*> ^ «, v *:«^:« ** a*' ♦ 
 
 
 
 
 «• jF^ v«ht** *ro> ^OTSV -**v 
 
PSYCHOTHERAPY 
 
 OR THE 
 
 Ministry of the Church 
 to the Body. 
 
 BY 
 
 Rev. Samuel Medary Dick, Ph. D. 
 
 Five sermons delivered in Wesley Methodist 
 Episcopal Church, Minneapolis, Minn., 
 Sunday evenings in January, 
 1909 
 
^4 
 
 f CONGRESS 
 
 Two Cooies Received 
 
 MAR 13 1«09 
 
 Copyriuai entry 
 
 GLASS C\_^ )'vaC. No. 
 
 COPY 8. 
 
 Copyright, 1909 
 
 by 
 Samuel M. Dick 
 
FOREWORD 
 
 |HESE sermons were delivered to crowds of 
 the most intelligent and cultured people 
 in Minneapolis, that filled the large audi- 
 torium of Wesley church to its full seat- 
 ing capacity. 
 
 The content of these sermons is based 
 upon the Holy Scriptures and the best 
 scientific authority on this new phase of mental science. 
 They are not technical nor critical discussions of Psy- 
 chotherapy, but an attempt to show that the ministry 
 to the body is not foreign to the gospel in its redemptive 
 power, and the methods of ministry as taught in Psycho- 
 therapy may become a powerful supplement to evangeli- 
 cal Christianity. 
 
 The demands for the sermons in print have been so 
 numerous that the Official Board of the Church, by official 
 action, authorized their publication. For this apprecia- 
 tive act on the part of my official members I express sin- 
 cerest thanks. 
 
 With keenest appreciation of the large number of en- 
 dorsements received from those who heard the sermons 
 I send them forth hoping that their mission may thus 
 be broadened and those desiring may have them for pre- 
 servation. 
 
 SAMUEL MEDARY DICK, 
 
 Minneapolis, Minn. 
 
FIRST PRINCIPLES OF MENTAL HEALING 
 
Thy faith hath made thee whole. — Mark 5 :34. 
 
 Bless the Lord, O my soul : and all that is within me, 
 bless his holy name. 
 
 Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his bene- 
 fits: 
 
 Who forgiveth all thine iniquities ; who healeth all thy 
 diseases ; 
 
 Who redeemeth thy life from destruction; who crown- 
 eth thee with loving kindness and tender mercies; 
 
 Who satisfieth thy mouth with good things; so that 
 thy youth is renewed like the eagle's. — Psalms 103 : 1-5. 
 
 Upon waking each morning make this language the 
 preamble of thy thought for the day. 
 
First Principles of Mental Healing 
 
 HILE I have chosen this language from 
 Mark, I might have taken the text in sim- 
 ilar language from Matthew and also from 
 Luke. I might have chosen it from any of 
 these various gospels, in more than one 
 place and under different circumstances. 
 I have chosen this remark which Jesus 
 uttered so often during his ministry, "Thy Faith hath 
 made thee whole," because it announces the fundamental 
 principle of Psychotherapy. It was uttered only in con- 
 nection with physical healing. 
 
 The teaching of Psychotherapy is becoming world- 
 wide. I will not undertake to recite its history in detail 
 tonight but will say that for four or five years, in Eng- 
 land and upon the continent of Europe, Psychotherapy 
 has received special attention. Clinics have been opened 
 in the great medical hospitals, and the work is finding its 
 way into the churches, and through the clergy is reaching 
 the people. It was introduced into this country through 
 Drs. Worcester and McComb, of Emmanuel church, Bos- 
 ton, and is coming to be known throughout the country 
 
8 First Principles of 
 
 through the articles in the various newspapers and maga- 
 zines. So far as I have information, the work in Wesley 
 church was the second opened upon the American con- 
 tinent. Since the opening in Wesley church, there have 
 been a large number of centers opened in various church- 
 es throughout the country, so that the movement has 
 grown until the question arises as to the wisdom of the 
 churches taking up the work of ministering to the body. 
 What shall be the message of healing in the Church of 
 Christ? 
 
 It is important, perhaps, to know the foundations of 
 this great movement from the scientific standpoint, and 
 the grounds on which scientists arrive at their conclu- 
 sions. This will determine whether or not the church 
 has a right to teach this great truth and to minister to 
 the bodies of the people, through its instrumentality. 
 There are three supreme facts of the universe that de- 
 mand our attention in dealing with the principles of life. 
 First, the supreme fact of the material universe; second, 
 the great personality that lies back of the material uni- 
 verse ; third, the fact of human life, the focal point of all 
 law whether in the material universe or of the great Spir- 
 itual personality back of the material universe. In deal- 
 ing with these great problems we must recognize this 
 fact, that law is universal and that the entire universe, 
 from that little particle known as the atom in matter to 
 the greatest infinite law of the spirit, is all one, and the 
 continuity is perfect. We must recognize in this great 
 
Mental Healing 
 
 system of law governing the world of material and spirit- 
 ual reality that there is perfect harmony. There is no dis- 
 cord in law. We must recognize the fact that law is God's 
 order, his first order. The raindrop that patters down in 
 the springtime, and as it falls catches the sunbeam and 
 splits it into its prismatic colors; and his little neighbor, 
 the snowflake, that within the last hour has covered our 
 door-steps and carpeted our streets; the leaf as it comes 
 from the bud to its full maturity, the blades of grass in 
 their beauty which carpet the earth, the flower that fills 
 the air with its fragrance and then withers and dies, — all 
 these accomplish their purpose and do their work under 
 one mighty law which is the expression of the divine 
 Father's will. 
 
 There is another fact that we must recognize in the in- 
 terest of harmony, viz., that higher laws may modify or 
 annul the forces of lower laws. That a lower law always 
 behaves itself differently in the presence of a higher law, 
 from what it does in the presence of another lower law. 
 We must also recognize that in the harmony of law, 
 when the lower law seems to have been thrown into dis- 
 cord or its influence seems to have been abolished and 
 its force seems to have been repealed, it is not lost, but 
 only swallowed up in the higher law ; there is no discord. 
 Temporarily, we may say, it has been repealed or a law 
 of nature has been reversed. When there is a personality 
 manifesting itself in the operation of any law it may seem 
 to reverse that law and for a time such manifestation may 
 not be understood even in this age of understanding. 
 
10 First Principles of 
 
 The early Church fathers may have called such a manifes- 
 tation a reversal of law, a miracle, but they did not mean 
 by that expression "miracle" that any law was violated, 
 or any law was repealed, or any law was annulled, but 
 only the presence of that higher law that is expressed in 
 the operation of personality. 
 
 In this great harmony of the universe and this expres- 
 sion of law which covers everything from the lowest par- 
 ticle of matter to the highest expression of spirit, we 
 must recognize that back of it is the law-giver, and this 
 law-giver is the infinite source of infinite life. We cannot 
 get the harmony out of the universe without we come to 
 the realization of the one great fact that back of the uni- 
 verse there is the intelligence of the Infinite Spirit. 
 
 Now we turn to the third supreme fact, in order to 
 learn the foundation principles of the great law we are 
 studying, which is human life. It is as important as the 
 law of the universe itself for it is a part of the universe. 
 Body, mind, and spirit, physical organism, personality — 
 it is this that makes the difference between the animal 
 mind and the human mind. Back of the harmony of the 
 great universe lies intelligence forming every relationship 
 and demonstrating the power that mind has over matter. 
 We must accept for the control of the bodily organism 
 that law which relates the mind to the bodily universe. 
 You can scarcely turn to the body of man without realiz- 
 ing that you have present in it every law that is seen or 
 moves in the material universe ; that there is a system of 
 advancing order in organism from the lower to the higher, 
 
Mental Healing 11 
 
 but no order of development in the animal kingdom 
 reaches to the conception of self-consciousness. The con- 
 scious nature is ever manifest and expresses itself in va- 
 rious ways, manifesting a large variety of emotions. The 
 animal manifests emotions of love, hatred, joy, fear, jeal- 
 ousy, and many other signs of the presence of sub-con- 
 scious traits. Indeed animal actions are all based on in- 
 stinct, which is closely allied to the intuitive in man, and 
 the subconscious in man acts by intuition and not by 
 reason. 
 
 We find also that this physical organism partakes of 
 the nature of a machine. It is splendidly organized. It 
 is marvelous in every expression of the great mechanical 
 skill of an Allwise Creator. It requires food, water, air. 
 When it is in order, we say it is healthy ; in disorder, we 
 say it is sick or ill; when it fails to function, we say it is 
 dead, and it merges back into its mother clay. We can 
 realize its force by taking the machrne aspect into consid- 
 eration. When it is in perfect order, it gives off heat 
 and energy, and when the functions cease, it weakens 
 and dies. We cannot fail to recognize that it must have 
 care and direction similar to the machine. Take the 
 locomotive that runs across the country. What would 
 be the effect if we pulled the lever letting the machine 
 go uncontrolled ? What would be the result if the 
 steam engine ran the engineer? Would you risk your 
 life behind it? Wherever there is friction in a journ- 
 al, it must be removed; if it gets dirty, it must be cleaned 
 and the machine must be kept in order if it is going 
 
12 First Principles of 
 
 to do the work and meet the ends for which it was 
 made. Now this bodily machine is intimately linked with 
 indestructible personality and it is this linking together 
 that allies it to the infinite. It bears the image of God 
 and partakes of the attributes of the Father. It contains 
 all the laws of the material universe and all the laws of 
 the spiritual universe; as the image of God, it bears the 
 very nature of the great source of life that lies back of the 
 material universe; as physical organism, it bears the 
 nature of the physical universe itself. Paul knew what 
 he was talking about when he spoke of the natural .and 
 the spiritual, the touch of the finite with the infinite. It 
 is the linking together of the material with the spiritual 
 in this close relationship that makes it worth while to 
 study this machine. 
 
 On the side of the spiritual, we use the phrase person- 
 ality, and speak of man as a personality. What do we 
 mean by personality? Dr. Strong gives this formula: 
 personality— self -consciousness-f-self -determination. This 
 means that a person has the power of declaring his re- 
 lationship to other objects and determining who he is and 
 what he is. If I were to stop to quote from Drs. Hudson, 
 Worcester and McComb, they teach that this is true ; that 
 most of the causes of functional nervous disorders, by 
 which this machine is thrown out of order and rendered 
 imperfect and out of tune affect the personality, and there 
 is an influence brought upon the spiritual life, upon the 
 inner man, detrimental to character and the true life. The 
 remedy offered for such functional disorders must be of 
 
Mental Healing 13 
 
 such a character as to restore the personality. The 
 Psalmist said "He restoreth my soul," and any affliction 
 that affects the personality for adverse character cannot 
 be remedied merely by restoring the body. You say at 
 once that this is true, and we are to take up this question 
 and settle it from the standpoint of the Christian. Man 
 differs from the animal because of this personality, and 
 this personality is susceptible to marvelous influence. In 
 the days of the prophets, they called it inspiration. I 
 asked the choir to sing that simple gospel song of the 
 "Ninety and Nine" because I wanted to tell you some- 
 thing of its story — the story of the music. I asked them 
 to use the familiar tune. You are aware that the music 
 was written by Ira D. Sankey, the sweet singer associat- 
 ed with Moody in the great work of evangelization. Seat- 
 ed in the train one morning, while reading a religious 
 newspaper, he discovered the poem entitled the "Ninety 
 and Nine." He said to Mr. Moody, "I have found my 
 hymn." He did not know what music he might use with 
 it. It had not been set to music. Mr. Moody paid but 
 little attention at the time. A few days later, they were 
 holding service and one of the preachers had preached a 
 sermon on the "Great Shepherd." Turning to Sankey, 
 Moody asked him to sing a song. He had already sung 
 the 23d Psalm and just at that moment could not think of 
 anything that fitted the sermon. Then came the impulse 
 to sing the "Ninety and Nine," but he had not written a 
 tune for it. But the impulse came the second time, sing it 
 anyway; and upon this impulse, he began to sing not 
 
14 First Principles of 
 
 knowing when he struck the chord on the organ where 
 he was going to end. He didn't know what the harmony 
 would be; he didn't know where he was going to come 
 out, he had no meter in the music, but he finished the first 
 stanza. He did not know whether he could sing the sec- 
 ond in the same way or not, but by the grace of God, he 
 made the effort, he followed the outline of the first stanza 
 and succeeded in getting the second as easily as the first, 
 and so he continued to the end. After he went to his 
 room, he wrote the music and immediately it swept 
 throughout the Christian world. 
 
