The Text - Section 11
A Defense against an Accusation of Putting Down Religion
BU 3:164, LC 4:85
I am often accused of putting down religion and when I ask what religion is, I am
told the same old story that everybody knows-to be good, worship God, etc. Now
all this sort of cant may do if it is not analyzed, but if you undertake to analyze it,
it vanishes like dew before the morning sun.
Religion is what it was before Christ and I think I know what that was. The
religion that Christ opposed consisted in forms and ceremonies. Now why did
Jesus oppose it if their belief had nothing to do with this health and happiness?
He never said anything to such persons, for He said, They that are well need no
physician. So if persons were well it made no difference to Jesus what they
believed, but He came to those who had been deceived by the priests and
doctors. Well how did He cure them? By changing their minds, for if He could not
change their minds, He could not cure them.
This was the case with the rich young man who came to Jesus to know what he
should do to be saved. Now if the young man was really in danger of being
doomed to eternal punishment, as we are taught, then all that was wanted was to
believe; so if his belief changed him, I ask if it changed his identity or mind? We
are taught that man cannot do anything of himself to save himself, but was this
the case with the young man? No, for Jesus told him what to do, to keep the
commandments and these commandments were not Jesus' but Moses.' The
young man said, This have I done from my youth up; so according to the young
man's story he was a very good man and Jesus found no fault with him but said,
If you would be perfect, go and sell all you have and give it to the poor and follow
me. Now here was a young man who had done everything to be saved and
Jesus would not save him unless he would give all that he had to the poor and
follow Him. Now as absurd as this looks, it is quoted as a command of Jesus, yet
you cannot find anyone that will comply with it, but they get over it by saying that
we must give up all sinful acts. Well, be as honest to that young man who went I
away sorrowful, for he could not understand. For his beliefs were so strong that
Christ answered him as much as to say, Go, give all your ideas away and
embrace the truth. Now this is a fair specimen of the parables. Jesus never
hinted that He or the young man had the slightest idea of another world, but it
shows on the face that a man like Jesus could not be so little or narrow-minded
as to send the person to endless misery because he would not give all his riches
to the poor. Such constructions on the Bible are the cause of a great deal of
sickness.
Now I will give my construction, and if I do not make Jesus more of a man than
the other, then I never will attempt to explain the Bible again. The Jews thought
that they were the chosen people of God and were the best and knew the most.
So riches were wisdom and they were rich in the laws of Moses. This young man
came to Jesus to ask him what he should do to obtain this belief that Jesus
taught-eternal life. Jesus said, Keep the commandments. This he had done. Well
go and give away your ideas and try to learn mine. This he could not do, for he
could not see into it. So he went away sorrowful. Jesus' own disciples were in the
same way for they said, We have forsaken all, what lack we more? He then goes
on to tell them what they must do but they did it not, for they all forsook Him. Now
if it requires such a sacrifice to go to heaven, then He never found one that went,
for they asked Him, If these things be so, how can a man be saved? He said,
Try; many shall try but few be chosen. Is it so now? No. It is the easiest thing in
the world to get religion now; all that is required is to join the church and pay the
minister well and you shall be saved. Now does anyone suppose this was Jesus'
mission? If he does, I am sorry. He must have a very low opinion if he supposes
that a man's salvation depends upon a certain belief, but it does, according to the
belief of our day.
Now a belief is one thing and the thing to believe is another. I will here illustrate.
We all admit the spine. Well, how many have seen one? Not one in a thousand.
So one tells what he sees and all tell what they believe. Now suppose a person
says, The spine is affected and another believes it; then to him it is so and this
belief makes him unhappy. Now is it the spine that is unhappy or the belief? It
must be the belief, for there is nothing of the sick man but beliefs. So you can
see that all his sickness is ignorance or beliefs. Now if you satisfy him that he is
mistaken and he believes it, then his spine is not affected and you change his
mind. Now he is happy. Is the spine happy or his mind? Now you see that the
belief is one thing and the thing believed is another. The spine is one thing and
the belief is another so that our happiness and misery are only our beliefs and
the thing believed has neither happiness nor misery. Now it is of vast importance
to man to know what to believe for that which we know we have no belief of but
proof, so that which we do not know is a mystery and causes a belief. Now there
are certain things that all admit-based on scientific principles. Then there are
other things that are admitted but have no proof only as the error has made it.
For instance, religion is one of the things that is based on an opinion and not on
science. The science is the thing or substance and the belief of it is religion and
we are happy or miserable just according to our belief. The masses' and the
religious world's religion is in their belief. Jesus' religion was the science itself. So
you see that man reasons about religion just as he does about everything else-
that the happiness or misery is in the spine and the belief is something else.
Now here is my religion. Mine, as that of Jesus, is in my acts, not in my belief.
The sick are in their belief and not in their acts, for if it were in their acts, they
would be better; for to be wise is to be good and to be good is to show your
goodness in your acts. So if a man is sick he is not good, and if he is not good he
is not happy, and if he is not good, that which is bad must be something else
than good. His goodness is science or Christ. His badness must be an opinion or
religion. Now to be born again is to separate the true religion from the dross and I
know of no better rule than Jesus laid down. He said, By their fruits ye shall know
them, whether they be of man or of God or science. Now I am willing to be
judged by my works, and if they bear me out, then I do not know as the wisdom
of this world of opinions has any right to pass judgment on me.
I will now show what Jesus' religion was. We are often told of the religion of
Christ, but when we ask what it is, it cannot be separated from infidelity or this
world; so I will try to define His religion. You remember I said that a belief was
one thing and the thing believed was another. Now Jesus' religion was the Christ
or the substance and the disciples and the multitude were the believers of the
substance, not seen, but in the heavens. So Christ is the substance or science or
the religion of Jesus. The Christian religion is in a belief of that substance called
Christ, Wisdom or God and my religion is my wisdom and not my belief and when
I come to the sick, I put my religion in practice and not my opinion. When I talk to
the well I talk about it, for those that are well need no physician. My opinion is
worth just as much as anyone's. I look upon all opinions as man's wisdom; they
are worth what they will bring. They may be right, but they are often wrong.
When I sit by a person, if I find no opinion, I find no disease. But if I find a
disease, I find an opinion. So that the misery that is in the opinion or belief is the
disease. I have to make war with the disease or opinion, and as there are a great
many that make their disease out of the world's opinions of religion, it is my duty
to change their belief in order to make the cure. It is astonishing to see persons
cling to their opinions just as though they contain the substance, when if they
knew the substance of their belief, they would laugh at their folly. Now to me it is
as plain as twice two makes four.
I can sum up the religion of this world and the religion of Jesus in one simple
parable. That is the parable of the child when the people were disputing about
the Kingdom of Heaven. Jesus took up a little child from their midst and said, Of
such is the kingdom of heaven; except ye become as little children ye cannot
enter into the kingdom of heaven. So the world, as a Christian world, has tried to
imitate the child, and I cannot dispute that in most of their acts they have fallen
short of the child; for he is ignorant of all their errors and as ignorance is bliss, 'tis
folly to be wise or in error. Now this is the true meaning of the parable of the
child. Science is not included in the Christian religion, neither wisdom of any kind.
The religion was made up of all the superstitions of Egyptian darkness so that
every man and woman was not in a fit state to become a disciple of Christ or
science. So Jesus wanted to show the people by a parable what was wanted to
get a person into the right state of mind to receive the kingdom of heaven or
science. Everyone knows it is harder to unlearn an error than to learn a truth. So
Jesus, knowing that a child was free from both, took him as a parable so that the
Christian world must give away or get rid of all their errors and become as a little
child to receive the Holy Ghost or Science. This was the new birth; therefore to
enter into Science or the kingdom of heaven was not a very easy thing. So if
anyone said he was born of God or Science let him show it, for many shall come
saying, I am Christ and shall deceive many but by their fruits ye shall know them.
So you see that Jesus' religion had nothing to do with the opinions of this world;
his was of wisdom and wisdom is something that is solid. Error or opinions are
about this solid, and opinion is the world's religion, but Jesus' religion was the
substance and that was what the sick had been robbed of by the blind guides. All
I do is to put in their possession what they have been unjustly robbed of.
1861
Imagination
BU 9:10, LC 6:107
This is a word which means something or nothing. The way it is used makes it
everything or nothing, but if it is applied to the power of invention or imitation, it
can be understood. It is wrong, however, to apply it to deception, for a person
must first be acted upon before his imagination can produce a phenomenon;
otherwise it would apply equally to all operators. But to apply it to one
phenomenon and not to another of the same kind is not right.
I tell you a lie and you believe it, immediately your inventive power or imagination
commences to create that which I have explained. I explain the operation of a
machine to you and your inventive power immediately creates it according as you
understand it. This is the power of imagination. In the first instance the world
says your imagination has deceived you and there is nothing in it, but in the latter
case you are right. This is a misuse of the word and you suffer from it. The power
of forming ideas called imagination is one of the highest elements in the human
intellect and it is the foundation of all true discovery, yet like all scientific facts it is
abused and misrepresented.
To give you a clearer idea of the misuse of this word, I will illustrate it by a
religious belief. Church members never use the word imagination in speaking of
their belief and their religion. Do they mean to say that they believe without this
power of creating the image of their belief? If so, then the power that understands
is the power of imagination. The fact is that their religious beliefs are founded in
deception and they deceive the people into them. At the same time outsiders are
skeptical upon these beliefs and apply the words "imagination" and "superstition"
in derision. In this way every person wishing to deceive the masses calls
everything imagination that does not coincide with his belief. The medical faculty
have assumed to themselves the whole power of creating by imagination every
idea based on wisdom and all ideas opposed to them are false. In such ideas
they say that the imagination that creates them is a disgrace and belongs to
ignorance and superstition.
A physician, for instance, may tell you the most absurd falsehood that his
imagination can invent, but it is "true" because it has the sanction of the faculty. If
you believe him, you use the power which if rightly applied is one of the best of
faculties for the purpose of creating a disease after his description which you
have taken for a truth. There is no dispute or controversy about that. But if some
outsider should deceive you half as much and you should create an idea,
admitted by the faculty, then you are accused of being superstitious and
believing everything and imagining all sorts of humbugs.
