The Text - Section 21
To the Sick
BU 106:11, LC 9:287
Dr. Quimby takes this way to give the sick and those who need his services a
short illustration of the manner of treating diseases, as they are called by the
medical faculty. My mode of treating the sick is entirely new and original with
myself. I have no similarity or affinity with any other mode of practice. Therefore,
when others undertake to identify my practice with any other, they not only
misrepresent me but show their weakness by so doing. For everyone that I treat
that can understand me at all see that I am entirely different from any other
person. Those that have some selfish motive to identify me with mesmeric
practice use this argument: it is nothing but mesmerism, etc. Others that wish to
class me with the spiritualist say it is spiritualism, but I won't own it.
Now this mode of misrepresenting me I, of course, can't help, only as I make my
patients understand. And as it is easier to let it go that I am a spiritualist or
anything else than to explain, they let it go by, saying I don't care what you call it
if I get well. So it makes it very hard for me to separate myself from others who
claim me as one of their kind, but l can see and explain where I differ from all
others. All persons of every rank and profession believe that disease is a thing
independent of the mind, and also that it can affect the mind. Now all classes
agree in this that there are curative properties in certain medicines and that
certain kinds of food give strength and also certain exercises, etc. In fact a sick
person is a complete slave to the medical faculty, to be acted upon just according
to their little narrow, contracted wisdom, narrowed down to a certain belief. Now
all of the above is to me superstition and ignorance. If every man and all sorts of
drugs were out of existence, it would not be twenty years before a race of people
would spring up healthy and happy, if all other sciences and improvements went
on.
I have been twenty years in the practice of curing disease and learning, the
causes and I have learned that nine-tenths of the sick at this time would be well
and hearty if the medical faculty were annihilated. Neuralgia is one of the
commonest diseases of the day, but this is giving way to a new invention called
the spine disease. And there have been such improvements that this has almost
lost its identity in the new inventions of human diseases. This has opened a field
for the medical faculty. There cannot be a female of any respectability but she
must be insulted by these quacks with the idea that she has this disease in some
form or other. Now all the above cases I can treat and cure almost at once, from
the fact that of all humbugs, it is the greatest, and the medical men know it, for
they arc not blind. Look at the cures performed by the mediums and the quacks
,As they arc called and you will see that eight out often belong to the class of
diseases above spoken of. And they are got up by the medical faculty. These
men lead the people and give direction to their minds and in this way, they gall
the people and they rob them of their health and get the people sick and in
despair. And in their trouble they seek a witch or those that have a familiar spirit
to enquire of them.
Now what I am trying to do is to convince the sick and all those who want to keep
well that my mode of treatment is entirely in opposition to the above. What they
call disease, I call an effect of deception; this deception I call the disease, and
the effect that follows,they call the disease. I will give some illustration. Take a
healthy person, if you can find one, tell him some exciting story which makes him
a little nervous. Now here is the ground for the medical sower to sow his seeds of
disease. He commences by telling the patient that he or she is liable to have the
consumption, so some humbug is started in the form of inhaling into the lungs.
This makes the patient nervous and then a new improvement is introduced to
inhale into the stomach. This prepares the way for all variety of diseases, like
falling of the womb, internal ulcers, ovarian tumors, weak spine, heart disease,
etc. Now I say and stand ready to prove that all the above diseases are made by
the medical faculty for their special benefit. A more miserable humbug was never
invented and men and women pay their money to these quacks for what never
had an existence outside of the profession. These diseases were never known to
the people seventy years ago, but now every female is liable to be affected by
these diseases. The medical faculty have been the means of lowering the female
character, for they feel guilty and ashamed of themselves. For they have been
made to believe a lie and they can't help it. Now I never make any examination,
nor apply any remedies of any sort, but simply tell the patients how they feel. I
know they have been misled by these quacks and deceived into a belief and this
belief is the cause of their troubles and to correct it is the cure. This is a very
easy task, for the deception is so apparent that it does not take much sagacity to
correct it.
Then there are other classes of diseases that cannot be cured so easily.
Rheumatism that affects the legs so much that the joints become stiff. Such I
would advise to stay at home if they think to be cured at one or two visits. All
bedridden persons that have the use of their limbs but can't walk from weakness,
I have cured very soon. But those that are paralyzed on one side or both had
better stay at home for the expense will be more than the good they will be liable
to get. Persons smoking or chewing, if they have any disease that they would
have me treat, independent of tobacco, I can cure; but if they are well and
choose to smoke or drink or chew, it is none of my business. It is a matter of their
own. But if they are sick, then if I find that tobacco hurts them, I almost always
cure them at the first sitting. If any person is nearly gone with consumption, I
should advise him to stay at home, unless it is to be relieved of their distress. So
it is with a great many kinds of disease. This circular is to send to those that write
for information. With this is a circular giving some idea of my method of curing.
1864
Truth and Belief
BU 44:12, LC 9:104
[orig. TRUTH]
Words are sounds to represent something that contains matter or form or they
are applied to some imaginary thing. Now the word truth is applied to either of
these two ideas. So when a person says a thing is so and so, if we believe it, this
is a truth. Now separate those things that we can't see clearly from those things
that are in the dark, and then apply the word truth to such as have a substance
according to man's belief and those that have no substance only as a belief, and
then you will know what is truth and what is not. For instance, what you know,
you are not a part of, but it is yourself; but the thing known is something, not of
you, but outside. For instance if I say to you, did you ever see a house? Now you
see you are no part of the house but outside of it. But if I ask you if you ever saw
a man come to you after he is dead according to your belief, you will say, No, but
if I ask you if you believe he has a spirit, you say I believe he has. Now don't you
see this belief contains no substance only a shadow and it requires darkness to
produce it.
So ignorance is darkness and truth is light. So as you come to the light or
science, the spirit or belief or darkness will vanish, for there is no substance in it.
So every word is nothing of itself till it is attached to some idea that contains a
substance. So to separate the truth from error is to correct the error that makes
the trouble called sickness. Now I class all the troubles of man among those
truths, based on a false mode of reasoning, for when a person knows a thing his
opinion ceases and he comes out of the dark and stands in the light. So
everything we don't know beyond a doubt has a shade of darkness. For instance
if I ask you if you can see the figure five, you will see it plain in your mind, but if I
ask you, if you see the answer to 75 added to 5, 13, 19, 6, 31, 100, 99 and 75,
now you are in the dark and you see no answer till after you add them up in your
wisdom and set them down in the mind. Then your wisdom can see the answer
in the mind, but before this there must be a chemical process to develop the
mind so the answer would come out, and when it is out, the opinion is gone, and
you stand outside looking at the answer.
So with disease, the seeds of opinion are sown in the mind from a belief of man,
for as I have said, mind is matter and governed by his belief which is matter, and
the wisdom is also matter and is all a part of the same and the truth destroys
both. So when the world gets wise enought to learn that what cannot be seen
outside of the man is nothing, if the thing seen is the effect, then it is not certain
that it exists at all. For instance all diseases like religious opinions admit
something that you cannot see. This is all as far as man's health and happiness
is concerned, for if he admits it as a truth, he certainly is liable to create the
misery of his folly.
For instance, heathen superstition is now believed to be all fiction or nearly so,
even the city of Troy, the siege of Babylon and lots of others. We get as good
and correct an account of them as we do of London and why should we not
believe one as well as the other? Just because we know persons that have told
us that London exists, but no one who had never been to London, but was
transferred to London in his sleep and then awakened, dare risk his life and
wisdom to say that he knew it was London. Therefore if he was as sure as he
could be without asking when he was told that it was London, this would not
make him any more sure. After getting satisfied, his belief is gone, and he stands
outside in his wisdom. So it is with all these old fables. They are accounts of all
kinds of diseases and how the people died and the symptoms have been handed
down to this day. The plague of Egypt is one, although all the history is based on
a fabulous account of what never had an existence. Yet we hear of this old
disease being in existence. So all this goes to show that whatever has been
handed down for history and been believed is as catching as the evils that are
invented by the medical faculty of our days. Modern fables or stories are as
popular as the fables of the ancients. Neither have an existence outside of the
mind.
1864
What Is Disease?
BU 26:4, LC 6:59
[orig. DISEASE]
What is disease? It is false reasoning. True scientific wisdom is health and
happiness. False reasoning is sickness and death; and on these two modes of
reasoning hang all of our happiness or misery. The question is, how can we
know how to separate the one from the other? The truth cannot be changed; the
false is always changing. The one is science, and the other is error, and our
senses are attached to the one or the other. One is the natural development of
matter or mind, and disease is one of the natural inventions of error. To show
how disease is not what it is supposed to be, by those who use the word, I must
show the absurdity of error's reasoning, for error is the father of disease.
We are all taught by this error to call disease something that is independent of
man. To make it more plain and show where the two modes of reasoning act, I
will suppose a case and take that of a young man or person who, feeling a little
disturbed, calls on a physician. The physician sounds his lungs, examines his
heart, and tells the patient he is very liable to have the heart disease. The patient
asks him how he got it, and he is told that he is liable to catch disease and have
it for it is not a part of him, and to get it or have it or catch it is to admit that it
exists independent of himself. And though the patient be dead, yet it would exist
the same and others would be liable to get it. At last the patient really has the
heart disease which his physician described to him.
Now has he created it himself, or has the doctor created it for him? Now I
propose to show that he has made what the world calls heart disease himself
without anyone's help. To show how a building is razed is to frame one and then
take it down again, so I will take down this building, heart disease, which this
man has raised, and then he can see how ideas are made or raised. I will say to
the patient, You have built the disease yourself in your sleep of ignorance. This
he cannot understand. So I will tell him how he has worked in his sleep and
made the very edifice, heart disease that he has got. So I begin to tell his dream
by telling how he feels, in which he admits I am correct. Now when he was
asleep, or ignorant of the feelings that disturbed him, behold a spirit in the form
Of a doctor sat by him, and to and behold, he called up from the dead a person
with the heart disease, as he called it, and he handled you, and your sleep
departed from you and your limbs became cold and clammy, and your pulse
quickened. This excited your brain, and at last a figure of a person arose like
unto the one you saw in your dream, and then you were afraid, and you awoke in
a fright. At last the image became more terrible till at length it overshadowed you
and became a part of yourself, so that when you awoke you looked, and to and
behold the dream had become reality, and you had the heart disease. Now
whose was it, the doctor's or yours? Did you catch the doctor's or did you create
it yourself by your own reasoning in your sleep or ignorance, according to the
pattern set you by the doctor?
