THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES LESSONS ON THE PHILOSOPHY OF LIFE. "He who seeth Me in all things and all things in Me, looseneth not his hold on Me, and I for- sake him not. " LUCIE G. BECKHAM. A L A M K U A , C A L I F O R KTI A , 1 8O9. 3V In the Truth presented in these lessons is Spirit, and is Life for all who open their hearts to receive. Expect as you read, to be healed. LlBRARv Wesson \. The Basic Principle Cod. We are to deal with the Philosophy of Life, there- fore we have to do, first with the Source of Life, the Creator. Inherent with man is some conception of a su- preme, overruling, creative Deity. The name that is given this Source of Being is not an essential point. Whether man calls his Deity Great First Cause, First Principle, Creative Force, Supreme Law, Great Spirit, Brahma, Tao, or God, he refers to the one Fountain-head or Source. Man has for ages been quibbling over words. As we place ourselves upon a broader platform, looking to the esoteric, in the depths of which all differences may be harmonized, rather than continuing to stumble over mere surface discrepancies, we realize that to whatever time, peo- ple, nation or religion we belong, all emanate from one Creator and all are seeking one end Freedom. ' ' That which exists is One, sages call it variously. " Rigveda. Throughout Christendom we are accustomed to the name God ; for this reason we will adhere to that name. There are many people who call themselves athe- ists because they have rejected the idea of a personal 6 The Basic Principle God. God. Strictly speaking such people are not athe- ists. While it is true that there are those who do not believe in the traditional conception of God, I refute the idea that there is one who does not believe in God as He is. " When we have broken the God of tradition, and ceased from the God of rhetoric, then may God fire the heart with His presence," says Emerson. James Freeman Clark, in his "Ten Great Relig- ions," says: "We are too apt to s-iy that a man has no religion who has a religion different from our- selves ; that a man has no Christ who believes in other forms of Christianity than ours, and that a man is without God who worships the Deity by other forms than our own." The reason that many think- ing people have considered themselves and have been called atheists, is because they have reached a place where they can no longer be bound by the limitations of tradition. "Socrates," says Clark, ' ' Was called an atheist because his conception of the Deity was higher than that of his contemporaries." God is not a particularized being, an embodied personality, located in some far away and unknown heaven, seated upon a throne, dealing out good and evil, reward and punishment, as might some mortal king. God is the great Law that governs the uni- verse. God is the Principle of Being. God is the great Spirit of the Good. In the fourth chapter of John, twenty-fourth verse, of the King James version of the Bible, we read that The Basic Principle Cod. 7 Jesus Christ said, "God is a Spirit." The original Greek reads, "Spirit the God. is ;" in other words, the God is Spirit. Know the Truth then, about God, and regard Him not as a Spirit, but as the Spirit or Substance of all that is. As we deepen and broaden our vision so that our spiritual horizon can no longer be encompassed by the limitations of a personal God, we understand that everyone believes in God. I make this state- ment because it is a fact known to those who have studied mankind with relation to its religious tend- ency, that however primitive the race to which he belongs, there is in the soul of man an innate recognition of a creative Source, whatever name he may give it. Another, and more apparent reason is, that every man believes in some form, or has some conception of the Good, and however limited this may be, it measures his belief in God. Many people, while acknowledging that they believe in universal brotherhood, in charity, in justice, in integrity, and while living to a large extent in accord with their belief, will tell you that they do not believe in God. It is impossible for one to believe in the Good and not believe in God, for God is the Good. The word God comes from an Anglo-Saxon word meaning good. Whatever variation there has been in the great mind of man concerning his idea of God, all have conceived of Him as supreme and good. If God is supreme and good, God must be the very acme The Basic Principle God. of Goodness, the Good itself. If God is the Good, we. may attribute to the Godhead all the qualities that can be placed under the head of universal Good. When I speak of God as the Good, I do not refer to relative good, that good which is good for you and not for your neighbor, or good for you today and not tomorrow, but I refer to that Good which belongs to all people throughout all time. This universal Good may be classified under such heads as Love, Wisdom, Life, Power, Purity, Satisfaction, Peace, Health, Light, Substance. God having any quality of Goodness, being supreme Source, He is that quality itself. If God is loving, God must be Love ; if God lives, God must be Life ; if God is pure, God must be Purity ; if God is omniscient, God must be Omniscience ; if God is omnipotent, God must be Omnipotence ; if God is omnipresent, God must be Omnipresence ; God is, therefore, Love itself, Wisdom itself, Life itself, Power itself, Purity itself, Peace itself, Health itself, the Good itself. The Truth denies that God is unknowable, and far removed from the daily life, but teaches us that He is as near as the throbbing of our own hearts. ' 'Our God is never so far off as even to be near, He is within." Let us bridge over the chasm which we have placed between ourselves and our Creator, by looking within the depths of our own being, where the one great master who demonstrated his knowl- edge of God declared God to be. When the The Basic Principle God. 9 Pharisee asked Jesus Christ when the Kingdom of God should come, he answered : " The Kingdom of God cometh not with outward show, neither shall they say, ' Lo here, or lo there !' for behold, the Kingdom of God is within you." The Kingdom of God is the kingdom of Love, Wisdom, Life, Harmony, All Good, and the Substance of all these is within you. Paul declared to them who were worshipping an unknown and unknowable God, "As I passed by and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with this inscription, 'TO THE UNKNOWN GOD.' Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, him declare I unto you. God that made the world and all things therein, seeing that He is Lord of Heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands, neither is worshipped with men's hands, as though He needed anything, seeing He giveth to all life and breath, and all things, and hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times appointed, and the bounds of their habitation, that they might seek the Lord if haply they might feel after Him and find Him, though He be not far away from every one of us ; for in Him we live, move and have our being. ' ' God is the great unmanifest, but man is the man- ifestor. It is the true mission of man to manifest God the Good. All Good is from God, and in the degree that we are, in consciousness, severed from io The Basic Principle Cod. God, we are cut off from all that makes up the Godhead ; from all that belongs to the highest Good Happiness, Health, Prosperity, Life, name it what you will. Let us here consider some of the God qualities . The Love that is God is not merely that which is known to the human heart ; that which is centered upon a few to the exclusion of many. It is not that love which goes forth only to the lovable, to the friend and neighbor, but it is that pure, unselfish, universal Love which goes out to all alike ; to the good and evil ; to the lovable and the unlovable ; to the friend and the enemy, without question, without discrimination. " For He is kind to the unthankful and to the evil." The Life that is God is that which permeates and animates the manifest universe from the microcosm to the macrocosm. All Life is God, whatever its form of expression ; whether it be manifest in the worm that crawls in the dust or in the highest type of man. The Life in all nature is God ; that which is in the plant, in the rock, in the sky or in the sea. The Life that is God cannot be encompassed by man's limit of three score years and ten. It cannot be touched by death. It is unchangeable, eternal. The Health that is God is not what we have today and lose tomorrow, but it is that which is beyond the touch of corruption perfect, unchang- ing Wholeness. The Basic Principle Cod. n The Power that is God, is that which admits of no failure, that which is Omnipotence. The Wisdom that is God is not confined to the capacity of man's brain, but is that which including human intellect, is infinitely superior to it. It is Omniscience, All Knowledge. The Peace that is God is not that which can ever give place to inharmony. It is " The Peace that passeth all understanding," and endureth forever. The Substance that is God is not matter. Matter is a collective name for that which is changeable, mortal, and limited. Substance is that which is unchangeable, immortal, unlimited ; the reality of material things Spirit. There is in reaiity no such thing as matter in the sense that the word is generally used. There is only one Substance, one Presence, the Spirit of God which permeates all that is. Everything in the visible universe throbs with life. Life is Omnipresent. Even materialists have recognized the fact that matter is motion, that all material things are composed of atoms, and that each atom is separate and distinct from every other atom ; that all matter is permeated with ether, just what this subtle substance is that is called ether, is beyond the ken of the materialist. Edison says that he is convinced that every molecule of matter has a center not only of intelligence, but of force. The inevitable conclusion is that all is Spirit. Whatever the line of investigation, the scientist is invariably brought to a point where he re^o^nizes 12 The Basic Principle Cod. a force or substance which is beyond the power of analysis. This unknown entity is Spirit, -the all- pervading, unchanging, Substance of the visible universe. Matter has been tersely defined as Spirit at the lowest rate of vibration. We realize that we cannot conceive of God in the highest at this time, nor use what language we will, can we describe Him. Our one object in entering upon the discussion of the God-head, is to bring to the consciousness of each one the recogni- tion of his nearness to God, and God's nearness to him. We must bring God from the realm of the unknowable into the knowable. Let us no longer try to be content with the far away God, but learn to know the Omnipresent God. We must know the God of Love, not wrath ; the God that blesses, not punishes ; that heals, not afflicts. Not only is God the Father Principle, but the Mother Principle, also. The word Jehovah means the two-fold entity ; the generative Principle in its dual aspect of male and female combined ; the androgynous, undivided One. In Infinite Majesty, Power, Strength, Protection, Wisdom, we know the Fatherhood of God ; in Infinite Love, Tenderness, Grace, Purity, Beauty, we know the Motherhood of God. Only as we fulfill our divine mission of manifesting the highest Good, can we grow into the consciousness of our true relationship with God. It is written that man is created in the image and likeness of God, and we have reasoned falsely, saying : " If I am in the The Basic Principle God. 13 image and likeness of God, God must be like me," while the true reasoning is, " If I am in the image and likeness of God, I must know myself as God-like." The work of the spiritual life is to lift the soul to a consciousness of its oneness with God, the highest Good. To do this, we hold ever before us as a point of attainment, the highest ideal of Goodness. Becoming at-one with this ideal, we shall find a still higher beyond. In this way does our knowledge of the Deity deepen and broaden as we advance. Thus does God become to us the fulfillment of every need of the human heart. In conclusion of this first lesson, you are admon- ished to begin at once to make the Truth you are investigating practical, by repeating this statement : "God, the Good, is the only Power and the only Presence." The one who is faithful to the repetition of this statement in his heart, will have its attendant blessings revealed to him. Statements for meditation will be placed after each lesson. STATEM EN TS God is the omnipresent Good. God is all there is in the realm of reality, hence there is only the Good. God is Spirit. God is omnipresent. Spirit is all there is in the realm of reality. Omnipotent Love is omnipresent. Omnipotent 14 The Basic Principle Cod. Life is omnipresent. Omnipotent Wisdom is omnipresent. Omnipotent Purity is omnipresent. Omnipotent Harmony is omnipresent. Omnipotent Peace is omnipresent. Omnipotent Health is omnipresent. Omnipotent Substance is omni- present. Omnipotent Good is omnipresent. Only the Good is true. The Divine Self. 15 Wesson \\. The Divine Self. Let us look for a moment at our basic principle. God is the omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent Good. While God is not embodied in a personal- ity, God is the embodiment of all that can be placed under the head of absolute Good. Keeping ever before us this one idea of the Creator, we will dwell in this second lesson upon the creation Man in his true relation to God. ' ' Know Thyself, ' ' is ever the command of the sage. Man cannot know himself without knowing God, neither can he know God without knowing himself. That man is in very truth created in the image and likeness of God, is the basic principle upon which the redemption of mankind rests. To know man in the image and likeness of God, means to know him in the image and likeness of all that is comprised in the Godhead Love, Wisdom, Purity, Wholeness, the highest Good. Man in reality is a thought of God. God is Wisdom, God is Spirit. If God is Wisdom and Spirit, He is also Mind. We cannot conceive of Wisdom or Intelligence apart from Mind, neither can we think of Spirit apart from Mind. 16 The Divine Self. By glancing at the definitions of the words Spirit and Mind, we find them in meaning synonymous. Webster defines them as follows: ' ' Spirit : an intelli- gence conceived apart from any physical organism or embodiment ; the intelligent, immaterial, immortal part of man. Mind : the entire spiritual nature, the soul, that which thinks, feels, wills, and desires Spirit." Mind is the Creator, man is the creation. The creation of Mind is thought, and is like unto the Mind that gave it birth, hence we find that man is a thought of God. In considering our basic principle in the first lesson, we dwelt upon the God -qualities, because all that God is, man is in his true selfhood, and of this he must ultimately become conscious. ' ' Now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall become." God the Good will ever remain the unmanifest except as man fulfills his divine duty, or rather accepts his divine privilege to make it manifest. The reason the world, today, knows so little of the highest Good, is because man is considering himself incapable of its expression. If we would know the Love, Wisdom, Purity, Health, Freedom, that are of God and are God, we must take our stand to be open avenues for their manifestation. This we will be able to do only as we realize that we are divine. Nearly all people believe in the existence of a " Divine spark" in the soul of man, but few have realized the necessity of going further than this. The Divine Self. 17 Not only has man a divine spark within his soul, buried under ignorance and materiality, but that spark is capable of being fanned into a flame that shall illumine all the darkness. In other words, in each one is a divine Self. Not only are we to recog- nize this divine Self, but we are to express it in the fullness. All the great philosophers have taught the divine Self, and the time is now ripe for this great fundamental Truth to become the corner-stone of the living temple each one must build unto God. ' ' Ye are the temple of the living God, ' ' says the Spirit of Wisdom through Paul. When I speak of man as divine, perfect in the image and likeness of the highest Good, I do not refer to the sinful, corrupt, limited creature, into which man has allowed his consciousness to degen- erate. I do not call that which is impure, pure ; that which is limited, unlimited, or that which is mortal, divine. Every one is conscious of the dual self, or the two selves : the lower self, the one that is holding us down under materiality and error, doing the things we would not do, and leaving undone the things we would do ; and the higher Self, the one who speaks to us in our best moments, who loves, sacrifices, who aspires to higher things, the Self we may have named the conscience. The lower self is the mortal, carnal, false-thinking one. It has no real entity, no eternal foundation upon which to stand, and can endure only through man's recognition and acknowledgment. The higher Self i8 The Divine Self. is the real, true Self, the one that God created, the only begotten Son of God. All the Good you realize is the consciousness of the divine One, or true Self. All the consciousness of evil or error within you is the false one. All within you that stands opposed to the higher or real Self, belongs to the realm of the seeming, and is to be overcome, and reduced to the nothingness from which it sprang. God did not create two selves, one good and one evil. He created but one out of the substance of Himself. Our work is to overcome the false self, that we may become fully conscious of the true Self. In the past we have not thought it possible to overcome our lower natures, our tempers, greeds, passions and emotions. We have been taught that we could not possibly attain beyond a certain mediocre point of goodness ; that we are naturally depraved, mortal, and carnal. Perfection has never been expected of human nature, yet the greatest master the world has ever known not only exempli- fied self mastery in his own life, but gave this mandate to all mankind, " Be ye perfect, even as your Father in Heaven is perfect." All the promises are given to him who overcometh. Had it not been possible for man to attain perfection, Jesus Christ would not have thus admonished him. However we may view Jesus Christ, we must concede that he spoke no idle words. If we regard him simply as a good man and great philosopher, inasmuch as he demonstrated his principles, we must The Divine Self. 19 give them due consideration. If we regard him as the Messiah, we must accept and practice his teachings. Do not limit yourself by adhering to the old idea that it is blasphemous to say that you are divine as Jesus was divine. No one has ever so plainly and clearly delineated the divinity of all mankind as did Jesus Christ himself. Jesus declared, " I and my Father are one," and the Jews took up stones to stone him, saying : " For a good work we stone thee not ; but for blasphemy, and because thou being a man, maketh thyself God." Then Jesus quoted their scripture, " Is it not written in your law : ' I said ye are Gods?' ): That to which he referred is found in Psalms : "I have said ye are gods, and all of you are children of the Most High." Jesus continues: "Though ye believe not me, believe the works, that ye may know and believe that the Father is in me and / in Him ;" and again they sought to take him. The same state of mind that cried "blasphemy," when Jesus Christ declared his divinity, nineteen hundred years ago, cries "blas- phemy" today to those who claim their divine nature. This state of mind belongs to those who are living in the letter, who are still in the old Mosaic consciousness, and have not penetrated into the spirit of the Christ teachings. Every declaration that Jesus made for himself, he made in substance for all who would live his principles. In the four- teenth chapter of John, we read : ' ' I will come again and receive you unto myself, 20 The Divine Self. that where I am (in the Father), there ye may be also." "Believe me that 1 am in the Father, and the Father in me. " " I will pray the Feather, and He shall give you another comforter whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth Him not, neither knoweth Him, but ye know Him, for He dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. I will not leave you comfortless ; I will come to you. 1 'At that day ye shall know that lam in my Father, and ye in me, and I myou." "These things have I spoken unto you, being yet present with you. But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance." Thus does Jesus declare not only his own divine Self, but the universal divinity of man. In the sixteenth chapter of John, he says : "It is expedient for you that I go away, for if I go not away the Comforter will not come unto you, but if I depart I will send him to you." " I have yet many things to say unto you, but you cannot bear them now. Hovvbeit, when he the Spirit of Truth is come, he will lead you into all Truth." Note that Jesus uses the terms, the "I AM" (which he declares to be the same in the Father, in himself, and in you), the " Holy Ghost," the The Divine Self. 21 "Comforter," and the "Spirit of Truth," synony- mously. He refers to the divine Ego, the Christ Spirit, the only begotten Son of God, which is the Christ Spirit, or the divine One in all, the One that God created, the true Self of every one. Jesus told his disciples that unless he departed as a personality, the Comforter or the Spirit of Truth would not come. Infinite Wisdom knew, and Jesus, holding himself at one with infinite Wisdom, knew, that so long as man looked to a personal Messiah as the sole embodiment of all Godliness, he would not come into the recognition of the Christ Spirit within. This is the mistake that the Christian world has made during the centuries since Jesus' manifestation on the earth. The time is now come for the spirit of Jesus' mission to be fulfilled, and for man to come into the realization of the Truth about his life. The real saving principle is, that the Holy Spirit, or the Christ that perfectly manifested itself through Jesus, is to be awakened in, and ultimately perfectly manifested through every one of God's children. '' Though Christ a thousand times in Bethlehem be born, If he's not born in thee, thy soul is all forlorn. Hold, there ! where runnest thou, know heaven is in thee. Seekestthou for God elsewhere, His face thou'lt never see. In all eternity, no tone can be so sweet, As where man's heart with God in unison doth beat. 22 The Divine Self. Whate'er thou lovest man, that too become thou must, God if thou iovest God, dust if thou lovest dust. Ah, would the heart but be a manger for the birth, God would once more become a Christ on earth. Immeasurable is the highest who but knows it, And yet a human heart can perfectly inclose it." The real purpose of Jesus' ministry was to exemplify the perfection of the divine Man. arid to give the methods and principles by which all might make the same attainment. ' ' He that believeth on me (the divine Me or Self), the works that I do he shall do also, and greater works than these shall he do, because I go unto my Father." Whenever Jesus spoke of his personality, it was to emphasize its nothingness. "I of myself can do nothing," He said, and when one called him "Good Master," addressing him from the personal standpoint, he replied, ' ' Why callest thou me good? There is none good but one, that is God." Only by the subjugation of his personality, was Jesus enabled to stand forth in his Godliness. There is only one thing that stands between us and God, and that is the personal self. Overcoming personality does not mean losing the individuality. The violet and the lily, while they have no personality, have a distinct individuality which ra- Hates itself in beauty, perfume, and color. The The Divine Self. 23 distinctive point between personality and individual- ity, is that j[.)ej^oj^i^_deiiLandSj and individuality Of all the precious stones, the diamond is the least in itself, and its very nothingness gives it the greatest reflective and radiating- power. If we would reflect and radiate the Good, we must become selfless in thought, word and deed. In further corroboration of the divine Selfhood of each one, note the prayer of Jesus, found in the seventeenth chapter of John. The whole burden of this prayer is that the children of men may realize their oneness with the Father, even as He knows his oneness with the Father. Possibly you have entertained the idea that Jesus made these statements and offered these prayers concerning the chosen few, the disciples, and those who came directly in touch with his personal ministry at that time. Even if we could make this thought consistent with an infinitely good God, and one who is no respecter of persons, Jesus takes pains to obviate this possibility in his declaration, "All things which the Father hath are mine. " "I pray for them which thou hast given me : for they are thine, and all mine are thine, and thine are mine, and I am glorified in them.' 1 As there are not two Creators, this includes all people throughout all time. Nothing is taken from the divinity of Jesus Christ, but all are included under a universal brotherhood 24 The Divine Self. in that same divinity. ' ' Whosoever shall do the will of God the same is my brother. ' ' " For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the Sons of God." " The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit that we are the children of God ; and if children, then heirs, heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ. " The sense in which Jesus Christ stands distinct from the rest of mankind, is that in which the full blown lily stands distinct from, those less developed, in the various degrees of unfoldment. The same life, perfume, beauty, is in the bulb beneath the earth, in the bare stock, leaf and bud, but it finds its perfect expression only in the full blown flower. The Christ Spirit, the Spirit of Truth, Infinite Goodness, the only begotten Son of God, the divine Ego, the Self, is the same in us all, but it has reached its full fruition only in Jesus. The rest of God' s children are in their different stages of unfoldment, all tending toward the same conscious unity with God. Jesus is the per- fected manifestation of God ; you and I may be in the degree that we apply his life precepts. A clear understanding of the false and the true selves will give you the principle of divine healing, or the overcoming of any evil that may express itself in your life. The self that can be sick, sorrowful, dissatisfied, poor in any good thing, or that can die, is the mortal consciousness, or false self. As we overcome the false self, we necessarily separate oun elves from the errors that attach themselves to The Divine Self. 25 the mortal. Tilts separation from the false is brought about by the constant recognition of our oneness with the True. God knows you only as He created you in the likeness of the highest Good. The Spirit, speaking through the prophet Habakkuk, says : "O Lord my God, mine Holy One, Thou art of purer eyes than to behold evil, and canst not look on iniquity." The Good takes no account of evil ; Love knows no hatred ; Purity knows no impurity ; Health knows no sickness ; Strength knows no weakness ; the Light knows no darkness. We must know ourselves as God knows us. So long as you through recognition identify yourself with your lower nature, you will express it in your life. ' 'As a man thinketh in his heart so is he." Cease to dishonor your Creator by declar- ing yourself to be a miserable sinner, a worm of the dust, unworthy any good thing, or by in any way belittling His handiwork. Speak understanding! y from your divine center, from your divine I AM, arid make declarations of Truth that are worthy of Man as the noblest work of God. S TAT EM EN TS. I am a thought of God. I am an expression of divine Mind. I am Spirit like my Father, spiritual, not material. 