 What is the teaching? Where did he get the tune? 
 Who struck the chord and out of his soul flowed that 
 song? It was what we would call inspiration, the touch 
 of his personality with the divine, the great source of 
 infinite life that made it possible for Ira D. Sankey to give 
 to the world that music. That is what I want to say to 
 you — that it is in the touch that this personality has with 
 the infinite personality that makes the difference between 
 man and the beast of the field. The conscious mind is 
 the animal mind. Paul spoke distinctly of two minds — 
 the mind of the flesh and the mind of the spirit. We have 
 the conscious or animal mind in the flesh, and the sub- 
 conscious or spirit mind which has its source in the per- 
 sonality, and lies underneath the conscious nature. The 
 question now arises which shall dominate? Shall the 
 conscious mind dominate our being, or shall the subcon- 
 scious dominate? Shall the person dominate the ma- 
 chine or the machine dominate the person? If you were 
 
Mental Healing 15 
 
 to board a train in this city tomorrow for a journey to 
 the Pacific coast, which would you prefer, that the en- 
 gineer should keep control in the cab of the locomotive or 
 that the locomotive should be the master of the engineer? 
 Which would be your preference if you were going to 
 trust the safety of your life to the man and the machine ? 
 Would you prefer that the engineer with his intelligence, 
 with his knowledge, his keen sense of responsibility, his 
 understanding and reason be the master, or that he should 
 be subservient to the machine and that it should go hith- 
 er and thither, on main track or side, or not run at all? 
 I think you would answer that question very quickly. 
 You would prefer that the engineer with his power of 
 thought should be the supreme master of that combina- 
 tion of forces. 
 
 I think we shall find before we conclude this series of 
 discussions that there is just as much difference between 
 the subconscious and conscious mind, and there are just 
 as many reasons why the subconscious mind should dom- 
 inate as there are that the engineer should direct the en- 
 gine. The first principle in mental healing lies in getting 
 the working mind to know the difference between the 
 animal consciousness and the personal consciousness. 
 There is the animal consciousness and there is the per- 
 sonal consciousness, and getting the relationship between 
 them fixed is the technical question. How the one is re- 
 lated to the other and the determination of that relation 
 is the foundation principle in mental healing. In the 
 language of my text, the Savior states, "Thy faith hath 
 
16 First Principles of 
 
 made thee whole." Analyze that statement and you will 
 find nothing of the miraculous in it. This does not mean 
 that Jesus used no miraculous power. Jesus attributes 
 no power of his own to the healing. He attributed it to 
 this one thing: that the power of the reconstruction of 
 the body was inherent in the body itself. In connection 
 with such healing as the text refers to Jesus declares that 
 virtue had gone out of him, showing his personal touch 
 with healing. The human race has undertaken to dis- 
 cover the laws of the universe. It fell to that great schol- 
 ar, Sir Isaac Newton, to give to the world his theory of 
 gravitation. Can you prove it? Can you demonstrate 
 it? Can you say there are no worlds that will not obey 
 it? No, but it seems that this is true. Men that work 
 out relations of planets on that hypothesis for a founda- 
 tion find them to act as they predict. For the scholar- 
 ship of Newton, we may have admiration, or we may 
 scorn, but if a man technically versed in his teaching 
 should announce to the world that on a given day in the 
 year 1909 there will be a certain part of the sun covered 
 by a certain part of the moon, and at a certain place the 
 eclipse will appear at a certain moment, every sane and 
 intelligent man and woman would believe it, and if desir- 
 ous of seeing it would place himself in the spot described 
 and expect to see the eclipse appear at the very moment 
 designated. Why? Because the scientist has based his 
 calculation on the Newton theorem. Not that the theor- 
 em has been proven, but when the astronomer calculates 
 as if it were, the results are as Newton announced. 
 
Mental Healing 1 7 
 
 What about the atomic theory? Has any microscope 
 been made with sufficient power to discover the atom? 
 No ! No scientist will tell you that he ever saw an atom, 
 or ever paused to demonstrate it. And yet every calcu- 
 lation he makes is based on that theory. Here again the 
 results are the same as if the atomic theory were true. 
 
 That is what we are trying to discover ; the relationship 
 between the personality and the conscious mind of the 
 animal nature as a working hypothesis by which we may 
 make a scientific statement as to what will be the result 
 of the power of mind over matter or how the mind will 
 dominate matter. Matter yields itself as in the days of 
 Jesus when he said to the woman, "Daughter, thy faith 
 hath made thee whole;" when he looked into the face 
 of the blind man and said, "Thy faith hath made thee 
 whole ;" when the ten lepers came to him and were healed, 
 and he said to the one who returned, "Thy faith hath 
 made thee whole.' , Not in a single instance, in regard to 
 the cure of the issue of blood, opening the eyes of the 
 blind man, or healing of the leper did Jesus attribute to 
 himself miraculous power, or even any power; I do not 
 say whether it was miraculous or not. Whatever was 
 this power, he told the man and woman that the power 
 residing within themselves reconstructed the flesh. 
 
 In the discussion a week later, I shall take up the his- 
 tory of mental healing from the beginning. I am not 
 doing that tonight for it does not apply here. I want to 
 show you in the subject of mental healing that the power 
 to heal does reside in the mind, and that there may be 
 
18 First Principles of Mental Healing 
 
 marvelous physiological transformations by men who 
 have no faith in God, and by men who do not necessarily 
 believe in God. That does not take it out of the domain 
 of religion. I want to say to you that while this power 
 has been used from the beginning of the human race, it 
 has been only within the past ten years that we have 
 found scientific data whereby a man dared to make a 
 statement in^legard to it. It is known that the subcon- 
 scious mind is open to suggestion. 
 
 In conclusion, the physical body relates us to the mate- 
 rial universe ; personality relates us to the infinite source 
 of health and life that lies back of the universe. The 
 mind is the active medium between physical power and 
 spiritual power; the medium between the great physical 
 universe and the greater spiritual universe with all of 
 its grandeur and glory. 
 
 This is the first principle of mental healing : the recog- 
 nition of the fact that mind puts its power on matter and 
 brings the infinite and the finite into relationship. 
 
 The power or law of the mind is a higher law than the 
 
 law of matter, and the lower law is always subject to the 
 higher law ; the lower law is always directed by the high- 
 er law, this order is never reversed unless there is a medi- 
 ating power between, which gives ascendency to the one 
 and depression to the other. Carry out that thought and 
 you will see that the first great principle of mental heal- 
 ing lies in the universal law of suggestion acting by 
 faith ; that the law is divine in its character and the most 
 rational ground of faith is Christ, who is the author of 
 the law, for "without him was not anything made that 
 was made." 
 
 

 MENTAL HEALING NOT A RELIGION 
 
And he could there do no mighty work, save that he 
 laid his hands upon a few sick folk and healed them. — 
 Mark 6 :5. 
 
 And he did not many mighty works there because of 
 their unbelief.— Matthew 13:58. 
 
 There is the soul life, direct from God. This it is that 
 relates us to the Infinite. There is, then, the physical 
 life. This it is that relates us to the material universe 
 about us. The thought life connects the one with the 
 other. It is this that plays between the two. — Trine. 
 
Mental Healing not a Religion 
 
 F I SHOULD follow my text tonight from 
 
 the exegetical standpoint, it would lead me 
 
 to the discussion of the merits or demerits 
 
 in the laying on of hands for the healing 
 
 of diseases, and it is a good theme and 
 
 worthy of an hour's discussion. But I 
 
 have not chosen this text with that view 
 
 in mind. I have chosen it because it supplements the 
 
 text of last Sunday night, in which Jesus said "Thy Faith 
 
 hath made thee whole." I said to you at that time that 
 
 the first principle of mental healing is that the power of 
 
 healing resides in the individual. Mark supplements that 
 
 in tonight's lesson when he says, "And he could there do 
 
 no mighty work, save that he laid his hands upon a few 
 
 sick folk, and healed them," and Matthew when he says 
 
 hat, "He did not many mighty works there because of 
 
 heir unbelief," showing that where there was a lack of 
 
 aith, he recognized limitations on the part of the exercise 
 
 f his power. I would not teach you from this pulpit that 
 
 esus did not possess miraculous power, for I believe he 
 
 lid possess it, and exercised it; but I believe there is a 
 
22 Mental Healing 
 
 universal law of mental healing, the power to exercise a 
 which resides in the patient, and that Jesus never used j 
 miraculous power where it was possible to use this law, i 
 and to obtain results. When there was a universal law { 
 at the command of the Savior, by which bodies could be 
 healed and disease rebuked, he did not resort to miracu- 
 lous power to do the work; he accomplished it by the ^ 
 universal law aft his command. Because of unbelief on 
 the part of some of these people, Jesus laid his hands on 1 
 them, to supplement their faith in order that they might 
 be healed. 
 
 Modern science has demonstrated that there is a thera- 
 peutic value in laying on of hands. Jesus may not have 
 thought of this law in its scientific sense, but he knew 
 its value as a supplement to faith, and where he found 
 opportunity to use it he did so as in the cases under con- 
 sideration. 
 
 I will call your attention tonight to this universal law 
 as a law that is inherent in the patient and falls within 
 the domain of natural law. I mean by that, that it is not 
 a religion. It may be a means of God's revelation of 
 himself to the world. But revelation given by natural or 
 material law is not adequate; the great means of reveal- 
 ing God to Man is the mind. It is the spiritual nature 
 expressing itself in thought that bears the closest rela- 
 tionship to the divine Father, and God has therefore 
 given us the greater revelation through the principles of 
 mind and heart. 
 
 Mental healing is a universal law that reveals God to 
 
 i 
 
 
not a Religion 23 
 
 the same extent as any other universal law, possibly 
 more, on account of its beneficence. It is as universal as 
 gravitation. Its effects are universal and beneficent to 
 the human race. Whether we call it a law of God or of 
 Nature, it has the same effect on suffering humanity. I 
 am persuaded in my own mind, as I have tried to teach 
 from the beginning of this Wesley movement, that every 
 law that governs your physical organism is a divine law ; 
 and when we recognize this law as a divine law it brings 
 us into closer touch with Him. 
 
 Because a law is beneficent does not make it a religious 
 law, nor does it make it a religion. For example, the law 
 governing the freezing of water is a beneficent law; no 
 law in Science is more beneficent ; yet it is not a religion. 
 (Though entering some churches we might think that 
 religion was based on some sort of freezing process.) 
 