I say you made it yourself. Now to cure you, or to take down the building, is to
show you that all the feeling you had at the commencement arose from some
trifling cause, and that when I can make you understand it, I have performed the
cure. And instead of giving medicines or going to work by guess to destroy the
building, I commence by showing the patient how he framed it by his own hand
or wisdom. So I reason in this way. You listened to the doctor to try and
understand what caused the heart disease. He explained every variety of feeling
or symptom, and you listened until you understood it. Now without knowing it you
created in your mind the disease, as much as you would if an artist or mechanic
had taught you how to draft a building, and you would carry in your mind the
building and in your sleep would create it. The only difference would be that one
would please you, for it would contain wisdom, while the other would bind you,
for it would contain fear and threaten to destroy your life.
Your trouble is the material with which to build the building or disease. A
chemical change in the fluids of your system takes place, governed by your
belief, and you condense these into a phenomenon corresponding with your
draft. Now the fluids become diseased and your ingenuity in manufacturing the
disease has been the destruction of your happiness. To destroy the disease I
convince you that what the doctor said was an idea gotten up by error, not
knowing how to account for some little disturbance, which in itself amounted to
nothing; but by the doctor's mode of reasoning about what he knew nothing, you
were led astray into the darkness of heathen superstition where all kinds of evil
spirits and disease dwell in the brain of man. Superstition always shows itself
through the ignorance of man's reasoning, assuming as many names and forms
as the father of all lies, the Devil or the error of mankind.
1864
Truth I
BU 90:3, LC 6:138
How are we to determine what is a truth? The dictionary says it is conforming to
facts, veracity, certainty, exactness, faithfulness, etc. Now all this does not settle
the fact how to tell what a truth is. We wish to find some ways of testing facts in
order to know how to define the truth so that persons won't ask what is a truth.
Now the truth is like the word right; neither would be needed if there were not
something to change; but as changes are continually taking place, the discord is
called wrong. When all is harmony, that is called right. So right is a truth and
wrong is a discord. To apply the word truth to discord or belief is using it in
another sense. If two persons agree upon anything, they call it a truth, but the
truth is in them and not in the discord or thing believed. For instance, two
persons believe that there is such a thing as a ghost. Now if they believe it, it is a
truth to them, but it is not certain that the ghost exists outside of themselves. The
word truth used in this way applies to all sorts of error. But there is another mode
of testing the word scientifically. I will give a case where the right and wrong truth
came in, for the word is only to assert to what one or more believe. I will show
how I test the word.
A patient calls on me; I sit down by her. I feel a sharp stinging pain in my breast.
This I tell to the patient as her feelings. This she says is true. So here is a real
truth without a belief for its basis. I now tell the patient that she thinks the pain
arises from a cancer coming on the breast. The patient says, Yes. Now here is
another combined truth, for it combines the two: the fact that she believes she
has a cancer and that I know she does. But in this there is a discord, for I know
there is no truth in it, but the truth is in her belief. So the discord is in these two
truths. It is also a truth to me that there is no cancer. Now to destroy the belief of
a cancer is what I try to do. My reason is to destroy one truth that is founded on a
belief and establish health and then she will enjoy it. This is a truth and we both
agree to this last result as a truth, that she never had a cancer, only as a belief.
Language was invented to communicate a sensation from one person to another.
Now if there never had been any sensation, there need not have been any
language. So as sensation is the first action in matter or mind, it required some
way to describe it. So of course discord would make the idea. Then the opposite
is harmony. So every word must conform to this rule of discord and harmony.
Discord is disease; harmony is health and every person starts from one or the
other of these two bases. The word truth is applied to both, but if there was not
any discord, there would be no need of harmony, for before there was discord all
was quiet. So that it is a truth that there is such a state as discord in the mind, but
the discord is in us and not in the thing spoken of. The discord is not in the tune
but in those that hear it, for if there were no one to hear it, there would be no
discord.
Now there are certain things that would exist if there was not a man on the face
of the earth and certain things and conditions that would not exist, for instance,
our senses. When a man dies, as it is called, if his senses die with him, then
everything that pertains to man ceases. But no one would say that if every man
was blotted out of existence that everything that existed would go with man. But if
we look at it in the right sense, destroy the wisdom that man has and you destroy
creation. For with wisdom they are all as dross. For everything that moves and
has life is in wisdom and there is nothing outside of him. Now as wisdom sees
through everything, matter is to wisdom a shadow, but to man it is a substance
and yet man creates things that to the one that creates them are shadows. So
the ideas that man has created and brought into being, which cannot be seen,
are the things I shall speak of as being of that class I call discord, to which the
word truth is applied. The invisible world or the things believed in that have their
existence in an invisible world are as real to those that believe them as those
things that are seen and felt by the natural senses. And both have the same
identity in the natural world and are called truths and here is the error in
language. To make it plainer, I will illustrate.
Suppose I tell you a story that I know is a lie and tell it as a truth and you believe
it. Now to you it is a truth and you believe it, yet I know it is false. Now the
question is how shall man distinguish between the two? One is based on a belief
and the other on a fact, yet you cannot show the difference between them. Here
is the lack of language expressing the true meaning of what a person wishes to
express. It all arises from admitting a lie at the beginning. Then someone began
to account for some sensations after his own thought and told them as if they
were true. This error, once introduced, started up a sort of false reasoning, based
on an opinion or false basis. And from this false basis has sprung up all kinds of
theories of another world and God and disease. And as men have received them
as living truths, man assumes them as facts and all his wisdom is based on
them. This is called the Bible and if this false theory is not admitted, then you
disbelieve the Bible. So now the question arises, what influence prompted the
writer of the book or did they have any higher object than those men that wrote
about the rebellion of our day? We know that there are certain events spoken of
that happened before the New Testament, but did the people who wrote the book
believe that they themselves were inspired from any superior power over their
followers that they could not learn? Now to me every man when he writes has his
two influences, but when he has nothing to test his wisdom by, it is of no value to
the world.
1864-65
To the Reader II
BU 90:24, LC 6:159
In introducing this work to the reader, my only excuse is the existence of evils
that follow the opinions of the world in regard to man's health and happiness. My
practice for 20 years has put me in possession of facts that have opened my
eyes to the misery of mankind, from ignorance of ourselves. My object is to
correct the false ideas and strengthen the truth. I make war with what comes in
contact with a person's health or happiness, believing that God made everything
good, and if there is anything wrong it is the effect of ourselves, and that man is
responsible for his acts and even his thoughts. Therefore it is necessary that man
should know himself so that he shall not communicate sin or error that will
rebound to his disadvantage.
All my writings are the effect of impressions made on me while sitting with the
sick so that my book is of the lives and sufferings of my patients, their trials and
sorrows, and my arguments are on their behalf. It may seem strange to the well
that I write upon so many subjects, but when you take into consideration the
great variety of persons and the peculiar taste of lecturers, varying from the most
cultivated taste to that of the lowest intellect, it would not be strange if my writings
did not excite the curiosity of the reader.
For instance, one is all full of religious ideas and becomes almost insane, and
some are entirely so. This excites me, and my thoughts run upon religion.
Another will be almost insane upon spiritualism; then I have to battle that or show
the absurdity of that belief. Some are excited upon Millerism and believe the
world is coming to an end. This brings up arguments to refute their belief, some
upon witchcraft. Now their minds are continually dwelling on all these subjects
and on the Bible. So to cure, I have to show by the Bible that they have been
made to believe a false construction. My arguments change their minds and the
cure comes. This is my excuse for what I have said upon the Scriptures.
Some people are lovesick and disappointed. These are not a great many. Minds
are affected in various ways. Some are shipmasters. Their sickness is caused by
various things. But all mankind must be reached by parables so I illustrate by
such parables and symbols as they can understand. All my illustrations are called
out by the case I have to treat. Females are more spiritual than men; therefore
with them my illustrations are drawn more from the Bible than from any other
work. The medical science I have to use rather hard, for the sick have the most
bitter feelings towards the physicians and the religious teachers. These two
classes I have to come in contact with. The fear of these two classes makes the
patient sick. I have found this out by the effect the patient has on me. I have been
so provoked when sitting by the sick, with the physician and also with certain
classes of disease, that it was with the greatest difficulty that I could keep my
temper, and I had never seen the doctor or minister. But I always found that
when I would get the patients clear from their opinions, they would express
themselves in as strong terms as I had. I thought the fault might be with me, but I
am now satisfied that I was only the scapegoat to carry off feelings they dare not
lisp out but could not tell why. Therefore, as far as I am concerned, I have not the
slightest feeling as a man towards any person but error. That I have no sympathy
with. It is a hypocrite in myself and in everyone else.
You may say that I have gone out of the way to attack religious denominations. If
I have, the fault is in my patient. Everyone knows that some very pious persons,
when sick, are the most profane and talk the worst about the Bible. This is
because they are the most in fear of it; this is the cause.
With these remarks, I will leave this part of my subject and say a word or two in
regard to words. I differ from all persons about some words. One is "mind." Mind
to me is not wisdom but spiritual matter. And I think before you get through my
book you will think so too and be convinced of the truth of what I say. So far as
my education is concerned, I need make no apology. If I have learning enough to
explain my theory, it is all I want.
1864-65
Conservatism
BU 90:27, LC 6:162
Conservatism is the body or disease to be corrected. Error is its opponent and so
is science. Conservatism is opposed to both. Error is like a stream set in motion,
governed by no theory, only chance. Science is the wisdom that directs error.
Conservatism is the body to move. Now put language into these elements and
you will hear how they reason. Now as I said, conservatism is a disease. Error is
progression without wisdom. Wisdom gives direction to error and conservatism is
a dead weight or the thing to destroy. To illustrate it, take the application of
steam. Error would set steam in motion without any regard to science. Science
would instruct error. Conservatism would oppose both and reason in this way.
