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220 Now, demonstrate this rule, which obtains in every line of mental healing, and you will find that a good rule works one way, and a false rule the opposite way.

Let us suppose that there is a sick person whom another would heal mentally. The healer begins by mental argument. He mentally says, “You are well, and you know it;” and he supports this silent mental force by audible explanation, attestation, and precedent. His mental and oral arguments aim to refute the sick man's thoughts, words, and actions, in certain directions, and turn them into channels of Truth. He persists in this course until the patient's mind yields, and the harmonious thought has the full control over this mind on the point at issue. The end is attained, and the patient says and feels, “I am well, and I know it.”

This mental practitioner has changed his patient's consciousness from sickness to health. The patient's mental state is now the diametrical opposite of what it was when the mental practitioner undertook to transform it, and he is improved morally and physically.

That this mental method has power and bears fruit, is patent both to the conscientious Christian Scientist and the observer. Both should understand with equal clearness, that if this mental process and power be reversed, and people believe that a man is sick and knows it, and speak of him as being sick, put it into the minds of others that he is sick, publish it in the newspapers that he is failing, and persist in this action of mind over mind, it follows that he will believe that he is sick, — and Jesus said it would be according to the woman's belief; but if with the certainty of Science he knows that an error of belief has not the power of Truth, and cannot, does