 The law of mental healing is adapted to all religions, 
 Christian, Pagan or Heathen, and is as applicable in one 
 as in the other, although not necessarily as apparent. It 
 has been the means of restoring the body to healthful con- 
 dition from the beginning of the human race. If we were 
 to go back to the time of Hippocrates, who has been called 
 the "Father of Medicine," and date the science of medi- 
 cine from 400 B. C. at which time he flourished, we would 
 still recognize that medicine as a healing agency is in its 
 infancy as compared with the law of suggestion. But we 
 have not yet come to realize much of this great principle. 
 For century upon century it was the only means that 
 humanity knew by which the body might be healed ; the 
 only means by which there might be a ministry for the 
 
24 Mental Healing 
 
 relief of suffering humanity in its bodily form, in its man- 
 ifold ways. It belongs to every tribe and to every age 
 of the human race. From the day when God first breathed 
 the breath of life into Adam in the garden of Eden, this 
 healing system of mental suggestion has been manifest. 
 It is a strange fact that this has been manifested in every 
 tribe, in every age, and in every form of life. Take, for 
 instance, that of the American Indian, with which some 
 of you are familiar, if you have witnessed the pow-wow 
 of the medicine man. Their conception of disease was 
 that it was the manifestation of an evil spirit or of evil 
 spirits; and when disease appeared in their midst, the 
 medicine man made himself up in the most diabolical way, 
 and made hideous noises to scare away the evil spirits, 
 and with their departure his patient was restored to 
 health. Even today, with all the science of our skilled 
 physicians, the pow-wow of the medicine man is more 
 effective in the healing of disease in the American Indian 
 than the treatment of the most skilled physicians who 
 may come from the great universities of the land. This 
 is not saying anything against the physician; it is only 
 another manifestation of the power of this law of mental 
 suggestion. 
 
 The schools of faith cure and mental cure have been 
 numerous. One of the most prominent of recent times 
 was that of Prince Hohenlohe in 1794, who became a 
 great healer and wrought many wonderful cures showing 
 himself possessed of unusual so-called divine power. Lat- 
 er on followed W. E. Boardman, proprietor of the "Nur- 
 sery of Faith," North London. He refused to allow it to 
 
not a Religion 25 
 
 be called a hospital. He wrought many great cures of 
 which the evidence is absolutely indisputable. Coming 
 now from across the sea to our own country, there was 
 the school established by Dr. Chas. Cullis, of Boston, and 
 the cases that he cured, especially of functional nervous 
 disorders, were remarkable. Then came A. B. Simpson, 
 of Old Orchard fame, who is still living in New York, I 
 think, and who acquired a national reputation. Later we 
 had John Alexander Dowie, of Chicago, who was known 
 not only as a great faith healer but as a financier and the 
 founder of Zion City. His great power and wealth were 
 acquired through his domination of the minds of his fol- 
 lowers and the marvelous cures that were wrought by 
 him. I walked beside a man through the streets of Chi- 
 cago and he said, "This building belongs to Alexander 
 Dowie," and of another, "This building belongs to Alex- 
 ander Dowie," and so of many others. Dowie related his 
 faith cure to the religious life, but made it a means of 
 getting rich. Then comes that most prominent cult, led 
 by Mary Baker Eddy, with her power of healing. She 
 has made it the foundation of a great religious movement 
 and money making enterprise. All of these, and multi- 
 tudes of others, have claimed to have the correct system. 
 One thing is characteristic of all these schools or cults, 
 that is their hatred of the medical fraternity. They have 
 all tried to show that the science of medicine is unneces- 
 sary and a failure. If there was any one thing they hated 
 more than medicine, it was one another, each one claim- 
 ing to have the correct demonstration because he worked 
 cures. Let us look at that for a moment. All have 
 
26 Mental Healing 
 
 claimed to have the correct system; all have worked 
 equally great cures; all have been equally scientific in 
 their own minds; all have been mystical and claimed 
 supernatural power; some have been beneficent while 
 others have used their power as a means of enriching 
 themselves ; all have some truth and all have a great deal 
 of error. But what seems strange in this law of mental 
 healing is that inanimate places and things have power to 
 heal as well as men and women. Knock Chapel, Ireland, 
 has had wonderful demonstrations of mental cure; 
 Lourdes, France, where the Virgin Mary was supposed to 
 have revealed herself to a peasant girl several times in 
 1858, has its long record of cures. Cures are wrought at 
 the various religious shrines, throughout Greek and Rom- 
 an Catholic countries, to which the multitudes go by the 
 thousands, many by the aid of crutches, and come away 
 in health and strength. Whether it be a man, woman, 
 place or thing, the result is the same if the mind of the 
 patient approaches it in the same light. Go back in your 
 life to the early period of your own experience and you 
 will remember, if you were brought up in the rural dis- 
 tricts of New England, New York, Pennsylvania or Ohio, 
 that people were often found carrying in their pockets 
 a potato or a buckeye as a preventive of rheumatism or 
 as a curing agency of rheumatism. And you ask, was 
 anyone ever cured by such means? I say, yes, a multi- 
 tude of men and women were cured of rheumatism by 
 carrying a potato or buckeye in their pockets. Was 
 there any merit in the potato? No, but some good, old 
 motherly soul told someone that it never failed to cure 
 
not a Religion 27 
 
 rheumatism, and so the potatoes were put in the pockets 
 and the healing power suggested. That is the law of 
 mental healing. 
 
 Dr. Tuke, in his work on "The Influence of Mind Upon 
 Body," tells of the curing of warts by selling the same to 
 another, or by charming them away. Another supersti- 
 tion was shown by the use of a toad. The hands were 
 rubbed with the toad and it was thrown over the right 
 shoulder. The patient must not look back or the charm 
 was broken. Many a boy with the backs of his hands 
 covered with warts, without any reference to science or 
 use of caustic, has gotten rid of his warts by selling them 
 to another boy for a trinket brought forth from the inex- 
 haustible storehouse of a lad's pocket ; or, strange as this 
 may seem, has cleared his hands of warts by the use of 
 the toad. It all simply demonstrates this one principle 
 that the power of mind that reconstructs the body resides 
 within the man, and that the law of suggestion reaches 
 it whether the suggestion comes from faith in Divine 
 power or whether it comes from the ugly toad. So far 
 as the law of suggestion is concerned the effect is the 
 same when it reaches the subconscious mind. I do not 
 mean by this that the power of suggestion may not be 
 greatly augmented by an outside personality, but this 
 does not change the truth of the above statement that so 
 far as the law itself is concerned results may be obtained 
 independent of an outside personality. Carry the thought 
 further, and consider the primitive mind of humanity, and 
 we find in the grossest superstitions of the most primitive 
 minds of the world this power of healing, this power of 
 
28 Mental Healing 
 
 reconstruction of fleshly tissue through the mind goes on. 
 We follow it up to the highest exponent of modern schol- 
 arship. We find it everywhere, and when we come to 
 realize its simplicity, we say, how insignificant it is, but 
 it is not insignificant. We can follow it through all 
 schools of faith cures and divine healing of all grades and 
 kinds. It manifests itself at all points between the ex- 
 tremes of the superstitions of the primitive mind and the 
 inductive scientific truth of modern scholarship. 
 
 In 1625, in the siege of Breda, a disease then known as 
 scurvy broke out in the army. The men became de- 
 pressed and sick, so depressed that the Prince of Orange 
 was on the point of capitulation. A so-called discovery 
 was made by some man wise enough to know the value 
 of mental suggestion. Each physician took three phials 
 and put in them a harmless liquid and circulated the re- 
 port that the marvelous medicine he had would cure the 
 worst case of scurvy. The news went before them and 
 Doctor Vonder Mye says, that men and soldiers who had 
 not been able to be on their feet for a month, with the 
 administration of a little liquid that was proven to be 
 harmless in the case, were well and on duty in a very 
 short time. So universal was the cure by the simple de- 
 lusion that it restored the army and enabled the Dutch to 
 maintain the siege. 
 
 In colonial days witches and the powers attributed to 
 them to cure or to create disease proved so serious that 
 it became a matter of legislation. I used to sit at the feet 
 of my grandfather and listen to the stories of witchcraft 
 that seem so strange and mysterious to us now and yet 
 
not a Religion 29 
 
 were believed in as firmly by him as the old Bible itself. 
 Dr. Hudson says, "There is a large class of people in 
 every community the fervency of whose belief in theories 
 that minister to their emotions is always in inverse pro- 
 portion to the amount of evidence that can be adduced to 
 sustain them. Hence it happens that those theories which 
 command their most fervent belief, and are advocated 
 with hysterical aggressiveness, are invariably those which 
 everybody knows to be untrue." This statement is pe- 
 culiarly true of Christian Science in the affirmation by 
 which it declares that there is no physical pain. Every- 
 body knows this to be false, and yet men and women go 
 on, and by accepting that principle, though against all 
 reason, often find healing. They know it is false, and 
 not one of them would accept it except in the form of 
 mysticism. You know it. As soon as you are permitted 
 to reason, the logic and doctrine of that cult cannot be 
 accepted by any man ; and yet Dr. Hudson says that the 
 law of suggestion acting on the basis of belief produces 
 the same results. The basis of belief may be false, but 
 the result of the suggestion may be beneficent. This be- 
 ing true we must not infer that all these schools of men- 
 tal healing and all these cults are equally valuable or 
 equally true. We must not conceive that God is thus 
 prodigal of his law or power of revelation. He has not 
 thus equalized truth and falsehood, good and evil, for any 
 purpose whatever. We must also be careful in the study 
 of this great principle, for powers that are extraneous to 
 the patient are dangerous. Where the healing power is 
 extraneous to the man himself, there is very great danger 
 

 30 Mental Healing 
 
 likely to follow in a reaction of the patient's faith. Many 
 of the schools which are teaching mental science are in- 
 tensely dangerous because of the extraneous force in- 
 voked; and many of our sane and sensible laymen are 
 afraid that there is danger in the church laying its hands 
 upon this two-edged sword. 
 
 There is some reason for conservatism along that line ; 
 and it is especially so of the influence of suggestion when 
 administered by any extraneous power, even though that 
 power be implored as divine. 
 
 There is, therefore, but one system that is correct and 
 it is that system which is based on demonstrable, in- 
 ductive, scientific truth. That is always safe whether it 
 be in the criticism of the Bible, in the examination of the- 
 ology, in the great domain of science, in the physical or 
 material universe or in the activities of mind, in psychol- 
 ogy, or in the demonstration of mind over matter. It 
 is safe for men to follow where science leads. The divine 
 power may always be justly implored to assist in the 
 realization of a divine law or divine truth. 
 
 Now the question is, is there a working hypothesis? 
 Is there a demonstrable, scientific truth on which this 
 work, as a science and an art, may be based? I believe 
 there was nothing of the kind in science ten years ago, 
 but I am persuaded that there is today. Whether or not 
 it has completely worked out an ultimate law, it now ap- 
 pears that science has reached a working hypothesis and 
 will reduce mental healing to a system. In so far as sci- 
 ence has done this the subject is worthy of our study; 
 and when science has formulated the law and made it 
 
not a Religion 31 
 
 safe, the law may then be used by any church, school, 
 physician or individual, religious or irreligious, with a 
 reasonable degree of safety. Demonstrable scientific truth 
 in the hands of sane men, or in the hands of scholarship, 
 is a safe proposition. 
 