You can't make steam propel anything. Error says, I can propel everything.
Science asks how? Error can't tell.
Science explains. Error does not understand. Conservatism says, You both are
too fast; let steam alone and I will come out right but you are both wrong. But as
error keeps up the fire, the steam holds back till science makes the engine and
the steam forms and tries to escape from the _ _ _ _ _ _ yet it won't start. But
when science unites the steam to the piston, then the body conservatism moves
off in triumph.
Then conservatism says, Now this is just what I said. I told you to wait, the time
had not arrived. But now it has come. So the water is made into steam by the
force of error controlled by the wisdom of science. The steam never dreamed
that it had gone through any change, for steam is water, hot or cold. So
conservatism is matter or weight at rest or in motion and it never had the element
of wisdom in it. It is the element to destroy and it destroys itself as fast as it
moves. So with all progression. Take governments. All governments are like
individuals. They either hold their identity, body or government or they dissolve
and take new identities. The principles or science live. Take this government. Its
life is its principles. Its principles are progression and freedom. So it contains, like
individuals, the trinity or element of the Godhead, progression, without any
definite idea of any kind. This element contains also freedom. Therefore as it has
the element of freedom, it will not be bound if it can help itself. But as it has in
this element no wisdom, it acts against its own reason, for when it wants
freedom, it will enslave its opponent. Now as freedom is the principle to be
obtained, science has to direct error. So science is the only element that can
exist. All the other elements are always changing. This is death.
1864-65
Truth-Day and Night
BU 44:10, LC 9:102
Truth like fire is an element of itself. It cannot be divided. It embraces every
element of itself. Error is a compound of ideas or mind. The senses are in self-
existence or a knowledge of itself. All the foregoing exist in an invisible state and
can only be seen through a medium. Yet it contains within itself all the power and
wisdom that exists. It speaks matter into existence. It gives life to what it creates.
It sets bounds and makes laws. It creates and destroys. I am now speaking of
man as we call him. He is God on a small scale, and yet he is but one ray of light
from the great fountain of wisdom. I will now try to show how he, that is this
wisdom, creates matter or disease, for I shall show that the phenomenon called
disease is matter according to our belief. Divide man into light and darkness or
matter and wisdom. For example, we speak of tomorrow just as though there
was another day separate from today. Now the word conveys the idea of two
different days as much as though you saw a man yesterday and you also saw
him today, showing there was space and time between the two events.
Now the man was the same but the space and time was in you. So it is with day
and night. We divide up the year as a man divides a wheel. The surface of the
globe is divided into twelve spaces and each space into equal parts according to
their length. The spaces are called nights and the parts called day. So in fact the
earth is a great wheel whose circumference (in round figures) is 25,000 miles.
This is divided by twelve, not in equal parts; then each part is divided into days
and the spaces are nights. Now this we all believe, not exactly as I have stated,
because we never stop to think of it, yet we speak of day and night as though
there were two separate days. Now if we are on the day called Monday, for we
must be on the day, if on anything, when do we step off on to the day Tuesday? I
can't see myself stepping at all. The day I make by my education. The earth is
like an apple and man is on it and if he lies down and sleeps and wakes he is on
the same spot as he was, and if he chooses to call that sleep, night, to him it is
night, but the earth has no such idea.
Now suppose a man could get his light from some source independent of what
he believes and the sun's light had nothing to do with his light, would he divide
the earth's surface into three-hundred and sixty-five days and just as many
nights? No. Then you see that night and day are conditions of man. Now this
looking for tomorrow is like looking for disease. Neither exists outside of the one
that is looking. Then what need of being troubled about what you know does not
exist only as you make it. We are not aware that we are affected by our belief. So
if we do what we believe is wrong and our error will come to light, then we fear
the morrow because we have transgressed some belief. So disease is what we
are afraid of. We fear the morrow lest it come. Now true wisdom destroys the
darkness or night and it becomes all day or light. So wisdom destroys the
darkness of disease and we see its existence was in us. Then we shall not be
afraid of this imaginary day. Then we say, Sufficient unto the day is the evil
thereof. Let the morrow be as a condition of progress. See what will develop, the
progress of progression.
1864-65
The World of Science
BU 52:1
[orig. untitled]
What progress has the wisdom of this world made in the world of science? I
answer none at all and in making this bold statement I will try and explain what I
mean. Ever since the remembrance of man, phenomena have taken place in the
world, the origin of which has baffled the skill of the most profound scholars of
the age. They see the shadow and treat it as though intelligence was contained
in it. Its form, locality and growth has occasioned much doubt and questioning
among the people. And the wisdom of this world, not wishing to be considered
unable to give satisfaction to the various repeated enquiries, comes forward with
all gravity due to the profession to still the troubled waters by presenting the fact
to the world in the form of an opinion which says: The problem is beyond the
power of man to fathom and in order to give proof that no further investigation
may be deemed necessary, he is followed by priestly robes who displays them to
the gazing multitude by repeating the psalmist's words, Thy knowledge is too
wonderful for me, I cannot attain unto it. And the people with reverential awe say,
"Amen." Thus conceived, born and baptized into a belief is man's opinions, and
its offspring is the shadow or idea, the life of which is its light; and if its light is
darkness or ignorance, then the more fearful and dense is the darkness, and its
ignorance or false knowledge, which is seen, makes the shadow or trouble, and
the world calls it disease.
That which is made was made. Then if it was made, it did not make itself but
must have been made by a wisdom or knowledge outside, or independent of
what was made; and the wisdom that made it must be in what it made, under
whose government it lives. If under the government of this world or man's
opinions, then the shadow or disease is its offspring. And if man cannot
recognize that which he has made and sees, how can he teach his brother man
the wisdom of God or science which he has not seen? This world sees nothing
without a form and in order to make a form, there must be something to make the
form out of. The mind, it is said, changes; therefore it must be matter and is
capable of assuming any form or idea it pleases according to the direction given.
In wisdom or science there is no matter or form. We cannot see God or wisdom
in a form or idea. There is no darkness in it but perfect light which destroys all
darkness or shadow by filling all space. A knowledge of it leads this world out of
its false ideas or disease to perfect knowledge or health, which is the world of
science.
January 1864
The Effect of Mind upon Mind
LC 6:47
It is an undisputed fact which philosophy has never explained that persons affect
each other when neither is conscious of it. According to the principle by which I
cure the sick, such incidents can be accounted for, and it can be proved beyond
a doubt that man is perfectly ignorant of the influences that act upon him and,
being ignorant of the cause, is constantly liable to the effect.
To illustrate this I will relate a case that came under my observation. A woman
brought her little son of about five years to be treated by me. When I sat with the
child, I found his symptoms were similar to those which persons have in spinal or
rheumatic troubles. But the child, being ignorant of names and having no fear of
disease, could only describe his feelings in this way: he complained of being
tired. Sometimes he said his legs were sore and sometimes his head was tired.
To me his feelings were as intelligent as the odor of a rose or any odor with
which I was familiar. I described his feelings to his mother, telling how he could
appear at times. This she said was correct and feeling impressed with the truth
that I had told her about her child, she said she would sit with me and see if I was
equally correct in describing her case. I found that the mother had precisely the
same feelings as the child. Yet she complained of diseases which the child never
thought of and furthermore she never had the least idea of the child having such
feelings. To prove to her that I was right about the child, I told her to ask him if he
did not feel so and so when he would lay his head down, and she found I was
correct. These were the mother's symptoms: a heavy feeling over the eyes, a
numbness in the hands, weakness in the back and a pain going from foot to the
hip, all accompanied by a feeling of general prostration, etc. To her, every
sensation she had the child had also, but he had not attached names to them.
After playing, his leg would pain him and he would be restless at night, while his
mother reasoned from the same feelings that she had spinal disease, trouble of
the heart and was liable to paralysis. If she had been as ignorant as the child of
names, she would not have had the fear of these false ideas and the child would
have been well. For all its troubles came from its mother and her trouble was
from the invention of the medical faculty.
It may be asked how could the child be affected by its mother? In the same way
as I was affected. To have the sense of smell or any other sense requires no
language. An odor can be perceived by a child as well as a grown person. To
every disease there is an odor and everyone is affected by it when it comes
within his knowledge. Everyone knows that he can produce in himself heat or
cold by excitement; so likewise he can produce the odor of any disease so that
he is affected by it. I have proved that I can create the odor of any kind of fruit
and make a mesmerized person taste and smell it.
The ignorance of this principle prevents man from investigating into the operation
of the human mind. Such course would change the whole mode of our reasoning.
It would destroy society as it is now and replace it on another basis. In the place
of hypocrisy, aristocracy and democracy, the three orignal elements of society,
science, progress and freedom would be introduced. In his ignorant state, man
belongs to the lowest of the aristocracy, but as he becomes scientific, he
subdues this element and then the others are not needed to sustain it. His
science works out patience, his patience perseverance and perseverance
wisdom and the fruits are religion. Now the religion of today contains the
elements of society and they run through all its roots and branches and poison its
fruit. Science makes war upon this trinity and the war will continue until it is
crushed. Then democracy will be subject to science and hypocrisy will not
appear in the Ieaders. Then will come a new heaven or dispensation based on
eternal truths and man will be rewarded for what he knows, not for what he thinks
he knows. The popular teachers will then publicly correct the democracy of the
errors which make them sick as well as a political error. Now political doctors in
addressing the masses bind burdens on them which they, kneeling like camels,
receive and kiss the hands that bind them. This slavery is the will of aristocracy
and consequently it is not popular to oppose it. Therefore no appeal must be
made to the higher feelings but these base passions must be addressed.
Aristocracy never complains of oppression except when it cannot oppress. Its
motto is "rule or ruin" and where it rules, slavery is considered a divine institution.
Science is mocked at in its religion and the mockery is echoed by hypocrisy and
it sits in the hearts of the rulers and delivers the law. But science like an
undercurrent is deep and strong, and as its tide advances, it will sweep away the
foundation of aristocracy. Revolutions must come and no man can tell what will
be the end of this generation, but science will work out the problem of universal
freedom to the oppressed in body and mind.
