INTRODUCTION
Jesus said: “Let not him who seeks cease until he finds, and when he finds he shall be astonished; astonished he shall reach the kingdom, and having reached the kingdom he shall rest.”
For nearly a third of a century the author of this book has endeavored to bring health, joy and peace to the suffering, sorrowful and hungry; in other words, to bring to seekers after Truth the vision of the Christ — the light of Mind, whereby they too might behold the Kingdom of God even as he himself beholds it. We may not all see eye to eye today with the statements of the author, but he who reads may accept or reject them; nevertheless they are the revelations unfolded to the author as he has come nearer and nearer to the Kingdom of God—that Kingdom not being in the far-distant future nor in the near-distant future, but here and now. God alone is infallible, and God alone provides the means for our advancement, and just to the extent that he, the author, has caught the Word of God, are these writings true. With added spiritual growth and understanding, some things which appear to be true today may give place to the higher vision of the allness of God.
In the spirit of divine Love, following humbly in the footsteps of her upon whom the Holy Ghost descended in this age, and which enabled him to attain this vision of the Christ, this book goes forth into the world, bearing with it the hope and trust that through its perusal others may feel this same descent of the Holy Ghost upon them, and so find that “peace which passeth all understanding.”
The Author Careswell Eighty Ibis Street Forest Hills, Long Island
L’ Envoi
And only the Master shall praise us, and only the Master shall blame,
And no one shall work for money, and no one shall work for fame,
But each for the joy of the working, and each, in his separate star,
Shall draw the Thing as he sees It for the Good of Things as They Are!
Rudyard Kipling
PRAYER The hours I spend with thee, O Christ,
Are my unceasing prayer to thee.
I think of one unending bliss, O Christ My very love, my very life.
Each thought of thee—itself a prayer,
To still my consciousness of wrong,
I think of thee from mom to mom,
And thou art glorified.
O wondrous hours that bless and glow,
As in thy consciousness I grow,
I glory in thy high esteem and strive To know thee more and more —
To know thee more.
Wentworth Byron Winslow
ASK WHAT I SHALL GIVE THEE
Ages ago from station KOG, the Kingdom of God, the great Announcer, God Himself, broadcast to the world, “Ask what I shall give thee,” and King Solomon dialed in and picked it up. This same message is for anyone and for everyone, because God is not a respecter of persons; so after Solomon received it, he relayed it to the world, over his loud speaker, for all to hear and heed.
Solomon was at his wits’ end, he had shot his bolt, he didn’t know whether he was coming or going; he had discovered that the human mind was but counterfeit, hence no good, and whatever it produced was nought but “vanity and vexation of Spirit.” This human mind had utterly failed him, and Solomon knew it. It will fail everybody sooner or later. It is the mortal mind, or death mind, in contradistinction to the living God, or the living Mind. Paul later said, “Ye are the temple of the living God” [of the living Mind].” For ages we have been striving for the impossible, to make our consciousness the temple of the human mind, or the mortal or death mind, and have reaped what we have sown. As Solomon said, “As a man thinketh in his heart so is he. ” Man, when he thinks by his own volition, thinks with or calls into being the human mind, or makes his consciousness the temple of this human or death mind; so small wonder that he is constantly in trouble, and ends in death and the grave.
What one should do, however, is to be the “temple of the living God” or of the living Mind. This Mind being self-operating, self-governing, acting by its own volition, and not directed by man, but directing and guiding man, gives man health, or wholeness, life, love, strength, intelligence, happiness, substance, and everything that is good and eternal.
Solomon saw all this and so he renounced the human mind, this death mind. In the vernacular of today, he dialed out of the mundane stations, and found himself dialed in to the spiritual station, the Kingdom of God, station KOG. This was, in fact, automatic, for it is entirely impersonal, and when anyone renounces the human mind or this death mind, he automatically finds himself dialed in to station KOG, and hears the Great Announcer, God Himself, speaking forth the Word of God. This is exactly what happened to Solomon.
So when he tuned in and caught that message from God, “Ask what I shall give thee,” he saw instantly that with the human mind he could not know what to ask for, and said, “I am but a little child; I know not how to go out or to come in. Give therefore thy servant an understanding heart [the one Mind] to judge thy people, that I may discern between good and bad; for who is able [with the human mind] to judge this thy so great a people,” or to judge righteous judgment as did the Christ; for we read in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, by Mary Baker Eddy, “Jesus beheld in Science the perfect man, who appeared to him [with the one Mind] where sinning mortal man appears to mortals [with the human mind].” Solomon had grasped the fact that he himself could ask only for the things he wanted, things which he and others cognized with the human mind, and of which God, the one Mind, knew nought.
A person, with the human mind, believes that he is sick, or that he has lost his health; believes that he is dying or dead, or that he is losing or has lost his life; that he is poverty stricken, or has lost his substance; that he is insane or has lost his mind, and so on, so he prays for the things of which at the time he does not believe himself to be the possessor. It may be that he does not pray by supplication; but if not, he prays by implication, by declaring himself to be the possessor of those things which at the time he does not believe he has.
You cannot get crumpets at a hardware store, so there is no use asking for them, even though you ask in the name of the proprietor himself; nor can you get life which may be lost, substance which may be lost, health which may be lost, mind which may be lost, in the Kingdom of God, though you search that Kingdom “from Dan to Beersheba,” for such are not in the Kingdom of God. Therefore you waste your time praying to God for such. The Life which is God is eternal, the substance which is of God is eternal, the intelligence which is of God is eternal, and so is whatever constitutes God, and there is no life, truth, substance, intelligence, or health which may be lost; therefore why ask God for something of which He knows nothing, and which is not to be found in His Kingdom? Jesus distinctly stated, “Labor not for the meat [things] which perisheth, but for that meat [things] which endureth unto everlasting life” and again, “He that loveth his life [that is, the kind of life that may be lost] shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world [this life that may be lost] shall keep it unto life eternal,” or shall exchange it for eternal life. The Word of God found in Science and Health says: “They [prevalent theories] insist that Life, or God, is one and the same with material life so-called… They claim that to be life which is but the objective state of material sense,—such as the structural life of the tree and of material man, — and deem this the manifestation of the one Life, God.” For this, the meat — flesh, blood, bones, the life, etc., that perisheth, Jesus says, we must not work.
It we would stretch our imagination a little, let us suppose an angel hears the suppliants’ prayers to God enthroned in His Kingdom, and reports thus: “Sire, there are people praying to you and asking for substance, life, intelligence, health, and so on. What shall we do about it?”
God, answering, says: “What shall we do about it? Why ask such a question? Have I not declared that ‘whatsoever ye shall ask in My name, that will I do?’ Give them what they ask for.”
The angel makes reply: “But Sire, we have searched the whole Kingdom of God for those things and find not the slightest traces of them anywhere ”
God replies: “Do you mean to tell Me that we have no substance, no Life, no Love, no holiness, or wholeness, or health, or intelligence, in the Kingdom of God?”
The angel answers: “Sire, we have abundance of all these things; they, in fact, are the very constituents of the Kingdom of God, but these people do not ask for these things which are of the Kingdom of God. They are asking for some other kind of substance, life, wholeness, intelligence, and so on, which are capable of loss, which they believe they have lost, or fear they will lose, and they call this lack, sickness, sin, death, poverty, insanity, — something quite unknown in the Kingdom of God. In asking surcease from these latter things, they are, in fact, asking for the return of lost substance, life, intelligence, holiness, and so on. Such are not to be found in the Kingdom of God, for the substance, Life, intelligence, Love, health, which are of God, cannot be lost. They are eternal, unchanging, ‘the same yesterday, and today and forever. ’ Of these we have abundance, but of other substance, other life, other health, which may be and have been lost, we have none at all. What shall we do about it?”
God replies to this: “Very well, we cannot give them that which we have not. I AM THAT I AM. It is not true that I am that I am not. Invite them into the Kingdom of God, and we will give them whatever we have, and as much as they desire.”
If you go into the kingdom of Boreas, you will get cold; into the kingdom of Sol, you will get warm; into the kingdom of Neptune, you will get wet; and similarly, if you go into the Kingdom of God, you will become God-like, or holy—every whit whole, healthy, alive, well, prosperous.
When you enter the kingdom of Neptune you ask, as it were, in the name of Neptune, and he gives you whatever he has, two parts hydrogen, one part oxygen, and a little salt. When you enter the Kingdom of God, you ask, as it were, in My name or in His name, and God gives you whatever He has to give: Life, intelligence, Truth, holiness, wholeness, substance, all of which are eternal.
But to return to Solomon. God is said to have answered Solomon’s prayer, saying in effect, that this prayer had pleased Him greatly; that He noted Solomon had renounced the human mind, and had asked in its stead that the one Mind, God Himself or as Solomon had termed it, “an understanding heart,” might come to him and direct him; nor had he asked for anything else, such as life, wealth, health, etc.; therefore God would answer favorably the prayer of Solomon, and grant to him this one Mind or “understanding heart.” But more than this, God would also give to Solomon the things he had not asked for (and in fact could not ask for), so that never before was there a king like him.
Jesus said the same thing in his inimitable way, when, after telling us to take no thought for life, for what we should eat or drink, for the body or for what we should put on the body, and take no thought for the morrow or for what the future might bring forth (and could the human mind find aught else to ask or pray for?) he followed it up by saying, “Seek ye first the Kingdom of God, and His righteousness and all these things shall be added unto you.” Solomon accepted this promise that God would give him the things which he had not asked for, and which were utterly beyond his human conception and so could not ask for, so he stopped his praying, and stepped out on that wonderful promise of God, for we read: “Now when Solomon had made an end of praying, the fire came down from heaven, and consumed the burnt offering and the sacrifices; and the glory of the Lord filled the house [filled his consciousness].”
When Solomon stopped his praying, thus letting the human mind fall into innocuous desuetude, then did the one Mind, or the Christ-Mind arise in Solomon, or the Spirit of the Lord rested upon him; and this Mind, or God, directed him in all his ways, or prayed for him, or gave him all the things which were in and out of the Kingdom of God, to the extent of his ability to receive them. Thus, even at that early day, was seen Christian Science, or the exact knowledge of the Christ (they are one and the same) in operation.
Christian Science brings divine Science to human apprehension, so when God showered upon Solomon the wonderful things of the Kingdom of God, they appeared to him and to others in such a manner as they could apprehend; so much so that silver became as plentiful as stones in the streets, and gold was used for making the common things of daily use, while his home and kingdom showed forth abundance and blessings to such an extent that when the queen of Sheba bade farewell to Solomon, she said: “It was a true report that I heard in mine own land of thy acts and of thy wisdom. Howbeit I believed not the words, until I came, and mine eyes had seen it; and, behold, the half was not told me: thy wisdom and prosperity exceedeth the fame which I heard. Happy are thy men, happy are these thy servants, which stand continually before thee, and that hear thy wisdom. Blessed be the Lord thy God, which delighteth in thee, to set thee on the throne of Israel: because the Lord loved Israel for ever, therefore made he thee king, to do judgment and justice.”
Be then like Solomon. Step out on the promise of God, that He will give you the things you do not ask for. Cease praying to God with the human mind for temporal things, for life, love, substance, and intelligence, for happiness, health, and other things which may be or have been lost, and so are but counterfeits of “that which is eternal and incapable of discord and decay” (Science and Health), but definitely and permanently renounce the human mind (the only devil there is or ever will be), and instead “let that Mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus’” and that same “understanding heart,” as Solomon called it, or the one Mind which is God, will then take command, guide your destiny, pray for you, and give you those needful things wherever you are or whenever it may be.
It will bring calm in the face of a storm, lead you from troubled into still waters, feed the few or the multitudes even in a desert place, give health where sickness may have seemed to be, life for death, joy for sorrow, roses for ashes, and freedom in the place of bondage, happiness and abundance where unhappiness and lack may have appeared. The wilderness shall blossom as the rose, the parched ground become pools of water, and the desert shall break forth in a riot of beauty, bloom, and color. Literally, the Kingdom of God will be found to be here—at hand.
EVENTUALLY — WHY NOT NOW?
Years ago there was an advertisement which consisted of the following words: “Eventually—why not now?” and a picture of a sack of flour. These four words were all that remained of an original writing of something over two thousand words. This is not a bad example for Christian Scientists, for after all is said and done, the millions of words spoken by Christian Scientists might be boiled down to these four, “Let God do it” Christian Science is not talking, it is being, a verb, not a noun.
It seems so futile and foolish to wait until one is dead before being entirely willing to let God do it. Yet we have still to meet the person who, until he is dead, is entirely willing to let God do it. Even the surgeons, doctors, psychiatrists, and others, after they have done everything they can think of doing, and whatever human ingenuity can devise, after they have shot their bolts, operated, tried climate, put the patient to bed, given him all sorts of medicines, dieted him, dug into the human mind, and so on, will say, “We have done everything we can do. Now it is in God’s hands.” Yet they never give up trying to do something to assist God. If, however, in the final analysis we must trust God, and let God do it, surely we should do so now. If not, why not?
Suppose a man dies. There is nothing more to do. Every material stream is dried. Nurses, doctors, specialists, friends, family, relatives, and the very man himself, thinks there is nothing more to be done. All hope is gone. Death has occurred. Everybody believes the man is dead and beyond all human aid. He himself believes it. Surely it is in God’s hands!
Then does the “I” which is God, the Ego, and which is the “Resurrection and the Life,” take command and prove itself to be that which it is — it demonstrates itself, and without human effort of any kind, but by “the unlabored motion of the divine energy” (Science and Health) causes this man to awaken from his dream of death, to awaken with a body “unseen by those who think that they bury the body” (Science and Health), and so he finds himself alive. The next moment he cogitates and says to himself, “If I am not dead, but alive, then I was not killed by (whatever it was) and it, too, is equally unreal and untrue,” and he finds himself not only alive, but well also, and no longer the victim of whatever he formerly believed to be the thing that killed him. God has done it. He who is the “Resurrection and the Life” has proven or demonstrated Himself to be so.
Then let God do it. It must be so eventually. Why not now?
Why, however, wait until one is dead before being willing to let God do it? Why not do as Paul when he said, “I die daily.” He went on to say: “If after the manner of men I have fought with beasts at Ephesus, what advantageth it me, if the dead rise not?” That is to say: What is the use of making these endeavors to attain the Christ, if the human mind, together with its evils, cannot be stilled, and the Christ-Mind arise in me, or the Spirit of God rest upon me?
Why not die daily? That is to say: Why not allow the human mind to die now, let God do it, and live on rather than wait until death occurs to the body? In fact, in Revelation we find: “Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection;” that is to say, he who, instead of waiting for the death of the body before he will let God do it, and then is resurrected or wakened with a body “unseen by those who think that they bury the body,” lets the human mind die now, will not have to die bodily, or, as the verse follows on: “On such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with Him. ”
Paul is continually telling of this, of dying to ourselves, or letting the human mind die. Jesus, too, told us in unmistakable language not to use the human mind, when he said to take no thought for your life, for your body, or for what you put on your body; take no thought for what you eat or for what you drink, and take no thought for tomorrow or the future. Surely if one does this, he is letting the human mind die; it is the denial of self. It is related of the remarkable Englishman, George Mueller, that when asked what was the secret of his wonderful service and phenomenal success, he replied: “There was a day when I utterly died – utterly died’ — and as he spoke these words he bent forward lower and lower until his head almost touched the floor—“died to George Mueller, his opinions, preferences, tastes, and will; died to the world, its approval and censure; died to the blame or approval of brothers and friends—and since then I have studied only to show myself approved of God.”
In Romans we find: “What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin?”—in the further use of the human mind with its thinking, which is the only evil there is or ever will be? “Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound?” Shall we continue with the right thinking of the human mind in order that the Christ-Mind may appear? Not at all. Right thinking, even as wrong thinking, always of the human mind, the “tree of knowledge of good and evil,” never promotes or produces the Christ; but just the other way about, for when the human mind is stilled, or we “silence the material senses”? (Science and Health) then the Christ arises, or “grace abounds,” and promotes right thinking and right acting, too, in the world of today.
Read on in the sixth chapter of Romans and see how plain it is, telling us to let this human mind die, whereupon will the Christ arise in us and govern us, and this chapter finishes with: “For the wages of sin [the results of the human mind with its thinking both wrong and right] is death.” Read also Romans 8:1-14. How plain it all is when one sees that the only devil or sin there is, is the human mind and its thinking!
In Science and Health we read, “It is a sense of sin, and not a sinful soul, which is lost” (or which dies); and preceding this, it states that man “can only lose a sense material,” and that “Sin exists here or hereafter only so long as the illusion of mind in matter remains,” and this, of course, is the human mind.
Let it die now. Let it die daily. Then will the Christ-Mind arise in us, and we shall live, and on us the second death—death of the body, which never had any life anyway— shall have no power, but “the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord ” Eventually! Why not now?
SEEK FIRST THE KINGDOM WITH WHAT? HOW?
Jesus knew the Kingdom of God could not be attained by means of the human mind. Millions of people have striven to find the Kingdom of God by human mind methods, but no one ever succeeded. The human mind would not know the Kingdom of God if it was in it; and, indeed, it is in it, yet the human mind believes it sees a material kingdom, liable to sickness, sin, death, and other troubles, such as disaster, poverty, war, want, and woe. Just like a man with delirium tremens who beholds a delirium universe, with pink rats and yellow elephants and blue goblins, while as a matter of fact, right before him is his home, his wife and family, and other familiar things. Moreover, those material things which appear to the human mind are no more real, as such, than the pink rats and yellow elephants are real as such.
Jesus had stilled the human mind, doubtless not altogether in the early days of his healing mission, but to a sufficient extent so that the Christ-Mind guided and directed him in his ways. With this Mind he beheld the realities of being, and it was with this Mind, not by his volition, but by its own volition, that he “beheld in Science the perfect man, who appeared to him where sinning mortal man appears to mortals.” (Science and Health) Having this one Mind, or the Christ-Mind, he knew that the consciousness of the presence of God, or the Kingdom of God, could not be attained with the human mind.
This he taught continually. It was foremost in him. His theme was to “deny self,” or lay down the human mind, stop your own thinking, take no thought, and such teaching. Over and over again he emphasized the fact that he of himself could do nothing, but it was the Father within that did everything. “I speak not of myself,” he said, “but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works,” and many similar statements came from his tongue.
His great discourse, if discourse it was, known as the Sermon on the Mount, made this point perfectly plain. He said, “Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on.” Then he gave an illustration and spoke of the fowls of the air, telling how they do no thinking about their care, pointing out that “your heavenly Father feedeth them,” and he asked this pertinent question: “Are ye not much better than they?” He ridiculed the possibility of anyone by his own thinking (which is the thinking of the human mind) doing anything, and said, “Which of you by taking thought [or by thinking] can add one cubit unto his stature?” He answered this himself by saying, “If ye then be not able to do that thing which is least, why take ye thought for the rest [for the greater things]?”
Then he reverts to his illustration again, showing how the lilies of the field take no thought, and yet God clothes them more wonderfully than Solomon in all his glory. Then he reverts once again to the first theme, and reiterates everything he has first said, and having told us, as definitely as it is possible for anyone to do, to stop thinking, thus ceasing the attempt to do things with the human mind, he says, “But seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you” — this to be done, mind you, without the human mind, without our own thinking!
How could he have made his point clearer? He tells us to forsake the human mind by ceasing to think about all those things, and to seek the Kingdom of God. And this must be accomplished without the use of the human mind! How? In one way only. By means of the one Mind, the Christ-Mind, which he well knew was the only Mind which could comprehend or apprehend Spirit or the Kingdom of God. This Christ-Mind arises in us to just the degree that we forsake the human mind and its thinking, for then we have rolled away the stone from the door of the tomb in our consciousness wherein the Christ has lain buried or dormant beneath the debris of this human mind’s thinking, whereupon does the Christ come forth, and, stretching out his hands, blesses one and all and reveals to us the Kingdom of God.
We must remember that Jesus was wholly intent upon “putting over” his teachings, and always foremost in his consciousness was the fact that the human mind is a liar, not to be trusted a moment, utterly worthless and powerless, and must be allowed to fall into innocuous desuetude. Therefore he was constantly preaching and teaching the necessity of denying self and letting the one Mind do all.
On one occasion, talking with his disciples, he asked them what people were saying about him, to which the answer was made that some said he was John the Baptist, some Elias, some Jeremias or another prophet, all of which he brushed aside with the question, “But whom say ye that I am?” Whereupon Simon quickly replied: “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.” And Jesus, full of the truth that the human mind was incapable of apprehending spiritual things, said, “Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-jona [or, you are blessed, Simon], for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee [or, this fleshly or human mind hath not revealed it unto thee], but My Father which is in heaven.” Could it be plainer?
AN ANACHRONISM
All about us are voices, music, songs, and so on, and if we dial in on them, we can hear them. Seldom, though, do we realize that the Voice of God is omnipresent, with its omniscience and omnipotence. If we dial in on Station KOG (Kingdom of God) we may hear that voice. The divine Mind, God, or Spirit, is omnipresent; but the human mind, the devil or Satan, is not omnipresent. It is related in Job that “there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan came also among them. And the Lord said unto Satan, Whence comest thou? Then Satan answered the Lord, and said, From going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in it.” From this biblical statement, it is plain that the human mind, or the devil, is not omnipresent, and, unlike omnipresent Spirit, it needs material things to put its messages across. I liken the method of reception of the human mind messages to a telephone, and that of the reception of the Word of God, or the omnipresence of Spirit, to a radio.
As we travel through the wilderness of human consciousness, we are much like one sitting quietly at home listening to the radio, which is on one side of us, and having the telephone on the other. The radio is permanently dialed in on Station KOG, and we are listening to the Word of God which is being relayed over its loud speaker, and as we hear God’s decrees, His Word of cheer, His promises, laws, and so on, we are experiencing that peace “which passeth all understanding.” When we listen to the Voice of God and to nothing else, we shall be obedient to it, and live and act in harmony and peace, even as do the planets, the sun, and all the heavenly bodies, which never under any circumstances hearken to aught else; and having no other mind but God, the one Mind, they obey that Mind, and ever maintain their perfect rhythm of action.
But our peace and harmony are interrupted by the telephone, which suddenly begins to ring violently, and if we take the receiver off the hook and put it to our ear, it will end our peace and quiet. The telephone is, for the purpose of carrying out the simile, the agent of the devil or the human mind; and when the devil would deliver a message to us, and fill our consciousness with error, fear, sin, sickness, death, poverty, or other lack of good things, he must first engage our attention by some evil suggestion or by ringing the bell, which is a notification and invitation to take down the receiver, place it to the ear, and listen to the tale of woe or whatever other evil the devil would impart to us.
The human mind, or the devil, (for the human mind is the only devil there is or ever will be), needs matter in some form in order to get its message across; whereas the one Mind, or God, being omnipresent, comes directly to us without the intervention of, or use of, matter of any kind; hence the illustration of the telephone and the radio. The Word of God in Science and Health says, “If Spirit pervades all space, it needs no material method for the transmission of messages. Spirit needs no wires nor electricity in order to be omnipresent.” The human mind, however, when it desires to get its messages over to us, or to be present, must have matter to do so. Moreover, it cannot furnish this matter itself, for being “neither person, place, nor thing” (ibid), and therefore nothing at all, it becomes at once apparent that it cannot produce matter, for nothing cannot produce something; and so since it has to have matter before it can impart its messages of evil, it is utterly powerless unless we ourselves furnish the matter — a body, hands, limbs, ears, and eyes—for the human mind to work with. As the Revelator to this age says, “Evil comes to us for life, and we give it all the life it has.”