 I think I have demonstrated to your minds that I do 
 not regard this universal law as a religion. It works as 
 well out of the church as in it. But all mental healing has 
 a faith basis, whether it be religious or irreligious. It is 
 the faith of the subjective mind. Suggestion has its 
 therapeutic value only in so far as faith can be and is ex- 
 ercised. That faith may be in Mary Baker Eddy, in John 
 Alexander Dowie or in the stick or stone that the imagin- 
 ation of the primitive mind has conceived to be inhabited 
 by some personality of God or devil. It may be in any 
 one of a thousand things and the result would be the 
 same. But mark this, // has a faith basis. It is only 
 sensible and sane to allow that faith to rest in the author 
 and finisher of faith and power, the Infinite and Eternal 
 Creator. The subjective mind is the mind of the person- 
 ality and the mind that bears the attribute of God. Hence, 
 the faith that assimilates the human will with the Divine 
 Will becomes the most potent faith for the action of men- 
 tal healing. Religion, therefore, is not alien to mental 
 healing, it is auxiliary. 
 
 In so far as functional disorders affect personality, and 
 in so far as mental healing readjusts the conception 
 of the personality toward the Divine Law and toward the 
 Divine Father, it ought to be used in connection with re- 
 ligion. In so far as it leads to higher spiritual life and 
 
32 
 
 Mental Healing 
 
 nobler conceptions of God, it may be used judiciously in 
 connection with the church. 
 
 I have laid these thoughts before you for thought, medi- 
 tation and prayer. To the human mind, this great uni- 
 versal law of God is a serious thing and worthy of un- 
 prejudiced heart searching study. To know how far we 
 may use this principle is the question demanding our at- 
 tention. I have not said anything about its limitations. 
 They are great. I do not want you to feel because of 
 what I have said, there are no limitations. But in spite 
 of limitations it is a majestic power to be used by the 
 man of God if he uses it with reverence and good sense. 
 
THE DUAL MIND, 
 CONSCIOUS AND SUB-CONSCIOUS 
 
For the mind of the flesh is death ; but the mind of the « 
 Spirit is life and peace. — Romans, 8 :6. 
 
 My son, attend to my words ; 
 Incline thine ear unto my sayings. 
 For they are life unto those that find them, 
 And health to all their flesh.— Proverbs 4 : 20, 22. 
 
 ^ 
 
 1 
 

 
 The Dual Mind, 
 Conscious and Subconscious 
 
 AST Sunday night, while I tried to show 
 you that this whole science of mental heal- 
 ing was not a religion, I said that it rested 
 on faith. Preliminary to what I have to 
 say tonight in regard to the dual mind, I 
 wish to say that the faith on which action 
 rests has three characteristics: first, it is 
 acquired by study and reasoning, and is 
 not in any sense the faith that grows out of superstitious 
 thought; second, this faith, grounded in law and fact, is 
 permanent and rational; third, in such faith, permanent 
 and rational, there is no diverse auto-suggestion arising 
 from the objective mind that weakens the potency of the 
 suggestion. If we are then to have a faith that is ration- 
 al, a faith that may be acquired by study and reasoning 
 and have no reaction afterward, we must understand 
 the nature of the mind in which that faith is grounded. 
 So tonight your attention is directed to the character of 
 the human mind, and its duality. 
 
 Paul says that "the mind of the flesh is death ; but the 
 mind of the Spirit is life and peace." The reason that I 
 read in your hearing from the 7th chapter of Romans 
 
36 The Dual Mind, 
 
 was that Paul recognizes two powers in every human 
 understanding: The mind of the flesh and the mind of 
 the Spirit. Jesus implies the same thing when he says, 
 "that which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which 
 is born of the Spirit is spirit." The Old Testament teach- 
 es the same thing when it speaks of the body returning 
 to dust from whence it came and the spirit to God who 
 gave it. Science demonstrates the teaching of the law 
 of the spirit in regard to two minds. 
 
 Professor James says: "It must be admitted, there- 
 fore, that in certain persons at least, the total possible 
 consciousness may be split into two parts which co-exist, 
 but mutually ignore each other, and share the objects of 
 knowledge between them. More remarkable still, they 
 are complementary ." 
 
 Dr. Hudson says : "Man has, or appears to have, two 
 minds, each endowed with separate and distinct attri- 
 butes and powers; and each capable under certain con- 
 ditions, of independent action." 
 
 Dr. Quackenbos says : "Man is a two-fold nature, ma- 
 terial and spiritual. As a spiritual being, the created copy 
 of God, he is continuous in nature with God, and by rea- 
 son of his divine pedigree he is invested immeasurably 
 with supernormal attributes, faculty and knowledge, 
 which, under certain conditions, he has power to utter in 
 his objective existence. He has thus perfect control over 
 the flesh — both over bodily functions and over intellect- 
 ual, emotional and moral expression." 
 
 Dr. Sowerby says: "The human spirit, next to the 
 Holy Spirit of God, is the mightiest agent in the world 
 
Conscious and Sub-Conscious 37 
 
 today. It can live independently of the body ; it controls 
 cell change, the circulation of the blood, excretion, secre- 
 tion and sensation. It acts independently of the five 
 senses, sees through matter, reads the thoughts of others, 
 never forgets, never sleeps, and never dies." 
 
 Paul says : "For the good that I would I do not ; but 
 the evil which I would not, that I do." 
 
 We can easily believe this if we believe in the immor- 
 tality of the human soul. We cannot read stories like 
 that of the transfiguration of our Lord, with Moses and 
 Elias, without believing in the hereafter of this immortal 
 part of man that is capable of action independent of the 
 flesh; that is, personality. The teaching of Holy Scrip- 
 ture and modern science, as to the mental processes of 
 humanity, agree. There is a recognition of unity in this 
 duality. I mention this fact lest some may think that 
 the dual mind is not a unity. It is a unity, and at the 
 same time a duality. 
 
 The mind of the flesh is a reasoning power. The mind 
 of the Spirit is intuitive. The mind of the flesh reaches 
 its logical conclusions by processes of development, step 
 by step. The intuitive nature reaches its conclusions at 
 once on hearing that which offers suggestion. There is in 
 every human being, personality, whether we are able to 
 define it or not. We all believe there is a difference be- 
 tween man and the beast of the field. One man has said 
 that if the pig could become selfconscious and realize that 
 he was a pig, he would immediately cease to be a pig. The 
 fact that we are conscious that we are individuals, and ca- 
 pable of reviewing the past and foreseeing the future, ca- 
 
38 The Dual Mind, 
 
 pable of bringing our experiences together and comparing 
 them for better or for worse, implies a self-conscious na- 
 ture that is not found in the animal kingdom. That pow- 
 er we call personality. We have certain power that is 
 independent of the flesh. It acts sometimes independent 
 of the body and we are unable to understand its nature 
 and character. I am not defining the sub-conscious mind 
 as the philosopher or scientist would define it; I am not 
 explaining it from the cerebral processes, as he might 
 explain it; but I am explaining it from the experiences 
 and observations that cannot be accounted for on the 
 basis of the conscious mind ; and it is called the sub-con- 
 scious mind because it seems to be under the control of 
 the conscious mind. 
 
 For a working hypothesis, we speak of this intuitive 
 nature, this nature which receives intuitions that we can- 
 not come to through reason, and cannot be explained by 
 reason, as the mind of the spirit, or, the sub-conscious 
 mind. The action of the gray matter of the brain we call 
 the conscious mind ; but the functions of personality man- 
 ifest through suggestion, we call the sub-conscious mind. 
 We must necessarily in cur discussion tonight, attribute 
 more to our nature than the philosopher would. I am 
 not sure that Dr. Wilde would agree with me on that 
 point. He would probably bring it more closely to the 
 conscious mind or that part of the nervous power that 
 does not reside in the brain itself. 
 
 Let us examine some of the experiences of humanity. 
 In the first place we may speak of dreams. There is 
 something very peculiar about dreams. Some of them 
 
Conscious and Sub-Conscious 39 
 
 can be explained on the basis of the conscious mind, and 
 some cannot. If we go back to Scripture, we find many 
 strange dreams. Joseph was warned in a dream to flee 
 down into Egypt. Joseph of Old Testament fame had 
 dreams significant of his later power and of his lordship 
 over his brethren. The dreams of Nebuchadnezzar inter- 
 preted by Daniel, those of Pharoah's servants interpreted 
 by Joseph while in prison, and many others which the 
 ordinary psychological explanation does not satisfy, were 
 potent in shaping Israelitish history. If we turn from 
 these to dreams of later date known among ourselves, 
 there are some things difficult of explanation. These 
 experiences are sometimes called telepathy. Telepathy is 
 the relation of mental processes between distant persons. 
 It is the wireless exchange of mental affections. I do not 
 feel in a great congregation like this that I should refer 
 to personal experiences, and yet in this connection I de- 
 sire to give an experience of my own. I would not do 
 this if I stood alone, but many others have had similar 
 experiences. While I was a student in college, at one 
 time a special problem was given to the class in geometry. 
 The professor, the teacher of this class, gave us several 
 original problems without equations or diagrams, one of 
 which was very intricate and difficult of solution. Three 
 boys stood at the head of the class. Night after night, 
 after we had finished our other lessons, we worked over 
 this problem, and yet we failed of success. One night 
 after preparation of my Greek lesson I took up my pencil 
 and again worked on the problem with intense energy un- 
 til two o'clock in the morning, but I could see nothing in 
 

 40 The Dual Mind, 
 
 it. At the end of this long study, I dropped my pencil and 
 retired. I fell asleep and after about two hours I had a 
 dream in which the solution of the problem came to me. 
 While the vision of the solution was in my mind, I arose, 
 lighted my lamp, made the drawings, wrote out the 
 equations and retired. The next morning I looked at my 
 tablet and found it was right in every particular. I ask 
 is there anything in the conscious mind that makes it 
 possible to solve a problem in a dream when it cannot be 
 solved in the waking hours? 
 
 . .The late Dr. Horace Tarbell, whose geographies and 
 other text books are widely known in the public schools 
 of America, was for eighteen years the successful super- 
 intendent of the public schools in Providence, R. I. He 
 never retired at night without placing by his bed-side 
 pencil, tablet and lamp, which he might require to record 
 the results of his mental processes in his dreams. He thus 
 often solved problems and caught ideas which were im- 
 possible in his waking hours. How do you explain 
 that? Was that a mere matter of the conscious mind? 
 Is that the action of the cerebrum? There are many oth- 
 er instances of a similar nature where the sub-conscious 
 mind works out problems, the results of which could be 
 obtained in no other way. 
 