I prophesy that the time will come when men and women shall heal all manner of
diseases by the words of their mouth. They will show the democracy that they
have been deceived by their blind leaders who flattered them that they ruled
when they have had no more to do with ruling the nation than the dog who is set
onto the swine has to do with his master's affairs. No slave either black or white
ever did or ever can rule. They both will fight for their master till they are
intelligent enough to know their own rights. Of all slavery, democracy is the
worst, for it is so indoctrinated into the hearts of man that it is popular and it is not
safe to oppose it. Aristocracy, its master, has given it a name which is superior to
every other, namely, the intelligence of the people, and to oppose this is to
oppose its master. It tells the people that they rule, while in truth, aristocracy itself
is the only ruler and it is the same with North and South, and the democracy in
both sections do their master's bidding. African slavery is kept in check by the
laws and democracy by the hypocrisy of the leaders. To appeal to truth with
sound logic is as unpopular at the North as to preach emancipation and abolition
at the South. The leaders would set the hounds on a person who would be rash
enough to attempt it.
Such evils arise from man's ignorance of himself. If man knew himself, his first
object would be to become acquainted with sensations that affect him. He would
then learn that a corrupt fountain cannot bring forth pure water and that from
aristocracy nothing but the blackest corruption can issue which, however, is
popular because of the fountain. From the dens of iniquity comes an atmosphere
as pleasant to aristocracy as tobacco to one who has been poisoned almost to
paralysis by it. Tell him it hurts him; the answer is, I know it, but I cannot help
using it. Such abject servitude is the medium of aristocracy, for democracy would
never have taken the weed had not the former set the example. All drugs when
taken stupefy the intellect so that science cannot reign. Error is a tyrant and
democracy his agent to destroy the progress and happiness of man. Show a man
who smokes or chews just how the habit affects him and he will part company
with tobacco as quickly as a democrat will leave his leaders when he sees the
corruption of their motives. A democrat is like a disease. He believes in
everything popular and opposes everything unpopular and does not regard the
welfare of his government. Let a man from this state in time of peace go South,
and if he is popular, he will be in favor of slavery; but if he honors the principles
of the constitution more than he loves this party, he will not be popular and
neither will he be in favor of slavery. Therefore, if he wishes to place himself
under the influence of slavery so that he will become a disease in the nation, let
him abide by the so-called democratic principles and denounce everything
differing from them as political quackery. Then he will be exceedingly popular. To
be popular in religion, praise the institutions of the Sabbath and the church. Say
what you please in the street about priestcraft and fear of man, only mention that
your family go to church and you will be considered sound. To be unpopular, be
honest in every act, treat others with respect, mind your own affairs and permit
others to do the same. Then like an old fashioned person you are out of society
and no one cares for you.
To be independent, speak the truth on all subjects without fear or vanity;
condemn error wherever it is popular; treat others as you wish to be treated and
let your religion be shown in your acts. Such a man will be envied by aristocracy,
respected by the wise, hated by hypocrites and listened to by the thinking
classes. He is at the same time popular and not popular. His style pleases the
people; therefore the aristocracy will be forced to admire him in order that they
may retain their power over him, for their rule is "keep as near a kicking horse as
possible." They will extol such a man in some things and condemn him in others
and thereby neutralize his effect on democracy.
Physicians will admit what the people believe. They will acknowledge I cure but
limit my power to a few nervous cases and appeal to the vanity of intelligence by
saying that it is not possible that an uneducated person can really cure actual
disease, etc. A political leader at the North appeals to the democracy in this way.
It is not expected that we at the North can equal those gentlemen at the South
who have devoted their lives to the study of politics. This is swallowed, for the
pronoun "we" makes it palatable, putting the leader and the democracy on a
level. Is this the way the Southern leader addresses the Southern democracy?
Not at all. He says to them, Those miserable Yankees want to rule over you
when you can each whip a dozen of them. Thus the demagogue makes
politicians of soldiers. This is the error of democracy which is really the
mouthpiece of aristocracy to which it is believed to be opposed. It is a stream
rising from a corrupt fountain. It trickles over the pebbles of ignorance and flows
down into the ashes of eternal monarchy. Politics, religion and disease are the
offspring of the trinity I have named and are the same combination of error. They
will exist so long as error exists, for they live on ignorance.
February 1864
Religion
LC 6:171
What does Jesus mean by the Kingdom of Heaven? We all know the common
opinion was that heaven was a place. Now some suppose it to be a state of
mind. Had Jesus either of these ideas? I say he did not, and will show what his
ideas were. God is represented as all wisdom and love. Now love is not wisdom,
but a desire for wisdom; therefore, a desire to get wisdom for the sake of
happiness that follows is the highest love. This is heaven and to be deprived of
this love is to be out of heaven. The sick are strangers to this heaven. It is true
they have a sort of love but it is governed by a false love or wisdom. It is the light
or wisdom of man. This leads to death but to have the true love or desire that
leads to wisdom, this is heaven.
Now as I have said, the sick are strangers to this truth and being strangers, they
are deceived into a false belief that lulls them to sleep. To cure them it is
necesary to arouse them from their lethargy and show them their errors. To get a
person out of an error is to destroy their error. This can be done in two ways, one
by ignorance, the other by science.
I will now give the true conversion of a man of this world or sick man converted to
the religion of Christ or cured intelligently, and also one converted from one
disease or error to another. I call all error disease that leads to death, and the
remedy is religion or a knowledge of the truth that will save us from the evils that
flow from our sins. To illustrate the different forms of religion is to show the
different modes of restoring the lost child of disease to health and happiness. To
show how Jesus differed from all others is to show each religion separately and
how the belief affects mankind.
All will admit that Jesus opposed all the religion or modes by which the medical
men and priests used to save the people from their sins or evils called diseases.
For to be diseased was an evil and the sick were dealt with accordingly; and the
false idea that the sins or diseases of the parents are visited upon the children is
handed down to this generation. This was the belief of the people in the days of
Jesus and to save them from their sins was to cure them of their disease. For this
cause Jesus came into the world, suffered and died and rose again that all that
believe might be saved from these sins and enjoy the presence of God which
was heaven. This was the doctrine Jesus taught.
Now what was the idea the world had of heaven? People never had such an idea
as the Christians have now. They never believed in any other world, but their
suffering was their evil and to be cured was their heaven or happiness. For this
object they employed every means in their power according to their belief. The
people were taught that there were certain rivers and pools the angels would
disturb and those who visited them were healed. Certain diseases were held so
sinful that the victims were kept aloof from the people till the priests cured them.
So their religion was all for their health or happiness. This idea of preparing for
another world never entered into their minds. It is true that there was a small
class who believed that at the end of the world the dead would rise. This belief
has been handed down from generation to generation so that religion was in that
mode which was used to restore them to health. This of course made them
happy. This to them was heaven.
So all religion was for the happiness of man, but their religion never extended to
any state after death. Now Jesus opposed their religion or belief so it was
necessary to destroy them to cure the sick, for these beliefs made them sick. To
do this he had to show them the absurdity of their own belief, so he called them
to him and said, Beware of the doctrine of the Scribes and Pharisees for their
doctrines bind burdens on you. It made them superstitious, made them believe in
ghosts, spirits and all sorts of juggling. This kept the people under the rule of the
priests who invented all sort of craft to deceive the people, pretending to take
away their sins so that God would not torment them with evil spirits and disease.
Jesus knew it was all in their beliefs, and if he could introduce a higher principle
or a better mode of reasoning or priesthood that could take away their sins or
errors so that they would be more enlightened he would be doing them a great
favor, and would establish a universal truth that would work out a more excellent
law. To do this it was necessary to bring proof of his superior wisdom. So it is
said, He came into the world, suffered, died and rose again. He was talking about
this great truth called God that governs every true and scientific mind. He made
two worlds: one the natural or superstitious man that they were all; the other the
scientific man. Now the scientific man was to rise from the earthly or superstitious
man. This he called a resurrection from the dead. Not that the dead rose, for if
you cannot get a man out of his error, there is no resurrection. As Paul says, If
Christ (or this science) be preached that it rose from the dead (or error), how say
some among you that there is no higher truth than man's opinion? As science is
spiritual, it must be explained by literal things. So he used parables to show how
this truth grows in the minds, for he makes the mind matter and sows the seeds
of wisdom in the mind. So he takes, for example, a little child before its mind is
filled with the errors of priest, as a figure of heaven. Not that the mind contains
any wisdom, but like the soil of the earth it is pure from foul seeds or error, ready
to receive the true seed of wisdom, guided by a higher development than the
priest. He says, "Of such is the kingdom of heaven," that this truth could live and
grow in the child. Not that the heaven or kingdom was happiness, but the
happiness was in the one that got into it. But as the kingdom grew, false ideas
would creep in, for it is not to be supposed that Jesus ever intended to make his
kingdom perfect till every enemy or error should be destroyed. So he likens it
unto a great many things, to a sower in a field, and an enemy sowing in the same
field. Here you have good seed and bad seed, truth and error, good and evil. But
the good was good, and the bad was bad, and they never mingled.
I will take a person as he would come to Jesus, and show how he preached to
them the kingdom of heaven. Take the little child that was tormented by the
devils that would throw him into the fire and water and on the ground. See what
he does. See if he ever said anything about another world, but asks the parents-
when they said they had carried him to the disciples and they could not cure him.
The cure was what they wanted. So here was the cure: Jesus asked how long
the child had been in this way . When told, he said, Do you believe all things
possible with God? They said, "Yes." So then he cured the child, not by a
"power" but by his wisdom, for he knew what he was about. So their faith in him
kept the child from having any more fits. All his cures went to prove his theory of
the mind. This theory of Christ was what he talked about. It was a science. So he
preached it and illustrated by parables, and proved it by showing himself to the
multitudes after they believed him dead. This truth was called Christ and when
Jesus spoke it he spoke Christ and the identity of it was a body and the doctrine
was its blood. So when he says, "If you eat not my flesh nor drink my blood, you
have no life in you." But the ignorance of the people thought he meant to eat the
man Jesus.
