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PSYCHIASIS 
 
 HEALING THROUGH THE SOUL 
 
 BY 
 
 Charles H. Mann 
 
 A Minister of the New Church 
 
 AUTHOR OF 
 
 The Christ of God" " Five Sermons on Marriage " " What 
 God Hath Cleansed " "Interior Spiritual Living " 
 
 — Acts iv., 30 
 
 BOSTON 
 
 MASSACHUSETTS NEW-CHURCH UNION 
 
 16 Arlington Street 
 
 1900 
 
 1 
 
TWO COP»lES RECEIVED, 
 
 Uhr&F^ of Co!sgrot% 
 
 Ufmu Qf the 
 
 6!AHlO1900 
 
 WegUter of Gopyrlghtsjt 
 
 
 O 1/ kJ ^> ^^ 
 Copyright, igoo 
 
 BY 
 
 CHARLES H. MANN 
 
 SeCOND COPY, 
 
Contents 
 
 PAGE 
 
 I. — Introduction .... 5 
 
 II. — Principles of Rational Thought 9 
 
 III. — The Facts to be Judged . • 21 
 
 IV. — The Power of the Mind over 
 
 THE Body 35 
 
 V. — Healing by the Prayer of Faith 45 
 
 VI. — Metaphysical Healing . . 57 
 
 VI I. — Christian Science as to its Doc- 
 trines 72 
 
 VIII. — Christian Science as to its 
 
 Rapid Growth .... 92 
 
 IX. — The New-Church Doctrine of 
 
 Mind Cure .... 103 
 
 X. — Health through Righteous Liv- 
 ing 113 
 
 XI. — The Right Application of Men- 
 tal Healing . . . .124 
 
 XII. — The Supreme Application . . 144 
 
 XIII. — Concluding Words . . .152 
 
PSYCHIASIS 
 
 I. 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 SOME years since in the ordinary 
 performance of my pastoral duties 
 I was moved by the state of popular 
 thought on the subject to deliver a 
 series of three sermons on ''The Heal- 
 ing of the Body Through the Soul." 
 They were intended to indicate some of 
 the general principles which should ob- 
 tain in the New-Churchman's considera- 
 tion of the broad subject of mental heal- 
 ing, under whatever name or system 
 classed. The discourses were found of 
 such use to those who heard them that 
 they were published in The New-Church 
 5 
 
psiecbiasis 
 
 Messenger, and were subsequently repub- 
 lished in pamphlet form. This edition 
 soon became exhausted, and a second 
 and revised pamphlet was issued. This 
 is now out of print. Some two thou- 
 sand copies have been sold and there is 
 still a demand for them. 
 
 In seeking to meet this demand, I am 
 moved to rewrite rather than merely to 
 republish the former treatise, for two 
 reasons : First, because my conception 
 of the theme has ripened since its first 
 treatment ; experience, observation, and 
 study have taught many things which 
 were not in my possession at the time 
 of the original sermons. And, secondly, 
 it is necessary to rewrite the whole es- 
 say because of the growth of my con- 
 viction of the truth of the doctrine 
 that there is a healing of the body 
 through the soul, and especially because 
 I have found that the doctrines of the 
 New Church are more explicit in this 
 direction than is generally supposed. 
 There is an ever-increasing clearness 
 6 
 
ITntroDuction 
 
 of teaching to be found in the writings 
 of the New Church as we continue to 
 study them with our eyes open to see 
 what they have to say on this subject. 
 In the little pamphlet just referred 
 to I said : " I believe in the healing of 
 the body through the soul. I believe 
 in the descent of the divine life with 
 health-giving power, not only into the 
 celestial and spiritual planes of man's 
 life, but even onto the plane of his phys- 
 ical existence." All this I can cordially 
 reaffirm, and to it add that I believe that 
 in the New Church we have doctrines 
 under whose guidance we may practice 
 and experience all the healing of the 
 body that can be procured from any 
 other system of teaching or practice. 
 We have everything we need in the New 
 Jerusalem. Nay, more than this, I be- 
 lieve that in the New Church we have 
 not only as good, but better teachings 
 than elsewhere, teachings that will lead 
 to a more interior, and therefore more 
 valuable healing than can be found in 
 
any other system of doctrine. We know 
 not the treasures that are in our posses- 
 sion. 
 
 To this it should be added that the 
 present treatment is intended to give a 
 very cursory view of the various isms 
 and cults that have arisen from mental 
 or metaphysical healing, to pass such a 
 judgment upon their nature or quality 
 as the doctrines of the New Church 
 seem to warrant, and finally to bring 
 out in contrast our own teachings. 
 
 I shall make whatever use of the ma- 
 terial of the first pamphlet may seem 
 wise ; but the treatment now is essen- 
 tially new. The order is different : 
 phases of the subject will be brought 
 in which were not alluded to in the first 
 essay, and, especially, it will be con- 
 sidered from an experience which at 
 that time was not possessed. This re- 
 written treatise will be given to the 
 public, first, as a series of papers in T/ie 
 New-Church Messenger, and secondly, as 
 a small book. 
 
 8 
 
n. 
 
