The Origin of Christian Science/Chapter 4

by Thomas Polhill Stafford

 

CHAPTER IV.

ANTHROPOLOGY.

The Neoplatonists held to the theory of trichotomy. That is, they considered a human being, to be a compound of three elements, mind, soul and body. But the material element was resolved by them into unreality. Dichotomy, or the theory that a person is composed of two parts, mind and body, is the common view of psychologists now, though there are still some who advocate trichotomy.

Though her psychology is Neoplatonic, Mrs. Eddy, judged from one standpoint, belongs to neither of these two classes. To her, mortal man is a compound of mind and matter. But there is really no such existence; mortal man is a delusion. To her, man, that is, immortal or real man, is not a compound of two or more elements but a simple substance. He is mind and nothing more. Body with all the notions, opinions, sensations, etc., that arise from it or are supposed to enter the mind through it, are unreal and do not belong to the real and true man and should not even be considered as having existence. Mrs. Eddy allows to the real man only those mental activities that the Neoplatonists said belonged to the mind in distinction from the soul; they of course discarded from the real man all physical qualities but ascribed to the soul certain mental activities which Mrs. Eddy discards as belonging to the realm of the unreal. We find soul in her terminology but it is, she says, a synonym for mind.^[1] The real man is simply mind.

Now does Mrs. Eddy mean by mind the same as the Neoplatonists mean by mind or nous? In eliminating physical qualities from the real man does Mrs. Eddy substract from man as he is commonly conceived as much as the Neoplatonists would have done had they eliminated both physical and psychical qualities, leaving only the intellectual? To these questions, striking as it really is, the answer is, yes. By mind Mrs. Eddy means not sensation, not opinion, not memory, not discursive reason, but intellect or intuitive consciousness; and this is exactly what the Neoplatonists mean by nous or the highest of the three component parts of human nature. Keeping in mind this one point of difference between the two systems, the similarities will become too numerous to mention.

It will be seen therefore that in Christian Science anthropology means little more than psychology.

Accordingly, in this chapter, we need to review only the more general aspects of human nature. The deeper and more intricate questions are reserved for the chapters on Psychology and Ethics. In this chapter it is appropriate to dispose also of Mrs. Eddy's theories as to Jesus Christ, since she regards him as a human being only, that is, as possessing divinity the same in kind with that which all men possess but superior in degree, it may be. Her explanation of him must be consistent with her philosophy. In working out this problem we will see how she follows Spinoza, for whom Synesius especially blazed the way, who solved the problem quite ingeniously two hundred and fifty years ago.

Mrs. Eddy teaches that the real man exists eternally. He is without beginning of days or end of years. He belongs to God's creation and his duration is timeless. Man is God's idea or thought and God's ideas and thoughts are eternal. He co-exists with God, and does so necessarily since God cannot exist without his reflection which reflection man is. Mind is by its very nature active; that is, it must think. In thinking it must think about something; that is, it must have thoughts or ideas. Therefore the existence of God requires that men also who are his thoughts or ideas exist, and since God eternally exists they must so exist. It is easily seen that in this we have a repetition of what was said of the relation of creation to God. At times, Mrs. Eddy seems to consider that man and his ideas constitute the entire creation, though she is not so clear on this point as we wish she were.^[2] Man's ideas are of course God's ideas. God is the great circle including in itself many other circles which are sons and daughters of God; and in these circles are again other smaller circles which are the ideas of men and women. These taken together constitute creation, it seems. God's ideas, which are men and women and their ideas which also are reflections of God,^[3] or God's children and grand-children, make up the created universe. There probably are no great-grand-children.

Mrs. Eddy says: It is a false conclusion to suppose “that there are two separate, antagonistic entities and beings, two powers, namely. Spirit and matter, — resulting in a third person (mortal man) who carries out the delusion of sin, sickness, and death;”^[4] “That which sins, suffers and dies, I named mortal mind;”^[5] “There is, strictly speaking, no mortal mind;”^[6] “Immortal man was and is God's image or idea, even the infinite expression of infinite Mind, and immortal man is co-existent and co-eternal with that Mind. He has been forever in the eternal Mind, God;”^[7] “Harmonious and immortal man has existed forever, and is always beyond and above the mortal illusion of any life, substance, and intelligence as existent in matter;”^[8] An “erroneous postulate is, that man is both mental and material;”^[9] “Man is the idea of God, not formed materially but spiritually, and not subject to decay and dust;”^[10] “Man as the offspring of God, as the idea of Spirit, is the immortal evidence that Spirit is harmonious and man eternal;”^[11] “Man; God's spiritual idea, individual, perfect, eternal;”^[12] “The forever Father must have had children prior to Adam. The great I am made all ‘that was made’. Hence man and the spiritual universe co-exist with God ;”^[13] “Man in Science is neither young nor old. He has neither birth nor death.”^[14]

From these sentences it is clear that what Mrs. Eddy means by immortal or real man is what is commonly understood as that part or faculty of the mind that thinks, that knows absolutely, that part to which intuitions and consciousness are referred, which is that part of man that the Neoplatonists called nous. This part of man they considered to be perfect and eternal as Mrs. Eddy does. Plato, as is well known, believed in the pre-existence of the soul (pseuche) . The Neoplatonists believed the more in the pre-existence, that is, the eternal existence, of the mind (nous) and its ideas. Of the eternal existence of the mind independent and apart from the body, before it entered the body and after it shall depart from it, Spinoza said many beautiful things.^[15]

Mrs. Eddy ascribes to immortal man those qualities which Plotinus ascribes to ideas of the intellectual world or of God. In this world he says there is eternity, not time; there is neither evil nor privation nor defect.^[16] In this world everything is perfect and eternal.

How Mrs. Eddy can thus follow Plotinus is made possible and plain simply by her definition that man is God's idea. God's ideas must be perfect and eternal. We must not forget that the Neoplatonists conceived of Plato's “eternal world of ideas” as God's ideas. They originate and are related as creations or eternal thoughts of the divine mind.

What was said above has now I trust become quite obvious, namely, that anthropology in Christian Science is little more than psychology, and therefore further consideration of this phase of the subject is reserved for the chapter on Psychology.

It will cause us to appreciate more Mrs. Eddy's conception of man in the parallel just drawn to notice that she defines life or explains it away just as the Neoplatonists do. We are in the habit of thinking of life as being something other and more inclusive than mind or thought, but these thorough-going monists must explain all reality in terms of mind. If therefore life is anything it is mind, and nothing more.