The word imagination is so misapplied that it has lost all the goodness it ever
had, and like religion it has only a name without a meaning covering numerous
deceptions applied to weak-minded people. I never use the word as others do.
When people think they have a disease which I know they have not, I do not
ascribe it to their imagination but to the fact that they have been deceived. A
physician tells you what is not true about yourself. If you believe it and he
deceives you, that is no disgrace to you, for it shows an honest heart and
confidence in the physician. Then follows the creation and appearance of the
thing he has told you. As far as you are concerned you are blameless, but the
physician is a liar and hypocrite and has used your creative powers to deceive
you for his own selfish ends. Now when their hypocrisy and deceit are exposed
they cry out, "Humbug, our craft is in danger. This quack works upon the
imagination of the sick and makes them believe the medical faculty are not
honest."
Let me call your attention to one fact: the word imagination never applies as the
first cause. There is a superior power, conception, that originates, and
imagination does the work and produces the thing. Error deceives the senses
and misdirects imagination. Science detects the direction that is given to
imagination and corrects it, if false. All men have gone out of the way, and no
one reasons from science. So wisdom classes them all in the dark that it may
save the whole by introducing the light of a new mode of reasoning that will
separate error from truth. This refers to the subject of health and happiness and
not the arts and sciences. The evils that affect the body and mind are included.
1861
The Senses II
BU 155:1, LC 6:78
Are our senses mind? I answer, No. This was the problem the ancient
philosophers sought to solve. Most of them believed the soul, senses and every
intellectual faculty of man to be mind; therefore our senses must be mind. The
translator of Lucretius says Lucretius attacks the ancient academics who held the
mind to be the sole arbiter and judge of things and establishes the senses to be
the arbitrators for, says he, "Whatever can correct and confute what is false must
of necessity be the criterion of truth and this is done by the senses only." This
difference is true in part. Both were right. But they confused mind and senses
into one, like the modern philosophers who make wisdom and knowledge, mind
and senses, Jesus and Christ, synonymous. Now mind and senses are as
distinct as light and darkness, and the same distinction holds good in wisdom
and knowledge, Jesus and Christ. Christ, Wisdom and the spiritual senses are
synonymous. So likewise are Jesus, knowledge and mind. Our life is in our
senses; and if our wisdom is in our mind, then we attach our life and senses to
matter. But if our wisdom is attached to Science, our life and senses are in God,
not in matter, for there is no matter in God or Wisdom. Matter is the medium of
Wisdom. This difference has been overlooked by the ancients, and modern
philosophers have put mind and soul in matter, thus making a distinction without
a difference. Now according to modern philosophy, the soul, mind, life and
senses are all liable to die; but according to this truth mind is matter, that which is
not true is matter, the life of a lie is matter and all matter must be dissolved.
Wisdom is not life. Our senses are not life. A truth is not life. But all these are
solid and eternal; and to know them is life and life eternal. Life is in the
knowledge of this wisdom, and death is in the destruction of your opinion or
matter.
I will give some experiments of the man of wisdom acting through the man of
matter and dissolving the man of matter so the man of wisdom can escape. This
process is the Science of Wisdom. Take for example two persons, or you and
myself. One wishes to communicate to the other some fact. You feel a pain. I
also feel it. Now the sympathy of our minds mingling is matter, but there is no
wisdom in it, for wisdom is outside of matter. If we both feel the same pain, we
each call it our own for we are devoid of that wisdom which would make us know
we were affecting each other. Each one has his own identity and wants
sympathy, and the ignorance of each other is the vacuum that is between us. So
we are drawn together by this invisible action called sympathy. Now make man
wise enough to know that he can feel the pains of another, and then you get him
outside of matter. The wisdom that knows this has eternal life, for life is in the
knowledge of this wisdom. This the world is unacquainted with.
Now Jesus had more of this life or truth than any other person, and to teach it to
another is a science. And although one may know it, he may not be able to teach
it. If you know it and can teach it, then you are a teacher of the truth; but if you
know it and cannot teach it, then you are a follower of the truth. Now the
knowledge of this truth is life and the absence of it is death. There are a great
many kinds of life. Man begins at his birth. Mineral life is not vegetable and
vegetable life is not animal life and there is another kind of life that is not
understood, and that is the life that follows the knowledge of this great truth. The
word life cannot be applied to Wisdom, for that had no beginning, and life has.
The word death is applied to everything that has life. All motion or action
produces life, for where there is no motion there is no life. Matter in motion is
called life, but life is not wisdom but a chemical change of matter, and that is
called animal life. Life is the action of matter, and to know it is a truth and to know
how to produce it is wisdom. I will now show how to produce eternal life. It was
possessed by Jesus, for he says, "My sheep hear my voice and I give unto them
eternal life. I and my Father are one."
I shall show that Jesus was not life but life or Christ was in him, and he taught it.
He says, "Whosoever will save his life shall lose it, and whosoever shall lose his
life for my sake shall find it." Then people believed their life to be in themselves,
but Jesus knew their lives were in God, for if they lost their opinions and found
this truth, then they had lost their life and found it.
I will now take my own practice to explain what life is according to Jesus. I said if
two persons were sitting together and each felt a pain, each would call it his own.
Now this pain is life, for it contains our senses, and this life is in matter. So the
pain is in our mind, and our mind, senses, and life are all the same according to
the world's wisdom. I know I can take a person's feelings, and this knowledge to
me is a truth, and to know it is life, and this knowledge the patient does not
possess. He knows he has a pain and this to him is a truth so that his knowledge
is life, but this life is in his belief and his belief is his knowledge and his
knowledge is his mind and his mind is matter. So his life is liable to be lost by his
losing his mind. My life is in my wisdom and my wisdom is not matter; so that to
know this is a truth outside of my patient's belief. And this truth contains my life.
To get his senses out of his matter into this truth is to give him eternal life. I want
to give him eternal life to save him from the sufferings occasioned by his belief
that he shall lose his life by disease of the heart. My wisdom acting on matter is
in matter but it is no part of it. So what to him is death is to me matter that can be
changed and there is no wisdom in it. His ignorance keeps his senses in fear of
death and all his life subject to bondage through this belief. I will try to teach him
the truth which will free him from the fear of death and give him eternal life which
is this truth.
I commence by describing to him his feelings. These he admits; but how I can tell
them is to him a mystery. This I know for I see him in his error, yet he cannot see
me in his wisdom, for wisdom is outside of error and error cannot see outside of
itself for it is in its own prison. It wants me to explain how I can see it and how I
know how it feels. I will suppose you, the reader, to be the patient, and that you
acknowledge that I tell your feelings and what you think is your disease. All this I
get from you without your knowledge; therefore you do not know how I do it. So I
will inform you. Everyone is made of matter and matter is continually going
through a chemical change; this change is life, not wisdom, but life like vegetable
or mineral life. Every idea is matter, so of course it contains life and is the name
of something that can be changed. Motion or change is life. Ideas have life; a
belief has life or matter, for it can be changed. Now all the aforesaid make up
man, and all this can be changed. As I am trying to convince you how I take your
feelings, I must use such illustrations as you can understand, for my life is in my
words; and if my words cannot destroy your life or matter, then I cannot give you
my life or wisdom.
I will now take a rose for an illustration. You are like a rose. You throw from
yourself an atmosphere or vapor. When the rose is dead, all outside of it is
darkness to the germ of the bud. This is the child. As the rose opens, it expands
and unfolds itself to the world, the same as a child's brain; as it expands, it opens
the folds of its understanding. As the rose comes before the world of roses, it
takes its stand with the rest of its kind. So it is with man. As he unfolds his
knowledge, he is classed with other minds of his kind. As the rose throws off its
peculiarities to the air, the world judges of its odor. So as man throws off his
peculiar character of life or health or disease, the world is to judge of his
happiness or misery by the fruits of his belief.
Take a person with consumption. The idea consumption is matter, and it
decomposes and throws off an odor that contains all the ideas of the person
affected. This is true of every idea or thought. Now my odor comes in contact
with this odor thrown from you, and I, being well, have found by 20 years'
experience that these odors affect me, and also that they contain the very identity
of the patient whom this odor surrounds. This called my attention to it, and I
found that it was as easy to tell the feelings or thoughts of a person sick as to
detect the odor of spirits from that of tobacco. I, at first, thought I inhaled it, but at
last found that my senses could be affected by it when my body was at a
distance of many miles from the patient. This led me to a new discovery, and I
found my senses were not in my body but that my body was in my senses, and
my knowledge located my senses just according to my wisdom. If a man's
knowledge is in matter, all there is of him is contained in matter; but if his
knowledge is in wisdom, then his senses and all there is of him are outside of
matter. To know this is a truth, and the effect is life in this truth, and this truth is in
wisdom. So the man who knows all this is in wisdom with all his senses and life.
Then where do I differ from you? In this respect: my wisdom is my health, and
your wisdom is your disease; for your wisdom is your belief, and my wisdom is
my life and senses, and my senses teach me that your trouble is the effect of
your belief. What is light to me is darkness to you. You being in the dark stumble
and are afraid of your own shadow. I with the eye of truth see you in your
darkness or belief and you seem to me blind, or like the rose you cannot see the
light, while I being in the light see through the clouds of your ignorance and see
your senses and all there is of you held in this ignorance by this error or matter
and trying like the life of the rosebud to break through and come to the light.
You have eyes, taste and all your senses but the clouds are before them and as
Jesus said, "Ye have eyes and see not and have ears and hear not and a heart
but cannot understand." Now what is the reason? It is this. Your eyes have not
seen, your ears have not heard and your heart has not understood what
happiness there is in knowing that your life, senses and all there is near and dear
to you is not part of matter, and that matter is only a belief or casket to hold you
in till wisdom dissolves the casket and lets you into the light of science. There
you hold life in the form of the rose and live in a world of light where all the
sorrows of Hell Eternal and disease can never come, where you can sit and see
that what man takes for a reality is only the dross of heathen superstition. Then
you will not be afraid of disease which leads to death.
You may observe if all I say is true, what is it good for if it is only a belief like all
religious beliefs? If it is nothing but a belief, then I will admit that it is of no more
value to a person than any religious belief. But it is not a belief and my practice
proves the truth of my assertions. You may ask for proof that will give some light
upon the subject. I will give it, as near as a man who has eyesight can explain
colors to a blind person.