 PRINCIPLES OF RATIONAL 
 THOUGHT 
 
 IN beginning the treatment of the 
 subject of healing the body through 
 the soul, certain general principles of 
 rational thought should be clearly de- 
 fined and conscientiously observed, that 
 our thinking may be true and our con- 
 clusions well assured. Many have fall- 
 en into errors of a very serious nature 
 by their assuming without even stating 
 them, some very broad and very bad ma- 
 jor premises by which they are led into 
 conclusions the most illogical. Assu- 
 ming erroneous general principles is 
 equivalent to begging the question. A 
 plain formulation of the underlying 
 laws of rational thought, so far as those 
 9 
 
p012Cbiasl0 
 
 laws apply to the judgment of the ques- 
 tions we are to discuss, is essential to 
 any correct thinking about them. 
 
 By what principles shall we be gov- 
 erned in our reasoning ? 
 
 First : I lay down this general law, 
 that the doctrine we are seeking must 
 be substantiated by proof additional to 
 the external success in the practice of 
 healing of those who advocate it. The 
 achievement of physical healing by one 
 who works through mental instrumen- 
 talities, demonstrates the presence of a 
 power adequate to the effect, but it does 
 not prove that the special theory, or 
 doctrine, which the practitioner pro- 
 claims is true. If he would prove the 
 truth of his theory from the success of 
 his practice, he must show that their 
 relationship is that of cause and effect, 
 and not of coincidence. A young 
 mother once told me that she gave her 
 child Mrs. Winslow's Soothing Syrup 
 to "make his teeth grow," and pointed 
 to his vigorous incisors as evidence of 
 
principles of IRational ^bougbt 
 
 the wisdom of her course. Through 
 an erroneously assumed major premise, 
 many a theory has been supported by 
 a similar nonsequitur. 
 
 The doctrine we hold concerning 
 the healing of the body through mental 
 forces should be demonstrated like any 
 other doctrine of spiritual thought ; that 
 is, by such things as the teaching of 
 the sacred Scriptures, the doctrines of 
 the Church, the laws of spiritual living, 
 the history of man's experience in spir- 
 itual affairs, and by all other considera- 
 tions which have weight in determining 
 what shall be accepted as true, and what 
 shall be rejected as false. The success 
 of the practitioner is one of the consid- 
 erations which fall into line with the 
 others, and is not alone to prove the 
 doctrine. 
 
 Some schools of psychotherapeutics 
 not only lay down the laws of the re- 
 lation of mind and body which they ex- 
 pect one to accept because of the fact 
 of their success, they venture into the 
 
1P5^cbta6l0 
 
 fields of theologic thought and teach 
 concerning the nature of the Divine 
 Being. 
 
 But the faith they hold concerning 
 God and immortality and spiritual life 
 and other matters of church instruction, 
 has no more authority on account of 
 what is successful in their system of 
 healing, than if they believed in the 
 most materialistic form of medical prac- 
 tice. Their religious faith has on that 
 account no more authority than the re- 
 ligious faith of any successful physician. 
 Nor is what is true in their doctrines 
 of the spiritual healing of the body 
 invalidated by any vagaries in their 
 thought on theological subjects. Suc- 
 cessful mind-cure practitioners are very 
 apt to be dogmatic in telling what is, 
 and what is not, in matters whose truth 
 or falsity is not involved in the success 
 of their method of practice. 
 
 This is a very important distinction. 
 We must always separate in our minds 
 the question of fact from the question 
 
tvincipicB of TRatlonal C^bougbt 
 
 of doctrine in the study of these phe- 
 nomena. 
 
 Secondly : All phenomena of this 
 kind must be regarded as non-miracu- 
 lous. The doctrine of the miracle, as 
 that word has in former times been un- 
 derstood in the church, is repugnant 
 not only to our present intelligence, but 
 to our spiritual thought and affection 
 as well. Whatever the powers may be 
 which accomplish the effects we are 
 considering in reference to our mental 
 states, they cannot be essentially dif- 
 ferent from the forces which do such 
 things in the ordinary experiences of 
 life. It is not uncommon for us to 
 speak of the power of nature. He 
 who is ill, if he be properly cared for 
 and his vital forces have sufficient 
 strength, will naturally recover ; and 
 we say. The power of nature did it. 
 The man who breaks his arm need only 
 properly care for it, and the power of 
 nature will in a marvelous way form a 
 new bone at the point of fracture and 
 13 
 
knit the pieces together stronger than 
 ever. 
 
 What is this power of nature that 
 performs thus in the common experi- 
 ences of all of us a miracle as wonder- 
 ful as any claimed by faith-cure ? If by 
 power of nature we mean some inani- 
 mate, inherent force of material parti- 
 cles, then the words, " power of nature," 
 express a doctrine from the infernal 
 regions. For material particles are only 
 the subjects of higher forces ; they are 
 themselves but passive recipients and 
 instruments. The power of nature in 
 healing a broken arm is simply the 
 power of life, which in a marvelous way 
 descends into the body and effects the 
 cure. 
 