Mrs. Eddy says: “Life is God, or Spirit, the supersensible, eternal;”^[17] “Life is divine Principle, Mind, Spirit. Life is without beginning and without end. Eternity, not time, expresses the thought of Life, and time is no part of eternity;”^[18] “Life is eternal;”^[19] “Life is, like Christ, ‘the same yesterday, and today and forever’. Organization and time have nothing to do with Life;”^[20] “One moment of divine consciousness or the spiritual understanding of Life and Love is a foretaste of eternity. This exalted view obtained and retained when the Science of being is understood, would bridge over with life discerned spiritually the interval of death, and man would be in full consciousness of his immortality and eternal harmony, where sin, sickness, and death are unknown. Time is a mortal thought, the divisor of which is the solar year. Eternity is God's measurement of Soul-filled years.”^[21]

In the above sentences note that life is identified or confused with eternity, with God, with divine principle, with mind and spirit. And notice that “divine consciousness” is the same as the “spiritual understanding of Life” the exercise of which is a “foretaste of eternity." And notice again that time is regarded as “no part of eternity.” “Time is a mortal thought”, that is, it is unreal; and Mrs. Eddy holds that “all the real is eternal”.^[22] If then life is something real it is eternal. Without going into these intricacies of thought it is impossible to understand Mrs. Eddy. But consider that the more winding in dark places her way is the more obvious is it that she follows another who first traveled these devious and doubtful paths.

Forgetting for the present other points let us see how the Neoplatonists too confuse the ideas of life and eternity. Plotinus defines eternity as “life which is now infinite, because it is all, and nothing of which is consumed, because nothing pertaining to it is either past or future, since otherwise it would not be all things at once.”^[23] This is also his conception of mind or intellect.^[24] He has the same idea of the relation of time and eternity that Mrs. Eddy has, saying: “With respect to eternity and time, we say that each of these is different from the other.”^[25] That is, time is no part of eternity, as the context shows. In essence or nature they are different.

Of the same opinion too is Spinoza who says: “Eternity cannot be defined in terms of time, or have any relation to time.”^[26] Both Plotinus^[27] and Spinoza^[28] exclude the idea of past and future from eternity. Plotinus says that eternity and not time is in the “intelligible world”^[29] and that intellect or mind “is the true eternity”.^[30] Porphyry thinks eternity is an attribute of intellect.^[31]

Comparing the language of Mrs. Eddy carefully with that of the Neoplatonists it is clear that they have identical conceptions of the relation of time and eternity, namely, that they have nothing in common; eternity is not infinite time as we are in the habit of thinking. There is in eternity no past nor future, that is, no succession. Notice that they are compelled to have this view as time or succession belongs to the world of matter and the sense of time arises from the body. Time has to do with unrealities. Therefore eternity which measures the existence of realities only has no relation to time. Here as always it is not an accidental parallel that we trace but one that belongs to the genius of the two systems.

And now we are prepared to see how it is possible for them to agree in identifying life with eternity or explaining one by means of the other. This is such a peculiar and curious parallel that it should of itself convict Mrs. Eddy of dependence on the Neoplatonists. We see also how they can identify life with mind, understanding, being, or reality. They must do this, as they both teach that all is mind. Life therefore must be mind or nothing.

We have come again upon a group of identical ideas: life, mind, reality, eternity. And we shall still have more of them. Mrs. Eddy and the Neoplatonists have a tendency to explain everything that has existence in terms of the one great reality, mind. If we cannot reduce it to this it has no existence. The Neoplatonists might draw back a little from signing the last statement but Mrs. Eddy would not. They are strict metaphysical monists and cannot allow more than one reality.

We are in the habit of looking upon nature as possessing many realities and many beautiful varieties. Instead of this Christian Science gives us a dead sameness. Life is not life; it is something else. Other things are not other things, they are this same, one thing, mind or principle. Christian Science tells us that we are looking into the big end of a funnel full of many apparently different realities but which are really illusions, and that by means of its minimizing glass we may see all of these illusions sink down and vanish at the little end, where there is room for only the one reality, mind. Everything has to be run through this funnel. What will not go through has no existence. Man is simply idea. He is intellectuality, he is thought and nothing more. He has, or rather he is, understanding, intuition or consciousness but nothing more. Eliminate body and all the so-called mental activities that are derived therefrom and what you have left is man. Man is simply mathematical knowing or mind, in its intellectual operation, without body or sensation or sense of time or memory or imagination or discursive reason or any other of the appurtenances thereof.

We have before shown that Christian Science is pantheistic; that it identifies nature and God. Since man is a part of nature we may then expect to find Mrs. Eddy identifying him with his maker. And so we do. In places she teaches the contrary but that is a difficulty for others to deal with, not for the writer of this book. I may say to the credit of Mrs. Eddy, however, that such contradictions are necessarily involved in monistic philosophy. They are found in great abundance also in Neoplatonism. Hegel more than any other thinker has brought into bold relief the contradictions necessarily involved in this philosophy. Mrs. Eddy sees them and tries to hide them. For example notice how often she affirms that man in Christian Science does not lose his identity or individuality. She realized that her reasoning was pulling us over into the chasm of the annihilation of individuality and personality and she felt inclined to put up some railing.^[32] Mrs. Eddy saw the precipice toward which she was driving but as is her custom simply denied dogmatically that it was there. So did the Neoplatonists try to avoid such a catastrophe.^[33] Man is related to God as the idea of a mind is related to the mind. Now an idea is in and of the mind. The Neopltaonists reasoned thus: The intellect, the intelligible and intelligence, these three are one. Intellect is the knowing subject; the intelligible is the known object; and intelligence is the act of knowing. These three are one, they said.^[34] Now this is not bad reasoning after all for an idealist; and from it has come much of the rationalistic idealism of the last centuries. In this reasoning we have the basis for the so-called Neoplatonic trinity which was brilliantly developed by Hegel and as such repeated in dim outline in Christian Science, as we shall see.

I am referring to the matter briefly here to point out that Mrs. Eddy, in following these idealists in holding that man is an idea of infinite mind, is following them also in identifying him with that mind.

Mrs. Eddy says: “As a drop of water is one with the ocean, a ray of light one with the sun, even so God and man, Father and son, are one in being.”^[35]

Concerning the illustration of the ray of light and the sun we have already spoken. As to the illustration of the drop of water and the ocean it is evident that a part of anything is identical with that thing. Remember we have found Mrs. Eddy reasoning thus: “If Mind is within and without all things, then all is Mind.”^[36] She emphasizes this statement as being a scientific definition and it seems that she speaks correctly. When we are thinking metaphysically to say that one thing is within and without another is to identify the other with it. So she identifies man with God.

Now a similar illustration is attributed by Is. Misses to Spinoza. He says that Spinoza regarded the relation of individual things to the creator to be as the relation of “waves of the sea to the water of the sea”, and cites another illustration like it in the Kabbala, namely, that they are related as “the folds of a garment to the gar- ment itself”.^[37] The conception, if not the language, is traceable to the Neoplatonists. It is a good illustration for idealistic pantheists. Mrs. Eddy is following these thinkers who do their best to teach both the sameness of created things with the creator and their distinction from him. They all are experts at it. We have no fault to find with their way of doing it. We are simply showing that Mrs. Eddy is doing it just as the pagan philosophers and infidels did it, but no better than they did it.

Man as defined by Mrs. Eddy cannot be a free agent. An idea of the mind is determined by the mind. Therefore man's activities or ideas are of necessity what they are. They are causally determined. Freedom of will is a delusion. Choice is impossible.