When I sit by a patient, if he thinks he has disease of the heart, the atmosphere
surrounding him is his belief, and the fear of death is in the density of the clouds
of his mind. Now knowing he is in the clouds somewhere, I, as it were, try to
arouse him, but it appears as though he were blind, so I shake him to arouse him
out of his lethargy. At last I see him aroused and look around but soon sink back
again. By my talk I seem to disturb the clouds and this sometimes makes the
patient very nervous, like a person coming out of a fit or awakening from a sound
sleep. What I say is truth, and being solid, it breaks in pieces his matter or belief
till at last he looks up to inquire what has been the trouble. My explanation
rouses him and gives another change to his mind, and that is like a
thunderstorm. When it thunders and the lightning flashes, the patient is nervous.
When the cloud of ignorance passes over and the light of truth comes, then the
patient sees where his misery came from, and that it was believing a lie that
made him sick. My arguments are based upon my knowledge of his feelings, and
this knowledge put in practice is the Science of Health and is for the benefit of
the sick and suffering.
1861
The Teachings of Jesus
BU 1:6, LC 5:131
[orig. JESUS AND HIS TEACHINGS]
I believe that there was a man called Jesus, the same that was called by some
the son of David and by others the Son of God and by quite a number of names.
I believe that he was a very good man from all accounts of him, but to take his
own story, he was not the man represented in our days. This man always
admitted a wisdom superior to himself. Now if there was a power superior to
himself, what was this power? It must be God. Now is God inferior to himself, for
this man Jesus prayed to this wisdom. How do you reconcile that prayer where
he says: "Father forgive them for they know not what they do." This was the
earthly man. Then the earthly man could pray like all other men? Yes, like earthly
men. The ignorance of the people attributed to Jesus what he as a man never
asked for or desired. On the contrary, he tried to prove to the people that there
was a higher intelligence than they had ever acknowledged, except as a power
without knowledge. This wisdom that Jesus had put him above the errors of the
age.
The ignorance of the people could not understand and in their zeal to worship
what they could not understand they confounded the man Jesus with his power
as they called it and named it Jesus Christ. So now they worship the shadow of a
substance called Christ. Christ is the name of something that the people applied
to Jesus and in their ignorance they called it God manifest in the Flesh. This
explanation is as clear as any part of their belief.
Every one knows that there cannot be a shadow without a substance to reflect it.
So when you speak of a thing, it shadows forth a form that has matter or
substance. Now this world is made of matter and when we speak of anything that
has form, the thing spoken of casts a shadow in the mind and the senses are
attached to the shadow. For instance, if you speak of a man, you make a man in
your mind; this is the shadow of your belief. Your senses are attached to the
shadow of your belief, so if the shadow embraces a very bad man, the shadow is
the same, and the effect on the body corresponds to the effect that the shadow
produces.
Now when Christians speak of Jesus, they shadow forth a being with form and
without form which is three persons, and only one that fills all space and yet is
condensed into one person or being with all love, all hatred, and all power, but
who will not use it, who knows all things and dictates all our acts so that not a
sparrow can fall to the ground without his knowledge. Then they make another
shadow of a man that fills some six and a half feet in height and contains all the
power and wisdom of the above. This man they shadow in the mind as standing
in one place calling persons to believe and they shall be saved. When asked,
Saved from what? The answer is: From their sins. When I ask, What is sin?
Everything wrong. If I ask if there is anything wrong of itself, I get no answer. So I
come to this conclusion: that wrong is in ourselves and not in God and to act
wrong is to do something that we have a feeling is not right. So if you agree that
to injure another is wrong, you shadow forth your belief and the punishment
attached to it, and your punishment is just according to your belief.
Now the truth is we believe in two powers: one wisdom called God, and the
other, the devil. These were the names of these two powers in the days of Jesus.
He acknowledged these two powers and tried to explain them. The true power
was called Christ or God or by some other name. These powers have always
been a mystery to the world. For when they hear the same person speaking
through the same organs, it is very hard to believe and give the credit to another
power. So when the people heard the man Jesus speak of himself and then of
what he called God, it was a mystery to them. Therefore they in their ignorance
put God in the man Jesus and called him Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
Now if the people had understood Jesus they never would have associated the
Christ with him, any more than they would the science of mathematics with a
man. Jesus was a man of flesh and blood as you or I, and he never intimated
that he was anything more but always gave to Science or God the credit of all the
impressions which he felt and which the natural man could not. Now this to you is
a mystery, that one person can be two. But when you understand what the two
means it will be plain enough to see what Jesus was trying to make the people
understand. The people had no idea of Science, but thought that everything that
happened which they could not account for was a mystery. So when they saw a
phenomenon, they attached it to some invisible power. Their superstition put
every phenomenon in some mysterious being. They were looking for some
power to be developed that would put them in possession of some wisdom from
heaven. So all that Jesus could say was of no force. The people would make him
more than he wanted them to.
Jesus wanted to teach them a science that would make them better and happier
but their superstition would not permit his explanation. They would rather believe
in a power than learn a science. So they put false constructions on his acts and
you cannot get Jesus' explanation of himself nor of this power called Christ. Now
there must be some way to get at the meaning of this power or Christ. If we can
settle down on a true explanation of that, then we have the same rock that Jesus
had. He had the same trouble in his days. All the people admitted a power, even
the Scribes and Pharisees, but they thought it was like the others that had
appeared so they attributed it to the devil, for the belief in the power of the devil
was common. Thus they classed Jesus among the sorcerers of his day, and had
he been willing to be classed with them, he would not have met with the
opposition that he did. But to explain what was never thought could be explained
brought him in contact with all the learned men of his time. And as they were
well, it was very hard to explain to them the feelings of the sick. Therefore Jesus
said, "Those that are well need no physician," and as the standard of the well is
applied to the sick, the sick had to be judged by the well. Thus you see the sick
have no voice in correcting the evils that the well bind upon them.
Jesus could not sympathize with the well for they opposed him because he
exposed their craft by which they held the sick in bondage. Now as every
substance throws forth a shadow, the well throw forth one. This to the world is
not frightful and does not produce any fear. Now all shadows that affect a person
arise from a belief based on error and not wisdom, for true wisdom casts no
shadow, neither does entire ignorance. Shadows come from error, so the fool
knows no fear. And if a person was entirely wise he would know no error, for all
would be light. So the light of God or Science is in the darkness or ignorance, but
ignorance knows it not. Error sees the shadow of the light in the darkness of its
mind and takes the shadow for the substance. Not knowing that it is a shadow, it
reasons about the shadow as one man reasons with another not knowing that he
is talking to himself but thinking that he is talking to some invisible being. So he is
a man beside himself. All this is the effect of the natural man. In all this I embrace
the religious man, the superstitious man, the infidel, the atheist and the deist. All
the above are standing, reasoning about the shadow of their own belief, some
denying it in toto, others believing it in full, but all affected by their own belief.
Here on this platform stands all classes looking for the Messiah or Wisdom to
explain the mystery of their belief. Yet the world is just as ignorant of the
phenomena as though they all settled down on one belief, for there is no
knowledge of science in their belief.
I will make a comparison to show this. Suppose Mr. A is ignorant of shadows and
by chance sees himself on the wall by a lamp that he holds in his hand. The lamp
makes the shadow. The error puts the fear of his belief in the shadow, so he calls
on Mr. B, the skeptic, to explain the phenomenon. As darkness or ignorance is
necessary to produce a phenomenon, they enter a room or state of mind about
as dark as a room that cannot produce a shadow. So while waiting for the spirits,
they kindle up a fire or error like a light. So the medium holds the lamp lit up and
a shadow appears on the wall. The skeptic starts, his faith is shaken in
ignorance, for wisdom he never had. Mr. A says, "Do you see that?" "Yes but it is
not a spirit." "Then what is it?" "Oh, your imagination." "Don't you see it?" "Yes, I
see something but I cannot make out what it is, but this I know, it is not a spirit."
"If it is not a spirit, what is it?" "Oh, you get nervous and imagine anything." "Well,
take this lamp and go up to it yourself." Mr. B takes the lamp and approaches the
shadow and it is gone, so he believes.
An infidel, that does not believe in any God or devil but is as bold as a lion and
fears not God or man, goes to investigate the phenomena. The conditions being
right, they all enter the room. A lamp is produced and three persons appear on
the wall. The infidel starts, his knees like Belshazzar's tremble; he is asked if he
sees anything, any spirits. In a quivering voice he replies, "I don't know. I cannot
exactly see." The medium who has the light steps one side; one of the spirits
move. The infidel pauses and says to the medium, "Ask the spirit to hold up his
hand." The medium holds up his hand and the spirit does the same. A great
many experiments are tried until one of the strongest minded men in the world is
frightfully convinced that it must be spirits from another world. These are fair
illustrations of the wisdom of the world in regard to the mysteries of life. In this,
you see that three persons all agree in the phenomena. Their superstition, based
on their ignorance, produced the phenomena. Their belief in spirits is as real as
their existence so that want of wisdom in regard to lights and shadows keeps
them in an error, and all their misery arises from their shadows or beliefs. This
makes them nervous.
All of this is the effect of priestcraft. Their nervousness makes in themselves all
sorts of evil spirits. This affects the body. Then comes a more hungry swarm of
locusts called doctors, and they try to enlighten the sick. This class is worse than
the others, for they admit their fears as a real existence independent of spirits.
They condemn the phenomena of the spirits but admit all the proof that follows
their belief as real phenomena. So you get a superstitious world within a world
like a wheel within a wheel. So now all can be satisfied with the effect of their
own belief. All this has nothing to do with the wisdom of God or Science. Science
is not in the above, neither is Christ; all belong to the superstitions of the natural
man or Jesus. Christ never made war with science. Jesus was never known to
declaim against any truth that was based on science. All the war he fought was
against the priests and doctors. The priests never could understand how there
was any intelligence independent of man that could act through the senses. So
Christ to them was an imposter.
