In the year 1866, I discovered the Christ Science or Christian Science discovereddivine laws of Life, Truth, and Love, and 3named my discovery Christian Science. God had been graciously preparing me during many years for the reception of this final revelation of the ab-6solute divine Principle of scientific mental healing.

    I have set forth Christian Science and its application to the treatment of disease just as I have discovered them. 24Biblical basisI have demonstrated through Mind the effects of Truth on the health, longevity, and morals of men; and I have found nothing in ancient or in modern 27systems on which to found my own, except the teachings and demonstrations of our great Master and the lives of prophets and apostles. The Bible has been my only au-30thority. I have had no other guide in “the straight and narrow way” of Truth.

    If Christendom resists the author’s application of the 127 127:1word Science to Christianity, or questions her use of the word Science, she will not therefore lose faith in Chris-3Science and Christianitytianity, nor will Christianity lose its hold upon her. If God, the All-in-all, be the creator of the spiritual universe, including man, then everything 6entitled to a classification as truth, or Science, must be comprised in a knowledge or understanding of God, for there can be nothing beyond illimitable divinity.

    Whence came to me this heavenly conviction, — a con-viction antagonistic to the testimony of the physical senses? 3According to St. Paul, it was “the gift of the grace of God given unto me by the effectual working of His power.” It was the divine law of Life and Love, unfolding to me 6the demonstrable fact that matter possesses neither sen-sation nor life; that human experiences show the falsity of all material things; and that immortal cravings, “the 9price of learning love,” establish the truism that the only sufferer is mortal mind, for the divine Mind cannot suffer.

12     My conclusions were reached by allowing the evidence of this revelation to multiply with mathematical certainty Demonstrable evidenceand the lesser demonstration to prove the 15greater, as the product of three multiplied by three, equalling nine, proves conclusively that three times three duodecillions must be nine duodecillions, — not 18a fraction more, not a unit less.

    When apparently near the confines of mortal existence, standing already within the shadow of the death-valley, 21Light shining in darknessI learned these truths in divine Science: that all real being is in God, the divine Mind, and that Life, Truth, and Love are all-powerful and ever-24present; that the opposite of Truth, — called error, sin, sickness, disease, death, — is the false testimony of false material sense, of mind in matter; that this false sense 27evolves, in belief, a subjective state of mortal mind which this same so-called mind names matter, thereby shutting out the true sense of Spirit.

30New lines of thought     My discovery, that erring, mortal, misnamed mind produces all the organism and action of the mortal body, set my thoughts to work in new channels, 109 109:1and led up to my demonstration of the proposition that Mind is All and matter is naught as the leading factor in 3Mind-science.

    Christian Science reveals incontrovertibly that Mind is All-in-all, that the only realities are the divine Mind 6Scientific evidence and idea. This great fact is not, however, seen to be supported by sensible evidence, until its divine Principle is demonstrated by healing the sick and 9thus proved absolute and divine. This proof once seen, no other conclusion can be reached.

    For three years after my discovery, I sought the solu-12tion of this problem of Mind-healing, searched the Scrip-Solitary researchtures and read little else, kept aloof from so-ciety, and devoted time and energies to dis-15covering a positive rule. The search was sweet, calm, and buoyant with hope, not selfish nor depressing. I knew the Principle of all harmonious Mind-action to be God, 18and that cures were produced in primitive Christian healing by holy, uplifting faith; but I must know the Science of this healing, and I won my way to absolute 21conclusions through divine revelation, reason, and dem-onstration. The revelation of Truth in the understand-ing came to me gradually and apparently through divine 24power. When a new spiritual idea is borne to earth, the prophetic Scripture of Isaiah is renewedly fulfilled: “Unto us a child is born, . . . and his name shall be 27called Wonderful.”

    The three great verities of Spirit, omnipotence, omni-110110:1presence, omniscience, — Spirit possessing all power, filling all space, constituting all Science, — contradict 3God’s allness learnedforever the belief that matter can be actual. These eternal verities reveal primeval exist-ence as the radiant reality of God’s creation, 6in which all that He has made is pronounced by His wis-dom good.

    Thus it was that I beheld, as never before, the awful 9unreality called evil. The equipollence of God brought to light another glorious proposition, — man’s perfecti-bility and the establishment of the kingdom of heaven on 12earth.

    In following these leadings of scientific revelation, the Bible was my only textbook. The Scriptures were 15Scriptural foundationsillumined; reason and revelation were recon-ciled, and afterwards the truth of Christian Science was demonstrated. No human pen nor tongue 18taught me the Science contained in this book, Science and Health; and neither tongue nor pen can over-throw it. This book may be distorted by shallow criti-21cism or by careless or malicious students, and its ideas may be temporarily abused and misrepresented; but the Science and truth therein will forever remain to be dis-24cerned and demonstrated.