THE DREAM
The next evening at the appointed hour Mrs. White made her appearance,
and after a few casual remarks, requested to be taken to Mrs. Williams.
The pastor introduced her to his wife.
The practitioner, after explaining her purpose in calling, kindly
requested the pastor to leave the room as she wished to be alone with
her patient.
As soon as the pastor had left the room, Mrs. White turned to her
patient and said in a voice full of affection and love: "Be not afraid,
Mrs. Williams, God is an ever-present help in time of trouble, therefore
I bid you hope."
Some of the languid and discouraged look that had been on Mrs.
Williams's face seemed to fade away as she said, "You bid me hope,
when all the rest of the world and my physicians have told me my case
is hopeless? Surely you do not believe I can be healed."
"Mrs. Williams, I not only believe, but I know you can be healed, for
nothing is impossible to God, and from now on He is your physician.
Do not think it is I that is going to heal you, but our heavenly Father.
'He doeth the work.'"
"If I could only believe," said the sick woman, with eyes full of
tears.
"Mrs. Williams, you can at least say the same as the man in the Bible
said when Jesus asked him if he believed He could heal him; he said:
'Oh, God, I believe, help thou mine unbelief.' And this is what I am
going to do, I am going to help thine unbelief, that is, cast it out,
and let Truth reign in your consciousness. To accomplish this you must
be obedient; if you have any prejudice, cast it aside. The word
prejudice means to prejudge, and very few people are wise enough to
prejudge even the most simple things of life, and those who do, are
wrong more times than they are right."
"What you say is true, and I don't want to be prejudiced about anything,
but there has been so much said against Christian Science and it has
been ridiculed so severely that I find it hard to have any faith in
it, yet I am very willing to give it a trial."
"Mrs. Williams, what would you think of a judge or a jury that would
convict a person solely on the evidence of witnesses who were opposed
to the person on trial, and probably all of the testimony was of this
type: ('I heard Mr. Smith say he heard the prisoner had done it')? in
other words mere gossip; would you consider this justice? Yet that is
just the kind of trial that all prejudiced people give Christian
Science. If Christian Scientists point to the great mass of evidence
in favor of this science, this evidence is ridiculed and denied, no
matter how honest the person may be who gave the testimony."
"Your contention is true, Mrs. White, I did prejudge or sentence
Christian Science on the testimony of its enemies."
"I am glad to hear you admit this, as it shows me that one obstacle
to your recovery has been removed, and you will now give Christian
Science an impartial hearing and a fair trial. And now before I give
you a silent treatment, I wish to set your thoughts aright about God.
You may have said that it is God's will that you are suffering, or
that He had put this thing upon you as a punishment, either for
something you, or some one else, had done. This is a terrible thing
to do, to accuse your Maker, a God who is all good, all love, of such
a contemptible act as this. No, Mrs. Williams, rest assured God never
did such a thing. Let us see what the Bible says on this question. In
the first place, it says God made everything good; do you believe
that?"
The sick woman nodded her head.
"Next, it says, 'And God saw everything He had made and pronounced it
_very good_'; it further states that God made everything that was
made; do you believe this also?"
"Yes."
"You have heard it said that Christian Science claims that sin, disease,
and death are not real, haven't you?" asked the practitioner.
"Yes."
"Now let us see if their claims are true. You agreed that God made
everything that was made and that it was good. Now then, can you in
any possible way show me wherein this claim of sickness of yours is
good? if not, then God did not make it, it cannot be real, and it does
not exist."
"But, Mrs. White, I have suffered with it for years, and it certainly
is real to me," said Mrs. Williams.
"Let me show you how real it is, and what is necessary to make it
unreal to you. Suppose I lie down on that couch over there," she said,
pointing to a couch at the further side of the room. "As I fall asleep,
the things in the room gradually fade from my sight and consciousness,
that is, they become unreal to me, in fact they have no existence for
me for the time being, yet they are all there. After a little I begin
to dream that I am getting ready to take a trip to Europe. I pack my
trunk, telephone for the expressman to take it to the depot, I dress
myself in my traveling suit, get into my carriage, and am driven to
the depot. On the way down I see some of my friends. I bow to them,
and as I get out of the carriage at the depot I find my husband and
sister there, to bid me God speed on my journey. I realize that my
husband came from his place of business, and my sister from a distant
part of the city. We enter the depot chatting gaily. My husband goes
to inquire about the train. He comes back and tells us it is ready,
and we walk down a pair of stairs and out into the train shed. As we
approach the train, my husband gets out my ticket, shows it to the
porter, and he says, 'Second car to the rear.' As we reach the place
indicated, my husband shows the ticket to another porter who is standing
there. He examines it and says with a wave of his hand, 'Right in this
car.' We enter, and find the number of my berth. My husband puts my
traveling bag under the seat, and we all sit there talking for some
time. We then hear the conductor's warning, 'All aboard.' My husband
and sister both kiss me and hurriedly leave the car. A moment later
I see them on the platform. I hear the bell on the engine ring, I feel
the car move, and wave a last farewell to those on the platform as
they pass from my sight. A little later I am out in the country. Then
we dash through a village without stopping, and at length we arrive
at New York. I take a carriage to be driven to the dock. On the way
there the horse becomes frightened, runs away, tips the carriage over,
throws me under a rapidly moving street car, which runs over both my
feet. The ambulance is called. I am taken to the hospital. The pain
is almost unbearable. The physician examines my injuries and says he
will be compelled to amputate both my feet. This seems so terrible to
me that the shock wakes me up. For a few moments after I awake, I still
feel the pain and lie there trembling with fright, for the dream has
been so real. Yet in reality I never left the couch, and everything
in the room is there just as I left it when I went to sleep. It was
all an illusion, and the only thing necessary to prove it to me was
something or somebody to awaken me. So it is with man. God made him
perfect and everything good, and all man needs to prove it to himself
is to be awakened, that is, made acquainted with the true facts
pertaining to life. This means man must understand the science of
being; then his delusion regarding sin, disease, and death will be no
more real than my trip to Europe with its accompanying pain and
disasters."
"I see the force of your illustration, Mrs. White, but I am sure I am
not dreaming." "But you are suffering from a delusion, and a delusion
is a dream, and is no more real. If it had been possible for some one
to tell me while I was on my dream trip, that it was a dream, I would
have denied it, because it seemed real to me. So with you, this delusion
seems so real you believe it to be a reality. Nevertheless the facts
were that I was suffering from a delusion, and so are you. So let us
deny that evil is real, and we will wake up to the truth, or
understanding, that it is not real. Now I will give you your treatment."