MISCELLANEOUS QUESTIONS

 

            UNDER this heading we have replied to a number of important queries from all parts of the world in the order in which we have received them. Owing to their great number and the amount of ground they covered Ave found it totally impossible to attempt any more definite classification.

 

            QUESTION No. 1. What is really meant by Metaphysical healing?

 

            ANSWER. Metaphysical Healing does not properly speaking mean anything more or other than the power of thought to overcome all physical derangement. Without entering into any lengthened dissertation concerning the reality or unreality of matter, before we can comprehend the theory of Metaphysical Healing we must understand the meaning of the term Metaphysical, which signifies “beyond physics, above physics,” and “mind over matter.” The above definitions are sanctioned by the best lexicographers. If then at the outset we simply concede the sovereignty of mind and the subserviency of sense we shall be prepared to logically admit that no physical condition can offer an insuperable obstacle to mind. An intelligent Metaphysical Healer who knows something of occult science may readily understand how every human thought is a magnet attracting kindred, and repelling antagonistic thought. If we think bright, happy, useful thoughts,

 

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we gather or accrete to us a force like unto that we send forth into the ambient psychic atmosphere, we thereby are related to whatsoever is true, pure and harmonious, but just as surely if we entertain sad, erroneous thoughts, do we draw to us mental influences of a darker hue.

 

            This fact is pretty generally conceded at present among students of psychic matters, still it is very necessary to persist in affirming this continuously, when called upon to treat those in whose minds, knowledge of spiritual law is at best but an uncertain-light.

 

            The germ theory of disease now so much in vogue in medical circles, and said to be in many instances proven by the microscope, offers no impediment in the way of accepting Metaphysical ideas, for the very fact of multitudes escaping when contagion is in the air proves beyond question that we must be in a receptive state, or we cannot take in bacteria.

 

            Now, while all physicians allow that susceptibility in one instance and non-susceptibility in another answers the query, “Why do some people suffer from infection while others escape?” it is only the Metaphysician who leaves the bodily condition behind and goes in search of a mental cause for such varied physical states. We do not deny that persons take cold and suffer in various ways because of their bodily condition, but what we do most persistently maintain is that physical states are invariably the result of mental.

 

            Seek the cause of physical susceptibility or weakness, in indecision, fear or some still worse emotion that has lowered the tone of your vitality. Succeed in changing the thought radically, and the physical state alters of necessity.

 

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            QUESTION No. 2. Will you define the nature of thought and how it acts on the body?

 

            ANS. To fully define the nature of thought and state just how it acts on the body would indeed require much ability, time and space, in all three of which necessary commodities we feel ourselves in the present instance, at least, sadly deficient.

 

            If “a word to the wise is sufficient,” we trust to all our readers being wise enough to let the following brief and humble word drop as a seed into the fertile soil of their receptive minds, in which it may quickly germinate like a grain of mustard seed into a prodigious tree. Thought we conceive to be generated by idea, through a process of mental friction; as two hard substances being rubbed together emit sparks and kindle flame, so two ideas, either two ideas of the same individual, or one of the individual’s and one of another’s coining together, produce a result, and that result we call thought, which is less than idea, though it must be a partial expression and outcome of some idea. We sometimes generate thoughts, and oftener still do we receive them; when we receive them we frequently call them impressions, but nothing can make an impression on us unless we are in an impressible condition.

 

            Matter is not necessarily a myth, but whatever it is, it is less than mind and is included in it. If matter in .its last analysis is force, then what is force? Thoughts are things, and therefore can be felt, and under favoring circumstances can be seen and heard also.

 

            A thought can strike your mind and wound it just as a stone can strike your body. By dexterous mental movement you can often dodge an unpleasant thought

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when you feel it coming, as you can avoid being hit by a stone flung toward you by physical dexterity. Those truly appareled in Spiritual sheen are like knights coated in armor of mail through which a bullet cannot pass. Again we must refer to occult science to prove our reasoning. We are constantly generating an aura which perpetually surrounds us. If this aura is of the higher type, the result of exalted modes of thinking and aspiring, it renders us absolutely impervious to the attacks of disagreeable thought, thus we become lifted to a region where we are no longer wounded or made angry by anything or any body.

 

            All outward things commonly called material are correspondences and results of things invisible, thus as our mental state governs our mental susceptibility it reactionally and ultimately determines our physical state.

 

            QUESTION No. 3. Can we treat ourselves metaphysically for our own regeneration in the same way that we can treat others?

 

            ANS. Most decidedly we can, though it must be admitted that it is a more difficult task to treat ourselves than others for the obvious reason that when we most sorely need treatment we are in the worst condition for giving treatment. Regeneration is a very large word and means vastly more than we can now explain in detail, but as it certainly includes the idea of development and reconstruction we can simply affirm and will content ourselves with affirming that regeneration is most readily accomplished by deliberately retiring from the outer world in thought as well as action, and then in some calm retreat at some convenient

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hour, either quite by ourselves or in company with some exceedingly congenial friend, fix our mind on whatever we most earnestly desire, and this object of our desire we must look upon with our mental vision as the artist gazes upon his picture, the architect upon his plan, the inventor upon his machine, as already perfectly externalized while yet not a single step has been taken in the visible execution of the design. Are you afflicted with grinding poverty, then see yourself in comfortable circumstances (we will not advise immoderately rich); are you physically crippled, then see yourself straight as a dart, hold the image of perfection in the direction in which you particularly seek it persistently before you, and if you will persevere in this mental exercise, most especially if you will insist upon seeing this image and none other before you at night before you fall asleep, you will soon relate yourself to a sphere of thought which will so invigorate your mind as to render actual in your body the condition you desire.

 

            QUESTION No. 4. Metaphysicians tell us to deny all limitations and affirm their opposite. Will you please tell ‘us how we are in truth in doing this?

 

            ANS. Regardless of what any persons may say, let every one speak and affirm what he individually feels to be the truth. No metaphysician should be regarded as infallible, nor his word placed in the stead of the voice of one’s own conscience; therefore, never affirm anything which you may deem untrue. Nevertheless as we grow in the knowledge of spiritual things we attain to a realizing sense of what we are in truth, in absolute reality, and then we find out that we are perfect

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and immortal Spirit. The whole secret of success in treating is to get oneself and patients out of material thought, i.e., thought about material things. When we realize our higher selves we do not think about our lower, and it is only in that exalted frame of mind that we can become oblivious to pains, vexations and limits and feel ourselves free as birds in the open air. We affirm literally nothing and we deny literally nothing concerning our physical organisms when we are “in the spirit.” You have probably all known what it is to experience at least occasional and transient absorption of thought in other things than those about you. The mind needs to rest and recuperate its forces by consciously bathing, as it were, in a spiritual ocean, from which celestial bath it returns re-invigorated to perform the varied and often irksome duties of the outward state; for this reason profound slumber, undisturbed sleep, is so necessary that insomnia leads to mental aberration. When you enjoy unbroken rest all night. you awake in the morning mysteriously strengthened and refreshed and often quite buoyantly happy. This mental elasticity is due to your having enjoyed a temporary sojourn in the spiritual realm unvexed by mortal cares. When giving or taking a treatment you need just this perfect release from material sensation. We can only explain it by saying that you must endeavor to travel in thought to the infinitely happy, free and rich; you must journey in mind to the absolutely perfect, and there bask in the light of the highest ideal which the mind can contemplate. Strive to feel that the immortal ego, the deathless I is perfect and possesses all things, and rest assured that only in this manner can you

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so relate yourself with the infinite as to overcome the limitations of the finite. Your ailments have departed, your sorrows have fled, your pains have vanished and yet you (lid not see or feel them go, but they went by reason of your mental posture; you took a spiritual sunbath, and the heat melted the ice and the light drove away the vapors. Place before yourself your highest possible conception of ideal humanity and you become negative to celestial and proof against infernal influence; you invite constructive and repel destructive force.

 

            You are well, you are perfect in your immortal being, which is the center of your life. Direct your thoughts to this true vital center and you will behold truth.

 

            QUESTION No. 5. You say every expression is a manifestation of God; disease is surely then a manifestation of God. Are not such manifestations necessary? If not, how can they be avoided?

 

            ANS. We do not say that every expression is a manifestation of God in a direct sense, but if we do believe every natural expression to be divine, Ave cannot thereby include diseased or distorted expressions of mortal error. Every work on pathology we have ever come across declares disease to be abnormal, it is never a natural and therefore healthy condition of affairs that is designated disease. Perversion produces the appearance of disease, and God is surely not the author of the act of perversion if He be the creator of the force which man either willfully or ignorantly perverts. Students of this subject can glean much under this head from the writings of Swedenborg whose arguments are very logical and whose deductions are very clear as to the cause and nature of so – called evil.