 But this is true of all the forces of 
 nature. The wonders of the vegetable 
 kingdom are simply exhibitions of the 
 forces of life in constructing out of the 
 material of the earth their forms of use 
 and loveliness. The same is true of 
 the myriad of things that are con- 
 14 
 
Hbrfncfplcs of IRatfonal tTbougbt 
 
 stantly taking place in our physical life. 
 The growth of our bodies, their preser- 
 vation in life and in strength, and all 
 the numberless operations that are in- 
 cessantly taking place within them, are 
 the work of the forces of life. The 
 "power of nature," so-called, is in re- 
 ality nothing else than the power of 
 divine life flowing into the realm of 
 nature. It is life from the spiritual 
 world which clothes the earth with veg- 
 etable beauty. It is life from the spri- 
 tual world that gives form and strength 
 to all animal creations, including the 
 body of man. All healing, then, of the 
 kind we are considering, must be looked 
 upon as simply a method whereby the 
 fountains of life are more copiously 
 opened. Healing from some spiritual 
 cause, and healing by means of the or- 
 dinary processes of nature, must be in 
 their essence identical. Both are the 
 effects of the powers of life. Both are 
 from the Lord. 
 
 The doctrine, then, which we are 
 15 
 
looking for is one which will show us 
 how the vital forces of the soul may be 
 made to flow more abundantly into the 
 realm of nature for the accomplishment 
 of their divinely appointed mission. 
 The healing of the body through the 
 soul is simply the cure of disease by 
 a greater opening into this fountain 
 life, made through spiritual instrumen- 
 talities, whereby there comes into the 
 body a richer influx of spiritual forces, 
 accomplishing in brief time and in un- 
 usual efficiency effects which are gen- 
 erally produced by long and tedious 
 processes. According to the doctrines 
 of the New Church, all the phenomena 
 of life in the whole realm of nature, 
 including the healing of man's body, 
 are effects of the forces of life which 
 flow down from the Lord through the 
 heavens. To produce richer effects on 
 this plane of life through the states of 
 the soul, is simply to make a wider open- 
 ing for the descent of this influx of life. 
 We call it heaUng through the soul be- 
 i6 
 
principles of TRational ^bougbt 
 
 cause these outpourings from the foun- 
 tain of divine life are outwardly and 
 evidently procured through mental ef- 
 forts. 
 
 This may be amply illustrated by 
 many natural things in our modern 
 methods of life. Not many years ago 
 the traveler was forced to make his way, 
 if not on foot, at least slowly and tedi- 
 ously by means of the strength of ani- 
 mals. But now by the use of steam or 
 electricity he accomplishes the same 
 effects more perfectly, more luxuriously, 
 at less expense, and vastly more quickly 
 than before. In using these agencies 
 we draw more freely from nature's great 
 storehouse of forces, and she does for 
 us in this way indefinitely more than 
 she could do for us in the old way. 
 
 To a doctrine demonstrating some 
 such opening by the soul of such forces 
 of life must we look for the orderly ex- 
 planation of the phenomena before us. 
 They are the effects of the richer open- 
 ing of the soul to the reception of in- 
 17 
 
p6iecbia0ls 
 
 flux from the spiritual world, whereby 
 the vital powers there, which are the 
 real powers of nature, are enabled to 
 express themselves more freely on the 
 lower planes of life. 
 
 This conception of the subject is 
 illustrated by a multitude of similar 
 features of our modern life. We are 
 continually learning new methods of 
 drawing from the exhaustless store- 
 house of natural forces the power we 
 need to accomplish the objects of our 
 lives. May it not be that there are 
 also spiritual ways hitherto unknown of 
 so reaching the storehouse of vital 
 powers, which is the divine love, as to 
 draw from its exhaustless resources the 
 forces of life which shall heal our bodies, 
 give us strength, and enable us to bear 
 the burdens of life } 
 
 From our New-Church point of view 
 we must lay it down as a canon of in- 
 terpretation that whatever be the instru- 
 mentality that produces the effect, it 
 must be universal and orderly, neither 
 i8 
 
prlndplc0 ot 'Kattonal ^bougbt 
 
 magical nor mystical, simply a fuller 
 opening into the abundance of the di- 
 vine provisions for the blessing of man. 
 Thirdly : It must be remembered that 
 no theory a person may hold concerning 
 a phenomenon is demonstrated because 
 we do not have a counter theory to sug- 
 gest in its place. Persons sometimes 
 say : If this be not a true theory, then 
 how can you explain the facts .'' But it 
 is quite possible for facts to be inex- 
 plicable under any principle we are at 
 present acquainted with, and yet the 
 theory suggested be utterly false. We 
 are surrounded by inexpUcable mys- 
 teries, and the privilege of holding our 
 judgment in abeyance until a doctrine 
 shall be brought forward that commends 
 itself to our intelligence is not only log- 
 ical, it is an essential position for one 
 to hold who would arrive at the truth. 
 The acknowledgment that we do not 
 understand a thing by no means requires 
 that we shall accept any special expla- 
 nation of another person. One should 
 19 
 
p612Cbfasf6 
 
 hold his mind open, but should not be 
 forced by the recognition of his own 
 lack of information into accepting that 
 which is not to his rational thought de- 
 monstrated. 
 