 I am going to relate a few incidents illustrating this 
 which are well authenticated and not mere newspaper 
 stories. The following is one of the strangest cases in 
 the history of science: A girl, having lost her mind, a 
 few years ago proved a very perplexing case to the physi- 
 cians in charge. She was found to be suffering from a 
 
Conscious and Sub-Conscious 41 
 
 nervous fever. In the fever she became so disturbed 
 mentally that she did not know what she was doing, she 
 was unconscious of what was going on about her. Dur- 
 ing - these periods of unconsciousness she began to recite 
 with great readiness and fluency whole passages of He- 
 brew, Greek, and Latin poetry. She recited with such 
 clearness that they could write it down. They began to 
 search out the means by which she could thus recite the 
 Hebrew, Greek and Latin, for she did not know one 
 Hebrew letter from another; the other languages were 
 equally strange to her. She was a domestic, and of very 
 limited education. Physicians that took the matter up 
 soon became very much interested in the case, and in the 
 search to find out the source of the strange phenomenon. 
 It was discovered that at one time she had lived in the 
 house of an old clergyman. Upon investigation it was 
 found that the old clergyman was dead, but a niece that 
 used to live with him still survived. They found the 
 niece who had inherited all his property including his 
 library, and with her they took up the case of the girl. 
 This girl, she said, came to live in her uncle's home, and 
 the library was just off the kitchen where the girl was ac- 
 customed to assist with the work. Her uncle was ac- 
 customed to read aloud Greek, Latin and Hebrew history 
 and poetry, in which the girl seemed much interested. 
 When the physicians went to the library and began to 
 search, they found the poetry and other literature from 
 which the girl had recited whole passages word for word. 
 Can you explain that on the basis of the conscious mind? 
 This whole mental process of which I am speaking is 
 
42 The Dual Mind 
 
 not a new thing. Some years ago, a boy was born in the 
 state of Vermont. At the age of six years, he began to 
 show genius in mathematics. He had never studied arith- 
 metic or algebra, and yet he could do difficult problems. 
 "At a meeting of his friends, which was held for the pur- 
 pose of concerting the best methods of promoting the 
 views of the father, this child undertook and completely 
 succeeded in raising the number 8 progressively up to 
 the sixteenth power. And in naming the last result, viz., 
 281,474,976,710,656, he was right in every figure. He was 
 then tried as to other numbers consisting of one figure, all 
 of which he raised (by actual multiplication, and not by 
 memory) as high as the tenth power, with so much facili- 
 ty and despatch that the person appointed to take down 
 the results was obliged to enjoin him not to be so rapid. 
 With respect to numbers consisting of two figures, he 
 would raise some of them to the sixth, seventh and eighth 
 power, but not always with equal facility; for the larger 
 the products became, the more difficult he found it to 
 proceed. He was asked the square root of 106,929; and 
 before the number could be written down, he immediate- 
 ly answered 327. He was then required to name the cube 
 root of 268,336,125; and with equal facility and prompt- 
 ness he replied 645." How was it that the boy could do 
 that with no knowledge of mathematics? Everyone 
 knows it did not depend on the knowledge of the con- 
 scious mind, or reason. 
 
 Can you explain the phenomena manifested along 
 lines of music? Many of you have heard that phenomen- 
 al musician known as "Blind Tom," in his musical pro- 
 
Conscious and Sub-Conscious 43 
 
 grams. It is said that he could reproduce any piece of 
 music he had ever heard whether it was a month or a 
 year or ten years later. I do not know whether he could 
 produce the so-called classical music note for note. Some 
 musicians say he could not do that with accuracy; but 
 no one will question his genius who ever heard him play. 
 Who on normal grounds can explain the particular func- 
 tion by which he accomplished such marvelous things? 
 And yet beyond that wonderful knowledge of music, he 
 knew nothing. He could not even take proper care of 
 himself. 
 
 Other illustrations are intuitive or along the line of 
 impelling suggestion. There was in the city of Chicago 
 a man who had a little daughter. This little girl was ac- 
 customed to go to the theater, especially to the matinee. 
 A few years ago, he bought tickets for her to go one after- 
 noon. It was the afternoon of the fatal matinee in the 
 Iroquois Theater in which so many hundreds of people 
 lost their lives. The little girl said to her father, "I do 
 not want to go this afternoon." Upon asking her why, 
 for he was surprised that she did not want to go, she said : 
 "I do not know, but I do not want to go." Upon urging 
 her to go and take her brother, she went. She stayed on- 
 ly a little while, and taking her brother went to her fath- 
 er's office. Her father was much surprised, and asked 
 why she did not remain at the play, she replied : "They 
 are going to have a fire in there ;" and within 20 minutes 
 551 people had lost their lives. Can this be explained on 
 the basis of the conscious mind? 
 
44 The Dual Mind, 
 
 A minister, who was the pastor of a church, sitting one 
 afternoon in his study working at his sermon had the im- 
 pression that he ought to visit one of his parishioners who 
 lived in the country. It was an exceedingly disagreeable 
 day; the minister sat and looked out of the window at 
 the falling rain, and said to himself, "this impression is 
 foolish and I will not go." After working a few minutes 
 more, he said, "I must go." Putting on his coat and hat, 
 he went to the barn, harnessed his horse and drove four 
 miles to see the man. To his very great surprise, there 
 was no one at home. He said, "There, I knew it was fool- 
 ish, I find now that it was a mistake." He walked around 
 the house, entered the woodshed and waited for the slack- 
 ing of the rain. While there he said something impelled 
 him to pray for the man and his family, and he kneeled 
 down and prayed aloud for their protection. After he had 
 thus prayed, he arose, got into his carriage and went 
 home. Some months afterward a man came to see this 
 minister, and said : "Do you remember that at such a time 
 you came to a man's woodshed and kneeled down and 
 prayed?" I was in that woodshed, hiding behind the 
 woodpile with my rifle in hand. I was there to kill that 
 man. If you had not called I should have taken his life ; 
 but after you had been there, and I heard you pray for his 
 safety, I took my rifle and slipped out; and now I am 
 thankful to you for coming and saving his life, and sav- 
 ing me from committing a crime. Later I learned he was 
 innocent of the wrong I thought he had committed." It 
 matters not whether you call it a coincidence or a freak 
 of nature, you cannot explain that incident on the basis 
 of the conscious mind. 
 
Conscious and Sub-Conscious 45 
 
 There is no limit to the illustrations like those I have 
 been reciting, to demonstrate the fact that there is an 
 inner and spiritual nature that Paul calls the mind of the 
 spirit, of which we can make no explanation from the 
 standpoint of the conscious mind. We find it in our 
 dreams at night. How many times do we have presenti- 
 ments or intuitions which no law of mind-reading can 
 explain. How many times in everyday life there are 
 things that you cannot explain apart from some sub-con- 
 scious power that lies deep in your nature. The clock 
 strikes, and some seconds afterward we hear and realize 
 it; or someone asks a question, and sometime passes be- 
 fore the conscious mind catches it. All along the line, we 
 find these manifestations that seem to transcend the con- 
 scious mind. 
 
 I have not spoken of the use of suggestion. I leave 
 the thought with you until next Sunday when I shall 
 speak on that theme. I might speak of hypnotism, mes- 
 merism and clairvoyancy and affirm that there are things 
 about them that no man can explain on the basis of the 
 conscious mind. It brings me back to my text. Paul had 
 deep meaning in his language when he said "For the 
 mind of the flesh is death; but the mind of the Spirit is 
 life and peace." Jesus had meaning in his language 
 when he said "that which is born of the flesh is flesh ; and 
 that which is born of the Spirit is spirit." When we 
 come back to the spiritual nature, the personality so won- 
 derful in its fashioning, that marvelous power which be- 
 longs to every man, we watch with astonishment its won- 
 derful manifestations. The facts we have observed; but 
 the law we have not known until science, within a decade, 
 has laid it at our feet, and given us a glimpse of an old 
 revelation in a new dress. 
 
SUGGESTION AND AUTO-SUGGESTION 
 
But the natural man receiveth not the things of the 
 Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither 
 can he know them, because they are spiritually dis- 
 cerned.— I. Cor. 2:14. 
 
 Train up a child in the way he should go: and when 
 he is old, he will not depart from it. — Prov. 22 :6. 
 
 He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty ; and 
 he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city. — Prov. 
 16:32. 
 
 
 Character is more than intellect. A great soul will be 
 strong to live, as well as to think. Goodness outshines 
 genius, as the sun makes the electric light cast a shadow. 
 — Emerson. 
 
Suggestion and Auto-Suggestion 
 
 1 i>\3&~ l!nKS9B»J 
 
 I AST Sunday night, I called your attention 
 to the dual mind, and its recognition by 
 Jesus, by Paul, and in modern science. 
 Tonight I quote again from Paul as he 
 teaches that in the acquirement of knowl- 
 edge the natural man fails in a significant 
 part. All knowledge cannot be acquired 
 alike. There are the things that are natural, that may be 
 acquired by the natural man ; and things that are spiritual, 
 which cannot be acquired by the natural man, but in order 
 that they may be known they must be perceived by the 
 spiritual, or as Paul says, they are spiritually discerned. 
 As you well know, in these evening themes I have not 
 made an exposition of the text. I have simply read a 
 passage suggestive of the line of thought. Tonight I call 
 your attention to two or three things introductory to the 
 sermon, — things simply marvelous that have come to us 
 here at home, illustrating the theme I have been discuss- 
 ing. A gentleman, a prominent lawyer in the city, fur- 
 nishes this illustration. He is present tonight, and if I do 
 
50 Suggestion and 
 
 not repeat it correctly I am subject to rebuke. While this 
 man was a lad in the academy, the class had completed a 
 work in algebra and a higher algebra had been introduced. 
 In this there were difficult problems, one of which the 
 teacher was unable to solve. The whole class was strug- 
 gling with it, teacher as well as pupils. One night this 
 young man, after working until after the midnight hour, 
 retired to rest. He had been working on one of those old 
 fashioned slates with a hardwood frame, such as they 
 used to use. He cleaned the slate before retiring, but 
 the next morning that problem was on it solved in every 
 detail, both sides of the slate being covered with the 
 figures. The work was in his own handwriting. He 
 had not been sufficiently conscious to know that he had 
 arisen from his bed during the night. This is simply the 
 manifestation of the power of the sub-conscious mind 
 while the conscious mind is unaware of what is going on. 
 Another case which is marvelous, and worthy of a 
 place in science: I shall not mention names lest I might 
 cause embarrassment. While we were in the sanctuary 
 worshiping last Sunday night, a young woman, a stu- 
 dent in the State University, who had been working hard, 
 and whose problems had been bearing down upon her 
 very heavily, became unconscious through nervous pros- 
 tration. This young woman wandered across the city, 
 fell on the sidewalk and was found unconscious. She was 
 carried into a house nearby and the next morning was 
 sent to her home. She did not recognize her parents, 
 sister, friends or her own home. She thought she was 
 in some strange place, a hospital or sanitarium. She 
 
Auto-Suggestion 51 
 
 talked wildly, her brain being very much excited, and she 
 remained in this condition more or less all day Monday, 
 and especially in the afternoon was delirious. Tuesday 
 her delirium was as bad as ever, and at no time had she 
 come to recognition of her home and family. Her con- 
 dition continued into Wednesday with no change for the 
 better. Then her family telephoned me to come into the 
 home and see her. I went on Wednesday morning. I 
 told her parents that from what I had heard and could 
 learn from conversation with her sister and mother, I be- 
 lieved her to be susceptible to suggestion. I had some 
 conversation with her mother and inquired into her con- 
 dition before I entered the room where she was lying. 
 Upon going into her room I found her in serious deliri- 
 um, not knowing what she was talking about and yet 
 talking much of the time. There was a look on her face 
 betraying her condition. I talked with her until I learned 
 the bent of her mind in its unbalanced condition, then I 
 proceeded to use the law of suggestion for the restoration 
 of her mind to consciousness. I told her what to do and 
 what she would do from 10 :30 until 5 o'clock. I told her 
 that she would rest quietly that day and that a certain 
 person would come to her home and would tell her cer- 
 tain things about the State University and about the 
 Sunday School in Wesley Church, the High School, etc., 
 and as he told her these things, she would come to con- 
 sciousness. She followed the suggestions to the letter, 
 from 10:30 until 5 o'clock. When the person came and 
 told her of the things mentioned in the suggestion, she 
 came to consciousness and one hour later, clothed in her 
 
52 Suggestion and 
 
 right mind, she was eating her supper with the family, 
 and later in the evening entertained them by playing the 
 piano. She has been bright and happy up to this time. 
 This is only a manifestation of the law of suggestion. 
 There was nothing peculiar about the suggestions made, 
 nothing other than any one might have done. We are in 
 the presence of a mighty law that governs human action 
 and I recite this as a matter of illustration. I would like 
 to tell you the complete story, but it would take the entire 
 time of this discourse. It is worthy a place in the his- 
 tory of science. It is a most wonderful demonstration of 
 the dual mind. There were many things said illustrative 
 of the dual mind, but not of a dual personality. 
 