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The writings of Henry James, an ardent admirer of Swedenborg, can be consulted with great profit by those seeking light on this subject, but as the theme is intensely profound and at first sight intricate, considerable time and attention must be given to it before the problem will appear solved. To give a patent illustration, you may conceive of all things as essentially, intrinsically good. All is good, there is no evil, but though all things are in their essence good, every separate thing is good for something and not good (therefore relatively bad) for something else. Abuse is in harmony which does not necessarily imply imperfection or error anywhere except in the use to which an. instrument is put. The ability to err is doubtless a necessary part of discipline. We, do not belong to that school which looks upon all physical expression as a mistake, we contend only for the possibility of so learning to employ everything aright that evil shall be utterly abolished and discord shall utterly cease. When you are suffering the best attitude to assume toward your suffering is that it is a stepping-stone to a height beyond, you thereby rob it of its sting. The uselessness of pain adds to its bitterness. Make it serve an end, transmute it, regard it as a consequence of some past experience remembered or forgotten, and, therefore, a factor in education. But whenever obstacles and sorrows present themselves remember we encounter them only to gain strength by rising superior to them. What we cannot agree to is the theory that we should tamely submit to be crushed by them and call our weakness the will of God. We can only avoid falling into misery in the future by learning wisdom from past experience

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and so conducting ourselves mentally as to draw to us only purely healthful and beneficent influences.

 

            QUESTION No. 6. Is the laying on of hands ever advisable?

 

            ANS. The laying on of hands is advisable when you feel it to be so, i.e., when you feel an influence unmistakably good impelling you to so act. The word hand is frequently used in Scripture in a figurative sense, and thus it is often straining a point to infer that whenever the phrase “laying on of hands” is met with, it signifies any form of bodily contact. We do not wish to appear illiberal, therefore, we are particularly careful to state frequently in public places, that we know many healers do great good who lay on hands in treating, at the same time we are most careful to state that in our opinion it is not the act of manipulation, but a spiritual force going with it that accomplishes the cure.

 

            If one is confined to any external mode of action, one’s usefulness becomes painfully confined, for this reason we do not advocate manipulation. Then, again, bodily contact is often productive of two serious evils in the first place, it renders the patient’s mind too active on the outward plane, and second, it frequently exposes the healer to the danger of contagion. We would, however, allow the utmost reasonable latitude in all such matters. No one should strive to be a law unto another. If you treat in the way you conscientiously feel to be best, the divine blessing will accompany your effort, whatever it may be. Pure motive is the essential need, and wherever the intent is pure, good must follow.

 

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                QUESTION No. 7. Of what use to an animal is the suffering that it endures? We can understand that our suffering raises us spiritually, and that it is through us that animals suffer, but as one creature ought never in justice to be sacrificed to another, the suffering that we cause them to undergo ought in someway to benefit them.

 

            ANS. There is indeed much room for speculative inquiry with regard to this interesting and complex subject, and it would be no difficult task for us to occupy many pages in a labored attempt at its satisfactory elucidation. Desiring, however, to be as brief and practical as possible, we will content ourselves with remarking that the whole gist of theosophical teaching is to the effect that everything is slowly wending its way -upward to a higher expression than has yet been evolved. If the theory of involution be studied in connection with evolution, it will be comparatively easy to trace the benefit accruing to all sentient creatures from the sufferings to which they are involuntarily subjected. Woe is ever pronounced against him by whom an offence cometh, not against those who are the victims of such offence. Inexorable divine justice through the perpetual out-working of the undeviating law of Karma or consequence ordains that those who perform an act of cruelty alone suffer for such act in the long run. Appearances are often so deceitful, and it is so hard for us to clearly distinguish between real and apparent loss, that we often fail in seeming evil to trace the good, but all unmerited suffering, i.e., all suffering not brought upon ourselves by folly of our own, redounds inevitably to our highest interest by accelerating the processes of our development, and let us remember that the law of Karma works in the animal

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as well as in the human kingdom. Animals as well as men, are all traveling on to a higher borne than they have yet attained, and as this is a fact known to those familiar with the ancient wisdom now being presented to the world at large, the problem is solved, immediately we see the law of compensation operating on behalf of animals as well as men. Dr. Anna Kingsford, that noble woman and true Theosophist who did so much to enlighten the world on the true basis of moral conduct, argued with overwhelming force against the eating of flesh and particularly against vivisection on the score of these practices being subversive of the highest interests of human welfare, as they are in flagrant opposition to our deepest moral instincts, but though we who err must incur a penalty in our own deterioration until we have expunged our fault with bitter suffering, the innocent victims of our inordinate selfishness only lose their mortal envelopes and doubtless in every case receive an impulsion forward through the sad experience which has removed their outward forms. No philosophy which does not carry the thought of infinite retributive justice in every department of the universe can be ultimately satisfactory to mankind, and for this reason, if for no other, we should defend the doctrine of a future existence for animals and allot their sufferings a place in the order of their progression.

 

            QUESTION No. 8. Are not consequences of human experience often totally disproportionate to the error which induces them? as for instance, a man mistakes a toadstool for a mushroom and dies in consequence.

 

            ANS. No act can possibly be solitary and unrelated to other and previous acts, therefore the gathering

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or eating of a toadstool in mistake for a mushroom and being poisoned in consequence is am experience which can only be correctly understood by one who has traced out the relations of cause and effect to an extent far beyond the attainments of the majority. Say that the act standing alone is a very trivial mistake, a simple error of judgment in no sense criminal, a philosophical inquiry of momentous import at once presents itself, viz., what has induced a state of mind rendering such an error possible? Is not the ostensible act only the first visible expression of perhaps a very long and important chain of unknown antecedent causes? If the spiritual perceptive faculty was in any way keen such a mistake could not occur, and why is not the intuition keen enough to avert such a catastrophe, is a very pertinent query in this connection. We continually attribute the gravest consequences to the most trivial acts solely because we do not see behind them into the mysterious past whence they sprang. We see a flash of lightning and hear a clap of thunder, these are the first intimations we often have of a terrific storm which has been, all unknown to us, for a long time slowly brewing. We are out in the storm without even a wrap or an umbrella, totally unprotected, surprised and at the mercy of the raging elements, or we are in a railway carriage or on a steamboat and an accident overtakes us so suddenly that we are instantly maimed beyond probable recovery. These things we say are casualties which cannot be prevented, and yet in every instance had we only developed our psychic perception to an extent we have not as yet clone, we should have been forewarned, forearmed, protected, or in some manner saved entirely

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from the affliction which has befallen us. Belief in special providence and absolute miracles has arisen entirely from a failure to account for exceptional occurrences in the light of relative psychic culture.

 

            QUESTION No. 9. Do we understand you to maintain that accidents as well as diseases are all preventible and therefore quite unnecessary?

 

            ANS. Accidents are invariably the result of folly or ignorance when they are not the fruits of lawlessness or crime. An accident must have a cause, it must be the effect of something, it does not originate through the arbitrary caprice of God, neither is it a freak of fortune. What occasions for the most part those events commonly termed accidents? Drunkenness, frenzy, fear and a host of other vices and follies coupled with recklessness and a lack of skill on the part of somebody, will account probably for 90 per cent., while the remaining 10 per cent., even though seemingly beyond human control, are simply beyond that limit of control which ordinary men and women have yet gained over their surroundings. Now we wish particularly to call our readers’ most careful attention to the following important proposition, which is that all mishaps are avertible, provided we are sufficiently developed spiritually to heed those numerous and instructive warnings which invariably precede disaster. Just as the weather prophet can, by scanning the face of the sky, which others can not read, foretell the impending tempest, just as the shrill whistle or clanging bell signals the arrival or departure of a train though a deaf person hears no sound at all, so unseen, and to the ear of flesh inaudible influences are perpetually

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warning us to get out of danger’s way, but alas, the prenez garde of our unseen friends is heard by comparatively few of earth’s children. The great practical advantages attending and resulting from psychic culture are that with our interior vision more fully opened we shall be able to see things in their true proportions, and thus avoid making mistakes and falling into pits of needless sorrow. The following clipping from the Golden Gate serves to illustrate in some measure what we are seeking to convey. The editor of that valuable weekly says: “One of the first fruits of the ‘gift of the spirit’ is that of being able to sense the spiritual status of those with whom one comes in contact. He reads his fellow-beings, whenever lie chooses to do so, as from an open book. He can not tell you how or why, but he knows, and that knowledge is almost infallible. In the higher unfoldment of this wonderful faculty one may ever know in whom to put his trust. Armed with this power how many of ‘the rocks and shoals of time’ may be avoided.” If this be true, as it unquestionably is in the main, in all particulars, can not we easily extend our view of this entrancing subject until it embraces a realization that we can so foresee coning events as to avoid painful experiences? The literature of clairvoyance abounds in striking illustrations of this power, but until recently the prevalent opinion has been that clairvoyance in its widest sense is a special gift, a dower bestowed by heaven on a few, but utterly unobtainable by the many. The present trend of advanced spiritual thought is toward the demonstrable conclusion that every one can in some measure develop his own inner nature so far as to be

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able to anticipate danger and thus avoid it. There is nothing arbitrary in the scheme of the universe. Immutable law shows no favoritism. He who has ears to hear and eyes to see can walk securely, and those who, mentally and spiritually speaking, are as yet well nigh destitute of these fundamental organs of perception can by diligent prosecution of befitting methods develop these much-to-be desired avenues of information.