 To repeat, we hold to these three 
 principles in the consideration of our 
 subject : First, that the doctrine we are 
 seeking must be substantiated by proof 
 additional to the external success in the 
 practice of healing of those who advo- 
 cate it ; secondly, all phenomena of this 
 kind must be regarded as non-miracu- 
 lous ; and, thirdly, that no^ theory is de- 
 monstrated because we do not have a 
 counter theory to suggest in its place. 
 
 ao 
 
III. 
 THE FACTS TO BE JUDGED 
 
 HAVING considered the laws of 
 thought in accordance with which 
 the subject of healing through the soul 
 should be discussed, we will bring be- 
 fore ourselves the facts to be judged. 
 They may be logically divided into three 
 classes. These are (i) instances which 
 are evidently and professedly the direct 
 effects of the states of the mind over 
 the health of the body ; (2) those claim- 
 ing to be from the influence of prayer, 
 or from the intervention of God ; and 
 (3) the phenomena known as Christian 
 Science, Mind Cure, Metaphysical Heal- 
 ing, and similar manifestations of recent 
 history. 
 
 First, as to the health-giving power 
 of the mind over the body. It is es- 
 
sential to any true apprehension of the 
 subject that the vast but little recog- 
 nized might of man's soul in determin- 
 ing the states of the body should be 
 appreciatively brought before us. To 
 some extent and in various ways the 
 influence of the mind upon the body 
 for weal or for woe, has always been 
 recognized. Throughout the ages it 
 has been known that happiness is health- 
 giving. The ancient proverb, Mens sana 
 in corpore sano, a healthy mind in a 
 healthy body, by its association of mind 
 and body, recognizes the health-giving 
 or health-destroying tie that links these 
 two constituents of our nature. 
 
 In trifling ways we all have experi- 
 ences of this dominant power of the 
 mind over the body. I recall an in- 
 stance of a somewhat susceptible woman 
 who was caused to vomit by a roguish 
 boy who pretended that he saw her 
 devour a worm with her strawberries. 
 Another woman was caused to faint, 
 simply from listening to the story of a 
 
tTbe 3facts to be 5uC>geb 
 
 surgical operation. I have been told 
 by the captains of passenger steam- 
 ships that whenever any serious danger 
 arises at sea all the seasick passengers 
 forget their illness, and practically re- 
 cover. In these various instances, phys- 
 ical illness or physical recovery is evi- 
 dently produced by purely mental states. 
 In the most superficial affairs of our 
 lives, how readily the body responds 
 with the most complicated physical ac- 
 tion to even the simplest mental states. 
 The face may be flushed by a thought ; 
 the body grows chilly from a slight 
 fright. The method of one's breathing 
 varies with the states of his thought. 
 The stomach is exceedingly sensitive 
 to the mental feelings of either disgust 
 or satisfaction. And it is a matter of 
 observation with medical men that there 
 are certain physical derangements con- 
 nected with particular mental condi- 
 tions. I have seen in medical books 
 prescriptions for homesickness, grief, 
 and melancholy, because, as was ex- 
 23 
 
plained by the physician to whom I 
 spoke upon the subject, these mental 
 states produce corresponding physical 
 conditions to which the medicines are 
 addressed. 
 
 In these common experiences there 
 will be found every degree in the variety 
 and the completeness of the healing 
 effect of the mental states. It is very 
 common that intense excitement will 
 make one unconscious of what would 
 under other circumstances produce the 
 severest pain. When fighting, men 
 often receive severe injuries without 
 knowing it, and it is not uncommon 
 for soldiers in battle to be seriously 
 wounded and not for a time discover 
 it. I recall the story of a man who was 
 retreating to his fortifications from hav- 
 ing made a sally, when his foot was shot 
 off just before he reached the entrance 
 of the enclosure, and he stumped his 
 way to a place of safety without discov- 
 ering his hurt until within the walls. 
 We entertain children when they are 
 24 
 
Zbc jpacts to be 5ut)ge& 
 
 suffering to get them to forget their 
 pain. A story of a priest is related in 
 which he was enabled to be unconscious 
 of the pain of a surgical operation by 
 absorbing himself in the enraptured 
 contemplation of his crucifix. 
 
 Even in those instances in which 
 medicine seems to effect the cure, it 
 may be the mind that does it. We 
 believe it was Dr. Hammond, of New 
 York City, who related that he once 
 procured for his devoted Roman Cath- 
 olic servant a small bottle of Lourdes 
 water for the cure of some ailment. 
 He first administered it to her under 
 the name of " aqua crotonis," which he 
 told her he desired her to try first. 
 Under that name, that is, under the 
 influence of her faith that it was not 
 Lourdes water, it did her no good. The 
 Doctor then administered what was cro- 
 ton water in fact, under the name of 
 Lourdes water, and she was very much 
 benefited. We recall also a certain 
 Dr. Jennings, an old school practitioner, 
 25 
 
Ipsiscbiaeis 
 
 who became convinced that medicines 
 were a mistake, and administered gin- 
 gerbread pills to his patients, they sup- 
 posing them to be the usual remedies. 
 The change was very beneficial to the 
 patients. It was evidently the faith 
 in these, not the thing, which accom- 
 plished the result. The power of one's 
 belief as an instrument of physical cure 
 is illustrated also by people's faith in 
 charms, amulets, or what not, many of 
 which have at times seemed to exert 
 a good influence over those who believed 
 in them. 
 