Keep the receiver on the hook. Don’t take it off. Let the bell ring. Let the evil suggestions come. As God said to Jeremiah, “Let them return unto thee, but return not thou unto them.” Let the suggestions come if they will, but do not believe them. You can still hearken unto the Voice of the Lord thy God while the bell rings. A little more difficult, doubtless, but it can be heard; whereas if you take the receiver off in invitation to the suggestion of evil, or the ringing of the bell, and place it to the ear, you cannot hear God until the receiver is on the hook again.
If you leave the receiver on the hook, the devil can never get his message over to you, and you will never know from just what you have escaped. Listen to God while the bell rings and rings and rings; listen to God over the noise, and recollect it can be done; and soon the suggestion will cease, or the bell stop ringing, and the operator will say to the human mind, “No answer.” Then the human mind will hang up. Do not think, however, that the devil has given up. Not at all. When Jesus encountered a similar experience which we are about to relate, as told in Luke 4, it is said that then the devil “departed from him for a season,” and if the devil or human mind left this remarkable man Jesus only for a season, it is hardly likely that we can escape the same temptations, and the bell will ring many, many times before we score the final victory.
If we take the receiver off the hook and listen in obedience to the ringing of the bell, in obedience to some suggestion, perhaps a pain down on the right side of the abdomen, the next thing we shall hear will be that we must go to a doctor, and then the next thing is appendicitis, an operation, and all the things which go with it; whereas if we let the pain or the suggestion of evil continue, or let the bell ring and listen to what God has to say, it will not be long before the suggestion of evil, the ringing of the bell, or the pain, will cease and we shall be well, and we shall never know what serious and perhaps fatal experience we have avoided. This is so with any suggestion.
Jesus had just such an experience while he was in the wilderness of human consciousness; after having fasted forty days, he was “an hungered.” Jesus was a good radio. We are all radios. He was dialed in on station KOG, listening to the Word of God, and doubtless enjoying a sense of peace and quiet after that experience, when suddenly the telephone began to ring violently. A suggestion of evil came to him. The devil, or human mind, was at the other end of the wire trying to get his attention. As we have said, the telephone cannot operate without matter if it would get its message over, and so unless you yourself take the receiver off the hook and put it to your ear, the devil is foiled. No one can take this receiver off but yourself. Jesus was startled by the ringing of the bell, by this suggestion of evil from the human or mortal mind which said, “If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread.” Did this man who was hungering accept the invitation and take the receiver down, and so listen to what the human mind had to say? Not at all. He continued to hearken to the Voice of God coming in over the air all the while from station KOG, and heard the following message and relayed it over his loud speaker for the whole world as well as himself to hear and heed: “It is written, man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.”
Now, it must be remembered that Jesus didn’t take the receiver off the hook and argue with the suggestion, or contradict it, or even answer it of himself. Jesus was a good radio, and when the bell started ringing or the suggestion of evil came to him, instead of taking the receiver down by arguing, contradicting, or affirming some truth opposed to and instigated by the error presented, he refused to do this, refused to take off the receiver, and listened over the ringing of the bell or over the suggestion, for the Word of God, and he relayed over his loud speaker this actual Word of God, not his own word, but the Word of the Father within, or, as he said himself) “I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works’” and this Word of God dealt with the suggestion of evil. It was God Himself whose Word Jesus thus relayed, and not his own. Then the suggestion left him, or the bell stopped ringing, for the operator had retorted to the devil, “No answer.”
“The wrong thought should be arrested before it has a chance to manifest itself.” (Science and Health) If this word had been simply the emanation of Jesus’ human mind, contradicting or negating the presented error, it would have done little or nothing, merely fighting the devil or human mind with its own weapons. Jesus deplored any such thing. He said, “My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight.” (His servants would be the human or mortal mind and its substratum, the body.) But this was the actual, veritable Word of God, and Jesus had no more to do with it than a radio has to do with what it is relaying to the world over its loudspeaker. He emphasized this point throughout his career, saying, “Of myself I can do nothing,” adding always that God was the doer.
In another moment, though, the bell began to ring again, and the devil was on the other end of the wire. It is well to note here that whenever evil approaches us, it can never come to us without a good and sufficient notice. It must ring the bell, or come by means of a suggestion, and we ourselves must always lift the receiver off the hook; but if we understand the operation of evil, we can, if we will, be on guard and refuse to lift the receiver and listen to evil. Science and Health says, “A knowledge of error and of its operations must precede that understanding of Truth which destroys error,” so let it be noted now and for all time that by suggestion, as has been set forth, is the way—and the one and only way that evil can make its approach. It must always give notice, must always ring the bell, or always come first as a suggestion; but it cannot do anything more unless you yourself invite it to do so by removing the receiver off the hook and listening.
This time the suggestion came in this way: The devil took Jesus up into a high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of this world and the glory of them and said to him, “All this power will I give thee, and the glory of them: for that is delivered unto me; and to whomsoever I will I give it. If thou therefore wilt worship me, all shall be thine.” The first temptation was that of material sensation; this was the temptation of temporal earthly power.
Did Jesus take the receiver down and listen to what the carnal mind had to say, as did Balaam, the prophet, ages before him? Not at all. Over the suggestion of evil, he listened to the Voice of God, and once more relayed the Word of God, not his own, over his loud speaker: “Get thee behind me, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve,” and once again the operator reported to the human mind, “No answer,” and the bell stopped ringing.
Again, however, the devil tempted him. The bell started ringing again, and this was the suggestion: The devil brought Jesus to Jerusalem and set him on a pinnacle of the temple and said unto him. “If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down from hence: for it is written, He shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee: and in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone.” This was the greatest temptation that can come to man. It is that of so-called spiritual power in the church. Did Jesus take the receiver off and put it to his ear and listen to the further blandishments of the devil? Not for a moment. Over the ringing of the bell, over the insidious suggestion, he listened to God and heard Him, too, and again relayed the Word of God into the world, for our benefit and his own also: “It is said, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God,” and again the operator reported to the devil, “No answer” — and Jesus had won the victory. But even then, great and wonderful though the victory, it is related, as before said, that the devil “departed from him for a season.”
So doubtless will it be with us as we journey forward into the Kingdom of God; but if we are faithful to keep the receiver on the hook, and listen only to God, there will come a time when instead of the operator saying “No answer,” it will report “Telephone disconnected,” and you will be able then to say as Jesus said before you, “Hereafter I will not talk much with you: for the prince of this world cometh [the devil or the human mind cometh], and hath nothing in me,” and then and then only will you have won the final victory.
THE SALESMAN
Jesus was facing the most difficult situation of his experience. He was arraigned before Pilate, with the chief priests, elders and scribes and the whole council pitted against him, and not a human being to help him. He was the victim of a plot to kill him, which today we would call a “frame-up,” and he knew perfectly well what was going on.
At this point Pilate asked him if he were King of the Jews. Jesus answered him that it was as Pilate said, thus making the claim that he was the son of God, that he was King of Israel, or that over man he had dominion.
Then did the human mind, the devil itself, set upon Jesus and accuse him of many things, just as in lesser ways the human mind attacks us through evil suggestions. What did Jesus do about it? Did he argue with it or against it, contradict the false assertions; did he mumble under his breath, or audibly, certain affirmations or declarations of spiritual truths in opposition to the presented errors, or recognize the presence of the human mind in any way. It was so astonishing to Pilate, that he said, as related, “ Answerest thou nothing? behold how many things they witness against thee,” but Jesus yet answered nothing.
Thus at the very zenith of his earthly career, at the point of his most difficult temptation, and just prior to his greatest victory, the vanquishment of death itself, he verily put into practice that which he had taught. He refused to recognize the human mind in any way whatsoever. The door of his consciousness he closed completely against the entrance of error. In doing this, he truly and scientifically prayed, for the rejection of the human mind is the reconception of the Christ. As Paul said later on, “Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we [that is, with the human mind] know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us.”
As a result of thus meeting the attack of evil, Jesus’ consciousness became a sanctuary for Truth, wherein the Christ, the very manifest presence of God, had taken up its abode, and no matter what was going on about him or happening to him, this Christ was operating to save him. Paul again tells us, “Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think [with the human mind], according to the power that worketh in us;” and this power, the Christ, or the very presence of God Himself, was praying for or saving him from and in spite of, whatever seemed to be going on.
When evil, or the human mind, through its thinking, attacked him or presented itself to his consciousness, he utterly refused to entertain it in any way, and so he maintained his consciousness as a sanctuary for the Christ. He stood “porter at the door of thought” (Science and Health), and refused admittance to error of any kind.
Like a salesman selling his wares, does this human mind come with its fruits of good and evil. The salesman approaches your house, which ought to be a sanctuary sanctified to your family, your friends, your goods and chattels, and yourself. You do not wish a total stranger to enter in and spoil your sanctuary. If you open the door even a little, only to tell him to be gone, the salesman sticks his foot in the crack and in a moment more he is wholly within and striving to sell his wares. Your sanctuary is no longer a sanctuary, and so to prevent this, you must absolutely refuse to open the door or even answer his knock. Then does your sanctuary remain a sanctuary.
The human mind is the salesman, constantly knocking at the door of your consciousness, demanding admission to sell his tempting wares. At first he never offers anything but the most tempting, pleasurable, luscious fruits; but if you let him in, you will find that in his bag he carries all manner of evils — sickness, sin, death, poverty, and other troubles. You must keep the door tightly closed, must be alert to know error’s knock and ring, and not even flicker an eyelid when he approaches. Jesus said of himself in regard to this, but only after years of experience, “Hereafter I will not talk much with you: for the prince of this world [the human mind] cometh, and hath nothing in me.” This, too, must be our goal. We must utterly refuse to argue with the presented error, whatever it may be; refuse to contradict it; refuse to make declarations or affirmations of Truths opposing the presented errors; refuse even to tell it to be gone; for to do any of these things is to recognize error in some way, and so open the door, be it ever so little, and instantly the salesman’s foot will be in the opening, and in another moment the whole human mind will be in, and consciousness no more a sanctuary.
Jesus said, “When thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray…” Could anything be plainer? Again making it so clear that “the wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein,” he said, “When ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do [do not argue with, talk back to, or recognize evil in any way]; for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking. Be not ye therefore like unto them: for your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask Him.”
You cannot pray with your consciousness filled with error. You cannot enjoy the privacy of your home with a stranger therein. “When thou hast shut thy door,” then pray, not before. “Closed to error, it is open to Truth.” {Science and Health) Jesus, at the aforesaid arraignment, had the door closed to error, but open to Truth. He utterly refused to use vain repetitions. The door was closed. Thus his consciousness was filled with the Christ, the actual presence of God, and that consciousness could and did pray. It was no labored human effort on the part of Jesus. It was “the unlabored motion of the divine energy.” (Science and Health) It was “the Father within”” doing the work.
Just as when your gas tank is filled with pure gasoline, with all impurities rejected, then does the gas explode or act, and driving the engine brings the car, and whoever and whatever is in it, safely to its destination. So when consciousness is a sanctuary for the Christ, filled with the presence of God, to the exclusion of every thought of the human mind, then does the Christ act or pray, and so brings whoever or whatever is in that consciousness safely into the haven of Soul, wherein all is holy, whole, healed, and saved.
The Bible repeatedly speaks of this. “It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh [the fleshly or human mind] profiteth nothing.” This Spirit is “the Father within” of which Jesus was so constantly telling us. “This is the word of the Lord unto Zerubbabel, saying, Not by might, nor by power [of the human mind], but by my spirit, saith the Lord of hosts.” Paul refers to it as “the power that worketh in us.” Ever is this power, the Christ, or God, manifest, working away within us, quite irrespective of what is going on with us, with the body, or with the world; just as the gas is exploding and driving the engine quite irrespective of what is going on in the car or what is in it. Day and night, it never ceases to work for us and for the world, and soon it will be seen that “the kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever.” This is holiness, wholeness, healing, and salvation.
Note what Unity of Good says: “To say there is a false claim, called sickness, is to admit all there is of sickness; for it is nothing but a false claim. To be healed, one must lose sight of a false claim. If the claim be present to the thought, then disease becomes as tangible as any reality.”
“CAST YOUR NET ON THE RIGHT SIDE”
John 21
Jesus said: “All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. For I came down from heaven [so did you], not to do mine own will [not to follow the dictates of the human mind], but the will of Him that sent me. And this is the Father’s will which hath sent me, that of all which He hath given me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day.”
Do you know what is “the last day”? It is when you have shot your bolt, when you have come to the end of your tether, when you are at your wits’ end, when you do not know whether you are going or coming, when you have come to the definite conclusion that whatever the human mind produces, it is never anything but “vanity and vexation of spirit.” Solomon was King of Israel, just as King George is King of Great Britain. Solomon had come to this last day. He knew it and so stated.
Jesus was King of Israel, and so he said when answering Pilate’s question, but he qualified his reply and “stepped it up” by pointing out that his kingdom was not of the earth earthly, but was the Kingdom of God. He said, “My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight.” Paul says, “Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?” The only servant Jesus had, or anybody has, is the human or mortal mind (“the body is the substratum of mortal mind.” Science and Health) This human mind is therefore at the disposal of humanity, as it was at the disposal of Jesus, and so could be disposed of, which is exactly what Jesus did with his servant, the human mind, and is what we, too, must do. It must be educated out of itself. Through Christian Science, the exact knowledge of Christ, or God, Jesus “reverses the seeming relation of Soul and body and makes body tributary to Mind” (Science and Health)—to the one Mind, not to the human mind. Had his Kingdom been of this world, then would his servants, the human mind and its thinking, fight, argue, contradict, affirm, or declare truths in opposition to presented errors, or fight against evils. He went on to say, “Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth.”
In this deeper and higher sense was Solomon King of Israel, even as Jesus was King of Israel, and, too, as you are, meaning thereby that man has dominion given to him by God, as we read in the first chapter of Genesis. Curiously enough, Solomon, like nearly all of us, had been trying to attain this God-given dominion himself by means of the human mind, which is, on the face of it, ridiculous and utterly impossible. The very word, “God-given” dominion, ought to show us that this dominion cannot be given by the human mind, which is the only devil there is or ever will be, and which is the arch enemy of God. Paul says of it, “The carnal mind is enmity against God.” Yet in spite of the ridiculousness of the attempt, the world goes on trying to attain this God-given dominion by means of the devil, the human mind.
It is a fact that when anyone tries to do something of himself, whatever it may be, he calls forth the human mind. He can do nothing of himself without this mind. This human mind is his servant if he knew it, the only thing a person has at his disposal; and it is well indeed that it is at his disposal, for being at his disposal, he may dispose of it. This Jesus did, and this is what Solomon before him purposed doing. The divine Mind, on the contrary, is not at man’s disposal. “Man proposes, but God disposes.” Man is at the disposal of the divine Mind, the Christ-Mind. He “is but the humble servant of the restful Mind” (Science and Health), and if he will let that Mind be in him which was also in Christ Jesus, it will dispose of him harmoniously; will give him eternal life, instead of a temporal and limited sense of life; give him eternal health, not health ebbing and flowing; give him eternal substance, not a limited sense of it; will, in fact, establish him in the Kingdom of God, and not permit him to be in a kingdom of matter, even for a short period of time.
King Solomon had come to the place in his experience where he definitely perceived that the human mind had failed him, as, in fact, it does invariably. So in answer to God’s, “Ask what I shall give thee,” he turned to God and prayed thus: “I am but a little child: [recollect that years afterwards Jesus practically reiterated this when he said, “Except ye become as little children, ye cannot enter into the Kingdom of Heaven”] and I know not how to go out or come in. [The man in the street would say, “I don’t know whether I am coming or going.”] Give therefore thy servant an understanding heart to judge thy people, that I may discern between good and bad; for who is able [personally, or with the human mind] to judge thy so great a people?”
When Solomon thus prayed, he disposed of or renounced the human mind, and correspondingly did the one Mind or Christ-Mind arise in him. Solomon relates this in his own way, and tells us that God spoke to him, indicating His pleasure in what Solomon had done, that He noted Solomon’s renunciation of the human mind, disposing of it as being utterly worthless; and since Solomon had done this, and had not asked for any material thing whatsoever, neither long life nor the life of his enemies, nor health, peace, or wealth, or any other such petty limited things as only the human mind can conceive of as being worthwhile, but had asked for an understanding heart (meaning that he had asked for what we today call the Christ-Mind, or the one Mind, God Himself) to come and direct his destiny or dispose of him, in place of his servant, the now discarded human mind, which had so signally failed him, therefore He, God, would give him this understanding heart, this one Mind; God would come to him and direct his ways, and moreover would give him the very things he had not asked for, and indeed could not ask for, so that never before him was there a king like him.
Solomon had not asked for the gift, but for the Giver; not for the blessings, but for the Blesser; not for the manifestations, but for the Manifester, God, Himself, to come to him in place of that deceiver, the human mind, now definitely disposed of, and this prayer was answered. It was in fact automatic, for as the human mind is stilled or disposed of, the stone is rolled away from the door of the tomb in human consciousness wherein the Christ has lain dormant or buried deep beneath the debris of human thinking, and then does the Christ arise and become the Savior.
Solomon perceived these things and, having awakened to this magnificent promise of God to give him the things he had not asked for, he stopped his praying and stepped out on this promise of God. We read: “Now when Solomon had made an end of praying, the fire came down from heaven, and consumed the burnt offering and the sacrifices; and the glory of the Lord filled the house,” or filled Solomon’s consciousness—which, of course, was the desirable thing and which we ourselves should likewise desire.
Then Solomon, satisfied with this wonderful promise of God, stepped out on it, convinced that the fulfillment of it was a foregone conclusion, and if it be true that he prayed at all, he did so in a way very different than heretofore, for now his prayer consisted of rejoicing and making merry, by praising and giving thanks, and glorifying God, by singing and dancing and banqueting. In fact, he prayed that greatest of all prayers, the prayer of acceptance or expectation, and in due course the fulfillment of it came to pass.
Thus, too, should we pray. Not by those old and outmoded prayers of supplication or implication, not by argument, contradictions, or affirmations and declarations instigated by some error to be destroyed, not by fighting against errors, for neither is our kingdom of this world, but by stepping out on the promises of God, such as are to be found in Luke 12:32,10:19,15:31, Genesis 28:15, and Deuteronomy 28:1-15, satisfied that the fulfillment is sure. This fulfillment may not be instantaneous, neither was Solomon’s; but day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year, did the many good things pour in to Solomon and in orderly sequence, and so will they flow to us as we patiently “occupy till I come,” or “until the spirit be poured upon us from on high.” (Isaiah) The vision has its own appointed hour. It is ripening. It will flower. Though it be long, wait; for it is sure and it will not be late.
Jesus bore this out to a marked degree. He told us, as has been quoted, that his kingdom is not of this world — the human mind’s world, or if it were, then would his servants fight against presented errors; but no, his kingdom is the Kingdom of God, Spirit, the spiritual kingdom wherein there is only good, and there is nought to fight against. He said, “Resist not evil”—let there be no argument, no contradiction of error, no affirmations or declarations of Truth in opposition to evil, and it would appear to the writer that he set forth this plainly in the Sermon on the Mount. “Ye have heard that it hath been said by them of old time, Thou shalt not forswear thyself, but shalt perform unto the Lord thine oaths: But I say unto you, Swear not at all; neither by heaven; for it is God’s throne: Nor by the earth; for it is his footstool: neither by Jerusalem; for it is the city of the great King. Neither shalt thou swear by thy head, because thou canst not make one hair white or black. But let your communication be, Yea, yea; Nay, nay; for whatsoever is more than these cometh of evil.”
Now the word translated as “oath” or “swearing” is better translated as “vow” or “avowal.” Christian Scientists have been for years making avowals of being the possessors of things—health, life, perfection, harmony, love, abundance, substance, and so on, when in fact they didn’t believe their avowals to be so; and moreover the very avowals were called forth by the false belief that they didn’t possess the very things they were avowing they had.
The Aramaic translation into English says, “Thou shalt not lie in thine oaths, but entrust thine oaths to the Lord.” Verily have we been lying in our oaths, disbelieving the very avowals we were making, because—and this is plain to be seen—the very moment it came to pass that the things avowed were a patent fact, we stopped the avowals and ceased that manner of prayer—plain evidence that so long as we continued to avow a truth, it was only because we still continued to believe in the error presented. Then it says, “Entrust your oaths [or avowals] to the Lord,” or let God do it. God is the only one who can carry out the instructions which Jesus said were necessary : “What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them.” Can he who uses the human mind conceive of being in possession of the things he is desiring? Impossible. Else he wouldn’t desire or pray for them. The very fact that he prays or desires, for desire is prayer (however he may do this—by supplication, by implication, or by affirmation, declaration, and so on) indicates that he doesn’t believe that he has whatever it may be that he desires. If so, why desire or pray for it? Note what Paul says of this very thing: “For what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for?” Then he goes on and says, “Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groaning which cannot be uttered [with words which cannot be uttered by the human mind]
God alone, the one Mind, can do this, for God is All-in-all, has all, is all, does all, knows all. He alone can bring into manifestation or show forth His allness. He alone can avow truthfully; therefore “entrust your oaths [avowals] to the Lord.” Let God do it. Let then this one Mind, “that Mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus.” Dispose of this human mind, have done with it and its thinking. Let it fall into innocuous desuetude, and this Christ-Mind will correspondingly arise in you, or the Spirit shall rest upon you; and no more shall you “forswear thyself’ or make avowals yourself, but “perform unto the Lord thine oaths,” or let God, the one Mind, your Mind, your Ego or “I,” make the avowals. Then shalt thou thyself vow not or “swear not at all,” neither by heaven (by human mind divinations of spiritual truths), for this is God’s business or throne; nor by the earth (nor by contradiction or fighting against error with the human mind or materially in any way). “But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth [in God Himself]: for the Father seeketh such to worship him. God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.” So God is not to be worshipped in matter of any kind. “Neither shalt thou swear [or make avowals] by thy head [by the human mind], because thou canst not make one hair white or black [cannot by your divination or right thinking do anything].” But let your prayer or avowal be yes or no, for “more than these cometh of evil” — or cometh of the human mind, the devil himself Could it be plainer?
Thus do we cast the net on the right (spiritual) side of the boat as we sail along the ocean of life. Hitherto we have been catching nothing, for we have been casting our nets on the side of the human mind, twisting everything awry, becoming the servant of the human mind rather than making it our servant (with its substratum, the body). We have striven to trade or exchange the bad or undesirable fruit of the “tree of knowledge of good and evil” for the good or desirable fruit of the same tree (the human mind); but it has always been corrupt although appearing to be good, for a corrupt tree cannot bring forth good fruit, and the human mind is always corrupt, even at its best.
We have but to look at the world today to behold the evidence before our eyes of the results of the machinations of the leaders of the world who sincerely try to use the good of this human mind, and this will continue until such time as the human mind is laid off, and the Christ-Mind comes into its own, or “until the spirit be poured upon us from on high.” Then “the kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ; and he shall reign forever and ever.”
We must cast our net on the other side of the boat, on the side of Spirit. We must let God do it. We must lay down the human mind, dispose of this servant, make it obedient to Mind by letting it fall into harmless disuse, until finally the Lord Christ shall reign forever and ever. Then shall we let down the net and draw forth a great abundance of fishes, nor will the net break as it has heretofore in every instance, nationally or otherwise.
The time is at hand.
