drawn, in Isa. 5:11, of the doom of those who revel in the works of men’s hands but do not regard the works of the Lord. Those who take pleasure in human fantasies and mysticisms will fare no better. There is a day of revelation coming, but too late for many. There is a reason for the falling away from sound doctrine. It lies in the perversion of the spiritual nature from the study of things of God to the study of artificial mysteries. Let us not blame nor censure, but by example and precept teach and exhort and appeal with “the spirit of . . . power, and of love, and of a sound mind.” 2 Tim. 1:7.