 Secondly, we have the instances of 
 healing of the body through the soul 
 associated with one's religious state, 
 such as healing from the prayer of faith, 
 or the intervention of God. Through- 
 out all historic ages, the healing of the 
 body through the soul has been mani- 
 fested in connection with one's religious 
 faith and character. This is a most 
 important phase of the subject. We 
 must not forget its prominence in the 
 26 
 
tibe 3fact0 to be 5uOge& 
 
 life of the Lord, in which healing 
 through the faith of those He served, 
 was so constantly practised. How many- 
 were His miracles of healing ! And 
 when John sent to Jesus to inquire 
 whether He were the Christ, He ap- 
 pealed to His acts of healing as the 
 things which should decide the question. 
 " Go your way and tell John the things 
 which ye do hear and see : the blind 
 receive their sight, and the lame walk, 
 the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf 
 hear, and the dead are raised up." 
 
 Physical strength and health from 
 spiritual faith were promised to the dis- 
 ciples. "And these signs shall follow 
 them that believe : in my name they 
 shall cast out devils ; . . . they shall 
 take up serpents, and if they drink any 
 deadly thing, it shall in no wise hurt 
 them, they shall lay hands on the sick, 
 and they shall recover." These prom- 
 ises have been claimed in the history 
 of the Christian Church, and many be- 
 lievers have professed to have been 
 27 
 
healed of infirmities of various kinds 
 through faith in the promises of the 
 Lord. I have been personally acquainted 
 with some who made this profession. 
 This claim has expressed itself in the 
 existence of practitioners of this kind 
 of healing — faith-cure doctors ; and 
 even institutions have been established 
 in which this spiritual means of cure 
 was the most prominent of its modes 
 of treatment. 
 
 When associated with religion, heal- 
 ing through the mind has been taken 
 as an evidence of the validity of one's 
 claim to spiritual authority, and many 
 denominations have laid hold of alleged 
 facts of this kind as evidencing the 
 truth of their doctrines. Among these 
 we may mention the Shakers, who affirm 
 that physical cures through spiritual 
 states took place at the time of their 
 establishment. It is taught in the doc- 
 trinal publications of that community 
 that the earlier receivers of their faith 
 were in a miraculous way healed of their 
 28 
 
^be 3fact0 to be 5u&geD 
 
 infirmities, and this they use as an argu- 
 ment to confirm their peculiar tenets. 
 
 The Roman CathoHcs tell of instances 
 of the healing of the body through spir- 
 itual instrumentalities without number, 
 which they relate as evidence of the 
 truth of their claim to be the true and 
 only duly authorized church. Most 
 prominent among their stories of this 
 kind is that of the blessing of a foun- 
 tain, near Lourdes, in France, by the 
 Virgin Mary, as seen in a vision by a 
 maiden of that place. 
 
 Only this last June, the Chicago Rec- 
 ord contains an account of similar 
 miraculous healing at the shrine of Ste. 
 Anne de Beaupre, Canada. We have 
 met with no stronger or better attested 
 cases of healing than is furnished in 
 the accounts of this sacred fountain 
 and place for the bones of saints. 
 
 Spiritualists (or spiritists) make simi- 
 lar affirmations concerning what has 
 been done, and can be done, through 
 the influence of spirits operating through 
 29 
 
proper mediums. When a young man 
 I once received treatment of this kind, 
 and with apparent benefit. 
 
 In all these instances we have a 
 second class of facts which we should 
 have in view before we can attain unto 
 any true analysis of the subject. 
 
 Thirdly, we have the recent exhibi- 
 tions of this kind which seem to come 
 not from the normal control of the body 
 by the mind, nor from God's answer to 
 the prayer of faith, but from the mental 
 denial of the power of illness, from the 
 affirmation of the inherently divine na- 
 ture of the soul, and from the incor- 
 poration into one's mental structure 
 of many other conceptions and ideas. 
 These are the most marked phenomena 
 of healing the body through mental, 
 or soul, influences — phenomena which 
 have shown themselves in decidedly 
 modern times. They are found in va- 
 rious cults and sects, which proclaim 
 doctrines of similar appearance under 
 the various names of ** Christian Sci- 
 30 
 
^be jfacta to be 5uDgeD 
 
 ence," "Mind Cure," "Metaphysical 
 Healing," and kindred names. Some 
 of these denominations, notably that of 
 Christian Science, not only would cure, 
 but are prepared to supply their sub- 
 jects with an entirely new philosophy 
 and a new theological system, with a 
 new worship, a new priesthood, and a 
 new interpretation of the Word. 
 
 These new schools claim that disease 
 and illness of every kind are absolutely 
 unnecessary, and that perfect health 
 can be realized through the faith which 
 they prescribe. They point with assur- 
 ance to many who, they claim, have 
 been reclaimed from all sickness, and 
 I once knew one of them to remark 
 that they recruited their ranks from 
 the graveyard. These schools of men- 
 tal healing, from their newness, their 
 aggressiveness, and their prominence, 
 are the ones which most forcibly appeal 
 to the New-Churchman for considera- 
 tion and judgment. 
 