A SIMILITUDE
Jesus evidently on occasions taught the healing and saving power of Spirit, God, by means of the symbol of water, for as we read John’s Gospel, we find John striving to make the point apparently taught him.
In the very first chapter we find John the Baptist baptizing with water, pointing out the baptism of the Holy Ghost, whereby one’s consciousness becomes the temple of God, or the temple of the Holy Ghost. We also have our first introduction to the fishermen disciples, who are to become fishers of men. In chapter two we have the turning of water into wine, typical of changing the insipidity of water into the virility, strength, life, and inspiration of wine, the turning from the crass materiality of the human mind to the inspiration of Spirit, divine Mind. In chapter three we come upon Jesus’ conversation with Nicodemus. “Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.” Jeremiah, ages before, said, “0 Jerusalem, wash thine heart from wickedness, that thou mayest be saved. How long shall thy vain thoughts lodge within thee?” I take it that Jesus was indicating that we must be cleansed by the Spirit even as we are washed by water, cleansed of the human, mortal, or death-mind and its thinking. In the fourth chapter of John we have the unequaled story of the woman of Samaria at Jacob’s well and the inimitable parallel of the water of the well and the water of life, wherein the story ends, “God is a Spirit; and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in Truth.”
In the fifth chapter of John we have that most wonderful example of the cleansing by the Spirit and healing power of Spirit as illustrated by the Pool of Bethesda, which has been dealt with specifically in a chapter of a previous volume of mine entitled Let God Do It
In the sixth chapter of John, commencing at verse fifteen, there is to be found a remarkable parallel and illustration, first telling us of the attempt to force consciousness and make Jesus a king, temporary king of Israel; rather than, through the orderly operation of Mind’s power, to make him spiritual king of Israel, or to attain man’s dominion, which can never be forced by the operation of the human mind, nor by the denial of self can man’s dominion be attained or that kingship of Israel be won. We find him then having “departed again into a mountain himself alone.”
What, though, of the disciples? Again we have this simile of water. “The disciples went down unto the sea.” Jesus had gone up, they went down, down into the depths of the human or mortal mind, while Jesus, denying self, had let the Christ arise in him and he was on the mountain top.
It goes on to say, they “entered into a ship [into a state of consciousness] and went over the sea [began to rise above the stark human mind] toward Capernaum.” Capernaum means repentance or change of mind, not change of thought from wrong to right of the same human mind, but change of mind from the human mind to the one Mind or Christ-
Mind. It goes on: “It was now dark, and Jesus was not come to them.” No wonder it was dark! For the Christ light had not come to them or penetrated their consciousness. “And the sea arose by reason of a great wind that blew.” The human mind became angry, or in ‘ a storm, threatening destructive and dire penalties by reason of a great wind that blew. “Wind. That which indicates the might of omnipotence and the movements of God’s spiritual government, encompassing all things.” (Science and Health) So with such a wind, it was not surprising that “the sea arose,” or the human mind was in a great turmoil.
“So when they had rowed about five and twenty or thirty furlongs [ when they had turned steadfastly toward God, or made their way over the sea toward Capernaum, toward the one Mind and away from the human mind] they see Jesus walking on the sea, and drawing nigh unto the ship [the Christ appears. “And o’er earth’s troubled, angry sea I see Christ walk, and come to me, and tenderly, divinely talk” (Poem, “Christ My Refuge” by Mary Baker Eddy)]. “He saith unto them, It is I, be not afraid [The “I,” God, Spirit, had come unto them] and immediately the ship was at the land whither they went [immediately spiritual consciousness was attained]. The Christ-Mind was in the ascendancy. The victory was won.
And so it goes on — the symbol of water indicating Spirit and its operation, including, “He that cometh to Me [Spirit] shall never hunger; and he that believeth on Me [Spirit] shall never thirst” — even as water quenches the thirst, so he that believes that the “I” is Spirit shall never thirst.
In the seventh chapter we find Jesus again saying on the last day of the feast of the tabernacles: “If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water,” and then it adds, making it perfectly plain, “But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believe on him should receive.”
Every one of those chapters contains at least one, and some more than one, reference to water symbolizing Spirit; and in the thirteenth chapter, we find Jesus washing the feet of the disciples with water from a basin, indicating the purification of or cleansing of Spirit, or being “washed in the blood of the Lamb.”
In the ninth chapter, however, perhaps we have the plainest of all illustrations. It relates: “As Jesus passed by, he saw a man which was blind from his birth. And his disciples asked him, saying, Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind? Jesus answered, Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that the works of God should be made manifest in him” — meaning, not as has been believed for many generations, that God had done this evil to the man, in order to later show His power to heal, but that this was an opportunity to show forth the ever-available power of God, Spirit, as Jesus so earnestly had been preaching and teaching. It says, When he had thus spoken, he spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and he anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay, and said unto him, Go, wash in the pool of Siloam (which is by interpretation, Sent). He went his way therefore, and washed, and came seeing.”
That is the entire story of this marvelous healing of a man born blind! Surely if the clay and spittle had any power to heal blindness, the very earth of Jerusalem would long since have been used over and over again; but on the very face of it, no one believes there was potency in the earth or the spittle of Jesus or anyone else to heal. In what is probably another account of the same healing incident (Mark 8:23), it is related that Jesus spit on the eyes of the blind man. What does it mean?
It is manifestly absurd to believe that a gentle, kindly, peace-loving man such as Jesus could have done such a thing as spit on the eyes of a poor blind man, and a beggar at that. Poor fellow! Could anyone be so inhuman and cruel? The world has striven for years to explain this action of Jesus, if it were his action, but the writer has no hesitation whatsoever in saying that Jesus never did any such thing. It would be too incongruous, too utterly impossible. Some have said that to spit was an indication of contempt, and that when Jesus spit on the eyes of the blind man, it signified his utter contempt for the material temptation to believe in this blindness to withstand the power of God. But even if this were so, why in the world should that most loving man spit on the poor man’s eyes? In fact, whatever might be the excuse for doing such a thing, it is utterly inconceivable that Jesus, of all men, could stoop to such a mean, common, vulgar thing. It is impossible! Utterly inconceivable!
After many years of study and practice of Christian Science, it becomes plain to the author that this was but a symbol or an illustration which Jesus used to indicate the nothingness of disease and error, and the omnipotence and omnipresence of God, and so awaken the patient from his human-mind beliefs and lethargy. The account is garbled because the hearers, and probably the man himself, didn’t understand altogether what was going on. He was a beggar well known by sight to everyone in Jerusalem who passed that way and saw him begging; they probably pitied him and threw him a coin occasionally.
Let us imagine the following to have been the immediate cause of the story as we find it, garbled, as has been said: A man is walking along the street, when walking toward him briskly^ comes a tall, upright, husky chap, dinner pail in hand, evidently hustling to work. As the latter approaches, head up, whistling happily, swinging his pail in rhythm with his step and tune, the former looks at him, stares, and then as the man with the pail passes him, he blurts out, “Hey there!” The other stops, smiles, looks at him as though he knew him, whereupon the one who stopped him (we shall call him Isaacson and the other Jacobson) says: “Isn’t your name Jacobson? Aren’t you the fellow who was born blind and sat and begged?” To this the second man says, “Yes, sir. I am Jacobson, the blind man, but I’m all right now. I work down at the pottery and am just on my way.”
“Well, “ says Isaacson, “how is it that you who were born blind, now see? I never heard of such a thing.”
Jacobson replied warily, for Jesus had warned him that he should not talk about his healing, and for him to talk freely of it to anyone required that the inquirer really should be desirous of knowing of it and that it be not mere idle curiosity. He relied, therefore, with this in mind, whereupon Isaacson indicated his intense interest, and Jacobson said simply, “I was healed by the Nazarene.” Isaacson was immediately further interested and said, “Oh, I’ve heard about him. Wasn’t he the fellow who was crucified and of whom his followers told some ridiculous story about him coming into life again? That he raised some other people from the dead also, and healed all manner of illness? I never believed any of those wild tales, but I certainly know you are Jacobson, that you were a beggar and blind from birth, and now I meet you on the street perfectly well, able to see, going to work and also well able to take care of yourself in every way! Tell me about it. What happened?”
Then Jacobson opened his heart and said: “Well, it was this way. Whenever Jesus passed by the corner where I begged for alms, he would speak kindly to me and tell me some truth to cheer me up, and he seemed so different from the others who passed by that
I inquired about him, and heard of those healings and his preaching, but I couldn’t get much out of it. Then one day he himself was coming along toward me. His disciples were with him, and I heard them talking among themselves—you know a blind man’s hearing is so acute that he can hear what others are quite unable to hear, and though of course they didn’t expect me to do so, I heard every word plainly. One of his disciples—I afterwards found out it was Thomas, called Didymus — was always asking questions. It always seemed as though he couldn’t get things through his head, but when he did, you just couldn’t get them out again! Well, Thomas said to Jesus, ‘Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind?”’
Here Isaacson broke in and said, “That was a stumper, I’ll wager. What did he answer?” Isaacson was just a man about town, wholly material and with little or no spirituality, which accounts for the materiality of the relation of the whole incident, and for his irreverence.
Jacobson said, “That was the thing that interested me and led up to my healing, for I had always thought I was blind because of some hereditary cause. Jesus readily answered Thomas and said, ‘Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that the works of God should be made manifest in him. ’”
Isaacson said, “Oh, I see. He taught that God had made you blind so that later on he could show forth God’s power to heal you? Well, take it from me, Jacobson, I want no such God as that in my life.”
“Oh, no,” said Jacobson, “Jesus taught no such thing. He simply meant that neither were my parents nor I to be held responsible, because the whole business of being blind was illusion, for God made everything good; but that here was an opportunity for him to show forth a proof of his teaching that the work of God is wholly good, and evil utterly unreal, by healing me. Then he came over to me and said, ‘Young fellow, do you know that you can see, have always been able to see, and have just as good eyesight as any of us?”
“I answered that my eyes had been examined by a lot of fine specialists and they said that so far as they could observe, my eyes were all right; but just the same I was unable to see and had never seen since I was born.
“To this Jesus replied by telling me that disease of any kind was wholly unreal, that it was simply illusion, never created by God, who had made everything and made it good, and that I was suffering from false beliefs superimposed on the body; but I couldn’t understand what he meant because to me I was certainly stone blind. So then Jesus set about to explain to me by an illustration. Since I’ve been able to see, I have listened to him explain things by means of parables and illustrations, and he certainly made things plain, as he did to me that day.”
“What did he say?” said Isaacson.
Jacobson went on, “Well, he went on to tell me that it was not because there was anything the matter with my eyes, but because I believed so, that I was blind and totally unable to see; but as I have said, I couldn’t understand that at all. It was Greek to me; so then he spat on the ground, and with his foot made a little clay or paste of the earth and spittle.”
Isaacson interjected, “How did you know what he did if you couldn’t see?” “Oh,” said Jacobson, “he told me so as he did it. He was talking to me all the while; so as I said, he spat on the ground, made clay of the spittle and earth and then said to me, ‘Now suppose your eyes were perfectly all right and you could see as well as anyone else, and I took this paste and spread it over your eyes, what would happen?’ I said, ‘Why, I wouldn’t be able to see. The clay over my eyes would prevent it. I’d be blinded by the clay. ’ He said, ‘Right! and that is just what has happened to you. Your eyes are all right, but they are blinded not by clay but by a lot of false human mind clay, or material beliefs of one kind and another, which like the clay prevents you from seeing, and until you get rid of those beliefs you’ll remain blind. Do you understand me?’ To this I replied that I heard him, but whether I understood or not I wasn’t so sure, because it seemed so absurd to me, who had been totally blind for some twenty-odd years, and all because I believed something to be true which was not true! At this he laughed and said, ‘Well, you’ll understand before long. ’ His very laugh was inspiring, so different from others, it sort of gave me courage to take in earnest what he said. Well, then he said, ‘Now suppose while this clay covers your eyes, I were to lead you over to the pool of Siloam’ (we were quite close to it) ‘and dipped you in or ducked your head in it, what would happen to you then?”
Here again Isaacson stopped Jacobson and said: “Did he put the spittle or clay actually on your eyes? Did he spit on your eyes? What for? To show his contempt for the disease, or what?”
“Oh, no,” said Jacobson. “Oh, no! He just illustrated it. You don’t suppose a man such as he would do that to another. Why, even though his contempt for disease and other evils of the human or mortal mind was so marked, yet he would never do such a thing as spit on an unfortunate blind person’s eyes. Oh, no, he was too considerate and compassionate. Well, as I was saying, Jesus went onto say, ‘ Suppose that having blinded you with the clay and spittle, I were to lead you over to the pool of Siloam and duck you under the water, what would happen to you?’ ‘Why, ’ I replied, ‘the clay would be washed off my eyes. ’ ‘And then?’ asked Jesus. ‘Why then,’ said I, ‘the clay having been washed off my eyes, I would be able to see. ’ ‘Of course,’ said Jesus, ‘and suppose at the first dip into the pool the clay came off only in part, what then?’ ‘Well,’ I answered, ‘I would only be able to see in so far as the clay was cleansed from my eyes. I might see partially or in a distorted manner. I might see men as trees walking.’ ‘Then, ’ said Jesus, ‘if I ducked you again until the clay was wholly washed away, what then?’ ‘Why, I would see perfectly. ’ To this Jesus replied, ‘Well, son, that is just the way it is.
You are blind because your eyes are covered, not with clay, but with material or human mind beliefs. That is all. For because God made you perfect in every way, you are so and remain so always. Now when you come to me, you come into my consciousness to the Father that dwelleth in me, or into the Kingdom of Heaven, or Kingdom of God, the temple of the Holy Ghost, or into the temple of the living God, or into a pool of spiritual consciousness; this would wash the clay and spittle off your eyes and so enable you to see, so now in this pool of spiritual consciousness those false beliefs are washed away by the pure water of life and you will see as well as anyone else. ’ He further explained to me that these beliefs were the product of the human or carnal mind and that my own thinking was responsible for my troubles, as Solomon had said years ago, ‘As a man thinketh in his heart so is he’— and this being so, if I would stop my own thinking, and still the human mind —‘silence the material senses’ (,Science and Health) — if I would eliminate or deny self, take No thought, then would these false beliefs disappear, for the Christ-Mind would arise and cleanse them from human consciousness precisely as the light comes and dispels darkness — a perfect example, for just as there is no darkness, neither is there disease or other evil.
“He went on to say, ‘When you go into the kingdom of Neptune, you step out on the promise or dictum of the ocean to make you every whit clean, and when you go into the Kingdom of God, you should likewise step out on the promise or decree of God to make you every whit whole. When you go into the kingdom of Neptune, it matters not a particle to it how dirty you may be, how long you have been dirty, what kind of dirt it is, how thick it lies on you, or whence it came or where it is on your body, for this water seeks out the hidden part of the body, and finds the dirt wherever it may be and cleanses you; and in the Kingdom of God, it matters not in the very least what is the matter, whence came the matter, how serious is the matter, how long it has been the matter, or where is the matter, for it is all the same to the Kingdom of God; and this presence of God instantly proceeds to seek out and find the hidden parts of the body and cleanses away the errors and false beliefs and makes you every whit whole, ‘For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.’
“When you go into the kingdom of Neptune, you do not pray to Neptune to make you every whit clean, but you pray the prayer of acceptance or expectation that it will cleanse you; and so you simply act as being in the kingdom of Neptune; you swim and dive, and splash about in the ocean; and while you are doing this, the ocean itself proceeds to fulfill its prerogative; and of itself, without the slightest aid from you, it seeks out the hidden parts of the body, finds the dirt and makes you every whit clean.
“In the Kingdom of God, likewise, you do not pray to God to make you every whit whole; but you step out on God’s promise or decree that He will do so, for ‘what things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them, ’ and thus you pray the true prayer, the prayer of acceptance or expectation that the Kingdom of God will carry out and perform its function and prerogative to search out the hidden parts of the body, ‘piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart,’ will do these very things, uncover, cleanse away and destroy the error whatever it may be, and so make you every whit whole.
“There is this to be done, also, as when you go into the kingdom of Neptune: you cast aside your garments which have enveloped you, and so enable the water to envelop you, and thus have full opportunity to wash the body and make it clean, sweet and cool, so in the Kingdom of God, as with blind Bartimeus, another beggar who, ‘casting away his garment, rose, and came to Jesus’ and was healed, we too must cast aside this garment of the human mind with its thinking in which we have been enveloped, and so enable the Christ-Mind, the one Mind, God, to envelop us and so have full opportunity to cleanse, as it were, the body with the ‘pure water of Life,’ and make us every whit whole.
“When you go into the Kingdom of God, you act as being in that Kingdom even as you acted, when there, as being in the kingdom of Neptune. How? By ‘speaking in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord’; you must be filled with joy, for ‘with joy shall ye draw water out of the wells of salvation’; you must be filled with laughter and mirth, and be merry, for ‘a merry heart doeth good like a medicine; but a broken spirit drieth the bones;’ you must praise and glorify and give thanks continually to God, and steadfastly refuse to praise and glorify the human mind, the only devil there is or ever will be, by talking of or claiming or admitting the presence of disease or other evils, which is like loading yourself with leaden weights when you would enjoy the ocean delights.
“In Unity of Good we find this remarkable statement: ‘To say there is a false claim, called sickness, is to admit all there is of sickness; for it is nothing but a false claim. To be healed, one must lose sight of a false claim. If the claim be present to the thought, then disease becomes as tangible as any reality. ’ Then, when and as you act as being in the Kingdom of God, and, stepping out on the promises of God you let go and let God do it, you will find that as the water of the ocean laves and cleanses the body, so this water of Life will cleanse and purify and heal and save your body.
“So I began to act as being in the Kingdom of God, and I was instantly healed by this power of God.”
So said Jacobson to Isaacson, and beholding the man which was healed standing before him, he could say nothing against it.
And so will anyone be healed, for the removal of the belief is the removal of the disease or trouble, just as the removal of the obstacle removes the shadow cast by that obstacle.
From the above imaginative story, which may easily be the way the once blind man told of his healing, may have been handed down the story as we have it in the Bible today, but whatever may have been the original descriptive tale, no doubt this is the substance of the healing as done through the great Master when he used the simile of the pool of Siloam and the clay and spittle.
“IT SHALL COME TO PASS”
“The Lord of hosts hath sworn, saying, Surely as I have thought so shall it come to pass; and as I have purposed, so shall it stand: That I will break the Assyrian in my land, and upon my mountains tread him under foot: then shall his yoke depart from off them, and his burden depart from off their shoulders. This is the purpose that is purposed upon the whole earth: and this is the hand that is stretched out upon all the nations. For the Lord of hosts hath purposed, and who shall disannul it? and his hand is stretched out, and who shall turn it back?”
It shall come to pass—note that statement. It shall come to pass! Nothing to do with you, nothing to do with the writer, nothing to do with any person or thing whatsoever, but has to do solely with God. As certainly as the sun shines every day, it shall come to pass. It depends not at all upon you, nor upon me, nor upon anyone else, but upon the Intelligence which governs all things. Not you, nor the writer, nor anyone else, can prevent the sun from shining, can cause it to rise one moment earlier or later than at the appointed time. Only the Creator Himself brings it to pass. God has decreed it. Likewise God has decreed that “it shall come to pass, if thou shalt hearken diligently unto the voice of the Lord thy God, to observe and to do all the commandments which I command thee this day, that the Lord thy God will set thee on high above all nations of the earth,” and no one can interfere with this decree. Paul says, “I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
Then God continues as follows: “And all these blessings shall come on thee and overtake thee”—think of it! Another decree which is equally unfailing. These blessings “shall come on thee and overtake thee.” Is it not wonderful! You do not have to ask for them, do not have to cajole God for them, implore Him, pray to Him, for those things, but they “shall come on thee and overtake thee.” Like the sun rising at dawn. You may be in a forest, falling over stumps, tripping over broken branches, sinking into the swamp, and surrounded by wild beasts which you hear prowling about, even while the thus far unheard “still small voice” is saying, “There is nothing to fear. Be still and nothing will harm you. It is your own vain struggling which causes your sufferings. Be still. Wait for the dawn. Then you will see clearly a pathway leading you out and into safety.” And it shall come to pass beyond peradventure of doubt that the sun shall arise at the appointed time, and nothing you or anyone else can do will prevent it or hasten it, but when the dawn does break, you will have light and warmth, and find your way out without further ado. So with you. These blessings shall “come on thee and overtake thee,” for it is decreed that It shall come to pass. Nothing you can do or a practitioner can do, nothing that anyone can do, can prevent this decree from coming to pass. God has decreed this, and it shall come to pass that all these blessings shall “come on thee and overtake thee.”
“Blessed shalt thou be in the city, and blessed shalt thou be in the field. Blessed shall be the fruit of thy body, and the fruit of thy ground, and the fruit of thy cattle, the increase of thy kind, and the flocks of thy sheep. Blessed shall be thy basket and thy store. Blessed shalt thou be when thou comest in, and blessed shalt thou be when thou goest out. The Lord shall cause thine enemies that rise up against thee to be smitted before thy face: they shall come up against thee one way, and flee before thee seven ways. The Lord shall command the blessing upon thee in thy storehouses, and in all that thou settest thine hand unto; and he shall bless thee in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee. The Lord shall establish thee an holy people unto himself, as he hath sworn unto thee, if thou shalt keep the commandments of the Lord thy God, and walk in his ways. And all the people of the earth shall see that thou art called by the name of the Lord; and they shall be afraid of thee.
And the Lord shall make thee plenteous in goods, in the fruit of thy body, and in the fruit of thy cattle, and in the fruit of thy ground, in the land which the Lord sware unto thy fathers to give thee. The Lord shall open unto thee his good treasure, the heaven to give the rain unto thy land in his season, and to bless all the work of thine hand; and thou shalt lend unto many nations, and thou shalt not borrow. And the Lord shall make thee the head, and not the tail; and thou shalt be above only, and thou shalt not be beneath; if that thou hearken unto the commandments of the Lord thy God, which I command thee this day, to observe and to do them: And thou shalt not go aside from any of the words which I command thee this day, to the right hand or to the left, to go after other gods to serve them.”
Is not this a wonderful promise? Yes, more than a promise—a decree. Dependent not on you, not on the writer, not on any person, any more than the stars in their courses depend on any person, but they are dependent on God. They are dependent on God alone. So are these promises and decrees. They “shall come on thee and overtake thee.” It shall come to pass. It is decreed.
“Not by might, nor by power [of the human mind], but by My Spirit, saith the Lord.” Jesus said, “It is the Spirit that quickeneth; the flesh [the fleshly or human mind or body] profiteth nothing.”
LET GOD DO IT
“In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.”
