SUBJECT — LIFE
John 14: 6. I am the way the Truth and the Life; no man cometh to the Father but by meJohn 14:6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.
1st What is the "I" referred As Written: refered to in the textJohn 14:6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.
2nd Is Life both matter and Spirit
3rd What is Life
4th What is death, and what is the the condition of man after death
[*]Editorial Note: A squiggly line appears at this point in the document. It seems to delineate the list of topics to be covered from the body of the text.The "I" referred As Written: refered to in the textJohn 14:6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. is not a person, it is a Principle it is not a man it is God. Jesus said "the words I speak unto you I speak not of myself.John 14:9 Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Shew us the Father? John 14:10 Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works. " Jesus was a man, he first became obvious to the personal senses as a babe whose infant wailings blended As Written: blent with the bleating of the goat and the lowing of the kineEditorial Note: Kine refers to a group of cows. The narrative of the birth of Jesus Christ, as given in the Gospel of Luke, has the baby Jesus laid "in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn." See Luke 2:7. , in a remote Judean province. "In JosephusEditorial Note: Flavius Josephus was a first century Romano-Jewish historian, whose Antiquities of the Jews contains two references to Jesus Christ. time there were several individuals by the name of Jesus" — Jesus was not Christ; Christ was but another name for GodEditorial Note: Christ is the Greek translation of the Hebrew, “Messiah.”, and it was an honorary title bestowed on Jesus for his great goodnessEditorial Note: Jesus was widely regarded by early Christians as the Messiah. “Christ” is the Greek translation of Messiah, and thus “Jesus Christ” literally meant “Jesus the Messiah.”. In the original texts, the term God took its origin from the word good, — hence the term Christ-Jesus, a good man. [*]Editorial Note: A metamark that looks like an X appears at this point in the manuscript. In the passage "I" am the way the Truth and the Life, the "I" alluded to is God— the divine Principle of the man Jesus and was that which guided his way in ScienceEditorial Note: Christian Science; To this divine Intelligence the different periods have affixed the terms Deity, Jehovah, Christ, and God. These terms should be understood to express God as divine Substance and Intelligence that belong not to man neither to a person; but are an infinite Principle. The gross materialism, at the commencement of the Christian As Written: christian era, required a very spiritual man to teach a divine Principle and to show by his own demonstration what this Principle is and the results of understanding it Jesus was the man for the age he could best explain Life as God but his rules and their illustration were misinterpreted, the God Principle of the man was not understood, had it been they must have admitted that Jesus' demonstration proved his Principle and his Principle explained his demonstration. Truth and Life understood cast out error, heal the sick, raise the dead, and this demonstration brings to light the Truth of Life and the Life of Truth. One fact in Jesus history is clearly apparent namely, that his Principle, rule and method of healing were mind not matter, that he required not drugs, dogma or doctrine to aid his work.
He only insisted on making the fount pure to make the streams pure, he argued that mind must first be right to set the body right, that we should know the Principle of man, and better understand God. Yea that we should have the Science of Life for without it the demonstration of Life or Truth can never be made . Science demands a healthy mind and a healthy body mind healthy and because it is imbued with Truth, and the body healthy because it is governed by this mind. The entire tenor of Jesus' teachings were first to set thought right with the Truth of being 2nd To learn how to govern the body by this Truth 3rd To govern the body by it. Believing As Written: Believeing that God is a person, hinders the understanding of this divine Principle and its demonstration . We cannot demonstrate a person, therefor a person is not the power that heals the sick in Science; we can ask a person to doctor our sicknesses and to forgive our sins, and that is all we can do but we can do more than that with a Principle, we can work it our selves to this result and following its divine rule with we can destroy sickness sin and death and this in accordance with scripture; work out your own salvation for it is God that worketh in you Phil 2:12 Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. Phil 2:13 For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure. Truth destroys error even as light destroys darkness. Sin sickness and death are error they are beliefs and this and this fact found out will at if length destroy them. Truth evolves Life as a result of itself for truth is immortal the truth of Life would destroys death.[*]Editorial Note: A metamark that looks like an X appears at this point in the manuscript. But this understanding comes slowly even to learn that matter has no sensation, is quite a task, although this simple proposition is self-evident
In the text ‘ I am the way the Truth and the Life and no man cometh to the Father except through meJohn 14:6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. we naturally ask what is this way referred As Written: refered to [*]Editorial Note: A metamark that looks like an X appears at this point in the manuscript. the way to harmony and the demonstration thereof is through the understanding of its Principle by which we can produce the harmony a person believed in is insufficent — the way therefore for this is Science and no man cometh to the Father o that is can understand the Principle of Being except through Science Through Science alone can we learn Life and demonstrate our understanding of it with Life and not death scriptures tell us that perfect love casteth out fearI John 4:18 There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love. , but this first commandment is our very last resort? we are even taught to fear God when it is science to so love goodness that we possess the power of good