26 The Divine Self. I am quickened and vivified by the Christ Spirit within me. I am whole as God is whole. I am glorified in the Father, and the Father is glorified in me. I of myself can do nothing. The Father in me doeth the works. I of myself am nothing. I and the Father are one. The Unradliiy of .Ti///. 27 Sesson \\\. The Unreality of Evil. We have been taught much about the Omnipo- tence, Omniscience, and Omnipresence of God, but it has been largely empty theory. We have said that God is omnipotent and omnipresent, but we have demonstrated by our living, our belief in another power and presence directly opposed to God, the Good. We have said God is everywhere present, but beware of evil which lurks in every shadow. We have claimed that God is all power, but that every one must succumb to evil ; that it belongs to humanity, and no one can escape. We have been educated to believe that every one must know more or less of sin, sickness and sorrow in life, and that all must end in death. We must turn directly about and live the Om- nipotence and Omnipresence of the Good ; think- ing, speaking, acting as though we believe the Good to be the only Power and the only Presence. Let us reason from the axiom, God is real. If God is real, and the Good, all Power, and everywhere present> then all that stands opposed to 28 The Unreality of Evil. the Good must be unreal. Evil, therefore, is an unreality : it has no real entity. We must either conclude that evil is not a real power and a real presence, or that our Deity is limited, capable of being overborne by evil : that God is not omnipotent and omnipresent. From the moment we take our stand to live the Omnipotence and Omnipresence of the Good, our emancipation from the dominion of evil begins. Presenting the unreality of evil is but another way of putting our ba.sic principle, the Omniscience, Omnipotence and Omnipresence of the Good. As in our second lesson we delineated the two selves, the real and the unreal, the true and the false, let us keep clearly before us the two realms of being, the realm of the Good, the real, the realm of evil, the unreal. As we understand that while it seems as though there were two selves, one opposed to the other, there is, in reality, only One; so we may understand that while it seems as though there were two realms of being, one good and one evil, in reality there is but One. As we from principle continuously acknowledge the good, and identify ourselves with the true one within, the false self will pass away or be overcome by the Christ Self. As the false self is overcome the environment of the false self must necessarily pass away. The world as it stands today, the embodiment of all that is corruptible and passing, sin, sickness, sorrow, The Unreality of Evil. 29 poverty and death, is exclusively the environment of the mortal man. As we lift ourselves out of the mortal consciousness into the spiritual consciousness, we become superior to evil. In the overcoming of the false self lies the overcoming of all error. By the overcoming' of evil we prove its unreality. That which is real cannot be overcome; it is unchangeable, eternal. Just so long as \ve fight evil as a real power and a real presence, will it seem real to us, and have power to overcome us. God will ever seem to man just what he believes Him to be, and evil will ever seem to man just what he believes it to be. All the power that evil ever has had, has now, or ever can have, is that which man has given it by continuous recognition. "Build, therefore, your own world," says j^mgrson. "As fast as you conform your life to the pure idea of your mind, that will unfold its great proportions. A correspondent revolution of things will attend the influx of the Spirit. So fast, will disagreable appearances, swine, spiders, snakes, pests, madhouses, prisons, enemies vanish ; they are temporary, and shall be no more seen. The sorder and filths of nature the sun shall dry up and the wind exhale. As when the summer comes from the south, and snow banks melt, and the face of the earth becomes green before it, so shall the advancing Spirit create its ornaments along its path, and carry with it the beauty it visits, and the song which 30 The Unreality of Evil. enchants it ; it shall draw beautiful faces, warm hearts, wise discourse, and heroic acts around its way, until evil is no more seen. The kingdom of man over nature, which cometh not with observa- tion a dominion such as now is beyond his dream of God he shall enter without more wonder than the blind man feels who is gradually restored to perfect sight. ' ' It is that which man feels beyond his power to master that he calls evil. In the degree that he can overcome evil does he divest it of that name. As we gain more knowledge of our oneness with Omnipotence, we shall realize more power to over- come evil, and it will become less and less a real factor in our lives. Evil is ignorance, and if through knowledge we are able to prove our superiority to it in any degree through our constant recognition of and consequent identification with the Spirit of Wisdom within, we shall be able to rise above all evil. There is no degree in evil itself. There seems to be degree of evil because of our ignorance of divine Law. As we unfold in the Christ principle this limitation will pass away. The Christ principle, perfectly unfolded and manifested in Jesus, met evil and proved its nothingness on every hand. Jesus Christ knew the unreality of evil, and the Omnipo- tence and Omnipresence of the Good, so that when evil came before him he ignored its seeming power, and called directly upon God the Good. The Unreality of Evil. 31 When he met what is called incurable disease, he addressed the true One, and said: "Be thou clean;" "Take up thy bed and walk;" and the disease was not. When he met the storm at which his disciples were terrified, because they were still recognizing evil as a real power, he said, " Peace, be still," and the storm was not. When he met sin, which the world has ever held as beyond redemption, he recognized the sinless One, and called it into manifestation, to the ultimate exclusion of the error. When he found he had but two loaves and three fishes upon which to feed the multitude, he thanked God for the fullness, and the lack was proven a delusion. When he met death, he recognized only life, and there was no death. Not through miracle working as a special dispensation of God in his favor, did Jesus accom- plish these ends, but through the understanding and application of principles which he has placed at the disposal of all mankind. He knew and applied a higher Law which governs the life of each one of us, even as it governed the life of the man Jesus. By the giving over of his whole consciousness to the recognition of the Omniscience, Omnipotence, and Omnipresence of the Good, did this great master of self exemplify the nothingness of sin, sickness, poverty, accident and death. Under the above heads may be placed all the evil to which humanity believes itself in bondage. Nor do we have to go back nineteen hundred 32 The Unreality of Evil. years to have the unreality of evil exemplified. The Christ principle has at last penetrated to the present day, and on every hand sin, sorrow and disease are being overcome by those who are learning to live at one with divine Law. Never have these lessons been given to a class of students that a number have not been healed of their diseases, and you may be healed as you read, if you will open your heart to receive the blessing that is for you. Do not shut the good out of your life by holding to the old and false idea that we must not presume to do the works that Jesus did, for his whole teaching refutes this error. "Go ye into all the world' ' he said, ' ' and preach the gospel good tidings." "The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils. " " He that believeth on me the works that I do he shall do also, and greater works than these shall he do, because I go unto my Father. ' ' If we look at the problem of evil as a whole, we may become confused, and feel it is impossible to believe in its unreality. Let us remember this Truth : We are the microcosm of the macrocosm, and whatever may be accomplished within one individual may ultimately by all be attained. The world is made up of individuals, and if you and I can, by the knowledge of a given principle, over- come that which is false in our lives to any degree, The Unreality of Evil. 33 we may by the continued application of that same principle overcome all error. What one can accomplish, two can do; what two can do, a family ; if a family, a community ; if a community, a nation ; if a nation, a world. Jesus, in speaking of the devil, said, ' ' He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the Truth because there is no Truth in him. When he speaketh a lie he speaketh of his own, for he is a liar and the father of it. ' ' The word devil is but another name for evil. As we have put aside the idea of the personal God, so we must know that the only devil there is, is man's consciousness of evil. When Jesus used the term devil or satan, he referred to evil as a whole, or to the false con- sciousness in each one which claims the reality of evil. Jesus made this very plain, when in reply to Peter's recognition of the Christ, he said, addressing the divine One, " Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona (offspring of the Holy Spirit), thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church." A short time after, when Peter let the false self come up in him, and tried to dissuade Jesus from passing through the crucifixion, Jesus said to this false one, ' c Get thee behind me satan, * * * thou savor- est not of the things that be of God, but of those that be of men. ' ' Thus did Jesus declare the unreality of evil when he said the devil, evil, has no Truth in it ; it ib a liar, a lie, the father or generator of a lie. That 34 The Unreality of Evil. which is a lie is false, that which is false is unreal : therefore evil is an unreality, it came forth from unreality, and must return to the unreality or nothingness from whence it sprang. A lie affects your life just so long as you believe it to be the truth, and no longer. If some one tells you a falsehood, so long as you believe it to be true, it may influence you, and you may act upon it. From the moment the Truth is revealed to you about that falsehood, it becomes to you as though it had never been ; it is unreal, it is nothing. While man is living on the sense plane he is largely dominated by the five senses, which con- stantly speak to him of sin, suffering, sickness, poverty, and claim the reality of evil. Every claim of error is false, it i.; a lie, there is no truth in it. Every time you hear the voice of the false one within you declaring that evil is real, or has any power over you, open your spiritual ears and you will hear the voice of Truth in the depths of your heart and soul speaking to you of your divinity ; telling you that you are not in bondage to evil, that the Good is the only power, that the Good is the only reality. You who listen to the voice of Truth, and believe, will find evil passing out of your life. Jesus gave forth some of his greatest truths in parable because, as he said, people had ears and heard not, had eyes and saw not, and hearts that did not understand. Before we can understand this great Truth of the The Unreality of Evil. 35 unreality of evil, we must cultivate the divine perception. Divine perception is the seventh,, or spiritual sense. Through the cultivation of this higher sense all our senses will be uplifted, and learn to testify only to the Good. It is now being widely recognized that there is a sixth, or psychic sense, which is capable of development. As we realize the possibility of unfolding the sixth or psychic sense, which has heretofore been latent, so we may understand that the seventh or spiritual sense may be unfolded, though it has up to this time been entirely unknown to our consciousness. The psychic sense is no higher than the other five senses. Psychic development is not necessarily an evidence of spirituality. One may cultivate the psychic sense without any reference whatever to his spiritual nature. This is, however, an unwise, and many times a dangerous tiling to do. The psychic sense in itself should not be cultivated. Not only is it unwise to cultivate the psychic sui;;e, but every evidence of its growth should be discouraged, and held in abeyance to the growih of the Spirit, or to the Self centering ol the soul. The seventh sense includes the other six senses, and whatever development on this side is right and true, will come to us as we unfold spiritually. Cultivating the seventh or spiritual sense, is really becoming conscious of the divine Self. It is the sense which speaks to man of his oneness with. God ; of his completeness. 36 The Unreality of Evil. You may not be able, at once, to reason out the unreality of evil, but the truth of it will be revealed to you as the Spirit is quickened within you, and you unfold in the higher life. " For what man," says Paul, " knoweth things of a man save the spirit of man which is in him? Even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God." "But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, neither can he know them, because they are spirit- ually discerned. There has ever been permeating the yeligious world the thought of self denial, but it has been observed in the letter, rather than the Spirit. By understanding the spirit of denial, we shall be able to apply our principle of the Omnipotence and Omnipresence of the Good, and the unreality of evil. It profits us little on stated occasions to deny the body food, raiment, or any external thing. The essential denial is that of the false consciousness, the consciousness of selfishness, pride, envy, con- demnation, malice, jealousy, sensuality, criticism, anger, fear, doubt, anxiety, grief, and all that makes up the false thinking self. This is the only tbinj; that stands between us and our Good. Do not condemn any error thought within you, or try to crush it out, for this is not true self-denial. Consecrate every false thought within you to God, for a thought that is given to God is lost in the Good and denied as evil. For example, hatred is The Unreality of Evil. 37 only really denied when it is consecrated to, or lost in Love. To deny unforgiveness, is to lose it in forgiveness ; to deny impurity, is to lose it in purity ; to deny sorrow, is to lose it in joy. We may use the form of denial and affirmation as follows: "I deny all fear, I am filled with the courage of God," or we may use the form of consecration, "I consecrate every feeling of fear, selfishness, pride as the case may be to God the Good." In the consecration of any part of our consciousness to the opposite Good, is included the denial and the affirmation. The Christ in Jesus, said : "Those that thou hast given me I have kept, and none of them is lost but the son of perdition. " The son of perdition is the one in us which knows evil, and in the degree that we identify ourselves with the Christ consciousness, that one is lost in the Good. Evil is always evil, the Good is always the Good. Evil is the unreal, the Good is real, therefore the Good must ultimately overcome all evil, and prove its nothingness. Refuse to recognize evil as a factor in your life, and actively acknowledge the highest Good. ' ' Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. ' ' 38 The Unreality of Evil. STA T EM EN TS. God the Good is the only reality, therefore there is no reality in evil. Sickness, sorrow, poverty, sin, death, do not belong to the realm of the Good, therefore they are unreal. The self that is conscious of evil is not the real Self. Anger, jealousy, malice, selfishness, hatred, un- forgiveness, pride, envy, condemnation, sensuality, fear, sorrow, anxiety, have no place in Me, they do not belong to my divine Self, they have no power over Me. I am free in the freedom of God. I live, move and have my being in the Good. Power of the Word. 39 iesson Power of the Word. The world is rapidly coming into the recognition of the fact that thought is the most subtle and potent force known to man. Mind is the creative power. Not only is Mind forcible in its influence upon the external world, but it is the actual seat of causa- tion. It records itself in body and environment as expressed Good and evil, according to the character of the thought. When we have realized the importance of disci- plining our thoughts, placing them under perfect control, so that we shall be able at any time to center them upon a given point, we shall have found the secret of governing our lives to accord with the great Law of the Good. Through the concentration of forces power is generated. The scattering of forces renders them impotent. Through the concentration of rays of light great penetrating power is gained, as exempli- fied by the search-light, and the head-light of an engine. Through concentration of heat rays, intensity of heat is gained ; illustrated by what is commonly known as a burning-glass. 40 Power of the Word. Nearly all the inventions that have been given forth to the world are the result of months and years of concentrated thought. So it is with the artist, architect, mechanic, who attains to any degree of success. In the dramatic world, an artist desiring to impersonate a certain character, not only becomes familiar with his lines, but he fixes in his mind an ideal of the character. In all he does, he identifies himself with that ideal. Mme. Modjeski is quoted as making this statement: "Just as soon as I decide to act a new character, I try to become that woman. I learn the lines first, but they are com- paratively nothing. My task is to learn to feel the woman who would speak these lines. My part is to sink Helena Modjeska's personality into that of the woman who would spontaneously and natu- rally, under the circumstances indicated in the play, speak these lines which I have acquired." As we persistently center our thought upon all that consti- tutes the divine man, as we keep ever before us the highest ideal, we shall sink our personality into the Christ, and express it in every line of our being. "Thoughts are things." Through the concen- tration of our thoughts we give them power to project themselves into the visible. Mind in the absolute, is the Substance out of which all things are created. Mind in activity, is the Word by which all things find expression. It Power of the Word. 41 is through the understanding of the use of the Word that the principle which has been presented in these first three lessons may become practical in all the affairs of life. The use of the Word is the connecting link between theory and practice. By the Word, we do not mean solely that which is contained in the scriptures of the world, but the word of Truth as it comes forth from the divine One within, whether it be recorded or not. Any declaration which expresses the Good, whether thought in the heart or spoken audibly, whether recorded or not, is the word of God. The Word is the agent of the Mind. What the chisel is to the sculptor, what the brush is to the painter, the Word is to the Mind. Of a chaotic state of mind must necessarily be born chaotic conditions, and of an orderly state of mind must be born orderly conditions. If we think evil, we shall meet evil in our lives ; if we think Good and evil, we shall meet Good and evil ; if we think only the Good, we shall meet only the Good." "A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth good things, and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart bringeth forth evil things." The Kingdom of God is already created, finished, complete in divine Mind. The Kingdom of God is within you. Heaven is not a place confined to some particular locality ever far distant from the 42 Power of the Word. earth plane. Heaven is a state of being, a state of perfect harmony. The Kingdom of Heaven is the kingdom of the Good, the abiding place or environ- ment of the true Self. The Kingdom of Heaven is the state of conscious oneness with God. Neither is hell a localized place prepared for the eternal punishment of evil people. This very primitive idea grew out of ignorance, and has no other foundation. The word hell, in its original sense, means the hidden, or unseen place. It is the translation of two words Hebrew, "Sheol," meaning the grave or place of the dead ; and Greek, ''Gehenna," the name of a dark gorge on the west side of Jerusalem, where refuse and criminals were burned, and where human sacrifices were offered. All through his ministry Jesus taught by symbol- ism. Every act of his life was symbolical of a saving Truth. Carrying out his accustomed method of teaching, Jesus used the term hell metaphorically, as a fitting word to express the state of the soul which persists in identifying itself with evil. In the degree that a soul is unregenerate, dead to the Spirit, it exists in the grave of its own materiality. The soul that has long been identified with evil passes through the fire of Gehenna, the place of torment within, and must be subject to it until all error is consumed. In this fire the soul sacrifices its lower nature to God. Hell, therefore, is a state Power of the Word. 43 of soul recognition of and identification with evil, a consciousness of separateness from God. On whatever plane, in whatever place the soul finds expression, it may be in Heaven or hell in the degree that it is consciously identified with harmony or inharmony. It is by the Word of Truth that we have power to manifest the kingdom of the Good to the exclusion of the kingdom of evil. In other words, it is by the systematic and persistent recog- nition of the Good that it becomes established in our lives. You have, no doubt, thought of many things as too good to be true, and have had ideals that you have deemed beyond the power of man to realize. Nothing is too good to be true, because all Good is contained in God. The ideal is the real. Its very conception proves that it may be attained. The ideal you have in your heart is only possible because you in your true Self are all and infinitely more than your present ideal portrays. Your divine Self and all that is befitting as the environ- ment of the Son of God, is capable of perfect expression or manifestation. " If you have built castles in the air, your work need not bit lost : that is where they should be ; now put the foundation under them."