The world has been receiving the things it has not asked for and, in fact, could not ask for in the past eons. Age upon age God has been conferring blessings upon this world, blessings of which the world itself had no thought or faintest desire whatsoever. As the earth was without form and void, and darkness upon the face of the deep, and inasmuch as the world only knows what it knows, it is necessarily circumscribed within the limits of its own knowledge; and so had it depended on itself to ask or pray for what it wanted, it never would have had aught else than darkness and void. But it had an Ego, and this Ego was God, infinite intelligence, the I AM: and this Ego or God said, as it were, “I perceive this world which I have created for My glory will glorify Me more if I give to it the things which I shall show forth hereafter, for it is My great pleasure to give it the Kingdom. First I shall give it light.” Now it is apparent that the world itself could not have asked for light, because at that period it knew only darkness; so God said, “Let there be light; and there was light”
Afterward He said, “Let the dry land appear,” and in due course this was so. Thus has it gone on for ages, God giving us the wonderful things of which we knew nothing whatsoever, and so could never have asked for them, or prayed for them, or even conceived of them; until now we find ourselves in this magnificent world surrounded by all the wonderful things we have, and consciousness is just that much larger than when it first knew only slime and darkness. Even today, though that consciousness be enlarged, the world would still be limited to its present knowledge of things and so be at a standstill, if it had to ask for, conceive of, or pray for that which is to come; for knowing nothing more than it already knows, it would be stopped at this point; but we all know that in a short time other things, undreamed-of things, will come into being, will be invented or discovered. Whence come they? From God; for God, the I AM, the Ego, is still forever saying, “Let there be — ” whatever it may be, and very soon it appears in consciousness. Isaiah wrote, “I am the Lord: that is my name: and my glory will I not give to another, neither my praise to graven images. Behold, the former things are come to pass, and new things do I declare: before they spring forth I tell you of them.”
The Word of God to this age says: “Creation is ever appearing, and must ever continue to appear from the nature of its inexhaustible source.” (Science and Health)
Everything created of God is eternal, and remains forever. The planets in their courses never interfere with one another, each year the trees put forth their leaves, the flowers blossom, the seasons come and go, and all is well. But let the human mind enter in and get its hands on anything—no matter what—and immediately trouble ensues. No matter what it is, the moment the human mind gets its finger into the pie, into anything whatever, there is trouble, and things go topsy-turvy. Wars, pestilence, famine, sickness, sin, and death follow, and whatever is ungodly is in the saddle, for all the human mind can ever produce is “vanity and vexation of spirit.”
If only we would listen to the voice of God and obey it, harmony and happiness, health and life, abundance and substance would be ours. The moment we stop asking God for things and step out on the promises of God as relayed by Solomon over his loud speaker ages ago into the world, and provided, like him, we renounce the human mind, cease relying on those picayune things which only the human mind can ask or pray for, and let God or an understanding heart, the one Mind, direct us, then He will pour down upon the world the things which we do not ask for, the wonderful things which are ours for the simple act of receiving them.
Moses said, “It shall come to pass, if thou shalt hearken diligently unto the voice of the Lord thy God, to observe and to do all His commandments which I command thee this day, that the Lord thy God will set thee on high above all nations of the earth; and all these blessings shall come on thee, and over take thee, if thou shalt hearken unto the voice of the Lord thy God,” and then he rehearses these wonderful blessings which will come upon us and overtake us as a result of hearkening unto the voice of the Lord our God and obeying it.
The planets, the stars, the sun and the earth and many other things hearken only unto the voice of the Lord their God and obey that voice, His commandments. The result is harmony. The sun rises (so we say) day after day, year after year, eon after eon, so certainly and positively that anyone may ascertain the exact time of its rising ten thousand years hence. They hear only the voice of God and obey, thus letting God do it.
“Now therefore hearken, O Israel, unto the statutes and unto the judgments, which I teach you, for to do them, that ye may live, and go in and possess the land which the Lord God of your fathers giveth you. Ye shall not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish ought from it, that ye may keep the commandments of the Lord your God which I command you. Your eyes have seen what the Lord did because of Baal-peor, the Lord thy God hath destroyed them from among you. But ye that did cleave unto the Lord your God are alive every one of you this day. Behold, I have taught you statutes and judgments, even as the Lord my God commanded me, that ye should do so in the land whither ye go to possess it. Keep therefore and do them; for this is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the nations, which shall hear all these statutes, and say, Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people. For what nation is there so great, who hath statutes and judgments so righteous as all this law, which I set before you this day? Only take heed to thyself, and keep thy soul diligently, lest thou forget the things which thine eyes have seen, and lest they depart from thy heart all the days of thy life: but teach them thy sons, and thy sons’ sons. Specially the day that thou stoodest before the Lord thy God in Horeb, when the Lord said unto me, Gather me the people together, and I will make them hear my words, that they may learn to fear me all the days that they shall live upon the earth, and that they may teach their children.
And ye came near and stood under the mountain; and the mountain burned with fire unto the midst of heaven, with darkness, clouds, and thick darkness. And the Lord spake unto you out of the midst of the fire: ye heard the voice of the words, but saw no similitude [no man in the image of God]; only ye heard a voice. And he declared unto you his covenant, which he commanded you to perform, even ten commandments; and he wrote them upon two tablets of stone. And the Lord commanded me at that time to teach you statutes and judgments, that ye might do them in the land whither ye go over to possess it. Take ye therefore good heed unto yourselves; for ye saw no manner of similitude on the day that the Lord spake unto you in Horeb out of the midst of the fire: Lest ye come in yourselves, and make you a graven image, the similitude of any figure, the likeness of male or female, The likeness of any beast that is on the earth, the likeness of any winged fowl that flieth in the air, The likeness of anything that creepeth on the ground, the likeness of any fish that is in the waters beneath the earth: And lest thou lift up thine eyes unto heaven, and when thou seest the sun, and the moon, and the stars, even all the host of heaven, shouldest be driven to worship them, and serve them, which the Lord thy God hath divided unto all nations under the whole heaven. But the Lord hath taken you, and brought you forth out of the iron furnace, even out of Egypt, to be unto Him a people of inheritance, as ye are this day…
“When thou shalt beget children, and children’s children, and ye shall have remained long in the land, and shall corrupt yourselves, and make a graven image, or the likeness of anything, and shall do evil in the sight of the Lord thy God, to provoke him to anger [or follow the dictates of the human mind or devil]: I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day, that ye shall soon utterly perish from off the land whereunto ye go over Jordan to possess it; ye shall not prolong your days upon it, but shall utterly be
destroyed But if from thence thou shalt seek the Lord thy God, thou shalt find Him, if thou seek Him with all thy heart and with all thy soul. When thou art in tribulation, and all these things are come upon thee, even in the latter days, if thou turn to the Lord thy God, and shalt be obedient unto His voice; (for the Lord thy God is a merciful God;) he will not forsake thee, neither destroy thee, nor forget the covenant of thy fathers which He sware unto them.
“For ask now of the days that are past, which were before thee, since the day that God created man upon the earth, and ask from the one side of heaven unto the other, whether there hath been any such thing as this great thing is, or hath been heard like it? Did ever people hear the voice of God speaking out in the midst of the fire, as thou hast heard, and live? Or hath God assayed to go and take him a nation from the midst of another nation, by temptations, by signs, and by wonders, and by war, and by a mighty hand, and by a stretched out arm, and by great terrors, according to all that the Lord your God did for you in Egypt before your eyes? Unto thee it was shewed, that thou mightest know that the Lord he is God; there is none else beside him.” Plain enough, isn’t it?
Job says: “Acquaint now thyself with him, and be at peace; thereby good shall come unto thee. Receive, I pray thee, the law from his mouth, and lay up His words in thine heart. If thou return to the Almighty, thou shalt be built up, thou shalt put away iniquity far from thy tabernacles. Then shalt thou lay up gold as dust, and the gold of Ophir as the stones of the brooks. Yea, the Almighty shall be thy defense, and thou shalt have plenty of silver. For then shalt thou have thy delight in the Almighty, and shalt lift up thy face unto God. Thou shalt make thy prayer unto Him, and He shall hear thee, and thou shalt make thy prayer unto Him, and He shall hear thee, and thou shalt pay thy vows. Thou shalt also decree a thing, and it shall be established unto thee: and the light shall shine upon thy ways.” Wonderful, is it not?
To decree a thing and to establish it is our heritage, our right, our inherent right, but not by virtue of any power of our own. The power inheres in God, in the Ego, or the I AM. The author of Crusoe’s world might have said, “Behold, Crusoe, I shall give you power to destroy the cannibals and rescue Friday.” Then Crusoe would have done those things, not of himself, but the author working through him, the power being inherently in the author, not in Crusoe himself.
So God, the Author, said, speaking through his character, Jesus, “Behold, I give unto you power to tread… over all the powers of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurt you,” and so as it was inevitable that Crusoe should manifest the author, it is likewise inevitable that this command of God be manifested by God’s characters.
So go forth with this assurance and do these things in obedience to the laws of God, and they will come to pass, because the power to do inheres in God, not in man.
THE GHOST OF EVIL
Let us suppose that you and I believed in ghosts.
Let us suppose, too, that we were quietly walking down a lonely country lane on a dim moonlight night, and that we suddenly came upon a post, and hanging thereon was a sheet flapping lazily in the breeze.
Our steps would first falter; we would pause, and then, as we believed we saw a ghost, we would turn and flee at the top of our speed.
Now then, from just what would we be running? Not from a post with a sheet hanging on it! Of course not; no one would run from a post with a sheet on it, or from either one of those things. We couldn’t possibly have run away from a ghost for the simplest of all reasons — there is not, never will be, and never was any such thing as a ghost. What, then, did we flee from? The veriest novice must see plainly that each one ran away from his own belief that he saw a ghost.
It must be just as evident, too, that each one ran away from his individual belief, and that we did not run from the same belief, for we are not running, remember, from a sheet-covered post, but are running from what we think is a ghost. And since there is no ghost to run from, we are not running from the same thing, but as aforesaid, each is running from his own belief that there is a ghost.
If in our feverish haste we run into a pit and hurt ourselves, of course, the reason of our fall and consequent injury could not be attributed to the ghost—because there isn’t any—neither could we lay the blame on the sheeted post, because as aforesaid we were not running from it. The reason is plain, very plain indeed: we fell into the pit and injured ourselves because of the false belief that each one of us entertained, for had not each one entertained a false belief, we would not have run recklessly or otherwise, and as a consequence would have met with no accident.
If another who saw us wildly fleeing toward the pit, had wished to save us from the visibly impending accident, would it have been of any use to bind the already secured post, even if he was aware of what had seemed to occasion the fright? Not at all! Of course, it would prevent the accident if actually the post or the sheet or the combination falsely seen as a ghost, were causing it, but we have seen that it was the belief, and not the combination of sheet and post in the moonlight, that was responsible for the wild haste. No! The way to prevent the evil consequences would be to destroy the belief that ghosts exist. I say destroy the belief— because it requires understanding of the underlying facts to destroy a belief; whereas simply to change the belief that there was ghost in the lane to the knowledge that what we conceived to be a ghost was but a post with a sheet thereon, would, it is true, lay that particular ghost and prevent the then impending accident. But we would both still believe in the existence of ghosts and be liable to some later untoward result as a consequence; whereas, if it were shown to us individually through spiritual understanding that because in God’s creation—the only creation there is — there is good only, which
would destroy the belief that there are such things as ghosts, we would never get into a panic from such a belief again, and no evil consequences could possibly ensue therefrom.
It is evident, too, that you cannot run away from my belief, nor can I run away from yours. You might have told me that there were ghosts—told me your belief — but would have had to accept it and make it my own before the belief would affect me. Then it would be my belief (yours that became mine) and not yours that I ran from. Moreover, it is none of my business what you or anyone else believes; but it is my business — very much my business — what I believe. It is my business, therefore, what I believe about you and of what you may be believing. If I permit myself to believe that you are believing rightly about there being ghosts, I am believing wrongly myself and become therefore subject to my own belief that you are right and that ghosts exist, with the result that I accept your belief as the truth, and thus making it mine, I am liable to, and probably will, suffer as a consequence of the then my own belief about the existence of ghosts. Furthermore, had I had spiritual understanding of the truth, I would have “pooh-poohed” your silly chatter about ghosts, well knowing you were advancing an erroneous theory; and this knowledge of the facts would have prevented me from being afraid when we came to the post standing there in the moonlight in all its white weirdness.
As it is with the “post” ghost, so is it with the “evil” ghost.
Inasmuch as God is All and God is good, all is good. We cannot get back of this fact. Therefrom there is no evil of any sort or description. It has no more reality than a ghost. As a matter of fact, it is nothing but a ghost and has no reality whatsoever—has no existence at all, never had, and never will have. Why? Simply because good is infinite, and All-in-all. That is why. Could there be a better reason?
What, then, is it which seems to cause us to suffer, which causes us to fall into the pits we have digged for ourselves? A ghost of evil? Not so! Why not? Because there is no ghost. What then? Even as we fell into the pit — suffered — as the result of our individual beliefs that there was a ghost (not, you will remember, because of a ghost — because there is none), so now do we suffer wholly and solely because of our individual beliefs that there is a ghost of evil. We suffer because of our individual beliefs, and only because of our individual beliefs, that there is something apart from God, good, which by its presence or absence has power to cause suffering or enjoyment, pain or pleasure.
As with evil, so with sickness, poverty, and all error; they are all evil; and we see that we do not suffer from sickness or poverty, nor do we enjoy from health or riches, because, being material, they have no existence—God or Spirit being in very fact All; but we suffer and enjoy because we believe there is something other than God, good.
To get rid of the suffering consequent, not upon evil, but upon the belief that evil exists, we as Christian Scientists must spiritually understand the Truth that God, good, is the Only and All, and this destroys the belief. It is not enough to change a belief of poverty to one of prosperity, or to change the belief of ill health to one of good health; but rather must the beliefs of ill health and poverty as well as health and riches be destroyed by spiritually understanding the allness of God, good, which is perfect harmony, a purely spiritual condition, wherein man “lives and moves and has his being,” as Paul said. Thus man as the reflection or image of God has, is, and does all that God has, is, and does eternally, because man is God expressed or God manifested. “All is infinite Mind and its infinite manifestation, for God is All-in-all.” {Science and Health)
Were this not done, we would find ourselves in a bad way, deluded by the endeavor to get rid of the evil belief “of the tree of knowledge of good and evil” by replacing or hiding it with the belief of so-called good of the same “tree of knowledge of good and evil,” which “good” is even more insidious than its accompaniment, evil, because it lulls us into a false sense of harmony.
So doing would be the same as in the case of the ordinary tree in your garden. We prune it of the dead, sick (or evil) branches and water the roots, which process causes the tree to grow and flourish the more; and “the tree of knowledge of good and evil” will grow and flourish more and more if we cut off the evil and water its roots by cultivating the goo human sense of good.
It is not to be inferred from the foregoing that good must cease. Not at all. The “good” that is referred to as the “good fruit” of the “tree of knowledge of good and evil” is what appears to humanity to be good, such as material health, but which really is not good. Mrs. Eddy says — and do not forget that this is the inspired Word of God, directly revealed to her—in referring to health and ill health, that “there is a universal insanity of so-called health” (Science and Health), and both of these beliefs must be obliterated before harmony can appear; this is what is meant by the foregoing. Many of us, not recognizing that physical health is an illusion of the human or mortal mind, even as ill health is, feel satisfied when we attain the former illusionary state and thus accept and are satisfied with the so-called “good fruit” of the “tree of knowledge of good and evil,” and it is not until that condition changes to ill health as it always does, because it is not stable, do we begin to look around for something to help us out of our difficulties. Other so-called “good” things are material riches of all kinds, material pleasure, etc., and as these become realities to us, then are we badly deceived. But if we, through spiritual understanding, by the advent of Christ, or Christian Science, into our consciousness, perceive the realities or truth of being, then health, wealth and happiness will abound, but instead of being material, though they will so appear, they will be of and dependent only on God, Spirit.
The good, however, in human consciousness is of God. It is the love that is the reflection of Love, manifest in mortals as meekness, humility, peace, joy, abundance, health, harmony, and all the human concepts of the divine goodness. These are not of “the tree of knowledge of good and evil.” These qualities are to be built upon and enlarged until, by losing all human attributes and mortal semblance, they merge into the divine and take on the divine hues.
Then, when we have destroyed the belief in evil, does the evil disappear? Does the ghost disappear? No. Why not? Because there never was any evil or ghost to disappear. All that has occurred is that human consciousness, by the advent of the Christ, has awakened to man’s Sonship with Christ, through spiritually understanding the allness of infinite good—God (the only way it can be understood); and this recognition of the fact is the destruction of the illusion.
It is no excuse to say that I was taught to believe in evil reality—in the reality of a ghost. I am responsible for myself, and it is my business to be about my Father’s business, and to do so, I must have the Mind of Christ. It is not my business, as in the example of the “post ghost,” to concern myself as to what the other fellow believes or how he acts. If I believe, however, that he is acting wrongly, unlovingly, unkindly, sickly or unChristly, whether I believe it true or not true, then I am believing wrongly myself for I am believing there is something else than God or good, or believing in ghosts of evil. Thus I will be receiving the results of my own false beliefs (or ghosts of evil) until I cease thus believing through the appearing of the Christ in my consciousness. For God is a consuming fire, destroying all unlike Him—the material sense or ghosts of evil.
MORE ON MALPRACTICE
If it be true that “the mind of the individual only can produce a result upon his body,” even though it be also true that “the belief that produces this result may be wholly unknown to the individual, because it is lying back in the unconscious thought, a latent cause producing the effect we see.” If this be so — and Mrs. Eddy makes these statements in Christian Healing—how can there ever be any effect produced upon anyone’s body because of an evil thought projected maliciously or ignorantly by a second person toward the first one?
If “the mind of the individual only can produce a result upon his body,” must it not be simply his own belief, and not another’s act or thought, that does the trick? Where, then, is the wrong thinking or malpractice that produces the result but in the consciousness of the individual himself? Where then is the wrong-thinker or malpractitioner but in the individual himself? Why not, then, protect oneself solely against one’s own false belief, by ceasing to so believe through understanding the Truth? This would seem to be the logical answer to the question, for Mrs. Eddy says, “… the mind of the individual only [or the individual’s own false belief] can produce a result upon his body.”
It would seem to be mere evasion to say malpractice from number two can injure number one if number one does not protect himself from that malpractice; or if number one believes there is power in malpractice directed toward him from number two, and that malpractice from number two can injure number one; for were either of these statements a fact, evil under some circumstances would have power, which is absolutely contrary to the teachings of Christian Science. If it be said that this is so only in belief, then all the more reason to protect oneself from the belief.
In the first event, the result — if result there be—would be due to the unconscious belief of number one. And in the second event, the result would be due to the conscious belief of number one that there was something other than God that had presence, reality, or power; whereupon number one would get the result of his own false belief or his own malpractice; for he would be malpracticing, which is all malpractice is, for the prefix of the word malpractice comes from the word mal, meaning bad or wrong, and thus malpractice is but bad or wrong practice, which is simply the act of believing that there is something else than God or good. To practice right or good, or to choose always to serve good and not evil, one must be awake and alert to detect the various disguises under which evil suggestions present themselves for their acceptance or rejection. Thus to handle malpractice successfully, each one must practice right when tempted to practice wrong — choosing always to accept good and to reject evil.
It is corroborated in Miscellaneous Writings that it is the belief of the individual
only that produces a result upon his body…. “you are the arbiter of your own fate.
In the words of our Master, you are ‘a liar, and the father of it.’ (the lie).” And “Each individual is responsible for himself.”
THE THEATER
Someone asks: “How do you ‘be still and know that I am God’? How do you still the human mind and so let the Christ-Mind, the one Mind, arise, and ‘know the Truth,’ ‘hold thought steadfastly’ (Science and Health), ‘realize the Truth,’ or ‘behold the perfect man’?”
It is as though you were in a theater. You are there to see the play. Everything is set for you to do so. The theater management attends to all this. You have but to pay close attention to the stage, its settings, its characters, and what is done thereon. The management enables you to have an unobstructed view of the stage and maintains quiet in the auditorium. Sometimes there is a disturbance, perhaps a radiator begins to crack and snap. The management stops it. There used to be pillars in the theaters, preventing a clear view of the stage. The management did away with this also, by removing the pillars. Sometimes a drunken man becomes obstreperous, talkative, and noisy. The management removes him also. If you yourself, by argument or otherwise, attempt to stop his noise and misconduct, it will only make matters worse, and there is liable to be a noisy dispute, and both of you are liable to be ejected, by the management. It is the management’s business to keep order, to see that all untoward conditions are removed so that you may see and hear what is going on upon the stage without being distracted in the very least. The management also has a doorkeeper who stands at the entrance and admits only those who are entitled to admission.
Then do you listen to the play and watch what is going on. The play is always the mind of the author expressed through its ideas symbolized by the characters and surroundings. You are looking into the mind of the author, and seeing that mind through its ideas, for thus is mind expressed.
A Booth may cut loose in spite of the guards, and assassinate a president. Then the turmoil is so great that the curtain is rung down, the theater is closed, and if one would see a play, he must go to another theater until the first one is prepared by the management to resume its functions.
We are in the great theater of good, God. Each one is in his own theater, as it were, and it is run by the “I” or Ego which is God, Spirit, universal Mind. The world is the stage. Shakespeare says:
All the world’s a stage
And all the men and women merely players.
They have their exits and their entrances.
We are there to behold the great play written and staged by the Author, God Himself, the Creator of all things and without whom nothing is made. The play itself is called “The Kingdom of God,” and the book from which it is drawn is “The Book of Life.”
We are in the theater watching the play, listening to everything that goes on. This play can be viewed only by and with that Mind which “was also in Christ Jesus,” the one Mind. To himself Jesus was spiritual, and so was everything else. He saw the realities of being in spite of the disturbances of, and temptations of, the human mind which swirled about him. He listened over their disturbances.
In this theater we should maintain a doorkeeper, or should “stand porter at the door of thought.” (Science and Health) David sang, “I had rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God, than to dwell in the tents of wickedness.” Only those who are receptive and would behold the play as it is enacted scene after scene should be admitted. When we see the play, we are simply looking into the Mind of the Author, God Himself. He is expressing Himself through His ideas, and whatever we see or hear on the stage is God expressing Himself and we can behold this only with the one Mind, the Christ-Mind, and never with or by means of, the human mind.
Nothing can enter this great auditorium of God “that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination, or maketh a lie; but they which are written in the Lamb’s book of life,” and everything therein is spiritual. In this theater we must watch and listen attentively to what is going on upon the stage. The human mind constantly strives to get the floor, by distracting us from the play. It puts pillars in the way, drunken men—Isaiah says, “They are drunken but not with wine, they stagger, but not with strong drink”—men drunken with the human mind are there; so are talkative persons, snapping and cracking radiators; every conceivable thing seems to arise to distract us from beholding the play, the Kingdom of God. The very devil himself, the human mind, seems to possess us at times, striving to prevent us hearing and seeing that which is going on upon the stage—from perceiving the realities of being. However, as in the material theaters, if we are really intent upon hearing and seeing the play, we will pay as little attention as possible to the human mind gyrations which are going on about us and listen and watch above the disturbing conditions and in spite of them, knowing that the management itself, God, the I or Ego, quells the disturbances. It is not your personal affair to attempt to eject them, argue with them, or fight against them.
To do so is to recognize them, and that invariably makes them worse, and all of you may be ejected. Jesus said to let the wheat and tares grow together until the time of harvest, lest in rooting up the tares, the good wheat be pulled up with them; but in the time of harvest the reapers will gather the good into the bams and bum up the tares. Leave the disturbing factions alone, listen and watch attentively to the play itself, and soon the management, God Himself by His very Presence, will quell and dispel the human mind and the evils, whatever they may be. Gradually you will find the pillars will be removed, the cracking radiators, the drunken and talkative persons, all disturbers and disturbances— in other words, sickness, sin, death, and other troubles will be removed; and then with that Mind, the one Mind, or Christ-Mind, always present in some measure, will you behold and hear the play itself, the Kingdom of God, with health, peace, life, love, and abundance of all good.