to heal and save If we understood God we should have no cause to fear Him we should know that He never punished a man for doing good, never made a law to produce softening of the brain because of over-much humanity, or perfect Love, and the fear of such a law and the consequences thereof would be cast out, by a correct idea of God. We may talk to you of Metaphysics, its divine Principle, rule and applicationonce every week, but this gives you little insight into the Life through which we learned Metaphysics and through you must learn it. This weekly service however, may point the way like a milestone that is all the apostleEditorial Note: Paul says how can we hear without a preacher and how can we preach except we be sentRom 10:13 For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. Rom 10:14 How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? and how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher? Rom 10:15 And how shall they preach, except they be sent? as it is written, How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things! Paul knew that a theoretical drill, and the grinding of scholastic mills, are not the preparation for a moral teacher He knew that inspiration cometh from Truth, from the Spirit, and not the letter;II Cor 3:4 And such trust have we through Christ to God-ward: II Cor 3:5 Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think any thing as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is of God; II Cor 3:6 Who also hath made us able ministers of the new testament; not of the letter, but of the spirit: for the letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life. a child God-driven is more capable of uttering Truth in its sweet simplicity and the power of Love than a merely As Written: merly manufactured Theologian ; hence the scripture out of the mouth of babes hath thou perfected praisePs 8:2 Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast thou ordained strength because of thine enemies, that thou mightest still the enemy and the avenger. Matt 21:15 And when the chief priests and scribes saw the wonderful things that he did, and the children crying in the temple, and saying, Hosanna to the son of David; they were sore displeased, Matt 21:16 And said unto him, Hearest thou what these say? And Jesus saith unto them, Yea; have ye never read, Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise? We all shall know when Truth is at work in science for it will heal our sicknesses and stop our sins. In the exact proportion that we understand Truth will it heal us mind and body. and in the proportion that we adopt error will it produce sin sickness and death
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2nd Is Life both matter and Spirit? Life is so considered; even the scriptures referred As Written: referd to it thus in the dark ages of burnt offerings and Sacrifices see Genesis 9..- 4.. But the flesh with the life thereof which is the blood thereof shall ye not eatGen 9:4 But flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat. ; but this was ritualism a materialistic religion which deluged the earth with blood. In the gospel of the more spiritual Christianity, we learn Life oppositely In Romans 8. 6. we read for to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is Life and peaceRom 8:6 For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. . Isaiah As Written: Isaih 38. 16. Oh Lord by these things men live and in all these things is the life of my SpiritIsa 38:16 O Lord, by these things men live, and in all these things is the life of my spirit: so wilt thou recover me, and make me to live. Romans 8._2. For the law of the Spirit of Life hath made me free from the law of sin and deathRom 8:2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. . 2nd Timothy Christ who hath abolished death and hath brought Life and Immortality to light through the gospelII Tim 1:10 But is now made manifest by the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ, who hath abolished death, and hath brought life and immortality to light through the gospel: .
Our conceptions of Life as Spirit come of Science and they exalt the aims, consecrate the motives and purify the affections; but our conceptions of life as matter debase subjugate and make mortal. The only evidence we have of material life is furnished by the five personal senses, and what are these senses, but matter? nerves and brains are as directly matter as a shoe string, or a jelly. Through optics, olfactory As Written: olofactory or tympanumEditorial Note: The tympanum , or tympanic membrane, is another name for the eardrum., we can obtain not the slightest sense of Deity, we can neither see, hear, taste nor smell Life, therefore it is self evident, that Life dwells not in that through which it is impossible to gain the least idea of Life Anatomy would have it that blood and nerves inform us correctly regarding a man's life, when it is plain that Life is Spirit and that matter can take no cognizance of Spirit. Again, we say nerves recognize life, and life is organic but how can nerves feel or recognize Life more than a stone or any form of matter can feel it or take cognizance of it The only Life the personal senses recognize As Written: recogniz is through mortal mind and a belief of structure that accident may destroy according to another belief. Life is Spirit and never matter, nor can it be structural, since it is Infinite. Again we say, nerves recognize Life as beginning As Written: begining and ending even from the fading As Written: fadeing flower to the falling world, from the death of the grass to the death of a man. But while nerves are thus falsely testifying of Life and death, something is ever saying, "I live," I am, and what is more I am learning that Life is mind and not matter, and that mind forms its own ideals of all things that mortal mind peoples the vegetable, animal, and mineral kingdoms with creations of its own, giving to each and all its own mortal outline form and color. While the formations of immortal mind or God are indestructible As Written: indestructable harmonious and eternal The side of nature which seems to the senses matter, is but the veil As Written: vail that hides the reality of being; the visible universe is but the picture of the minds ideas, the expression of thoughts, In the words of Starr KingEditorial Note: Thomas Starr King (1824–1864) was