 In the consideration of all these ex- 
 31 
 
amples of psychiasis, I separate entirely 
 the question of fact, or at least the 
 question of appearances honestly taken 
 for facts, from the question of doctrines, 
 or interpretation, or principle. Re- 
 garded merely as the reports of honest- 
 intentioned witnesses, I am not inclined 
 to question the truth of the main claims 
 of these various manifestations of the 
 power of the mind over the body. Doubt- 
 less many cures have been effected 
 through mere mental influences, through 
 joy, through hope, through will power, 
 through a change of faith, and through 
 other mental states. Doubtless, too, 
 many cures have been effected seem- 
 ingly through prayer. And we are 
 prepared to grant a similar appearance 
 of validity to the claims of the recent 
 schools which make so prominent a fea- 
 ture of the healing of the body through 
 the soul. 
 
 But all of these systems have their 
 degrees of failure. Though the advo- 
 cates of some of these sects claim al- 
 32 
 
tbc 3fact5 to be 3-ut)ge& 
 
 most limitless power of this kind, that 
 claim has not in any of them been in 
 my judgment substantiated by the 
 facts. It is true that in the instances 
 of their non-success, there is that great 
 unknown quantity, the faith of the in- 
 dividual, and that the enthusiasts of 
 any school can easily claim, when there 
 is failure, that the fault is not with the 
 system, but that the requisite degree 
 of faith is wanting. 
 
 But in my experience, the evidence 
 of faith has, in certain instances of 
 failure, been so tremendous, that the 
 plea that faith was wanting is much 
 more difficult of acceptance than the 
 claim that the system does not apply 
 to the case. I have known instances 
 of those whose faith in the recovering 
 power of prayer was so explicit that 
 the evidence of an absolute faith in a 
 coming restoration to health was as 
 great as could be given ; and then fol- 
 lowed disappointment, and a tragic 
 collapse and death. 
 33 
 
In Christian Science I have witnessed 
 as many failures as seeming successes, 
 if not more ; and I have known a num- 
 ber of unspeakably sad experiences in 
 those who have trusted wholly and un- 
 questioningly to what is promised. 
 Victims to this class of faith are well 
 known, the character of some having 
 been so extreme as to provoke an ap- 
 peal to the law to determine whether 
 one who so gives himself up should not 
 be prevented from doing what was by 
 the appellants regarded as a species of 
 suicide. A very dear friend of mine I 
 cannot help regarding as a victim of 
 this sort of infatuation, refusing all ra- 
 tional treatment until it was too late, 
 and death came to her relief. I am not 
 now discussing the doctrine or the the- 
 ory of Christian Science, but simply its 
 alleged facts. They are by no means 
 beyond challenge. 
 
 34 
 
IV. 
 
 THE POWER OF THE MIND 
 OVER THE BODY 
 
 WHAT shall we do with all the 
 facts I have enumerated con- 
 cerning the healing of the body through 
 the soul ? How shall we account for 
 them ? In what way shall they be in- 
 terpreted ? What shall be the doctrine 
 founded upon them ? What is the truth 
 they are intended to bring to us ? What 
 does the New Church teach us about 
 such things, and by what means shall 
 we take advantage of the health-giving 
 forces which they reveal ? 
 
 In seeking replies to this flood of in- 
 terrogations which comes rushing upon 
 us, we must not forget the law of in- 
 terpretation already insisted upon, that 
 the question of fact and the question 
 35 
 
of doctrine are entirely separate. We 
 may accept the fact, and be ignorant of 
 the principle which is involved in it ; 
 and we may believe a person's word as 
 to the thing that has taken place, with- 
 out being logically required to accept 
 the doctrine he founds upon it. 
 
 In general there have been founded 
 on these phenomena three doctrines, 
 representing three schools of thought. 
 
 The first holds that all these things 
 are accounted for under the commonly 
 accepted principles concerning the in- 
 fluence of the mind over the body. 
 This is the refuge of the skeptic when 
 called upon to accept any of the isms 
 and cults whose doctrines, it is claimed, 
 are confirmed by these psychophysical 
 healings. And doubtless all will ac- 
 cord some position to this claim. The 
 practical question is where to draw the 
 line. To what extent, the honest in- 
 quirer asks, will the generally acknowl- 
 edged normal influence of the mind 
 over the body account for these things } 
 36 
 
Zbc Ipowcr of tbe /BbinD over tbe JSoC)i5 
 
 In my judgment, the power of the 
 mind to ward off diseases from the 
 body, and to hold it in a state of health, 
 a power always and everywhere in some 
 degree recognized, is much greater than 
 has heretofore been generally under- 
 stood, and that it is sufficient to account 
 for the greater part of the phenomena 
 in question, without recourse to faith- 
 cure, mind-cure, or Christian Science 
 doctrine. If with the little observation 
 which has been given to this phase of 
 the relation of the soul and the body, 
 the quick and delicate physical response 
 to man's slightest mental state has been 
 noted, what may we not expect to dis- 
 cover from a more extended and intelli- 
 gent study of the subject ? and that, 
 too, without any reference to any new 
 system of doctrine or of worship ? If 
 marked physical effects are produced 
 from trifling mental causes, how mighty, 
 how interior, how effective may be the 
 physical effects produced from more 
 subtle and more powerful states of the 
 37 
 
soul ! If the insignificant experiences 
 of embarrassment, timidity, or fright, 
 show themselves at once in physical ac- 
 tion, may we not reasonably conclude 
 that the more profound emotions of 
 the soul, its deep-seated convictions, its 
 controlling purposes, and its interior 
 motives, must produce correspondingly 
 more far-reaching effects ? 
 