- THOREAU. By practicing the declaration of the Good, into whatever language we put it ; in other words, by the continuous use of the Word, we shall make 44 Power of the Word. ourselves pure, perfect channels through which God may be expressed. The Good will then become manifest in the heart, body and environ- ment, as Happiness, Satisfaction, Health, Harmony, Prosperity and Success. When evil makes its claim in any way upon your life, you will check it and prove its nothingness by immediately declaring the opposite Good. When fear comes up in your heart, declare that you have infinite courage, because you know that evil is unreal, and the Good is the only power. When you seem to be impatient, declare you have the patience of the Christ. When you seem to be angered, say to that angry one, " Peace, be still." or declare that you are filled with divine Love. When you seem to be sorrowful, declare that you are filled with the joy of the Lord. When you seem to be dissatisfied, declare that you are filled with divine Satisfaction. In the face of seeming inharmony declare that perfect harmony reigns in and through your life. When you are beset by impure desire, declare that you are a pure, holy child of God, that every desire is now fulfilled in God. In pursuing this method of affirming the Good, notwithstanding the appearance of evil, you are not saying that which is untrue, you are recogni/ing that which always has been, is now, and ever shall be true about your divine Self. Remember that Power of the Word. 45 all on the side of evil is false, it is untrue ; only the Good is true. Ignore that which is false, that you may become entirely separate from it, and prove your superiority to it. Give positive recognition to that which is true in order that you shall become identified with it, and that it may become established unto you. It is not sufficient for us to occasionally make these declarations of the Good. We should con- tinue in them until our whole consciousness is permeated with the true idea ; until the mind is changed from the habitual recognition of evil to the habitual recognition of the Good. " Be not conformed to this world, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind. ' ' The continued repeti- tion of the Word expressing some fundamental Truth finally objectifies it. This practice may seem to be mechanical at first, but do not yield or become discouraged. No Word of Truth, no affirmation of the Good is ever lost. Every thought placed on the side of the Good is as essential in bringing about the desired result, as is the overturning of every clod of earth to the reaping of the harvest. For example, as you begin to realize that it is your mission to be an avenue for the expression of divine Love, you may find that you love only the few people you call your own, and that you dislike or are indifferent to a great many. Take the state- ment, " I Am the Spirit of Selfless Love," repeat 46 Power of the Word. it again and again, let it become the burden of your thought. At first your words may seem empty, and you may seern to get further away from the realization of Love. This is but a transitory period : press faithfully on, and you will mid your heart warming, and your love spontaneously going iorth to all people. In this way work to overcome every error that makes its claim in your life. When you have once set your face toward the manifestation of any Good, never yield to the seem- ing power and presence of evil, or to anything that may seem to stand between you and the realization of that Good. If the centering of your thought in a given direction does not fruit today, continue in it to- morrow ; if it does not fruit tomorrow, continue in it the next day; and so on, persistently and steadfastly, taking no account of time, until your concentrated thought dissipates every obstacle, and finds expression. You may find it difficult at first to concentrate your thoughts : practice is all that is necessary. The rule for the spiritual student, given in the Bhagavad-Gita, is this: ''To whatever object the inconstant mind goeth out, he should subdue it, bring it back, and place it upon the Spirit." All through our Scripture we find references to the use and power of the Word. In the works ol Jesus Christ we find exemplification of it. By the Power of the Word. 47 spoken Word, Jesus made manifest health in the place of disease, harmony out of chaos, plenty where there appeared to be lack, purity where sin seemed to abound, and life in the face of death. ''If ye abide in me," he said, "and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you :" and "Verily, verily, I say unto you, if a man keep my sayings, he shall never see death." " Man liveth not by bread alone, but by every word that proceeded! out of the mouth of God." " Inasmuch as you are the expressor of the Good, you are the mouth-piece of God." Solomon says : ' ' The tongue of the wise, is health." "The wise," is the one who knows that the Good is the only Power, and the only Presence, and uses His tongue to express only the Good. "A wholesome tongue is a tree of life." " Death and life are in the power of the tongue. " " Pleasant words are as honey- comb, sweet to the soul, and health to the bones." "Thy words are life to those that find them, and health to all their flesh." We read in Job, "Thou shalt decree a thing and it shall be established unto thee ;" and in Peter, ' ' He that will love life and see good days, let him restrain his tongue from evil, and his lips that they speak no guile." Do not allow yourself to talk of evil. Do not depreciate yourself, or talk of the false characteristics of others. Consecrate your tongue to God until it habitually testifies only to the Good. 48 Power of the Word. When we understand the potency of our words, and take into consideration the amount of error that is talked on every side, we cannot wonder at its manifestation. Scandals, crimes, sickness, sorrow, death, are topics of discussion at the dining - table, in the drawing-room, on the street, in the clubs, heralded and enlarged upon by the press, yelled and reiterated by the children on the street as the important news of the day. This accounts, in a degree at least, for epidemics of disease, suicide and murder. Every one who takes his stand to identify his consciousness with the Word of God, to think and speak only the Good, is doing his part toward checking and overcoming not only the evil in his own life, but that expressed in the world at large. ' ' In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by Him (the Word), and without Him was not anything made that was made." "And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us." The Word is the Logos, the Christ, the divine Ego, the "Me," to whom is given all power in heaven and in earth. Power of the Word. 49 STA TEM EN TS. I see all things, and all people, and God sees them, perfect in His image and likeness. My mind is the Mind of God. I see as God sees. I feel as God feels. I hear as God hears. I think as God thinks. I speak as God speaks. I will as God wills. I now see myself as God sees me, pure and holy, loving and wise. I am at one with my true Self. I am awake in the image and likeness of God. The Spirit of Christ governs me and controls me in all ways. The Mind is now in me that was in Christ Jesus. My consciousness is the Christ consciousness. All things are now working together for my good. I am free from all limitation. I am selfless, satisfied, loving, holy. So Faith. iesson V. FAITH. John Lord, in his essay on Paul, makes this statement : ' ' Great pulpit orators, renowned theo- logians, profound philosophers, immortal poets, successful reformers and enlightened monarchs have never disputed his intellectual ascendency." It was Paul who said, "Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." Yet we find the larger part of the world scoffing at faith as a factor in bringing about any practical result. This comes, however, from ignorance and superficiality. Whether man recognizes it or not, he uses faith in all his activities. Even in the materialistic world faith is an important factor. Faith is an inherent quality with man ; it is a part of his very being. A little child is called upon to exercise faith in learning to walk. The mother encourages the little one with every step. She inspires it with confidence in its own power to hold itself erect and carry itself forward. In this way its faith is established as time goes on, and walking becomes the natural thing. It is through this established faith in the power within that we are enabled to hold our bodies erect, Faith. 51 to lift our hands to do the simplest act of our daily lives. The body has no motive power of its own. In all its functions, from least to greatest, it is governed by the engine of thought. As materialists put it, the brain keeps up a constant telegraphic communication with the different parts of the body, which obey its dictation. There is, in the I AM consciousness, the perfect confidence or faith in its power to use the body as an instrument to carry out what we call our natural functions. It is the fearless, self-confident one, who quickly learns to swim, ride a bicycle, or do anything that requires practice. We often hear people say of one who has made a success in a given direction, " He had such unbounded faith in himself. ' ' Many times such a one has only ordinary ability. On the other , hand, we meet gifted, intellectual people, who seem to fail in life because they are making the fatal juist_ake of self depreciation. They lack the neces- sary confidence or faith in themselves. The word faith repeatedly enters into the ordinary conversation of business men. No large sum of money is ever invested without faith on some one's part being exercised. The inventors of the world show the must persistent, unwavering faith ; a faith that stands in the face of repeated failure, scepticism and ridicule of others. This faith has forced the world's recog- nition of goals attained which were deemed beyond the pale of human power. 52 faith. Thus does faith play an important part in the advance of civilization. People employ the physi- cian in whom they have faith, and the physician himself recognizes the importance of inspiring his patient with confidence. A physican of thirty-five years practice once told me that the greatest cure he ever performed was of a woman to whom he gave bread pills as the only material remedy. She was suffering the most intense, physical pain. He impressed her mind with the fact that he thoroughly understood her case, taking great pains to gain her perfect confidence. He then told her that the medicine he would leave was very powerful and infallible ; that she would feel it within fifteen minutes after taking it to the very extremities of her being. Leaving the bread pills, with explicit directions for taking them, he went his way. When he called again the woman said the medicine was most remarkable in its effect ; that she had indeed felt it to her very finger tips, and she was entirely cured. A San Francisco drug clerk once gave this testimony to a teacher of the Truth : A man went into the shop where he was employed, and asked him if he would put up a prescription for a certain physical ailment. The clerk not knowing what to recommend, thought he would try an experi- ment. He filled a bottle with water, labeled it with a pretentious Latin name, recommended it Faith. 53 highly, charged the man a dollar, and sent him on his way. In a short time the man returned, declared himself much better, and wanted another bottle of that most excellent medicine. The attribute of faith is not lacking in the human heart, but it is for the most part misdirected. Man has great faith in evil. He believes in it as a positive necessity, and many times as a special dispensation of an all-wise and all-loving Creator. We are taught from infancy to expect sickness, sorrow, accident, reverses, and that no one can possibly reach beyond a certain degree of goodness ; that sin is the prerogative of the human heart, and that death is the inevitable and irretrievable end. At best, in all the practical affairs of life, we have placed our faith in relative good. Despite these traditional errors that have been instilled into the heart of man, he innately recog- nizes that Power, Health, Wisdom, Satisfaction, and all God qualities belong to him as a rightful inheritance. Not knowing that the Source of all Good is within, he places his faith in the external. He puts his faith in money to give him power, in material remedies to give him health, in books to give him wisdom, and in sense indulgence to give him satisfaction. This faith is of a quality that if turned into a right channel, it would be sufficient to revolutionize the world. For example, there are many people who struggle for years to overcome 54 Faith. disease through material means, only to find them- selves pronounced incurable. They finally try divine healing, and if they are not healed within a certain length of time sometimes months, some- times weeks, and again only a few days is the limit they conclude God is ineffectual, and go back to Materia Medica which has never afforded them anything but disappointment and failure. I once heard of a man whose earnest recommendation of a medicine was the fact that he had used it for ten years. This faith is of the quality that when placed in God will lift man above all evil. Our work is to take all the faith that we have placed in evil divided between Good and evil, placed in relative good, or in material things as a source and direct it toward the highest Good God. Solomon's statement, "As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he," is repeated in that of Jesus Christ, " Be it unto you according to your faith." That which we have believed in we have mani- fested in our lives. It has ever been unto us according to our faith, is now and ever shall be. In as much as we have believed in evil, we have been identified with it ; in as much as we have believed in Good and evil, we have known Good and evil ; in as much as we have placed our faith in less than the eternal Good as the Source, has our good been changeable and passing. Everything but God must come to an end. God only is eternal. Faith. 55 If we place our faith in that which is less than the highest as the Source of our Good, we may receive it today and lose it tomorrow. P'aith in material remedies may avail for a time, but the many institutions for the incurable, the hundreds and thousands of people continuously succumbing to disease, prove the fallacy of them beyond a certain point. That Materia Medica emanates from the mind of man and not from the Mind of God, is proven by the fact that notwithstanding the many years of time, energy and intellect devoted to its study and investigation, the number and variety of diseases steadily increase, and the fruit of all this worldly knowledge is repeated failure. The most learned physicians are the ones who have the least respect for the so-called science oi medicine. Many do not hesitate to say that it is not a science, but merely guess work. Dr. Abercrombie, of the Royal College of Edinburgh, made this statement: "Medicine is the science of guessing." Prof. Valentine Mott, the great surgeon, said : "Of all sciences, medicine is the most uncertain." Sir Astley Cooper, the famous English surgeon, said : " The science of medicine is founded on conjecture." Dr. Hufeland, a great German physician, says, ' ' The greatest mortality of any of the professions, is that of the doctors themselves.'' Prof. Magendie, the great Parisian, addressed the students of his class in the allopathic 56 faith. college in that city, in the following language : "Gentlemen, medicine is a great humbug. I know it is called a science science, indeed ; it is nothing like science. Doctors are mere empirics when they are not charlatans. We are as ignorant as men can be. Who knows anything in the world about medicine? Gentlemen, you have done me the honor to come here and attend my lectures, and I must tell you frankly that I know nothing in the world about medicine, and I don't know anybody that does know anything about it. I repeat it, nobody knows anything about medicine. I repeat it to you, there is no such thing as medical science." The greatest physician the world has ever known,' one who knew the science of health, one who came to demonstrate the methods of Infinite Wisdom, used no drugs, nor any kind of material remedies. As we learn to hold ourselves ever in touch with the divine Self that transcends all evil, we shall find that health of body is not a fleeting, precarious condition, but the normal state of man. As we grow into a broader knowledge of the great and inexhaustible Source, so shall we become estab- lished in the state of divine Wholeness. We may gain a certain power by material acquisition, but today we are rich, wielding the power of the world ; tomorrow we are poor, our power gone. As we place our faith in the almighty Faith. 57 power of the Good within, our needs will be supplied from the one fountain-head of all Good, and whatever the claim of external conditions every obstacle shall be overcome. We may seem to satisfy the desires of the heart for a time through sense indulgence, but for a time only ; when the longing is redoubled, and can never be stilled save as we drink of the water of life in the depths of our own being. ' ' Whoever drinketh of the water I shall give him, shall never thirst, but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing into everlasting life. ' ' We may reach a certain intellectual attainment by the study of books, but in order to come into the knowledge that will set us free from bondage to evil, we must seek the higher Wisdom within. Therefore, center all your faith in God, the highest Good. Jesus Christ, in all his healing ministry, taught that faith is the great requisite. His whole doctrine may be embodied in these words : " Have faith in God ; have faith in the Good. ' ' Though the people who sought his healing evi- denced their faith in the mere act of following him and crying for help, often did he turn and insist upon a positive declaration of faith before he spoke the freeing Word. To the blind men who followed him, crying, "Lord have mercy upon us," he turned and said : ' ' Believe ye T am able to do 58 Faith. this ?' ' and when they replied, ' ' Yea, Lord, ' ' he touched their eyes, saying : " Be it unto you according to your faith." Again and again did Jesus recognize faith as the essential quality by such statements as these : ' ' Thy faith hath made thee whole. " " Thy faith hath saved thee. " " Said I not unto thee, if thou wouldst believe, thou wouldst see the glory of God?" " I have not found so great faith, no not in Israel." Then too, he gave the repeated admonition not to fear. " Be not afraid," he said, " Where is your faith?" "Fear not, only believe. " "If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth. ' ' ''Why are ye fearful, O ye of little faith?" The student should go to work at once on the overcoming of fear. We cannot fear evil and trust the Good at the same time. Fear of evil is denial of the power of the Good. To deny the Good is to shut it out from our lives. Fear is really per- verted faith. Job says : ' ' The thing which I greatly feared is come upon me, and that which I was afraid of is come unto me. ' ' The greater the fear of an evil, the more intensely is our thought centered upon it, and the greater is our belief in its reality. Through tliis concentrated thought, unless a counteracting force is interposed, we draw the evil feared into our lives. No evil can befall us, if, from the standpoint of knowledge of the Omnipotent, Omnipresent Good we are absolutely iearless. faif. h . 59 It was when Peter began to fear, that he began to sink. So long as he kept his eyes on the Christ, he walked on the breast of the turbulent sea, but the moment he began to contemplate the stormy waves, they began to engulf him. Fear of disease will bring it upon us. It is a physician's statement that thousands are continu- ally dying of fear, and that fear has been known to kill a perfectly healthy man in one hour. Many people in comfortable circumstances have feared and talked poverty until it has resulted in the loss oi their possessions. Fear, which animals instinct- ively sense, will cause them to attack a man, when otherwise they would allow him to pass unnoticed. While it is necessary to recognize the fact that fear becomes a magnet to attract evil, do not enter into the negative state of being afraid of fear. Hold steadfastly to the highest Good : know that you are protected, even from yourself, by the omni- present Love of God. In times of darkness, when the sea of your life is troubled by claims of sick- ness, loss, sorrow or error of any kind, be true to your principle. Keep your eyes above all appear- ance of evil by declaring, ' ' I fear no evil ; I trust the omnipresent, omnipotent Good." In this way your fear will be overcome, and instead of being submerged by evil, you will rise superior to it and conquer it with the Good. One of the severest tests of faith to which Jesus 60 Faith. ever subjected any one, was when the Canaanite woman came to him and sought healing for her daughter. The woman came to Jesus as the Mes- siah, with no thought but that he would freely grant her that which he had been dispensing to the multi- tudes. Her appeal, though unconsciously, was made to the Christ within herself. Not having the wisdom to turn within, she looked to Jesus as her Lord. It was to her as though her God had refused her, when Jesus turned to her and said : "It is not meet to take the children's bread and cast it unto the dogs." In the face of this rebuke the woman's faith transcended appearances and she replied: "Truth, Lord, yet the dogs eat from the crumbs that fall from the master's table." Jesus had accomplished his purpose. He did not test the woman's faith for the mere sake of proving her, but he knew that the faith that admitted of no doubt or wavering was necessary to the healing of her daughter, and when he had called it forth he said, "O woman, great is thy faith, be it unto thee even as thou wilt." Because we find ourselves so entangled in the meshes of our own past false thinking, there may come times when it seems to us that the indwelling Christ is refusing us. It may seem that though we have spoken the Word in faith, it has been void. At such times, let us remember the Canaanite woman and be not doubting, but filled with the faith which is the substance of that which faith. 61 we seek. Take the attitude of Jacob with the angel. Say to the angel of the Good, which is the fulfillment of your particular need, "I will not let thee go except thou bless me." The Christ principle is unchanging, eternal, and never fails us if we have the steady, persistent faith that will not take " No " for an answer. " If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say to this mountain, remove hence to yonder place and it shall remove, and nothing shall be impossible to you." The mustard seed falls into a field and grows and increases until all else is out- rooted. This is the quality of faith turned toward God, the highest Good, that will overcome all evil and establish our kingdom of heaven upon the earth. " Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things unseen.'' We do not come into this high state of faith at once, but we grow into it through increasing our understanding. We attain to the requisite consciousness of faith through understanding. We attain to understand- ing through faithfulness to the Word. The fruition of the Word is realization of its vital force or Truth, and realization is manifestation. 62 Faith. STATEM ENTS. I have nothing to fear. I am not afraid, for God the Good is with me and protects me from all evil. I am free from all doubt and all scepticism. I cannot be moved or influenced by the doubt or scepticism of another. I have faith in the Good working in and through my life. I now consecrate all the strength of my faith to the highest Good. I have almighty faith in the Word of God spoken through me. I have perfect faith in God as my health, strength, love, prosperity, guidance, protection and life. Nothing can shake my faith in the Good. I am fixed and centered in the Truth. God is for me, who or what can be against me. Understanding. 