I will give an illustration. Suppose a person comes to me to learn navigation. I
say, "You must be born again, for your ideas of navigation are all false." He says,
"How can I learn or be born again when I am so old?" I answer, "You must be
born in the science, of navigation." This he cannot understand, but still he wishes
to learn. So I begin to explain. As he begins to learn, this is called the love that is
spoken of with which he so loved the world, etc. Now the love for wisdom
prompts him to learn, and as he learns his happiness is full. This is entering into
heaven. This is the heaven that God has prepared for everyone who will try to
learn, and if everyone will search for God or Wisdom, God will not cast him off.
I will apply this to disease. To me the disease is a lie or burden bound upon you
by the errors of the world. I take upon myself your infirmities that I may lead you
to health, for health to you is heaven. The love for health prompts you to come.
My love for you prompts me to lead you to health. This I do by teaching you the
errors of your belief and showing you where you have been deceived. The truth,
like love, leads you to see your error, and the happiness of your recovery is
heaven. People believe that religion is one thing and health another. This is a
false idea, and if you look at it you will see that to be happy is the chief end of
man. And now what is happiness is in what we think we have obtained. Take the
religion of our day: but that is a poor illustration of happiness, for the misery it
occasions is twice the happiness. We are taught our belief is one thing and our
health another. But it is not so. Man's belief is his heaven or his hell. You may not
be aware of the effect of your belief.
Disease is one of the evils that follow our belief. For instance, I will cite a case.
Take a young lady. Begin to tell her that her happiness depends upon her having
religion. She has no idea what you mean. So to convince her you give an
account of what religion is and show that she must get it or be eternally lost. This
makes her nervous. So you tell her to come to Christ. This to her is all blind. You
say Christ is standing with his arms extended to embrace her. Now for her to fall
into the arms of a stranger is more than she can do. So she weeps, not knowing
what to do. She becomes unhappy. This you tell her is the conversion of her
soul. At last she is made to believe she is not worthy to be a Christian. Then
come the soothing words of the priest and his words soothe her aching head and
she quiets down. Then you tell her this is a change of heart. Now she is in a state
to get religion.
What has been brought to pass? The young lady has been deceived into a belief
that has cost her all the happiness she had. It ,will be said her religion had
nothing to do with her health, but this cannot be the case for our life is nothing
but a belief and when this fact is known then people will begin to be cautious
what they believe. For every person is responsible to God or Wisdom for his
belief, and must take the consequences of his belief.
Now as I said, religion is a belief and disease or happiness is what follows. So as
all man have sinned or got a belief, the sentence of death has been passed upon
them, for all have sinned and come short of the truth. So this truth came into the
world of opinions to open the eyes of the blind, or appeal to a higher intelligence
to lead them to the truth that would cure them of their sins or errors. Now a
religion or a theory was to explain to the masses to keep them out of their
trouble. We suppose that Jesus wanted to convey the idea that man was in
danger of being destroyed after death, but if he would believe in Jesus he should
be saved.
So our belief depends upon our beliefs. Now what was Jesus' idea? Let us see if
Jesus' belief was founded on man's opinion or on the scientific fact that man
through his belief in the priest had been deceived. This deception had brought on
evils that were unable to destroy. The leaders of the South who have deceived
the people and brought forth all the evils we are now suffering from. They have a
God and a religion which upholds them in their wicked belief. The North also
have their God and their religion. Now Jesus' religion or belief was different from
this. He had no words or ceremonies but a love for the higher development of the
human soul. This was Jesus' religion and he put it in practice by his acts upon
the sick, not by giving an opinion of what he knew nothing but by showing that
their sickness was the effect of their belief. Now see if you admit that mind is
matter and to change the mind you remove the burden.
How often have you heard persons say that they are not nervous and they never
change their mind. That is as much as to say that they have no wisdom, for
wisdom changes the mind. Make a person believe a thing. The belief being
matter or mind is an obstacle to wisdom. This obstacle must be removed before
the truth can shine. If there is not wisdom enough to remove the obstruction we
say such a man has a strong mind. It is true he has a strong error to be
overcome, but his mind embraces just as much intelligence as a stumbling block
in the way of a train of cars. That must be overcome by wisdom. The dissensions
among the passengers represent the contrast between the strong-minded and
the intellectual man. One sees no way to remove the obstacle and concludes that
it cannot be overcome and settles down in the strength of his mind, while the
wisdom investigates the chances and sets himself to work to remove the burden.
As the intellectual man works, his mind changes; while the strong man sits and
contends that he knows, and when he makes up his mind nothing can change it.
The other is fickle and therefore has no mind or stability.
This is the case with disease. The belief is the burden to be overcome. In any
disease the strong mind means a man deficient in mechanical wisdom who can't
see whether the world develops him or he develops the world. The strong-
minded man is a man whom the world develops and he, not knowing the fact that
change comes with the growth, and therefore he never changes. While the man
of God or Wisdom develops the world, for the world is a universal truth, while
matter is a universal error. These two principles of truth and error make up the
extremes and every identity is in the one called truth, but the controversy arises
about the sensation made on this mind or matter. The strong-minded man's
foundation is in what has been handed down from one generation to another.
This to him is truth and the disciples of this are his leaders. So his wisdom is
based on their opinions and these, being false, are the burdens that the scientific
man has to remove, so that the conflict is not to establish an opinion but to
destroy an error. The error is the disease and the destruction of the error is
freedom from the disease. But the strong-minded man reasons as though you
wanted to destroy his belief and make him embrace yours. But truth reasons in
this way. Truth is a universal element of God and the destruction of error leaves
the man this element without an opinion, but with wisdom.
I will give an illustration. Suppose someone should say that a messenger had just
arrived and said that Washington was taken by the Rebels. Now the minds of
men would be disturbed and their wisdom would begin to create in themselves
burdens according to their mode of reasoning, except those who were bound
before. This class would begin to throw off their burdens, so each one's mind is in
action directed by their wisdom, governed by their love of party. So this love or
enemy would destroy or create trouble. Now when the mind is disturbed the
ignorance of our wisdom rises from what they know, and as the lower kind of
reason comes from error, there is no wisdom but fear or submission. This is the
element that man is afraid of. This is the element man worships and bows down
to and prays to. He worships it not because he loves it but because he is afraid of
it.
May 1, 1864
Death-A Scene
BU 42:12, LC 11:222
The impressions made on me sometimes as I am attending patients has opened
to me scenes of a future existence so plain that to doubt the truth of them would
be as absurd as to doubt my own existence. And these scenes show me the
absurdity of the Christian belief, for man makes himself the creature of his belief.
Life and death to him are as real as heat and cold. Now we admit that these two
ideas, life and death, exist independent of our senses. Then of course they must
have an existence outside of our senses or belief. Now I will admit that man
believes all this and he is responsible to himself for his belief and all the misery
that follows comes from his own belief.
Man is in his belief, although he is not a part of it, but is like a man's wisdom in
his works. His works contain no wisdom so his belief is the work of man's
wisdom; and if his wisdom is of man's belief, he is in his belief; and if his wisdom
is of science, he is in truth. Now I will show how these two elements take the
senses or man from the idea body. I was attending an aged gentleman who had
been rather feeble and according to the world's belief was gradually running
down. The lamp of life was nearly consumed. Now all his friends expected the
change, yet the time had not arrived for the angel to summon him to leave his
earthly habitation and be transferred to the world of spirits, yet they, like the
bridegroom, clamored, till the angel of death gave the alarm. Now it happened
that a strange vision came over the old gentleman. A nervous cough set in. This
was the signal of alarm and the angel of opinion gave the alarm. This roused the
inmates and fear fell upon all the friends.
Now I felt the weight of this false belief, death, for I could see no danger, but from
sympathy. It went like fire on a prairie till it enveloped the friends of the old
gentleman. This I had to put out or it would envelop the old gentleman himself.
Now I will relate my vision of what seemed to me to be a truth. Man's belief
contains something. This acts upon another and mingles with every person just
according to the evidence. So the sick are at the mercy of the world's belief. Now
the senses are not in the belief, so if the belief is presented to a person in doubt,
he is not in a state to resist it. So as the belief of the sick man was that his time of
departure was near at hand, he would throw from himself an influence that would
have a tendency to create distrust in his friends.
So as man's belief in death is a separation from the body, he will try to find some
resting place outside of his earthly body. So heaven is introduced. This being a
belief, we all without being aware create a place for our friends, and the first
impression is that our friends cannot live. This acts like mesmerizing a person.
The sick sit or lie passive, yet convulsed, and begin to show signs of short
breathing. This encourages the friends in their belief, till a sort of atmosphere is
created sufficient to bring up the spirit or identity of their friend and he rises like a
person in a balloon and is carried beyond the regions of this world. There he
floats in space, for their beliefs cannot define a spot. Now this cloud or ignorance
or belief I saw, and as it gathered around the old gentleman, it seemed as though
he sat upon a cloud ready to leave as soon as the cords of life were severed.
Now I felt as though I could locate an atmosphere more rarefied than death and
lighter than error's darkness. So I let my light shine into the cloud of death. Death
was swallowed up with truth and the cloud dissolved. The light took its place and
the truth prevailed.
July 1864
How the Opinions of Physicians Operate
BU 163:9, LC 6:1
No one knows the mischief or the misery that physicians of all kinds make by
their opinions, and this never will be known till man learns that his belief makes
his trouble. For instance, a person feels a slight disturbance at the pit of the
stomach. Ignorant of its cause, he applies to a physician. Here comes the
trouble. The physician assumes a false character. His practice makes him either
a simpleton or a knave, for if honest he would know that he could not tell
anything about the patient. If he were blind he could not even tell that the patient
was sick, so that all his knowledge is gathered from observation and questioning.
Therefore he is doctor only in name. He dare not risk his reputation by sitting
down by the patient and telling his feelings as I do. Therefore he knows he is
acting the part of a hypocrite. The patient is in the hands of a deceiver whose
business it is to deceive him into some belief that happens to occur to him. At this
time the physician stands to the patient like a tailor ready to fit him a garment. If
rich he will persuade him he has the spinal complaint, or bronchitis, or some
other disease that fits the patient's fears. If very poor, and there is no chance for
a speculation, he will fit an old pair of worn-out lungs onto him, just enough to
keep him breathing a short time. This is the way the regular faculty humbugs the
people. Now when the people are educated to understand that what they believe
they will create, they will cease believing what the medical men say and try to
account for their feelings in some more rational way.
