Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy (universal ebook reader .TXT) 📖

in pain, and this belief is called a

boil. Now administer mentally to your patient a high 153:21 attenuation of truth, and it will soon cure the boil. The

fact that pain cannot exist where there is no mortal mind

to feel it is a proof that this so-called mind makes its 153:24 own pain - that is, its own belief in pain.

 

Source of contagion

 

We weep because others weep, we yawn because they

yawn, and we have smallpox because others have it; but 153:27 mortal mind, not matter, contains and carries

the infection. When this mental contagion is

understood, we shall be more careful of our mental con-153:30 ditions and we shall avoid loquacious tattling about

disease, as we would avoid advocating crime. Neither

sympathy nor society should ever tempt us to cherish 154:1 error in any form, and certainly we should not be error’s

advocate. 154:3 Disease arises, like other mental conditions, from association. Since it is a law of mortal mind that certain

diseases should be regarded as contagious, this law ob-154:6 tains credit through association, - calling up the fear that

creates the image of disease and its consequent manifestation in the body.

 

Imaginary cholera

154:9 This fact in metaphysics is illustrated by the following

incident: A man was made to believe that he occupied a

bed where a cholera patient had died. Imme-154:12 diately the symptoms of this disease appeared,

and the man died. The fact was, that he had not caught

the cholera by material contact, because no cholera patient 154:15 had been in that bed.

 

Children’s ailments

 

If a child is exposed to contagion or infection, the

mother is frightened and says, “My child will be sick.” 154:18 The law of mortal mind and her own fears govern her child more than the child’s mind governs itself, and they produce the very results which might 154:21 have been prevented through the opposite understanding.

Then it is believed that exposure to the contagion wrought

the mischief.

154:24 That mother is not a Christian Scientist, and her affections need better guidance, who says to her child: “You

look sick,” “You look tired,” “You need rest,” or “You 154:27 need medicine.”

 

Such a mother runs to her little one, who thinks she has

hurt her face by falling on the carpet, and says, moaning 154:30 more childishly than her child, “Mamma knows you are

hurt.” The better and more successful method for any

mother to adopt is to say: “Oh, never mind! You’re not 155:1 hurt, so don’t think you are.” Presently the child forgets

all about the accident, and is at play.

 

Drug-power mental

155:3 When the sick recover by the use of drugs, it is the law

of a general belief, culminating in individual faith, which

heals; and according to this faith will the effect 155:6 be. Even when you take away the individual

confidence in the drug, you have not yet divorced the drug

from the general faith. The chemist, the botanist, the 155:9 druggist, the doctor, and the nurse equip the medicine

with their faith, and the beliefs which are in the majority

rule. When the general belief endorses the inanimate 155:12 drug as doing this or that, individual dissent or faith, unless it rests on Science, is but a belief held by a minority,

and such a belief is governed by the majority.

 

Belief in physics

155:15 The universal belief in physics weighs against the high

and mighty truths of Christian metaphysics. This erroneous general belief, which sustains medicine and 155:18 produces all medical results, works against

Christian Science; and the percentage of power on the

side of this Science must mightily outweigh the power of 155:21 popular belief in order to heal a single case of disease. The

human mind acts more powerfully to offset the discords

of matter and the ills of flesh, in proportion as it puts less 155:24 weight into the material or fleshly scale and more weight

into the spiritual scale. Homoeopathy diminishes the

drug, but the potency of the medicine increases as the 155:27 drug disappears.

 

Nature of drugs

 

Vegetarianism, homoeopathy, and hydropathy have

diminished drugging; but if drugs are an antidote to 155:30 disease, why lessen the antidote? If drugs

are good things, is it safe to say that the

less in quantity you have of them the better? If drugs 156:1 possess intrinsic virtues or intelligent curative qualities,

these qualities must be mental. Who named drugs, and 156:3 what made them good or bad for mortals, beneficial or

injurious?

 

Dropsy cured without drugs

 

A case of dropsy, given up by the faculty, fell into 156:6 my hands. It was a terrible case. Tapping had been

employed, and yet, as she lay in her bed, the

patient looked like a barrel. I prescribed 156:9 the fourth attenuation of Argentum nitratum with occasional doses of a high attenuation of Sulphuris. She improved perceptibly. Believing then somewhat in the 156:12 ordinary theories of medical practice, and learning that

her former physician had prescribed these remedies, I

began to fear an aggravation of symptoms from their 156:15 prolonged use, and told the patient so; but she was

unwilling to give up the medicine while she was recovering. It then occurred to me to give her un-156:18 medicated pellets and watch the result. I did so, and

she continued to gain. Finally she said that she would

give up her medicine for one day, and risk the 156:21 effects. After trying this, she informed me that she

could get along two days without globules; but on

the third day she again suffered, and was relieved by 156:24 taking them. She went on in this way, taking the

unmedicated pellets, - and receiving occasional visits

from me, - but employing no other means, and she was 156:27 cured.