Sometimes, indeed, some cataclysm, such as the assassination referred to, will occur in your theater or in your consciousness, and the curtain will be rung down and the theater temporarily closed. Then is the time to seek out another theater, that of a practitioner —though everyone calling himself a Christian Scientist should be a practitioner, and potentially everyone is so — and enter his consciousness or theater. There you must watch and listen to the performance, until such time as your own consciousness, or theater, or auditorium, is cleansed and purified of the human mind’s disturbing influences and distractions. But wherever you are, in your own or another’s theater, wherein the play goes on eternally, you must listen and watch to behold the play itself and its characters and settings, and sooner or later you will behold the Kingdom of God; and this Mind which was also in Christ-Jesus, this one Mind, will reign supreme in you, for the Kingdom of God can never be perceived save only by the Christ-Mind, this one Mind; and this old faker, the devil or human mind, will be no more. The fact that you do behold the Kingdom of God is evidence that you have this one Mind in you.
It is the prerogative of the Ego or “I” which is God, Spirit, and which is truly the Mind of the genuine practitioner to whom you have turned, or into whose theater you have entered, to prevent the entrance of any evil. There must not be even a taint of error permitted to pass the portals of his consciousness, or enter the auditorium of God, good. Then when you enter into this pure consciousness of the Christ, do you behold and experience peace, harmony, life, love, strength, and abundance. Then, too, very soon your own theater is once again open, the curtain raised, and the play is on, ready for yourself or others to behold the realities of being, and an SRO — standing room only — sign will soon be necessary in front of your theater.
THE LIGHTHOUSE KEEPER
“The Lord went before them by day in a pillar of a cloud, to lead them the way; and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light, to go by day and night. He took not away the pillar of the cloud by day, nor the pillar of fire by night, from before the people.” (Exodus)
Always is this presence of God with us, this pillar of cloud by day, and of fire by night, to guide us on the way and lead us into safety.
Jesus said, “I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life;” and “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.”
It is the business of everyone calling himself a Christian Scientist, and more particularly those who advertise themselves as practitioners, to maintain this light of the Christ in consciousness—a pillar of cloud by day, and of fire by night. Then whoever sights this light and steers his course by it, will come into the Kingdom of God, or the haven of Soul, and receive the benefits which shall accrue to him—holiness, wholeness, healing, and salvation.
The Christian Scientist is like a lighthouse keeper. The lighthouse keeper’s duty, and his sole duty, is to keep the light burning brightly in the lighthouse. He has nothing else to do, but it is imperative that he do this one thing. No matter what the weather may be, be it stormy or fair, be it sleet, snow, or rain, be it monsoon, typhoon, tornado, or hurricane, be it a blizzard or whatnot, it is all one to the lighthouse keeper; for as has been said, his sole duty is to keep the light burning brightly in the lighthouse, and this quite regardless of what is going on outside. No matter what may be happening to the ships on the ocean, no matter whether it be a Queen Mary, a Chinese sampan, a tug, a five-masted sailing vessel, or a small dory, whether one or all of them be in trouble, liable to drift on the rocks, or already on the rocks, no matter what the peril, whether it be that the ship is out of control, a fire, or whatever it may be, quite irrespective of it all, it is the business of the lighthouse keeper to keep the light gleaming, and to do nothing else. He must not leave his post to try to succor some ship, its passengers, crew, or cargo, lest in so doing the light become dimmed, or mayhap go out, and so endanger not only that particular ship, but other ships which may be steering their course by the light as they pass through those dangerous waters. He must keep the light alight.
The lighthouse may be situated on the bleak shores of the Aleutian Islands where ships seldom pass, and so “the light shineth in darkness and the darkness comprehended it not.” Then comes a ship passing through those treacherous waters. The navigator seeking the light, sights it and steers his course by it. At that moment the light shining in the darkness is no longer uncomprehended, and the mariner instantly receives the benefits. The mariner, as it were, sets up the “treatment,” if it may be so termed. This continues so long as the mariner is navigating those waters, but when the ship has passed through them
and into safety, the mariner, finding himself in quiet waters, no longer requires the light, but turns from it and steers by his own compass, or by his own knowledge of those safe familiar waters, thus stopping the “treatment,” even as he originally set it up.
The mariner has his work to do also. He has his nautical almanac, a volume tried and true, thoroughly to be relied upon, for it has been compiled by those who have preceded him over the course. It charts the Scylla and Charybdis which endanger navigation, the shoals and shallows, the reefs and rocks, the adverse currents, or whatsoever makes for peril at sea. It likewise charts the lighthouse which is always nearby, this “pillar of cloud by day, and of fire by night,” to guide him on his journey.
Let it be repeated that the Christian Scientist, and more particularly the practitioner, has his sole duty to perform also, and that is to keep the light of the Christ burning brightly in his consciousness at all times, day and night, under whatever circumstances. Whether awake or asleep he must do this. Moreover, he must do this quite irrespective of what kind of problem may be presented to him. To him who thus maintains the presence of God, or the Christ in consciousness, it is of no importance whatsoever what may be the matter, how serious the matter, or how long it has been the matter; it is of no importance who the patient is, of what race, or language, or where he is, no matter whether he has a cold or a cancer, is alive or dead, or whether it be physical, financial, mental, moral, or domestic, it is all the same to the practitioner, for his sole duty is to keep the light of the Christ ablaze in his consciousness. He can do no more than this; and if he does this faithfully and well, as did the Master, then whoever turns to him for assistance, will be healed of whatsoever ails him, no matter what; and will find himself safe in the haven of Soul, or in the Kingdom of God, well, strong, healthy, happy, and prosperous. As Jesus said, “Thy Kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.”
The light of the Christ has always been shining. Jesus sighted it and recorded it by word of mouth to his disciples and followers, and for nineteen hundred years afterward the light shone into the darkness of the human consciousness, but, except intermittently, the darkness comprehended it not. Then came Mary Baker Eddy, who received this revelation, or sighted the light of the Christ again, and recorded it plainly in Science and Health. Like the light in the lighthouse situated on the Aleutian Islands, it may be that the Christ- light may at times shine in the darkness and the darkness comprehend it not, but the time will surely come when some mariner, some seeker after Truth, or so-called patient, will sight the light. He, too, has his nautical almanac, (the Bible and Science and Health, the Word of God,) tried and true also, for it records the experience of those who have traversed the course before him into the Kingdom of God. In this nautical almanac, setting forth the true way and the experience en route to and into the Kingdom of God by those who have gone before on this adventurous journey from sense to Soul, he will find that at all times, even in the midst of danger, this light of the Christ is always at hand shining brightly, ready to guide him into safety, if he will but follow the plainly charted course over which those others have passed before him. Furthermore, he learns to avoid the traps and snares which have been set. No longer does he have to go through the crucifixion, no longer does he have to go into the Lion’s den, nor into the burning fiery furnace; no longer does he have to starve in the wilderness, or a thousand and one things which have threatened to overthrow those others who have preceded him into the Kingdom of God. All these experiences have been met and overcome and passed through safely, and profiting by those experiences, he may avoid those temptations, should they again confront him.
It is really the patient who sets up the “treatment” when he sights the light and steers his course by it, for like the light in the lighthouse, the light must be kept burning brightly quite regardless of whatever may be going on. And when the patient has come safely into holiness, wholeness, health, etc., the patient himself stops the “treatment,” even as he started it, and stops it automatically when he turns from that light, and elects to find his way under his own light of the Christ. But the light continues to shine just the same.
The course is clearly marked now, and our gratitude to those who have gone before us and charted this hitherto unknown course should know no bounds. If we will steer our course by the light which we have sighted, no matter what the trouble, no matter who it may be, or who or what may be concerned, and no matter how impossible may seem the situation or problem to be met, overcome, healed, or saved, the solution of it will surely be brought about and manifested unto the world.
“And on the day that the tabernacle was reared up, the cloud covered the tabernacle, namely, the tent of the testimony: and at even there was upon the tabernacle as it were the appearance of fire, until the morning. So it was always: the cloud covered it by day, and the appearance of fire by night. And when the cloud was taken up from the tabernacle, then after that the children of Israel journeyed: and in the place where the cloud abode, there the children of Israel pitched their tents. At the commandment of the Lord the children of Israel journeyed, and at the commandment of the Lord they pitched: as long as the cloud abode upon the tabernacle they rested in their tents. And when the cloud tarried long upon the tabernacle many days, then the children of Israel kept the charge of the Lord, and journeyed not. And so it was, when the cloud was a few days upon the tabernacle; according to the commandment of the Lord they abode in their tents, and according to the commandment of the Lord they journeyed. And so it was, when the cloud abode from even unto the morning, and that the cloud was taken up in the morning; whether it was by day or by night that the cloud was taken up, they journeyed. Or whether it were two days, or a month, or a year, that the cloud tarried upon the tabernacle, remaining thereon, the children of Israel abode in their tents, and journeyed not: but when it was taken up, they journeyed. At the commandment of the Lord they rested in their tents, and at the commandment of the Lord they journeyed: they kept the charge of the Lord, at the commandment of the Lord by the hand of Moses.” (Numbers)
UNCLE SAM
The dictionary defines the word “demonstrate” as meaning “to manifest, show forth, exhibit; to exhibit proof beyond possibility of doubt.”
Many Christian Scientists are constantly endeavoring with the human mind, by prayer or otherwise, to demonstrate something which at the time they do not believe they possess, and this is really why they try to demonstrate it. They may be endeavoring to demonstrate health, life, sobriety, love, peace, abundance, supply, and such things; but, curiously enough, they invariably make this endeavor when they do not believe they have those things (which lack is manifested or shown forth in sickness, sin, death, drunkenness, hatred, fear, anxiety, poverty, and other troubles), and as we have pointed out, it is because they do not believe they have those desirable things, that they try to demonstrate them. Is it possible to demonstrate or show forth or exhibit that which they have not? It is impossible. One can only demonstrate or exhibit that which he has. So soon as he has it, he can show it forth, but not before. How can he show forth that which he has not? It is absurd even to think of such a thing! Oddly enough, when he has the thing, he no longer tries to demonstrate it; he no longer tries to get something which previously he did not believe he possessed; for whatever it may be, it is now in manifestation, is demonstrated or shown forth, and without effort. There it is, and that is all there is about it. The thing is done. He has it. Then the human mind takes it for granted, accepts it, takes it as a matter of course, and then doesn’t even try to demonstrate it or exhibit it, for it is a demonstrated, established fact. “The Lord shall establish thee an holy people unto himself, as he hath sworn unto thee.” The mere fact that one has something is demonstration, or it is manifested. “This apodictical”—apodictical means “clearly demonstrable”—“This apodictical Principle points to the revelation of Immune, ‘God with us, ’ — the sovereign ever-presence, delivering the children of men from every ill ‘that flesh is heir to. ’” (Science and Health)
“God is All-in-all.” (Science and Health) As Paul says, “By Him all things consist.” God, Spirit, the Father within, the “I” or Ego, therefore, is the Demonstrator, for having all things, or still better, being all things, He demonstrates, manifests, shews forth, or exhibits Himself, that which He has or is. “Creation is ever appearing, and must ever continue to appear from the nature of its inexhaustible source.” (Science and Health) God never ceases to demonstrate certain proof of His being. He is never without a witness of Himself. This is so because He is what He is, or as Himself hath said, “I AM THAT I AM.”
What is God? Many of us glibly say: God is “Principle; Mind; Soul; Spirit; Life; Truth; Love.” (Science and Health) But how many of us really grasp the significance of this statement? Even though in some measure, at least, we have come to the point where we no longer believe God to be a venerable white-whiskered old gentleman, perhaps sitting on a cloud or mayhap on a golden throne; and we say that He is impersonal, incorporeal, Spirit, Mind, Principle, etc. — yet do we not retain a sort of idea that God is an omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent Being, who is a Ruler in and of the Kingdom of God? A sort of benevolent Despot? Mayhap a loving Father-Mother God (somewhat in the sense of a humanly formed father or mother)? A King, as it were, to whom we turn or look for help in time of trouble; a sort of Ruler who looks after us and the Kingdom of God, something like the pictures we see of John Bull taking care of his people and lands, or Father Knickerbocker watching over his city, or perhaps Uncle Sam taking care of his kingdom, the United States of America and all that is therein?
Who is Uncle Sam, anyway? He is depicted frequently as watching over the U.S.A. We can see him in his funny old beaver hat, his striped trousers, and his spike-tail coat, standing guard over his domains. But is there any such Uncle Sam? Positively there is not. Uncle Sam is the U.S.A., or the U.S.A. is Uncle Sam. There is no John Bull or Father Knickerbocker either. They are England and New York City respectively. There is no God either who watches over the Kingdom of God and the things therein. God is the Kingdom of God. Uncle Sam is a mythical figure symbolizing or representing the U. S. A., but the U.S.A. is no myth. Uncle Sam is the U.S.A. God is a mythical figure too, representing the Kingdom of God, but the Kingdom of God is no myth. God is the Kingdom of God; the Kingdom of God is God. The U.S.A. is what it is, and might well say, “I am that I am.” The Kingdom of God is what it is also, and says and ever has said, “I AM THAT I AM.”
Let it be reiterated, there is no Uncle Sam watching over the U.S.A. The U.S.A. watches over itself There is no God watching over the Kingdom of God; the Kingdom of God watches over itself. The U.S.A. contains within itself, of whatever it is constituted, whatever it has, whatever it does, and is self-contained, self-governed, self-constituted, and is simply itself. Uncle Sam, as such, is a myth, for actually he is the U. S.A. God as Ruler or King is equally a myth, for God is the Kingdom of God; but the Kingdom of God is very real, in fact, the only reality there is or ever will be. Moreover, this Kingdom is here now and right at hand. In it “we live and move and have our being.”
Sometimes we hear England broadcasting, and a voice says, “Hello, America. This is England speaking.” The U.S.A. answers and a voice says, “Hello, England. This is America speaking.”
Of course, we know perfectly well that it is not England or the U. S. A. speaking, but someone speaking in the name of England, or of the U. S. A. England must have a body, lips, etc., and a voice to express itself, or it would be dumb. So with the U. S. A. So also is it with the Kingdom of God. Error, too, if it would live, must have a body to express itself or act through. It is our privilege to supply a body for error or to refuse it a body. Error or evil has no body to act with, no ears to hear with, no legs to walk with, and if we refuse to supply this agency or body to evil or error, evil or error will fall by its own weight or die for want of expression. It is nothing, and we should let it remain so, and not give it a body, or organs, limbs, etc., to act as though it were something. The Kingdom of God likewise requires a body to express itself, a creation consisting of ideas, otherwise the Kingdom of God would die for want of expression also, or would not exist. Try to image the U.S.A. without its lands, rivers, government, army, navy, cities, states, territories. Quite absurd, for then there would be no U. S. A. Very well; imagine the Kingdom of God with no body, no creation, no expression! Equally, if not more, absurd!
There is this difference, though, between God and the devil, good and evil. God supplies His own body or ideas, and governs them, and this body or embodiment is the Kingdom of God, Himself in manifestation, the Kingdom of God made visible; whereas the devil, evil, cannot supply a body for itself and so express or perpetuate itself, but must have a body supplied for it. Therefore, as said before, if anyone refuses to supply evil or error with a body, evil or error dies to him who thus refuses it a body.
We shall assume the following conversation to be carried on in the broadcast: England says, “What are you, America?” America more properly the U. S. A., answers, “I am the sunshine, the air, the lakes and rivers, the streams and waters; I am the flowers, the trees, and grains, I am Chicago, New York, Boston, San Francisco; I am Texas, Rhode Island, California, Florida; I am the broad avenues, the churches, schools, the parks, the cities, the states, the territories, the inhabitants; I am the subways, the busses; I am the land of liberty and freedom, the land of unequaled opportunities, and all these for anyone according to law, at any time, without regard to race, creed, color, class, rank, or birth—I am, in fact, that I am.”
Someone in a foreign country listens in to this broadcast and resolves to go to this land of freedom and opportunity. He is down-trodden, poor, wretched, almost, if not quite, a slave; one who is eking out a miserable existence, to whom life is just one drab thing after another, and this wonderful country described offers to him everything desirable. In due course he arrives, and the moment he steps on American ground he partakes of American things. He stands on American soil, eats American food, drinks American water, breathes American air, strolls in American parks, drives over American roads, rides American subways, attends American churches, theaters and schools, and is governed by American laws.
Does he have to demonstrate these things—the subways, the schools, and so on? Not at all. They are already demonstrated and shown forth. The U.S.A. itself demonstrates these things and everything it has. The one coming into the country does not demonstrate them; he has but to accept those things already demonstrated, and demonstrated by the U.S.A. Furthermore, the U.S.A. is constantly demonstrating more and more wonderful things.
We, too, perhaps sick, sorrowing, fearful, slaves to drink or other material things, slaves to appetite, to the senses, dwelling in the kingdom of matter, may have tuned into the broadcast from station KOG (Kingdom of God), and have heard the voice of the Great Announcer, God Himself, saying, “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light ” Or, “Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God and there is none else.” We have heard these broadcasts coming directly from the Kingdom of God. We have heard them when we were in that far country, far, far away from the Kingdom of God, and we, too, resolve to leave the kingdom of materiality with its discords, and enter the Kingdom of God, the “land of brooks of water, of fountains, and depths that spring out of valleys and hills; a land of wheat, and barley, and vines, and fig trees, and pomegranates; a land of oil, olive, and honey; a land wherein thou shalt eat bread without scarceness, thou shalt not lack anything in it; a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills thou mayest dig brass.”
When we turn from materiality to Spirit, we find ourselves in the Kingdom of God, and at once partake of the things therein. We breathe the air of the Kingdom of God, drink God’s water, eat God’s food, “live and move and have our being” in the Kingdom of God, and are governed by the laws of the Kingdom of God. We partake of that wonderful promise of God, “It is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”
Do we have to demonstrate all or any of these things? Not at all. They are already demonstrated for us. The Kingdom of God demonstrates itself, shows forth or exhibits itself. It creates itself, or is self-created. We do not have to demonstrate life, health, peace, love, abundance, plenty, the things of the Kingdom of God, yea, which constitute the Kingdom of God. Not at all. Not any more than the foreigner who comes to this U. S. A. has to demonstrate the things constituting the U.S.A. Those things are already demonstrated for him. Moreover, the U.S.A. will demonstrate or show forth more and more. He has but to obey the laws, and the things of the U. S. A. are his as much as he deserves. Free are they to all, under law.
So the things of the Kingdom of God are here and demonstrated. The Kingdom of God demonstrates itself and the things constituting itself. All these are ours for the mere acceptance, according to law. Moreover, the Kingdom of God is showing forth or exhibiting more and more wonderful things for us and for the glory of God. “Behold the former things have come to pass, and new things do I declare; before they spring forth I tell you of them,” broadcasts the Announcer from the Kingdom of God. All is created for the glory of God, and this creation is the body through which God acts or manifests Himself, this body which is “the temple of the Holy Ghost, which ye have of God and ye are not your own.” And more, much more, is yet to come.
Most of us, when we come into the Kingdom of God, try to have the things of that Kingdom and enjoy them while still obedient to the laws of the old kingdom of matter which we have forsaken. We are jealous, fault-finding, critical, mean, hateful, quarrelsome, avaricious, afraid, grasping; we get angry, are ill-tempered, bad-humored, and a thousand and one other things which have no part whatsoever in the Kingdom of God. So we fail to receive and accept the fullness of the wonderful things in the Kingdom.
As if the foreigner coming into the U.S.A. might refuse to send his children to school on the basis that if this is a free country, he is free to do so. Soon the truant officer would call upon the head of the house and demand the reason, and finding no good excuse, would demand that the children be sent to school, and, if still meeting with a refusal, would have the parents arrested, and put in jail. Then, although in some measure still breathing the air of the U.S.A., eating the food of the U. S. A., drinking the water of the U. S. A., the food, the air, and the water would not be so fresh and clean as if he were free to go out into the parks and elsewhere, and so secure the things he might desire. When, however, he elected to obey the laws again, he would be set free from his bondage, and be able to accept to the full the things of the U. S. A., which are exhibited or demonstrated.
So with us. We come into the Kingdom of God from the old kingdom of matter, and fall into the mistake of trying to operate under our old laws, and the result is we find ourselves in some sort of discord, sick, sinful, suffering, poor, wretched, in want and woe, or limited in health, peace, life, love, abundance, all of which we enjoy in some measure, but to a limited extent. We are in bondage. However, when we learn the laws—or as the Spirit speaking through Jesus said, “Take my yoke upon you and learn of me” — and obey them, we once again become the recipient of the unlimited supply of good, just exactly to the degree of our ability to accept and obey the laws of Spirit, God.
What better example of this can we find than in the parable of the prodigal son? The younger son had found himself in a far country starving for the good. Then he returned to his Father humbly and lovingly. “Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before thee, and am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants.” Whereupon did the father give him the best robe, the new shoes, the gold ring, and, killing the fatted calf, set him at his right hand at the feast prepared for him. These things had been all demonstrated long ago. All the son had to do was to accept them according to law. Breaking the laws, operating under material laws, he was shut off in large degree from the supply which otherwise was naturally his. Now he obeyed the law and immediately he was able to receive, and did receive the things of the Kingdom of God.
The elder son, always in the Kingdom, was trying to accept the things of the Kingdom of God while operating under the laws of his old kingdom of matter whence he had come long since; and naturally he was unable to partake fully of the things of God. Hear him: “Lo, these many years do I serve thee, neither transgressed I at any time thy commandment: and yet thou never gavest me a kid, that I might make merry with my friends.” Now why was this? For surely the Kingdom of God had demonstrated these things for him also. All he had to do was to accept then. Even his father said, “Son, thou art ever with me, and all that I have is thine.” Why could he not have received or accepted them? Because—and it is plain enough—he was jealous, envious, avaricious, trying to operate in the Kingdom of God under material laws. So he was in bondage, jailed. He received much of the Kingdom, but not what he might have received, had he obeyed the laws of God. It was all demonstrated for him — “all that I have is thine” — but he could not accept it. The younger son was now operating under the laws of the Kingdom of God, and so, quite irrespective of what he had done, now he was free, and the Father was pouring forth whatever he could accept. The Father had been doing so always. So is the Father doing for us. We have but to accept.
I AM THE LORD, THY GOD
We read in the Scriptures : “The hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him. God is a Spirit; and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.” “The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do: for what things soever he doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise.” “My doctrine is not mine, but his that sent me. If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or whether I speak of myself He that speaketh of himself seeketh his own glory: but he that seeketh his glory that sent him, the same is true, and no unrighteousness is in him.” “When ye have lifted up the Son of man, then shall you know that I am he, and that I do nothing of myself; but as my Father hath taught me, I speak these things. And he that sent me is with me: the Father hath not left me alone; for I do always those things that please him.” “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God,” and “Likewise the Spirit helpeth our infirmities; for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.”
“Surely as I have thought, so shall it come to pass; and as I have purposed, so shall it stand.” Thus hath the “I,” the Lord of Hosts, sworn. Not as you think or purpose, not as Jesus thought or purposed, not as anyone else thinks or purposes, but as “I,” God, Spirit, Love, Mind, Principle, Soul, thinks or purposes, “so shall it come to pass.”
This “I” is God, is your Ego, your own “I,” my “I,” everybody’s and everything’s “I.” The “I” is not person, not man, not thing, but the “I” is Spirit, Soul, God, Mind, Principle, Life, Love, omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient, omni-luscient. Man includes the universe, for man is not just the person, but man is his whole consciousness, the very body of God; man is the expression, the manifestation of the “I,” and as much of the “I” as you or anybody else may have, do you or they manifest.