It may be repeated that Mrs. Eddy, since she finds the expression, “will of God,” in the Scriptures, must ascribe will to God;^[38] but she means by it when so used, as we have shown, not the power of choice or self-determination in view of future action but divine understanding. Will in any other sense, or what we mean by the term, has no existence in the real man. Will as purpose involves time and is a quality of mortal man. She says: “Will,—the motive power of error; mortal belief. * * * A wrong doer.”^[39] “Will-power is capable of all evil;”^[40] “Human will belongs to the so-called material senses;”^[41] “Every function of the real man is governed by the divine Mind.”^[42]

Spinoza has the same view exactly as to the necessity of man's actions. Explaining will away, just as Mrs. Eddy does, he says: “A particular volition and a particular idea are one and the same.”^[43] This is his way of proving that “will and understanding are one and the same”. His conclusion is that the “mind is determined to wish this or that by a cause”,^[44] and the cause of all ideas is God.^[45] This is again the ground for his conclusion that nothing is contingent; that all things, human actions as well as natural events, are causally determined. He says: “It is in the nature of reason to perceive things truly, namely, as they are in themselves, that is not as contingent, but as necessary.”^[46] The thought is that we see things as they really are when we see them as necessary and not as contingent. Proclus appears to advocate the same view when he says that Providence or the superintending deity sees indefinite things as definite.^[47] Mrs. Eddy says: “Accidents are unknown to God, or immortal Mind. * * * Under divine Providence there can be no accidents.”^[48]

The student will see that this view is logically necessary for those who hold that the creator made the world or all realities simply by intellection or intuitive thinking and not by choosing one of two or more mental pictures and willing it to be. Thus we see, what we perhaps have already anticipated, how Mrs. Eddy whittles off the attributes of man, as she does the attributes of God, until man, the real or immortal man, is also robbed of personality.

I ask the student to notice that I am not pointing out accidental similarities between Spinoza and Mrs. Eddy. From the mere fact that two thinkers teach the determinism of the will we can infer nothing as to their relation; for traveling independently and on different roads they might by accident meet at this point. From seeing Spinoza and Mrs. Eddy at the same depot, we can infer nothing. But when we see them start from the same place, travel on the same road and get off at the same station and go together in the same winding way around town and finally stop at the same hotel, we have the right to infer that they are intimately related. A detective would hardly want facts more significant than these. And since in this case we cannot say that the woman is leading the man around we must say she is following him.

One may see at a glance that Mrs. Eddy with her definition of man must reject the Bible doctrine of the Fall. It is impossible for immortal man to fall or commit sin. He is the true reflection of God and since God is without imperfections so must his reflection be. If the body before the mirror is perfect, so will the image in the mirror be perfect and must be. And again, any imperfection in the reflection demonstrates imperfection in the original that is reflected.

Mrs. Eddy says: “In divine Science, man is the true image of God. The divine nature was best expressed in Christ Jesus, who threw upon mortals the truer reflection of God and lifted their lives higher than their poor thought-models would allow, — thoughts which presented man as fallen, sick, sinning, and dying. The Christlike understanding of scientific being and divine healing includes a perfect Principle and idea, — perfect God and perfect man, — as the basis of thought and demonstration. If man was once perfect but has now lost his perfection, then mortals have never beheld in man the reflex image of God. The lost image is no image;”^[49] “Never born and never dying, it were impossible for man under the government of God in eternal Science to fall from his high estate.”^[50]

The reader is requested to notice that this doctrine of Mrs. Eddy is based not upon the relation of two persons, father and son, the latter of whom may sin and not involve the character of the other; but upon the relation of an idea to the mind, in which case imperfection in the idea demonstrates imperfection in the mind. It is connected logically with the doctrine set forth above that man is not a free agent, that all his ideas are causally determined. The cause is therefore accountable for the effect or contains the effect. Let us not forget that in Christian Science man is not a person but an idea or a collection of ideas. The student of philosophy will readily see that in all this we have a reproduction of the Neoplatonic development of Plato's world of ideas in which there is no imperfect idea. The world of ideas became for the Neoplatonists God's ideas. As this phase of the subject belongs more properly to psychology, I defer further treatment of it here.

Since Mrs. Eddy denies to man a fall or lapse in his essential nature and professes to hold to the Bible, it is interesting to see how she deals with the account of the sin of Adam and Eve as recorded in Genesis.

In brief it is this. In the third chapter of Genesis, we have not an account of the sin or lap?e of immortal man but of the origin of mortal man. Now what is mortal man as here characterized? Mortal man or mortal mind is the belief that there is a reality, or something, other than or opposite to God.

In this explanation we have a faint reproduction of Hegel. Students of Hegel may recall how much of his philosophy is suggested by three words, thesis, antithesis and synthesis. Thesis stands for absolute existence or God; antithesis for his creation, as ideas coming to self-consciousness or to that stage of development in which they affirm their own existence in opposition or contrast to that of the absolute. The so-called fall of Adam and Eve as related in Genesis is a picture of the rise of this self-consciousness or the knowledge that we have existence as in opposition to God. Of course in this we have an explanation of the fall that explains it away. It becomes rather one stage in the evolution of the race and the universe.^[51] It was not a “fall down” but a “fall up” as Henry Ward Beecher eloquently and heretically preached.^[52] Mrs. Eddy too, strange to say, finds in the first sins of the race ground for optimism. They become a “cleansing upheaval.”^[53] How darkness can help on the cause of light is difficult to see. This trio of brilliants cannot succeed in getting it into our heads that going down is going up.

The third word, synthesis, Hegel used to symbolize thought as realizing the oneness of all things. It stands for the unity of both thesis and antithesis. Now this is the Hegelian trinity which is also Neoplatonic, as will be seen.

It is not affirmed here that Mrs. Eddy's explanation of the fall is derived from Hegel's or is the same in detail as his, but only that it is suggestive of his. But since Mrs. Eddy reproduces the naturalistic trinity, as will be proved, which is used by Hegel to explain the fall, it is proper to point out that Mrs. Eddy comes very close at this point to, if indeed she does not step in, the tracks of this great idealist, who owed no small debt to the Neoplatonists. The three words of Hegel referred to, correspond to three words of the Neoplatonists, intellect, intelligible, and intelligence, or the subject knowing, the object known and the act of knowing, by virtue of which the subject and object are united and become in reality one. All this is quite natural in an idealistic system. Mrs. Eddy has the same conceptions but couched in words better suited to her purpose, as we shall see.

As Mrs. Eddy's doctrine of Jesus Christ is that he was only a human being or, what amounts to the same thing, that he was divine as all men are, that is, that he possessed a nature the same in kind with ours, though in character he reached a degree of perfection above us, it is proper in this connection to show the source of her revelations on this subject. In Christian Science the treatment of Jesus Christ belongs to anthropology rather than theology.