 

            QUESTION No. 10. Is it possible for a healer to remove a patient’s desire for liquor or love of tobacco without the person knowing it?

 

            ANS. It is not possible for the patient to get rid of any habit unless he makes an effort. But how is the patient to be induced to make the effort? As effort is necessary on the patient’s part, you must treat him with a view to his making the effort. You must break down all indisposition. When persons will not work, idleness is their disease; you therefore have to treat for idleness. Many treaters fail because they hold their patients in error. They seem to settle down under the conviction that their patient is not willing to be convinced. If you hold any thought of idleness over any idler it makes him still more idle; your belief that he will remain in error strengthens the bond of sin around him. What we have to do in such cases is to treat ourselves for our beliefs concerning our patients. That seems to be the hardest work of all, for many practitioners. They can only with great difficulty obey the wise injunction, “Physician, heal thyself.” Ladies have often come to us and said their mothers or other relatives never would accept spiritual truth; there was a statement most unspiritual and groundless. Married women have

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often said: “My husband never will accept the truth.” What influence do you suppose people exert over their companions by entertaining such views of them? If they are giving them treatments they are certainly malpracticing. A daughter takes to her mother the ilea “that she never will look favorably at certain things, and while the daughter is crying over this, her own belief, the mother is kept in a state of antagonism by the unconscious mental influence of the daughter. A woman going around telling of her husband’s untruthfulness, keeps him untruthful, though of course she is not aware that her conduct keeps him from improvement. If a person is given to drinking or smoking and you tell everybody so, though you are not aware of so doing, you are keeping the one you wish to see reformed under bondage and preventing his reformation. Healers must pluck the beams out of their own eyes ere they can see clearly to cast the motes out of their brother’s eyes. It is limitation in ourselves that we have to fight against. You can not successfully treat au person whom you hold in false belief. You must hold no less favorable thought than that your treatment is inducing the patient to make all necessary effort, and treatment does not take genuine and permanent effect unless patients make efforts themselves to hold their lower appetites in rightful subjection, only if you always hold good thoughts do you treat in the right way. It is certainly easier to lay blame upon others than upon ourselves, but Jesus had no patience with such self-flattery. Some of his disciples complained to him that a certain person could not be cured, and he said to them in reply: “O ye of little faith!

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if you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you can say to mountains, be removed and cast into the sea, and it shall be done, and nothing shall be impossible with you.” If we only break ourselves of this detestable habit of holding our brethren in error, if we persistently hold mental pictures of harmony before our eyes we shall soon be universal public benefactors. Put so long as we acknowledge and dwell upon error in others, we impose limitations upon them and prevent them from making the effort they otherwise might in the right direction; we disqualify ourselves from helping them to make the necessary effort. If our mind reaches them it holds them in error, and as we encourage erroneous thought concerning others, it holds us in error. We must not think toward any one. I wish you would make an effort, but I feel sure you will not. Encourage only the thought that sees them perfect. We must see mentally whatever we desire as accomplished already. Just as the artist sees his picture in mind before it is put on canvas. It is complete, mentally, before he takes up pencil or brush. So in the mind of an architect, the perfect building is seen. It is all completed before the draughtsman touches pencil, or the first stone of the material fabric is laid. So before the first really practical and effective step has been taken toward the improvement of your patient, you must see him in thought perfectly well. By holding this mental image you do the thing necessary to make him appear well. First, see him perfectly well in mind, then set to work to build the external in harmony with the mental design.

 

            QUESTION No. 11. What effect has treatment upon the law of Karma?

 

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                ANS. Whenever treatment takes effect, it causes the patient to make good Karma. If the patient had never made any bad Karma in the past, lie would not be feeling ill now. Karma manufactured in the past has borne fruit in the present. We are what we are in consequence of what we have been. Successful treatment is to so act upon a patient as to cause him to make good Karma, and that destroys bad Karma. The past being irrevocable, you find different patients in very different conditions of receptivity when you first treat them. As you succeed in bringing them out of bad conditions you succeed in helping them to make good Karma, which is only the Buddhistic name for what the Christian calls a good life. You can produce the result of good Karma by inducing the patient to follow truth instead of error.

 

            [NOTE.—Karma, only means consequence, and is a Sanscrit term employed chiefly by those designating themselves Theosophists, who study Oriental works of mystical import.]

 

            QUESTION No. 12. Is it always possible in the present stage of development to overthrow crime?

 

            ANS. If you feel after earnest effort to overcome it that it is not possible in the case of a certain patient you may conclude that it is no part of your particular work to treat that particular patient. We have often to make a selection, for we cannot treat everybody. It you feel you cannot hold a certain individual in the highest and purest thought, then leave the case alone. Acknowledge that it may be no part of your special work. We have had many experiences where we have felt: Well, whether a desired result can be attained or not, we shall not attempt to decide, but it is clearly no

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part of our special work to bring it about. Therefore we don’t take in hand such a case at all, but are perfectly willing any one should, who feels it is part of his Mission to do so. We do not know to what extent every cue can be influenced, but one thing we do know, and that is that we can never influence patients for good until we can hold them in the thought of good. When we have reached a plane of perfect good we can perhaps hold all others on that high level. There seems to be no definite Karmic limitation mentioned in the New Testament. Jesus was astonished at lack of faith, he wept over Jerusalem and cried, “Oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!” We do not believe any one is obliged to make bad Karma. We do not believe any one is obliged to reject truth, but all have liberty to do so. If we deliberately reject truth when presented to us we voluntarily create evil Karma. If it appears that Karma sometimes operates so as to prevent certain persons from seeing truth, you as healer may be perhaps allowed to feel: “Well, I have done my duty, I must leave results to God.” Sometimes you may have to shake dust off your feet. Jesus said, “Go ye into all, the world, preach the gospel to every creature.” The preacher must be swayed by no doubt as to whether some people can receive his message whilst others can not. If we entertain a belief that some people cannot be healed, we impose limitations upon ourselves we should be much better without. If we do our duty faithfully we shall always be blessed. If you undertake some cases and fail, (as you say,) you

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do not fail utterly because you have certainly been of some use to the person you treated and to humanity at large. You have sown good seed. Whenever a person speaks a good word, though it ma not male any appreciable impression upon the person for whom it was intended it effects somebody for good, we know several cases in point, one of which we will quote: Two ladies were walking on the street, one of them pleading earnestly with the other. A woman whom neither of them saw or knew anything about was walking behind them, and her whole future was changed by what she overheard. We never know the extent of our audience. We cannot tell when treating how many minds we are reaching. Do not narrow down your treatment to a single patient, but remember always that our work is bound to be of service to humanity at large in ways too subtle for objective analysis many times. Only by doing good to others can we make good Karma for ourselves.

 

            QUESTION No. 13. What would be your explanation of poison coming from minerals or vegetables?

 

            ANS. Because of their being improperly used. A taxidermist finds arsenic very useful in stuffing birds. Tie has no disagreeable thought with regard to arsenic. He knows it is not intended for food. He knows if lie puts it where it does not belong it will become relatively evil. Every so-called evil thing must be put in its own place and allowed to do its appointed work, then will it prove itself good in its manner. The thought of poison in plants and minerals proceeds from a derangement in ideas. Everything has its place. Certain things fit into certain grooves. When error

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results discord must have been created. Looking at poisons from another point of view Mrs. Grimke says: “If there were no calumny in mortal mind there would be no arsenic in visible effect.” Many say there would be no poisonous plants if erroneous states of mortal mind had never caused them. Some people kill valuable plants by destructive thoughts, others again sustain noxious weeds. We know a lady who can make nothing but weeds grow in her garden. Another lady’s garden has no weeds. It simply comes to this: The emanations from the one lady nourish weeds, while the emanations from the other nourish flowers. Of course there is truth in the theory of magnetism, but magnetism is primarily spiritual or mental power. If any one benefits another by magnetism, it is really by mental action or thought transference. Magnetism far too often associated with material beliefs which convey ideas not in harmony with spiritual science. It seems to us that, taking the world as it is, we can justly entertain three ideas concerning poisons. In the first place, everything is good provided it is rightfully related, and not otherwise. Therefore you do not think of eating everything. And if you do not eat everything you use, why should you eat certain vegetables, or take certain minerals into your system? Then another view is, that everything is produced in obedience to a state of mind we sometimes recognize, but often fail to recognize, and so long as certain states of mind continue so long will their expressions continue. If we cultivate higher thoughts we shall starve out poisonous plants and animals. If such gigantic creatures as the mammoth and mastodon no