The “I” is God, the “I AM THAT I AM,” and the body, the world, or your consciousness will manifest exactly as much of the “I” as you have of the “I.” The body is, of course, spiritual, but today it appears otherwise. As we get more and more of this “I,” it will appear less and less materially, as John says, “Now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.”
God does all. Man is His manifestation. If it be true that man started in slime, if his release had depended on his own prayers for freedom, he would still be slithering about in slime, for man can only pray for something which he knows about, and not for something of which he knows nothing; so since all he knew then was this slime experience, the best he could do would be to pray for more or less slime. Happily, however, he had an Ego, and this Ego was God, the “I,” and this “I,” infinite intelligence, could pray for anything which would be for its own glory. So God, the “I,” proceeded to give man the kingdom. So far He has given to us what we know today, but it is not a circumstance to what He will give to us soon. In other words, the “I” which is God, prays for us, reveals Himself to us, and reveals all the wonderful things to the world for His own glory.
Did the human being—the person, call him what you will—with the human mind give to the world all the wonderful things it has received in the past ages? Never. Man could only pray for the things or believe along the lines with which he was already familiar, and as he is limited to the boundaries of his own consciousness, he knows only that which he knows. New ideas cannot come from the human mind, else they wouldn’t be new, and if these ideas were in the human mind, they would be in manifestation already. These new ideas came from God; whatever they may be; they came from this “I,” infinite intelligence. Man, not knowing anything about motor cars, radios, telephones, airships or other electrical contrivances, could not have prayed for, asked for, or even conceived of them, for how could he do so, knowing nothing about them? Man cannot pray for the still more wonderful things which are about to come into the world in the near future because he doesn’t know the first thing about them. But God, man’s Ego or “I,” reveals them to man by his Spirit, for “the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God,” and “before they spring forth I tell you of them.”
It is God that prays. Not a God such as we have been concerned with for so many generations, but the “I,” the all-knowing God, perceives the desirable things for us and gives them to us. Prayer is desire. Whose desire? God’s desire, the desire of the “I,” Spirit. Man couldn’t possibly desire anything beyond that of which he knows, because he doesn’t know anything about it, that he might desire it. The commandment, moreover, tells us plainly not to covet or desire things which we know of, which we believe at the time we have not and which someone else may have. God, the “I,” however, beholds the desirable things for us, and this “I,” God, Spirit, gives us those things, reveals them to us. As the author, the mind of the Crusoe world, saw that it would be a desirable thing for Crusoe to have an ax, he prayed as Jesus prayed and said we should pray. “What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them.” Crusoe’s prayer didn’t originate in himself, but originated in the author, and so the author prayed, turned to his own mind, the mind which was the author, and drew from itself, or prayed, or originated the idea which Crusoe expressed in his prayer for the ax. Crusoe didn’t know anything about an ax being wanted, and could have gotten along quite well without it, even as our ancestors got along perfectly well and happily without motor cars, radios, or other electrical inventions, without which today many of us would be at a loss. The author, the “I” of the tale of Crusoe, saw what was wanted for the greater glory, not of Crusoe, but of himself, the author, and so he gave him not only the ax, but a whole chest of tools. This he wrote in the book known as Robinson Crusoe, and so brought it into the world of Crusoe, which after all is said and done, was but the body or expression or manifestation of the mind which was the author of the tale and everything in it.
So God, the Author, has written the Book of Life, and among many other things beholds man, his character, created for His own glorification, just as was the whole world of Crusoe created for the glorification of the author himself, and not for Crusoe. This ‘I’ or God perceives that His creation will glorify Him more and more if He gives them wonderful things, and so He writes them in the Book of Life, and there they are. God hath revealed them to us by His Spirit. But it is God’s desire, the desire of the “I” or Spirit.
This same “I,” God, Spirit, Soul, Principle, says to you: “I perceive My beloved son or character will glorify Me more by having health, life, love, peace, strength, abundance, success, happiness, and many other things. Well, I’ll give them to him, and do so in abundance. It is My good pleasure to give him the kingdom, and so I will. Before he calls I will answer, and while he is yet speaking I will hear. I know what he has need of before he asks Me.” And He no sooner says so that it is written in the Book of Life, and we onlookers read it as it is spread out before us—which is now and at all times.
“OCCUPY TILL I COME”
Why worry about death and a body to be buried after death, and keeping up an insurance policy to bury the body, which, after all is said and done, isn’t there anyway to be buried? All that is being tucked away into the ground is the belief that there is a body there, for as a matter of fact, the body is present and functioning as it was before this death dream was entertained. If others are fooled by the seeming presence of death, and they believe you to be dead, it will not fool you who are alive and know it, and this is the fact with everyone who believed for a moment that he or she died.
Why meditate on death, when you have the promise of eternal life? Jesus said, “if a man keep my saying, he shall never see death.” Why not at least try to believe what he said? Moreover, he not only said this, but he proved it for himself, and so for you and me.
Jesus said to Peter, “If I will that he [John] tarry till I come, what is that to thee?” Thereupon did the disciples say that John should not die. But John said that Jesus didn’t say he should not die, but only said, “If I will that he [John] tarry till I [the Christ, God, the Ego, your Ego, your “I,” my “I,” everyone’s and everything’s “I”] come, what is that to thee?” However, although John said the foregoing, and although Jesus didn’t say in so many words that John should not die; nevertheless it is a fact that if John tarried until the ‘T’ came to him, he would not die, nor could he die, and neither can you or anyone else die who will tarry until the “F’ comes. “Occupy till ‘I’ come.”
The thing to do is to wait patiently for the “T to come, and when it does come, you may be sure that to whomsoever it does come, that one shall not die. This is the only way. “I am the way, the truth and the life; no man cometh to the Father but by me”—by way of this “I.” Stop planning for death; plan for life. You will never find the way to eternal life by way of insurance policies, by the way of making wills, by digging graves. Death is not the way to eternal life. “I am the way.” There is no other way. ‘Tor the grave cannot praise thee, death cannot celebrate [glorify] thee: they that go down into the pit [die] cannot hope for thy truth. The living, the living, he shall praise thee, as I do this day.” (Isaiah)
A woman died. This is what happened. There came a time when she believed she was dead. So did the doctors and the nurses, her relatives and friends. There was this difference, however. The woman herself immediately awakened sufficiently from the dream of death to know that she was still alive. Then she said to herself: “Well, here I am alive, and if I didn’t die, then that which appeared to kill me didn’t do so, and is no more real than death, and so I’m not sick either.” So she was freed from her sickness, or wakened from that belief, even as she had wakened from the belief of being dead. That, however, was as far as she got in her awakening, and she still continued along in her dream. She could see us and the things about her as before, just as we could do so, but we were unable to see her alive with us, and continued to believe that she was dead, and buried what we continued to believe was her dead body. She walked and talked, trying to make us understand that she was all right and that nothing had happened, but we couldn’t communicate with her, nor she with us, because we were blinded by the false belief that she had died and was dead. So we buried the belief, and wept over our belief of her demise. We sent flowers, had a funeral, spent a great deal of money, ill-afforded, and all the while she was alive and well, better, as a matter of fact, than before the dream of death occurred.
It’s something like this. Did you ever see a prestidigitator? He draws your attention to an egg which he has in his hand. He points out that there is no room to hide it up his sleeve, or elsewhere, all the while drawing your attention to the egg and the impossibility of its getting away without your seeing it.
Then he places the egg in his left hand, and shows it to you lying there. Next he takes it with the right hand from the left, leaving the left hand open and exposed so that you see there is no egg therein, up and down, time after time, until you become accustomed to seeing the egg go up and down. Sometimes he stops the movement for a moment or two and shows you the egg in the right hand, and then once again swings the arm up and down, up and down, with the egg therein plainly in view.
The eye has now become accustomed to this, and then suddenly, quickly but unobserved, still swinging the right arm in regular rhythmic action, he leaves the egg once again in the palm of the left hand, closes it and slips the egg into his pocket or other convenient place, while at the same time the right arm continues its rhythmic swing just as though the egg were still there; and you would be willing to wager your very life that such is the fact.
Meanwhile, the egg is now concealed somewhere about his person, while to you it appears to be still in the right hand, now immovable in the position of hand and arm upraised, and the egg apparently held in the closed fist. Then with the free left hand, he takes a handkerchief, and with it covers the right hand, which you are quite certain still holds the egg, all the while keeping up a running conversation while you keep your eye on the handkerchief covering the right hand, which presumably contains the egg. Then he secures a pencil and, tapping the handkerchief for a moment, he raises the handkerchief with the pencil, drops it, opens the hand, and lo, the egg is gone. Where? You wonder, and then he appears to take it from your ear or some other place.
Death is something like that illustration. We have become so accustomed to see everybody go on from birth to death, that we never believe it isn’t so. There comes a time, however, when instead of dying, the body goes along just as it has been doing, living as we call it. But as we became accustomed to see the egg go up and down and up and down, and failed to see and follow it when it didn’t do so, so when the person goes along from what is called birth to death, with the intervening steps, there comes a time when instead of dying as we expect him to do, he stops short of it, and remains alive—though we fail to observe this—fooling everyone except himself, and even he is for a brief moment equally fooled; but inasmuch as the thing didn’t occur to him, he ceases being fooled, and he finds out that that which he, too, thought had occurred, didn’t occur at all, and instead of being dead, he is very much alive.
He cannot, however, make the others believe that the thing which is true is the fact, any more than you can make some foolish fellow believe that the egg is not in the right hand, or the pea under the shell where he is willing to wager it is. We who remain are sure that the person is dead, even as we are sure the egg is in the right hand; and so we hold a funeral and weep over the demise of some dear one, and there is recorded in the registry of deaths that someone has died, which from beginning to end is a series of errors. It would be a comedy of errors were it not so sad and pitiful.
So with this woman to whom we have referred: when she seemed to die, she no more died and was dead, than did the egg go up in the palm of the raised hand. As the egg remained in the palm of the left hand, right before your very eyes, but you didn’t see it so. You believed she died, and you thought you saw what you believed, just as you thought you saw what you believed about the egg. But the egg remained in the left hand; so this woman remained alive and well, right before your very eyes, but you didn’t see it so. You believed she died, and you thought you saw what you believed, just as you thought you saw what you believed about the egg. But the egg remained in the left hand; so this woman went right on living.
ENCHANTMENT
“Surely there is no enchantment against Jacob, neither is there any divination against Israel: according to this time it shall be said of Jacob and of Israel, ‘What hath God wrought!’”
Did you ever see a bird enchanted or hypnotized by a serpent? At least you have read of it. The snake poises itself, slowly advancing on the bird in its peculiar sinuous way, always watching the bird. The bird likewise watches the snake, its eyes riveted on it. So long as the bird watches the serpent, the bird is enchanted or mesmerized—by itself, not by the snake, for the serpent has no power whatsoever over the bird. All the while the serpent is bearing down upon the bird which is held fast by its own fears, hypnosis, or enchantment, and if the bird does not turn from watching the snake, the bird is doomed. The serpent has no power over the bird at all. The bird is getting itself into trouble by watching the snake. The serpent could watch the bird for hours on end without harm to the bird if the bird were asleep, or otherwise unconscious of the presence of the snake; but the instant the bird sees the snake and watches it, gazes upon it, the bird becomes self hypnotized or enchanted, and unless it looks away, it is doomed to destruction.
The bird can, however, free itself at any moment, if it will turn from the seipent and look elsewhere. The moment it takes its eyes off the serpent, at that instant it is free to spread its wings and mount into safety—as, in fact, it was free even when it was held in bondage by its self-hypnosis.
It is the same with us. We become mesmerized or enchanted when we watch the serpent of evil, no matter what may be the nature of it—whether it be sin, disease, death, or other troubles. If we fail to turn away from evil, we are liable to suffer; but if we resolutely turn to God, perceiving “What hath God wrought,” thus turning away from the serpent of evil, we will be set free instantly from whatever sort of evil it may be. The moment we do this, we can take the evil or the serpent by the tail, and when we take hold of the serpent by the tail, that is the end of it. Unless we do this, the end of error is not yet. The serpent can do nothing of itself. We bring troubles on ourselves by watching the evils, and we can rid ourselves of them by the very simple method of turning to God, thus perceiving “What hath God wrought,” and so not believing “what hath evil wrought.” Said Jesus: “Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurteth you.”
Again we have the Word of God uttered by Jesus, who says, “What I say unto you, I say unto all, WATCH.” And then he proceeds to tell us just what not to watch and just what to watch. He warns us against the serpent of error, saying, “Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat or what ye shall drink,” and “take no thought for your body” what ye shall put on the body,” and to “take no thought for the morrow,” for to so watch those things is to become self-enchanted with the serpent of evil, and consequently doomed.
Then he tells us to behold “What hath God wrought,” and we are pointed the way to the good road as follows: “This is life eternal, that they might know thee, the only true
God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent,” meaning, of course, that we should watch or behold God, or good, and Christ the real and true man, the only begotten Son of God. Mrs. Eddy, likewise relaying the Word of God, says in Science and Health: “The Christian Scientist takes the best care of his body when he leaves it most out of his thought, and … is ‘willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord’”; and again, “In the line of the corporeal senses, the less a mortal knows of sin, disease, and mortality, the better for him, — the less pain and sorrow are his,” and “Hold thought steadfastly to the enduring, the good, and the true, and you will bring these into your experience proportionably to their occupancy of your thought.”
Similarly in Isaiah we find, “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, saith the Lord [God is speaking, not Isaiah, recollect; for if it were Isaiah himself, the very Word of God would be vitiated]. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts;” and in Jeremiah, “For I [God] know the thoughts that I think toward you, thoughts of peace, and not evil, to give you an expected end ”
Turn then from the error, whatever it may seem to be, by looking into the Kingdom of God, which is right at hand.
“Surely there is no enchantment against Jacob, neither is there any divination against Israel: according to this time it shall be said of Jacob and of Israel, “What hath God wrought!”
UNTHINKING
“The less mind there is manifested in matter, the better. When the unthinking lobster loses its claw, the claw grows again. If the Science of Life were understood, it would be found that the senses of Mind are never lost and that matter has no sensation. Then the human limb would be replaced as readily as the lobster’s claw, — not with an artificial limb, but with the genuine one.” (Science and Health)
A woman backed her car into a beautiful maple tree, and tore a great gash some four feet long at its longest part, and perhaps two feet at the widest, — a ragged, jagged rip. No one prayed over it, no one thought about it, no one “treated” it, nor paid the slightest attention to it; but God — some may call it Nature — healed it, and what a beautiful piece of work it was! Far and beyond anything that a human being could do, God sloughed off the tom, ragged and jagged edges of the bark and drew them together, sealed the seam, and cemented the bark to the trunk, until today the scar, if scar there be, is barely noticeable.
If, then, God heals the “unthinking lobster,” and grows a new claw, if He heals the more unthinking tree and grows new bark in place of the old and tom, how much more reasonable to assume—since, as Jesus has said, “Are ye not much better than they?” — that God will heal the unthinking man of whatever it may be, whenever man becomes unthinking and lets God, Mind, do the thinking for him?
Jesus said, “Take no thought for your life, take no thought for what you eat, or for what you drink; take no thought for your body or what you put on the body, and take no thought for the morrow—the future.” Then, having thus covered about the whole gamut of man’s thinking, and having ridiculed the possibility of man’s thinking accomplishing anything, and having illustrated this by his reference to the fowls of the air and the lilies of the field, and reiterated his admonition to “take no thought,” he added this final instruction: “But seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.”
For many years the writer puzzled over these very definite instructions to take no thought, to still this human mind or “silence the material senses” (Science and Health), and then to seek the Kingdom of God in some way other than with his thinking, for God through Jesus had definitely barred this already. Finally, of course, it was seen that when and as a man stopped his human-mind thinking, there arose in him that “mind which was also in Christ Jesus,” and this Mind, the one Mind, or God, proceeded forthwith to direct and guide man into the Kingdom of God.
But how to become this unthinking man was the puzzle. It was all very well to say, “Don’t think,” but the human mind went on thinking just the same, and never seemed to stop, one way or another—sometimes quite good, and other times quite evil, and sometimes a mixture of both.
The more one tried to stop his thinking, the harder he thought. Yet the Master said, “Take no thought,” and said it so many times in so many different ways that it was impossible to believe that he might have meant something else.
Gradually it dawned upon the writer that he must do as Paul said,—“die daily,” or every day refuse to think about certain things, refuse to entertain human thoughts and opinions, the doctrines and theories of men, and all the preconceived imaginations of the human mind. Paul said something too about “casting down imaginations… and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ.” Then the writer recalled a story. This is it, and it proved helpful in the doing.
It appears there was a nice old German musician who played the tuba in the band. A tuba is a great brass wind instrument which goes uumpah, uumpah, uumpah. The band was called one day to rehearsal. The band leader started the band off, and when they came to a certain place in the new composition, this old fellow with the tuba played a false note. So the leader with his baton rapped for the band to stop, and then started it off again; but, as before, at the same place the old German tuba played a false note again. This occurred several times, until finally the leader became enraged, and stopping the band once more, he proceeded in no mincing words to berate the tuba player. The latter, hearing the storm break, took his glasses out of his pocket and, putting them on his nose, peered through them at the music. In a moment, with a broad genial smile, he said, “It was a fly speck, und I thought it was a note, und I played him.”
On the next attempt, although he still saw the fly speck, which was no part of the musical score, he simply passed it by, refusing to think on it, of it, or about it, and the result was perfect harmony.
This is the Kingdom of God. “The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ; and he shall reign forever and ever.” In spite of all evidence to the contrary, this is an eternal fact. It may appear that error is real, that there is a material world, that there exists evil of all kinds—sickness, sin, death, war, pestilence, famine, woe, want, fear, worry — but this is not true. They are but fly specks, and no more part of the spiritual Kingdom of God than was the fly speck a part of the beautiful and perfect musical score; and as the tuba player passed over the fly speck, even though it still appeared, and took no thought for it, so must we pass over and pass by the fly specks, be they called matter, evil, or whatnot, and take no thought for them, thus in some measure stilling the human mind. Whereupon, Nature abhorring a vacuum, will the Christ- Mind arise in us, or the Spirit of God rest upon us, and since this Mind is “of purer eyes than to behold evil, and canst not look on iniquity,” it will behold the realities of being, the Kingdom of God in all its loveliness.
Then man has become unthinking, or takes no thought, in obedience to the Master’s explicit instructions, and has the Mind of Christ, or the one Mind, God, has become his Mind; and this unthinking man, or this man no longer thinking by his own volition, thinks in obedience to and by the volition of the one Mind, God Himself, as He speaks to us through that great transparency, Jeremiah: “I know that the way of man is not in himself; it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps.”
The great trouble with us all is that as soon as we read the statement, “If the
Science of Life were understood,” we say to ourselves, “Then I must understand this Science of Life,” and proceed forthwith to make the invariably unsuccessful attempt to understand it with the human mind — an utter impossibility. The Science of Life is the Science of God, or the Science of Mind, God’s Science, or Mind’s Science. Science means exact knowledge. So it is Mind’s exact knowledge, yet not the human mind’s exact knowledge. If it were possible for the human mind to comprehend or understand the Science of Life, or Mind, it wouldn’t be Mind’s Science, or the Science of Life, or Mind, but mind’s science or the science of the human mind; and the human mind, at best a myth, would then be exalted instead of God. In Unity of Good we find: “God is egoistic, knowing only His own all-presence, all-knowledge, all-power.”
We have been striving to make this body a temple of the human mind or of a human mind method. We have tried to make it the temple of the mortal or dead mind, instead of the temple of the living God, or of the living Mind, so no wonder we have brought out a material, dying body, eventually to find itself in the grave, and experiencing all manner of suffering and evil in the interim between so-called birth and death. In fact, we began to die as soon as we were born, for every day carried us one day closer to the grave. Yet we have called this living. More truly should we have called it deading. “I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth, saith the Lord God; wherefrom turn yourselves, and live ye.”
THE PRAYER OF EXPECTATION
We must recollect at all times that there is nothing impossible to God. Our difficulty lies in the habit we have formed, in the many years of our experience in what we believed Christian Science, to be—a system of right thinking, which it isn’t at all. The definition of “right” is “in opposition to wrong.” Right thinking, therefore, can be done only by the human mind, for the divine Mind, God, or Spirit, knows nothing about an opposition, knows no error, hence cannot think right or in opposition to wrong; Mind, God, thinks perfectly, knows no evil, is “of purer eyes than to behold evil, and canst not look on iniquity.” (Habakkuk 1).
However, believing that Christian Science was a system of right thinking, many formed a habit of thinking right with the human mind in opposition to any error or wrong thought which presented itself in the form of suggestion, the only way any error can present itself. For instance, if one felt dizzy and feared he might fall, he quickly thought, “Underneath are the everlasting arms,” or perhaps, “They shall bear thee up in their hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone,” or something similar.
Although these are spiritual truths, they become vitiated when the human mind is uttering them, mere “electrical transcriptions.” It is just the human mind doing a “stunt,” and being the human mind, it has no healing qualities whatsoever. One might as well say “eenie, meenie, minie, mo.” Yet this method has been so impregnated in our consciousness that it becomes a very difficult thing to drop it. It has become part of ourselves. We have made ourselves the temple of the human mind and that method, instead of being a temple of the Holy Ghost or of the Living God, Mind. Today we may refrain from saying these things audibly, but we do say them more or less automatically without the audible utterance of the words themselves. Thus doing, we recognize evil, and that is all evil requires of us in order that it may function.
Try, instead of this, to do as David said: “Be still and know that I am God’” or, as in Isaiah, “Their strength is to sit still.” (Rest from wrong thoughts, be still and let God do it). Still this human mind by refusing to recognize error in any way whatsoever. Refuse to entertain human thoughts and opinions, the doctrines and theories of men and all the preconceived imaginations of the human mind. Do as Solomon did, stop praying as heretofore and step out on the promises of God, thus praying the efficient prayer of acceptance or expectation. Here are some of them: Luke 12:32, 10:19, 15:31; Genesis 28:15; Deuteronomy 28:1-14; John6:37-39; First Kings 3:5-14; 8:54-61; Second Chronicles 7:1-3. Then read First Kings 10, and see what wonderful things happened to Solomon when he stopped his old-fashioned prayers and stepped out on the promise of God, that He would give him the things he did not ask for. As Jesus later said, “Your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him” — so why ask?
God, the universal Mind, is your Mind, but this Mind is not directed by you, the person. This Mind directs itself and you and all. This is “the unlabored motion of the divine energy” (Science and Health), utterly effortless, just as the sun shines without effort. It just is. So God just is. If the moon tried to shine, it would make an unsuccessful effort; but without effort, it reflects. Whatever is, is, without any effort whatsoever. It requires no effort to be. When man tries to think (right or wrong), he has to make an effort, because it is not his prerogative to originate “thought.” The sun shines and the moon reflects. God thinks and man reflects, but man doesn’t of himself think, any more than the moon of itself shines.
After awhile you get accustomed to letting God do it, without any effort on your part to assist Him in any way, which effort on your part always recognizes the evil to be overcome, and this God makes no effort whatsoever to do and never recognizes evil, just as the sun shines, never beholding or recognizing darkness, and warms the earth, whereupon the barren earth shortly afterward becomes a riot of beauty and color — all this without effort on the part of the sun, the earth, the seeds, flowers, etc. The sun shines just by itself, without any effort, without trying to do it or thinking about it; but the sun is just itself, and so shines and sends forth warmth and light, which results in the barren ground breaking forth into bloom.