 I am to speak tonight of the law of suggestion. It is 
 a powerful law. Whether we can prove that there is a 
 dual mind or not, is of no great significance in the use of 
 this law of suggestion. I want to impress upon your 
 mind the fact that men and women are susceptible to 
 suggestion; they come under the power of suggestion 
 precisely as if there were a dual mind. It is of no very 
 great importance to Science whether or not we can prove 
 there are atoms in actual existence; but this is true, sci- 
 entists demonstrate that matter acts as // there were 
 atoms. It is of no very great importance whether we 
 can prove the theorem of Newton with regard to the heav- 
 enly bodies ; but one thing is true, namely, that the heav- 
 enly bodies act as if the theorem were true. It is of no 
 importance whether we can demonstrate to your satisfac- 
 tion in science, that there is a dual mind, but one thing is 
 true; under the strange law of suggestion and auto-sug- 
 
Autosuggestion 53 
 
 gestion, men and women act as if there were a dual mind. 
 That is the only thing that concerns us. A working hy- 
 pothesis is what we are seeking. 
 
 Every great law discovered in science meets with uni- 
 versal objection. Dr. Hudson, speaking along this line, 
 says: 
 
 "When this is once accomplished, however, — such is 
 the 'conservation of science,' or the perversity of human 
 nature, — the discovery is generally destined to encounter 
 three successive stages of opposition. First, it is met 
 with a universal shout of derision. When that fails to 
 disprove it, as it sometimes does, everybody claims it as 
 his own. When that is disproved, as it sometimes is, each 
 claimant proceeds to cover himself with the dust of old 
 libraries in an effort to prove that it was always known." 
 
 It was so with Keplar's theory, it was so with Newton's 
 nebular hypothesis. Everybody knew it was so from 
 the beginning. Talk about Newton's discovery of gravi- 
 tation. Why, everybody has always known about it. So 
 it is with the law of suggestion. It is now in the stage of 
 ridicule. Churches are afraid if they make use of it some- 
 body will point the finger of scorn; however, some are 
 coming to use it, and are receiving commingled praise 
 and ridicule. There is one underlying principle which is 
 uniform. The law of suggestion does its potent work 
 through the essence of faith. I called your attention to it 
 in the first and second sermons of this series and want 
 to emphasize it tonight. The fact that Jesus used it is 
 enough to exalt faith, aside from the fact that it is the 
 one scientific thing underlying the power of suggestion. 
 
: 
 
 54 Suggestion and 
 
 I think we shall never be able to improve upon it what- 
 ever may be the experience we gain. Those familiar with 
 Carpenter's Physical Law will remember that he uses 
 the phrase here and there, "Expectant Attention." Sci- 
 entists may regard Dr. Carpenter's discovery of the men- 
 tal process known as "Expectant Attention" as a great 
 discovery; but when Dr. Carpenter discovered that men- 
 tal process, and used this scientific phrase for the simple 
 phrase Jesus used when he said, "Thy faith hath made 
 thee whole," he had added nothing new to human ex- 
 perience. 
 
 After the introduction of mesmerism and hypnotism, 
 when these phenomena came under criticism and analy- 
 sis, especially that phase known as mesmerism, it was 
 taken up by the Medical School of Paris and they ap- 
 pointed a committee to investigate. They made a careful 
 analysis, and reported to the Medical Academy of Paris 
 that there was a very great therapeutic value in it, and 
 that marvelous cures had been made, but they had dis- 
 covered that these cures were merely products of the 
 "imagination" and therefore unworthy of the attention 
 of the Medical Academy. They had simply another word 
 for the phrase Jesus used when he said, "Thy faith hath 
 made thee whole." As I have already demonstrated, in 
 the use of this working faith, it does not necessarily 
 mean a faith in God or a faith in Christ. It is a state of 
 mind. 
 
 What do we mean by suggestion as related to faith? 
 Suggestion is no substitute for a working faith. There 
 is nothing in it to cure any disease. The creative power 
 
Auto-Suggestion 55 
 
 does not lie in the working suggestion. It is no substi- 
 tution for the mental condition of faith. But suggestion 
 is that power of mind brought either by another, or by 
 oneself upon the mind, by which the faith of the mind is 
 crystallized. It is that power brought upon the mind by 
 which the mind itself yields and accomplishes that which 
 is suggested. Suggestion is always of value in the super- 
 inducing of faith. When faith has been awakened, it 
 crystallizes it into experience. I have learned through ex- 
 perience in the last fifteen months that we can do nothing 
 for the sufferer, unless he has faith in the use of this 
 great power. So I affirm it is suggestion crystallizing 
 faith that accomplishes the results. 
 
 Dr. Sowerby, one of the most conscientious of writers, 
 maintains that all cures outside of medicinal cures, and 
 he recognizes the therapeutic value of medicine, are di- 
 vine cures. He attributes the cure to the Divine Father in 
 all schools of healing. He believes that even if the faith 
 is in a stick or a stone, or in the bones of an old saint, 
 no matter what be the object, the healing is a divine mani- 
 festation of power. I like to believe that myself. I like 
 to believe that every mortal is in so close touch with God 
 that the restoration of the body is a manifestation of the di- 
 vine will and immanence. I wish now to speak of the prac- 
 tical side of suggestion, instead of its therapeutic value. 
 Take for example the influence and power of suggestion 
 upon child life. This is the most significant point I have 
 touched in discussing this theme. Children are exceed- 
 ingly susceptible to suggestion. There is much written in 
 the magazines on the power of suggestion over growing 
 
56 Suggestion and 
 
 children; how lying and other bad habits are cured by 
 the power of suggestion. Any person who accomplishes 
 the reformation of a boy or girl in this manner is doing a 
 good work, but the power of suggestion is vastly greater 
 than that. A little child under normal conditions is af- 
 fected more by the power of suggestion than under ab- 
 normal conditions. And this is the significance of the 
 law I am suggesting to you. No pastor goes very far, 
 if he calls at the hour when the children are in the home — 
 until he hears remarks such as these: "Mary is a very 
 nervous child," "John will never learn anything. He is 
 very dull. He cannot get hold of anything at all." 
 "Henry is the worst boy you ever saw, the worst boy in 
 the whole community ." Now what has happened? The 
 mother has done more to make Mary nervous than all 
 the work she will do in the next two months. She has 
 planted a suggestion in the child's mind that is enough 
 to make her a nervous wreck. The mother has done 
 more to make John dull and lacking in brain force, than 
 his public school teacher can take out in twelve months ; 
 and if Henry becomes a bad man charge the blame to the 
 mother when she makes that suggestion in the presence 
 of Henry. This law of suggestion is a great force. If 
 you use it in the right way it will make a good boy out of 
 Henry. I am touching live wires tonight when I am talk- 
 ing about this power you are using in molding the char- 
 acter of your child. There are parents living in this com- 
 munity who seldom enter the church. A little while ago 
 a mother came to me requesting that something be done 
 by which her boy might be induced to come to the sane- 
 
Auto-Suggestion 57 
 
 tuary and be brought under religious influences. There 
 are two periods of time when the child is most susceptible 
 to suggestion. These times are at the table when the 
 child is eating, and at the hour of retiring at night when 
 the child is falling asleep. It is one o'clock on Sunday. 
 Father and mother have come home from church. The 
 family has gathered about the table. The parents pro- 
 ceed to criticize the church, the members, the superin- 
 tendent of the Sunday School ; while Johnny is apparently 
 concerned only with his beef-steak or turkey. But while 
 the conscious mind is absorbed, the subconscious mind 
 is having implanted in it the suggestion which will cause 
 the boy to refuse to enter the church. This is a tremen- 
 dous responsibility. Guard these periods. When the 
 members of the family come together and enter into con- 
 versation with one another, there is ten times more said 
 about the ordinary trashy literature of the day, about 
 some scandal or story in the daily newspaper or the 
 Sunday newspaper, or some story of gossip that is going 
 around, than about the great masterpieces in literature. 
 Shakespeare, Milton, Longfellow — these great authors 
 with their great masterpieces are pushed aside; and the 
 common gossip of the day, the daily newspaper with its 
 divorce cases, murder trials, and sensational stories, is 
 paraded before the child. Then the parents wonder why 
 that child goes to the devil. An easy problem for those 
 who know the mighty law of suggestion. 
 
 Much now is being said about the curing of children; 
 the curing of the boy who is a thief; the boy who has 
 proven untruthful; the boy who is disrespectful to his 
 
58 Suggestion and 
 
 father and mother. I admit that there are many such 
 cases going on record, but that is the abnormal use of 
 suggestion. It is vastly better that you keep the boy from 
 being a thief, a liar, disrespectful to his father and mother ; 
 vastly better that you know the law and use it in mold- 
 ing the child's character. 
 
 When the child is falling asleep at night it is most sus- 
 ceptible to the law of suggestion, even more than at the 
 dinner table. It is a well-known fact today that where 
 there is an abundance of wealth, many of the parents 
 trust their servants to put the child to bed, and the child 
 never hears the fatherly or motherly word at night that 
 would mold or shape its character. I say to you that the 
 child that is being taught to kneel at its mother's knee, 
 and has the motherly word and kiss at night has inherited 
 a benediction that angels might covet. To you who have 
 children in your homes, let nothing come between you 
 and your child, as he falls asleep, to keep you from mold- 
 ing and shaping, by suggestion and prayer, the character 
 of the child as you want it. The mother who takes ad- 
 vantage of that hour and turns it to account in the child's 
 life has little to fear. That is what the writer meant when 
 he said, "Train up a child in the way he should go: and 
 when he is old, he will not depart from it." 
 
 Turning from childhood to manhood this law of sug- 
 gestion is still effective, but a man is not as easily im- 
 pressed as a child. Every man who is a salesman under- 
 stands this law. He knows and uses it. Every salesman 
 knows the influence of the power of suggestion. Let me 
 say a word to salesmen, clerks, and teachers ; they are all 
 
Autosuggestion 59 
 
 dealing with the minds of others. The first thing is to 
 know your goods. This is just as applicable to the teach- 
 er. If the teacher does not know her subject, she is not 
 a successful teacher. Know your goods! You must 
 know it, whether it be merchandise or mathematics. Sec- 
 ond, know yourself. The teacher that understands her- 
 self, the salesman that understands himself, is all impor- 
 tant. Third, know your customer. If that be a teacher, 
 the customer is the child. If the teacher knows these 
 three things she may use the law of suggestion with 
 mighty power. Know your theme, know yourself, know 
 your child. If a salesman, he realizes the nearer he brings 
 his mind in accord with the mind of his customer, the 
 better are his chances to sell his goods. There must be 
 self-appreciation, and yet not bigotry. There must be a 
 feeling that he is called to his task. A man with no con- 
 fidence in himself cannot bribe his customer with twenty- 
 five cent cigars. He passes out the cigars, and thinks he 
 has bought him up. Do not be deceived. If you are a 
 man of integrity, if you make a suggestion with righteous- 
 ness and honesty and fairness in the deal, you will com- 
 mand your man. 
 
