Page:Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures (1906).djvu/412

396 worst of diseases. One should never hold in mind the thought of disease, but should efface from

thought all forms and types of disease, both for one's own sake and for that of the patient.

Avoid talking illness to the patient. Make no unnecessary inquiries relative to feelings or disease. Never

startle with a discouraging remark about recovery, nor draw attention to certain symptoms as unfavorable, avoid speaking aloud the name of the disease. Never say beforehand how much you have to contend with in a case, nor encourage in the patient's thought the expectation of growing worse before a crisis is passed.

The refutation of the testimony of material sense is not a difficult task in view of the conceded falsity of this

testimony. The refutation becomes arduous, not because the testimony of sin or disease is true, but solely on account of the tenacity of belief in its truth, due to the force of education and the overwhelming weight of opinions on the wrong side, — all teaching that the body suffers, as if matter could have sensation.

At the right time explain to the sick the power which their beliefs exercise over their bodies. Give them divine

and wholesome understanding, with which to combat their erroneous sense, and so efface the images of sickness from mortal mind. Keep distinctly in thought that man is the offspring of God, not of man; that man is spiritual, not material; that Soul is Spirit, outside of matter, never in it, never giving the body life and sensation. It breaks the dream of disease to understand that sickness is formed by the human mind, not by matter nor by the divine Mind.