Briefly stated her doctrine is as follows. Christ is the ideal man; or he is the true idea of God, as any man is when all material or mortal qualities are eliminated. The two names, Jesus and Christ, give us two conceptions of the Savior, the latter being the true one and symbolizing his eternal, spiritual and perfect nature; the former being the human conception of him as having a mortal nature and temporal relations, which all ceased with his ascension. But in this case the ideal man or the Christ was not limited or rendered imperfect by the mortal man, Jesus.^[54] A very common synonym for Christ is truth, which she uses not figuratively of Christ but as describing literally his nature. Her conception is that Christ, the ideal and true man, is not a person. He is simply an idea which she contends any and every real man is. So then in Jesus Christ we have the example of one who possessed, or attained finally to, perfect understanding, in whom intuitive consciousness reigned, who exhibited the kingly power of mind, who knew only reality and eternity and who had no sense of time, limitation, suffering, sin, sickness, or death. Jesus Christ is the way-shower, “only this and nothing more.”

Mrs. Eddy says: “Christ the true idea of God;”^[55] “The Christ dwelt forever an idea in the bosom of God, the divine Principle of the man Jesus;”^[56] “Christ is the ideal Truth, that comes to heal sickness and sin;”^[57] “The divine image, idea, or Christ was, is, and ever will be inseparable from the divine Principle, God;”^[58] “Jesus demonstrated Christ; he proved that Christ is the divine idea of God;”^[59] “The advent of Jesus of Nazareth marked the first century of the Christian era, but the Christ is without beginning of years or end of days;”^[60] “Christ expresses God's spiritual, eternal nature;”^[61] “The corporeal man Jesus was human;”^[62] “This dual personality of the unseen and the seen, the spiritual and material, the eternal Christ and the corporeal Jesus manifest in flesh, continued until the Master's ascension, when the human, material concept, or Jesus, disappeared;”^[63] “The ‘Man of sorrows’ best understood the nothingness of material life and intelligence and the mighty actuality of all-inclusive God, good;”^[64] "Truth has no consciousness of error;”^[65] “This enabled him to be the mediator, or way-shower, between God and men;”^[66] “The eternal Christ, his spiritual selfhood, never suffered;”^[67] “The real Christ was unconscious of matter, of sin, disease, and death and was conscious only of God, of Good, of eternal Life and harmony.”^[68]

It is important that we observe two things in the above sentences. First, that Mrs. Eddy sees in Jesus of Nazareth only an ideal and perfect man. This becomes clear when we compare these statements with those that explain the nature of man. Secondly, his perfection consists in the fact that he possessed the divine principle, Christ, truth, God's idea, or perfect understanding.

This enables us to see how Mrs. Eddy can confuse Christ with the Holy Spirit and even with Christian Science, and these in turn with each other. She says: “Christ is the divine idea of God—the Holy Ghost, or Comforter;”^[69] “He (Jesus) was endowed with the Christ, the divine Spirit, without measure;”^[70] “The true Logos is demonstrably Christian Science, the natural law of harmony which overcomes discord;”^[71] “It (Christian Science) is a divine utterance,—the Comforter which leadeth into all truth.”^[72] All this is not confusion but made easy of apprehension when we discover that what Mrs. Eddy means by Christ is simply an intuitive power of mind that gives a clear understanding of reality, and this the disciples got on the Day of Pentecost and this also Christian Science bestows on us. These three things by this expert manipulation become one thing. Here again we have a group of ideas that go into the Christian Science funnel and are pressed out the little end as one thing, which in this case, as in the others, is the same one thing, namely, mind.

What has been said of Christ will enable us to prove more conclusively that Mrs. Eddy's conceptions of him are Neoplatonic, to which task we are now come.

And first we observe that she identifies Christ with mind, as has just been stated, which, strange to say, is an identification of son and father. How could Mrs. Eddy do this? It was not impossible for her to do it inasmuch as she regards the Biblical trinity not as three persons, but as different expressions of one being or principle. She says: “The Ego is revealed as Father, Son and Holy Ghost; but the full Truth is found only in Divine Science, where we see God as Life, Truth, and Love.”^[73] The Neoplatonists could very naturally call mind the son of God as they posited a deity above mind. But how can Mrs. Eddy identify mind, which is her synonym for God, with the Son of God, when it is her contention that the Son of God is distinct from God, as the reflection of an object is from the object? Christian Scientists may solve this riddle if they can. But, while they are doing it, I suggest that she identifies mind with Christ or the father with the son, because she is either slavishly or cunningly following the Neoplatonists. Whether she blunders blindly or not she is reproducing them in her doctrines of Christ. Few maneuvers of Mrs. Eddy are more curious and circuitous than this one.

She says: “They (metaphysical works) never crown the power of Mind as the Messiah.”^[74] But she does. Here we have two more synonyms, mind and Messiah. And Mrs. Eddy understands rightly that Messiah and Christ are also synonyms,^[75] the former being the Hebrew word and the latter the Greek word for the promised Redeemer of Israel and both meaning the Anointed One.

Now will the reader please notice distinctly that we have here an identification of Christ or the Son of God with mind? We have from quotations already given anticipated this, but now we have before us her direct statement. We could trace her in her Neoplatonic meanderings without this “index finger,” for her tracks are unmistakable; but this sentence makes the task easier.

What we mean is this, that Mrs. Eddy conceives of Christ as the Neoplatonists do of the infinite and eternal intellect, or what they called the nous. The properties or qualities of this hypostasis or nature were such as those Mrs. Eddy ascribes to Christ. It is free from the limitations of matter. It is ever conscious. Its ideas are eternal. It is without error. It does not suffer. A fuller analysis of the character of the nous will be found in the chapter on Psychology. The fact that Mrs. Eddy in identifying Christ and mind is repeating the metaphysics of the Neoplatonists is what concerns us here.