Jesus tried to separate his knowledge called Christ from his own knowledge as a
man. This was the hardest thing to be done, for if this one fact could be settled, it
put an end to all the controversy, and the science of health and happiness would
be established on earth as it was in heaven. This never was established, so the
people to this day look forward to Christ just as they did eighteen-hundred years
ago. And the Christians say that if Christ was on earth now as he was then they
could be cured of all their diseases. For when I ask them, Do you suppose that if
Jesus was alive they could be cured? They all say, Oh, yes! Now was it the flesh
and blood that cured or was it the power that acted and took flesh and blood? Of
course, it was the power and not the flesh. Now if it was the power and not the
flesh, what was that power? Here we are just back to the question we started
with, this something or power called Christ.
I will now try and see if I cannot separate it, and to do so I must take a patient, for
the well know not Christ. It is the sick alone that know him. I will commence with
one of my patients. You will admit I take your feelings. "Yes." "Could I have taken
them through your ordinary senses?" "Yes." "Well if I feel your symptoms, I must
be in sympathy with you, must I not?" "Yes." "Can you tell me how I get in
sympathy with you and still retain my own senses?" "No." "What do you call this
knowledge; is it not something higher than you possess?" "Yes." "Is it not more
than any one of himself possesses?" "I cannot speak for another, but for myself,
it is more than I can do."
You admit that I can tell your feelings. "I have no doubt of that, but the well will
not believe it." I am aware of that and to such I am not sent, but to the lost sheep
or sick of Adam's race. Therefore it is to the sick and not to the well that this is
written, to open their eyes so that they can see how they have been deceived. I
will now take you as a sick person and try to separate the Christ from the Jesus.
You admit that I am with you or your feelings when I tell you what they are. "Yes."
Well, what do you call that power? "I do not know." I call that power or that
wisdom or that science which feels your feelings: Christ. Now Jesus says that
false Christs shall spring up and deceive many, so he warned the people against
them, and he told them how we should distinguish a true Christ from a false one.
It is not every one that can tell your feelings that is a true Christ, but the one that
can take your feelings and explain them away so that you can understand and be
wiser by understanding; that is the true Christ. Now what makes the feelings?
They are what arises from our belief. "Will you explain what you mean?" If we are
in the dark, there are no shadows. Now suppose I tell you of something you
never heard of. You of course knew nothing of it only as I explain. Suppose I
should tell you of a man and give you a very minute description of his person.
You would create such a person in your mind, would you not? "Yes." This
creation of a man contains no effect on you one way or another.
After I have made you see him plainly, your belief condenses itself into what is
called matter in the shape of an idea called man, but your senses are not
affected by it. But suppose I tell you he is a very bad man. Now your mind is
affected. This affects your idea or man. This, being your belief condensed into a
man, is now disturbed and shadows forth a man according to my description.
This last man is the offspring of your belief. So it is your child and I am the father.
For you being married to my belief, this is the offspring. Now your senses being
attached to the shadow, it troubles you and your trouble is your feelings; all this
belongs to this world. Now suppose I sit down and talk to you about another
world and try to explain it to you. Can you not see how you create it in your
mind? "Yes." I explain heaven and hell and you have the two beliefs condensed
into two ideas: heaven and hell. The former for the good and the latter for the
bad, and you must govern your life according to the laws I lay down. For I am a
minister of the Gospel and have wisdom that you must not dispute. After I bind
burdens and lay them on your shoulders, I leave you to shape your life just as
you please with this caution: that you must render to God according to your acts.
Your life is now in the hands of man's God and as all things that man invents are
his own, God has nothing to do with it at all. But you listen to man's wisdom and
this excites your belief and sets your heaven and hell in trouble. This shadows
forth all the terrors of a bad place and makes you nervous.
The doctor is called and he, like the minister, commences by introducing his
stock in trade, which consists of all kinds of diseases from the gout to the
consumption. He asks you all kinds of questions about yourself and then
condenses them into a disease of which you are a stranger. This newcomer, like
a lover, is not very acceptable at first. But by talking over his false wisdom, you
become interested in it; and at last your mind or belief is completely overcome,
and you become married to his belief. If you had any belief before, you have left
it and become wedded to this new belief. Now as this new belief or husband is of
this world, it is like all other bad husbands who are never happy except when
they see others miserable. It begins to show its authority by laying restrictions on
you. And if any of your old ideas or lovers appear, your new husband or belief
puts his threats into execution. Suppose your new husband or belief is Mr.
Consumption. Every one knows that he is a very bad character. Of all hypocrites
in the world, he is the worst, for he keeps you in fear all of the time. If you attempt
to speak, he seizes you by the throat. And if you try to get rid of him, he seizes
you by the side and in fact you are completely in his power. Now in your lonely
hours, for you are always alone except when your tormentor is near, this belief
throws out a shadow and the shadow is the child of your belief. So you attach
your senses to this shadow and cling to it as a mother clings to her child.
Although her husband may be a bad man and her tormentor, yet she has some
sympathy with him. The priests have invented a belief and called the people
together. They pour out their wine or belief and the people drink of it and get
intoxicated. And in their intoxication as in other dissipation, they fall in love and
bad results follow. So the priests by their craft excite the people and in their
excitement they marry the very belief that three days before they would not have
listened to at all. The party breaks up and the company retires and as in all other
gatherings where wine is drunk to excess a great deal of evil is done. After the
excitement is over the lovers come; some have gotten married, others insulted,
and some have left their father's house or innocent state of mind and have
become the wife or husband of some bad belief. This was the case in the days of
Jesus. He saw all of the above and saw where people were deceived. This
knowledge of his was not of the priests or people but of a higher and more
excellent wisdom that acted through Jesus and could see all the phenomena that
the priests produced. This was called Christ or Science and was never applied to
the testing of our beliefs.
Science was acknowledged in everything that could be demonstrated by a
principle, but that man's belief should be made by science was something so new
that when Christ came to test their belief by Science, they said that their craft
was in danger. For if a man's thoughts could be felt and the effects of their
thoughts on the body explained, the priests could see that their acts would come
to naught. So this science of analyzing mind was a new idea that the natural man
knew nothing of. This science came from the father of all and was always in the
world but never acknowledged. So that all phenomena that were taking place in
the world were looked upon by the priests as a revelation from God, and they
were ordained to explain all the mysteries of the Godhead. So their explanation
made the people seek this man Jesus. They saw from his peculiar organization
that he could take the feelings of the sick, and the feelings being the shadows of
their belief, science discovered the substance. And when Jesus' science or Christ
analyzed the substance, he found it to contain hypocrisy and deception, based
on ignorance. So he called this substance or belief the devil and the shadow was
its child. So he said to them, You are the children of the devil and his works ye
will do. He was a liar and abided not in the truth or science, for science has no
beliefs but tries all beliefs to see whether they are of God or man.
Paul understood this science when he said, It was better not to marry or have a
belief, but if you are not able to take care of yourself, it is better to have some
belief than to be ignorant of all beliefs. Now the Christ that Jesus had was
confined to the intelligence of mankind, to the opening of the eyes of the
superstitious, loosening the tongues of the dumb, making the lame to walk and
instructing those oppressed by the priests in the truth that sets them free. This
was the true Christ. How can you tell a true Christ from a false one? By his
science. If I tell a person how he feels and then he tells me his opinion, he is a
liar and the truth is not in him. That is a false Christ. And if one tells you how you
feel and attributes your feelings to the wisdom of man by locating a disease,
believe him not, for there shall be many false Christs or theories.
The true Christ comes in this way. He takes no thought what he will say but it
comes to him when he sits down by the sick and the answer corresponds with
the feelings. For instance, if you feel a pain you have a wisdom of what the
substance or belief is that makes it. So your Science or Christ will analyze the
substance and explain it to the patient in language so plain that he will
understand it. And as he understands, he embraces your wisdom and that lights
up the error or belief till the belief is lost in wisdom and the shadow is gone. And
you rejoice in the Christ or Truth that sets you free. This is the true Christ. So the
word Christ is the name of that wisdom that can feel a sensation of another,
analyze it so as to explain the error and destroy the belief so that the patient is
set free from his belief. Christ is light. So is science and to be equal with Jesus is
to do as he did. If you, by any power not understood, should do miracles or
anything far beyond Jesus and do not know how you do it, then you would be a
Christ, but an ignorant one. To be equal with Christ is to do the things intelligently
and the wisdom is Christ; let it come through Jesus or any other man, for God
has no respect for persons. All can learn to be Christ or Science if they only
study.
1861
The Explanation of Matter
LC 4:76
[part of previous article - The Explanation - Questions in Healing ]
The religion of the pagans and heathen was founded on the superstition of their
leaders and their philosophy was to prove their religion. Their religion affected
the people, for the wiser men saw that there was no truth nor sound logic in all
their reasoning but the tendency of their religion was to make man ignorant and
superstitious. So to offset this a more enlightened class of philosophers arose
whose aim was to destroy the mythology.
To do this it was necessary to show the absurdity of their doctrines. As their
doctrines purposed to commence at the beginning of time, it was necessary that
they should attack the very foundation of their theory. As of course those
philosophers commenced in matter, it was necessary for the philosophers who
wrote in opposition to their religion to show the absurdity of their theory. So
Lucretius, who stands among the first of the pagan philosophers, struck at the
pillar of their very foundations by showing that there was no foundation for their
beliefs.
All philosophers mention the existence of matter which being dissolved passes
into space. And man being made of matter, as his body decomposes, he also
passes into space. And he, like all other matter, comes to an end. But as this
theory would not cover the whole ground, it leaves man in space like all other
matter, a sort of spirit or soul or some living principle that comes out of this
matter and exists somewhere.
The locality of this soul or life was never defined by the religious world.
Philosophers have given different accounts of the soul, but at the time that
Lucretius wrote, the religious world had no idea of a world after death, like the
Christians of our day, but all their religion was confined to this life. It is true that
there were exceptions, but the large majority of the people at the time of
Lucretius, onehundred years before Christ, believed in a soul. So that by reading
Lucretius you get a very good idea of the opinion of that philosopher concerning
the effect of religion on the masses. He looked upon it as the worst enemy of
man and to destroy it, it was necessary to show that the philosophy on which it
was based was false.
So he commenced with matter and proved that matter is nothing but an idea, that
there was no such thing as matter with the First Cause. He reasons man and
matter into space and shows that all the philosophy of man is based upon a false
basis and religion does more harm than good. So he, like all the rest, dissolves
man and leaves him in space and all beyond is man's opinion, without any
foundation.