 I have so far said little about auto-suggestion. That 
 power is quite as important, quite as powerful. The dif- 
 ference between them is this; in the one case it comes 
 from without, in the other from within. If I make a sug- 
 gestion to you to accomplish what I desire, it is sugges- 
 tion ; if you make the same suggestion to yourself and ac- 
 complish what you desire, it is auto-suggestion. It is 
 auto-suggestion that we are interested in in this health 
 
60 Suggestion and 
 
 movement in Wesley Church. We are not so anxious 
 to use the law of suggestion ourselves as we are to teach 
 men and women to use the power of auto-suggestion. We 
 want to put every man in that attitude toward himself 
 by which he can be his own master. "To master yourself 
 is to cause all things in yourself to enter their true sphere 
 of action, and the very moment that the will proceeds to 
 direct all things into their true spheres of action, the first 
 step in mastership has been attained. 
 
 It is a great thing for a man or woman to become self- 
 master. We are trying to teach that it is possible for 
 them to accomplish everything they are trying to do. We 
 want them to put themselves in tune with the divine 
 power, "in tune with the infinite." They have then 
 acquired that tremendous power by which a man rises 
 to the dignity of his manhood by the conquering of his 
 own spirit. In order that auto-suggestion may have its 
 full force, when a man is making a suggestion to his own 
 mind, it is of importance that he recognizes that there 
 are two minds, and out of the conscious mind he is speak- 
 ing to the subconscious mind to do the thing he desires 
 done. He must feel it. He must rise to where he ex- 
 pects it. When a man rises in his expectation of results, 
 to where he comes to feel that his deeper nature is allied 
 to the power that stands behind this universe, then it 
 is that man becomes master of his own spirit. We 
 have not yet learned the alphabet of the power of sugges- 
 tion and auto-suggestion, for the simple reason that it has 
 been regarded as a fake or superstition; anything but a 
 divine law that is as universal as the law of gravitation. 
 
Auto-Suggestion 61 
 
 It is only in the past four or five years that science has 
 discovered that this law of suggestion is as uniform as 
 the law of gravitation. We find, however, that sugges- 
 tion coming from without is destroyed by suggestion 
 coming from within. Auto-suggestion is just as great as 
 suggestion, sometimes greater. We have experiences 
 of this kind when it seems as if the law of which I have 
 been speaking is no longer to be trusted. It has been 
 proven furthermore that what seemed to destroy the law 
 was only counter-suggestion, and it no more destroyed the 
 law than a ball of wax thrown to the ceiling and adhering 
 there would destroy the law of gravitation. We would 
 not say that the law of gravitation had been destroyed, 
 but that the law of adhesion had taken its place. In other 
 words, when one law is restrained by the action of an- 
 other more powerful, it does not follow that the law has 
 been destroyed. Where the law of suggestion is counter- 
 acted by the law of auto-suggestion, and seems to be 
 destroyed, we find they are acting in perfect harmony 
 as the law of gravitation and adhesion. I am not speak- 
 ing of a freak in Nature, but a law as uniform as the 
 law of gravitation, and in another half century it will be 
 as well understood as the law of gravitation. 
 
s 
 
 
THE RELATION OF MENTAL HEALING 
 
 TO THE 
 
 CHURCH AND to the NEW TESTAMENT 
 
Therefore I say unto you, All things whatsoever ye 
 pray and ask for, believe that ye receive them, and ye 
 shall have them. — Mark 11:24. 
 
 And Jesus seeing their faith saith unto the sick of the 
 palsy, Son, thy sins are forgiven. — Mark 2 :5. 
 
 That it might be fulfilled which was spoken through 
 Isaiah the prophet, saying, Himself took our infirmities, 
 and bare our diseases. — Matt. 8:17. 
 
 Finally, I have one advice which is of very great im- 
 portance. You are to consider that health is a thing to be 
 attended to continually, as the very highest of all temporal 
 things. There is no kind of an achievement equal to per- 
 fect health. What to it are nuggets or millions? — Car- 
 lyle's Address to Students at Edinburgh. 
 
The Relation of Mental Healing to the 
 Church and to the New Testament 
 
 HHE word health has been greatly narrowed 
 in its meaning as used in the Scriptures 
 since 1611. In the ritual of the church in 
 the sixteenth century, in the "Morning 
 Prayer," we find "We have left undone 
 those things we ought to have done, and have 
 done those things which we ought not to 
 have done, and there is no health in us." In 1604 we find 
 in the communion prayer the word health in the follow- 
 ing passage: "And as the Son of God did vouchsafe to 
 yield up his soul by death upon the cross for your health" 
 etc. This word is changed in the edition of 1662 to "Sal- 
 vation." Also in Wycliff's Bible, Acts 28 :28, "Therefore 
 be it known to you, for to heathen men this health of 
 God is sent," And in both Wycliff and Tindall, Luke 
 19 :9, "This day is health come to this house." 
 
 In modern editions of the Scriptures the word health 
 in these passages is translated "Salvation." 
 
 When we consider some of the sayings of Jesus we find 
 mental healing is closely related to the New Testament. 
 

 66 The Relation of Mental Healing to the 
 
 It is taught throughout the Evangelical church that men 
 are saved by faith. The commonly accepted meaning 
 of that term is saved from sin ; but when we come to ex- 
 amine the use Jesus made of it we find he always used 
 it in connection with bodily healing. He used the phrase 
 "Thy faith hath made thee whole," five different times, 
 and every time it is used in connection with healing the 
 body. He does not use it at all in connection with for- 
 giveness of sins. 
 
 The phrase "Thy faith hath saved thee," is used by 
 Jesus in connection with the forgiveness of sins and also 
 in connection with healing diseases. To the woman who 
 had washed Jesus' feet with her tears and wiped them 
 with the hairs of her head* he said, "Thy sins are for- 
 given, thy faith hath saved thee." And to the blind beg- 
 gar who sought to have his eyes opened Jesus said, "Re- 
 ceive thy sight; thy faith hath saved thee." It is clear 
 from these passages that salvation by faith was not only 
 from sin, but also from sickness. There is no place in 
 the Scriptures where we find that this salvation by faith 
 is "from sin only." 
 
 There are other evidences also of the power of sug- 
 gestion in healing diseases in New Testament times. We 
 are told in the Acts of the Apostles that from the body of 
 Paul were brought handkerchiefs and aprons unto the 
 sick, and the diseases departed from them, and the evil 
 spirits went out of them. We are further told that the 
 sick were brought into the streets and laid upon beds 
 and couches that the shadow of Peter might fall on them, 
 and they were healed. We find in the gospels that mul- 
 
Church and to the New Testament 67 
 
 titudes were healed by the touching of the garments of 
 Jesus. In the light of modern science we can hardly con- 
 ceive that every such healing was a miracle, although in 
 the light of the age in which it occurred it was so con- 
 strued. It is a clear manifestation of the power of the 
 law of suggestion, and with the same amount of faith on 
 the part of the patient may be duplicated today. It does 
 not follow from this that no miraculous healing was ac- 
 complished by Jesus and by the Apostles; but it does 
 follow that much healing in that day was the direct result 
 of the law of suggestion; and in so far as healing was 
 done by the law of suggestion it may be duplicated in 
 this day. 
 
 That much disease has a moral basis is an indisputable 
 fact. This doctrine is not new. In the days of the Old 
 Testament as well as the New the blessings of health 
 were directly attributed to God, and the cause of sick- 
 ness was considered a punishment inflicted by divine 
 power, or by evil spirits by divine permission. Some- 
 where or somehow the ill will of the God who ruled over 
 all had been incurred and the penalty of disobedience was 
 inflicted in form of disease. I once heard a very devout 
 follower of Christ say, with all sincerity, that a boil was 
 the result of a stroke from the hand of the Devil. He 
 believed it even in this day, and he was an advanced stu- 
 dent in one of the leading colleges in this country. If 
 there is a moral foundation for much of the sickness from 
 which humanity suffers, the Church must at least be very 
 closely related to it. Whether or not the Church has 
 fully discharged its obligation when it encourages medi- 
 
68 The Relation of Mental Healing to the 
 
 cal colleges, fosters medical science and builds Christian 
 hospitals may be a question worthy of discussion. 
 
 This brings us to the relation the Church sustains to 
 the question under consideration, viz., the law of sug- 
 gestion. The church is for the uplifting of man. It has 
 no excuse for existence on any other basis. That human- 
 ity may be brought face to face with God through Jesus 
 Christ is the highest purpose for which the Church can 
 claim the loyal support of a progressive people. It is to 
 help realize revealed truth that it may be used for regen- 
 eration and transformation of character. The Church is 
 to help men to know God through Christ, whom to know 
 is life eternal. Christ said, "I am the truth," the truth 
 shall make you free. It is the mission of the Church to 
 bring that aspect of truth to man which is necessary for 
 his salvation, or if we were to hold to Wycliff's or Tin- 
 dall's translation, that which is necessary for his health. 
 
 There can be no clash between united truth and related 
 truth. United truth may be denned as that truth found 
 in the laws governing any single object, as for example, 
 the laws governing the physical man ; or the laws govern- 
 ing the spiritual nature. Related truth may be defined as 
 the truth of the laws of the spiritual as related to the 
 truth of the laws of the physical. But if both be truth 
 there can be no clash, so we are safe in our hypothesis 
 that there can be no discord in united or related truth. 
 In Jesus' day, by coming to know Him, men were healed 
 of infirmities of the flesh as well as of infirmities of the 
 soul. We have more records of bodily healing in his day 
 than we have of sins forgiven in his day. Inasmuch as 
 
Church and to the New Testament 69 
 
 he represented himself to be the truth, and through his 
 word a sinful soul was forgiven and the sick body made 
 well there can be no clash between the fundamental 
 truths applied to accomplish these results. 
 
 Not only the Bible but experience teaches us that men 
 are forgiven of their sins in this day, and that character 
 is transformed from that which is below the brute crea- 
 tion to that of lofty, noble manhood. Experience and ob- 
 servation also teach us that by mental processes men 
 are healed of their infirmities of the flesh, and that in 
 almost all such cases there is a transformation of char- 
 acter, or an increased spiritual conception and devotion. 
 These experiences are not a few and are constantly grow- 
 ing in number. In Jesus' day men were saved from sin 
 and from sickness by faith or through faith, and so far as 
 can be ascertained neither the law of forgiveness nor the 
 law of healing has been repealed. The nature of the law 
 by which a man's sins are forgiven is not yet understood, 
 and possibly never will be ; but the nature of the law by 
 which a man's body is healed is now, through scientific 
 investigation, coming to light; but I see no reason why 
 its use to the Church should be denied because it has to 
 a great extent exchanged its garment of mysticism for a 
 robe of intelligence. 
 
 The slogan of the Church has recently been, not saved 
 from sin, but saved to service. I like this, but what do 
 we mean by saved to service? If a man is saved to serv- 
 ice he ought to be saved to the largest, best and happiest 
 service possible. When is a man best fitted for service? 
 When he is racked with pain and burnt with fever? 
 