I know that a belief in any disease will create a chemical change in the mind, and
that a person will create a phenomenon corresponding to the symptoms. This
creation is named disease, according to the author. The idea disease has no
effect on a person who has no fear of it. The small pox, for instance, produce no
effect on a person who has had it, or has had the varioloid, or has been
vaccinated; but on another it is not so. The doctor can produce a chemical
change by his talk. It makes no difference what he says. A phenomenon will
follow to which he can give a name to suit his convenience.
For instance, a person gets into an excited, heated state and a doctor is called.
He gives medicine which affects the patient and he feels better. That then was
what the patient needed and the doctor has the credit. If the patient grows worse,
the medicine makes him sick; the doctor says he has the symptoms of a fever,
while in reality he himself has been the cause of nine-tenths of the trouble. Give
men the knowledge of one great truth, that man is constituted of two different
principles: wisdom which is seen in science and error which is seen in matter and
in opinions. The latter is governed by no principle known to man but is simply the
action of cause and effect. If wisdom is the cause it goes with the effect, but man
who sees only the phenomenon puts wisdom into it, for the cause is never seen.
Wisdom is always the real cause. To the natural man this is a mystery and it is
not taken into account.
I will illustrate it. Take the small pox. The first sensation upon the patient contains
neither opinion, happiness nor misery, but it is like a breath of air blown upon
your face. The cause was one of the natural results of motion which might be
traced back through many changes containing no more harm than any breeze
that reaches man at any hour, but it gives a start to the mind like the fall of a
weight. This shock, although containing no intelligence, disturbs the senses
which is the real man. I will drop this illustration here and undertake to describe
the senses or the real man and separate them from what seems to be the man.
The senses are all that there is of a man. Therefore when he changes his
senses, it is necessary to know what he gains or loses by the change and also
what he embraces. To suppose a man has but five or seven senses is as absurd
as to suppose that he has but a certain number of ideas. His senses are himself,
what he knows and what he thinks he knows. Paul divides man into two
identities: wisdom or what could be proved by a science, and knowledge or what
man believes to be true. So when a man says he thinks he knows or believes he
knows, it is sure that he does not know as he should. But if he can prove his
knowledge by science, then his science is known to him.
A man's senses embrace these two characters, which are natural opponents, to
both of which life has been attached. The scientific man sees and knows himself,
and he also sees and knows his opponent, but the man of opinion can only see
the scientific man in a mystery. As wisdom advances in man, the effect is to
destroy the senses which are attached to knowledge. When knowledge
overbalances a man's wisdom, his error reigns, but if wisdom is in the
ascendency his knowledge becomes subject to his wisdom. In mathematics,
chemistry and all the arts and sciences that can be demonstrated, knowledge
submits to wisdom, but that part of man's senses attached to knowledge that is
not subject to science is in the ascendency in religion, disease, and politics.
These are false sciences based on opinions. They are the same that Jesus
denounced as false prophets, evil and blind guides who deceive the people.
These errors embrace that part of men that believes in sickness, death, another
world, and all kinds of superstition. They beget tyranny and selfishness in man,
and slavery and democracy in nations. It is the mission of science to destroy
these, and science will be developed till they are destroyed.
Therefore when man's belief in these opinions is at an end, his senses will seem
to be annihilated, but in reality he will be like the young eagle which has burst its
shell and soars aloft on the wings of wisdom, where he looks down upon the
earth and sees the natural man crawling like a reptile, waiting to devour the child
of science as soon as it is born.
Every development of wisdom, whether applied to creeping things or to the
element of freedom, is a child of God. Concealed in the egg of slavery, wisdom is
kept warm by the heat of discussion, but now it has broken its shell and assumed
a character and the enemies of freedom, like those of Christ, stand ready to
devour it as soon as it is born. But the mother of freedom will receive the child to
its bosom and will flee into the wilderness till the time arrives when the senses of
man will be so changed that slavery will be chained to the lowest grade of
brutality and there in the wilderness it will die and be forgotten. The error of
disease will go through a similar revolution, for it has been hatched by the
church, kept concealed by the medical faculty, while their absurd opinions are the
very food that has fed the child of science whose heel shall bruise the head of
the serpent, disease. These two characters, science and error are separate and
yet they act together and always will till truth reigns over all the dominions of
opinion. They are embraced in every man and their separation was the science
that Jesus taught. To understand the separation is eternal life in Science.
Jesus came into the world of error, not into Science, for he was there with
Wisdom. All science was with Wisdom, but when it comes to the world it comes
as Jesus did. It first comes to the educated but they, having no light to distinguish
between truth and error, cannot receive it. So it turns to that class which has no
prejudices, and here in the wilderness it develops itself until it has attained its
growth and then it comes forth. Then commences the war between the educated
who are ignorant of the truth and the science. While science is growing in the
minds of the people, its opponents are eating and drinking, gloating over their
spoils, till the tide of popular opinion sweeps away their foundation and they
never seem to realize their danger till their house falls over their heads. This has
been the case with the Democratic house; while they still hold to the idea that
slavery will be tolerated, the thunder of freedom is shaking the temple to its
foundation, and they hide themselves in the crevices of their belief, claiming, "I
was always opposed to the extension of slavery, but the Constitution must not be
violated." That is, you must not break the egg by the heat of discussion and let
out the bird of liberty, for if you do, democracy is dead.
The medical faculty reasons in the same way. "Do not destroy the medical
constitution," they say, "for you will let in a swarm of quacks that will get the world
in a horrid state. The regular physician will have no standing and sickness and
death will triumph over the land." The ministers also exclaim, "Do not touch the
divine institution, for religion is all that keeps the world from going to destruction."
Wisdom replies, "I will laugh at your fears, and I will pour out light like wrath and
cut you off from the face of the earth and give the earth (or mind) to a more
enlightened people who will obey the laws of science and teach others to do the
same, and you shall be cast into everlasting mistery." This is progression and it is
the religion of Jesus. It is the stone of science that the builders of religion
rejected. It is the star that guided the wise men to the only true God. Its body is
wisdom, its blood is its life and unless you eat it and drink it, you have no life in
you. Happy is he who, when a cloud of disease comes, for the Lord is always in
clouds of error, can say, I fear not, fear hath torment and perfect wisdom casteth
out fear. He will rise from the clouds and meet Christ above the opinions of man.
Then when the science comes you will not be harmed.
I wish to make you understand these two characters, science and opinions. Give
to each an identity like a man and separate one from the other, and then see
which you follow; for you must follow one. You cannot serve both at the same
time. If you serve science you are in your wisdom and know it. If you serve
opinion, you have no wisdom but your life is in a belief that can be destroyed. So
you will live all your life subject to bondage through fear of death. But if you have
passed through death or opinions to the life of science, death will have no power
over you. Disease is death and the belief is the fear; therefore if death is
destroyed the fear is gone. It becomes us then to search into the causes of the
phenomena called disease and find if it is not an image of our own make. The
Jewish people were making all sorts of false beliefs that tormented them. So God
through Moses says, "Thou shall make no graven images" to represent any false
idea which they had been taught, nor worship any superstition, for truth was
jealous of error. It always condemns our error and rewards our scientific acts.
Disease was conceived in priestcraft and brought forth in the iniquity of the
medical faculty. The priests prophesied falsely and the doctors flourished by their
lies, and the people love to have it so. Then the question arises, What can you
do to prevent it? I say, repent all, and be baptized in the Science that will wash
away your sins and diseases with your belief. Come out from the world of
opinion; and when a doctor says you have so and so, make him prove it.
July 16, 1864
Obstacles in Establishing a New Science
LC 6:9
The great obstacle in establishing a new science in the understanding of the
people arises from their ignorance. Science always has had to contend with this
difficulty, and no one has as yet been able to direct the mind of man towards the
true mode of reasoning so that superstition should dissolve before the advancing
light of science; for man has always been ignorant of himself, and his errors he
has fastened upon others.
These are two modes of reasoning, both true to the one that believes them, and
neither anything to the person that knows the truth. To the scientific mind, a
superstition about anything that science has explained is nothing. But to the
unscientific mind, it may be a truth. Now the science to be established is to give a
theory based on a truth which can be applied to a false mode of reasoning, which
not only can destroy it but can bring about a more perfect and better state of
society and sweep away the lies that, like the locusts of Egypt, are devouring our
lives and happiness. This cannot be done by any philosophy known to the world,
for the present mode of reasoning is based on the very errors the coming science
is to destroy. If Satan cast out Satan, then his kingdom is divided against itself.
But if wisdom cast out error then the true science will stand. I base my reasoning
on a stone which the builders of error have rejected. Mind is matter is the
foundation on which I stand, and this is rejected by the world.
Every idea having a form visible to the world of matter is admitted by that world
as matter. The reasoning which stands on this basis is one world, and scientific
knowledge is another. Science does not make peace with the world; it makes
war. It seeks not to save the life of error but to destroy it. It sets ideas at variance
with each other, the father against the son. It sets the world of matter in motion,
that it may like the earth be prepared to receive a higher cultivation. This has
been done in a vast number of ideas, but in the things that concern man's health
and happiness, the world is in Egyptian darkness. This subject never has been
sounded. The sole cause of man's misery and trouble lies in our false reasoning.
It always has and it always will be so till man is convinced that his happiness
depends on his wisdom, and his misery on his belief. True, he may be happy for
a time in believing a lie, but that is like a man finding happiness in taking opium.
It stupefies him so he is not sensible of his trouble, but it really increases his
misery. Mind like the earth is under the direction of a higher power which is
subject to wisdom. The world calls it God. These two worlds, wisdom or science
and belief in other words, happiness and misery, have their existence outside
the idea matter. To one matter is nothing; to the other it is everything. To science
it is an unexplained error; to belief it is a real living substance. I am now speaking
of the subject of health. I do not include any true science. But every science not
based on the rock I have mentioned must crumble if that rock falls on it, and
every idea that is rooted in matter and bears the fruit of misery must be hewn
down.