 Analyzing this power of mind over 
 body, we find that it may be grouped 
 under four heads : (i) will-power ; (2) 
 the power of conviction, or faith ; (3) 
 the power which comes from concentra- 
 tion ; and (4) the influence of subjec- 
 tion, of putting one mind under the 
 control of another. 
 
 I. Will-power is by far the most 
 conspicuous of the forms of mental 
 control in the body. Its vast might in 
 man's physical organism is astounding. 
 Often has it enabled a person to rise 
 from a sick bed and by sheer strength 
 of volition to drive illness from his 
 members. This is the form of mind- 
 38 
 
Zbe power ot tbe /lRln& ovct tbe :Bo^^ 
 
 rule in the body most generally known, 
 and most extensively recognized. 
 
 But will-power, with all its dramatic 
 exhibitions of itself, is by no means the 
 strongest of man's metaphysical sources 
 of physical healing. It is too self-con- 
 scious, and thus too dependent upon its 
 self-strength. And especially it lacks 
 efficiency by acting in a faith in the 
 greatness of the power of what it seeks 
 to vanquish. Will-power acknowledges 
 the strength of its opponent, and seeks 
 to overthrow him. That acknowledg- 
 ment gives the enemy a foothold in the 
 mind, and thereby is a source of weak- 
 ness. Yet will-power is essential to 
 healing through the soul, since it is 
 will-power that enables a man of faith 
 to embody his belief in actual deeds. 
 This is shown in some of the Lord's 
 acts of healing. " Stretch forth thine 
 hand," He said to the man with a with- 
 ered hand, and it was the man's will- 
 power that obeyed. But it was through 
 his faith that he was healed. Will- 
 39 
 
lP012Cbfa6f0 
 
 power makes physically real the con- 
 victions of man's soul. But its position 
 is subordinate as an actual source of 
 power. It is not the primal source of 
 the healing. This is one of the special 
 lessons of recent developments. 
 
 2. The power which one's convic- 
 tions, or faith, exerts over the body is 
 almost a revelation in modern mental- 
 healing manifestations. Under this di- 
 vision I class fear, and its opposite, con- 
 fidence ; and also the whole attitude of 
 a man toward his physical ills. It is 
 through these states of the soul's con- 
 victions that the great health-producing 
 power of the mind over the body is ex- 
 erted. The Chairman of the Board of 
 Health of New York City, once related 
 to me how in the efforts of the Board 
 to isolate contagious diseases, espe- 
 cially smallpox, their officers were often 
 obliged to enter the houses where 
 friends had concealed the sick man, 
 and carry him out in their arms. To 
 my question as to whether these officers 
 40 
 
Zbc power ot tbe ^inD over tbe JBoD^ 
 
 did not themselves sometimes catch the 
 disease, he replied that he had never 
 known an instance, though he did not 
 employ immunes. " How do you ac- 
 count for it ? " I inquired further. " I 
 do not know," he answered, " unless it 
 be from their absolute freedom from 
 fear." Here was a freedom from con- 
 tagion as ample as that which Christian 
 Science professes to give, but without 
 Christian Science doctrine. 
 
 Under this division, which I have 
 called the power of conviction, comes 
 the influence which anticipation exerts 
 for good or for ill. The well-known 
 story of the king's jester, who, in a trial 
 for Ihe-majeste^ had been condemned 
 to be beheaded, illustrates this special 
 phase of the subject. The trial, the 
 condemnation, and the sentence, were 
 all intended as a grand joke, though 
 tragic enough to its victim. At the 
 final scene a pail of water was dashed 
 over the condemned man's head in the 
 place of the blow from the executioner's 
 41 
 
Ipsiscbfasis 
 
 axe. But when the spectators looked 
 for a joyous denouement of their pleas- 
 antry, it was found that the man was 
 dead. Anticipation caused the cold 
 water to kill him as effectually as 
 though his head had been severed from 
 his body. 
 