Synesius, who said that in becoming a Christian bishop he would give up neither his wife nor his philosophy, found himself facing the mystery of the incarnation. How could he explain Christ according to his philosophy? He did so by saying that he was the nous.^[76] Plotinus in designating the nous as the creator's son had prepared the way most excellently for Synesius. Plotinus says: “As he who diligently surveys the heavens, and contemplates the splendor of the stars, should immediately think upon and search after their artificer, so it is requisite that he who beholds and admires the intelligible world, should diligently inquire after its author, investigating who he is, where he resides, and how he produces such an offspring as intellect, a son beautiful and pure, and full of his ineffable fire.”^[77] Proclus refers to the “paradigmatic cause,” or the nous, as the “only-begotten.”^[78] And these philosophers “made the way straight” for Spinoza, whose Neoplatonic explanation of Christ Mrs. Eddy has failed to improve upon. He says: “By this it will at once become clear, what we in the First Part have said, namely, that the infinite intellect, which we named the Son of God, must from all eternity be in nature.”^[79] Notice at present in regard to this sentence only that Spinoza calls the “infinite intellect” the “Son of God.” Again Spinoza says: “With regard to the Eternal Son of God, that is the Eternal Wisdom of God, which has manifested itself in all things and especially in the human mind, and above all in Christ Jesus, the case is otherwise. For without this no one can come to a state of blessedness, inasmuch as it alone teaches what is true or false, good or evil.”^[80] As to this quotation notice now only that he identifies the “Son of God” with the “Wisdom of God” and that this “Son of God” or “Wisdom of God” is manifest in “all things and especially in the human mind, and above all in Christ Jesus.” Here is an element of mind or power of thought that is exhibited in nature and especially in the human mind (that is the higher qualities of it) and preeminently in Jesus Christ. Now what kind of wisdom or mentality is this? It is that kind which is independent of the body. It is spiritual or intellectual understanding. Spinoza, explaining how prophecy and revelation are possible to a higher kind of knowledge than that which is dependent on material symbols, says: “We may be able quite to comprehend that God can communicate immediately with man, for without the intervention of bodily means He communicates to our minds His essence; still, a man who can by pure intuition comprehend ideas which are neither contained in nor deducible from the foundations of our natural knowledge, must necessarily possess a mind far superior to those of his fellowmen, nor do I believe that any have been so endowed save Christ. To Him the ordinances of God leading men to salvation, were revealed directly without words or visions, so that God manifested Himeself to the Apostles through the mind of Christ as he formerly did to Moses through the supernatural voice. In this sense the voice of Christ, like the voice which Moses heard, may be called the voice of God, and it may be said that the wisdom of God (i. e. wisdom more than human) took upon itself in Christ human nature, and that Christ was the way of salvation.”^[81]

In this language of Spinoza notice that Christ is superior to all other recipients of revelations in that he received or discerned them by means of the intuitive faculty and without material media, that is, that in Jesus, there was the free and untrammelled reign of the intellect and that he was, by virtue of this endowment, the wisdom of God and the way of salvation.

We need not refrain from saying that Mrs. Eddy and Spinoza say certain beautiful things about Christ, some of which we may be inclined to accept tentatively. But that the Evangelist John by calling Christ the Logos meant to suggest that Christ is a school-master to bring us to Plato, which a few modern theologians along with Spinoza and Mrs. Eddy seem to imagine, is the height of absurdity.

But let us not forget that whether these revelations of Mrs. Eddy concerning the character of Christ be beautiful or ugly, true or false, they come via Spinoza, the Jew, infidel and pantheist, and that the foundation for them is found in the philosophical profundities of certain learned pagans.

We come now to consider how Mrs. Eddy disposes of the resurrection of Christ. We will find that her explanation of it or her explaining it away is Spinozaistic and has, like her explanation of the character of Christ, its metaphysical ground in Neoplatonism.

Mrs. Eddy's position, stated frankly, is simply this. There was no bodily resurrection of Jesus. He did not really die, though he was thought to have done so. And what seemed to be his death and resurrection was only one stage or step in his spiritual evolution or emancipation from the flesh, the consummation of which was realized in the ascension from the Mount of Olives, where the “mortal coil” was left behind forever. It was impossible for Jesus to reinhabit the tabernacle of clay. The soul in the body is as a wandering star, “heaven's exile straying from the orb of light.”^[82] It will not depart after it has found again its orbit or true home.

What then can the resurrection, so emphasized in the Scriptures, mean? For the language of Holy Writ must be retained, though the truth of it is cast to the winds. “Know all you materialistic mortals that the resurrection is spiritual. It is better to stress the spirit of Scripture than the letter. So the resurrection properly understood has no reference to the raising of the body to life but rather to the lifting of the mind to spiritual understanding. So be spiritually minded, get in tune with the infinite, become unconscious of your body and you too will thus enter into the glorious inheritance of the resurrection life! For did not Paul say that Christians are raised together with Christ and should seek the things that are above?”

Yes, Christian Science makes much of the philosophy of the resurrection but denies the fact of it. But Paul based the philosophy of it upon the fact of it, which only is a sane method. In the resurrection of Jesus Mrs. Eddy sees nothing done in his body but much done in the minds of the Apostles and something accomplished, also, it may be, in the mind of Jesus. Matter was not affected at all, but there was a mighty movement of mind. The resurrection of Jesus in the light of Christian Science is philosophy teaching by delusion.

Now let us hear Mrs. Eddy. She says: “He (Jesus) allowed men to attempt the destruction of the mortal body;”^[83] “His disciples believed Jesus to be dead while he was hidden in the sepulchre, whereas he was alive;”^[84] “They (his disciples)* * * saw him after his crucifixion and learned that he had not died;”^[85] “After his resurrection he proved to the physical senses that his body was not changed until he himself ascended,—or, in other words, rose even higher in the understanding of Spirit, God;”^[86] “Jesus' unchanged physical condition after what seemed to be death was followed by his exaltation above all material conditions. * * * In his final demonstration, called the ascension, which closed the earthly record of Jesus, he rose above the physical knowledge of his disciples, and the material senses saw him no more. His students then received the Holy Ghost. By this is meant that by all they had witnessed and suffered, they were roused to an enlarged understanding of divine Science;”^[87] “The advent of this understanding is what is meant by the descent of the Holy Ghost;”^[88] “Our master reappeared to his students,—to their apprehension he rose from the grave,—on the third day of his ascending thought, and so presented to them the certain sense of eternal Life.”^[89] The Revelator is quoted with explanatory interpolations thus: “I am he that liveth, and was dead (not understood); and, behold, I am alive for evermore (Science has explained me).”^[90]

It is impossible for Mrs. Eddy to believe in the resurrection of Jesus, because the body per se is an evil. Jesus therefore in coming into the highest glory must have gotten rid of it. If he had departed from it while it was in the tomb he would not have returned to it. So there was no separation of soul and body in the time from the crucifixion to the morning of the so-called resurrection. She will not accept the fact of the resurrection and yet she will hold to the Bible. So she attempts to patch up this difficulty in the above fashion. She interprets the Bible according to her philosophy.

But Spinoza disposes of Christ's resurrection in the same way and from the same philosophic necessity. He says: “I accept Christ's passion, death, and burial literally, as you do, but His resurrection I understand allegorically. I admit, that it is related by the Evangelists in such detail that we cannot deny that they themselves believed Christ's body to have risen from the dead.”^[91] What he means by “allegorically” is explained elsewhere thus: “I therefore conclude, that the resurrection of Christ from the dead was in reality spiritual, and that to the faithful alone, according to their understanding, it was revealed that Christ was endowed with eternity, and had risen from the dead (using dead in the sense in which Christ said, ‘let the dead bury their dead’).”^[92]

With the exception that Spinoza believes there was a literal dying of Christ and Mrs. Eddy does not, on which point their disagreement is of almost no significance, the parallel is all that we could wish and all that Christian Scientists may regret. Both hold that Christ's body was not raised from the dead, that the disciples thought it was, that “dead” in this connection means without understanding and that the result secured by this illusion of the disciples was the realization that Christ's nature is eternal.