Theories are like trees and ideas can be grafted into them, thereby changing the
whole character of the fruit. Jesus engrafted his truth into the understanding of
the people by means of parables. Everyone knows that ideas can be sown in the
mind like seeds in the ground and that they will grow and bear fruit. The causes
of both phenomena are unknown to us, but to the world above matter they are
known. To wisdom, these facts are mere ideas, but to matter, they are solid
truths.
As I have said, everything having a visible form is matter, but there are things
into which the world has put life which bring no danger to man because they
contain no knowledge. There are others which breed misery, such as the ideas of
disease. These ideas must have their foundation in science or in matter. If in
science, why is science called upon to destroy itself? If God made disease and
science destroys it, then God's kingdom is divided against itself; but if this world
made it, it is not natural to suppose that this world will destroy itself. Wisdom can
set the world of errors at variance, and out of the war will come a new theory that
will enlighen the mind.
According to the world there is such a disease as the small pox. With God or
wisdom this must be a truth or it must be a lie or a belief in a lie. No one will
believe that wisdom or science can have the small pox. Therefore its foundation
must be in this world and it must be confined to the inhabitants of this world.
Wisdom teaches that error can create out of itself another error, the same as a
tree can bring forth another tree, and that mind or matter can generate itself.
Wisdom cannot create wisdom, for it fills all space. But it can shed its light upon
the world of matter, thus destroying the things of darkness and bringing to light
things hidden. I have said the small pox is the work of this world and its evils are
confined to the inhabitants therefore. This disease is like a tree whose fruits are
scattered abroad infecting those who eat them. It is a superstitious idea and like
all such it has a religious cast. It had deceived the world so that every person
was liable. Therefore Truth or God so loving the world sent (his son) the idea
"kine" pox into the world that all might be saved or vaccinated. As far as the small
pox was concerned, this was a savior and as many as received the virus (or were
baptized with the belief) were saved. Here is introduced another world or a state
of progress after death which is deliverance from small pox. To all who have
passed from their old belief into the world of vaccination, there is no more death
from fear of the small pox but a fear lest they have not been vaccinated with the
genuine virus. Now what does their salvation rest upon? It rests on no principle
outside the mind. In their ignorance of causes they are satisfied with someone's
belief that there is virtue in this savior. Thus their minds are quiet and the fruits
are a milder disease; and if the graft is put into a healthy tree (or child), to that,
according to their belief, it is a stranger.
This will apply to all diseases. Every disease is the invention of man and has no
identity in wisdom, but to those who believe it, it is a truth. All there is of man is
his senses and these are nothing in a belief or in wisdom. If everything he does
not understand were blotted out, what is there left of man? Would he be better or
worse, if nine-tenths of all he thinks he knows were blotted out of his mind, and
he existed with what was true? I contend that he would, as it were, sit on the
clouds and see the world beneath him tormented with ideas that form living
errors whose weight is ignorance. Safe from their power, he would not return to
the world's belief for any consideration. In a slight degree, this is my case. I sit as
it were in another world or condition, as far above the belief in disease as the
heavens are above the earth. Though safe myself, I grieve for the sins of my
fellow man, and I am reminded of the words of Jesus when he beheld the misery
of his countrymen: "O, Jerusalem! How oft would I gather thee as a hen
gathereth her chickens, and ye would not." I hear this truth now pleading with
man, to listen to the voice of reason. I know from my own experience with the
sick that their troubles are the effect of their own belief. Not that their belief is the
truth, but their belief acts upon their minds, bringing them into subjection to their
belief, and their troubles are a chemical change that follows.
Small pox is a reality to all mankind. But I do not include myself because I stand
outside of it where I can see things real to the world and real with wisdom. I know
that I can distinguish a lie from a truth in religion or in disease. To me disease is
always a lie, but to those who believe it, it is a truth, and religion the same. Until
the world is shaken by investigation so that the rocks and mountains of religious
error are removed and the medical Babylon destroyed, sickness and sorrow will
prevail. Feeling as I do and seeing so many young people go the broad road to
destruction, I can say from the bottom of my soul, "Oh, priestcraft! Fill up the
measure of your cups of iniquity, for on your head will come sooner or later the
sneers and taunts of the people. Your theory will be overthrown by the voice of
wisdom that will rouse the men of science, who will battle your error and drive
you utterly from the face of the earth." Then there will arise a new science,
followed by a new mode of reasoning, which shall teach man that to be wise is to
unlearn his errors. Wisdom cannot learn, but it can destroy.
The introduction of science is like engrafting. Every graft does not live, for some
have no life except what they derive from error. When you believe a lie in the
form of some disease and the doctor comes, he does not engraft into your
wisdom but into your belief, for wisdom will not grow in error, nor error in wisdom.
Each must have grafts of their kind. The small pox is a lie and so is the pine pox.
It is the offspring of the former, and the senses, becoming separated from the
one, cling to the other. Wisdom shows that they are both false and that they are
the inventions of superstition. Thus the world is vaccinated from one lie into
another, and this is called progression. But the time must come when this false
mode of reasoning must give way to a higher wisdom where all things are proved
by science.
I tell you a lie which you believe and an effect follows. This does not prove that I
told the truth because the effect is seen. For instance, I tell you that you have the
small pox. This shocks you and you are really frightened. A phenomenon attends
or follows the fright. The physicians are consulted and they pronounce the
disease small pox. To you and to the world this is proof that it is small pox, but to
me it is only proof that you believed the lie.
Now the question to settle is this. Can a lie act upon a person who believes it so
as to make him sick? No one will deny that I think. Nothing then produces
something, unless a lie is something, and if it is, where does it start from? Not
from wisdom, for if you say it is nothing you must reason in wisdom, for error
shows the effect is something. To me the lie and the effect are both nothing, but
to those who believe them, both are something. So when I sit by a sick person, I
come in contact with what they call "something." This "something" frightens them,
and another "something" is produced which they express by aches and pains
and other bad feelings. All these they think come from what they call disease. To
me this something that they call disease is a lie which they believe, and their
aches and pains are the expression of their fears and are like the moans of a
criminal sentenced to be hung or shot. Now comes the process of vaccination, or
conversion, which is getting them out of one lie into another. The doctor
introduces his opinion like a virus which being received into the mind, a change is
produced. And if his arguments are heeded, a milder disease is brought forth in
the new graft, and finally the person is carried to that state of mind called "safe"
or "saved." The priest goes through the same process. First he affirms his belief
till the people become alarmed. He then introduces his opinion as a means of
safety, and when this is received, the mind is quieted and this is conversion.
The world has been humbugged by these two classes till the sick are tired of life;
their substance is devoured; their fields of happiness are laid waste and every
kind of enjoyment destroyed. While the people are in this state, another swarm of
locusts come upon them to get what is left. These are the political demagogues,
the second growth that always springs up after the others get the mind troubled
and ready to be affected. These parties are the scourges that pursue society as it
passes through the wilderness of error to the land of happiness and science. This
journey that science has been traveling is dotted with little opinions where
wisdom has cleared up the wilderness and burned up the error. Wisdom never
stops; it continues and has now reached the wilderness of disease. And every
tree that brings not forth good fruit will be hewn down by the axe of science and
burned up by the fire of truth.
July 11, 1864
The Explanation of an Error Is the End of Disease
BU 48:7, LC 9:122
[orig. untitled]
The idea that the understanding of my theory is the cure of disease is a
stumbling block to the wisdom of this world. They can't see that to understand
what you believe is different from believing what you do not understand. Suppose
I say to you that the earth is flat and you do not believe it. Now if I ask you to
prove it is not flat, that is out of your power, unless you take the testimony of
persons that have proved to the world that it is round. I presume there is not one
man in ten million who could prove it either round or flat by experiments of his
own, yet every person believes it round and to them it is round.
Now suppose a certain set of philosophers start the idea that it is of some other
shape, just as absurd to the world as the idea that it was round was to the people
that believed it flat, and show evidence of their idea that it is out of the power of
the philosophers of our day to refute. Although they might know it was wrong,
they would be changed, not only their mind or belief, but to them the earth would
take the form of the majority's belief. You may say their belief could not alter the
earth. Was the earth round to the people that believed it flat? No. Then which
changed, the earth or the belief? Could you change their belief and still have the
earth flat to those people? No. Then their belief is all that we have to do with, for
just as a person believes to that person it is a fact.
This holds good in everything as far as ourselves are concerned. Now as you
have admitted that man can change his belief, you must admit that his belief is
something, in order that it may be changed. Now if my belief embraces my
senses and all that I know, then to change my belief I change myself. Now what
does a man believe in regard to what he does not see? If I see myself I know that
fact, but I can believe that I shall not always see myself. So what we see, we
know we see, and what we believe we do not see. Now the thing seen is the
phenomenon of what we believe. Suppose I ask you if you ever saw a person
with the heart disease and you should say, Yes. I then ask you how you know
and you would have to give some answer that was based on a belief, for your
assertion to me is only an opinion. Now I see the person and he says I have
heart disease. Now is it a reality or a belief or both? You might say his belief had
nothing to do with his disease, that the heart might become diseased and he
have no mind or belief about it. Then where is it? Can there be a phenomenon in
a person and the person know it and still say it is not a part of his senses? The
trouble lies in the false idea of ourselves.
Mind, being subject to the will, is always being changed by every thought. Even
our thoughts are not our own and in fact man is a combination of ideas that are
constantly working out some problem and we are all a part and parcel of this
great problem. To suppose that we act of ourselves is as absurd as to suppose
that a clock keeps time by the weight. There is an intelligence that governs the
world or man that is not known and this intelligence acts upon the belief, while
the belief is not aware of the fact. Now all man's trouble is in this element called
belief or mind. The phenomenon that we see is a fact. That is not intelligence but
the effect of intelligence. Here is where we fail in perceiving how the
understanding makes the cure. The doctors always address themselves to the
phenomenon; I, to the intelligence. I will state a case.
