FORWARD

      The multiplication of books has no justification unless something new can be added to the subject-matter under discussion.  
      Nothing can be added to the completeness of Mrs. Eddy’s statement of Christian Science, Science and Health, the textbook of Christian Science, for it is all-sufficient, needing no amplification or elucidation.

      What, then, it may properly be asked, is the reason for this book?
      The answer must rest upon the effectiveness with which it helps the reader to understand Christian Science and so proves “useful” (S. & H. Pref. X:10.) in compelling him to think Science and Health, instead of merely reading its words.
      During the thirty-two years that I have been holding Christian Science classes, approximately twenty-seven hundred people have attended them and, inevitably, countless questions have arisen.
       Since 1923 there has been no restriction placed upon the taking of notes in the classes, as it has been my conviction that each one has the right to acquire an understanding of Christian Science in his own way. As a consequence, there are in circulation a great many notes taken by various persons and passed about among friends.
       When these were brought to me, as sometimes happened, with the request that I correct or revise them, I invariably refrained from doing so because notes convey to the one who originally took them vastly more than appears on the surface. Were another to attempt to revise the, their meaning to the recorder might be endangered.
      But with this large accumulation of notes in a wide diversity of phrasing already circulating freely, it is, I feel, not only expedient but honest that I should state clearly—by going completely through a class—the fundamentals of the pure metaphysical reasoning of “clear, correct teaching” (My. 297:18.) as it has unfolded in the various classes.
      A class in Christian Science is spontaneous communion with Mind. Questions and answers arise naturally in the course of its unfoldment, for “come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord,” (Isa. 118.) is the invitation of Mind always.
      Each class is individual in character and progresses from its own starting point as though it were evolving for the first time.
      A Christian Science class is not a lecture course. It has nothing about it that is stereotyped. It is purely spontaneous from beginning to end, full of “wit, humor, and enduring vivacity.” (Mis. 117:11.)
      However, there is the general foundation upon which all classes must be laid, and it is the purpose of this book to present such a foundation.
      A record of what has taken place in the discussion of a subject is not at all the same thing as an effort to reformulate the subject. A book, for instance, may record facts deduced from mathematics without reformulating the basic principles of mathematics. It is impossible, in fact, to reformulate a subject that has once been revealed as exact scientific truth. As such, it is unchangeable, and thereafter it is only possible to draw conclusions from it that are applicable to human advancement. Hence this book will be a presentation of facts deduced and the fundamentals from which they are deduced, not an attempt to reformulate the subject.
      It is, of course, impossible to go into the minutiae of class discussion because every class takes its own trend according to the demand of those in the class. It is my purpose to cover the general ground of what the metaphysical reasoning and the application of such reasoning in Christian Science actually means, and, in doing so, to show how it is in consonance with all that Mrs. Eddy has written on this subject.
      For the unselfish assistance of a number of scholarly, consecrated Christian Scientists in the preparation of this book, I am deeply grateful.
      If the book proves profitable to the reader, I know his appreciation of their work will be added to mine.