This remarkable exegitical maneuvre is not original either with Spinoza. It may be traced as far back as Synesius. Alice Gardner wonders why it is that Synesius singles out the resurrection of Christ as the one miracle that he rejects. Though writing fascinatingly of the character of this interesting personality she does not appreciate the fact that his philosophy, which he resolved not to give up, compelled him to reject especially the miracle of the resurrection.^[93] But it does not appear that it prevented him from accepting miracles in general.

And in this connection it should be noted that Mrs. Eddy and Spinoza do not explain the other miracles as they do the resurrection. They deny the fact of the resurrection. But in regard to the other miracles, they did occur but they were all natural events and should not really be termed miracles. Thus they keep together, in their serpentine course in the underbrush of subtle speculation.

Now, Synesius, contrary to the many of his day, understood the resurrection to be “a holy mystery,” or as Dr. C. Bigg thinks he means, an allegory, which Spinoza understood it to be as he expressly affirms. That is, the resurrection is a pious fraud, a white lie. Synesius argues in defense of his position, that lying is necessary, that deception is better than naked truth for the common run of people, who are unable “to gaze on infinite light.”^[94] To tell them plainly that Christ has a spiritual and immaterial nature was letting too much light shine upon their eyes. It would blind them. So they must be duped and by degrees gotten to this spiritual insight.

The position of Synesius is the same as that of Spinoza and Mrs. Eddy, namely, that if a trick had not been worked upon the disciples, making them believe that the body of Christ was raised up, they would never have been brought to believe in his existence as independent of and free from the body, which is the significance of the ascension, which was another illusion; for it must have been a descension or cessation of the body rather than an ascension or a perpetuation of it. Thus by this enlightening illusion the disciples become gloriously disillusionized. By seeing their Lord ascend into a cloud, in a body that they recognized, they learn that he has no body at all. One who can really so reason must have a legion of dull demons dancing in his “dome.” If that be understanding or true knowledge then pray let ignorance be our portion forever.

The writer hopes that one can understand Christian Science without becoming a fool; but he is convinced that one cannot both understand it and believe it without losing the ability to think consistently. Christian Science paralyzes the power of reason. It is a microbe that feeds upon the logical faculty.

Some playful boys, it is said, took the sign of a cabinet maker, “All kinds of twisting and turning done here,” and put it over the office door of an attorney. Not for fun but for truth's sake, I hang the same sign over the firm of Spinoza & Eddy, Specialists in Adapting Pagan Theology to the Modern Mind. And I remind the reader that the point of interest is not mainly that they both are proficient in the art of “twisting and turning” but that the female member of the firm does exactly the same kind of “twisting and turning” that was done by the male member, and that she has been much more lucky, than he was, in hitting upon a good market for her wares. He was frank and discovered plainly his goat's hair. She is foxy and hides in a great show of sheep's wool.

It is somewhat comforting to orthodox people to discover that the claim of a type of scholarship, that miracles are best understood as “pretty parables,” is nothing other than the ancient voice of Baal brought down to date by the addition of a certain critical tone; the voice of Baal, I say, whose priestess Jezebel dieth not and changeth not. She was not slain on Carmel where her puppet-prophets perished. She was much in evidence when John on Patmos received and delivered the last revelation,^[95] and she yet speaketh lies and worketh abominations and deceiveth if possible the saints. Blessed is he that is not infected with the breath of her mouth or with the poison that droppeth from her pen.

As the trinity as interpreted by Mrs. Eddy has to do with the nature of man and the character of Christ, it seems proper to take up that subject here. The reader perhaps has discerned in this discussion already certain general features of the doctrine as taught by Mrs. Eddy and seen clearly that it is not in harmony with the Biblical doctrine of the trinity. Mrs. Eddy's explanation of the trinity is this. The Father, Son and Holy Ghost are three expressions of one being. They are not persons but manifestations. Besides, the New Testament terms do not give us, she thinks, the best symbolizing or presentation of the trinity. The trinity is best expressed by the three words, life, truth, and love. The trinity of Christian Science is not a tripersonality but a triple manifestation, which may be seen in nature and man as well as in divinity.

Mrs. Eddy says: “The Ego is revealed as Father, Son and Holy Ghost, but the full Truth is found only in Divine Science where we see God as Life, Truth, and Love;”^[96] “Life, Truth, and Love constitute the triune person called God,—that is, the triply divine Principle, Love. They represent a trinity in unity, three in one,—the same in essence, though multiform in office: God the father-mother; Christ the spiritual idea of sonship; divine Science or the Holy Comforter. These three express in divine Science the three-fold, essential nature of the infinite. They also indicate the divine Principle of scientific being, the intelligent relation of God to man and the universe;”^[97] “The advent of this understanding is what is meant by the descent of the Holy Ghost;”^[98] “Compare man before the mirror to his divine Principle, God. Call the mirror divine Science, and call man the reflection. Then note how true, according to Christian Science, is the reflection to its original;”^[99] “Firmament, or understanding, united Principle to its idea. Life and (or) Intelligence (corresponds to) this Principle; idea (corresponds to) the universe and man.”^[100]

In addition to the points above specified notice that in the last quotation especially we have the clue to the original source of the Christian Science trinity. The terms show that Mrs. Eddy does not follow the Neoplatonists verbally and also that they were not, at least in the first edition of Science and Health, selected with technical discrimination but her thought, which is easily apprehended, is an exact reproduction of theirs. Her trinity as explained more fully consists first of a thinking subject called principle; secondly, of its object of thought called an idea and corresponding to man and the universe; and, thirdly, of a mental act called the understanding by which subject and object or mind and its idea are united as one.

As to the three words which she claims give the best expression of the trinity, the first, life, has no special significance and is simply a synonym for God or mind. The second, truth, is well chosen as it is her common synonym for Christ, and as truth also implies two things, a thinking subject and an object of thought clearly discerned. The third word, love, is selected with fine discrimination, since it is with Mrs. Eddy and her masters not only a synonym for understanding or intelligence, by which the subject and object are united as one; but since it also suggests an affinity or mutual attraction between them by virtue of which they are eternally affianced and are essentially one. Mrs. Eddy, or someone who has given literary finish to her writings, is a workman in words that needeth not to be ashamed. In this instance she shares honors quite equally with Spinoza.

The Christian Science trinity may be called the psychological trinity or the trinity of nature when nature is conceived ideally. It is also good form for a pantheism that would have a semblance, without the substance, of the Christian religion.

This naturalistic and idealistic trinity is easily traced back through Hegel and Spinoza to the Neoplatonists. Hegel, as we have before pointed out, used the words thesis, antithesis and synthesis for his high development and attenuation of the doctrine.