70 The Relation of Mental Healing to the 
 
 When he is despondent, blue, irritable, cross, worrying 
 and a chronic dyspeptic? But few people, even with a 
 saving faith, suffering with any of these maladies can 
 live a joyous, happy, Christian life of large service. It is 
 not the pleasure of God that any should suffer merely 
 for the sake of suffering. To be sick when a man ought 
 to be well is far from honoring God. A man has no more 
 business to live in sickness when that is brought on by 
 moral causes or ignorant practices than he has to live in 
 sin. Multitudes of Christians ask God for grace to bear 
 a sickness when it would be vastly nearer God's will if 
 they were to ask for grace to remove the sickness. 
 
 Prayer is the key to the right relationship with God. 
 It is the truest source of communion with God. It is 
 bringing the Divinity within us into communion with the 
 Divinity without us. It is the attunement of the human 
 spirit through Jesus Christ to the Divine Spirit. This 
 means forgiveness of sins and under normal conditions 
 healthy bodies. 
 
 I maintain that it is the business of the Church to bring 
 the Divine and the human together in the largest possi- 
 ble way, and to have men saved for the largest possible 
 service; and if to accomplish this it requires the use of 
 the whole truth in its application to the whole man then 
 I say in the name of the Most High let us use the whole 
 truth as science has laid it at our feet. 
 
 We may understand the whole problem better if we 
 raise and answer the question : 
 
 "Did Jesus heal diseases by the law of suggestion or 
 by miracle?" 
 
Church and to the New Testament 71 
 
 This question can best be answered by the introduction 
 of the story of the paralytic as recorded in the gospel of 
 St. Mark, 2:10, 11. He says, "But that ye may know 
 that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins, 
 (he saith to the sick of the palsy,) I say unto thee, Arise, 
 and take up thy bed, and go thy way into thine house." 
 
 Three gospels recite this story. Mark gives the most 
 detailed narrative. Mark's gospel is declared, by con- 
 sensus of Bible scholarship, to be the oldest of the syn- 
 optic gospels. The story is therefore stripped of all 
 mythical setting. The history of no story is better au- 
 thenticated. 
 
 This true, it becomes one of great interest because it 
 clothes Jesus with a power that no law of suggestion can 
 explain. Thy sins be forgiven thee is not the ring of sug- 
 gestion. Jesus here declares the forgiveness of sins be- 
 fore he heals the man or suggests any healing of the body. 
 
 The power by which sins are forgiven is a supernatural 
 power. It is the divine personality exercising its power 
 of compassion toward the human personality which is 
 truly penitent. Sin puts the human soul out of tune with 
 the divine Father. Forgiveness is the reconciliation or 
 the reattunement of the human spirit to the chord of di- 
 vine love that ever vibrates in the bosom of God. 
 
 In the case before us Christ saw the need of moral heal- 
 ing before physical healing. It is so today in about nine 
 cases out of every ten. A little reflection will probably 
 justify the statement that nine-tenths of human suffering 
 and sickness is of moral origin. The great suffering of 
 the human race is not physical pain, but mental and spirit- 
 ual pain. It is not the headache, severe as that may be, 
 
72 The Relation of Mental Healing to the 
 
 but the heartache that makes its inroads upon the physi- 
 cal organism. It is not work but worry that kills. No 
 one ever worries and feels a sense of gratitude at the 
 same time. This is a law that modern science has de- 
 monstrated beyond any doubt. I believe the conclusion 
 may be drawn that nine-tenths of the physical sickness of 
 the human race would be removed if humanity were to 
 accept forgiveness of sins and appreciate it as a true sense 
 of gratitude would require. 
 
 The expression of gratitude and the cultivation of ap- 
 preciation is an art that is easily lost under conditions of 
 prosperity. If the study of psychotherapy revives the 
 masses to a feeling of the need of cultivating the happy, 
 appreciative side of life it will prove to be a great bene- 
 faction to the human race. 
 
 This leads us to the very underlying law of health, 
 simplicity of life, unselfish behavior toward others, and 
 unfailing gratitude toward God, with self-forgetfulness to- 
 ward all the little ills that might be easily magnified into 
 troubles and nursed into diseases. 
 
 In the light of these suggestions we may well ask 
 whether Jesus employed miracle or suggestion for the 
 healing of the body. We may equally well answer, both. 
 I think it may be established as a well authenticated 
 scriptural fact that Jesus never worked a miracle, where 
 a miracle was not necessary to establish some point of 
 revelation which could not well be established without it. 
 He never worked a miracle to satisfy the curious or to 
 demonstrate the mere fact that he could do so. Every 
 miracle of our Lord was purposive. Every one counted 
 
Church and to the New Testament 73 
 
 for something in establishing his great mission of redemp- 
 tion and revelation. Regarding this as true, we can 
 scarcely conceive of every case of healing of our Lord 
 as a miracle. Neither do we wish to, for any such con- 
 ception narrows the universal law of Christ's power to 
 particularity, and thus robs it of its utility as a benefaction 
 to mankind. I believe we are safe in saying that Jesus 
 never used a miracle to do a thing which could be done 
 by the universal laws already established in God's crea- 
 tion. The law of suggestion was from the beginning as 
 was the law of gravitation. It is quite as universal. 
 Gravitation was known from the day of Adam, but was 
 not formulated and scientifically expressed until the day 
 of Newton. However, as death reigned from Adam to 
 Moses, when the law of sin and death was unknown, so 
 gravitation was used from Adam to Newton, when the 
 law was unknown. But it will be granted that since the 
 day of Newton the law of gravitation has been more in- 
 telligently used. It has been worth more to science and 
 to civilization; but because we have come to know it, it 
 is none the less God's law and an expression of God's will. 
 So with the law of suggestion. It has been used from 
 the day of the first man of the human race. Christ spake 
 as one having authority. He used the law as it has not 
 been used since or was not used before. He knew the law 
 for he was author of the law. Without Him was not 
 any thing made that was made. But like the law of gravi- 
 tation we have had to wait all these centuries before man 
 could discover this subtle power and formulate it into a 
 law to be used for suffering humanity. 
 
74 The Relation of Mental Healing to the 
 
 Serious objections are raised to it now; just as serious 
 objections were raised to the law of gravitation when it 
 was formulated. Today we smile at the objections raised 
 to the law of gravitation in Newton's day and count our- 
 selves scholarly because we see things differently. Fifty 
 years hence men will laugh at the objections raised now 
 to the law of suggestion, and they will seem as far from 
 scholarship in that day as the objections to Newton's law 
 seem from scholarship today. 
 
 But because Jesus used this law and dignified it, and 
 declared that greater works will ye do, we must not con- 
 clude that all the healing Jesus did was confined to the 
 use of suggestion. In the case before us we have what 
 seems in the light of modern scholarship a clear case of 
 miraculous healing. The power to forgive sins was called 
 in question. He was accused of blasphemy for saying thy 
 sins are forgiven. His Messiahship was at stake. His 
 power to reveal God and be counted the Son of God was 
 under question; a miracle was necessary; and when a 
 miracle was necessary he used it. Does he heal diseases 
 today by miraculous power? I do not know. We hesi- 
 tate to believe any further miracle necessary to establish 
 his mission of redemption or of revelation, hence scholars 
 have questioned whether he now heals any miraculously. 
 But whether he does or not, there are wonderful cases on 
 record of healing through faith in God. It is the privilege 
 of anyone sick to go to God for new vital force and trust 
 Him for regeneration of the body as well as the soul. 
 His arm is not shortened to save, nor his power to re- 
 deem the whole man limited. 
 
Church and to the New Testamen t 75 
 
 The atonement has been regarded generally as covering 
 the sins of man, but not usually taught as covering the 
 sicknesses of the body. However, Christ was not un- 
 mindful of the bodily needs of his followers when he of- 
 fered himself a sacrifice for their salvation. Matthew 
 8:17 says, "That it might be fulfilled which was spoken 
 by Esaias the prophet, saying, Himself took our infirmi- 
 ties and bear our sicknesses." The New Testament here 
 evidently interprets Isa. 53 :4 as covering physical as well 
 as moral diseases. Dr. Monroe Gibson says, "Christ re- 
 lation to human sickness was of the same kind as his 
 relation to human sin." 
 
 Much of the sickness and suffering of humanity is due 
 directly or indirectly to sin, and in so far as sin is at the 
 root of suffering in so far the atonement covers suffer- 
 ing. Lift the world out of selfishness and into a reason- 
 able intelligence and much of the suffering would pass 
 away. 
 
 The difficulty arising in our modern church work is the 
 failure of the church to teach the masses that with salva- 
 tion from sin, bodily suffering should be reduced to a 
 minimum. But we have rather taught that suffering was 
 almost an essential to a high degree of character and have 
 prayed for grace equal to the endurance of any kind of 
 suffering that might be placed upon us. Christ is never 
 pleased with suffering that comes through ignorance or 
 through sin. There is an adequate amount of suffering, 
 through environments which we cannot control, to cover 
 the human need, if humanity needs to suffer at all, but 
 
76 The Relation of Mental Healing to the 
 
 that which comes from ignorance or sin can never be 
 justified on any ground of perfection of character. 
 
 Christian people ought to be taught, therefore, that 
 they can be free from much of the suffering they now 
 endure. This teaching is legitimately the work of the 
 church and ought to be done in the regular ministry, but 
 it is not. The work of missions, and teaching the people 
 of the church their duty toward the non-Christian peoples 
 of the world, is the work of the church and ought to be 
 done in the regular work of the church, but it is not. 
 Hence, missionary study classes, laymen's movements, 
 young people's conventions and a multitude of other agen- 
 cies are resorted to, to give the necessary information. 
 Then why not classes in the church, advised and directed 
 by competent pastors, physicians, and trained laymen, 
 for the improvement of health, and to bring the people 
 to a consciousness of their privileges in Jesus Christ? 
 
 The ministry of the Church to the body is not a dead 
 issue nor an insignificant question. The law of sugges- 
 tion as taught by science is a force next to Spiritual force 
 in its significance, and if used by the Church and wisely 
 directed may become a mighty force in bringing the fol- 
 lowers of Christ to a larger realization of their privileges 
 in Him, and may become a mighty agency in bringing 
 the church to a higher Spiritual level and to a closer walk 
 with God. 
 
 If the Church refuses to use this old power, newly 
 clothed in scientific dress, charlatans and quacks will 
 
Church and to the New Testament 77 
 
 use it, and it may become a most formidable instrument 
 in the hands of the foes of evangelical Christianity. 
 
 Let the Church consider well before she turns her back 
 upon this power which may become her greatest friend. 
 
M AR 7 3 isuo 
 
Psychotherapy 
 
 or the Ministry of 
 
 the Church to 
 
 the Body 
 
 Rev. Samuel Medary Dick, Ph. D. 
 
 Price, Twenty-Five Cents. 
 
• 
 
 R D 174 
 
;» -^> ,j+ »j!5$S^I»_ <t. 
 
 
 * "W 
 
 
 ." .*"•% 
 
 ^/ 'tffe: W -'flit V** •***' 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 -0 V • !,*,?* 
 
 
 
 •©MS* 4? <^> *vJ?LvP* ^lv ^k *@K2» 
 
 
 .•il?*-^ 
 
 ^ ♦^7i» a^ 1 
 
 
 /,^.\ 
 
 .T« A 
 
 <* *'TT 
 
 
 f^.25SJlf.%i 
 
 
 : ^ < . 
 
 
 
 ^ ^ 
 
 
 .*3fe*: -ov*" ». ^^ JOB 1 : -o/ ;