I had a young officer who had his arm shot by a minie ball through the wrist. The
hand became so painful and swollen that it was necessary to amputate the limb
just below the elbow. But still the sensation of the hand remained, and it was so
troublesome that he could not rest; his hand was in constant pain. The stump he
did not feel but the hand that had been taken off was as real as the other. Now I
suppose you would say this was all imagination, for the hand was gone. Now
who is to decide this question, the person that felt the pain or the observers? He
felt the hand and the doctor could not change his mind by telling him the hand
was gone. This was false in the true sense, for his hand was a part of his senses
and the phenomenon that could be seen was nothing to his senses; he had a
hand, and it troubled him. Now was the trouble in his mind or in the phenomenon
that the doctor had taken off? I say it was his mind and this was what he wished
to get rid of. Although he, to his belief, had lost his hand, his senses had not lost
it. And to cure or satisfy his senses, he wished to get rid of his hand, for it
became a source of torment. So I took hold of the stump and by explaining the
truth, I changed the mind and he cast the idea away and then felt of the stump
and became quiet, satisfied that it was better to have one arm and be happy and
well, than having two, and being in torment.
Now if I could not have changed his mind, he could not have gotten rid of the
pain or misery. So you see, the taking off the phenomenon called the arm had no
pain or disease in it, for it was there just as real as before. Suppose he had been
a child and his hand had been crushed and amputation had taken place. The
same effect might have been seen in the child. We think that our senses or mind
may not be aware of the suffering of the body, that the body may be sick and the
mind well. That is impossible, for the body cannot be sick any more than a steam
engine could be sick. The owner may be sick, so a child may be sick, but when
we speak of a child, we speak of what we see and not what we understand. The
child is not visible but the phenomenon is, and when we doctor the phenomenon,
we do not know the owner. The owner is where the eye cannot penetrate. Does
not every person in the room hear the clock strike whether he is aware of it or
not? In the same way mind is sensitive to every thought whether the body shows
it or not. A belief is something and if it comes in contact with matter, it will make
an impression. I might bring thousands of facts to show that disease is the effect
of our belief, whether we know it or not. How many there are who do not think
that they are influenced by others' beliefs, when it is as apparent as it is that the
sun shines on a clear day, and yet they will take their oath that no person's belief
affects them when in fact they are the mouthpiece of some belief. How often do
we hear this remark. I have a belief of my own. Now if they have a belief, it
cannot be a fact, so that their belief is in regard to something that they think
exists. So if you can make a person believe a thing exists, then his belief to him
is a fact, and this he considers as his own, although it is a belief.
This is the way disease comes. We are made to believe a lie and this belief
creates a phenomenon. This is the proof that our belief was founded in wisdom,
when we do not know that our belief is the very thing that changes the mind and
creates. Make man know this and then he will see that what he needs is to know
how to correct his mind in order to get rid of his trouble. This has to be done by
another mode of reasoning and this is my mode of cure: to change the mind,
believing that all our troubles are out of sight but the phenomenon is in sight.
Therefore never look into the effect for the cause. The cause can never be seen
by the natural eye, for man never sees the idea he is afraid of; causes cannot be
seen, only effects. The cause is the belief of what cannot be seen. The belief
affects the mind and a phenomenon is produced. This is called, for instance,
cancer. Now show how we get an idea into the mind of man and the process of
discovery rids the mind of the belief. And then the person is as free from cancer
as a person who once believed the eclipse was sent from God as a warning to
man to repent is, when he understands astronomy. The fear or belief is gone and
no phenomenon can take place. So it is with all diseases, for they are all lies and
to discover the mode in which they were made is the destruction of error.
Sunday, Aug. 27, 1864
The Opinions of the Physicians and Priests
BU 48:25, LC 9:128
[orig. untitled]
Physicians and priests, like politicians, have no idea of the effect of their belief on
mankind. All know that they affect the masses or they would not talk and try to
change their minds, yet they are ignorant of the effect, for it would seem too
much to believe that men would deliberately murder one another. And yet they
are causing worse evils than all the accidents by shipwreck and railroad,
collisions and every other conceivable thing; and still they seem to be perfectly
ignorant of the evil they are making. It is not necessary for me to say anything
about the troubles caused by this set of minds in regard to the rebellion, but I will
confine myself to my practice. I know beyond a doubt that most of the misery that
man has from disease is the result of false reasoning and the world will never be
enlightened till the thinking minds are directed to this one fact: that man's
diseases, as they are called, are the effect of false reasoning. This can be proved
by thousands of instances. I will give some of the instances that come before me
in my every day practice to show how disease is created and how little the
physicians know of the evil of their opinions. It would seem as though it were
intentional on their part, but when I see so much misery produced by them, it
must be through their ignorance. But I will give the facts and let the people judge;
then I shall take the testimony of patients as they understand the physicians.
I will give the case I had of a lady that came to me for an examination. On sitting
down by her, I found her very nervous and she had hot flashes that passed all
over her system. Those feelings I always take by sympathy, like all feelings that
contain ideas of disease. I can tell them from those that do not as well as I can
tell the sensation of water by putting my finger in it. Cold water to a child might
make it start, but no effect would follow its putting its hand in it; but if the water
was scalding, then bad effects would take place. So it is with the fluids of the
body. Now the fluids of the body are the material to be worked upon. This I call
mind and this is the starting point. The senses are something outside of this, but
being mixed like gold and dross we take them as one. So when we speak of the
mind, we apply it to the senses. But in this way, we deceive ourselves and are
liable to get into trouble, because to adopt this mode of reasoning, there is no
separating the truth from the error. Now one mode of reasoning combines the
matter or fluids and the result is what is called disease; the other mode dissolves
the mind or matter and destroys the phenomenon. So I have to explain. Man
does not go back to causes.
I have a patient that was very inquisitive and reasoned very fine. And if his basis
was good, his reason was correct. Now this man was laboring [unfinished]
Aug. 3, 1864
The Poor vs the Rich
BU 127:1, LC 7:96
Every now and then we hear of the rich oppressing the poor and these attacks
come periodically. Now why is it? At times we are quiet and then this disease, as
it were, breaks out again. There must be a cause for all this which never has
been known, else the disease could be eradicated. It generally makes its
appearance just before an election so that the cause must be in the
electioneering. Now are the rich so oppressive to the poor or is that a lure to
keep some designing politician in office? There is an element in mankind that is
overbearing and aristocratic, but it is not confined to the rich any more than it is
to the poor. It is an element in us and if we are poor it chafes us and makes us
envious. Give us money and it acts like a stimulant. It excites and brings out the
aristocratic element and we become overbearing. Our nature is not changed but
money stimulates our passions.
If we are poor and have no envious feeling, riches will not change us any. Like
intoxicating drink, it excites the ruling passion in man. Some years since there
was a political party called The Know Nothings. Now what gave rise to that
party? It was because the Democrats let the Irish vote, not because of the envy
of the poor towards the rich. There is and always will be a set of demagogues in
the country who are too lazy to work and too proud to beg, who are always
contriving to excite the poor and envious against the richer part of the
community. There is as much aristocracy in the lowest hod-carrier as there is in
the wealthy merchant. The one is poor and envious and the other rich and
aristocratic. The demagogue knows that his salvation depends on setting the
poor against the rich and he makes no distinction in individuals but calls the rich
as a class all aristocrats who want to grind the poor, and in this way these
demagogues get the votes of the poor.
The foreign population have been worked upon by these demagogues and the
Democrats have got nearly the whole of the Irish under their control and that
gave rise to the Know Nothing movement. Now let the poor stop and think if it is
for their interest to oppose the rich, simply because they are rich. All this talk is
just to create an excitement and turn some one out or to get some one into office.
The mere getting one or more persons in or out of office is nothing of importance,
but to set one class against another leads to bad results. This is seen by the
rebellion by setting the whites against the blacks which was only for the benefit of
the political demagogues. The rebellion was caused and now they are getting
their reward. All demagogues who would set the poor against those who are
giving them employment are doing an act that will some day rebound against
them.
To say the rich cannot live without the aid of the poor is erroneous. If I have
money enough, I can live just as I please, but if I am poor, I must work, beg,
steal, else die. Now if a man has capital and is willing to help the poor and thus
help and benefit himself, he is the poor man's friend rather than his enemy, and it
is as much for the benefit of one as the other for they have a mutual sympathy in
the cause and he who would destroy this sympathy between them is a low
demagogue and not fit to be trusted by any class. He sets the very element of
progression at variance, for if the rich will not employ the poor, it reduces them to
slaves, while the rich become an aristocracy. Beware of the demagogue who will
set the employee against the employer. You only see them just before an
election, at which time they have a great deal of sympathy for the poor, but all
they want is some office themselves or are tools of some one else who does. But
after election is over and the smoke clears away, you return to your employers
ashamed for having abused them when you had nothing in reality against them
and merely acted as you did from political excitement.
September 1864
The Senses (Sight)
BU 48:28, LC 9:241
When we see an object do we see it or do we not see it, or is it only the shadow
of the object we see? We often say we know a thing and find we are mistaken.
This kind of reasoning comes within the comprehension of every person. There
are things that cannot be seen by the natural eye and yet which are seen by
some persons and believed to have an existence as much as the seen. The
distinction of things seen and things not seen causes all the controversy of the
world, for what all agree to, there is no controversy about. To make it clear I will
illustrate.
The things that are natural are attributed to God, and man being one of the many
natural objects of God's work, he reasons in his own element which is matter. Yet
God knows that every living thing is nothing but his own creation and wisdom is
the author. Wisdom speaks into existence certain ideas and man is one of them.
To wisdom they are all as dross or shadows, and man, like all the rest, reasons
that his natural life is his real existence. Everything that God has made comes
within the sphere of man and this makes man's material world. Yet to wisdom it is
nothing but the shadows of ideas and every idea having the power to create
other shadows. Therefore, the idea earth is the foundation of man's reasoning.
Now out of this reasoning comes a more perfect man invisible to the earthly man,
for the reason of the latter is the foundation or earth for the higher development
of man. Now the invisible man begins his foundation on the highest development
of the natural man. In this world every idea that has formed in the natural world is
conceived or shadowed forth in the natural world so that everything that is
manufactured or shows the hand of man is attributed to some being or animal.
Now as God has made fish in the sea, so man has made ideas that lie out of
sight of the natural world and yet they are believed to have an existence as much
as the fish or wild beast of the forest and man is as liable to be devoured by
them. I will name some of the evils or enemies that