 

A stately advance

 

Metaphysics, as taught in Christian Science, is the

next stately step beyond homoeopathy. In metaphysics, 156:30 matter disappears from the remedy entirely,

and Mind takes its rightful and supreme

place. Homoeopathy takes mental symptoms largely 157:1 into consideration in its diagnosis of disease. Christian

Science deals wholly with the mental cause in judging and 157:3 destroying disease. It succeeds where homoeopathy fails,

solely because its one recognized Principle of healing is

Mind, and the whole force of the mental element is em-157:6 ployed through the Science of Mind, which never shares

its rights with inanimate matter.

 

The modus of homoeopathy

 

Christian Science exterminates the drug, and rests on 157:9 Mind alone as the curative Principle, acknowledging that

the divine Mind has all power. Homoeopathy

mentalizes a drug with such repetition of 157:12 thought-attenuations, that the drug becomes

more like the human mind than the substratum of this so-called mind, which we call matter; and the drug’s power 157:15 of action is proportionately increased.

 

Drugging unchristian

 

If drugs are part of God’s creation, which (according

to the narrative in Genesis) He pronounced/ good/, then 157:18 drugs cannot be poisonous. If He could create drugs intrinsically bad, then they should

never be used. If He creates drugs at all and designs 157:21 them for medical use, why did Jesus not employ them

and recommend them for the treatment of disease?

Matter is not self-creative, for it is unintelligent. Erring 157:24 mortal mind confers the power which the drug seems to

possess.

 

Narcotics quiet mortal mind, and so relieve the body; 157:27 but they leave both mind and body worse for this submission. Christian Science impresses the entire corporeality, - namely, mind and body, - and brings out the 157:30 proof that Life is continuous and harmonious. Science

both neutralizes error and destroys it. Mankind is the

better for this spiritual and profound pathology.

 

Mythology and materia medica

158:1 It is recorded that the profession of medicine originated

in idolatry with pagan priests, who besought the gods to 158:3 heal the sick and designated Apollo as “the god

of medicine.” He was supposed to have dictated the first prescription, according to the 158:6 “History of Four Thousand Years of Medicine.” It is

here noticeable that Apollo was also regarded as the sender

of disease, “the god of pestilence.” Hippocrates turned 158:9 from image-gods to vegetable and mineral drugs for healing. This was deemed progress in medicine; but

what we need is the truth which heals both mind and 158:12 body. The future history of material medicine may

correspond with that of its material god, Apollo, who was

banished from heaven and endured great sufferings 158:15 upon earth.

 

Footsteps to intemperance

 

Drugs, cataplasms, and whiskey are stupid substitutes

for the dignity and potency of divine Mind and its effi-158:18 cacy to heal. It is pitiful to lead men into

temptation through the byways of this wilderness world, - to victimize the race with intoxicating 158:21 prescriptions for the sick, until mortal mind acquires an

educated appetite for strong drink, and men and women

become loathsome sots.

 

Advancing degrees

158:24 Evidences of progress and of spiritualization greet us

on every hand. Drug-systems are quitting their hold on

matter and so letting in matter’s higher stra-158:27 tum, mortal mind. Homoeopathy, a step in

advance of allopathy, is doing this. Matter is going out

of medicine; and mortal mind, of a higher attenuation 158:30 than the drug, is governing the pellet.

 

Effects of fear

 

A woman in the city of Lynn, Massachusetts, was

etherized and died in consequence, although her physi-159:1 cians insisted that it would be unsafe to perform a needed

surgical operation without the ether. After the autopsy, 159:3 her sister testified that the deceased protested

against inhaling the ether and said it would kill

her, but that she was compelled by her physicians to take 159:6 it. Her hands were held, and she was forced into submission. The case was brought to trial. The evidence

was found to be conclusive, and a verdict was returned that 159:9 death was occasioned, not by the ether, but by fear of

inhaling it.

 

Mental conditions to be heeded

 

Is it skilful or scientific surgery to take no heed of men-159:12 tal conditions and to treat the patient as if she were so

much mindless matter, and as if matter were

the only factor to be consulted? Had these 159:15 unscientific surgeons understood metaphysics,

they would have considered the woman’s state of mind,

and not have risked such treatment. They would either 159:18 have allayed her fear or would have performed the operation without ether.

 

The sequel proved that this Lynn woman died from 159:21 effects produced by mortal mind, and not from the disease

or the operation.

 

False source of knowledge

 

The medical schools would learn the state of man 159:24 from matter instead of from Mind. They examine the

lungs, tongue, and pulse to ascertain how

much harmony, or health, matter is permit-159:27 ting to matter, - how much pain or pleasure, action or

stagnation, one form of matter is allowing another form

of matter.

159:30 Ignorant of the fact that a man’s belief produces disease and all its symptoms, the ordinary physician is

liable to increase disease with his own mind, when he 160:1 should address himself to the work of destroying it through

the power of the divine Mind.

160:3 The systems of physics act against metaphysics, and

vice versa. When mortals forsake the material for the

spiritual basis of action, drugs lose their healing force, 160:6 for they have no innate power. Unsupported by the

faith reposed in it, the inanimate drug becomes

powerless.

 

Obedient muscles

160:9 The motion of the arm is no more dependent upon the

direction of mortal mind, than are the organic action and

secretion of the viscera. When this so-called 160:12 mind quits the body, the heart becomes as torpid as the hand.

 

Anatomy and mind

 

Anatomy finds