His philosophy was to destroy the religion of his day, and mine is to destroy the
religion of my day and show that our religion is based on our philosophy and
claims the story of the Old Testament to prove it. So I have to commence at the
beginning and show that the philosophy of the Old Testament had nothing to do
with the creation of the earth nor anything in it nor on it. But those ideas were the
beliefs of the ancients before Moses was born. Moses is supposed to give a
description of the commencement of the world, when nothing can be more
absurd. He only gave a theory of the creation of man and showed that there was
a power superior to man. But the ignorant and superstitious supposed that
Moses was writing about the creation of the world. This led to superstition and
priestcraft and as these beliefs were accompanied with a philosophy to establish
their doctrines, they turned and twisted the Old Testament into a religious book,
teaching ideas that Moses never dreamed of.
Moses' religion was his wisdom and his wisdom was far superior to the religion of
his day. His religion was his philosophy; so is every one's, and that philosophy
which contains the most truth is the best religion. Science had nothing to do with
their religion and was opposed to it. Religion, or man's science or philosophy,
bound burdens on the people and there was no philosophy that could explain or
lighten man of these burdens. For the wisdom of man had not arrived at the point
where there could be a philosophy that would teach man that his happiness was
the result of his wisdom and his misery was the natural result of his belief.
Now the mistaken idea of what mind is has led man into trouble and causes so
much sickness and sorrow, and this is the origin of disease. Convince man that
mind is matter and wisdom is not, and he will no longer be deceived by false
guides, crying, Peace, peace, when there is no peace.
This is the origin of disease and this is what the philosophers of Greece and
Rome, Lucretius and others wrote against. For they saw that the priests by their
false doctrines made men believe all sorts of stories. They knew that their beliefs
were matter or mind and they saw what their effect on the people was. But as the
priests in those days held the people in a slavery sanctioned by their Gods,
reformers found no favor with the people. Now as the priests kept binding
burdens of disease on the people, philosophers would rise up and try to rid the
people of their burdens. But the priests held such sway over the people's mind by
phenomena that the masses could not explain, that the wise could not put their
wisdom into practice. So the priests exercised full sway over the minds of the
people. The philosophers who knew that mind was matter could see through the
hypocrisy of the priests. Also they could see through the fact that any idea or
belief could be condensed so as to come within the senses of the masses and
this would be proof that the priests were right. So at the time these philosophers
wrote, their doctrines or wisdom could not be understood. Nor is it understood
now by the masses, nor will it ever be, although it be true and can be reduced to
a science. Thus the masses have always been under the control of the priests.
So that this wisdom which would destroy all standards in matter was not tried to
be put into practice scientifically for some hundred and fifty years, when Jesus
called attention to the same theory.
There were persons who could change matter, move bodies and cure many
diseases and some had reduced it to a sort of belief which would counteract the
priests' belief, but none but deceivers tried to sell the art. Even in these days, you
see certain persons undertaking to teach people to psychologize, as though they
knew something that others did not, while they themselves are so ignorant of the
way they produce phenomena as the people were in the days of Jesus. The
priests took advantage of every phenomena, but they kept the knowledge for
their own benefit and made the people believe in superstition. Finally they formed
a religious belief, attaching penalties to the disobeying any laws that the priests
set up. Now the science or wisdom that shows that mind can be acted upon
would leak out and it kept the priests all the time inventing some new phenomena
to keep the people under. At the time of Jesus their craft had leaked out so that it
had gotten into the hands of the people and took the names of the inventions of
men. They were like the mediums of our days, talking about a gift and
communications from the spirits of the dead. Many such pretended to do as
Jesus did, thinking it was a gift or art from God; they knew that theirs was not
genuine, but the people believed in them. In these days, I am set down with the
same class of people, who have a power or gift, by fools or the ignorant because
the superstition and religious creeds have closed up all avenues to wisdom. They
are in the fog and cannot see out and they think that every one else is in the
same place.
In Jesus' day, if he undertook to expose the priests, they would accuse him of
making himself equal with God and would cry, Crucify him. So like the leaders of
any party, when they want to bear down on their game, they set on the dogs.
When Jesus began to teach this new truth, for although it was old it had a place
in the minds of the masses, he called the people together, not to instruct them in
religion but to show them that religion was just what the wise philosophers had
called it. So he denounced the leaders, showed the people how their belief made
them sick and being wiser and having more courage than any who believed as
he did, he tried to reduce this wisdom to a science. To do this it was necessary to
prove it by his works, as the priests would cure by their deception. For the mind,
like potter's clay, is under control of whoever gives direction, the works showing
whether they be of God or man. If of man, then man is under the law; if of God or
science, man is free from the law so that the law has no power over him, for he
that is dead to the law or alive in wisdom is free from sin and death or error.
Jesus wanted everything in common, that is, if a person knows anything that is
for the happiness of man to know, let it be known. He said that every truth should
be given or taught to man. No one should say, Know you this truth or science,
but all should acknowledge it from the wisest and it shall become the wisdom of
the world. Perhaps it will be necessary to say what there is to be known. It is this:
Jesus wanted the people to understand that religion, as they were taught it, was
the blackest sort of hypocrisy, only got up to keep a class of lazy thieves and
robbers in power, who devour houses of wood and houses of mind, carrying off
and selling men and women into slavery, for their own good. When Jesus applied
these sayings to the people, it melted down their heathen belief and by his words
of wisdom, they were cured.
Jesus never had any religious opinions. His works were his life and his life was
his Christ or theory. The people could not understand this so they crucified him,
and that ended the life of one of the best men that ever lived, for his natural man
became subject to his scientific man or wisdom. This wisdom cannot help making
mankind better any more than a good man can help becoming narrow-minded
and bigoted by belonging to a church. Our beliefs are all there is of us and just as
we measure out to our neighbor, we measure out to ourselves, so action and
reaction are equal. If we make a person believe anything that we have no proof
of, except as an opinion, we bind burdens on our friends that our wisdom cannot
remove. Wisdom says that every idle word must be accounted for at the day of
judgment.
So here I stand as a mediator for this young lady and if I have shown that her
accusers are guilty of perjury against the laws of wisdom, then the court will give
the verdict to the defendant and cast a wicked and ungodly belief into the fire of
science, where it shall be burned with unquenchable truth.
I will stop here, for I believe that I have satisfied the court that the priests bound
on this young lady their hypocritical creeds which made her nervous, and then
the other part of the priesthood, the doctors, decoyed her into the worst of all
company where she was betrayed into all kinds of misery. Then they turned their
backs upon her after robbing her of her money and character-for her belief is her
character-and making her believe she is one of the worst of characters. For to be
sick is a disgrace and if the superstition of the world had the power, they would
kill the sick for the safety of the well. These two classes, priests and doctors,
have so degraded men that sickness is the greatest evil in life. Jesus knew this
and he laid down his life or ran the risk that neither dared to do, took their
diseases upon himself, risking the danger of becoming sick and dying as they
would do.
In closing my argument, I will say to the court and multitude that I knew that this
girl had been deceived by these two blind guides. In the first place, I never ask
my patients anything but tell them all. This the doctors do not pretend to do. I
have no religious belief to teach as the priests have. Something cannot come
from nothing and as I have nothing of myself, they get nothing from me that will
affect them. The priests' belief is a lie and is of matter; the believing of it changes
the mind or matter. The ignorance of the creeds is their light and that being a
false light makes a shadow and in the shadow the patient puts his trust. As it is
founded in ignorance and superstition, it contains all sorts of evil spirits and
ghosts, etc. My wisdom can see through this veil of the priests. I see where the
deception lies and as I explain, the vacuum of their mind is lit up and the shadow
disappears, like the rays of the moonlight when the sun rises. As ignorance or
religion receives the truth or science it gives way to a higher priesthood not made
by man, but eternal in wisdom, that teaches man to do to another as he would
like that other should do to him. This is all; so I stop for the verdict to be made up.
January 1861
Death II
BU 38:1, LC 4:116
What is the true definition of death? Death is the name of an idea; an idea is
matter so that the destruction of an idea is death. Every opinion has its center
and its center is the idea. Now if a person believes in anything that is founded on
an opinion, the idea is in the opinion, and the senses being also in the opinion
are attached to the idea. This imprisons the senses in the opinion. Now the idea
is of itself nothing but an opinion condensed into a solid and called matter and
every word goes to make the idea. So to make an idea, men reason about
something they have no proof of, only as an opinion.
The word is called reasoning, governed by their wisdom and their wisdom is of
the natural man or error. It affects the mind of their opponent so they build their
building or opinion out of their error, and in the center is the idea; and if they
succeed in establishing their opinion, they imprison their opponent in their
opinion and the misery is what flows from the idea.
I will illustrate. Take the word "consumption." This word is of itself nothing to the
person who never heard of it. To make it is to create the opinion or building and
then reduce it to an idea; so matter in the form of words is so arranged as to
make the idea in an opinion. Now as the opinion is forming in the mind, a
chemical change is going on and the matter is held in solution until it is
condensed into a form according to the pattern given by the direction; and after
the opinion is fairly established in the mind and the person or idea in the center,
the senses are then attached to the idea and become a part of it; so the senses
become wedded to the idea and both are held in the belief or opinion. Now to
separate the senses from the idea is death to the idea but life to the senses. This
separation is what is called death, but it is only death to the one idea.
Man is always dying and living in progression, for error or opinion must always be
in the mind and mind must always exist until time is no more. Man is made of
science and ignorance or life and death. Man, seen by the senses, is the center
of our belief and the senses are attached to the idea called man, so the idea,
"man," varies as much as one star differs from another. No two men or ideas are
alike, so each idea, "man," is composed of error and science. The word brute
embraces all kinds of dumb animals, so the word man embraces all kinds of
characters that vary as much as the brutes. Each idea, man and brute, is made
of this combination called mind combined and held together by a superior
wisdom to the matter.
I will now give you an illustration of what I call life and death of the animals. The
animal is content to be just as he is and seeks no wisdom above his kind; he
lives the animal and when his identity is destroyed, he is forgotten by his race;
but this is only my opinion. But the animal that is dead to the living is as much
alive in the higher state of matter or mind as the man who loses his idea. Each
retains his own identity but man is progressive and the beast is the same forever.