63 Sesson V\* UNDERSTANDING. Faith and understanding should go hand in hand. It is not what is known as blind faith that will carry us into the full realization of the kingdom of God, but faith that is based on knowledge. Some good results are accomplished through blind faith, but it can only reach a certain point: it is necessarily limited. We must have understanding to attain to the highest. Understanding is not mere intellec- tuality. It is coming into conscious touch with divine Wisdom which is in man. It is the spiritual awakening to the saving power of the Truth. Igno- rance is the root of all evil. Crime, sickness, sorrow, poverty, death, are made possible because man does not know God. The knowledge of the world counts for little in the eyes of God. Paul says, ' ' The wisdom of this world is foolishness with God, ' ' and ' ' The foolishness of God is wiser than men. ' ' With all its colleges, academies and centers of learning, despite intellectual heights attained throughout the ages, ignorance has been the canker worm that has eaten at the foundation of national 64 Understanding. and individual glory, until decay and ruin of both mark historical epochs. History will repeat itself so long as man's knowledge is based on materiality; until he seeks as the paramount purpose of life to know God, and builds on that foundation. Man must gain Self knowledge through soul identifica- tion with the Spirit of Infinite Wisdom God in the depths of his own being. "No man knoweth the Son but the Father' '- within. ' ' Neither knoweth any man the Father save the Son" within. Had we sufficient Wisdom, we would never be sick or miserable : we would never feel the lack of any Good. The Spirit of Wisdom is your true Self. You will come into the realization of this by giving it constant recognition. The word education comes from the Latin word educere, to lead out, or forth. True education is not the storing of the mind with something from without, but it is the developing or leading forth of that knowledge which is the basis of man's being. Only by experience in the spiritual life can we come into the understanding of the real difference between intellectuality and spiritual knowledge. We read in the Bhagavad-Gita : "Even if thou wert the greatest of all sinners thou shalt be able to cross over all sins in the bark of spiritual knowl- edge * * * * . There is no purifier in this Understanding. 65 world to be compared with spiritual knowledge, and he who is perfected in devotion, findeth spiritual knowledge springing up spontaneously in himself in the progress of time." By devotion to the Word ; by continued recognition of the Truth, which we have accepted intellectually, we shall through spiritual assimilation enter into spiritual realization or true knowledge. Spiritual knowledge includes intellectuality, but is infinitely superior to it. For example, today you hear a statement of Truth ; you believe it to be true from the intellect, but it has not touched the heart. Tomorrow the same statement comes to you, perhaps from another source, or as a memory, and you are electrified by its vivifying power. It seems to come from the center of your being. From that time forth you are identified with its underlying Truth : it governs your thoughts, words and acts ; you live it ; it becomes your very self. This is spiritual knowl- edge. The way to the attainment of spiritual knowl- edge is through overcoming. Suppose you have harbored unforgiveness. Intellectually you have accepted the truth that the attitude of the Christ Self is always that of forgiveness, but you do not feel the forgiveness in your heart. You are true to your principle, however, and persistently declare that the divine One within you forgives. The bitterness or feeling of injury becomes less and less and finally gives way to the Christ, and from 66 Understanding. the depths of your heart you not only forgive, but you go out in love to the one you felt had wronged you. The Christ always says to those who are in error : " Father forgive them, they know not what they do." The reason Jesus Christ was made perfect in faith, was because he was made perfect in knowl- edge. He knew God ; he knezv the Omnipotence and Omnipresence of the Good. The reason that people have not been able to trust God in the fullest sense of the word, is because they have not known God. In the degree that we realize the true and the living God within, the God that is Love, Life, Power, Wisdom, All Good, we shall be able to trust it. When we know God, our trust in Him will not be in name only, or a mere theory, but we shall turn to Him in all the practical affairs of the daily life. Ignorance has declared : "God sends good and evil ; God punishes and rewards ; God afflicts and heals." The Truth declares : "God is the Omni- present, unchangeable substance out of which all the needs of man are fulfilled, whether they are of soul, mind, body, or environment." Can you conceive of wrath coming forth from Love ; corruption from Wholeness ; death from Life ; evil from Good ? Impossible ; neither can you conceive of a God of Infinite Love sending affliction, disease, sorrow, poverty and death upon Understanding. 67 His children. You will never be able to trust God to heal your body, supply your needs, protect you from evil, to give you your Good so long as you believe it possible for Him under any circumstances to take your Good from you. Nothing has done more to destroy man's faith in God than the dis- torted teaching concerning the divine Will. God has been portrayed to us as a monster beyond the most cruel and benighted earthly monarch. It is when evil becomes too extreme to be cured or alleviated by human power, that ignorance says : " II is God's will, and must be borne with resigna- tion as the inevitable." The idea which has been entertained by a large portion of the religious world, that God afflicts His children to punish them, and bring them nearer to Himself, is false from the beginning. God is not an arbitrary ruler standing over mankind with a rod, but is the great unchang- ing, eternal Law of the Good, which works only and always for the Good. God's will is for the universal Good of all. Man suffers because he does not understand how to hold himself at one with divine will. Man afflicts and punishes himself because he is not wise enough to work in harmony with the great Law of his being. Jesus Christ stands as the great exemplar of God's will. He said : "I come to do the will of my Father, ' ' and he healed the sick ; not a chosen few, whom he deemed worthv, but the multitudes. He delivered 68 Understanding. humanity from its suffering on every side, and especially did he go out in loving forgiveness to the sinner. If in the day of Jesus' ministry on the earth it was God's will that the sick be healed, the hungry fed, the sinner forgiven, and the dead raised, it is God's will today. Either this is true, or we must conclude that God is vacillating, or that Jesus Christ made a mistake in precept and example. A mother will love, protect and excuse her child, no matter how great his error. No sacrifice is too great to protect him from the result of his own wrong doing. Is the love of man greater than the love of God ? Mother love is the highest type of earthly love. Where was it conceived, and from whence does it spring? From the great Mother Love of God. ' ' If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in Heaven give good things to them that ask Him." If one believes it is God's will that he is sick, poor, or miserable, in order to be consistent he should not take medicine, or try to better his circumstances ? There are many dear ones chained to beds of sickness because they believe God wills it to be so. This thought alone is sufficient to hold them there, for God's will is, as they believe, unchangeable, immutable. It is unto man according to his belief, and if he perverts the idea of God's will he is held Understanding. 69 in bondage by it. When we learn, however, that God's will is unchangeably and immutably good, that it is incapable of working for anything but the Good, it means freedom. I know a woman who had been afflicted from childhood. She was reared in the church, and devoutly believed that it was God's will that she should suffer. She had been given up to die by several different physicians, and had been prayed over by the clergy. She was finally prevailed upon to try divine healing, and was lifted out of her bed of suffering in a week's time by this declaration, used understandingly : "God's will be done in you." Another woman was pronounced to be an incurable cripple. At a time when things seemed very dark to her, her minister came and prayed that she might have fortitude and patience to bear the burden that the gracious Lord had been pleased to put upon her. He told her it was God's will that she was afflicted in this way, and that she must learn to bear it with resignation. A little later she turned to the Truth, and was healed. Many devout and earnest souls have struggled for years to say, "God's will be done," and have not been able to do so, because it meant to them resignation to the most cruel affliction and suffer* ing. It is, however, a demonstrable Truth, that if, in the face of sickness, you say with understanding : " God's will be done," it means the springing forth 70 Understanding. of health. If you say : "God's will be done," in the face of inharmony, it means that harmony must be established ; to say, "God's will be done," in the face of lack or poverty, means that the need must be supplied. ' ' Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man the things that God hath prepared for them that love Him." Do not make the mistake of thinking that it is God's will that any good thing be withheld from you, but in order that you may receive the highest Good, submit your will entirely to the divine Will. Let your life be governed in every detail according to the plan of Infinite Wisdom and Infinite Love. All that comes under the head of universal Good belongs to us as a rightful inheritance. It is a part of our divine Selfhood. It is always God's will that we be healthy, successful, happy, satisfied, wise, free, but in all the finite workings of our life we should leave all in the hands of our Father- Mother Good. Be careful not to interpose the personal will, born of desire the will of the mortal or lower self. Today we may wish for a thing with all our heart, and by the intensity of our desire and strength of our personal will, we draw it into our lives. Tomorrow we find that this is not the thing that is for our highest Good, and it becomes a stumbling block in our way. We may be saved such unhappy experiences by consecrating the Understanding. 71 personal will to the will of God, determining that no will shall be done in and through our lives save that born of Infinite Wisdom and Infinite Love. Whatever we meet in our lives that speaks of error, is the result of our not understanding how to yield our mortal will to the will of the highest Good. We must learn to say : " Not my will, but Thine be done," from a heart filled with joyous thanksgiving, because of the positive knowledge that we shall hereby be saved from the mistakes of our own ignorance of divine plan. We read in the book of Job : ' ' There is a spirit in man, and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth him understanding." Jesus declared that the Holy Ghost or Spirit of Truth within should teach us all things, and bring all things to our remembrance. This Spirit in man is a tangible presence. It is the indwelling Spirit of Truth, of Wisdom, and we may call upon it and trust it to lead us, direct us, protect us, and teach us in every detail of our lives, from the least to the greatest. Thousands of people are today depending upon it as implicitly as a little child depends upon the wise and loving parent. Those who have recognized this Truth, who have learned to be led by the Spirit, make no plans, but live each day as though it were a whole life. Trust the outworking of all things to the holy one within, who ever carries out the divine plan for the good of all. This removes all personal care and 72 Understanding. responsibility, and in consequence smooths many a wrinkle, and straightens many a back bent from carrying unnecessary burdens. Carrying burdens, making mistakes, doing and undoing, constitute no part of divine plan. All this stumbling in the daily life may be avoided as we learn to follow the guidance of the Spirit. You will learn to hear the voice of the Spirit, by calling upon it exactly the same way that a little child calls upon its mother. Do not waste time saying, concerning any problem that comes up, " I don't know what to do." Go into the stillness of your own soul ; ask the Father-Mother there ; ask the Spirit of Wisdom ; the Holy Spirit using what term appeals to you most to tell you what to do, where to go, what to say, or to reveal to you that which you should know. Ask, and the answer will come. Sometimes it will come immediately from within ; sometimes it will come through a personality, and it has been known to come in a dream. Whatever avenue is used, it will come with that inner conviction of its Truth from which nothing can turn you. You will know with that knowledge that is beyond reason, and is based upon something within that cannot be put into language. Do not think anything too trivial or too simple to be worthy of divine guidance. There is always a best way, and a right time to do everything. Understanding 73 Whatever is worth doing, is worth doing well. Therefore take this stand in all the activities of your life : " I of myself can do nothing ; the Father in me doeth the works." You doubtless have many times been guided and protected by what you have called impressions which you have been unable to understand. There are many who feel that when they follow their first impressions they are guided aright. It is not necessarily the first impression that is the true one, but the impression that pre- sents itself most forcibly to you and is nearest in accord with the highest within you. These impres- sions when they speak of the Good, and result in the Good, are from the Spirit. The reason that we have not been more clearly guided by the Spirit, is because we have not given it intelligent recognition. In order to be divinely led, we must constantly call upon, acknowledge and obey this inner voice. Otherwise, it will continue to be indistinct or as though it were not. This is the practice of the presence of God. There is a little book entitled ' ' The Practice of the Presence of God, the Best Rule of a Holy Life, ' ' containing the personal experiences of a very spirit- ual man, who was a lay brother among the bare- footed Carmelites in Paris, 1666, and who was afterwards known as Brother Lawrence. This holy man endeavored to walk always in the conscious- ness of God's presence, and made great attainment 74 Understanding. in that direction. He said that we should establish ourselves in a sense of God's presence by continu- ally conversing with Him. That, in order to form a habit of conversing with God continually, and referring all we do to Him, we must at first apply to Him with some diligence : but after a little we shall find His Love inwardly excite us to it without any difficulty. That we ought to act with God in the greatest simplicity, speaking to Him frankly and plainly, asking His assistance in our affairs just as they happen, and that God never failed to grant it as he had often experienced. When he had a duty to perform, which seemed to him either diffi- cult or disagreeable, he said to God that it was His business he was about, and that if he was to do it well, He must take the responsibility and see him through it. Then he set about it with no care or uneasiness and in the end always found it well per- formed. Perfect obedience is a most essential point in the understanding of divine guidance. There are times when personal desire will conflict with the direction of the Spirit within. At such times, if we obey the Spirit, all things will come out better than we could have planned or foreseen, and in a way satisfactory to all concerned. If we disobey we may have to learn our lesson by hard experience, and in the end we will have to retrace our footsteps, undo what we have done, and follow the higher leading. Bear in mind that the Spirit of Wisdom Understanding. 75 never leads you to do an erratic or fanatical thing, or anything that would prove a stumbling block to your brother. Asceticism is not of the Spirit, but grows out of the unbalanced or uncentered condi- tion of the mortal. When invoking the leading of the Spirit, first declare, ' ' I can be influenced only by the Christ Spirit within me ; I am guided by the Spirit of the highest Good. ' ' Whatever your experience may be at first, in learning to be led by the Spirit, it is only practice that you need. Continue to consecrate your life, your desires, your will, and to invoke the Spirit until you are perfectly at one with it. Should you at any time think you are acting in accord with divine leading, and find that you are mistaken, do not be discouraged, or yield to doubt, but with even greater trust than before, declare that you cannot make a mistake, for the hand ol God is leading c> you. If you are true to the highest you know, you will surely be redirected, turned into the right path, and through it all protected. Never give up your trust, never cease to depend upon the Spirit, and you will be led into that place ol perfect secur- ity, serenity and peace, that has ever been intended for you by infinite Love. The great need of the world is to come into knowledge of the indwelling God. Through knowledge man attains to Freedom. "Ye shall know the Truth, and the Truth shall make you 76 Understanding free." The world makes the mistake of condemn- ing evil and the evil doer. Evil never has been overcome, nor can it ever be through condemna- tion. Every condemning thought you send out takes root in your own soul, and if continued in will manifest itself in body and environment as some false condition. There is no justifiable condemna- tion, for it never lessens, but always accelerates the evil. You are condemned by your own condemnation, and you cannot escape it so long as it endures. If you find yourself bitterly condemn- ing an error in another, you will usually find some phase or form of that same error in yourself. We do riot like to meet our false selves, and many times the mortal is greatly antagonized when it sees itself reflected in another. At such a time as this be honest with yourself. Remove all con- demnation from yourself, and the neighbor in whom you have seen yourself reflected, and let Love do its perfect work. As an example of this, suppose you are condemning some one for intem- perance, say for drinking, or sensuality ; you enter into excessive grief, excessive anger or bitterness, over this error. You are indulging in another phase of the same intemperance you are condemning. Instead of condemning a man for evil from which he has not the wisdom to set himself free, let us teach him to rise above it. Whatever the appear- ance of evil, condemn it not, but hold fast to the Understanding. 77 Truth that in every one is One that is pure, holy, loving and wise. Look beyond the external impurity, selfishness, or ignorance, and say to the Christ within : " Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world." Look for the Good in everything and everybody, and lead all to do the same by precept and example. In this sense was Jesus Christ the saviour of the world ; in this same way you and I may become saviors of the world. " He whose heart is full of tenderness and truth, Who loves mankind more than he loves himself, And cannot find room in his heart for hate, May be another Christ. We all may be The saviors of the world, if we believe In the divinity which dwells in us, And worship it, and nail our grosser selves, Our tempers, greeds and our unworthy aims, Upon the cross. Who giveth love to all, Pays kindness for unkindness, smiles for frowns, And lends new courage to each fainting heart And strengthens hope and scatters joy abroad, He, too, is a redeemer. Son of God." Ella Wheeler Wilcox. Solomon says : ' ' With all thy getting, get understanding." Teach a man to know better and he will do better. Awaken the world to know the Truth, and the Truth will set it free. 78 Understanding. STATEM EN TS. I am wise with the Wisdom of God. I have perfect understanding of my divine Self. I am at one with the Spirit of Christ within me. I am filled with divine Wisdom. I am guided and protected by the Holy Spirit within. The Holy Spirit teaches me all things. The Spirit of Truth now reveals to me all that should be known by me. The Holy Spirit directs me in all that I do. My will is the will of God. God's will is my will. I am willing to do the will of the highest Good. I am willing to yield my will in all things to the will of God. God's will is now done in me. I now realize that God's will can work only for the Good. I trust the will of the Good to adjust my life according to divine plan. I know the Truth ; I live the Truth ; I radiate the Truth. I am an open avenue for divine Wisdom to speak through. The meditations of my heart, and the words of my mouth are now acceptable to thee, O Lord. Freedom from Man-Made Law. 79 Wesson V\\- Freedom from Man-Made Law. So long as we look upon ourselves as material, carnal beings, born of the flesh, we find ourselves in bondage to the limitations that have ever attended the flesh man. The external man, or the false self, has become entangled in a network of limitations which may be spoken of as man-made laws. These limitations are to us laws, in as much as they have received our recognition as agents, governing our lives. These laws govern us just so long as we recog- nize them and no longer. Every man is monarch of his own being ; each one has dominion over his own life. The unregenerate man finds himself in a perfect maze of laws of his own making. They are so many and bind so tightly, that he necessarily breaks them and then suffers. The Truth teaches us not to break these laws, but that we may trans- cend them through knowledge of a higher Law. The divine Man recognizes but one Law, the Law of Love, which works only and always for the Good of all. The criminal law holds in check and applies only to the one who places himself under it by making 8o Freedom from Man-Made Law. himself one of the class for whom it is intended. The moral, law-abiding citizen, the man who is a law unto himself, does not break the criminal law, but is superior to it ; it is to him as though it were not. So as we overcome the false self, and live, move, and have our being in the divine consciousness, or in the degree that we pass from the physical plane on to the spiritual plane, we find ourselves superior to the limitations which belong only to the physical realm of the natural man. We then enter the Freedom that belongs to divinity. Some of these limitations come under the head of race laws because they have for ages been univer- sally acknowledged. Every one born on to the physi- cal plane, or the earth plane, is subject to them until liberated by the Truth. Among the race laws are these: the law of heredity, the liability to sin, sickness, sorrow to evil generally ; subjection to climatic conditions, being affected by heat and cold ; liability to accident, old age, and death. Besides race laws, we come under those created by the medi- cal world, those placed upon us by our parents, and the laws we daily make for ourselves. They are myriad, but I shall dwell only upon a sufficient number to give the student the principle by which he may transcend this bondage and prove its nothingness. Growing old, or entering into that which speaks of decay, is the result of the identifica- tion of the consciousness, with all that makes up the Freedom from Man-Made Law. Si physical or material. Care, responsibility, anxiety, fear, grief, whiten the hair and wrinkle the skin. Carrying mental burdens and wasting the forces by all kinds of passions, emotions, agitation, bend the back and bring weakness. Recognizing, seeing evil as a reality, takes the lustre from the eye. It is a self-evident fact that something more than the mere passing of years is necessary to bring about the conditions of what the world knows as old age. A man at fifty often looks older than another at seventy-five. The people who take life hard, to whom evil seems very evil, grow old early. Bright, joyous, easy-going or philosophical natures retain their youth. As we realize more and more the unreality of evil : as we trust more implicitly in the Good : as we do less planning, live less and less in the past and in the future, and more in the blessings of the present : as we