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longer exist, why should not poisonous insects, reptiles and plants die out? They certainly will ultimately disappear under the law of the survival of the fittest. The third view is that all these things need not affect or move us. We are so far superior to all minerals, vegetables and animals that if we only realize our true relation to God, and also understand our right relation to the inferior or external world, we shall be always safe. In treating one who has been poisoned you must make your patient fully realize his relation to God, he must also realize his relation to the external universe. Your relation to your friends in truth is that of co-operative harmony. Your relation to angelic influences is that of true spiritual communion. But your right relation to every form of error is the relation of controlling power to the thing controlled. Many people talk about mind and matter so as only to confound language. They say matter is negative and spirit positive, but after they have declared this they make spirit negative, and matter positive. They say matter can influence mind and make persons ill. They affirm that influences below man can overcome man. But there can be no real health apart from spiritual understanding, the understanding and realization that we are children of God. When Ave truly realize our sonship to the Eternal we can completely subdue all below us; we are then in a condition not to dread reptiles and other creatures equally below us. In that state, if a viper lighted upon your arm it could not harm you any more than it hurt Paul. Our most effective work consists in exorcising demons from our own breasts. If we practiced stricter self-discipline or

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self-control we should soon render ourselves invulnerable and no longer care for lower things. We should then no longer dread the viper or the upas tree. We might remove them for the sake of others, but we should ourselves be in no danger from them. When we get on the high ground of spiritual victory we have outgrown the infantile condition of the mind which, being negative even though innocent, renders its possessor susceptible to danger.

 

            QUESTION No. 14. Do you think one mind can rise superior to the universal mind in relation to poison?

 

            ANS. There is no universal mind except the mind of deity and God’s mind is alone infinite; when we trust God fully we become one with God. One finite mind alone can not resist all danger. When you realize your relation to God you feel the force of the words, “I and my Father are one.” The infinite can surely overcome the finite, but the finite can not vanquish the infinite. You say when in the bondage of sense and therefore fear the strength of evil, “I am but one mind contending against a host of minds.” But is it not easier for you to contend against all there is of finite mind than against the infinite mind of God? God is on the side of health and good, disease is opposed to Him, fear of poison is rebellion against the mind of God, or at least it is utter distrust of God’s sovereignty. Trust in God is necessary to our deliverance from fear. If we don’t trust we remain in fear, because we think of the multitude of evil influences about us. But how many good angels are there? Are there not more angels than devils in the universe? Then why should anyone be overcome by evil? Which is the stronger – evil or good?

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good? Health or disease? Poison or spiritual influx? If we only turn our thoughts to angels instead of devils; if we only think of the power of God instead of the power of evil, we gain the victory. A young man in ancient story was affrighted when he saw the enemy, but when lie saw the host of God he feared the enemy no longer. David never was so strong physically as Goliath, but when Goliath attempted to fight David lie was conquered. If David had trusted in any other power than the divine he could not have conquered Goliath. If you have intelligently read Bulwer Lytton’s story, The Coming Race, you will know that the vril he speaks of as being carried in little frail sticks by those mysterious people who live under the earth, and who he says are to become the future inhabitants of the upper world according to that romance is nothing other than will power. A boy of twelve encounters a tremendous monster, but on directing his little vril stick towards him, the creature is consumed to a cinder. Vril possesses a power like lightning. The one who carries it feels that he has indeed a magic staff in his hand. We all have a similar feeling when we realize that in spirit we possess that which can destroy every form of error. Instead of fearing poison we know that we can give error a dose of truth that will destroy it instantly. We are never safe till we trust entirely in the divine light we derive from the infinite, the electric fire of the Holy Spirit.

 

            QUESTION No. 15. To what occult force does vril correspond?

 

            ANS. It signifies the human will as superior to the animal will. It is generated by the enlightened mind of

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man when man’s sixth principle is developed. If man exercises his sixth principle nothing can injuriously affect him. The human soul (fifth principle) versus the animal soul (fourth principle) always conquers, but vril is discovered only though the sixth principle (spiritual soul), for until reason and intellect are illumined from above (within) we cannot truly discipline and employ our fifth or intellectual principle in subduing the fourth and its correspondents, which take in the entire range of the animal and yet lower kingdoms; we must unfold the higher to guide the next below.

 

            QUESTION No 16. What is prophecy? Wherein consists the chief difference between priest and prophet? Why did Paul place prophecy above all other spiritual gifts? Can we all attain to a development of it? Has Astrology any connection with genuine prophetic insight?

 

            ANS. The chief difference between prophets and priests consists in the fact that the former are seers, while the latter are but echoes, so far as their teaching is concerned. This statement is not intended as in any manner disrespectful to the priests of any religion, many of whom are noble philanthropists; it simply embodies the self-evident conclusion that those who look to ancient canons of authority for all their wisdom, must necessarily refuse to allow that the still small voice speaking within the soul of each - individual is that individual’s rightful and only absolute guide.

 

            A prophet is a revelator and an exhorter. Prediction, in the ordinary sense, is not always true prophetic insight; a prophet is not a fortune-teller, but one who sees so deeply into the realm of causation and the soul of things as to be able to, state the inevitable outcome

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of a certain course of procedure. Prophets know more of cause and effect than other people, and may be coin-pared to men standing on lofty heights, commanding an extended view of the surrounding country. Dwellers in the valleys can only see a little way before them, and thus, through ignorance of where different roads lead, make many false steps, and go in the opposite direction to that in which they need to tread. A man on a mountain can call down to them from his exalted station, and his voice may be that of a true guide and savior, because he is in a position to see whither roads tend, the destination of which can be ‘viewed only from a lofty elevation.

 

            True seership is the most practically useful of all possible endowments, and therefore Paul eulogized it beyond all other gifts. How can Ave cultivate it, is the important question to answer. It is necessary to retire into silence, to give no heed for a while to external voices, to cease interrogating our neighbors, to desist from consulting the world’s oracles, then if we remain mentally still for a short time, fixing our thoughts and desires intently upon the object of our search, we shall learn that we have inward eyes and ears, and that spiritual voices and divine intuitions can lead us safely over innumerable difficulties, under which Ave should, in our ordinary condition, sink.

 

            Prophecy is insight, hindsight and foresight, and is in truth nothing other than a penetrative perception of the law of necessity. A prophet is not a fatalist, he does not affirm that there is a private destiny marked out for each human individual. He deals with the race destiny of man, and with the inevitable sequence of

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events, which does not at all imply that men and women have no power to shape their own ends.

 

            Ignorance means bondage, while knowledge is indispensable to freedom. By increasing knowledge the prophet increases the responsibility of man, as it is his sacred mission to so instruct the world that ignorance, which aforetime was only weakness, at length becomes criminal.

 

            All true teachers are prophets. It should never be our ambition to pry into the future so as to forestall either joy or sorrow, and live as though we were the creatures of luck and not of effort, but to so learn the relations of cause and effect, as they concern our daily life, that we may be able to prevent accidents and avert catastrophes. To foretell impending doom in a blank sense is not edifying, it is depressing and enervating. The old adage is true, “forewarned is forearmed.” If we know that certain events are likely to transpire, true seership will enable us to prepare to meet them. By means of it we can conquer obstacles to winch, in our blindness, we should yield.

 

            With reference to astrology the words of an enlightened astrologer may he quoted with profit: “The wise man rules his stars, the fool obeys them.” By this it is meant that jest as meteorology enables coast men and farmers to protect their belongings and secure general public safety against the coming of storms, whose approach can not be warded off, so those who are warned by intuition or clairvoyance may be in a condition to guard against wrecks or disasters, which need not follow if proper precautions are taken, but which must inevitably supervene unless some skillful mind is

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ready against an emergency. True prophecy calls attention to the leak in the vessel or the hole in the roof. It detects it and proclaims the direful results which must inevitably ensue if it be not attended to in time.

 

            A true prophet would deliver his message to captain, engineer, or other officer in charge of boat or train, and, by foreseeing danger, stave it off, and thus win the lasting thanks and honors of a saved multitude; or if his message were unheeded, the doom which befell those who refused to hear, would be a calamity for which they had only their own obstinate obduracy to blame.

 

            QUESTION No. 17. An eminent occult student in a private letter says: Everything in nature is real to those things involved therein, hence pain is as real as we are. Will you please explain the discrepancy between this and your teaching (if there is any)?