The beast has but one rotation of life and death but man lives all his life subject
to death. So that to destroy one idea called death, he is liable to die again and
again to the end of time unless his wisdom destroys death by the science of life.
The last enemy to science is death, so the scientific man or idea shall reign till all
error is destroyed.
All identities called man are not the same. There is the well identity of man, the
lame, the sick, the deaf, the dumb and so on. I might enumerate as many
varieties of men or identities as there are stars in the firmament. Each varies
from the other and all are called man. Now all men are liable to have a
combination of all these identities. For instance, a well man or child is an identity.
Now it changes to a sick identity, so the well identity is destroyed and the child's
senses are attached to the identity of a disease. Man's life is a life of progression
governed by science or error, so to know what makes happiness is to know what
makes misery. The science of life is to know how to keep man from getting into
death or error. This is my theory-to put man in possession of a science that will
destroy all the above ideas of the sick and teach man one living progression of
his own identity, with life free from error and disease. Now as man passes
through these combinations, they differ one from another; so will it be in the
resurrection of the dead to life, freed from their false ideas and in truth. Now
suppose that man could be so wise as to know every sensation that affects his
senses. He could never change, so he would be always the same. Now take
another that believes in all the opinions of man and he is dying and living all the
time, dying to error and living to truth till he dies the death of all his opinions or
beliefs. Therefore to be free from death is to be alive in truth, for sin or error is
death and science or wisdom is eternal life and this life is the Christ.
March 1861
How I Hold My Patients
BU 57:28, LC 1:51
The question is often asked how I hold my patients when I give no medicine and
make no applications. I answer, it is through my belief or my knowledge. Then
you may ask me where I differ from others. In everything so far as disease and
what produces it is concerned. All persons believe in disease and their belief is in
the thing believed. For instance, take consumption. People are not aware that
consumption has an identity as much as a serpent or canker worm, that it has life
or a sort of knowledge. It is liable to get hold of us, and if it does, we cannot
shake it off as Paul did the viper from his hand.
All diseases have an identity and the well are subject to be deceived by them and
if they once get hold of them, they must surrender arms or compromise. These
diseases are in the mind as much as ghosts, witchcraft or evil spirits, and the
fruits of this belief are seen in almost every person. These beliefs show what the
people are afraid of and what they have to contend with, and make it necessary
for them to have some help in driving off their enemies. For if a person cannot
conquer his enemy or disease himself, he must have help. Now those employed
admit the existence and superiority of their enemy or disease and commence
making war with him by first firing calomel, and if that does not start him, the next
is blistering or burning, etc. This only enrages the enemy, and a regular battle
commences. Finally a council of physicians is called, a suspension of arms takes
place, a compromise is made and health yields up all claims to happiness and
enjoyment. And the victim has the privilege of going about a cripple and an
outcast the balance of his natural life, knowing all the time that he is liable to be
caught by any of his enemies at any time, either asleep or awake. This keeps
him in a nervous state of mind, not fit for any business, like a man who is in
prison under sentence of death. This is just the state of this world.
Now, is it strange that a person is known by this character and is afraid of this
state of mind or disease? And when one who has the power of restoring health
and destroying these enemies comes up to another who is tormented by these
devils, is it strange that he likes him and feels safe in his presence until he
himself is perfectly free? This feeling is not always known by the sick, but it is felt.
It cannot be understood, for its language is its feelings, and it cannot talk till it
learns to speak through the senses. It knows and feels its friend and clings to him
as a child does to its parent before it can walk; it is led by sympathy till it can go
alone and can understand that it has power over its enemy.
Then its knowledge is its cure. Till then it feels the need of some one who can
protect it from its enemy. Now my belief is their protector and my explanation is
their cure. My belief is accompanied by my sympathy for their trouble; and like a
shepherd who leads his sheep, I lead the sick, by my belief alone, home to health
and deliver them to their friends. Then I leave them happy and feel that they
appreciate the benefit I have been to them. This money cannot buy. This is what
holds my patients. It is what none but the sick can appreciate. The well know
nothing of the feelings of the sick; therefore to them it is a stumbling block and to
the doctors, foolishness.
March 1861
The Natural Man
BU 87:1, LC 4:133
All mankind have respect for wisdom or something superior to themselves that
they cannot understand. Man of himself is naturally indolent, brutish and willful,
content to live like the brute. He is pleased at any bauble or trifling thing. He has
imitation and tries to copy whatever pleases him. In this he shows his reverence
for his superiors. As he does not possess wisdom or science, he is often
deceived. Thus he is made timid and willing to be led. His courage is the courage
of ignorance, and when he sees superior numbers, he curls down like a dog
when whipped by his master. Easily led and easily deceived, no confidence is to
be placed on his word, for his word is always like the wag of a dog's tail to show
his submission. But when his ends are answered, his next act might be to injure
the very one that had just saved him from some trouble. He is easy in his
manners if all goes well, but if needed for anything he, like the dog, is ready at
the whistle of his master or anyone that will pat him, to bite his own master or
anyone else.
Now because the brutes can be taught something, it does not follow that they
can be taught science. They have their bounds which they cannot pass. So the
natural man has his bounds which he cannot pass. But when I speak of the
natural man, I speak of that wisdom that is based on an opinion. The brute is
undergoing a change by the introduction of the wisdom of man; so the natural
man in the same way is undergoing a change by the introduction of the scientific
man. The brute is developed as far as the wisdom of man is capable of
instructing him; so science takes the man of opinions and instructs him in the
wisdom of God or science. Now as every man has more of the wisdom of
opinions than of science, he is ignorant of himself, and being ignorant, he can
only see one character; for all the wisdom he has is public opinion. He is up
today and down tomorrow and knows not the cause of his rise or fall; so he is but
one identity that is acknowledged by him. His change is so gradual that he never
knows he has changed but supposes that all changes go to prove that he has
remained the same. These minds are often found in politics. You will hear a
person say, "I was always a Democrat or Federalist and my father and
grandfather were before me." Now this is a man of one idea. He is like the old
gray-headed veteran who stands on Mount Joy and looks around on Portland
and then turns to his young friend and says, "My lad, I remember when I helped
cut the wood where the city now stands some eighty or ninety years ago." His
young friend says, "You must have changed very much." "Oh! I am older but I am
the same man I was then." In reality there is not a single idea about him the
same except his five senses. So it is with the political man. His senses are
attached to the word "Democrat" and as long as that word lives in the wisdom of
opinions, he is a Democrat; and so long as this identity lives in him, he never
changes, for his senses never were attached to any principle. So the changes of
principle are nothing to him as he never had any. But with the other party it is not
the same. The senses of the masses are attached to the word as the Democrats
are, but as there is a progressive wisdom that works in man, it finds more affinity
in the Federal Party than in the Democrat, for the leaders of the party are selfish
and appeal to the one idea Democrat or Federal. This makes up the great parties
in all the progress of opinions and science. Now the science, being a stranger to
both, cannot work like the demagogues by appealing to the one idea, for the
senses are attached to the progression or wisdom that governs both. So as
progression is the order of the day the senses of the masses become attached to
new ideas and detached from old ones and thus parties are all the time
changing, and minds are changing to suit the times. This gives the demagogues
a chance to appeal to the masses, and as long as they can lead the masses by
one idea, they use any sort of cunning that comes up to suit their convenience.
March 1861
Spiritualism: Death of the Natural Man
LC 4:137
I am often asked where I differ from a spiritualist. In everything, but as this is an
opinion to you, I will try to make it clear. The spiritualist believes in the dead
rising and they sometimes say there is no such thing as death. Now let us see
what their works show. What is life? All will say it is what a man knows. So his
senses are attached to his wisdom, his wisdom is made of opinions and his
senses are attached to his opinions. His opinions embrace all beliefs. So to
destroy his belief, you destroy his senses, for they are in his belief and a part of
it.
Let us see what his belief embraces. In the first place, he believes in matter,
called living matter, that has life, for he says that life or matter must die or perish.
Now here is the contradiction in the spiritualist's belief. They deny that the dead
rise but if the dead do not rise, what are the dead? You are pointed to a man
lying motionless and to all appearances, even according to a spiritualist, dead.
Now is he dead or is he not dead? The spiritualist may answer, The body is
dead. Was it ever alive? You must say, Yes, for I point to a man moving around
and ask you if that man is dead and your answer is, No. Then he must be a living
man and according to your belief we have a living man and a dead one. Now
where do they differ? Here is the mystery. Their belief, like all others, flies right
back to the old superstition which they all believed, that the dead rise and in this
fog they get lost like all others. Now let me help you out of your belief. You are a
man of opinions and your senses are attached to your opinions and your belief
makes no separation between your wisdom and your belief. Your belief is matter
so that when the matter ceases to act, the senses also cease, for you have no
wisdom above the opinions of man.
I will show where I differ from spiritualists and in fact all other sects. My theory is
founded on the fact that mind is matter, and if you will admit this for the sake of
listening to my ideas, I will give you my theory. I assert that according to man's
belief there are certain facts admitted and established beyond a doubt, and as
my wisdom is not of this world or belief, only in part, what I know I have no
opinion about. All knowledge that is of man is based on opinions. This I call this
world of matter; it embraces all that comes within the so-called senses. Man's
happiness and misery are in his belief; all the wisdom of science is of God and is
not of man.
To separate these two kingdoms is what I'm trying to do, and if I can succeed in
this, I have accomplished what never has been done but what has been the aim
of all the learned philosophers ever since the world began. The secret of life and
happiness is the aim of all mankind and how to get at it is the mystery that has
baffled the wisdom of the world. Now I should never undertake the task of
explaining what all the wise men have failed to do but for the want of some better
proof to explain certain phenomena that come under my own observation which
have never been explained, from the fact that the error exists now as much as
ever. The remedies have never destroyed the cause nor can the cause be
destroyed by man's reason, for science cannot admit what cannot be proved.
Until some better proof of what we see and hear and feel can be produced, the
world must grope in darkness and skepticism. My object is not to strike at any
science that is established. I admit such for fear I may be misunderstood.