invoke the Spirit within, day by day becoming illumined by it, we find ourselves growing younger and more childlike. The Spirit, the Christ, is eternal youth. You in your true Selfhood are Spirit. The law of heredity has no more power to hold us in bondage than any other claim of error. We have been taught that we are created of fleshly parents : that their characteristics, tendencies, fail- ings, diseases, must also be ours. This is a false idea, and grows out of man's ignorance of his divine origin and nature. We are children of Spirit, Sa Freedom from Man-Made Law. not of the flesh. God the Good is the only creator : God the Good is the Father- Mother Principle. We then, are immaculately conceived of the Good, born of the Good, therefore can inherit only the Good. You are a free and independent being. God- Love is is your Father ; God- Love is your Mother ; God is your family ; God the Good is the only reality. Jesus Christ said : " Call no man on earth your father, for one is your Father which is in heaven." Our earthly parents are the avenues through whom God expresses His Father-Mother- hood to us. While we are to be ever filial and grateful to them, yet in order that the necessary freedom shall be established, we must know and keep ever before us the Truth that God is the only creative, generative Power. Because your grandmother died of a certain disease, it does not follow that you need to do so. If you feel that you are suffering from any prenatal influence, or the law of heredity, do not yield to the current but false idea that it is therefore fixed upon you, but take your stand in the Highest. Declare, ' ' I am free from the law of heredity : I am a child of the pure Spirit of Love. I inherit only the Good." By being faithful to this thought you will realize your freedom. Man has looked upon death as the way into the kingdom of heaven : but Jesus Christ said, "The kingdom of God is within you," and "I am the Freedom from Man-Made Law. 83 way, the truth and the life;" referring to the divine- Self, which is the true gateway into the heavenly state. Paul says: "Death is the wages of sin." Sin means missing the mark : sin is ignorance. Death is the result of not knowing the indwelling Christ. Death does not necessarily set us free from all suffering, neither does it plunge us into punishment for sin. The kingdom of heaven is a state of perfect harmony. The way into the king- dom of heaven is through renewing the mind, or entering the Christ consciousness. God is Life and Love, therefore death is not a mandate of God but a man-made law, and one which must be overcome by the Spirit. Paul says, ' ' The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death." He also says, ' ' The law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death." People who are suffering from any disease of the body, need to be set free from the laws under which the materialistic diagnosis of that disease has placed them. The medical world has agreed that certain physical conditions must have certain results : that some diseases are incurable, and that a given time is required for other diseases to run their course. Whenever a case comes into the hands of a divine healer it is necessary to set the patient free from all limitations placed upon him by physicians. This 84 Freedom from Man-Made Law. is done by declaring, ' ' You are free from every man-made law and governed only by the law of God." That these laws or limitations can be set at naught is continually being proven by the vast number of so-called incurable diseases that are healed through the understanding of the higher Law. A little girl lay in a child's hospital in San Francisco for many months, under treatment by the best physicians for spinal trouble. She was at last informed that she must die. Her mother was advised to take her home, as nothing could be done for her. She was then placed under divine healing. One of the first things her healer did was to declare her free from every law imposed upon her by physi- cians, friends and relatives, who were all holding her in bondage to the decree that had gone forth. In three months time the child was sent home healed, and is today well and happy. A woman was stricken with typhoid fever, and instead of sending for a doctor she sent for a divine healer. When the healer reached her the patient could not speak, and had a high fever. In less than an hour the fever had broken, and she was visibly improved. Her family, thinking she had made a great mistake in choosing divine methods rather than medical assistance, sent for a physician. When he came, the sick woman frankly told him what she was doing, and that she did not need his Freedom from Man -Made Law. 85 attendance. The physician commended her for pursuing the course in which she had faith and said that there were more physicians recognizing the power of divine healing than cared to acknowledge it. In three days time this woman was about, attending her household duties. Six weeks is the prescribed time for typhoid fever to run its course. At the time of a previous attack when she was held under physical law, this same woman was the prescribed six weeks in recovering. Children suffer from laws placed upon them by their parents. From the time a child is ushered into the world it is surrounded by fear, and held subject to disease and error. This very fact brings evil upon children, and only as the parents come into the Truth, or as they themselves learn the higher Law can they become exempt from it. There is probably nothing that holds people more in bondage than laws of hygiene, or nature's laws, which are erroneously called God's laws. In as much as they limit, they are not of God, but of man. There are hundreds of people who are continually setting themselves free from all that comes under the head of physical law. The man who knows himself a spiritual being, not material, as mind, not matter, need not be a slave to his food. Man's digestive organs are controlled by his mind, not by the food that he eats. The dyspeptic is apt to say : ' ' But I have eaten certain kinds of S6 Freedom from Man-Made Law. food without thinking of their hurting me, and I have suffered in consequence." Now this, in a general way, is what happens with one who feels that he must be careful about his diet. An inhar- monious state of mind impairs the perfect working of the digestive organs. The food that is eaten under these circumstances does not digest, and is forthwith condemned. The inharmonious state of mind continuing, one after another different kinds of food are condemned as injurious. Fear being added to the original mental inharmony, stomach trouble is many times the result. All kinds of dieting, all kinds of material remedies, are tried, change of climate and scene are resorted to, yet this many times is of no avail, because the real cause of the trouble is not in the food, but in the mental condition. The food that is put into the stomach is perfectly innocent, and has no power to cause any evil effect except as it is condemned as evil. That which we pronounce as evil, to us will seem evil. Many go through these phases delin- eated above, and finally die of fear, or, believing themselves utterly dependent upon their food, and not. able to eat, are starved to death. On the other hand, many have been healed of acute and chronic stomach trouble, and set entirely free from bondage to their food. I know of one who had been troubled with indigestion from childhood. She tried everything in the category of external rem- edies, and then appealed to the Truth. She began Freedom from Man-Made Law. 87 at once to put away all thought about dieting. At first, until her fear of certain kinds of food was overcome, she blessed everything that she ate, and pronounced it good, and as she advanced in her understanding of the Truth she was perfectly healed. A certain woman, who was a sufferer from chronic constipation, had not eaten cheese for years because it is considered an astringent. After coming into the higher thought, she found the trouble was not in the cheese, but in her own consciousness. She was healed, and found she could eat not only this condemned article of food, but many others that had been forbidden her under the laws of hygiene. A patient of mine had for many years been attacked by a severe headache if she did not have a cup of coffee at a certain time. Some time after coming into the Truth she was out on a jaunt, where the accustomed coffee could not be obtained. The headache promptly began to make its appearance, when she bethought herself of her principle, and took her stand against this bondage. She declared she was pure Spirit, free from every man-made law. The pain left her immediately, and thereafter she was free. The inconsistencies of the human mind teach many lessons to those who are open to receive them. A man who had for years suffered from indigestion, said that when he could eat no other kind of solid food, cucumbers agreed with him. Two women 88 Freedom from Man-Made Law. were talking in my presence one day, and one said, " I cannot drink tea at night for it always keeps me awake ;" the other replied, " How strange, if I am wakeful I always drink a cup of tea and it quiets me and puts me to sleep." A large number of people are still under the delusion that flesh eating is necessary to physical strength, and the production of bone and sinew. Many children are forced into eating meat against their own higher instincts. This fallacy is being refuted on every hand by the rapidly increasing- number of vegetarians. There are many people who for years have not eaten any kind of flesh, fish or fowl, and who are strong and muscular. A good example is the Hindu coolie, who is noted for his heavy burden-bearing and indefatigable strength. He has never eaten flesh but lives on rice. As a result of the controversy that has arisen in Ger- many between vegetarians and flesh-eaters, several athletic contests have been entered into for the pur- pose of proving whether people who did not eat meat could retain their strength. Every contest ended in a sweeping victory for the vegetarians. As man realizes more fully the great law of Love that governs all life, he will not allow himself to be a party to the killing of animals for the mere grati- fication of his palate. That in man which desires flesh for food is on the lowest plane of his conscious- ness, and so long as he feeds it he is nourishing his lower nature. Freedom from Man-Made Law. 89 Another delusion from which the Spirit has power to set man free, is that of taking cold as a result of external conditions. The disease commonly known as cold does not come from getting into draughts, change of clothing from thick to thin, time of bath- ing, or anything in the realm of the external. The cause is in consciousness. Cold, bronchial trouble, consumption, and all diseases of the body are results of certain false states of mind. If, however, you fear any of these external conditions, it may seem as though you took cold from them, but it is really the fear that does the work and not the condition itself. Perhaps at the time you sat in a draught you were not afraid, and possibly you did not know you were in the draught that you believe to have given you cold ; but if you are recognizing external causation, you are holding yourself under the law and suffer from breaking it. Even as it is true that an essential step in the heal- ing of stomach trouble, is for one to be set free from bondage to his food, so must one in overcoming any throat, lung trouble, or sensitiveness to colds, set himself free from the fear of these outer conditions. A certain elocutionist had always found it neces- sary to be very careful about protecting her throat from the night air, and was subject to cold from what she considered the slightest indiscretion. Coming into the Truth she proceeded to rise above this limitation. One night she awakened feeling 90 Freedom from Man-Made Law. that she was taking cold from an open window. She felt the time had come to take her stand for freedom, so she arose, went to the couch imme- diately under the window and lay down upon it, declaring that she would no longer recognize evil in God's pure air ; that she was a child oi Spirit, free in the freedom of the Spirit. In this consciousness she fell asleep. She took no cold, and from that time she went out in the night air in thin attire, took no precautions whatever, and had no more trouble from colds. Another woman had been subject to pneumonia, and having a severe attack from which no one expected her to recover, she was healed by the Truth. She had always slept with closed windows because she dared not breathe the night air. When she was convalescent, she resolved to sleep with her window open, and lay aside a wool gown she had thought it necessary to wear. The night she took this stand she awakened, feeling all the evidences of having taken cold. This, however, did not shake her faith nor frighten her. She began to speak the Word for herself to the effect that God, the Good, was omnipresent, and that the air which came in at the window was the breath of God and could bring her nothing but a blessing. Thus meditating she fell asleep and in the morning she was perfectly well. Still she did not have the courage to leave off n chest protector which for years she had worn. Freedom from Man -Made Law. 9: She left her room one morning to attend to her daily duties, with the prayer in her heart that she might gain sufficient faith to put the protector aside the next day. She had a bright day, fee-ling un- usually well, and when she returned to her room in the evening the first thing that met her eye was her chest protector. She had forgotten to put it on. From that time her freedom was established. A Truth student overheard this conversation between a physician and a lawyer : " Doctor," said the lawyer, ' ' I understand that you are in the habit of rowing violently for an hour or two, and while in the heated condition that necessarily ensues you plunge into the bay for a swim. Is not that a very dangerous thing to do ?" "It has always been considered so, ' ' replied the physician, ' ' but there is nothing in it, any one can do it who thinks so. ' ' While without knowledge, we suffer from break- ing these man-made laws, through knowledge of the Self and constant recognition of the spiritual nature, we rise above them. Do not take any of these steps toward freedom with your heart full of fear, but work diligently to overcome the fear. When you have become fearless through understanding of the principle, you will find that you may eat and drink what you please and when you please ; that you need take no thought about texture of clothing, time of bathing, or amount of sleep that you get. Whether the air you breathe is night or day, you 92 Freedom from Man-Made Law. will know that it is Good. ' ' Hearken unto me every one of you and understand : there is nothing from without a man that entering into him can defile him because it entereth not into his heart. That which cometh out of the heart of the man that defileth the man. For from within out of the heart of men proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornica- tions, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. All these things come from within and defile the man." The question has been asked, "Can one drink alcoholic stimulants, use tobacco and opium, without harm to himself?" We must remember that freedom is not license. Emancipa- tion comes only as a result of spiritual unfoldment, and the spiritual man has no abnormal desires. Every time we make a positive declaration about our lives on the shadow side, or side of error, we make a law for ourselves. Remember the I AM is the Christ Self, and do not desecrate it by making false statements concerning it. Your words are powerful, so do not condemn yourself to the result of your own decreeing by saying, ' ' I am sick, I am poor, I am ignorant, I am a miserable sinner." Speak only words of Truth : only that which you desire to see manifest. Recognize only the one great law of the Good. Even as you realize that there is a perfect Law governing the universe at large, so it is true that the same la\v governs every Freedom from Man-Made Law. 93 atom of your body and every detail of your life. When the affairs of your daily life seem to be chaotic, declare persistently and unwaveringly, ' ' There is only one law working in and through my life. ' ' This does not mean that the inharmony, error or chaos is the working of the law, but that it is to be overcome by the law, whose one purpose is har- monious adjustment. In considering the application of the principle of Truth do not look ahead to the ultimatum, and con- clude that because you cannot at this time do the greater works, that you cannot take a step in that direction. You would not say to the little child, " Because you cannot do an example in the higher mathematics the principle is false." You would teach the child as the first step, to put two and two together, and that as it grew to understand the prin- ciple, it would be able to do the more difficult problems. Then do not think that because you cannot walk the waves or transcend all physical law at this time, that you must remain in bondage to those limita- tions which are taking from you your health, happi- ness and freedom, but apply your principle in what may be called the lesser things, and know that he that is faithful in little shall be made ruler over much. The overcoming of physical law through spiritual development has been proven by many people suffi- ciently to demonstrate the principle. A principle 94 Freedom from Mart-Made Law. that will apply in part will, through understanding and application, carry us to the ultimatum. One has carried the principle to its full fruition. Even as Jesus Christ stood at the pinnacle of his divinity, so through knowledge and consecration you and I may do the same. Let us at no time in our ascent of the mountain of spirituality trample the flowers that bloom at our feet, by fixing our longing eyes on those that bloom at the top. Gather the beauty and fragrance of them all every step of the way, thus will the top be gained without hardship or struggle. In this way we may realize that ' ' All the way to heaven is heaven." Freedom from Man-Made Law. 95 STATEMENTS. I cannot be deceived by any appearance of evil or error. I live, move and have my being in the mind of God. I cannot be moved or influenced by any thought of evil. I cannot be deluded by the material world. I am free from every man-made law. I cannot be influenced or deceived by any per- sonality, either my own or another's. I am pure Spirit, free in the freedom of the Spirit. I cannot be self-deceived. I cannot be moved by the error of another. I cannot be moved from my center in divine Love. All things in and through my life are working under the perfect law of God. 96 Cause of Disease, or Forgiveness of Sin. Wesson V\\\- Cause of Disease, or Forgiveness of Sin. Humanity has for ages been struggling against sin, sickness, sorrow, and death. The reason that it finds itself still in bondage is because it has not sought the cause in the right place. Man has sought cause in the external ; in the realm of effect, and naturally has not found it. Not knowing the cause, it has been impossible to remove the effect. The salient point of this lesson is, that the seat of causation lies within, in the thought realm. Whatever is now manifest of good or evil had its origin in mind. Whatever we are individually manifesting in our lives, whether disease of body, sorrow of heart, inharmony of environment, or poverty of circumstances, their origin is somewhere in the vast realm of our consciousness. All the Good we are enjoying we have also created by our thought. This is a great saving principle, and to know it is the secret of attaining to Freedom. If the cause of evil is in mind, to change the mind must necessarily change the result. " Be not con- formed to this world, but be ye transformed by the Cause of Disease, or Forgiveness of Sin. 97 renewing of your mind." Man's great need is to learn how to think. Few people know what true thinking is. The current idea is, that if a man lives in accord with the moral code, there is noth- ing more required of him. Jesus said, ' ' Except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven." It is not enough for man to conform his outer life to a cer- tain mediocre standard of goodness. The Christ is the true standard. Jesus said : "Be ye perfect even as your Father in heaven is perfect. " It is not sufficient for one to merely control his false characteristics and keep them in abeyance. They must be redeemed, uplifted and entirely overcome. Though anger, passion, unforgiveness, criticism, are buried so deeply in the heart that they show no sign on the surface, yet they are doing their destruc- tive work, and are vitally active in keeping man out of the kingdom of God. The false self must not merely be kept out of sight, it must cease to be. It is not what man is doing, but what he is think- ing, that is of paramount importance. ' ' Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." All suffering comes from sinning. Sin is the trans- gression of the law of God. The law of God is embodied in these words : "Acknowledge God in all thy ways." "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and 98 Cause of Disease, or Forgiveness of Sin. with all thy strength, and with all thy mind." To do this, means to put all recognition of evil out of the consciousness. Man suffers not alone from conscious or willful sinning, but from ignorance of what is really true righteousness. Righteousness is right thinking ; right thinking is thinking on the Good. Not only does sin, according to the world's definition, manifest as outward chaos, but certain states of mind which we have felt quite justified in permitting, as surely find inharmonious expression. Condemnation, criticism, sensuality, deception, ava- rice, malice, revenge, anger, jealousy, selfishness, are palpably false, and they record themselves as cor- ruption of body, inharmony of environment, or poverty of circumstances ; but beside these, fear, grief, sensitiveness, anxiety, doubt, scepticism, self- depreciation, human sympathy, belong entirely ro the mortal, and must be quite as assiduously put away as generating false conditions. In short, any dis-ease lack of ease in mind, will, if continued in, express itself in outward disease. There is no one in the world who is not in bond- age to many of these states of mind to some degree. And when we realize this, we may understand why what are commonly known as good people, and children, suffer. Children are negative : they are like photographic plates, and often reflect the inharmony about them. It is many times neces- sary to teach the Truth to the parents or guardians Cause of Disease, or forgiveness of Sin. 99 of a child, before the child itself can be reached. The cause of children's suffering, however, is not always attributable to those who have charge of them, for from early infancy their mortality begins to assert itself in false characteristics. Many people who have tried to believe in a per- sonal God have become very much embittered because of the current idea that God permits evil to come to innocent people. The great law of the Good is not responsible for the suffering of humanity. We suffer from igno- rance of the Law. Sin is nothing more nor less than ignorance of how to live in conformity with divine Law. Whether in child or adult, false thinking will show itself forth as evil conditions. It is simply a matter of cause and effect, and not the mandate of a personal God. ' ' Do men gather grapes of thorns or figs of thistles ? Every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. Of thorns men do not gather figs, nor of a bramble bush gather they grapes. A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good ; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is evil." There are many who are living in all kinds of materiality and sin and they are apparently happy, prosperous and healthy. This is because they are satisfied. They are content, for the time being, to i<x> Cause of Disease, or Forgiveness of Sin. stagnate on the animal plane, and aspire to nothing higher. It is the quickened, awakened soul that suffers, not the one asleep and content to be so. What might be called a minor error in a sensitive, aspiring soul, will manifest itself more quickly and seem more pronounced than a greater error in a soul that is dense in its materiality. A hair will stop the delicate works of a watch, while it will have no effect on a piece of heavy machinery. We must remember, however, that though evil seems to flourish, all who are not living in the Christ consciousness are liable to be overcome by evil at any time, and they are steadily marching down toward old age and death. The health that is not based on knowledge of the Christ Self may at any