 

            ANS. Innumerable controversies have arisen in consequence of persons using one word in several opposite senses. The word real is certainly susceptible of more than one definition. When in the highest metaphysical sense, Spirit is spoken of as the only reality, while matter is declared to be unreal, the thought intended to be conveyed is that Spirit alone is eternal. Now pain may appear as real as pleasure on the external or sense plane of existence, but we must never forget that our sensations are transitory, and so far as they appear to arise from external things, they can not be everlasting. Pain as a sensation may be regarded as an educator, we do not necessarily disagree with those who call it the voice of an alarmist bidding us see to what is wrong, that having our attention called

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thereto, we may rectify an error. As to saying pain is as real as we are, we consider it a most unscientific statement, unless by “we” is meant simply the lover or earthly nature which the higher and abiding “we” hope some day to outgrow. If we are replying to a student of theosophical literature we should ask him to consider pain as an emotion of the inferior principles in the constitution of man. The higher principle does not and can not suffer, as it never errs or sins, and pain is a penalty, educational, redemptive, necessary we admit, when we have fallen into error, but the higher principle does not fall into error, and consequently neither needs nor endures such reformatory chastening. A brief consideration of the three distinct principles which enter into the constitution of man, and of which we are all more or less deeply conscious, may throw some light on this seemingly perplexing problem. We, as intellectual beings, are living between the spiritual and the animal in us, and suffering is occasioned by the struggle or conflict continually going forward in us as well as around us. Paul graphically describes this in the seventh chapter of his epistle to the Romans, which may be very profitably studied in this connection. We shall undoubtedly all suffer pain until we no longer require such discipline; pain therefore, in its place is good, it serves an end, and when its use is made plain it is no longer the hopeless enigma it was previously. We must outgrow a condition which necessitates suffering, and true spiritual treatment assists us to do so. A right treatment helps a patient to grow, mentally and morally.

 

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            QUESTION No. 18. Do you agree with the following from the same writer? God is not only love and intelligence but He is everything that exists on earth and an anywhere else. Cause and effect are one and the same thing – they can not be separated. Man and God are the same, hence this physical nature is as holy and sacred as the angelic.

 

            The points raised in the foregoing statement, which is not a question but an assertion, are far too profound and numerous to be entered into here at any length. We regard the statement as decidedly pantheistic, and as we are not pantheists we fail to endorse it in toto, at the same time the ultimate of such assertion is agreeable to the genius of an enlightened philosophy, and cannot be said to differ from the New Testament doctrine that the human body is God’s temple. In essence everything must be divine, there can be no other life than the one infinite life which is the life of God. Such a view is calculated to elevate rather than depress our view of existence, and is therefore largely beneficial. We must get to the root of all things to find their real divinity. We must touch the bed rock in the nature of our patients before we can treat them successfully, and were we called upon to treat a person holding the opinions under review, we should scarcely seek to supplant them. All is good; there is no evil, is ultimately true in every instance.

 

            QUESTION No. 19. Why is it that men often grow more mercenary as they advance in life? Generous boys often make stingy men.

            Why are we so sordid, and why do we grow more so?

            If we are all spirit, why such earthly natures?

 

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            ANS. We must never forget that so long as we are subject to mortal influence at all, we shall remain to some degree the creatures of our surroundings. While the supreme truth concerning man as an immortal spiritual entity is that lie is pure spirit, we should not allow our eyes to close against the fact that we have a mortal mind to educate and develop, until it becomes the fitting channel for the expression of the inmost or highest principle of our nature. The lower principle or animal soul in us is not essentially or intrinsically evil. It is, indeed, very good when rightfully subjected to the higher principle, and our earthly discipline can only be said to be complete when this lower nature is completely subservient to the higher. Now, this lower principle is the nature we share in common with the animals, all of whom, without exception, manifest a lower type of affection than that which bespeaks the spiritual man. Self interest, self-preservation, love of approbation and particular regard for those who bestow favors on them are marked characteristics of many, if not all the lower creatures who serve us and with whom we associate. Now, in man these animal traits are always conspicuous until the loftier spiritual manhood pertaining to the higher principle, which animals do not share with man, is made manifest. What then is the sordidness of which so many complain? Surely it is nothing more or other than an intense, indeed, an overweening regard for one’s personal comfort and social standing and that of one’s family, without thought or regard for the equal advantages due to others. “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself,” introducing as it does, the singular number

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in both cases, suggests to every attentive mind that the command, when fully interpreted, tells us that it is our duty to recognize all men and women as our brothers and sisters, even to the extent of acting out the sublime principle of fraternity, so far as to think no more of our individual prosperity, than that of any other human unit in the great mass we call society. This is where spiritual science, or true theosophy, antagonizes human selfishness and calls forth the bitterest and most scornful denunciation from selfish and self-sufficient egotists, who will not tolerate the assertion that the rights of our common humanity must never be set aside to favor the caprice of an ambitious individual. If we can but, grasp, in some measure, the glorious idea of God’s universal parenthood, we have a base on which to build securely a sound philosophy of human brotherhood and sisterhood. But until this conviction becomes deep enough in every heart to male it the moving principle, the mainspring of all conduct – until man becomes angelic enough to live in the love of heaven, caring more for his brethren than for himself – not, indeed, neglecting his own culture or disregarding his own needs, but placing himself in such relation to all his neighbors as to consider any two human entities of twice the value of one, even though himself be the unit under consideration – until then, the love of hell, which is nothing other than inordinate self-love, greater regard for self than for neighbor will continue to plunge men and nations into all the awful depths of crime and convulsive throes of anarchy, which at the present moment so sadly terrify and depress many gentle and most amiable persons. Now, the only possible remedy

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for these gigantic evils, all springing from human selfishness, is a purely spiritual, but at the same time intensely practical system of moral education. Moral education need not lead to asceticism, and it certainly does not tend to fanaticism in any direction. It is purely and simply the culture of the higher dispositions of our nature, and by a constant direction of all our energy toward spiritual growth, instead of toward the accumulation of earthly property, it diverts the mind from selfish dreams of personal aggrandizement and fixes the eye of ambition on the shining mark of spiritual advancement. False standards of wealth and honor easily corrupt the morals of youth. Fine houses, extensive lands, elegant equipages, handsome clothes, expensive jewels, these and many like vanities are regarded as the highest good by multitudes, and why? Surely because, as a rule, we all show respect to those in affluent circumstances, while we show disrespect to those of far greater moral and mental worth who have not these baubles to display. Riches exert a powerful psychological hold on the minds of men and women, because of their immense purchasing power – and what can they not purchase in society as at present organized? If they could only buy collateral advantages of an external hind, many who now dote on them would at once despise them. But alas, they purchase in so many instances the respect, esteem and homage which by rights belong only to superior character. When our standard of value is reversed and we esteem people for what they are, not for what they have, this sordidness must disappear like murky vapors before time day dawn. Many men who seem intensely sordid in

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business circles are most kind and lovable at home, and try to live up to the Golden Rule; the world’s temptations in the commercial sphere are however so strong that they succumb. Let it be our work to reform public sentiment so as to deliver such from evil.

 

            QUESTION No 20. What influence is it that prompts noble men and women to so far interest themselves, even to martyrdom and violent deaths, in the momentous questions of the day – to the advocacy of Anarchism in America and Nihilism in Russia. Is not their devotion to these causes of disruption a misinterpreted inspiration?

 

            ANS. We regard the persons referred to as blundering reformers, many of them without doubt are endeavoring, as best they know how, to correct prevalent abuses, but so under the dominion of the lower principle are they, that they fail altogether to detect the only true means, whereby reform can be brought about. Co-operation, not competition, is the natural order. Children are falsely instructed when led to gratify an emulous ambition to rise above others. Poverty is quite unnecessary in America, but it will never be fully abolished as long as the wage system continues. This old system, a relic of feudal institutions, can not, however, be swept away by violent aggressions on the part of laborers upon the persons and possessions of capitalists. Reform can only be attained through processes of social and industrial evolution. Anarchism and Nihilism are the children of despotism. They are the offspring of systems of injustice and inhumanity which give birth to desperadoes, who destroy their own parents. Evil invariably destroys itself. In these times of excessively

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rapid motion the work of destruction is accomplished by violent measures and at a high rate of speed. The chemicalization of error must needs continue until every vestige of selfishness and animality is purged from human thought and affection, and while we may bemoan the measures taken to rectify wrong, and leave no stone unturned to show our erring brethren the better way, the only proper attitude to be taken in these (lays of angry revolt is that error in destroying itself is manifesting its true inwardness. We may-learn from present disasters how absolutely necessary for the maintenance of social order and domestic peace are the spiritual truths, which are now engaging the attention of profound thinkers throughout the world. One evil may destroy another, as one poison may be an antidote to another, but it takes an enunciation and demonstration of the principle of true science to up-build a republic of the nations, in which every citizen will enjoy a comfortable competency as the reward of his own industry, which is possible immediately the (lemon of selfishness is cast out of mind.

 

            QUESTION No. 21. To a person whose happiness of the higher sort on earth has been entirely centered in the exercise of the affections, does it follow that nothing of this is preservable in our future states except those feelings which have a direct reference to religious or spiritual philosophy? Is not love imperishable?