a prominent Unitarian/Universalist minister who took a strong stand for the Union during the Civil War. Eddy is likely referring to this passage from Starr King’s The White Hills: Their Legends, Landscape, and Poetry (1876): “Nature is hieroglyphic. Each prominent fact in it is like a type; its final use is to set up one letter of the infinite alphabet, and help us by its connections to read some statement or statute applicable to the conscious world” (p.394). the hieroglyphic record of the art and meditation of Deity There is not a planet that wheels a tiny circle around its controlling flame, not a sun that sheds its steady radiance upon the dark depths of neighboring space, not a comet that rushes through its eccentric As Written: excentric track, not a constellation among all that hang like fantastic chandeliers upon the dome of heaven, that is not the visible statement of a conception which dwells in the Omnipotent Mind. It is through the silent command of Mind that the morning light bursts like a wave of glory over the orderly universe
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The materialist feels the ground to be solid beneath his feet, but the scientistEditorial Note: Christian Scientist feels with more certainty the solidity of Truth. The eternal permanent side of things is unseen by the senses. A man may have just as much Life as he pleases if he goes to work right [*]Editorial Note: A metamark that looks like an X appears at this point in the manuscript. by understanding Life we accumulate it even as the muscles grow by use, we have just as much Life as we have of Truth goodness virtue, etc,. What is Life? It is Spirit — What is Spirit? God. What is God? Mind — unerringAs Written:unering, infinite and eternal Mind — But is God the Life driven like an insensible nail in and out of matter? does matter master Life God and Life God have nothing to say for itself? Do we ask the consent or refusal of Mind to be born a babe, or to die and old decrepit As Written: decepit man? is not the protest or acquiescence As Written: acquiessence of mind on such important events heeded less than than the whine of a dog at your door? But Science does not thus reckon As Written: reckone the prerogatives As Written: prerogitives of mind, rather hath it crowned mind with Life, might, majesty and immortality. I am not a PanthiestEditorial Note: Pantheist to believe that God is in matter, when the less material a man is the nearer he is to Spirit, God, and when divested of all matter, and never until then, this divine Principle will enfold him in bliss and glory. [*]Editorial Note: A metamark that looks like an X appears at this point in the manuscript. Health, Life and morals will never reach their maxiumEditorial Note: This word is likely maximum. until we relinquish the belief that matter has aught to do with Life In physics we say, life is imprisoned within its own formations, that Life is subject to germanationEditorial Note: germination, growth, maturity, and decay; but here the ancient question presents itself, which is first, the egg or the bird? the flower or the seed? if the egg is first, whence came the egg? And if the bird is first what is the origin of the bird? If there were no flower, whence came its seed for you say without the seed there can be no flower; although the — Scripture informs us. He made every plant before it was in the groundGen 2:4 ¶These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens, Gen 2:5 And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the Lord God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground. — Mind and Mind only is the creator — Science impresses deeply the lesson that there is a causal power and stability in the world of mind, and its creations, of which the material is only the transitory show, every thing we touch or see is but the shape and color of a thought that lies behind We learn in Metaphysics that Life is in the thought instead of the thing it has expressed, and that this thought hath Immortality only in proportion to its correctness That Life never enters its own formations for Life is Infinite; that mind never enters the limits of its own thoughts for Life and Mind are one. [*]Editorial Note: A metamark that looks like an X appears at this point in the manuscript.
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I am glad there is but one God, but one Life, and this one is shadowed forth in order, beauty and goodness, I am glad that evil hath no life or immortality, that mortal pain-givvingEditorial Note: giving sources are but the things of belief, dreams and not realities, the vagaries of the mortal and not the Immortal thought and that this shall sometime be learned and the body be free as the pinions of a bird and every sense of weakness or or of pain shall disappear [*]Editorial Note: A metamark that looks like an X appears at this point in the manuscript. [*]Editorial Note: A metamark that looks like an X appears at this point in the manuscript. 4 th [*]Editorial Note: A metamark that looks like an X appears at this point in the manuscript. What is death and what is the condition of man after death? This question has met with its reply in the foregoing answers to other questions but if Metaphysics are made more apparent by a treatise on death, by dealing with nothing as if it were something, we will allude briefly to this unexplored mystery of sense. Do we need a more impressive revelation of the fact that Truth and thought alone are permanent, than the bare conception of the death of matter, for we know there is in reality no death that mind cannot die, and all that is eternal is mind and its ideals But age may not be ready to accept this fact, it never is ready to accept at first the first facts of a Principle. But for all this we must repeat the facts all the same until they are understood
The pains and pleasures of the body are but beliefs entertained by mortal thoughts, for matter can neither suffer nor enjoy. If mind says I am happy, the result will be happiness and vice versa for nothing can talk above mind, the clay cannot reply to the potter why hast thou made me thus? matter cannot say I am weak I am sick I am wretched, I am dying, or I am dead; true, erring or mortal belief can say this of what it names matter but matter cannot say it matter is as much alive when we call it dead as it ever was and as dead when we call it alive.