The following sentences from Spinoza identify the naturalistic trinity and theological trinity in language as definite though not so detailed as Mrs. Eddy's. He says: “The infinite intellect, which we named the son of God, must from all eternity be in nature;”^[101] “With regard to the Eternal Son of God, that is the Eternal Wisdom of God, which has manifested itself in all things and especially in the human mind, and above all in Christ Jesus, the case is far otherwise.”^[102] Notice in these sentences that Spinoza conceives of Christ as a wisdom or a truth or a principle that is manifest in nature and in men, as it was preeminently in him who is known as Christ Jesus. That is, Christ is a manifestation of wisdom or understanding and not a person. Notice also that in this connection Spinoza has the order of the words, Christ Jesus, which Mrs. Eddy says that she prefers^[103] rather than Jesus Christ, as Christ is the designation of a quality in the person Jesus, namely, wisdom or understanding. Spinoza also confuses the Spirit that the disciples received after the resurrection of Jesus with Christ or wisdom as we have found Mrs. Eddy doing. He says: “Because this wisdom was made especially manifest through Jesus Christ, as was said. His disciples, insofar as it was revealed to them by Him, preached it and showed that they were able beyond others to rejoice in this Spirit of Christ.”^[104] Spinoza's suggested inference is that the disciples only saw Jesus after the resurrection, that is, they were the only ones that thought that they saw him; that is, their delusion was their wisdom. Mrs. Eddy had a good guide in sophistry.

It can be easily seen that the interpretation of Christ as given by Spinoza and Mrs. Eddy requires that the Holy Spirit be considered as nothing else than the spirit of wisdom or understanding, which he possessed and which the disciples received when they learned that the resurrection was to be understood spiritually. It explains also how Mrs. Eddy can be so bold as to call Christian Science the Holy Ghost, since as she claims both give us the true knowledge of the unity of God, man and the universe.

Now the philosophic basis for this kind of trinity is found in Neoplatonism; or rather it is the Neoplatonic trinity amplified so as to embrace the Biblical trinity. Or stated still more accurately, it is an explaining away of the Biblical trinity in order to make it harmonize with the psychological trinity of the Neoplatonists.

Plotinus says: “Intellect, intelligence and the intelligible are one and the same thing.”^[105] He argues that creation is related to the creator as the image “in water, in mirrors or in shadows”^[106] is related to its object, in that the image exists by virtue of the object, thus furnishing the basis for the like figure of Mrs. Eddy's sentence above. Proclus says: “Since thinking is the medium between that which thinks and the object of thought, these are the same, thinking likewise will be the same with each.”^[107] Now, consider the sweeping significance that these statements must have when uttered by the founders of a system of idealism, the psychology of which becomes essentially its metaphysics. Existence in toto has three aspects, the knowing subject, the known object and the act of knowing and these three are one, namely, existence itself, or God. This is certainly a sort of trinity. But how the Biblical trinity should be confounded with this idealism is a marvel indeed.

Spinoza says: “This truth seems to have been dimly recognized by those Jews who maintained that God, God's intellect, and the things understood by God are identical,”^[108] and that “independent of God there are no objects of His knowledge, but that He Himself is the object of his knowledge, indeed He is that knowledge.”^[109]

It is evident then that Spinoza's interpretation of the Biblical trinity is a logical result of his Neoplatonic psychology and metaphysics and that the same is true of Mrs. Eddy's identical interpretation. I ask the reader to compare carefully the last quotation from Mrs. Eddy with those from Plotinus, Proclus and Spinoza. This important phase of the case rests thus with him.

Prof. W. N. Clarke in his brilliant work, “An Outline of Christian Theology,” would explain the Biblical trinity in about the same way as Mrs. Eddy and Spinoza do. But he does not tell us where the roots of the theory grow. To read all this into the first verses of the Gospel of John is the accommodation, not the interpretation, of Scripture. Plato, too long hast thou worn the crovni in Zion! It is time now for his Lordship to be recognized whose right it is to reign there.

In concluding this chapter it is proper to point out how natural it is from the anthropology and Christology of Mrs. Eddy for her to make the claims which she does for herself as compared with Jesus of Nazareth. She claims equality with him, if not superiority over him. This is very natural and even necessary for one who holds that Jesus is divine as all men are but that he came to the highest possible understanding of truth for his age and on as far as ours when she herself favors humanity with the complete development of his system and the finality of revelation. Christian Science presents to us a trio of great revelators, Moses,^[110] Jesus, Eddy, each emitting light according to his time and place in the upward march of the race. Now according to the logic of evolution, the last is greatest.

This makes it plain, I repeat, how Mrs. Eddy with the serenity of an angel of light can take a seat by the side of, if not above, Jesus of Nazareth.

Mrs. Eddy says: “No person can compass or fulfill the individual mission of Jesus of Nazareth. No person can take the place of the author of Science and Health, the discoverer and founder of Christian Science;”^[111] “He (Jesus) expressed the highest type of divinity, which a fleshly form could express in that age;”^[112] “The Ego is revealed as Father, Son and Holy Ghost, but the full Truth is found only in Divine Science where we see God as Life, Truth, and Love;”^[113] “If the author of the Christian Science text-book call on this Board (of Directors of the First Church of Christ Scientist, in Boston, Mass.) for household help, or a handmaid, the Board shall immediately appoint a proper member of the Church therefor, and the appointee shall go immediately in obedience to the call. ‘He that loveth Father or mother more than me is not worthy of me’.”^[114]

Notice in the above sentences these points: Mrs. Eddy claims a distinct mission for herself that is comparable with that of Jesus of Nazareth; she suggests that Jesus' expression of divinity was limited by the age in which he lived; she claims to teach the complete truth concerning the trinity which she affirms was not fully revealed by Jesus and the Apostles in the Scriptures, that is, her revelation as to the trinity is superior to Christ's. She demands manual and menial service for herself that Jesus never demanded for himself, but on the contrary rendered to others; and she does this, assuming the same spiritual authority over souls that Jesus claimed for himself.

As a Christian who regards Jesus Christ as the Holy One of God and all men and women as poor sinners, whose hope is in his infinite superiority over them, that is in his divinity, I am tempted to rise up in righteous indignation and call Mrs. Eddy's claims blasphemy. But as an expounder of Christian Science and as one who appreciates Mrs. Eddy's mental gymnastics and speaks as representing her, I prefer to say: “Hold you indignant Christian! There is no place in the real and true man for passion. Such turbulent feelings arise from ignorance, as all imperfections do. It is not blasphemy at all. It is sublime understanding. It is divine metaphysics. When you free yourself from the illusions and delusions of the flesh, or learn the little trick that all is mind, then you also by the aid of Christ the way-shower, and of me the discoverer of Christian Science or the Holy Ghost, may take a seat along with us two, the male originator and the female finisher of real Christianity. Oh, you poor Christian, in bondage all your life-time to fear, do not be bothered about sin or blasphemy, all which is unreal. When Jesus used these words he was simply accommodating himself to the limited mentality of the unscientific countrymen of an obscure people of a materialistic age. What you need is to think, to think powerfully, that is metaphysically. And when you learn this art, before you even observe the process and as quick as thought you will find yourself on the same lofty summit of divine vision with us where all is mind. No, it is not blasphemy. It is ecstacy. It is mind realizing its emancipation, sitting serenely upon its throne and, regnant with power, smiting the darkness with the scepter of light.

