y cure by mental or other means unnecessary? It
seems to me that, by thus allowing the body to become diseased, and then
"curing" it by mental control (even granting that this is the case), we
burn the candle at both ends--for the reason that we devitalize the body
by allowing it to become diseased and then waste more energy in the
mental effort to get well again! Would it not be more simple and more
philosophical so to regulate the life that such diseased states and such
cures are unnecessary?

The fundamentals of Mrs. Eddy's doctrine are well known. God is all in
all; God is good; hence all is good. Sin and sickness are delusions of
poor mortal mind. They do not really exist. And this, they say, may
easily be proved--on the one hand by the cures which take place; and on
the other by the doctrine of idealism, which philosophers and scientists
alike are accepting more and more as a satisfactory interpretation of
the universe. The whole system is very delightful--and very illusory!

In the first place, as to the cures. I must contend that because some
remarkable cures have been effected, that, therefore, the _doctrines_ of
Christian Science are not thereby established. We know similar cures
have been effected at Lourdes; over the bones of saints (which did not
really exist under the sacred cloth); over (fraudulent) "chips of the
Cross"; by means of hypnotism, and in a hundred ways. The whole root of
the matter lies in auto-suggestion; in the patient's faith in himself,
and in the degree of faith he places in the curing object or dogma. The
dogma may be quite false, but the cures are effected just the same.
Because cures are effected by Christian Science methods, therefore, it
is no proof whatever that the Christian Science theology or philosophy
is right. It may be one huge error, but the cures would be effected just
the same--provided the faith, the emotions, the imagination and spirit
of the patient be touched in an appropriate manner.

True it is that science and philosophy tend towards idealism; and the
belief that there is, strictly speaking, "no matter." But this belief
need not make us any the more believers in Christian Science and its
methods. There is a subtle error here which is unperceived by the
majority. When first the truth reaches the mind that there is "no
matter" that matter cannot feel, etc., it bursts like a flood of light
upon the unfettered mind and appears a fact so overwhelmingly great, so
vast