moment pass away ; so may happiness, prosperity any good. Furthermore each soul must one day awaken, for conscious life is eternal. Whether the soul has laid off the body or not, when it begins to cry out for higher food, then comes the time of suffering for past error. When this time comes nothing but the Truth will emancipate it. Let us look at man for a moment in his threefold nature : as Spirit, soul and body. The Spirit is the divine Self, the eternal I AM, at one with God : the same yesterday, today and forever. The soul is the present consciousness : whatever one realizes or knows of Good or evil at this time. The body is the manifestation or reflection of the soul or Cause of Disease, or Forgiveness of Sin. 101 present consciousness. The whole work of the soul is to unfold, to become at one with the Spirit. The body at every step of the on-going continues to represent the soul consciousness. As the soul is purified, the body shows forth health, strength, vigor, life. Do not think of yourself as a body having a soul. Know yourself as a soul having a body, which is an instrument for its expression, and which should be under its perfect control. Specifically considering cause and effect, let us note the action of mind upon body and environ- ment. The influence of mind in causing and heal- ing disease is becoming a universally recognized fact. Hypnotic suggestion has been thoroughly proven to be more potent than an anaesthetic in preventing and allaying pain, and has become a common factor in the practice of the physician. A case was reported in a medical journal of a condemned criminal who was offered a chance for his life if he would consent to being exposed to cholera germs. The ostensible purpose was to prove whether cholera was contagious or not ; the real purpose was to prove the influence of mind. The man was told that if he contracted the disease and recovered, he should have his freedom. He consented and was taken to a new house, placed in a new bed in which no one had ever lain, and in thirty-five minutes he developed a malignant type of cholera. It was only by careful nursing and io2 Cause of Disease, or Forgiveness of Sin. assuring him that he had not been exposed to the disease, that his life was saved. A young clerk went to his place of business one morning, as well as usual, and one of his fellow work- ers conceived the idea of telling him, as a joke, that he looked sick. It was taken up by others, and he finally succumbed to this repeated suggestion, and before noon became too ill to remain at his work. A certain dentist was in the habit of using an anaesthetic before cleaning a tooth, and a fluid to cleanse away the anaesthetic afterward. One day after a successful piece of work, he discovered that he had reversed his medicines ; that he had used the cleansing fluid first, and the anaesthetic afterward, but the effect had been exactly the same as usual. I know a physician of local fame who states that all diseases of body are the result of shocks to the nervous system, and that these shocks are caused by the various sorrows, disappointments, emotions, and inharmonies that enter into the daily life. More and more as the higher thought advances, is the world recognizing mind as the seat ot causa- tion. Steady and sure must be the march ol Divine Wisdom until ail know, as the few do now, that there is no kind or description of disease that is not the direct manifestation of a corresponding state of mind. Every organ of the body represents a divine idea. As man persists in perverting the divine idea, the Cause of Disease, or Forgiveness of Sin. 103 organ which represents it may become diseased. The heart is the symbol of Divine Love. If the love nature is degraded : if there is inharmony in the love life, disappointment, sorrow, or a sense of emptiness or loss in the heart, the organ may be affected as a result. One suffering in this way should declare, "I am filled with the Spirit of Divine Love, and it heals me." The blood stands for the Life. Impure blood would indicate impure thinking, and a healing statement is, "I am cleansed and purified by the Spirit ; my life is the Life of God." The eyes and the ears represent Divine Percep- tion. Jesus said to those who did not understand him: "Having eyes ye see not; ears, ye hear not ;" and to his disciples, he said : " Blessed are your eyes for they see, your ears for they hear," clearly addressing the inner consciousness. It is the soul that sees ; the external eye is but the window for the vibrations of light to pass through. Jesus said, ' ' If thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. " The single eye is the con- sciousness that recognizes one Power and one Presence, the Good, in distinction to that which sees good and evil as equal realities. The ears also stand for obedience. A good healing thought for deafness is, "I am non-resistant, child of Love : I hear the voice of the Spirit, and am willing to be obedient to it." To overcome blindness, use this io4 Cause of Disease, or Forgiveness of Sin. thought, ' ' I am illumined by the Christ Spirit within ; my spiritual eyes are open, and I now clearly see." The spine stands for the Divine Will. There are three false conceptions of will that cause spinal trouble. One who is weak-willed, who, as we are accustomed to say, has no "back bone," and who is dominated by personality, should assume his divine responsibility. He should cultivate his cour- age to stand unmoved in his convictions, and allow himself to be led only by the Spirit within. He should hold the thought : ' ' My will is the will of God." One who is strong willed, and dominating, should utterly yield his will in all things to the Divine Will. He should declare, ' ' I have no personal will : God's will is done in me." Then he should be careful to take his mental hands off from all with which he has to do, allowing affairs, charges, loved ones to be governed wholly by the will of the highest Good. The third error is the belief that God's will may afflict. This is explained at length in the sixth lesson. The hands stand tor loving service, and skill : the knees for divine humility : the hair for the Holy Spirit, or man's radiating power : the feet represent that understanding which must be lifted troni the plane of the earth or materiality, to the spiritual plane. The work of the feet is to carry one for- ward, symbolizing the on-going. All spiritual on-going is marked by the evolution ol the under- standing, as well as the regeneration of the love Cause of Disease, or Forgiveness of Sin. 105 nature. Love and Wisdom go hand in hand, and in the highest are one. The teeth stand for recognition. The office of the teeth is to masticate the food as the first step toward assimilation. The first step toward spiritual assimilation of the bread of life, the Word, is recognition. It is the universal and habitual recognition of evil that causes the decay of the teeth. As one unfolds spiritually, the teeth become less and less subject to decay. I know of one whose lower teeth were in such a bad condition that the dentist advised her to have them taken out. This she refused to do, and determined to save them by the Word of Truth. She overcame the most excessive pain, which was supposed to come from the condition of her teeth, arrested decay in them, has filled tw r o or more cavities, and the work is still going on. I know of another woman past fifty years of age, who filled live cavities in her teeth within a few months time through her understanding of Truth. A good thought for the preservation of the teeth is, "I am conscious only of the Good. I am at one with the unchanging Substance of God." To fill a tooth, speak directly to it, and say : ' ' You are cleansed and purified by the Spirit ; you are filled with Divine Substance." The lungs stand for the active life principle. They are the receptacle of the breath, and the breath is the life of God, active. Any error that 106 Cause of Disease, or Forgiveness of Sin. seems to vitally affect the life, may cause disease of the lungs. There is no fixed law concerning these corres- pondences. There can be nothing unvarying on the side of error. While the correspondences can be followed in a general way, it is always necessary to ask the Spirit in each individual case to reveal the cause of the trouble. One error in conciousness may show forth as a certain disease in one person, and take quite a different form in another ; or the same disease in two people may have its origin in different states of mind. Generally speaking, con- demnation, criticism, sarcasm, pride, a sense of emptiness in the love-life, may manifest as rheuma- tism, neuralgia, skin disease, and an impoverished condition of the blood. Passion, anger, irritation, emotion of any kind, may throw the digestive organs out of order. It is commonly asserted that dys- pepsia makes one cross, morbid or depressed, while as a matter of fact, it is the state of mind that causes the disease. Any one in this state should declare: ' ' I am filled with the peace, love, and harmony of God." Fear, sensuality, lust, agitation, may manifest as cold in its various forms, such as catarrh, bronchial trouble, and consumption. A healing statement is, "I am cleansed and purified by the Spirit of Divine Love : Love governs me, controls me, and satisfies me." Fire symbolizes the warm- ing, cleansing power of Divine Love, and whenever Cause of Disease, or Forgiveness of Sin. 107 the material remedy would be hot applications, declare for the patient his oneness with Divine Love. I know a woman who was healed of pneumonia within a few days, by such statements as, "You are quickened, vivified, warmed, and relaxed by the Spirit of Divine Love. You are filled with Divine Love. You are Divine Love." Oil is also a symbol of Love. It symbolizes the softening, relaxing-, soothing quality of love, which makes all things move easily. That which we love to do we do with ease. When there are tense, contracted, congested conditions of the body, for which oil would be the material remedy, anoint the con- sciousness with the Word of Love. Such conditions as these manifesting in the body, give positive evidence of the same state in consciousness, and relief will quick.ly be realized under the Word, ' ' You are warmed and relaxed by the oil of Divine Love." This statement was held for a woman whose body was drawn out of shape by contraction of the cords and muscles, accompanied by the most excruciating pain, and within fifteen minutes she was entirely relaxed and resting in perfect peace. Within an hour she was up and about as usual. On previous occasions of this kind, before she turned to the Truth, she was always placed under the influence of morphine, and was a week or more in recovering. Fear and lust have been known to cause cancer. A healing thought for this trouble would be : "All io8 Cause of Disease, or Forgiveness of Sin. accumulation of error within me is now melted down and consumed by the fire of Divine Love." To overcome fever, declare that the patient is free from all fear, resting in the peace of the Spirit. Speak your words of peace in the quietest, gentlest way of which you can conceive, scarcely breathing the words to yourself. Great stillness is necessary where there is fever. Pain is caused both by con- scious and unconscious resistance. It will succumb to the thought, ' ' There is nothing in me that resists the Spirit ; I am filled with the Peace of God." Unforgiveness many times shows in the body as kidney trouble. Pride stiffens the joints, causes stagnation of the blood and swelling. The counter- acting thought is: "I am meek and lowly of heart. ' ' One effect of sensitiveness is tooth-ache. A sense of bfing wronged, harboring injured feelings, or injured pride, may manifest in accident or injury to the body. Selfishness may cause the organs of the body to become sluggish in their functions ; torpid liver is one result. All errors in consciousness really have their root in selfishness. Analyze any false characteristic, and you will find self love is the foundation on which it rests. Selfishness is one of the great causes of poverty. ' ' Look out for number one," is the whole basis of action in the world, and so long as man lives from this stand- point poverty will endure. Unhealthy circum- stances, lack, are no truer than an unhealthy body, Cause of Disease, or Forgiveness of Sin. 109 and the same principle is applicable in the overcom- ing of both. Overcome the cause in mind, and the effect will be removed. The law is perfect and sure : " Give, and it shall be given unto you, * * lor with the same measure that ye mete withal, it shall be measured to you again." If we would receive any Good, we must first give. If we would be loved, we must love ; if we would receive justice, we must be just ; if we would be forgiven, we must forgive. If we would be prosperous and successful in our undertakings, we must make the key note of our lives, giving, not getting. People sometimes grasp at the truth as an added means to carry out their selfish ends, but it cannot be desecrated in this way. The Good must be sought for its own sake ; the fruits are the natural result. ' ' Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things (all things needful) will be added unto you." We receive from the great Spirit of the Good just what we give to It. In the degree that we hold ourselves from the Good, we shut the Good out from our lives. Bear in mind that the divine mission of each one is to bean open avenue through which the Good may flow forth to all. If we close up that avenue with selfish desires and considera- tions, we shut out our own good, not in one way only, but in many ways, and finally we stagnate and die. Poverty may also come to one as a result of centering the thought on loss, or from a feeling rro Cause of Disease, or forgiveness of Sin. that life is empty and void. For example, a man may be well conditioned in life, having family, friends, abundance. He meets with a loss ; he grieves over it, talks about it, magnifies it, and finally his concentrated thought upon loss manifests in a succession of misfortunes. Life then seems empty, and he is held in that state so long as he continues to tear down with his thought. The world says, " misfortune never comes singly ;" but it may come singly and be entirely overcome by the one who will meet every indication of error by a positive declaration of the opposite Good. When evil begins to manifest itself in your life, do not think it is there to overcome you. It is not. It merely represents something in you that needs to be redeemed. You, in your true Selfhood, are the Christ. Error says to you, ' ' Redeem me, heal me." All your false thoughts and characteristics appeal to you to uplift them and to show them the way into the kingdom of harmony, or heaven. Then put away all fear of evil, knowing your power to overcome it. While the student is admonished to look within, it is not wise to dwell upon seeking specific cause of evil. Hold your thought upon the Supreme Good, and the error will fall away for want of recog- nition. "Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on Thee." The true forgiveness of sin is the redemption of the sinner. To forgive sin is to give good for evil, Cause of Disease, or Forgiveness of Sin. in to give wisdom for ignorance, love for hatred ; it is to overcome the mortal by the divine. Love is the redeeming power of the world, and as the soul becomes permeated with love, sin is forgiven or is lost, as the darkness is lost in the light. This is beautifully expressed by Henry Drum- mond, in the following language : " You are to so cultivate the soul that all its powers will open out to God, and thus beholding God, be drawn away from sin." Cause of Disease, or forgiveness of Sin. STATEM EN TS. Nothing can move me, disturb me, or irritate me. I am filled with the loving patience of the Christ. Anger has no place in me ; nothing can tempt me to anger. I am filled with the Love that is God. I am meek and lowly of heart. I am free from all thought for self. I am free from all desire for self. I am pure, holy, selfless child of God. There is no condemnation in me. I have not one condemning thought for anything or any body. I am filled with Divine Love. Love consumes all jealousy, all envy, all hatred, all unforgiveness. It is easy for me to forgive. It is easy for me to realize Divine Love. I now forgive everybody, and my Father does now forgive me. The Lord is my shepherd, I know no lack. I am rich in spiritual riches which do now manifest in the fullness of my every need. I have no consciousness of lack ; I am rich in God's Love. I am now cleansed, purified, healed and blessed by the Holy Spirit which fills me. Unity. 113 UNITY. We are entering upon the understanding of a religion which is practice, not theory. The literal meaning of the word religion, is to bind back, to relate, and taken in its broader or truer sense, it means to bind back to the Source, to know the true relationship with God. Every human soul consciously or unconsciously aspires to be at one with God. We have seen that the consciousness of separateness from God is the cause of our suffering. Our work, then, lies in making the reunion. Man came forth from God perfect in His image and likeness. He must consciously return to God, and again know himself in His image and likeness. Not through death is this union to be made, but through self purification, by the cleansing fire of Divine Love. We must learn the great lesson of Love, unselfish Love, which, when it enters the heart, brings us nearer and nearer to our fellow men. As we become more at one with God, we become more at one with all humanity. ' 'As the spokes of a wheel grow nearer together as they approach the hub, so ii4 Unity. man grows nearer to man as he approaches God." You niay measure your distance from God by that which lies between you and your fellow men. ' ' He that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?" This we may apply in a most practical way in our daily life. It is possible to come into harmonious touch with every one that comes into your life. You need not try to love the selfish, disagreeable, or unlovable one in your neighbor, but remember that the Divine One is there, and that you have power to call it forth by your persistent determination to see only the Good. While we cannot always love one in all the outward appearance of error that may be encrusting him, we may with the eye of the .Spirit look beneath the shell and love the divine, the true Self. This Self will finally come forth to meet your love, like a flower to meet the sunshine, A woman who is endeavoring to live the Christ principle went to live next door to a certain family, and from the first they began to show great unkind- ness to her little girl. Instead of resenting this treatment, the mother of the child knew the one true remedy was Love. So she began to think how she could show that family her love for them. It was not pretence on her part, but genuine Christ Love that went out to them, and it soon found a way to express itself in some neighborly act. From that time forth all antagonism melted away ; every Unity. 115 effort was made to undo the wrong that had been done, and perfect harmony was established. Every one comes into your life to receive of that pure Love which is your true Self. If you rind joy in loving the one that is dear to you today, how much greater will be that joy when every one becomes to you a loved one, and there wells up in your heart a continuous stream of love that rlows out to all mankind. If you find yourself feeling that you have nothing in common with a person, that you are separate in tastes, interests and desires ; if there is antagonism or inharmony between you, do not make the mis- take of thinking your neighbor all at fault, but stand on your principle. Never look outside your- self for cause, but continually hold these thoughts : ' ' I am at one with your true Self. " "I see you as God sees you. " " The true relationship is now established between thee and me." If in this way you are faithful to the highest within you, you will find that all feeling of difference will give place to warm friendship. Jesus said : ' ' Love your enemies. ' ' By ever invoking the spirit of Divine Love, holding last to the truth that " Love never faileth," we shall love our enemies into our friends ; change inharmony into harmony, chaos into order, and thus establish our kingdom of heaven on the earth. n 6 Unity. " The longer I live and the more I see Of the struggle of souls towards the heights above, The stronger this Truth comes home to me, That the universe rests on the shoulders of love. A love so infinite, deep, and broad, That men have re-named it and called it God." The one who is wise faces every problem in life with the conscious power to solve it. Never make the mistake of trying to run away from your over- coming. We can not run away from our problems, because we can not run away from ourselves. Today we meet a false condition ; we may try to run away, but that in the soul consciousness which made the error possible, still remains. Whether we have gone from east to west, or from north to south, we will meet the same thing again and again, until the cause is removed. Turn and meet the condition with the conscious knowledge that the Good is the only Power : melt it down with Divine Love ; overcome it with the Christ Spirit, and your freedom is established. Our environment need never retard our spiritual on-going. Whatever the external circumstances, nothing can take from us our freedom of thought, and if the thought is held centered on the Good, whatever is false in the environment must necessarily fall away. Make every obstacle a stepping stone to greater realiza- tion of the divine character, and each experience will become a blessing. The way to freedom does not necessarily lie through hard experiences, but Unity. 117 if you find yourself in the midst of an experience, make it an opportunity, not a stumbling block. There is always a way out of every difficulty. There is always an easy way to overcome. As we become more and more at one with Divine Love and Wisdom, we shall find ourselves less and less involved in hardships. The Spirit ever unites, while materiality tends always toward separation. On the material plane we find separation : nation from nation, family from family, individual from individual. On the spiritual plane we are all united in one common brotherhood, founded on the rock of selfless Love. Love is the fulfilling of the law. Love _makes it easy for us to be kind to everything and to everybody. Love teaches us to be tolerant with the errors of others, and with all people's ideas and beliefs ; to seek ever for points of agreement, and to avoid antagonizing. "Agree with thine adversary quickly whilst thou art in the way with him." The Truth is broad enough to find a place of meeting in all sects, denominations and religions of the world. There is no phase of religion which does not contain some Truth, else it could not stand, and the fundamental Truth in all religions is the same. Do not allow yourself to condemn other people's ideas simply because they differ from your own ; nor to imagine that God is working only through the little avenue in which you find yourself. Know that infinite n8 U n'ity. Love-Wisdom -Power seeks to express itself through every possible avenue and on every plane of being, to the very highest of which that plane admits. When you talk with the Jew, your common meeting ground is the supreme power of the one God. Your point of agreement with the Catholic is the power and divinity of Jesus Christ. When you talk with a Hindoo, remember that the Christ mani- fested through Buddha as well as through Jesus of Nazareth (though not in the fullness), and that the teachings of both are largely the same. When you talk with a man who thinks he does not believe in God, present to him the great Law of the Good, or the Supreme Intelligence which governs the uni- verse. Through agreement with that which is true in each man's religion, you will be able to lead all who are ready to the one fundamental principle, the Christ within ; the divine Man. Unity oneness with all life whatever the manifestation, is the watch- word of the Spirit. Make yourself at one with the life in all nature ; with the breeze that sighs through the trees ; with the ceaseless rhythm oi the ocean ; with the mighty stillness of the mountains ; with the vastness of the sky. Make yourself at one with the life in the worm, the gnat, the snake, and the fiercer animals, from which in terror we have been taught to shrink. We read in the prophecy of Isaiah : " The wolf shall dwell with the lamb and the leopard shall lie Unity. 