Then you may find yourself, in obedience to the Christ-Mind, uttering the very same words you previously did with the human mind; but it won’t be the human mind at all. It will be God, Mind, the omniscient Being who, without knowing the least thing about the error, may specifically destroy it, just as sunlight shining into a square room, a pentagonal room, an octagonal room, or a circular room, which is dark, automatically assumes the shape of whichever room it may be, and does it without effort or even knowing whether the room is square, pentagonal, octagonal, or circular, and so dispels the darkness from every comer.
For instance, Jesus spoke in the wilderness, when the several temptations were presented to him, the first of material sensation, the next of temporal power, and the third of so-called spiritual power; and the words uttered by him were each time a direct refutation of the specific evil temptation; but it was God doing this, speaking through him as a radio, and not Jesus’ human Mind answering and so recognizing the presented error. If it had been just the human mind, or Jesus himself, doing it, he could not have won the great victory on that occasion; but it wasn’t so (and he said over and over again that it was not), not he himself with the human mind, but “the Father that dwelleth in me.’” It was God, and Jesus had dialed in to Station KOG and picked up the veritable Word of God and was relaying it over his loud speaker. He himself had no more to do with that Word than your radio which relays the broadcast over its loud speaker has to do with what is said.
Just be happy, let go and let God do it. Don’t try to assume the prerogative of God.
IT SEARCHES THE JOINTS AND THE MARROW
If you go into the kingdom of Boreas, you get cold; if you go into the kingdom of the Sun, you get warm; if you go into the kingdom of Neptume ,you get wet; and if you go into the Kingdom of God, you become God-like, holy, every whit whole.
It matters not in the least to the kingdom of Neptune how dirty you are, what kind of dirt it is, how long you have been dirty, how thick the dirt upon you or whence it came, or where it may be, for the ocean immediately functions, making you clean, and keeps you so. And when you go into the Kingdom of God, it matters not in the least what is the matter, how long it has been the matter, how serious is the matter, when came the matter, or where is the matter, for the Spirit of God proceeds immediately to make you holy— every whit whole.
When you go into the water, you cast aside your garments, and let the water have every opportunity to cleanse the body and make it clean. And in the Kingdom of God, like blind Bartimeus, who, “casting away his garment, rose, and came to Jesus,” you must cast away your garment, the garment of the human mind with its thinking, right or wrong, and so enable the Spirit to seek out, find, and destroy whatever and wherever is the matter, and thus make you every whit whole.
When you go into the water you do not carry a lot of leaden weights or attach them to your body; but, stepping out, as it were, on the promise or decree of the ocean to make you clean, you simply swim, dive, tread water, float, and splash about, or act as a being in the kingdom of Neptune. And then without any prayer to the ocean, without any intervention on your part to help the ocean, without any intercession to the ocean, you simply let the ocean function according to promise, whereupon it searches out the hidden parts of the body and finds the dirt, wherever it may be. It may be that the accumulated dirt, the dust and grime of the day’s work, may be on the body in quite unknown places, and even the kind of dirt may be unknown; so how would it be possible for you, if you would, to tell the ocean what to do? But the water itself, by its very nature, searches out the hidden parts, finds them and makes them clean.
So in the kingdom of God, without prayer, as we read of Solomon: “Now when Solomon had made an end of praying, the fire came down from heaven, and consumed the burnt offering and the sacrifices; and the glory of the Lord filled the house” [his consciousness]” —without making intercessions as Paul says, “For we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings [words] which cannot be uttered” [by the human mind]. But stepping out upon the promises that He will make us every whit whole, which is the very best prayer (even as we stepped out on the promise of Neptune to make us every whit clean), we simply act as though we were in the Kingdom of God; whereupon, as the water sought the hidden places and cleansed the body, so the Spirit searcheth all things, “dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discemer of the thoughts and intents of the heart,” and so seeks out and finds whatever error there may be, wherever it may be, and destroying it, heals and saves.
How does one act as being in the Kingdom of God? By being joyous—“With joy shall ye draw water out of the wells of salvation.” By being filled with laughter and merriment — “A merry heart doeth good like a medicine; but a broken spirit drieth the bones.” By giving thanks to God continually, and by praising and glorifying Him. Not by attaching to ourselves the leaden weights of praising and glorifying the devil or human mind by recognizing the evil, by talking about it, arguing against it, etc. In Unity of Good we find: “To say there is a false claim called sickness, is to admit all there is of sickness; for it is nothing but a false claim. To be healed, one must lose sight of a false claim. If the claim be present to the thought, then disease becomes as tangible as any reality.” And then, without any intercession on our part or prayerful endeavor to help God in any way (and not infrequently we are totally unaware of what error is to be destroyed, so how could we make intercession for, or pray for, that of which we know naught?) this very presence of God searches the heart and the hidden places of the body, and, like the water, cleanses and makes us every whit whole.
THE PRECIOUS FROM THE VILE
“If thou take forth the precious from the vile…” (Jeremiah). The precious is the “I,” Spirit, Soul, Mind, God. This “I” is the way, the only way. “I am the way. No man cometh unto the Father, but by Me” — by the way of this “I.”
We continually place this “I” in the vile. We say, “I suffer,” “I am in pain,” “I am sick,” or “I am in want ” Thus do we place the “I,” the precious, in the vile. In Science and Health we also find, “You say, ‘I dreamed last night. ’ What a mistake is that! The I is Spirit.” By this mistake the precious is placed in the vile.
It is just as erroneous, just as fatal ultimately, to say, “I suffer,” “I am in pain, and I am sick,” or “I lack,” as it is to say, “I dreamed last night.” What mistakes are they all! For the “I” which is Spirit, Soul, Mind, God, is none of these evils; and just as the sentence following immediately after the foregoing quotation states, “God never slumbers” (Science and Health)—neither does He suffer, be sick, in pain, or lack anything good, and as “His likeness never dreams” (ibid), so neither does God’s likeness suffer, be sick, or lack.
If, however, you continue to place the “I” which is the precious, in the vile, in the body, or elsewhere other than where it belongs in God, you will become a prodigal and feed on husks. If, however, “thou take forth the precious,” this “I,” Mind, Soul, Spirit, God, Principle, from the vile, from the body, or elsewhere where it does not belong, and where it has been so long misplaced, and instead, claim your rights and press your claims, that the “I” is Spirit—“I am Spirit,” “I am Soul,” “I am God” — and so “F have all that is good, meaning, of course, not that the person is God, Spirit, but that the “F or Ego is so. The person is simply the manifestation of as much of that “F or Ego, God, Spirit, Soul as you have. Then it will not be very long before this “F will manifest or show forth itself in your very life, environment, and body, and you will find that the “F has brought you back again into the Kingdom of God, where good is to be found and experienced.
TRANSFORMATION
“Be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind,” said Paul. Just what did he mean by it?
Moving from his old place of abode to a new one, a person took with him his radio set which was equipped for alternating current, or A. C., but on attempting to dial in to the broadcasting stations, he found the set would not work. His new home and surrounding territory were furnished with direct current, or D.C.
There is a difference between the two. A.C. jumps to and fro continually from one wire to another, and thus delivers its power; but D.C. delivers its power by means of a continuous flow of electricity from the main power house in one direction only, as it flows along the wires.
Being desirous of using the same set, the man had a transformer installed, which changed the set from A.C. to D.C. Then he was able to dial in to the broadcasting stations and listen to whatever he would. Note this, however: the change was not made from A.C. to D.C. in the sense that A.C. became D.C. Not at all. It changed the set or equipped it to receive, not A.C., as formerly, but D.C. A.C. was eliminated. D.C. took its place.
The human mind is the only devil there is. It is “the tree of the knowledge of good and evil,” or of right thinking and wrong thinking. It is the A.C. or anti-Christ, and, like the alternating current, is always jumping about from one thing to another, from wrong thinking to right thinking, and then back again interminably, and is just as liable to jump one way as another. Thus does it attempt to deliver its claimed power.
On the other hand, D.C., or divine Christ, the one Mind, or God, made manifest, unlike the human mind with its continual jumping from good to evil, from right to wrong, and vice versa, delivers its power, the power of God, in an ever-steady flow from God to man and the universe, as set forth in Science and Health: “Thought passes from God to man, but neither sensation nor report goes from the material body to Mind. The intercommunication is always from God to His idea, man.”
When the call comes to “come out from among them and be ye separate,” and we feel the urge to leave the kingdom of matter, and take up our abode in the Kingdom of God, which is right at hand, and is spiritual, eternal, good, and harmonious, if we would take with us the same instrument, the body, and would dial in to station KOG (Kingdom of God) and listen to the Great Announcer, God Himself, speaking forth His Word, which is “quick and powerful,” then we must change the equipment from the human mind (the AC. or anti-Christ), to divine Mind (the D.C. or divine Christ).
To do this Paul’s advice must be followed, and a transformer be affixed, as it were. This transformer does not change the human mind into the divine Mind, does not change the A.C. or anti-Christ, into the D.C. or divine Christ, but it transforms the instrument itself, so that instead of having human mind, it will now have “that Mind which was also in Christ Jesus,” and so be able to receive the veritable Word of God, rather than the spurious stuff emanating from the human mind. It does not change the wrong thinking of the human mind into the right thinking of that same mind, does not jump from good to evil, and the next moment jump back again, leaving “the last state of that man worse than the first;” but the human mind is eliminated altogether, while in its place enters the divine Mind, the Christ-Mind, which automatically dials into station KOG, and so receives the angelic message.
The transformer is the stilling of the human mind, the silencing of the material senses. This is accomplished by refusing to entertain human thoughts and opinions, the doctrines and theories of men, and all the preconceived imaginations of the human mind; while at the same time one turns to God, by rejoicing, by giving thanks, praising and glorifying God, by singing and dancing and making merry in the heart, with its accompanying joy, mirth, and laughter. Thus the human mind is stilled, and thus do we “silence the material senses”; the stone is rolled away from the door of the sepulchre in human consciousness wherein the Christ has lain buried deep beneath the debris of human thinking; and then does the Christ arise, and, stepping forth from the tomb, stretches forth his hands and blesses whomsoever may have turned to him.
MORE ABOUT PRAYER
Jesus said, “When thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray…”
It is quite useless to pray with the door open and with consciousness filled with materialism, or evil by any name. “The Lord is in his holy temple; let all the earth keep silence before him.” Then is the time and the only time to pray, for then “the Lord is in his holy temple.” Otherwise we might as well not pray at all, for to pray in any manner, by supplication, by implication, or what not, if the prayer be predicated on some error to be eradicated, is to leave the door wide open, and consciousness a receptacle for evils of one kind or another.
The Word of God in this age states: “The closet typifies the sanctuary of Spirit, the door of which shuts out sinful sense but lets in Truth, Life, and Love. Closed to error, it is open to Truth, and vice versa To enter into the heart of prayer, the door of the erring senses must be closed. Lips must be mute and materialism silent, that man may have audience with Spirit, the divine Principle, Love, which destroys all error ” (Science and Health)
We must “stand porter at the door of thought” (ibid), and prevent any kind of error from prevailing in consciousness; we must refrain from entertaining evil of any sort. “The door of the senses must be closed. Lips must be mute and materialism silent.” (ibid) There must be no recognition of error in any way, either by argument, contradiction, mumbling of opposing declarations or affirmation of Truth. “Let all the earth keep silent before Him” — let every material or earthly suggestion of evil be barred from consciousness, or let the door be tightly closed. Thus the complete denial of error is accomplished, and its consequent entrance into consciousness is prevented, and thus is consciousness made “the sanctuary of Spirit” (Science and Health), the temple of the living God, not a temple of the human or mortal or death-mind, but the temple of the living Mind; the temple of the Holy Ghost; the house of God; the home of Christ; the Kingdom of God; the house of prayer; the church of God, or the Church of Christ, Scientist. And, of course, therein is to be found the occupant of that house, temple, church, or sanctuary; God, Spirit, is present, or, as Jesus referred to it, “The Father that dwelleth in me,” and according to Habakkuk, “The Lord is in his holy temple ”
You cannot run your engine with water, because it is a gas engine. You must have gas in your tank, which is why it is called a gas tank; if it were meant to hold water, it would be a water tank. The creation of God is not run with the human mind, the devil, or nonintelligence, but by the one Mind, God, Spirit, infinite intelligence. So if your consciousness is filled with the human mind or error, things will not go right with you. But if you have your consciousness or temple, from which error or the human mind has been excluded, filled with the Spirit, God, with the one Mind, then it will operate, pray, or act; and, taking command, cause things to go right, just as in the engine the gas will explode or act, and the engine will function properly and rightly. “When the king entered into the house of the Lord… and humbled himself… things went well” (II Chronicles 12)
Paul says, “Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities; for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings [words] which cannot be uttered [by the human mind].” The human mind doesn’t know what to ask for or to pray for, just as the water in the tank cannot be made to run the engine; but get rid of the water, and let the tank be filled with pure gasoline, and at once it will commence to function and make the engine go. So when the human mind, which is the only devil there is, for it “is enmity against God,” just as the water is enmity against gasoline, is closed out of the “think-tank” or consciousness or sanctuary or kingdom, and is filled with the one Mind, the Christ-Mind, or the Spirit, God, then will “the Father that dwelleth in me,” as Jesus put it, begin to function, or to pray for us, and it knows exactly what we have need of. “Your Father knoweth what things ye have need of before ye ask him.” God Himself proceeds to make intercession for us, or prays for us, and gives us those things which are needful, and does all this for His own glorification. Just as Crusoe didn’t know what he wanted, but the author knew what he had need of before he asked him; and so Crusoe knew not what he should pray for as he ought, but the author knew, and it was his, the author’s, good pleasure to give him the kingdom—that little kingdom in the South Seas. So the Spirit itself also maketh intercession for us, or prays for us, for He, God, the Author, perceives what things we have need of before we ask Him, and He gives us the Kingdom of God, for God’s own glory, and whatever goes with it.
Jesus said, “Glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee,” and “O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was.” And again, “I have glorified thee on the earth. I have finished the work which thou gravest me to do,” and yet again, speaking of the inability of the human mind to do anything worthwhile, he said, “If I honour myself, my honour is nothing: it is my Father that honoureth me; of whom ye say that he is your God.”
“Jesus went into the temple of God [into his own consciousness or temple] and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the money changers, and the seats of them that sold doves.” He closed the door on all manner of evil, those that bartered in prayers and a false sense of peace, the commercialism of Spirit. He closed the door on whatever indicated trust in supply as coming from anywhere save only from God, lest he make his “house [or consciousness] a house of merchandise.” He stood “porter at the door of thought” and prevented any kind of evil from lodging in his temple or consciousness, and said unto them, “It is written, My house shall be called the house of prayer, but ye have made it a den of thieves.” For the devil, or human mind, if admitted into consciousness will rob us of everything—health, wealth, peace, supply, substance, and even life itself. “And the blind and the lame came to him in the temple,” in the house of God; and he, “the Father that dwelleth in me,” as Jesus termed it, “healed them.”
Once again, it is a fact: “The Lord is in His holy temple: let all the earth keep silence before Him.”
Would it not be a wonderful thing if each one went into the material edifices, known as houses or temples of God, or houses of prayer, each one having cast out from consciousness all manner of evil, commercialism, or reliance upon aught but God for supply of any sort, be it health, wealth, peace, life, love, or whatnot. And with that consciousness then having become the temple of the living God, the temple of the Holy Ghost, the true House of God, or the Church of Christ, Scientist—the Church, Temple, or House of the exact knowledge of God or of the Christ — and then would find it had come to pass that “where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I,”—God, Spirit— “the Father that dwelleth in me,” as the Master said, “in the midst of them.” Surely once again the blind and the lame coming to this “I” in the midst of them would be healed.
WHAT IS MAN?
Solomon said, “As he [man] thinketh in his heart, so is he ” And since this is so, it must be admitted that he has gotten himself into a dreadful predicament with this thinking of his, manifested forth as sickness, sin, poverty, weakness, death, and other troubles. In the great revelation given to Mrs. Eddy and relayed to us over her loud speaker, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, this statement of Solomon’s is followed up with: “hence as a man spiritually understandeth, so is he in truth [or so is he in fact].”
The human being, having accepted this fact and pondered over it, that “as he thinketh in his heart, so is he,” and perceiving that he has gotten himself into trouble as a result of thus thinking, curiously enough continues to use the same human mind to get himself out of the very troubles into which it placed him. It seems incredible that he should be so stupid as not to strive to cease his thinking, and to let the one Mind, God, do the thinking for him. But no. He blithely says: “If my thinking has caused me to get into such troubles, this thinking which I have indulged in must be wrong thinking; therefore if I make a turnabout face and think right, I shall better conditions.” And so he has gone on trying to think right instead of wrong, forgetting, if he ever knew, that this human or mortal mind with which he does his thinking, is double-minded, and must ever think both right and wrong, by virtue of its very nature. He believes that this right thinking will manifest itself in his body and in his daily life, in righteousness, in health, life, peace, love, harmony, strength, abundance, and so on, to the exclusion of wrong thinking, but he must do both, if he would do either one.
The world has not been alone in thus thinking, for unaccountably, in view of the plain teachings of the Bible, and of Science and Health with its interpretation thereof, Christian Scientists themselves have more than frequently accepted right thinking to be the summum bonum of existence, and so have believed the teachings of Jesus Christ, which today we term Christian Science, to be a system of right thinking, which it is not at all. Christian Science is the Science of Mind, or Mind-healing. It is not a religion of right thinking, for this would involve the human mind. The Word of God, says, “There is not sufficient spiritual power in the human thought to heal the sick or the sinful.” (Miscellaneous Writings) Time and again the Revelator to this age deplores the use of the human mind, saying over and over again that it has no part whatsoever in Christian Science, or the Science of Mind.
The human being, in thus trying to think right in place of thinking wrong, and so to order his life aright, has continued to use the same human mind with which he thought wrong, and so has striven for the impossible. The human mind by its very nature cannot think right to the exclusion of wrong thinking, nor can it think wrong to the exclusion of right thinking. In fact, the very definition of the word “right” in any dictionary is, “in opposition to wrong,” and so we see that if we have the one, we must have the other. The human or mortal mind, myth though it be, is “the tree of knowledge of good and evil,” the tree of right and wrong thinking. It is, in fact, the only devil or adversary there is or ever will be. It is “enmity against God,” as Paul says. The enemy of the one Mind, God. This human mind is double-minded in contradistinction to the one Mind; and James, Jesus’ brother, says, “A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways” and since “as a man thinketh… so is he,” therefore it must be the producer of, or manifest forth, a double man, a man “unstable in all his ways,” one that is sick and well, poor and rich, sane and insane, strong and weak, living and dying. James was as clear as a bell on this point and makes it perfectly plain to him who reads.
The textbook says, “As a man spiritually understcmdeth, so is he in truth.” This spiritual understanding, the human mind can never attain. It is the sole prerogative of the one Mind, God, or the Christ-Mind, never of the double mind. James says, “If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally.” Wisdom is of God, so is understanding, and they are one and the same. Neither wisdom nor spiritual understanding is of the human mind. The human mind is incapable of either. Paul says, “My speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man’s wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power: That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.” Note here also that faith is not something of the human mind either, but it is of God, which is why James further said, “But let him ask in faith [that is, the true faith which is of God, and not the counterfeit, which is of the human mind], nothing wavering [that is, not using the human mind, and so wavering betwixt good and evil, or right and wrong, which is the only way the double-minded man can do] … For let not that man think that he shall receive any thing of the Lord.” Paul also says, “Howbeit we speak wisdom among them that are perfect: yet not the wisdom of this world.. .But we speak the wisdom of God… even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory,” and continues, “But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.”
Thus we see that the human mind with which human beings do their thinking, must be both evil and good, wrong and right, and although it may be possible, and doubtless it is possible, to alter the balance of the human mind’s thinking so that it will be more right than wrong, rather than perhaps as it has been more wrong than right, and so produce somewhat better conditions; yet whether this be so or not, it will always be a double minded mind, for that is the way it is constituted, and so it will produce a double fruitage, a man “unstable in all his ways,” one who wavereth from good to evil and vice versa. James says, “He that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed” — tossed from one side to the other, from good to evil, from right to wrong, sickness to health, peace to war, weakness to strength, joy to sorrow, poverty to riches, life to death, and back again; and even though the better things may preponderate, the other things— negative things—must necessarily hover about also, and finally will end in death, for he goes on to say, “Let not that man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord,” and neither will he.
The way out, the only way out, is, “as a man spiritually understandeth, ” or as Paul says, it must be done through the wisdom which is of God, which wisdom is foolishness unto the human being or “the natural man,” as he terms him; or as James says, “Let him ask of God” — of the one Mind which is never double-minded, but single-minded, as Jesus said.
When a man understands spiritually—which he cannot do of himself with labored effort, but which is done of God, or by the one Mind, with the “unlabored motion of the divine energy” (Science and Health), not by the person himself, but by the “Mind which was also in Christ Jesus,” or as Solomon expressed it, by “an understanding heart,” which Mind becomes the person’s Mind just to the exact degree that he ceases using the human mind — then does the real and perfect man appear, or as Jesus said, “The Son of man cometh at an hour when ye think not”—not “when ye think,” but “when ye think not.”
Let, then, this Mind be in you. This Mind thinks not right and wrong, not good and evil, is never double-minded, never wavers, for otherwise it would not be the one Mind; and so this Mind which is God produces man or manifestation, not “unstable in all his ways,” and so not sick and well, not poor and rich, not weak and strong, not sane and insane, not alive and finally dead; but produces man made in the image and likeness of God, “perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect” — the Son of God, the manifestation of the one Mind. “All is infinite Mind and its infinite manifestation, for God is All-in-all.” (Science and Health)
Jesus made it perfectly clear when he said, “The light [harmony] of the body is the eye [that which you perceive with, namely Mind]: if therefore thine eye [that which you perceive with, or Mind] be single [that is, if your Mind be the one Mind, or God, not the human mind, the double mind or evil, the devil], thy whole body shall be full of light [harmony, health, peace, life, abundance]. But if thine eye be evil [that is, if your perception or mind be the human mind, or the double mind, and so evil], thy whole body shall be full of darkness [the darkness of the double-minded mind]. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!” Then Jesus goes on and tells us, as has been set forth, saying, “No man can serve two masters”—cannot serve this double-minded mind . And then he launches into a scathing denunciation of the human mind and its thinking, telling us not to think, and so to drop the human mind, which is the only thing we have to our thinking with, or “silence the material senses” (Science and Health), and instead to “seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness,” which we know can never be attained with or by means of the double-minded human mind; but can only be spiritually discerned with the single-minded Mind, the one Mind, God. This Mind does its own thinking, which is always good, and man is seen to be the “think” of Mind, the idea. The idea doesn’t think of itself; it is the “think” or “thought” or idea. Thus eventually the so- called human mind disappears, completely obliterated.
When the human being ceases his use of the double mind or human mind, when he silences the material senses, when he stops his own thinking, when he does as the Master counseled, “Take no thought,” he will find that whenever this human being and his surrounding world becomes diseased, harmed in any way, or they meet with any untoward trouble, whatever it may be termed, they will be wholly restored and become normal and whole, for the divine Mind, or the Christ, will arise and assume control. The textbook says, “The less mind there is manifested in matter the better. When the unthinking lobster loses its claw, the claw grows again.” And so if, when even “the unthinking lobster” has something evil happen to it, and God, Mind, heals it, surely it seems reasonable to believe that God will do the same for the unthinking man, if and when he ceases his own thinking, and thus lets the one Mind become his Mind and do the thinking for him.