 

            ANS. All true affection is spiritual, and therefore immortal, but surely none will deny that much that is called love is nothing but self-love. If we love others in a purely earthly manner by reason of the happiness they give us, our affection can not pertain to the immortal

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state, but if we love one another purely and unselfishly we may take the words of Jesus, recorded in the fourteenth chapter of the Fourth Gospel, and apply them to every human case. Individuality is the basis of life. We do not teach or believe that a time will ever come when the soul’s identity will be lost. Neither do we anticipate a day Chen those who are truly related in spirit will be forced asunder. Darby and Joan, who after fifty years of welded bliss are clearer to each other than on their wedding day, can surely with confidence look forward to a continuation of their mutual love beyond the grave, while those whose affections are sensual and selfish will assuredly drift apart and eventually discover that what they called love on earth was only a delusive chimera. Unhappiness in married life cones from inordinate exaction on one side or the other. The true sin ritual scientist must not demand affection or live to be blessed, but bestow affection and work to bless others. Angelic love is all unselfish, the love of heaven that seeks no return is the love that reaps so glorious and plenteous a harvest, that indescribable bliss fills those souls to overflowing who, thinking not of any reward, find the truth of the statement, most perfectly exemplified in their experience, that to give is more blessed than to receive. It our affections are of the earth we must be wounded through them, as, being mortal they must die, and we suffer in their death if we cling to them. All true affection is eternal.

 

            QUESTION No. 22. What is faith? Is it necessary that the patient have faith in the healer?

 

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            ANS. Faith, from the Latin fides, which gives us the English word fidelity, does not by any means signify that blind credulity or unreasoning belief, which many people so erroneously dignify with the name of faith. In the old Hebrew sense of the word, faith invariably meant integrity, and thus the upright man was always styled the man of faith. In business circles, rather than in religious ones, we find this word still employed in its uncorrupted meaning; no etymologist would so far misemploy it as to identify it with gullibility. Faith is a grace, a moral excellence, a virtue of the highest ethical importance. Belief is secondary to faith and has a value quite distinct from faith, faith relating to the purpose of life from a moral standpoint, while belief can be only a matter of intellectual conviction at most. To require genuine faith of a patient is to demand nothing unreasonable, as it is only to require honesty of purpose, sincerity of desire, etc. Now as to belief, no reasonable person can expect another to believe without sufficient evidence, as lie himself can not yield assent to any unproven proposition. It is not virtuous to believe, neither is it vicious to disbelieve. When a stranger makes his appearance and puts out his sign in a new city, the inhabitants rightly inquire into his credentials before they take him into their families. So, when a novel theory comes before the world, wise people neither endorse nor condemn it off hand, they earnestly and dispassionately investigate it. Patients are often tired of experimenting with medicine. They have suffered much at the hands of various schools of practice, and hearing of what seems to them a new and wonderful method of healing, especially when importuned

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by friends to do so, they are quite willing and often anxious to give it a trial. Such people can not approach a mental or spiritual healer in perfect confidence that his system is the only true one, nor can they feel absolutely sure of receiving benefit, unless some very strong influence or evidence is brought to bear upon them to produce such a result. Now a healer should not crave impossibilities or endeavor to exact what is unreasonable from an inquirer. Let the works speak for themselves. Let faith follow rather than precede demonstration. If anyone expects another to believe in him, he must generate and dispense an influence which compels grateful recognition at the hands of the sick and sorrowful, and the true healer invariably does this. You have doubtless all felt a subtile, pervasive atmosphere surrounding particular people, a “virtue” going forth from them in some indescribable manner, reaching and blessing you, which has compelled you to acknowledge that they are dispensers of a power which ordinary people seem not to convey. Now if you are in some such manner attracted to a healer it is because he has already treated you and you have felt the beneficial result, which always accompanies and follows time establishment of harmony in your mental sphere. Some people possess this gift in marvelous degree, and only those who can help others unconsciously by reason of this helpful force going from them to others, are really well adapted to become professional healers: As in many lines of business good address goes a great way, and persons of considerable intelligence are frequently unfit for prominent positions where they

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have to constantly meet and converse with many people, because of their lack of all that goes to make up what is commonly called “good address,” so a public healer who would make healing his life work, as physicians devote themselves to the practice of medicine, should invariably be one who can inspire confidence and regard in the great majority of the sufferers lie encounters or who come to him for advice and treatment. What is often regarded as necessary on the patient’s part is at first inseparable from certain qualifications in the healer essential to induce it, so while oftentimes stumbling blocks may be placed by the patient in the way of his own recovery by his own obdurate bigotry or folly, it frequently happens that the “too little faith” is in the healer as well as in the patient. The Gospel narratives amply illustrate this fact, as they record a variety of cases where the disciples failed to heal because of their own imperfections, while many other cases present the fact of the fault being on the side of the invalids. Faith of the right sort is required on both sides. The healer needs to be so well grounded in spiritual conviction, as to be above time doubts and fears which so readily assail the ordinary individual, while the patient often needs that stimulation of faith which contact with a more thoroughly convinced mind frequently supplies. Prejudices must be laid aside, the patient must endeavor to let go of bigotry and give the healer a fair field, though a true healer asks no favors. Faith in time sense of belief is a response to a blessing already received, while faith in its deeper sense means perfect straightforwardness, honesty in thought, word and action. If you find yourselves inspiring

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confidence in yourself and the system you advocate, even among people who have hitherto been totally indifferent and skeptical if not positively antagonistic to spiritual methods of healing, you have evidence that from you has gone forth to them a force as palpable to their interior sense as a flower’s fragrance is to your exterior sense of smell. When you can arouse faith in all its meanings in those to whom you fain would minister, you are showing indisputable credentials vouching for your genuine ability to heal.

 

            QUESTION No. 23. What is chemicalization? Is it a necessary stage in unfoldment?

 

            ANS. Chemicalization is equivalent to crisis and ferment, it occurs when new thoughts are actively engaged in conquering old opinions. All physicians speak much of crises and declare them to be the turning points in the conditions of their patients. Chemicalization is often inevitable though no one is justified in assuming that it is invariably necessary, for many cases have been known to yield instantly to spiritual power, without the patient suffering anything of the nature of a crisis. To explain the workings of the various forces, all operating upon a patient, from most discordant sources, would require a lengthy discourse, and, as in reply to a question, we can do little more than hint at the solution of a complex problem, we must request our readers to ponder our remark long and carefully, that by setting their minds upon the subject under consideration they may induce a mental state favorable to the reception of ideas through their own interior avenues of perception. We all speak and hear much of the force of habit, and those of us who are at

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all familiar with psychological influence, must be more or less aware that when a practice, be it desirable or undesirable, gains powerful hold over a person’s mind, it is in consequence of a (usually unconscious) establish meat of psychical relations between his mind and the minds of others. Let us look for a moment at habits and their formation. Almost without exception habits are forced on sensitive people, very young people, and children in particular, from without, they seem rarely to be evolved from within. Many of the most pernicious practices to which men are addicted, do not seem indigenous to the natural mind, they are artificially induced through contact with people who influence those younger and in some respects weaker than themselves. Drinking and smoking as well as the filthy and detestable habit of chewing tobacco, with many other forms of impropriety, are usually pressed upon a boy by older companions, into the net of whose vile mesmeric fascination he is ignorantly drawn. Whenever one does anything one feels to be degrading or even unpleasant, because of an outside influence urging him to do it, he is yielding to a psychological influence of the baser sort and forming mental associations of the most dangerous character, from whose grasp he may find it difficult in the extreme to struggle free in future years. As men follow each other in paths of vice so do even virtuous women follow each other in the paths of folly, and in many things allow themselves to be led wholly by some stupid fashion or prevailing custom, which in their hearts they thoroughly despise. These weak yieldings to extraneous influence so far impoverish the will and render people

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unnaturally susceptible to every foul thing about then, that when they least expect it they find themselves overtaken with some pestilential, though fashionable because prevalent, disorder. Now when spiritual force operates to break the chains and loosen the bonds which hold the prisoner captive in the clutches of degrading error, a conflict ensues, the devil struggles to keep his prize in his embrace, while the Christ works to take his victim from him. Many instances in the New Testament forcibly illustrate this experience. Take the unclean spirits tearing the demoniacs when they came out of them. You probably all know the ancient Oriental theory of disease, it was invariably attributed to the action of powers of darkness, and thus, loosing the bonds of wickedness and delivering people from demoniacal possession (a process often called exorcism) played a very conspicuous part in all Eastern methods of healing. Modern Spiritualism has thrown much light on some of these ancient records by starting a theory of obsession, which is practically identical with the old belief in demoniacal possession. Such theories, while they are not wholly true and are terribly subject to exaggeration, being frequently pressed so far as to make them ridiculous as well as dangerous, nevertheless contain sufficient truth to explain much which would be utterly incomprehensible without their aid. Chemicalization is simply a modern expression recognizing exorcism in a more intelligent form, as belief in evil is now being greatly modified in all enlightened circles where psychology is receiving the attention it deserves. We can readily see how all the influences which tend to degrade man may have been massed together by

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ancient philosophers, who styled them collectively Iran’s “evil genius,” and how all of an. elevating character have been similarly massed and designated “good genius.” Now the true spiritual healer stands to the patient as a representative of the good genius, while all that opposes his enlightenment and recovery stands in the attitude of evil genius. The struggle for ascendancy between the true and the false, the wise and the foolish, confidence and fear, love and hate, etc., is chemicalization.