There is no death. mind cannot die, and matter has no life, hence there is nothing left for death to claim — Paul saw this and said, where is thy sting Oh death, and where Oh grave is thy victory; the sting of death is sin and the strength of sin is the lawI Cor 15:55 O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? I Cor 15:56 The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law. ; he regarded the pangs of death as merely a mortal belief, a suffering of the thought of and not of the body and that mortal thought had made this law of suffering. —
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Some loving heartEditorial Note: The “loving heart” here is probably the unknown author of a letter (593A.61.001) to Mary Baker Eddy, dated March 13, 1880. hath said shall we know each-other there? — and where is that radiant shore, Shall we not seek it and weep no more? Since ever we investigated Metaphysics and traversed in freedom this realm of mind, we have been careful not to overate our discoveries or or to state what we had not first understood — We have not demonstrated the actual state of mans existence beyond the limits of the observation of our senses and only as we reason from deduction is it possible to define this state. any hypothesis beyond this conclusion presupposing the condition of the departed is fully understood is a vain conjecture unsupported by reason or revelation.
From facts apparent to the understanding and gathered from the Science of Soul we know that man is Immortal and that the shadow we call death is but a phase of mortal belief No change has been wrought when we say, "my friend has just died ; that friend is saying in the full consciousness of existence and with its same surroundings — I never died X It was but a dream I had; for Life is going on with me the same as before I am not spirit yet I am as much flesh and bones as I ever were The only change to me is I cannot communicate with my friends and why? because they do not understand me now They call me spirit, but I am not, they As Written: thy say I died, but I did not; they do not know what I am, where I am or what I am pursuing As Written: persuing I shall not be spirit until I lose all limits; they have lost their evidences of me through their personal senses because they have said I changed, I died; their mistaken views of life have parted us, their belief that life ended with me or took upon itself a new form has prevented their understanding the reality of my present existence — hence our separation through these opposite beliefs and our opposite conditions as the result thereof further communication between us is impossible until their belief changes through the footsteps that mine have done and becomes like mine. This change will be named death but that is their belief of it not ours who have rent the veil As Written: vail that hides the mystery of a moment Yes We shall know each other there. We shall love and be loved we shall never looseEditorial Note: lose our identity but find it more and more in its order, beauty and goodness. Men claim to know that pain is a fact although it is unseen, they need to know that peace and bliss are greater facts and that this world is the veil of brighter glory that lies beyond it
So flit before memory the different stages and states of existence. The error gradually disappearing and Truth coming to be understood. Let us rejoice that Life like an opening bud is unfolding to our consciousness the bliss of Being, for Thine are all holy things O Life, strong and divinely free, bearing the bereaved the gifts of wisdom and of chastened love, still brooding o'er them with a dove-like wing, immortally endowed for liberty. Patiently wait all ye who have parted from some earth-idol, remember that naught but broken music flows from joy that is sublunaryAs Written:sublinary, but hope hath its higher goal “"we shall know each other thereEditorial Note: This phrase is found in a nineteenth century hymn titled “Shall we know each other there?” Its words were written by “W. M.,” and set to music by Robert Lowry. One of the verses reads: “Shall we know the friends that greet us, / In the glorious spirit land? / Shall we see the same eyes shining, / On us, as in days of yore? / Shall we feel their dear arms twining / Fondly round us as before?” The phrase is also in another hymn, written by Margaret E. Winslow, and titled, “We shall know each other there.”" a happier oracle a clearer understanding an unwavering light will friendship then become, Life's fuller music will give forth rejoicing tones when heart meets heart , where all lovely gifts and pure are laid upon befitting shrines, joy hath a living fount, a bliss forever. The heart hath vainly sighed, what shall the future be? This is the future, heaven will be thine, but when its Life shall come, no man knoweth not the son but the Father; our sins are not forgiven here or heareafter, for every sin there is a just measure of misery, and death cannot advance our joy, nor make us wiser better or more pure. The Science of all being must be learned ere this is won. Bliss is not the boon of one brief moment After the veil As Written: vail has dropped, we have to learn the same as now our way to heaven, by slow and solemn footsteps, for no man cometh to the Father but through Truth and LoveJohn 14:5 Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how can we know the way? John 14:6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. .