119 down with the kid ; and the calf and the young lion and the fading together, and a little child shall lead them. * * And the sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the adder's den. They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain, for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. ' ' Jesus declared that they who believed should take up serpents and they should not be hurt. The ' ' knowledge of the Lord' ' is the knowledge of Love. To Love and Wisdom all things are possible. Love melts down all bar- riers. Love is the healing power, the unifying power. Making our union with Love is the true atonement, the at-one-ment. The vicarious atonement, as it is commonly un- derstood, is a dishonor to a God of Love. Jesus Christ did not pass through the death on the cross to appease an angry God for the sins of humanity. Neither was there any expiation of its sins through this act alone. The crucifixion was a great object les- son, symbolizing that which had already taken place- in Jesus ; the crossing out or cancellation of the false self. Jesus' one great purpose in allowing himself to die upon the cross was that, through the resur- rection, he might prove the nothingness of death. It was necessary for Jesus to die in order to raise himself from the dead. In raising himself from the dead he proved its unreality to the one who is made i2o Unity. perfect in knowledge. ' ' Greater Love hath no man than this that he lay down his life for his friends," said this master. The laying down of his life was not in the dying, but in the living. He laid down his life from conception to ascension in ex- emplification of a universal principle. Jesus gave precepts for the overcoming of all sin, mistakes or errors of the human soul, and exemplified these pre- cepts by his life. He is the perfect example of the saving principle. In this sense only is he the savior of the world. He was enabled to accomplish his works, not because of any fundamental superiority to the rest of God's children, but because of his spiritual crucifixion or crossing out of the false con- sciousness, thereby making his at-one-ment with God. Making the at-one-ment with God is the only atonement there is or ever can be for sin. The atonement for sin is the forgiveness of sin. The forgiveness of sin is the wiping out or over- coming of sin. To overcome sin is to become at one with all that is comprised in the Good. To become at one with Love is to become separate from hate ; to become at one with purity is to become separate from impurity ; to become at one with joy is to become separate from sorrow. This atonement for error each soul must make for itself. Jesus showed the way, each one must walk therein. The Christ Self is the true mediator between man and God. The Christ within you is the only savior Unity. 121 of your world. When you have supplanted your consciousness of error by that of the Good, you will have made your own atonement, at-one-ment, through your divine Sonship, with God. As we look through the symbolism into the spirit of the church ordinances, we find them rich in this one idea, unity of God and man. Jesus admon- ished his disciples to eat his body and drink his blood, which he symbolized by bread and wine. The body represents the Substance, the Spirit, the Life. To eat the body and drink the blood of the Christ is to identify the consciousness with the Christ Spirit ; to live the Christ life. The idea of eating and drinking is used in different places in the scripture to indicate soul identification with a principle, and in this sense Jesus used it. We are to eat and drink, digest and assimilate the Christ nature, thus making it our very own. Jesus said, ' ' Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, ye have no life in you. He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood dwelleth in me and I in him. This is the bread that came down from heaven ; not as your fathers did eat manna and are dead : he that eateth this bread shall live forever." And when his disciples murmured because of their misunderstanding, he said : " It is the SPIRIT that quickeneth, the flesh profiteth nothing ; the WORDS I speak unto you they are SPIRIT and they are LIFE." Fasting 122 Unity. is the symbol of self denial. We gain nothing spiritually from external fasting unless it lessens our false consciousness. The mere sacrifice of the moment counts for little. It is from false thinking, we need to fast. The spirit of fasting and com- munion is the same. As we fast from the false consciousness or false self, we are necessarily in communion with or feasting on the true Life or Substance of the Christ Self. The essential baptism is that of the Spirit. Water symbolizes the cleansing power of the Spirit, and the true baptism is the use of the Word, which cleanses the consciousness from all error and immerses it in the realization of the highest Good. John came baptizing with water, but the Christ baptizeth with the Holy Ghost. John the Baptist represents that state of consciousness which is still in the letter of the law, in symbolism ; the consciousness which precedes but has not entered the Spiritual or Christ consciousness. The larger part of the religious world has stranded on empty symbolism, making the letter of the law the important thing instead of the Spirit. " The letter killeth but the Spirit maketh alive." That the spirit has been lost sight of, is evidenced by the fact that the observance of the communion, fasting, and baptism, has not meant the healing of disease, sorrow, poverty the overcoming of evil. The one who truly communes, fasts, or is truly immersed, is Unity. 123 lifted day by day. higher and higher above sin, sick- ness, sorrow and death, and is brought nearer and nearer to the present realization of Divine Life which is free from all evil, fraught with all Good. If your symbolism has not meant this to you, it has been void. As we enter into the Spirit the symbol is no longer essential. The one who is bound by tradition may say : "But Jesus commanded the observance of these forms. ' ' Jesus admonished his disciples to use these symbols in the same way that we give our children picture books before they can read. The pictures express to them the ideas. After they learn to read they no longer need the pictures. Jesus did not command his disciples to break the bread and drink the wine, or to be bap- tized, any more positively than he did to wash one another's feet, and to take up the cross daily and follow him. There is a sect that observe the wash- ing of one another's feet, and if we are to do these things merely because they were commanded, this custom is quite as essential as any other. If we are going to take Jesus literally regarding one of his commands, why should we not do so in regard to all ? In other words, if we see that one com- mand cannot be taken literally, and that it can only be observed in its spiritual significance, why should we not conclude that all are to be taken in the same way. Jesus said : "If any man will come after me, let him take up his cross daily and follow 124 Unity. me." This cannot be literally done any more than we can literally partake of the body and blood. The taking up of the cross daily, is the daily can- celling of the false self, and the following ' ' Me' ' is the following of the Christ Self. The washing of one another's feet teaches the lesson of divine humility and perfect equality. It was the under- lying principle of all these admonitions that Jesus desired to instill into the heart of man. The symbolism of one is no more important than the symbolism of another, and its literal observance will inevitably pass away as man comes into the higher understanding. We must cease to live merely on the surface of life, but learn to look deep into the heart of God, and there behold all things, not as they seem to be, but as they are. Looking deep and long we shall see the self reflected there in all its purity and God- likeness. We shall see the Self in God, God in the Self, through the awakened consciousness ; the Father, Son and Holy Ghost : God, the Father ; the Self, the Son ; the awakened consciousness of oneness, the Holy Ghost ; in other words, the Creator, the Creative Power, and Perfected Crea- tion ; the Father, Holy Ghost and Son, the three in one. We cannot conceive of the Creator apart from the Creative Power and Creation. Neither can we conceive of the Creative Power apart from a Creator and Creation, nor a Creation apart from a Creator and Creative Power. Unity. 125 Know thyself, O mighty being that thou art, in all thy limitless, boundless grandeur. Let no pigmy trial bedim the glory of thy horizon which encircles the universe, and speaks of Freedom to every soul encompassed therein, and holds it close in perfect oneness with the great heart of the Infinite. 1 26 Unity. STATEM ENTS. I am filled with the spirit of Divine Love. I am quickened and vivified by the spirit of Divine Love. I radiate Divine Love. I love everybody, and everybody loves me. The love of God is moving in and through every part of my being, blessing me, healing me, and giving me peace, now. I am one with the Christ in myself. I am at one with the Christ in my neighbor. I am at one with the Good in everything and everybody . I am at one with the universal. I am at one with God. Divine Satisfaction. 127 Wesson 3C. DIVINE SATISFACTION. Divine satisfaction is the normal state of the soul. Man as he finds himself in the world today, separate from God, is in an abnormal condition. Until he enters the true life, and begins to make his at-one- ment with God, he goes about with a soul hungering and thirsting after he knows not what. He seeks his satisfaction first in one external thing, and then in another, but he does not find it. All the mad scramble after wealth, personal love, fame, pleasure, is caused by the yearning of the soul for true satisfaction. Man is ignorant of the source of the true substance that alone can feed him, and is self- deceived, in as much as he thinks he can be satisfied by sensual gratification or material acquisition. However much we may have of what the world has to offer, there is always something lacking. One goal after another is attained, only to find some other will-' o-the- wisp ahead, luring us on in quest of the unattainable ; unattainable because that which we really seek lies within, and cannot be found in any external thing. Many dear ones are roaming over the world, satiate with all that money can buy, love can offer, 128 Divine Satisfaction. or pleasure give, yet filled with a surging unrest that makes them feel that life holds nothing worth the effort of living. We have been living on the sense plane, trying to satisfy the soul with all kinds of sense gratification. The lesson that must inevita- bly be learned, is that the soul cannot be fed upon the husks of materiality. Until we turn within, and seek the Self which alone can know God, the one Source of satisfaction, life must be fraught with more or less disappointment and hardship. ' ' In the world ye shall have tribulation, but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world." What man is really seeking is God, and many stumbling on in ignorance of what they really want, go from one excess of sensuality to another, desperately trying to still the inner craving, a craving which is the cry of the soul for the living bread. ' ' I am the bread of life ; he that cometh to me shall never hunger, and he that believeth on me shall never thirst." All bondage to habits, such as the use of tobacco, opiates, drinking, or any form of sense indulgence, is but evidence of the great desire of the soul to know its own divinity. Instead of condemning the one who is thus deluded and enslaved, speak the freeing word : endeavor to awaken him to know himself. Tell him that he is a child of pure Love ; that he is not self deceived ; that Divine Love fills and satisfies him. In this way he will be healed of the desire and set free. This phase of soul-healing Divine Satisfaction. 129 forms a large part of the work of the Truth, and many pages might be rilled with testimonials of people who have been freed in this way. A certain young man was healed from the habits of swearing, smoking, and drinking, by listening to three lectures on the Truth. He had been in the habit of swear- ing in ordinary conversation, and he drank as a matter of course. In describing his experiences, he said : "I suddenly found that I not only did not want to swear, but that I could not." The desire to drink also left him, without any conscious effort on his part. He seemed to be most in bond- age to the habit of smoking. He smoked inces- santly, even getting up in the night to smoke, but after once having the Word spoken for freedom from this habit, he was perfectly healed. One who had become a slave to the morphine habit was using fifty grains a day, when, in desperation, he turned to the Truth. In a week's time he had reduced the amount to three grains, and in two days more he was healed. Healing came to a man addicted to the drinking habit through reading the literature on the Truth, and treatment from a distant healer. A man past sixty years of age became a student of Truth, and realiz- ing that his soul was being held in bondage by smoking and drinking, he took the simple method of saying : ' ' Father, take the appetite. ' ' He spoke in faith, and it was done. He was free from that hour. 130 Divine Satisfaction. So long as we keep the soul down in the dark cellar of materiality, it suffers. It is dissatisfied, and longs to come out into the light of Love, Purity, Selflessness and Godlikeness, which is its native element. We need never expect to be satisfied while unforgiveness, selfishness, fear, dis- trust, condemnation, or any foreign or mortal attribute is harbored in the heart. Man innately knows his divine nature, and he can never rest until he begins to give it conscious recognition. From the first glimpse he gets of his true Self, there comes a sense of peace and satisfaction never before realized. This increases as he steadily advances in the spiritual life. There is one true life to live, and that is the life consecrated in thought, word, and deed to the Good ; the life which has for its paramount purpose, soul unfold - rnent, character building. Every force in man is divine, even that which seems to give impetus to evil. In our ignorance we have wasted our life forces through many false channels. All the energy or force that goes out in passion of any kind, in emotion, sensuality, anger, fear, jealousy, revenge or grief, is the Substance of life. All our forces should be consecrated to the Good, and brought under perfect control of the divine I AM. Self control is the secret of power. Man can never be master of his circumstances, of his body, of his life, until he is master of himself. Divine Satisfaction. 131 Through self control or conservation of these forces we generate strength, vitality, the very essence of all we need for the accomplishment of any purpose in life. The secret of Jesus' power lay in his perfect self control. Nothing could move him from his divine center. He could not be moved to passion or emotion ; he could not be moved to anger or resentment. He was enabled to truly say of himself: "The prince of this world cometh and finds nothing in me." Virtue was said to go forth from Jesus to heal those who but touched the hem of his garment. This virtue was the conserved life or God force which belongs to us all, but which we have dissi- pated through the sense consciousness. We have strayed from the Father's house, and wasted our substance in riotous thinking. Every one has his own peculiar atmosphere, which is colored by his thoughts as they are centered on good or evil. In the presence of some people you feel a sense of peace and rest, in that of others you feel wearied. In the degree that we become spiritual in thought do we radiate the Christ virtue, and our very presence becomes strengthening and uplifting. When we have as completely consecrated every thought, emotion, desire, to God, as Jesus had, when we have as perfect self control, the same virtue will go out from each one of us, and we shall do the works of the master. 13^ Divine Satisfaction. Solomon says : "A good man shall be satisfied from himself." Man must realize his own com- pleteness, and thereby gain his divine independence. It is a delusion of the mortal that we are dependent upon any person, place or environment, for our happiness or satisfaction. The Source is within, and until we find it there our environment will always seem to lack the essential element. But as we gain our independence of externals, and seek all happiness and peace in God, we shall find that our surroundings will adjust themselves to express harmony. Attachment to particular persons, places and things, is one of the errors that the world calls good, but which the divine Man must overcome. Attachment is bondage. The Spirit demands free- dom, and freedom can only be known as one swings out from the particular into the universal. The free soul holds itself in a position to give good to all, and to receive good from all : to give love to all, and receive love from all. When we center our love upon one, to the exclusion of others, we are adulterating the Divine Love with selfishness, and in this state we can never find true happiness or satisfaction. We must learn to love without being attached to the object loved. So long as we are attached to or dependent upon the person or thing loved, our souls are held in bondage. One thus imprisoned cannot possibly enter into the highest state. We must be set free from all bondage to Divine Satisfaction. 133 our earthly loves, and learn to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength. Having given our love to God, we shall find that, for the first time, we know the true, satisfying love, not only for those whom we call our own, but for all people. Edward Carpenter speaks these words to those who are ready to receive them : ' ' Ah ! love having journeyed through all life, having become freed even from thee there remains nothing glorious but thee." The Truth teaches us to love without desire for possession; to love selflessly. There is no "mine and thine" in the kingdom of God, and a perfectly selfless love is the only love that can satisfy the soul. "As the disciple retreats within himself, and becomes self dependent, he finds himself more defi- nitely becoming a part of the great tide of definite thought and feeling. When he has learned the first lesson, conquered the hunger of the heart, and refused to live on the love of others, he finds himself more capable of inspiring love. " Light on the Path. We must broaden the horizon of our love life until, instead of being centered upon the chosen few, it shall embrace many, and, ultimately, include all. In learning the universal love we do not love our dear ones less, but all people more. ''That love for one from which there does not spring Wide love for all, is but a worthless thing." 134 Divine Satisfaction. As we realize the divine satisfaction we become more childlike in our desires. Where we were once wearied and surfeited we find ourselves inter- ested and delighted. The earth takes on the hue of the glass through which we look. On days when we are happy and joyous all nature seems to have on a brighter dress. The sky seems bluer and the sun brighter, the birds sing more sweetly, and people seem agreeable and kind. On days when the heart is full of discontent, the same scenes pass unnoticed and we think everybody in the wrong but ourselves. If you find yourself attributing your feeling of dissatisfaction and unhappiness to some particular person or external condition, immediately declare : ' ' My happiness does not depend upon any person, place or thing ; I draw all happiness from within." If you feel bereft because of separation from some loved one, declare : ' ' There is no separa- tion in Divine Mind. I am at one with the All Good. The true Self of my loved one is with me now. I am perfectly satisfied. ' ' " Of thorns men do not gather figs." Out of a dissatisfied heart cannot grow satisfactory condi- tions. Look to God for the fulfillment of your ideal. Expect all Good from God. Accept all Good as coming from the hand of God. Ask nothing, ex- pect nothing of personality. ' ' All that is good in man is God. " When you have learned to main- tain this attitude, you may find that the personality Divine Satisfaction. 135 which formerly disappointed you will begin to express your ideal. As we turn persistently to the Christ within, those with whom we are associated show to us a side of their nature that could be revealed in no other way. As we realize the ideal within ourselves, we come in conscious touch with the ideal in our neighbor. By seeking God within as the one Source of all Good, we make it possible for the ideal to manifest itself. We should regard all the relationships of life as purely incidental to soul unfoldment, and never allow them to bind or limit. No personality, however near and dear, should be allowed to stand between us and our soul ongoing. ' ' He that loveth father and mother more than me is not worthy of me ; he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me." No relationship should ever be entered into for its own sake or for self gratification, but only as a means to the one great end, union with God. " Whosoever shall do the will of God the same is my brother, and my sister, and mother." This is the true attitude of mind to be taken by every disciple of Truth. God is complete, sexless being. God is the Father- Mother Principle ; the male and female perfectly blended in one. In every man is the latent woman ; in every woman the latent man. The work of each man is to develop the feminine principle within himself, that, the masculine and feminine 156 Divine Satisfaction. may consciously become one. The work of each woman is to develop the indwelling masculine prin- ciple, and consciously blend the two in one. Sweden- borg says : "In the masculine principle, love is in- most and its covering is wisdom ; whereas injthe^ feminine principle, the wisdom of the man is inmost and its covering is love ; so that the man is .the. wisdom of love, and the woman the love ofjhat . wisdom/' The Divine Man is in the image and likeness of God, sexless, satisfied, complete in himself. " He whose heart is not attached to objects of sense finds pleasure within himself, and through devotion united with the Supreme, enjoys imperishable bliss. " Bhagavad Gita. Divine Satisfaction. 137 STATEM EN TS. I am complete and whole in every part, the perfect idea of God. I am filled with the love that is God, and it satisfies me. I am divine, sexless, complete being. I am free from all bondage to the sense plane. I am not dependent upon any person, place, or thing for my satisfaction. I am satisfied within myself. I am divine satisfaction. I am permeated in every part of my being by the Spirit of God. God is my all in all. 138 The Silence, or True Prayer. Wesson The Silence, or True Prayer. God works in the stillness. Never in the din and confusion of mortality can we hope to find God. Go into the silence of your own soul, and when you have stilled the senses and shut out all thought of evil, center your mind on that which is holy and true. Learn to stand at the center of your being, and be unmoved by the passing of the external world. Man needs to commune more with his higher Self. He needs to meditate more on the things of God. Everyone should set a time apart each day for entering the silence, and filling his soul conscious- ness with thoughts of Purity, Love, Wisdom, Truth. This is as essential to soul unfoldment as the rain and sunshine are to the development of the flower. In order to know God we must practice the pres- ence of God. Practicing the presence of God is thinking on the Good. Because of our long habit of false thinking, we must be systematic and persistent in forming the habit of true thinking. There is nothing mystical or difficult to understand about going into the The Silence, or True Prayer. 