I will separate the two worlds of which I am now speaking and show what one
has failed to do, and also that the other is not acknowledged independent of the
first. The world of opinions is the old world, that of science is the new world, and
a separation must take place and a battle must be fought between them. The
world of error and opinions has held science in bondage ever since man began
to act independently of the savage life. The child of science has been nourished
in the bosom of its mother, in the wilderness of error, till it grew up so as to
assume a character; then when it has undertaken to assume its rights, it has
always been met with the thunder of error. But as it is so much of a friend to the
happiness of man, the enemies or error could never prevent its growth, for that
was in the scientific world. That world has no matter or it is so rarefied that the
error cannot see through it. So the scientific man can pass through the errors and
instruct the child of science till it bursts forth and becomes a man or law. Then
the natural man or error destroys its leaders and falls down and worships the
scientific laws and acknowledges them as king of this world. So as the science is
now acknowledged, the kings of the earth are cut off and the kingdom is divided
against itself; the leaders with their armies flee into the wilderness, there to rally
for another attack when any new science is started. Now the Science of Life and
Happiness is the one that has met with the most opposition from the fact that it is
death to all opposers. It never compromises with its enemies nor has any
dealings with them. Its kingdom is of science, not of error. Therefore it is not of
this world of matter.
I will give you a declaration of its laws, how much it admits, how much it
condemns and how it puts its laws in force. Its habitation is in the heart of man. It
cannot be seen by the natural man for he is of matter and the scientific man is
not matter. All he has are his senses; there is his residence for the time. He has
no abiding city but is a traveler or sojourner in the world of matter. His house is
not made with hands but is in the scientific world, so his whole aim is the
happiness of man. Now as man is of matter, his belief embraces all there is of
him. The scientific man sees through this matter which is nothing but an error
acknowledged as a truth, although it is to the natural man a reality. Now as error
holds on to all territory as under its power, it keeps the scientific man in slavery or
bondage. So to keep the Science of Life down, they invent all sorts of humbug in
the shape of invisible things and attribute life to them while they pretend to be the
people's guide to wisdom. It is almost impossible to tell one character from
another as both communicate through the same organs. As the scientific man
has to prove his wisdom through the same matter that the natural man uses, he
is often misrepresented and put down by false stories, representations of the
errors of the natural man. This was where Christ found so much trouble in his
days, for the people could not tell who was speaking.
The scientific man was called by the natural man, "angel." So if an angel spoke
they would listen. The natural man, being superstitious and ignorant, is easily led
by the cunning errors of the world. The leaders, being crafty and superstitious,
believe in every phenomenon which is produced and they attribute it to the
invisible world. The locality of this world is the mystery, and so all kinds of
speculations are got up about it. It opens all the avenues of matter through which
to give the inhabitants communications, but the natural man has possession of
the mediums so that the scientific man is misrepresented in nine-tenths of all he
says. Now to be in the scientific world is not necessarily to be wise but to
acknowledge a wisdom above the natural man which will enter that world where
wisdom sees through matter. This is the condition with those persons who are
thrown into a clairvoyant state. To them matter is nothing but an idea that is seen
or not, just as it is called out. All of their senses are in this state but are under the
control of the natural man. So it is always hard to establish a fact in this world
that goes to destroy the power of the natural man. All the explanation of this
scientific world is given by these blind guides who have eyes but cannot see,
ears but cannot hear and hearts that cannot understand science. They are afraid
of the truth lest it will destroy them, for their death is the introduction of the
Science of Life and Happiness.
To show you the two characters conversing through one medium I will take
myself as the medium of the scientific man and also of the man of error or of this
world. When two persons argue, it is supposed that they have some object in
view or there would be no need of reasoning; but nine-tenths of all arguments are
about nothing, from the fact that error contains no wisdom but a belief which is
started by some crazy brain and acknowledged by the ignorant as true.
Ignorance is roused into action. This produces error and error is not confined to
any particular mode of reasoning but is always attaching its senses to some
opinion which has been acknowledged as a truth. As opinions are always
changing, error does not see the change, for its senses are not in the change but
in the opinion. The scientific man attaches his senses to science, not to opinions.
For instance, eighteen hundred years ago there was a man called Jesus. All
admitted the fact that he was a man. His theory of action was reasoning to
mankind, so a controversy sprang up in regard to the man; the man of opinions
attaches his senses to the opinions about the man. The scientific man saw
nothing to affect him in any way; so when Jesus was brought before Pilate, Pilate
heard the stories, but seeing no proof of any superior wisdom beyond any man
said that he found no fault in him. So he attached his senses to the man, Jesus,
as a man. But the superstitious were divided, as they always are. One class
claimed that he came from God, the other, that he had a devil. So these two
classes were at war with each other and in their zeal they attached their senses
to the acts of Jesus as proof of their wisdom. One party wanted to show that
Jesus came from God and they introduced his cures as proof, for no man could
do as he did except God be with him. Their ignorance never saw that his cures
proved nothing except that he knew more than they did, which did not prove that
he came from any place, only that he did the cures. But no man is bound to
believe this because they say so, anymore than they are bound to believe that a
person who cures another gets his power from the spirits. The ignorant say if it
does not come from the spirits, where does it come from? Thus the skeptic is
either bound to take their explanation and believe it is the spirits or he is an
infidel or unbeliever.
So it is with the ignorant about Jesus; they assume as a fact that you must
believe that Jesus came from God. If you believe and acknowledge his cures,
that will not do, but you must believe what you and no other person has any proof
of and which rests only on what a certain number of persons say. So the
controversy among the people was about something which never had anything to
do with Jesus. This is the way with all persons who attached their senses to an
opinion of some other person without proof. Jesus, like any other man, was in the
hands of the people and they gave their opinions about the man so that the
writings of the Old and New Testament contain opinions about the man Jesus
and others. Man now takes the opinions as the words of Jesus, while Jesus had
not the ideas which were attributed to him. As he had no one to speak for him, I
will try to give his ideas as a man. Jesus always wanted to make a difference in
regard to his opinions and what he knew as a science. To show how he
separated himself as a man of opinions from the Scientific Man or Christ, it was
necessary to show something as proof, and the sick was the problem to be
solved. This separation was a mystery to the people and their superstition was
called into action, and instead of listening to Jesus when he talked the Christ or
Truth, they attributed his works to a power from God and all the cures were taken
to prove that fact. If the people could believe that he came from God it was of no
use to know how he cured, for if they knew this, it would destroy the belief that he
came from God and so upset their religion. Therefore the leaders labored to
prove to the people that Jesus had a mission from heaven to earth to save souls,
and the cures were only to prove that he came from God. Now the believers are
in the opinions of man and not in Christ, for Christ was Jesus' science and this
gives the lie to all the former. Jesus stood before the world as I do, with this
exception; my own case will explain both. The two parties who sat in judgment on
Jesus were divided on this point. One party thought he came from heaven; the
other thought that the spirits of the dead talked through him, and they hoped to
introduce dissension among the people, enough to put down the established
religion. Jesus was in the hands of these bigots and could not explain what he
intended to have the people believe. It is so with me. One class calls me a
spiritualist but a hypocrite; another calls me evil or the devil. The third says I am
an infidel or a disbeliever in Christ. A fourth, not the least, say I am a harmless
humbug. The sick is the only class who know anything about what I teach. They
say it is a science and can be learned. But as it is in the world of error and
superstition and my judges belong to this class, I am accused, as I have stated,
and of course my works are my proof.
Now as I have said, when men argue they think at least that there is some point
to start from or they would not reason. As the standards of parties are
established by error, it is almost impossible to introduce any new science unless
it is explained on some of the theories of the natural man. Thus all phenomena
are thrown into the hands of these blind guides who have pronounced judgment
upon everything that has appeared. So whenever anyone shows a phenomenon,
the priest and doctor catch the idea out of the mouth of the author and explain it
on some theory known to the people. The theory of health is one that has come
up many times and failed because of the blindness of the wise, so that it has now
almost become a terror to the one who has boldness enough to stand up and
face the blind leaders of the blind. You see that Jesus could not stand up against
so powerful an enemy, for the instant he spoke, they would put a false
construction on his every word. So they turned the word of God to no effect by
their theories and traditions. Thus you see that with the people the wisdom of the
science of life had no foundation but was like a house built upon the sand; when
the wind of science blew upon it and the tide of public opinion came, it must fall
and be destroyed. But unto this science men have raised altars with this
inscription: "To the unknown God." I will say to these guides, This science that
you ignorantly worship, I will declare unto you. First of all, you know that mankind
are in the dark so far as their life is concerned; that man is all his life subject to
disease and death; also that it was foretold that Christ should come and lead
man back to God. This same Christ that you crucify by your theories is the same
that Jesus taught eighteen hundred years ago. It was taught by the prophets of
old and has always been in the world but has never been applied to the curing of
disease, although false Christs have arisen and deceived the people, and the
true Christ has been crucified by the priest and doctor till this time.
I will now try to establish this science or rock and upon it I will build the Science
of Life. My foundation is animal matter or life; this, set in action by wisdom,
produces thought; thoughts, like grains of sand, are held together by their own
sympathy or wisdom or attraction. Now man is composed of these particles of
matter or thought combined and arranged by wisdom so as to make a form called
man. As thought is always changing, so man is always throwing off particles or
thoughts and receiving new ones. So man is a progressive idea yet he is the
same man although he is changing all the time for better or worse. As his senses
are in his wisdom and his wisdom is attached to his idea or body, his change of
mind is under one of these two directions, either of this world of opinions or of
God or Science, and his happiness or misery is the result of his wisdom. As the
idea man has always been under the world's wisdom, the scientific man has
always been kept down, from the fact that no man has ever risen to that state
where the scientific man could control the wisdom of the natural man. This has
always kept man in a war with himself. These two powers make up man, and the
science is to keep the natural man in subjection to the scientific man. In this
warfare, if the natural man rules, disease and death is the fate of the scientific
man; if the latter rules, life and happiness is the reward.
Now I stand on this rock fighting the errors of this world and establishing the
Science of Life by my works. What is my mode of warfare? With the axe of truth I
strike at the root of every tree or error and hew it down so that there shall not be
one error in man showing itself in the form of disease. My wisdom is my
knowledge and not matter or opinions. It decomposes the thought, changes the
combination and produces an idea clear from the error that makes a person
unhappy or diseased. You see I have something to reason about and this
something is Eternal Life and this life is in the science. This was what Jesus tried
to establish so that man could have a starting place, but the wisdom of this world
tries to account for all phenomena on some principle founded on man's opinion,
letting the world grope in darkness.
