Page:Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures (1898).djvu/194

174 Is Spirit the source or creator of matter? Science reveals nothing in Spirit out of which to create matter.

Science repudiates matter. Spirit is the only substance and consciousness recognized by Science. The senses oppose this: but there are no material senses, for matter has no sensation. To Spirit there is no matter; even as to Truth there is no error, and to Good no evil. It is a false supposition, the notion that there is real substance-matter, the opposite of Spirit. Spirit is God, and God is all; hence He can have no opposite.

That matter is substantial, or has life and sensation, is one of the false beliefs of mortals, and exists only in a supposititious mortal consciousness. Hence, as we approach Spirit and Truth, we lose the consciousness of matter. The admission that there can be material substance requires another admission, — namely, that matter is self-creative, self-existent, and therefore eternal. From this it would follow that there are two eternal causes, warring forever with each other; and yet we say that Spirit is supreme and omnipotent.

The belief of the eternity of matter contradicts the demonstration of Life as Spirit, and leads to the conclusion

that if man is material, he originated in dust and must return to it, — logic which would prove his annihilation.

All that we term sin, sickness, and death is comprised in a belief in matter. We define matter as error,

because it is a false claim to life, substance, and intelligence. Matter, with its beliefs, cannot be substantial if Spirit is Substance. Which