God said, “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him return unto the Lord, and He will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.” Could He say more?
THE MINING ENGINEER
A man walked into a practitioner’s offices and said, “I am a mining engineer. I made my pile down in Mexico some sixteen years ago. So I came up here to New York and established myself, bringing my wife and our several children; the latter to be educated, and my wife and I to live out our lives in comfort, peace, plenty, and happiness. I had a fairly large income from my mines, all producing, and a large sum in hard cash.
“The war came on about fourteen years afterward, and my mines were confiscated, and bandits cleaned out whatever was left. My income ceased entirely. However, I had plenty of cash on hand, and this being untouched, I saw no occasion for being alarmed. Of course, I had by this time lost all my connections with mining interests; therefore to get back into that business seemed entirely out of the question, so I cast about to see what I might turn my hand to. In a short time I found a man and went into the contracting business with him. I put in the money and he put in the experience. In less than two years, he had the money and I had the experience. The net result is that I am completely ruined. I am just about to be dispossessed; the butcher, the baker, and the candle stick maker have all shut down on me; my credit is a thing of the past, and I have nothing left but two or three dollars in my pocket, which is all that stands between us and starvation. There seems no way out for me now except to shoot myself and let my wife and family have my insurance. Even that must be done quickly lest I default on my premiums and the insurance lapse. Can you do anything for me? I know nothing whatever about Christian Science, but my wife has been studying it a little, and it is because of her insistence that I am here. If you can do anything, do it.”
The practitioner looked at him and said, “Well, Mr. —we shall call him Jones — that is a pretty tough story, but after all, it is just the human mind trying to befool you, for however true it may seem to you at this time, it is a fact that you are the son of God in the Kingdom of God, are under the protection of the Most High, and have right at hand, though unseen at the moment, whatever you require for your needs, and vastly more. God takes care of the sparrows, the trees, and the flowers, and everything else; even the very hairs of your head are all numbered, and this being so, He will surely take care of you. Cease listening to the insistent talk of the carnal or human mind, and instead, turn to God and listen to what He shall say to you, and you will hear His voice, and He will direct you into the paths of peace, plenty, health, happiness, abundance, and work also.”
Then for some three-quarters of an hour the practitioner expounded some of the things of Christian Science to him, telling him that unto him a child had been born, unto him a son had been given, or the Spirit of God rested upon him and its name was called Wonderful, Counselor, the mighty God, the everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace, and that the government was not upon his shoulders, but upon the shoulders of the Christ, the Spirit of God; that this Kingdom of God was at hand, that he was actually in it, and dependent upon God and not upon people or material things.
He left the office feeling better. He was not even able to pay his fee (which was quite all right). At about three in the afternoon he returned, and this was his story:
“When I left your offices I didn’t know what to do, but I thought I would gravitate homeward, and so started for the subway As I passed along the street suddenly a voice spoke to me and said, ‘Present that letter. ’ Now, when I left Mexico I was given a letter of introduction to a president of a trust company, by Don Jose Limantour, Finance Minister of Mexico, but I had never presented it. Why should I have done so? I was independently well to do, had plenty of money, plenty of friends, and needed nothing, so I simply carried it around with me in my pocket. For some sixteen years I had carried it about, expecting some day when I was downtown that I would present it. Each night I took it, with other papers, out of my pocket and laid it on the bureau, and the next morning put it back into my pocket. Now I took it out and looked at it. The envelope was worn at the edges, and turned brown. The envelop itself had become soiled, but inside the letter was intact, clean, and not unfresh looking. I threw the envelope away and started downtown. When I arrived at the address, I found that the trust company had disappeared and had merged with another, and that the president was now the Chairman of the Board of the merger and at a new address, to which I went.
“In his offices I handed the letter to his secretary. He did not send for me, but walked out of his private office himself and, grasping me by the hand, said, ‘I am so glad to see you, Mr. Jones. Any friend of Senor Limantour’s is a friend of mine.’ He led the way into his offices, sat me down by his desk, and as he chatted he read the letter of introduction carefully.
“Then he turned to me and said, ‘I see you are a mining engineer. Are you by any chance footloose and fancy-free at this moment, and able to take on a big piece of work?’ I answered that I was, whereupon he called up someone on the telephone and after a moment’s conversation turned again to me and said, ‘This morning Mr. So-and-so (mentioning a well-known man) called me on the telephone and asked if I could recommend a mining engineer to go down to South America, but I told him I knew of no one. Now I have just communicated with him and he wishes you to go over at once to his offices, which are only a few doors away, so although I should greatly like to talk to a friend of Senor Limantour’s, nevertheless I should be doing you a great injustice if I delayed your call upon my friend nearby. ’
“I left immediately and went to see this other man who, with his mining syndicate, is internationally known, and in about half an hour I left with this contract (showing the practitioner) which is for one year, to be renewed for one more if necessary (and this was afterwards done). It requires me to go at once to Venezuela to examine a great gold- mining property. All my expenses are paid, I receive a salary of $ 1000 a month, and I have had $11,500 placed to my credit for current and incidental expenses.”
This was the beginning of the further successful career in the mining engineer’s life. He carried this contract out to the entire satisfaction of the syndicate, then went to British or Dutch Guiana on a similar quest, and subsequently opened a great copper and gold mine in Newfoundland. At present he is again in some foreign country and one of the most successful mining engineers in the world.
Again we say, “Who is so great a God as our God?”
A GREAT OLD PRACTITIONER
There was a great old practitioner whose name was Alijah, and by the way, he was a direct antecedent of Jesus. He certainly knew the Truth as we know it today.
There had been healed a certain King, Jeroboam by name, who represents evil, the human or mortal mind. He had been taught by his healer, and by Ahijah also, certain fundamentals concerning the Kingdom of God, but had failed to put those teachings into practice, and let it be said here for all time, that unless these truths learned are practiced, they are less than worthless, for as Jesus said in effect, “He that knoweth not his Master’s will and doeth it not, is beaten with few stripes; but he that knoweth his Master’s will and doeth it not, is beaten with many stripes.” The Word of God to this age says, “Truth is revealed. It needs only to be practiced ” (Science and Health)
King Jeroboam’s son was sick, sick unto death, the story runs, and in despair, Jeroboam’s thought harked back to his own healing through spiritual means, so he sent his wife to the old seer to ask for the required help.
The story becomes somewhat hazy in its relation in the Old Testament (I Kings 14:1 -7), but the meaning is clear enough. It says that Jeroboam sent his wife in disguise to Ahijah. Be it known that every so-called patient or seeker after spiritual help comes in disguise to the practitioner, for error always claims to be real when it presents itself; so when the seeker or patient presents himself or herself to the healer, called seer, practitioner, prophet, or whatever you may choose to call him, the temptation is for the healer to believe that the person and his problems are both real; whereas the fact is that man is the son of God, spiritual, sinless, perfect, and harmonious. And if the practitioner permits himself to believe that there is a real patient, that his troubles are real, that there is, in fact, a patient at all, or someone or something to be healed of anything whatsoever, that healer or practitioner is helpless to do anything for the so-called patient. Instead of being a practitioner, he is a malpractitioner. The practitioner must be awake to the facts of being, and through the operation of the Christ, must know the truth that man is ever spiritual, perfect, well, and always will be so. Consequently he must not permit himself to be fooled by the presented error.
It says of this remarkable healer, Ahijah, that he “could not see, for his eyes were set by reason of his age;” and at first it would appear as if this man’s eyes were set in blindness, by reason of his old age; but to this writer that is not what it means at all. It seems that he could not see evil — sin, disease, death, or other troubles—because his eyes were set on good, by reason of his age-long practice of Truth. “Thou [God] art of purer eyes than to behold evil, and canst not look on iniquity.” (Habakkuk) To him came the Word of God, as it ought to and does to every genuine practitioner of Truth, warning him of the attempt of evil to make him believe something to be true which was not true— in this instance, to present itself as a woman, Jeroboam’s wife, with her troubles, whatever they might be, and claiming this to be the real creation of God or God’s man. The Word of God warned him that when this disguise presented itself to him, he must be alert enough to see through or beyond the disguise or illusion; and in spite of it, behold the perfect man; and if he could do this despite the suggestions of the carnal or human mind, and if the patient was receptive, the healing work would be done and done immediately.
On this occasion when the woman presented herself with the story of a sick son, she was met immediately with the Truth—that the practitioner knew perfectly well that she wasn’t the reality as she appeared in the flesh, but that man was spiritual and perfect in every way. He proceeded to tell her in unmistakable language just what was the matter, that because Jeroboam had forsaken the Truth, the teachings of the Christ, he had lost the spiritual idea, and so, falling upon evil days, found himself in a sad condition with a sick son and sorrowing wife. In doing this, the prophet strove to raise her consciousness from crass materiality to the point where she could conceive at least a modicum of Truth; or he endeavored to raise her consciousness to some measure of spirituality, and warned her that if she returned to her previous material state of consciousness (which is really unconsciousness), she would lose her spiritual ideas, and her son, for her son would then die.
One would have thought that if Jeroboam’s wife had understood in the smallest degree what the seer was driving at, she would have tried at least to maintain that spiritual consciousness to which the prophet had raised her. But apparently his teaching fell on dull ears, for she had no sooner turned from him and his uplifted consciousness, than she was so beset by her previous fears, doubts, and anxieties concerning her loved one, that she immediately fell back into that erroneous state of consciousness, taking in the testimony of the senses rather than the evidence of Mind, God; and just as the prophet had foretold, under those circumstances she lost her spiritual idea and her child also. Had she retained her spiritual consciousness, the consciousness of the Christ, there is not the slightest doubt but that her child would have recovered.
This ought to act as a warning to us all, that we should remain in that spiritual or Christ consciousness, thus knowing that God is All-in-all, and that man expresses continually Life, Love, health, peace, abundance, supply, substance, and all the other things of God; which spiritual consciousness is ours only in proportion as we still the human mind, for then does this Christ-Mind arise in us or become our Mind, which by its own volition, not the volition of the person himself, beholds the perfect man.
PERFECTLY ATTUNED
“My first discovery in the student’s practice was this: If the student silently called the disease by name, when he argued against it, as a general rule the body would respond more quickly—just as a person replies more readily when his name is spoken; but this was because the student was not perfectly attuned to divine Science, and needed the arguments of truth for reminders. If Spirit or the power of divine Love bear witness to the truth, this is the ultimatum, the scientific way, and the healing is instantaneous.” (Science and Health) [Emphasis supplied]
Many of us believed for many years we were not “perfectly attuned to divine Science” and so continued with the argument, when, as a matter of fact, all were “perfectly attuned to divine Science” and had been so from the very first day they ever grasped a fundamental truth of Christian Science, and no more required the arguments of the human mind than one needs to use a self-starter after the engine is running. From that moment he simply steps on the gas.
The operation of a motor engine is a good illustration of this very fact.
Everybody knows how to run a car today. The first thing you do is to step on the self-starter and hold it with the foot while the engine turns over. In a moment the spark is ignited, whereupon immediately the foot is taken off the self-starter, the gears are meshed and you step on the gas. From then on you need no self-starter, and, in fact, should you use the self-starter while the engine is running, you are liable to pull the teeth out of your engine and destroy it. Furthermore, you cannot run your car with the self-starter; and all you have to do, once the engine is running, is to step on the gas; and the harder the hill or the more difficult the road, the more gas is demanded, so you press down harder on the accelerator and give it still more gas.
The very first time you ever heard of Christian Science and grasped a fundamental sufficiently to be interested enough to ponder over it, you stepped on the self-starter of the human mind, with its thinking and reasoning, and began to mull it over with that same human mind that which you heard. This was the self-starter turning over the engine. Then suddenly the divine spark was ignited, whereupon instantly you should have taken your foot off the self-starter, or stopped reasoning with the human mind, and should have stepped on the gas of revelation, for your gears were meshed, or, as the textbook says: “reason and revelation were reconciled,” and from that time forward the self-starter of the human mind with its thinking, arguments, contradictions, and so on, should have been utterly forsaken, and you should henceforth step on the gas of revelation, for no matter what might be the problem, great or small, all it needed was more gas—more revelation, not more of human mind reason.
One has but to look over the world, and even among the so-called Christian Scientists, to see the results of those who have been vainly trying to heal themselves or others by relying upon the self-starter of human mind reason or argument, for you can no
more run yourself or your world by the self-starter of the human mind and its thinking than you can run your car with the self-starter, and the sad results are seen in those trying to do so in the loss of not only their teeth, but sometimes their hair, hearing, and sight; their whole body becomes incapacitated, even death itself has occurred.
Cease then this foolish business of trying to heal and save by that impossible faker, the human mind, with its thinking and argument, which is as utterly worthless for that purpose as is the self-starter is worthless to run your car. Over and over again the textbook, the Word of God, tells us such plain facts as, “Remember that the letter and mental argument are only human auxiliaries to aid in bringing thought into accord with the spirit of Truth and Love, which heals the sick and the sinner” (Science and Health)’, and “There is not sufficient spiritual power in the human thought to heal the sick or the sinful” (Miscellaneous Writings). Instead, step on the gas of revelation and let God do it, even as we give the engine more gas and let the gas do it.
JOY
The vine is dried up, and the fig tree languisheth; the pomegranate tree, the palm tree also, and the apple tree, even all the trees of the field, are withered; because joy is withered away from the sons of men. So said the prophet Joel ages ago. Yet how many think of this in periods of what we are pleased to call depression? If what Joel said to be true, there is every reason for the depression to continue, for surely as one walks along the streets, one sees little joy expressed. Suppose those who read these lines commence to manifest joy instead of the opposite. You will be surprised at the result, not only in others, but in yourself and in your affairs.
Some ten or fifteen years ago there was a woman in Queens Village, Long Island, who was supposed to be dying with Bright’s disease. The doctor had left, promising to come back when called — meaning to give the death certificate as required by law. The entire family had given up all hope, and at this point a Christian Science practitioner was called into the case.
He arrived about eight o’clock in the evening, was met by one of the daughters of the woman, who told him the foregoing, and was then led upstairs to the bedroom. The gloom could have been cut with a knife. There were many persons in the room, including two medical nurses. There were sons-in-law and sons, daughters-in-law and daughters, some weeping, all worried and distraught. There they stood or sat about the bedside, waiting for dissolution.
The woman herself was a woeful sight. The practitioner had had a wide experience in his mission of healing, and knew that when a woman is suffering from some slight indisposition, yet sufficient to call the healer to her bedside, that this is shown forth by her appearance. She will perhaps be sitting up, with her hair and face made to look as attractive as possible; she will be gowned in some tastefully colored boudoir clothing, and the very setting of the bedclothes will be evidence of her slight indisposition. But if she be like this woman, desperately ill, suffering intensely, she shows it forth in everything about her, for she had come to the place where she doesn’t care how she looks.
This woman, in the first place, could not lie down and had not slept naturally for a long time, so there she sat propped up by several pillows, her head hanging over on one side, the picture of utter despair. Her pink kimono trimmed with a bit of blue hung loosely about her, exposing the upper part of her body, the bedclothes were heaped somewhat hopelessly over her, her cap hung over one ear, and her hair was straggling over her shoulders in an unkempt fashion, while to cap the climax, there on the night table at her side lay a switch of hair—a thing no woman would permit if she were measurably apprehensive of what was going on.
At once the practitioner perceived that the case was a desperate one, and said to himself that there was certainly nothing that he himself could do, but that God must do it all.
When he came in, his name was announced to the sick mother; but she had taken not the slightest notice of it or of him. He sat by the bedside, facing slightly toward her feet, and looked around. But what a heavy atmosphere of gloom and despair! The Kingdom of God seemed far, far away.
Just then from the hall in the rear came the sound of children playing and laughing. The grandchildren were, of course, too small to be aware of the presence of the dark angel of death hovering about, so they played their little games quite regardless of anything unusual. With what seemed to be almost the last breath left in the sick woman’s body, she cried out, “Oh, take those children away. I can’t stand the noise. Take them away.” Immediately several of the mothers and fathers rose to carry out the woman’s expressed wish, but as they did so the practitioner said, “Hold on a moment. It says in the Bible that in the Kingdom of God the children shall be laughing and playing in the streets, and this is the only sign I can see anywhere of the Kingdom of Heaven, so let them stay and play.”
At this the gloom vanished, and the whole roomful of people, save only the mother, began to smile, and they all filed out, leaving the practitioner alone with the woman.
Taking his cue from the last remark, he commenced to tell her of the Kingdom of Heaven, to talk of life and the things of the Kingdom of God; but at first he might have been talking to a stone image for all the recognition shown. Then as he watched her out of the corner of his eye, he saw her peering at him under her partly opened eyelids. He went right on talking about the Kingdom, however, as though he had not seen her doing so. As she watched him, apparently to see if he was aware of what she was doing, she quietly moved her hand from her side and reached out for that switch of hair, and quickly slipped it under the pillow. The practitioner smiled and said to himself, “She’s getting better.” However, he went right on talking quietly to her of the Kingdom as though he was entirely unobserving.
At this point she opened her eyes and saw her unclothed body, and quickly adjusted the clothes about her, tidied her kimono, and sat up a little straighter in bed. Then she straightened her pink cap and with her fingers began to poke the strands of hair under her cap. All of which was unobservingly observed by the practitioner as he sat beside her. Then after a little more time — perhaps half an hour — she slipped herself off those pillows at her back, curled herself up, and went to sleep. Then the practitioner went home.
Well, that’s about all there is to the story. He went to see her perhaps for a week, and she entirely recovered. She is alive and well today, a good many years afterward. The good doctor never had to deliver that death certificate. The great point of the whole thing is not that the woman is alive and well, but that joy which indicates the very presence of God, indicates also the very presence of Life, health, peace, and whatever else constitutes God or the Kingdom of God. Just as H2O constitutes water. If you have water, you may count on two parts hydrogen and one part oxygen; and if you have the presence of God, you may depend on the presence of all the constituents of God, and so the presence of Life.
THE VISION OF THE REAL MAN
As one progresses in the understanding of Christian Science, one invariably arrives at the conclusion that Christian Science or the Word of God is, to use a time-worn expression, as old as the hills.
Solomon says, “Where there is no vision, the people perish.” The word “vision” in the Bible generally means spiritual consciousness, the Christ consciousness, or the apprehension of the Truth. In fact, a Christian Science treatment is really a vision — the vision of the Christ or the perfect man. The Word of God, as quoted in Science and Health, says: “Jesus beheld in Science the perfect man, who appeared to him where sinning mortal man appears to mortals. In this perfect man the Savior saw God’s own likeness, and this correct view of man healed the sick.” This vision of the Christ healed the sick, saved the sinner and raised the dead, and without this vision, as Solomon said, the people would have perished.
Paul said the same as the foregoing. He said, “To be carnally minded” — and to be carnally minded is certainly to be without spiritual-mindedness, or to be visionless — “To be carnally minded [where there is no vision] is death [the people perish],” and he added, “but to be spiritually minded [to have the vision of Christ, or to have spiritual consciousness] is life and peace,” which Solomon left for us to deduce. A simple enough deduction, for if “Where there is no vision the people perish,” conversely, “Where there is vision the people live.”
What could be more plain, or in greater agreement?
Christian Scientists recognize this fact, and their endeavor is to have this vision or consciousness of the real man constantly, despite the evidence of the senses or of the human mind.
To anyone who will study the Bible in the light of Christian Science, or Truth, the coming of the Christ, or this spiritual vision, is assured. Habakkuk says: “I will stand upon my watch, and set me upon the tower [meaning that I will steadfastly hold to the fact that I have the Mind of Christ], and will watch to see what he [the Christ] will say unto me, and what I shall answer when I am argued with [argued with by evil suggestion or the human mind, of course].” “For the vision [the coming of the Christ consciousness] is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak, and not lie: though it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry.”
The appointed time is all the time, or any time, as soon as we are prepared for it by our study, practice, and consecration. Balboa, the traveler and explorer, believed there was an ocean beyond the isthmus of Darien and ultimately made arrangements with the Indians in that country to lead him across the isthmus from the Atlantic to what is now known as the Pacific Ocean. After struggling through an almost impassable jungle, he came to the foothills of the mountains which he had to cross. The Indians led him by a pathway almost impossible to detect, but gradually they approached the top where, once it was attained, one could see the Pacific stretching out in front and the Atlantic behind.
When the Indians, who were familiar with the ground, came to within a few hundred feet of the spot where one could get his first glimpse of the promised ocean, they stopped and sent Balboa forward alone that he might be the first white man to behold the long-looked- for water, and when he reached the place—the highest point on the pathway whence he could look down over the tops of the trees and mountains—he had his first vision of what he had so long dreamed about. This moment was the appointed time. It might have been any time in his life, but the appointed time was the moment when he attained a sufficient height to be able to command an uninterrupted view of the ocean.
So the appointed time for Christ to come to us is any time in our earthly experience we reach an altitude where we perceive spiritual things. Then has the Christ come at the appointed hour.
Ezekiel the Prophet tells us likewise that the healing is a result of the vision of the Christ; yea, more, he deplores the belief in consciousness then as now, that the result of the vision should not be recognized as instantaneous, so he says: “Son of man, what is that proverb that ye have in the land of Israel [or in consciousness], saying, The days are prolonged [the healing is prolonged], and every vision [treatment] faileth? Tell them therefore, Thus saith the Lord God; I will make this proverb to cease, and they shall no more use it as a proverb in Israel; but say unto them, The days are at hand [the healing is now at once, instantaneous], and the effect of every vision. For there shall be no more any vain vision [worthless treatment] nor flattering divination [flattering of the human mind by right thinking] within the house of Israel [or within consciousness]. For I am the Lord: I will speak, and the word that I shall speak shall come to pass; it shall be no more prolonged: for in your days [now, at once, immediately], 0 rebellious house [O rebellious consciousness], will I say the word, and will perform it, saith the Lord God. Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying, Son of man, behold, they of the house of Israel say, The vision that he seeth is for many days to come, and he prophesieth of the times that are far off [the healing takes a long time]. Therefore say unto them, Thus saith the Lord God; There shall none of my words be prolonged any more, but the word which I have spoken shall be done, saith the Lord God.”
That the healing will surely result is well borne out also in the Mosaic decalogue, which says, “Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain,” or vainly; or in other words, if one utters the Word of God, or has the vision of the Christ, the Word shall not go forth in vain, but the result will be sure; and Paul bears out the same in his letter to the Corinthians.
Orthodoxy has been so intent upon believing the physical sense testimony that it has used this wonderful healing chapter as a burial service, but it really brings out the sense of life. Paul says, and I interpolate the language of today, “Behold, I shew you a mystery [behold I show you something which had heretofore been mysterious to you]; We shall not all sleep [die], but we shall all be changed [healed]”—think of the wondrous statement, we shall all be healed, every one of us—“in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump [when we may have reached the very limits of human endurance]: for the trumpet shall sound [the voice of the Christ shall be heard, or the vision shall come to us], and the dead shall be raised incorruptible [those buried in the very depths of the carnal mind shall be raised into spiritual consciousness, or shall have the vision of the Christ] and we shall be changed [healed], “for GOD CAN DO IT.
“Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand.”—The Kingdom of God is here (not will be).
AMEN It IS Done
The End