Again I exhort you, excited Christian, not to be controlled by passion but to think, to think calmly and imperially until all things are understood and you have peace in the consciousness of universal harmony. Yes, be at peace, troubled Christian and do not fear blasphemy. Do not fear anything, neither the devil for he does not exist; nor God, for he cannot become angry; nor hell, for it is subjective only, and you cast it out when you cast fear out. Just think and understand and be divine. Take my narcotic and go to sleep and sleep a sleep that is sweet and deep and ‘from which none ever wakes to weep.’

But I almost forgot, pliable Christian, that there is one thing that you must fear. You must fear me. And if you happen to be a member of the Mother Church and I want you for a housemaid you must, at the order of the directors of said church, cease whatever you may be occupied with, even though it be the ascent to the summit of spirituality, and do menial work for me. Yes, for my sake you must descend again to the sphere of materiality; and refusal to obey my call dooms you to the loss of spirituality forever. Yes, you presumptuous Christian, I will tell you whom you must fear. You must fear me, who am able to destroy your soul in materiality forever.”

So bent is Mrs. Eddy on creating reverence for herself that to accomplish this result she violates the laws of her psychology. However, her claim to be equal with or even superior to Christ is quite logical and in perfect accord with her anthropological principles. It is very convenient to possess that Emersonian greatness that exempts one from paying toll to consistency! Simon says thumbs down—thumbs up, wiggle-waggle! Selah!

1. Cf. S. and H. p. 115.
2. Cf. S. and H. pp. 515 and 503.
3. Cf. S. and H. p. 336; p. 503.
4. S. and H. p. 204.
5. Retros. and Intros. p. 40.
6. No and Yes. p. 25.
7. S. and H. p. 336.
8. S. and H. p. 302.
9. S. and H. p. 91.
10. S. and H. p. 200.
11. S. and H. p. 29.
12. S. and H. p. 115.
13. S. and H. p. 267.
14. S. and H. p. 244.
15. Cf. Eth. 5. 23.
16. Cf. 5. 9. 10.
17. Unity of Good p. 13.
18. S. and H. p. 468. cf. p. 200.
19. S. and H. p. 246.
20. S. and H. p. 249.
21. S. and H. p. 598f.
22. S. and H. p. 353.
23. 3. 7. 5. cf. 3. 7. 3.
24. Cf. 5. 1. 4.
25. 3. 7. 1.
26. Eth. 5. 23. Note.
27. Cf. 3. 7. 3.
28. Cf. Eth. 1. 33. Note 2.
29. 5. 9. 10.
30. 5. 1. 4. Tr. by Fuller.
31. Aux. 44.
32. Cf. S. and H. p. 217 and p. 259.
33. Cf. Plotinus in Ennead, 5. 9. 10.
34. Cf. Plotinus, Enneads, 6. 7. 41 and 5. 1. 4. cf. Porphyry, Aux. 44. cf. Proclus in Theo. Ele. 169.
35. S. and H. p. 361.
36. S. and H. p. 257.
37. In Zeitschrift fur Exacte Philosophie. Vol. 8, p. 363. cf. also Schwegler's Hist. of Phil. p. 220.
38. Cf. S. and H. p. 597.
39. S. and H. p. 597.
40. S. and H. p. 206.
41. S. and H. p. 144.
42. S. and H. p. 151. cf. p. 424.
43. Eth. 2. 49. Corollary, Proof.
44. Eth. 2. 48.
45. Cf. Eth. 2. 7. Note and 2. 9.
46. Eth. 2. 44. Proof.
47. Prov. 2. (p. 22.)
48. S. and H. p. 424.
49. S. and H. p. 259.
50. S. and H. p. 258. cf. p. 215.
51. Cf. Hegel's Philosophy of History. Part 3, Sec. 3. Chap. 2.
52. Cf. Treasury of Illustration. p. 470.
53. S. and H. p. 540. cf. p. 579f.
54. There is proof, however, that Mrs. Eddy believed that Jesus came by degrees to that perfection of character which was attained by the complete reign of the Christ in him. Cf. S. and H. pp. 30, 32, and 53. But her inconsistencies are many. Some, it may be, she did not see but some, the most, it seems, are the necessary result of her false premises.
55. S. and H. p. 54. cf. p. 50.
56. S. and H. p. 29. cf. p. 331.
57. S. and H. p. 473. cf. pp. 135, 34, 35, 333.
58. S. and H. p. 333.
59. S. and H. p. 332.
60. S. and H. p. 333.
61. S. and H. p. 333.
62. S. and H. p. 332.
63. S. and H. p. 334.
64. S. and H. p. 52.
65. S. and H. p. 243.
66. S. and H. p. 30.
67. S. and H. p. 38.
68. No and Yes. p. 45.
69. S. and H. p. 332.
70. S. and H. p. 30 cf. p. 137.
71. S. and H. p. 134.
72. S. and H. p. 127.
73. Unity of Good p. 64.
74. S. and H. p. 116.
75. Cf. S. and H. p. 333.
76. Cf. Synesius of Cyrene by Alice Gardner p. 89.
77. 3. 8. 11.
78. On Tim. Quoted in Select Works of Plotinus p. 323.
79. Kurzg. Abh. 2. 22. (p. 97.) Tr. fr. German, cf. 1. 9. (p. 39.)
80. Letter, 21.
81. Theo.-Pol Treat. Chap. 1.
82. Cf. Aux. 41.
83. S. and H. p. 51.
84. S. and H. p. 44.
85. S. and H. p. 46.
86. S. and H. p. 46.
87. S. and H. p. 46 f.
88. S. and H. p. 43.
89. S. and H. p. 509.
90. S. and H. p. 334.
91. Letter, 25.
92. Letter, 23.
93. Cf. Synesius of Cyrene, p. 109 f.
94. Neoplatonism p. 339 f.
95. Cf. Rev. 2:20-23.
96. Unity of Good. p. 64.
97. S. and H. p. 331f.
98. S. and H. p. 43.
99. S. and H. p. 515 f. cf. p. 467.
100. S. and H. First Edition, p. 230. The parenthetical words are the writer's.
101. Kurzg. Abh. 2. 22. (p. 97.) Trans. from German Version.
102. Letter, 21.
103. S. and H. p. 333.
104. Letter, 21. Trans. from German Version.
105. 6. 7. 41. cf. 5. 1. 4. cf. Porphyry, Aux. 44.
106. 6. 4. 10.
107. Theo. Ele. 169.
108. Eth. 2. 7. Note. The great Jew, Maimonides, so taught. Cf. Pollock's Spinoza; His Life and Philosophy, p. 95.
109. Cog. Met. Part 2. Chap. 7. cf. Kurzg. Abh. 2. 22. (p. 97.)
110. Cf. S. and H. p. 200.
111. Retros. and Intros. p. 96.
112. S. and H. p. 332.
113. Unity of Good. p. 64.
114. Manual of the Mother Church, p. 93.