 

            QUESTION No. 24. Can you present to us any other certain method of developing the moral fruitfulness in man’s nature than that which, is laid down in the Scriptures, where the physical and intellectual developments have failed to bring spiritual life to light? Is there any theological creed, ancient philosophy, or modern “liberalism” which, has or can change one soul from slavery to sin (i.e. passion, revenge, etc., etc.), to t1 at freedom f spirit and soul which, was promised and is still given by the holy Spirit through faith, in the Son of God, who alone ever claimed to do the will of God or to forgive sins?

 

            ANS. We do not pretend to give any teachings in opposition to those contained in the New Testament. It is simply our desire to arrive at the spiritual truth enshrined in its letter instead of clinging to its outward husk that causes us to take issue with prevailing orthodox opinions. Our view of Scripture is that all ancient Scriptures which have been and still are highly venerated by multitudes, in their letter reflect the general sentiment of the times in which they were written, but in their spirit they deal with essential truths of vital moment to mankind at all times and

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everywhere. Now as to a certain method of developing our moral nature, we should most decidedly take ground that it can only be developed at all by a sincere and determined effort of will in the direction of its development, and by will we mean affection putting forth an effort to reach its object. In the Athanasian Creed the opening words Quicumque vult signify whoever wills or earnestly desires salvation must hold to the universal faith, and it has always been a tenet of Christianity that the will must be perfectly surrendered, and that lovingly (not through fear) to the Divine Will, or salvation, for which regeneration is but another word, is impossible. Now it is a self-evident conclusion reached by all students of human nature that nothing can be successfully accomplished in any direction apart from persistent effort in that direction. The will must be directed toward the cultivation of muscle, intellect or art, or culture in those lines is impossible. The only unpardonable sin is blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, which means a deliberate steeling of one’s affections against truth. It is certainly a correct view to take of education that mere secular training is by no means adequate to secure the highest welfare of humanity, but spiritual culture is not brought about by dogmatic theology or by the enforcement of creeds, but solely by the influence of moral suasion in its highest sense. As to changing a soul from slavery to sin, to a state of freedom and righteousness, we should pronounce all creeds and institutions inadequate to the accomplishment of this divine work, which can only be brought about by the liberation of the spiritual man from bandage to the mortal belief which makes of evil

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an abiding reality, a potent force in the universe, either personal or otherwise, and thereby creates a (Tread of its power. To destroy all fear of evil and all belief in its potency is to deliver men from its clutches. We yield universally to what we fear as well as to what we love, and where the love of sin appears not to exist, the fear of it, and particularly the dread of its consequences, leads to its commission, not through deliberate intent, but through weakness, which is always at one with abject susceptibility. As to faith in the Son of God, we can understand the Swedenborgian expression that we must be adjoined to the Lord by affection for good, but the ordinary evangelical interpretation of faith is to our mind extremely unsatisfactory. Faith means fidelity to conviction, and springs from love of truth, not from a mere intellectual assent to propositions of truth. As to the forgiveness of sin, sin never is forgiven in the old ecclesiastical sense. It has to be outgrown in every sense, and to forgive it as Jesus forgave is to destroy the love of it and prevent its re-commission, not at all to deliver the one who has already committed it from the reformatory penalty.

 

            QUESTION No. 25. Please explain in condensed form the practical teaching of Christian, Mental and Spiritual Science when freed from the points of difference over which special parties wrangle?

 

            ANS. Probably most, if not all our readers are quite well acquainted with the names “Christian Science,” “Mental Science” and “Spiritual Science.” Metaphysical healing is now practiced under these different names all over the world. The essential truth presented by this system is that mind is entirely sovereign, matter

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being totally subservient to it. All take the ground which has been taken by philosophers from time immemorial, that all is mind, and therefore there is no matter. This statement is certainly astounding to the ear of an ordinary listener. The statement in one sense appears groundless, because it seems to destroy all our confidence in our senses. But when we realize that all that is necessarily implied in such a statement is, that there can be no effect without a cause adequate to produce it, and that all material things are simply phenomenal effects, while there is a great spiritual power behind everything, we are only called to look upon the external universe as the shadow of the spiritual, which is the substantial universe. The substantial is immortal; it can never (lie or fade away. The shadow comes and goes, while eternal stability pertains only to that which is as deathless as the Eternal Being who has spoken all things into existence.

 

            Now, when man realizes himself as one with eternal life, he knows that the only life of which he can be conscious is the one life which fills immensity, there being no void nor emptiness any where. Our views of life are hereby lifted entirely above the material plane. We are carried in thought beyond all perishable forms of clay and made to realize that we are spirit, that Ave all belong to one great family, and that we have – in the last analysis of our subject – no parent except the eternal God, and no destiny except to enjoy conscious relation with the eternal soul of all life forever.

 

            The word metaphysical means beyond physics, and mind over matter. It really means, in its fullest sense, everything included in the vast domain of what lies beyond the reach of the physical senses.

 

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            While metaphysicians do not call themselves Theosophists or Spiritualists, and do not take any sectarian name, or join with any particular creed or party, we may safely say that their universal object is to investigate the realm of soul, and learn all they can concerning spiritual being, to distinguish between outward existence, which is at the very best transitory and evanescent, and that being which is eternal and immortal, which never changes, and can never pass away.

 

            As the word theology literally means the science of God, and of all things divine, as truly as geology means the science of the earth, or of terrestrial things in general, equally may we affirm that spiritual science means the science of the spiritual man, the science of the spiritual universe, yes, and the science of God also, for there is no sublimer and clearer definition of the Supreme Being to be found in any literature, ancient or modern, than in John’s gospel, where Jesus, in conversation with the Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well, declares “God is Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship him in spirit and in truth.”

 

            Now when the Jews and Samaritans were disputing among themselves whether God should be worshiped in the temple at Jerusalem, or from the top of the mountain where the ruined temple of the Samaritans was still standing, Jesus said practically : It matters not whether in the temple at Jerusalem, or on this mountain-top; whether in the open desert, or in the solitude of your own inner chamber; whether in the crowded streets and busy thoroughfares dedicated to places of business, or in halls devoted to amusement. You can worship God everywhere h doing all things to the glory of God.

 

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            Now, the real object of metaphysical instruction is to help people to put into practice Paul’s affirmation that we should pray without ceasing. We can do all things to the glory of God, whether we eat or drink, or whatever we do. It does not need to be explained that God does not need anything at our hands, God is never hungry nor thirsty, nor in want of any kind; we can not minister directly unto Him, but His children all around us are in need, and when we give to theta we are presenting an acceptable offering to the Eternal Being, who can only be pleased as we bless the children of His love, who are our brethren as well as His children.

 

            We agree with all true Theosophists who explain that the basis of Theosophy is universal brotherhood, and that all true philosophy must be built upon this one foundation. We must recognize the unity and brotherhood of the entire human race, so that every man is our brother and every woman our sister. We must not only believe, we must feel this, and there can be no true metaphysical work done so long as we unduly respect wealth or even. intellect; so long as we divide ourselves into aggressive knots and groups and parties, looking down upon some as inferior, while we regard others as superior; so long as we look to the outward form and fashion of men; so long as we care for a long line of hereditary descent, for what is commonly called blue blood flowing in our veins; so long as we reverence the god of gold, to which so many bow in servile adoration; so long as we care for vain fashions and frivolities, and consequently raise our voices in concert with the multitude, “Great is Diana of the

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Ephesians,” if she be the popular deity of the hour, we may be spiritual scientists in abstract belief, but we shall ignominiously fail in practice. But when we learn to truly respect ourselves so as to live in accordance with the light which shines in the innermost recesses of the soul, when we direct our path by the voice which speaks within us, then we shall be free indeed, free in truth, and our freedom will not consist only in freedom from the fear of death, but also from sickness and the recognition of death altogether.

 

            It may sound strange to many persons, even if they have read Mrs. Eddy’s work, “Science and Health,” to be told that there is in reality neither death, sickness nor sin in all the universe; but we must learn to look away from all things perishable to divine realities; we must learn to find within man that which is alone enduring, which is never sick and never suffers, even the divine soul which never dies. It certainly sounds very strange to be told there is no sin, no sickness, no death, while we see so many prisons and reformatories, which cause us to say with much slow of reason, “It is, indeed, a reality that sin abounds.” While hospitals are filled with sick people, is not sickness a reality? Is not death a reality when we are requested again and again to officiate at funeral services, and cemeteries are filled with dead bodies? But we ask, what is it that sins? What is it that suffers? What is it that dies? It can only be an external adjunct to man. Man surely is a deathless entity who can neither sin, nor be sick, nor die.

