ead backward, these
propositions mean identically the same as when read in the usual order,
and she seems to regard this as conclusive proof of their logical truth.
She says, "The metaphysics of Christian Science, like the rules of
mathematics, prove the rule by inversion. For example: there is no pain
in Truth, and no truth in pain; no nerve in Mind, and no mind in nerve;
no matter in Mind, and no mind in matter," etc.

In his article upon Christian Science, published in _The Atlantic
Monthly_, April, 1904, Dr. John Churchman says:

The uncompromising idealism, however, which Mrs. Eddy offers us not
only has these defects, but is guilty of a far more serious charge.
It poses as an explanation, and is in reality a total evasion. To
deny that matter exists, and assert that it is an illusion, is only
another way of asserting its existence; you are freed by your
suggestion from explaining the fact, but forced by it to explain
the illusion. It is the old mistake of imagining that an escape
from a problem is a solution. You are out of the frying-pan, it is
true, but you are in the fire instead.[4]

Having thus disposed of matter, Mrs. Eddy seems to think that her
definition has actually changed the nature of the case, and that though
we live in houses, eat food, and endure the changes of the seasons, our
relation to the material universe is changed because she has defined
matter as an illusion.

It is not, however, Mrs. Eddy's definition which is so remarkable, but
her application of it. Having stated that matter is an illusion, she
asserts that "matter cannot take cold";[5] that matter cannot "ache,
swell and be inflamed";[6] that a boil cannot ache;[7] that "every law
of matter or the body, supposed to govern man, is rendered null and void
by the law of God".[8]

_There is No Material Universe_

Quimby acknowledged the actual existence of the universe, of the
physical body, and of disease; Mrs. Eddy teaches that they are all
illusory. The earth, the sun, the millions of stars, says Mrs. Eddy,
exist only in erring "mortal mind"; and mortal mind itself does not
exist. All phenomena of nature are merely illusory expressions of this
fundamental error. "The compound minerals or aggregate substances
composing the earth, the relations which constituent masses hold to each
other, the magnitudes, distances, and revolution of the celestial
bodies, are of no real importance.... Ma