139 silence. Go apart in some quiet place where you will not be disturbed. Go alone, or with some one who understands how to co-operate with you. Re- lax mentally and physically, and open your heart to receive the Good. Relax the body ; tense muscles indicate tensity of thought, and the mind cannot be tense and receptive at the same time. One should continue in this practice of relaxation until all tensity is overcome. Many people go about with tightly shut teeth, clenched hands, and taut muscles. Such people do not even let go of themselves when they lie down, but hold themselves up, instead of resting on the bed. This condition originates in fear, anxiety, or suppression of feeling, and the over- coming of it is very important to the one who would progress in the spiritual life. Close your eyes when you meditate so that your mind will not be distracted by external things ; then choose some statement of Truth and repeat it over and over, until it reveals its inner meaning to you. In this way you place yourself at one with the Sub- stance of every need. That which you concentrate upon will become manifest in your life. Concen- trate on God and the Good will express Itself. You will become like that which you center your thought upon. Think steadily of all that makes up the Divine Man, and you will become the Divine Man. If you are surrounded by inharmonious conditions which seem to hold you in bondage, do 14 The Silence, or True Prayer. not try of yourself to adjust things, but trust the great Law of the Good to do its perfect work. Know that the first step is to realize harmony within your own soul. Go into the silence ; declare that you are filled with the peace and har- mony of God ; that Harmony is expressed in every avenue of your life, and you will find that things will adjust themselves. When you require Wisdom regarding any prob- lem which comes up in your life, retire to the still- ness, declare yourself at one with Divine Wisdom, and the knowledge you need will be given you. If you desire money to meet a certain obligation, go into the silence ; declare that in Divine Life there is no lack ; that God is the omnipresent Substance of your every need, and you will find ways and means opening to you at just the right time. If you find yourself entangled in some false environment though from your mortal standpoint you can see no way out declare there is one law working for the highest Good of all concerned ; that you are free in the freedom of the Spirit ; and thread by thread will the knot disentangle. Remem - ber that there is always a way out of every false condition, and that through communion with God the way will be revealed to you. When you go into the silence and hold the Word in this specific way, forces are immediately set at work to bring The Silence, or True Prayer 141 about the desired result, just as when you plant a seed in the ground forces are set at work to bring the life hidden there into manifestation, according to the character of the seed. Let us not, however, observe the silence simply for the adjustment of affairs, but ever bear in mind that the paramount purpose is soul unfoldment. False characteristics will present themselves to us so long as there is any part of the mortal left unredeemed. Daily, hourly should we turn to the Spirit to overcome them. When you have entered this holy of holies within yourself, give recognition to all that is embraced in your divine nature. Make declarations that are true of your divine Self, and you will find yourself each day becoming more gentle, more loving, more patient, purer, and more selfless. As you give your- self up to this higher communion, you place your- self in touch with all that is grand, noble, pure, true and Godlike in the great Mind of Man. God is the Silence itself. When you go into the Silence you enter into God, and the Spirit permeates your whole being, baptizing, cleansing you, making you a fit tabernacle for the living God. " Know ye not that ye are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you ?' ' Through self purification or regeneration by the Word of God you will become a reflector of God ; a radiator of God ; a magnet to attract to you all Good. r4 2 The Silence, or True Prayer. Make this time of meditation your first considera- tion, and do not allow anything to interfere with it. It is of vital importance to you, and when you have realized this, you will find a way to observe it. Take time for meditation before you go to your daily work, and place your mind in an orderly state. Immerse yourself in the sweet Spirit of Peace, Love and Harmony, which you will always find in the Silence, and everything during the day will in con- sequence move on smoothly, and the time spent will be more than regained. There are many people who carry the activities of the day into their sleeping hours. They add up figures, sew, plan, buy and sell, as the case may be, all night, and awaken in the morning as weary as they were the night before, because the mind was not at rest. This may be avoided, if, at the end of the day, you spend at least a few moments before going to sleep, declaring that you are Spirit, resting in the Love and Peace of the Spirit. Fatigue is really caused by the state of mind, rather than by physical labor. You will become rested in the Silence in a much shorter time than by the mere cessation from work, or by sleeping, with the idea of fatigue still retained in your consciousness. We should give as much time as possible to this higher communion, for upon it largely depends our spiritual growth. There are those who find it difficult to sit still enough for meditation, and yet at first more The Silence, or True Prayer. 143 difficult to concentrate. This only shows how great is their need of this practice, and such people should be especially diligent in its observance, even if at first it becomes a matter of self-discipline. If one is faithful until this spirit of restlessness is subdued, he will find that this time of silent com- munion is his greatest recreation and blessing. Not only should we practice the presence of God at special times of meditation, but we should endeavor at all times to think only on the Good. In the Silence we form the habit of true thinking, and it then becomes easy to carry it into all the activities of life. Where formerly you thought at random, learn to think to a purpose. Let some Word of Truth be the undercurrent of your thought wherever you are, whatever you may be doing. In this way you will become Self centered, and learn to be unmoved by strong feelings and emotions, or by the disturb- ances of the external world. Man's life is like a lake. When it is thrown into waves, and storm -tossed, its reflective quality is destroyed. When it is still, it becomes a perfect mirror. We must still the emotion-tossed con- sciousness in order to reflect God. Remember, too, that little ripples on the water take away its power to reflect, quite as much as do the greater waves. Preserve your equilibrium through the petty annoyances of the day, as they, as well as the 144 The Silence, or True Prayer. more palpable errors, cloud your consciousness, and keep the Good from expressing itself in your life. When you find yourself becoming disturbed, annoyed, or excited in any way, let this statement repeat itself within your consciousness : "Be still, and know that I am God." This is the voice of the Spirit within you, and as you learn to hear it you will find that you are able to meet circumstances which have formerly seemed most trying, without being at all troubled. Holding yourself still, keep- ing yourself centered in the Good, is always a necessary step toward overcoming any false condi- tion. Learn to overcome without being involved in the overcoming. "Fight, but be not thou the warrior. ' ' Habitual communion with God is true prayer. Every aspiration of the soul is prayer. The prayer of supplication or pleading with God for some good which He has seemed to withhold, is meaningless and useless. God is not changeable and vacillat- ing, therefore no amount of supplication will induce Him to change His mind. As God is the Good itself, filling all time and space, the prayer or peti- tion has no intelligent basis. Jesus said : ' ' When thou prayest, thou shall not be as the hypocrites are, for they love to stand praying in the synagogues and in the corners of the street, that they may be seen of men. But thou, when thou prayest, enter into the closet, and when thou hast shut the door, The Silence, or True Prayer. 145 pray to thy Father, which is in secret, and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee manifestly." "Use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do, for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking. Be not, therefore, like unto them, for your Father knoweth what things ye have need of before ye ask Him." This is but another way of saying : "Go into the closet of your own, inner consciousness, close the tloor to false thinking, and give full recognition to the Good there abiding, and the Good shall find expression in your life." Jesus used the prayer of acknowledgement, and he never uttered a prayer that was not answered. In raising Lazarus from the tomb, Jesus did not beseech God to give Lazarus back to his sisters, he simply said : ' ' Father I thank thee that thou hast heard me, and I know that thou hearest me always." Then he called upon the divine One in Lazarus to come forth. This was the highest form of acknowledge- ment of the Omnipresent Life of God. When the disciples told Jesus that they must have bread for the multitudes who had followed him into the desert, he took no account of the appearance of lack, but replied: "How many loaves have ye?" Then he took what they had, blessed it, and gave thanks. This was the recogni- tion of the Omnipresent substance of God. Recognition of the Omnipotence and Omnipres- ence of the Good, is true prayer. The purpose of 146 The Silente, or True Prayer. prayer is to bring every soul into the realization of the Truth in Jesus' statement, " I and the Father are one." Every act of the soul that brings man nearer to this realization is prayer, rich in potency and Light. "Thou art the temple of the living God." Go into the inner court, and there in the Holy of Holies, in the Silence that is God, thou shalt behold thyself reflected in His image. The Silence, or True Prayer. 147 STA TEM ENTS. Now does the sweet Spirit of Peace still every emotion of my soul. I am divinely protected from all evil. I rest secure in the secret place of the Most High. God is my environment. I now consciously live in the kingdom of heaven. I am in tune with the Infinite. I consecrate my love to God. I consecrate my emotions to God. I consecrate my desires to God. I consecrate my intensity to God. I consecrate my feelings to God. I consecrate my body to God. I consecrate my life to God. 148 Hov to Heal. Wesson HOW TO HEAL. This lesson presents different methods of healing that have been proven good, and gives suggestions for workers. To be well grounded in Principle is the important thing. The method used in applying the Principle is not so essential. Different workers differ in detail as to method, though having the same basis and carrying out the same idea. One necessarily uses different methods in meeting the great diver- sity of minds and their needs. Each student, while he will find the experiences of others helpful, should allow his own individuality full scope, for God has many modes of expression. The term healing does not refer alone to the bringing forth of health in the body, but to the establishing of a normal, healthy state of soul, body, environment and estate. All true healing must begin in the soul. The object of the spiritual life is not to heal the body, nor to bring about any material good, but it has for its great purpose the unfolding of the soul to the full fruition of its own Godlike- ness. We must seek the Truth for its own sake ; H ow to Heal. 149 Love for its own sake ; Purity for its own sake ; the Good for its own sake ; and the results must necessarily follow. There are those who seek merely the healing of the body and who do not care to know the Principle. While they are in this state of mind, the healing is often withheld. Sometimes such people are restored to health by the realization of the healer, but it cannot endure. For one to be permanently whole, happy or free, he must know the Principle and live the Life. The great, far-reaching essential work is to teach, and every healer should be a teacher. Not only should a patient be healed of his present disease, but he should be taught to be his own physician and to live above disease. In all our spiritual work we should be careful not to become entangled in results. If we keep our eyes fixed upon the result of our work, our power may be weakened by anxiety or doubt, or we may be self-exalted by success. To watch for results is unfaith ; to take pride in our suc- cess, is claiming for self that which belongs to God. The faithful performance of the work belongs to us, the result to God, and we must leave it entirely to Him. We read in the Bhagavad-Gita : "The man who doeth that which he hath to do, without attachment to result, obtaineth to the Supreme." In all your healing never take any responsibility of your patient. Give it all to God. Do not think 150 How to Heal. you are burdening God, for Omnipotence can know no care. Never doubt the power of your Word. It is not your Word but the Father's. Make yourself a willing and pure avenue for infinite Love, Wisdom, Power to work through, and know that this trinity is equal to all thing's. Your part is to absolutely trust it. " With God all things are possible. ' ' Whenever a divine healer finds his work wearing upon him, or having anything but a salutary effect, it is because he is working more on the mental than on the spiritual plane. He is trying to do the work too much of himself, instead of letting it be done by the Christ within. When one is working in the highest way, he will be quickened and uplifted by every word of Truth he speaks, and the more people he heals the stronger spiritually and physically he becomes. Do not allow yourself to think that you cannot heal. This is denying your Christ, lor it is the Christ in you that heals. If you deny ihe power, it will be to you as though it were not. Give it recognition and you will be able to heal yourself and others. Have faith in your Word, to whom- ever, or whatever it is sent, and it will be unto you according to your faith. It is not necessary for the patient to report all the symptoms of his case. The thought of both healer and patient must be kept upon health, not disease ; upon the reality, not the appearance. Remember it is the mind that needs How to Heal. 151 to be worked upon, not the body. The cause is in mind, so do not try to heal the body but change the mind. Heal the false thought that gave birth to the condition that is showing forth in the body. It is not necessary to speak the Word for each disease that may be manifesting in the patient. All disease is error, and filling the soul with the Truth will dispel the error, whatever name may be given it. A woman whom I know was healed of spinal trouble, an internal abscess, creeping paralysis, and physicians said that every organ of her body was more or less diseased, yet her healer knew of only one of these troubles. People are often healed without ever speaking of the nature of their disease at all. Always, if possible, be alone with your patient, where you can get control of the thought atmos- phere. Teach him from the first, but be careful not to antagonize him or talk too much in the absolute. Always invoke the Spirit to guide you and speak through you, and you will say just the right thing to meet the present need. After talking with your patient as much as for the time you think wise, ask him to relax, close his eyes, and it is usually best to give him a statement of Truth to repeat, while you go into the Silence and speak for him the freeing Word. As to the method of healing, use your knowledge of the correspondences, or cause and effect, as given in the eighth lesson. This knowledge will broaden 152 How to Heal. as you advance in the Truth. Your intuition will be developed, and many times by merely looking into the face of a person, you will be able to see the cause of the trouble. Seeing the error in con- sciousness, annul it by declaring for him the opposite Good, which you know belongs to his true Self. The relation of the healer to the patient is largely that of a father confessor, and should be held sacred. If one who is in trouble will frankly unburden himselt to his healer, his need will be more quickly reached and overcome. There is a true idea underlying confession, and in some cases it is necessary to the healing. If the cause of the trouble is not imme- diately revealed, do not waste time seeking it, but rather make absolute statements that will cover every need, such as : " The Spirit of Christ within you sets you free. " " You are filled with Divine Love and it heals you." Some healers use this method altogether, without reference to specific cause, knowing that whatever the cause, holding one in touch with the Spirit of God will heal. There is one way that the body itself may be treated in accord with the Principle. The body is not matter, as the word is commonly interpreted, but a low order of consciousness. Every organ of the body is composed of cells, and it is now an acknowledged fact that every cell has a center of intelligence. Prof. Virchow, the great German biologist, and a leader in medical science, is quoted How to Heal. 153 as making the statement : " The life of an organ is the sum of all the lives of the single cells, and each cell is an independent, living being." Talk to the consciousness of any organ of your body as you would talk to a person, telling it the truth about itself, and quickening it by the Spirit. For example, if you have a pain in your heart, go right there with your thought and speak to it, not as an organ but a state of consciousness, and say : "You are willing to yield yourself to the Love of God ; Love brings you peace and heals you. Supposing there is a tumor growing somewhere in the body ; regarding it as a darkened consciousness, say to it : ''All error within you is consumed by Divine Love. You are cleansed and purified by the Spirit." The life in you is the Life of God, and you are willing to manifest it. Your soul is not located in any particular place, but permeates every part of your body, therefore the uplifting of your soul is the spiritualizing of your body. A most potent method of healing is to simply repeat the name Jesus Christ. Use the word apart from the personality of the man Jesus. Use it in its highest significance, " manifest Spirit of God." This name has stood to represent all that is Godlike for many centuries, and the Spirit in it is almighty in its healing power. Center these Words, Jesus Christ, in any part of the body or environment that 154 How to Heal. is not manifesting the Good, and the error will be overcome. A healing and uplifting practice is to speak the Word Jesus Christ in every part of the body, beginning at the crown of the head and going to the soles of the feet. Pass the Word through the whole being, as you would take a light into the darkness. There are those who do good healing by repeat- ing the Lord's prayer, carrying in mind the spiritual significance of each statement and applying it to the need. In the Lord's prayer is contained the fulfillment of every need of the human heart, and if you will meditate upon it until the Spirit interprets its deeper meaning to you, you will receive a great blessing therefrom, and be able to use it to bless others. If one has brought himself into a high realization of Divine Love, he may sit down before his patient, and by force of the great God- Love that wells up within him, and flows forth from him, he may heal without formulating a single thought. The aura of one who is living a consecrated life is healing, and there are those who go into the Silence with the patient and by simply realizing that God is All, the work is accomplished. The laying on of hands, many times is quickly and markably effective. When one feels especially led by the Spirit to do so, it is good to heal by laying on hands. One should wait, however, for How to Heal. 155 positive leading, before pursuing this method. I personally know a woman who fell and injured herself so that one of her ribs was sprung out of place. For nine years she was in this condition, and during that time suffered great pain in her side, and had never been able to lift her arm above her head. She was treated by the laying on of hands, and the realization of the Word Jesus Christ. The rib has sprung back into place, the soreness has gone, and she has perfect freedom in the use of her arm. The more consecrated one is, the more spiritual he becomes, the more conscious he is of the Spirit permeating every part of his organism, the greater virtue will he emit from his touch. The word of Truth may be sent to people at a distance, and be quite as effective as when the patient is present. Wherever the thought can go, the Omnipresent Power of God can be called into activity. The only difference between the present and absent speaking of the Word is, that the faith of the patient may be greater when face to face with the healer, and more perfect co-operation of thought may be established. But these things being equal, the distance itself is no obstacle. When you have occasion to speak the Word for an absent patient, it is well to set a corresponding time for both to be in the silence. Always remember that the now is the accepted time. Never put the manifestation of the Good off 156 How to Heal. into the future. If you think of your Health, Love, Prosperity, Satisfaction, as coming to you at some future time, you will keep it in the future. Take the attitude that all things are now complete and finished in God. In this way you make it possible for your good at any moment to manifest itself. In meeting the needs of people, be careful not to allow your sympathies to be drawn upon, for in so doing you will exhaust yourself and destroy your helpfulness to them. Human sympathy is recogni- tion of evil, and is an added burden to the sufferer. Never say you are sorry for one, or pity him in any way. On the other hand, this must not offer an excuse for being cold or indifferent to the sufferings of others. There is a divine compassion which is of the Spirit, and should be felt by all. Lend a willing ear and a helping hand, prompted by a heart full of Love, and no one will feel the lack of your sympathy. It your neighbor fell into a ditch, you would not sit down on the bank and bemoan his fate. You would give him your hand and pull him out. If your neighbor falls into the slough of despond, do not weep with him, but lift him up by your recognition of the unreality of the evil which seems to surround him, and the Omnipotence of the Good to set him free. When people are pouring forth their troubles, deny them, declare that only the Good is true, and you will bring them a sense of freedom and be blessed yourself. How to Heal. 157 Never impose your ideas upon people who are not ready to receive them. " Cast not your pearls before swine." Many enthusiasts make the mistake of urging their loved ones to accept the Truth, and of arguing with unbelievers. They learn many times by bitter experience that this is not the wisest course, nor the way of the Spirit. The Spirit gives everyone his perfect freedom of thought and action. The Spirit does not need to argue. It is what it is, and simply radiates Itself. You cannot feed a man who is not hungry. After presenting the Truth and letting its blessings be known, if it is rejected the one who is wise will drop the subject, and go on quietly living his principle. His life then becomes a more eloquent sermon than could possibly be put into words. Do not make the mistake of telling people who do not understand, that they are not sick when they think they are, or that they have no pain when they say they have, or that they look well when suffering is written on every line of the face. This only serves to arouse opposition, and does more harm than good. Speak your words of Truth silently to the uninitiated, and use divine judgment in present- ing the Principle. In pursuance of your study of the Principle, do not expect to grasp the whole Truth in a day. We grow into the knowledge of the Truth only as we live the Christ life. 158 How to Heal. These lessons should be carefully studied and meditated upon. Do not reject that which you do not understand. Take the blessing from that which appeals to you as true, at this time. A Truth which you refuse today you will accept tomorrow. That which is not true you will never be called upon to accept ; that which is true will reveal itself to you when you are ready to receive it. "Go ye forth and be doers of the Word, not hearers, only." Our knowledge of Truth must always be measured by our power to demonstrate it. Only as you carry the practice of the Principle into all the affairs of your daily life, can you know its blessings. You are not a slave, you are a master. The almighty Power of God is within you : the Power that shall overcome all evil. You are the bread of Life, upon which the nations shall feed. You are the Light of the world, which shall dissipate all darkness. You are the Beloved of the Father, in whom He is well pleased. You are the One of whom the Spirit through Paul spoke these words : "He must reign until he hath put all enemies under his feet." And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son also be subject unto Him that put all things under him, that GOD MAY BE ALL IN ALL. UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY Los Angeles This book is DUE on the last date stamped below. jtiN , Form L9-10m-3,'48(A7920)444 C.'A ANGEL BV 45Q1 Beckham-. B38 1 Lessons on the philosophy of_ life. I-, ~ ' . c 1158 00187 9484 BY 4501 B38 1 A* " " ' in'ii 1 1 ll | 001 146 632