 

            This great truth concerning man is surely apprehended, or, at least, vaguely recognized, when we talk

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of our better moments. We all realize that we have a higher self, and we all talk of our better moments What are we talking of, if not of our real, cardinal nature, which is the foundation of all our existence? Is not this our true and imperishable being? And is it not desirable that we should become practically oblivious to external things, for the sake of more fully appreciating the real and ever living spirit that we are here and now?

 

            We shall not become spiritual entities after we have dropped the mortal form. We shall not go to a spiritual world when these mortal forms have passed into dust. We shall not then become the sons of God, but we are such, here and now, and when our mortal forms have passed away nothing will have passed from us save an outward garment of flesh.

 

            Now, when we undertake to treat patients in harmony with spiritual science, we find ourselves obliged to direct the patient’s thoughts away from external things altogether; therefore, instead of dwelling continually on outward signs and symptoms, instead of highly regarding the body, and always quizzing it to find out, if possible, in what condition it may be; instead of administering medicine at certain hours, and endeavoring to keep a room at a regulation temperature, and performing a variety of outward ceremonies, we know that liberation from disease is to get out of the thought of these material works, and forget, at least for the time being, that there is anything external.

 

            Now, in order to get out of the external we must get into the spiritual. You can not think of nothing,

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you can not long do nothing. Every person will occupy himself in some way, if not profitably, then mischievously. Our minds will never remain still, and therefore to say we must not think of matter, we must not regard the flesh, and leave the statement in so unfinished a form is to preach a doctrine which practically means nothing, because no man can long comply with its requirements. But when we say, “Fix your thought upon spiritual form; maintain that all is life, all is good; look within, take a glance at your own immortal soul, and find yourself face to face with the stupendous reality of spiritual being,” we know that your mental gaze can be so riveted upon the immortal that you will completely forget the mortal. Your whole thought will be concentrated on the eternal, and so you will become unmindful of the material, and of all outside the interior realm, where your higher consciousness forever dwells secure.

 

            Speaking of outward aids to interior development, many people inquire, “Of what possible use can a talisman be?” We do not ourselves believe that sacred words have any efficacy of their own resting in them. But as for thousands of years people have worn or otherwise employed them, as many Jews lave placed texts of Scripture in little houses, upon their foreheads, and upon their arms, that they might be perpetually reminded of divine truth; and while among enlightened Jews there never was a time when the tephilin were considered of talismanic value, they being only used as reminders of great spiritual truths, so all outward assistants are, from a metaphysical standpoint, regarded as valuable only in so far as they direct the

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thought to a desired object. The words, “Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One,” whenever their eyes lighted upon the Hebrew characters they wore, would remind them of the great central truth of all religion, the Divine Unity. So when we are giving treatment, either verbally or silently, by presenting a thought we direct attention to a certain plane of idea. Now if you look upon illuminated texts such as “Honesty is the best policy,” or “Charity never faileth,” or “Do unto others as you would that they should do unto you,” you are at once reminded of truth which perhaps you had temporarily forgotten. If in a church a prayer is spoken or a hymn sung in your hearing, you are reminded of what perhaps you had forgotten in the multiplicity of your household cares.

 

            While it is impossible for us to do any work for our brethren in their stead, we can assist them to arise and work for themselves. The great work of the truly efficient metaphysical healer is the work of one who is continually presenting to a patient or student the line in which thoughts should march. When a line of march is indicated to us, when the right way is pointed out, and a voice says to us, “This is the way; walk ye in it,” there comes along with the pointing a subtle, restraining and inducing power; it is not mesmeric; it is not psychologic in any ordinary sense; it is not one mind controlling or exercising authority over another; for the true metaphysical healer is an educator, an enlightener of his brethren; for when we undertake to place truth before our patient, we desire to make that patient realize it and follow in that way which is pointed out to him by his newly awakened sense of spiritual discernment.

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Spiritual science proclaims liberty for the individual enlightened by truth, to walk in the light of the truth as he himself perceives it. Multitudes of people love truth, but have not yet perceived it very clearly. Multitudes are longing to see some brighter ray before them, to hear a voice directing them where to go, and to discern a hand pointing in the true direction, and it is to help all such, to help all who are struggling into light, that we should work.

 

            QUESTION No. 26. What is really meant by Metaphysical Healing, and how is cure effected if not by magnetism? How can prayer heal the sick?

 

            In reply to the ever recurring question, what is meant by metaphysical healing, and what are the means by which cures are accomplished, we answer there are three means of healing plainly revealed in the New Testament; at all events the three necessary requisites are Faith, Prayer and Fasting. Jesus says, “This kind,” meaning the power to heal all manner of infirmities, “cometh not forth except by prayer and fasting.” And He also says: “According to your faith be it unto you.”

 

            Now, when asked to define prayer, we say prayer is our recognition of divine good, and our earnest endeavor to enter into intimate relation with it. Montgomery beautifully defined it when he sang, “Prayer is the soul’s sincere desire, uttered or unexpressed.” Prayer is mental asking, mental seeking, mental knocking.

 

            Whenever we induce people to seek, to knock, to ask in a definite direction, whenever we help them to aspire toward the light, we teach them to pray rightly.

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Prayer, therefore, can be continued without ceasing, and if we are cured of any ailment through the agency of prayer, we do not consider that any such cure is brought about vicariously or in any unnatural manner Individuals are simply directed into channels of thought in which they continually aspire toward spiritual light. Desire is prayer; moral effort to attain to virtue is prayer; but the prayer of faith is the only effectual prayer, as it is aspiration or desire after virtue and does not allow the word “cannot” in its vocabulary. It maintains that whatever is right for us to have can be received by us just because it is right for us to receive it. Faith in its grand old sense means fidelity, honor, straightforwardness of character, nobility, integrity; it means everything that stands for grand and noble character, not mere belief, concerning which contentious persons are ever wrangling and disputing, but noble virtue, moral excellence, ethical worth. Then fasting, what is it? Not going without food at stated intervals necessarily, but the complete subjugation of lower to higher impulses. We must deny our lower selves – sacrifice our lower appetites, that we may gain true freedom to fulfill the desires of our nobler instincts.

 

            Now, if all students realize that they must pray, exercise faith and fast – in the sense in which we have defined these terms – we know that to-day there may be a spiritual outpouring as great as there ever was in ancient Galilee. It rests with ourselves as to whether, when we teach or attempt to heal, the result is or is not a truly pentecostal one. We must all remember we have still very much to learn. While the writings of Mrs. Eddy, Dr. Evans and others, may

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assist many to the light, the source of light is within us. In every human being dwells the divine word; therefore every essential word of truth must come from within, not from without. The living oracle, the ever-speaking word of God, must be recognized, or success can not crown our endeavors. We need more reliance upon our own spiritual nature, and far more direct, communion with the source of all light.

 

            Spiritual science will tend to make us calm, quiet, strong with quiet strength, less dependent upon legal measures, outward modes of attack, controversial argument and money, and infinitely more dependent upon that silent, spiritual power which is strictly invisible and absolutely potential. Many live like people who have long subsisted upon fruitful soil and land which contained valuable ore, but have known nothing of their possessions, contented with scanning the surface. Now, though our land has become no richer, we are told of our hidden possessions, of the wealth of our mines, and we discover that our land is highly arable and can yield beautiful flowers, delicious fruits and golden harvests of grain.

 

            Now, let us set to work and plant our vineyards and olive groves. Let us get our mines to work and our wells in operation, and though formerly our resources were as great, and our possessions as large as now, we knew nothing of them, so we now commence for the first time to enter consciously into our inheritance.

 

            Thus do we finch the golden key which unlocks the inmost secrets of our nature, unfolding to us our priceless latent treasures, which, though adding nothing to our capabilities, brings to light hidden things divine.

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The science of spirit is the golden key which opens up the spiritual heaven to all, just as civilization, with all its discoveries and implements, reveals to us the treasures hidden within the earth, and beneath the ocean wave – treasures which have been there for centuries, but of which we knew nothing until our attention was called to them and they were placed at our command.

 

            Feel that there are spiritual gems of every hue lying buried in your inmost nature, as old Greek philosophers would express it, your latent know ledge on needs to be brought out by education; and ever as you seek to bring forth the treasures which are embedded in Your soul, remember there are just two effective modes of digging, delving and diving, and these methods are love of truth and practice of charity.

 

            If you are lovers of truth and also lovers of your fellow-beings; if you can hear to stand alone, face to face with your own interior life, and not quail before its revealments, then you can rise superior to every mortal passion and the consequent ailments proceeding from sensuous indulgence.