If I can show that man's happiness is in his belief and his misery is the effect of
his belief, then I shall have done what never has been done before. Establish
this, and man rises to a higher state of wisdom, not of this world but of that world
of science that sees that all human misery can be corrected by this principle, as
well as the evil effects of errors in any science. Then the Science of Life takes its
place with other sciences: then is brought to pass, "Oh death! (or error) Where is
thy sting! Oh grave! Where is thy victory!" The sting of ignorance is death but the
wisdom of science is life eternal to all who believe it.
I have said that to reason there must be something to reason about. I will show
the world's reasoning and how I reason. I will take the oracles of the world, for all
science of this world of opinions has oracles. These oracles of which I speak are
those who pretend to instruct the people in regard to health and happiness. The
first is the clergy, for they lead off in everything pertaining to man's happiness. I
will ask them what they think of Christ, his mission if he had any, and of what
advantage it was to the world? They reply that the world or man had gone so far
astray that it was necessary to send Jesus Christ into the world to convince man
of a future state of rewards and punishments, that he might repent and be saved.
If this is true I ask, Why did Jesus devote so much time to the sick? (Oracle) To
show that he came from God. [Q] What does that prove? If I cure a person, does
it prove that I came from God? (O) No, but do you make yourself equal with
Christ? [Q] Have you any proof of anything that you never saw and is only an
opinion? (O) The Bible. [Q] Does the Bible speak for itself or does some one
explain it? (O) We must take the Bible as our guide of truth.
Let us now sum up this oracle's wisdom. All of his wisdom is founded on an
opinion that there is another world and that Jesus Christ came from that world to
communicate the fact to the inhabitants of this one. This is all an opinion
sustained by no proof. On the contrary, everything goes to prove it is false, for
the happiness of man is not increased by this false theory because this oracle
cannot cure the sick. Now Jesus cured the sick and said if they understood him
they might do the same. We want a theory like that of Jesus, not of talk but
works, for talking a theory that will not cure is worthless. So if I set down the
priests as belonging to the false prophets, the sick are no better for them. Next
are the medical oracles. These number as many as the former and are on the
increase. How much knowledge have they independent of an opinion? None! Yet
they have given the people to understand that their wisdom is far above that of
the masses, but their knowledge is all opinions and the sick pay them as though
it were wisdom. The people have been cheated into a belief that these oracles
have more wisdom than they have. This I admit, otherwise they could not
humbug the people out of their money and deprive them of their health and
happiness.
My oracle is Jesus. He proves the goodness of wisdom. Jesus was the oracle
and Christ the wisdom shown through this man for the happiness of the lost or
sick who had been deceived by the other two classes: priest and doctor. God or
wisdom has seen how these blind guides had robbed the widow and the poor of
their little goods, deserted them and left them forsaken and despairing,
dependent on the charity of a wicked world. This wisdom developed itself through
the man Jesus and he fearlessly stood up and denounced these guides as
hypocrites and devils. He showed how their theories affected the people and also
that they were in direct opposition to all science and good feeling, and he
introduced a new theory, a more excellent priesthood or science which had no
sacrifice of feeling but took upon itself our infirmities and explained them for the
happiness of man.
What was it that Jesus wanted to communicate to the world? One simple fact
that man was a progressive being, that his happiness and misery were of his own
make, that his belief is his wisdom and if it is founded on an opinion, it was liable
to make him unhappy. To separate the truth from the error is a science, the
knowledge of which teaches how to correct an error or disease and in this
knowledge is eternal life. Jesus never intended to teach the people a belief in
another world. His words and acts showed them that their beliefs were false and
that they were the cause of their misery. But this they could not understand, and
being in their belief, their belief became a part of their identity. As they were
taught to believe in spirits, their misery was attributed to them. And as error
begets error, the people were tormented by their own belief. It never entered into
the minds of these blind leaders that as a man sows, so shall he reap, for action
and reaction are equal. The knowledge of science was not general and that the
belief of man had anything to do with his health was a thing not dreamed of. All
that was believed was something that could not be seen, so the prophets
prophesied of someone coming from heaven. Now if heaven was not something
that the people believed in, away and apart from this earth, then it would not
have been in the prophesies. So this heaven was an established fact and all their
controversies were in regard to it. They introduced all sorts of mediums that
purported to come from and have communications from that place. There was
the dwelling of God and all religious theories were based upon the belief that
there was another world where God dwelt and where He ordered all things
according to His own will. Absurd as this is, man is made of this composition, for
man is only a mass of matter or ideas, combined together by a wisdom superior
to the matter of which the ideas are formed. Science is not recognized in this
belief. For it belongs to that class of minds which have never risen to a state
where they can discern that man can perceive anything independent of his
natural senses. To this class of minds whatever is not established is a mystery. If
a lead ball is thrown into the water it sinks to the bottom, that is a fact. If a
wooden ball is also thrown into the water it floats, and then comes the mystery. A
medium from the other world is required to explain the phenomenon. Argument is
of no force. The explanation must come from God, and thus it is with every
mysterious phenomenon-supernatural power only can explain it. Thus man is
kept constantly excited to understand every little thing that happens. He never
has thought that heaven and hell were a part of his belief and consequently a
part of himself, but he believes that these two places are independent of himself
and he is liable to go to one or the other after he is dead. So he lives in hell all his
life, trying to get to heaven, but never gets there for it is always at a distance, and
he is always looking for a savior to save him from hell.
How often we hear very good people say that they are weary of this wicked world
and they long to be with Christ, showing that they are not there now, but hope to
be. You see that their faith contains a belief, not a substance. The faith that is of
man is merely a belief in something not obtained, for when the substance is
obtained, then faith or belief is lost in the substance and they have what they
hoped for. Was Jesus' faith a belief? No, His faith was the substance of our belief
and that substance was Christ. Jesus put his faith in practice for the happiness of
man. This substance or Christ or faith is something intended to be applied to
man, and Jesus put this in practice for his happiness. The question arises, Has it
an identity? Answer, it has; it is all that ever had an unchangeable identity. It is
wisdom itself but the Christian's faith is an opinion about this wisdom. I have said
that Jesus' faith had an identity and to this his senses were attached. This Jesus
could say to his faith, "Father forgive them for they know not what they do." What
did this Christ strive to do? It strove to enter the heart of man and teach him how
to break away from his errors and learn the truth. Jesus taught Christ and put it in
practice by his works. Do the Christians do the same? No. They preach about it,
so their faith is not of works but a belief. The world is no wiser or better for it. To
prove your faith in music is to play a tune on an instrument by your faith or
science, not to talk about music, telling about how beautiful it is. The Science of
Health which Jesus taught was practiced by his faith or wisdom and his
instrument was man. He took man after he had been beaten, bruised and
deceived by the priests and doctors and applied his science or Christ to put him
in tune, so that he could sing psalms to the one living and true science and
appreciate Jesus as the medium for "he hath opened the seventh seal" that can
correct the errors of man who shall be saved from disease and misery. How does
Jesus stand by the side of his pretended followers? He talked and taught his
Christ to the people. Priest and doctor talk about it. Here is a vast difference.
Jesus put intelligence in the Christ or science; the Christians put no intelligence
in Christ or science but apply all the intelligence to Jesus, calling the Christ a
power. The difference has always been kept up; the natural man cannot see
intelligence in anything he cannot understand. Therefore Christ or intelligence of
Jesus is to him a power or mystery and he wanted to know whence it came. This
ignorance on the part of the priests and people originated all their speculation
about Jesus. The Christ or higher intelligence was shrouded in darkness to them,
for they could not see why he, merely a man, should be more than a man.
Everyone knows that a clairvoyant state is different from the natural state. Let me
illustrate what all will admit. Persons in a clairvoyant state can talk, using the
same organs as when awake. They also have every faculty which they have in
their waking state, independent of the natural body, and space and time may or
may not be annihilated. They act entirely independently of anyone and when
awakened may not remember anything that has been going on. Here you see a
being acting independently of the natural body or the identity of flesh and blood,
with all the organs and senses of the natural man. Now where is this identity
when the natural man is acting, for both cannot be acting at the same time?
Everyone will perceive that if a man could retain his reason and natural senses
and at the same time be conscious of the other state, he would be a man beside
himself, thus making two living intelligences in one identity, acting through one
medium. Thus the clairvoyant man could correct the errors of the man of flesh
and blood and keep him in subjection to his wisdom. This was Jesus Christ.
To have this Christ was to be born again or receive the higher wisdom. This
wisdom or Christ was the mystery to mankind. This was the Christ that should
reign till all error should be subject to it. Disease, being the off-spring of error,
deceives the people, making them nervous, sick, and liable to death, for all this is
matter and belongs to the man of flesh and blood. But it is the design of wisdom
that matter should be the servant of this clairvoyant man or science; therefore
when Jesus received this wisdom, he became God and man. When the man
spoke, it was like anyone else, but when the Christ spoke, it spoke not as a man,
for that is of God or wisdom from above. Jesus taught the people to distinguish
by their works the true Christ from the false. It must have proved its source by
works, for he says, "Not everyone who says I am Christ is so himself, but he that
doeth the will of the wisdom that sent me."
Let us see if a test can be found such as Jesus laid down. When he called his
disciples together he gave them power over all unclear spirits and sent them forth
to heal the sick. Here is the test of the clairvoyant or Christ power or wisdom.
How did he apply it when he cured disease? Of course, if he was in this state all
the time, all things were present to him so that not a sparrow could fall to the
ground unnoticed by him, not Jesus, for although the Christ was made known
through Jesus, it was only made known according to the necessities of the time
when he, Jesus, lived. I will take one of his miracles to show that Jesus and
Christ acted together. When the centurion came to Jesus to tell him that his
servant was sick, Jesus was not aware of the fact but immediately became
subject to his clairvoyant state, saw the servant and administered unto him. Then
he said to the centurion, Go thy way, and according to thy faith so it shall be unto
thee. So the centurion left and the servant was healed in the selfsame hour. Now
this is as plain to me as any cure I ever performed. This was not a power but a
higher wisdom that the world knows not of. I will now introduce myself, showing
that