 3. The power of the mind over the 
 body, by what I have called concentra- 
 tion, is something tremendous. By ab- 
 sorption in one idea one may become 
 oblivious to all other things of life. 
 The stories of soldiers from the excite- 
 ment of battle unconscious of wounds, 
 and the account of a priest forgetting 
 the pain of a surgical operation through 
 the contemplation of his crucifix, al- 
 ready related, are to the point. This 
 feature of the mental control of bodily 
 state is very prominent in mind-cure 
 systems as we shall find later on. Its 
 special force is very livingly illustrated 
 by the insane who from absorption in 
 one idea become incapable of recogniz- 
 ing anything at variance with it. 
 42 
 
XLbc ipower ot the /iRlnD over tbc :©oDi2 
 
 4. The effect upon the body of sub- 
 mitting to the will of another is exhib- 
 ited in its most pronounced form in 
 hypnotism. Under the influence of 
 hypnotism the subject may be made en- 
 tirely unconscious of the pain of phys- 
 ical derangements, and on the other 
 hand he may be made to feel, or to 
 think he feels, pains which have no 
 bodily condition to account for them. 
 Hypnotism, conscious or unconscious, 
 imposed at times by others, and at 
 times by one's self, is a frequent instru- 
 ment of mental-heaHng operation. 
 
 With these four methods in which 
 the mind manifests its power in the 
 body clearly before us, we can easily 
 understand why to many no new doc- 
 trine need be taught in order to ac- 
 count for all the phenomena of healing 
 through the soul. It is merely a ques- 
 tion of mental power, and so far as the 
 practices of mental healers look to 
 bringing the minds of their patients 
 through will-power, through conviction 
 43 
 
or faith, through concentration, through 
 subjection, or through any two or more 
 of these, to throw off the ailment, all 
 their achievements are fully explained 
 by the simple doctrine of the well- 
 known power of mind over body. 
 
 But the question will arise as to 
 whether all these modes of mental in- 
 fluence over the body are right, and 
 thus as to what, if any, are to be 
 avoided. May we not sacrifice a men- 
 tal balance for seeming physical health } 
 May there not be practices which 
 threaten one's moral integrity .? May 
 not the question of a true spiritual life 
 be involved in what one is called upon 
 to believe and to do } These, the most 
 momentous features of our subject, will 
 come up later. 
 
 44 
 
V. 
 
 HEALING BY THE PRAYER OF 
 FAITH 
 
 THE second general doctrine which 
 deals with the healing of the 
 body through the soul, associates it 
 with religion, and is known under the 
 name of faith-cure ; that is, it accom- 
 plishes the cure through the prayer of 
 faith. A very prominent and earnest 
 faith-cure advocate defines their faith 
 as resting in the ''power of healing- 
 through the prayer of faith," Proba- 
 bly most of my readers know persons 
 who hold these views. Doctrines of 
 this kind have been advocated in the 
 New-ChtLvch Messenger. What are the 
 teachings of the New Church on these 
 positions .-* 
 
 First, it will strike the New-Church 
 45 
 
student as seeking to move God, the 
 unchangeable, to do for us what He 
 would otherwise be unwilling to do. 
 This is the objection so efficiently urged 
 against the natural conception of prayer, 
 namely, that it is an assumption on the 
 part of man to guide the Almighty, 
 and seems to depend upon a personal 
 act on the part of the Lord in carrying 
 out the object which he who prays de- 
 sires to have accomplished, rather than 
 a reception into his soul of the cur- 
 rents of infinite power which come 
 pouring into the hearts of men for their 
 acceptance. 
 
 A still more serious objection to 
 every form of faith-cure I have ever 
 met with is that it appears to place 
 spiritual life more in the exceptional 
 experiences of mankind than in the 
 normal and ordinary acts of their lives. 
 If there is one truth above all other 
 truths important, it is that we make 
 spiritual life a something that is present 
 at every instant and in every affair, es- 
 46 
 
Mealing b^ tbe ipr^^er of jfaitb 
 
 pecially in business and routine in- 
 terests. The acknowledgment of the 
 Lord's presence and of his providence 
 should belong as much to the things 
 which seem to come from one's pru- 
 dence, as to those things which come 
 from sources we do not know. As it 
 is as much the divine providence which 
 protects us from evil when no evil ap- 
 pears to be present, as it is when we 
 meet with a narrow escape, so the di- 
 vine power is as much with us in giving 
 us blessings when we seem to procure 
 these blessings by our own prudence, 
 as it is present with us when they come 
 unexpectedly and in coincidence with 
 our necessities, or even after a direct 
 petition for them. He who receives 
 wages for honest labor, receives them 
 as much from the Lord as he who in 
 the strait of necessity is given by the 
 impulse of some loving heart the re- 
 sources that he needs. The man who 
 recovers through careful nursing, or di- 
 eting, or medical treatment, is as truly 
 47 
 
healed by the Lord as is he who 
 through pleading prayer and the laying 
 on of hands rises from his bed of sick- 
 ness. I shudder at any doctrine of re- 
 ligious faith which makes the Lord 
 present in what is unusual, or peculiar, 
 or striking, rather than in what is or- 
 dinary and commonplace. Faith-cure 
 doctrines often lead their followers to 
 look to the exceptional as indicating 
 the divine presence rather than to the 
 ordinary ; and this is a great danger in 
 their teachings and practices. 
 
 A third objection to the faith-cure is 
 that it not unfrequently leads to spir- 
 itual unhealthiness and infatuation. In 
 the forms of its application, it is relig- 
 ion at fever heat. As the assurance 
 on the part of the afflicted sufferer that 
 he will recover is a part of the faith 
 required, it has at times happened that 
 the expectation was all that was at- 
 tained, and disheartenment and despair 
 were brought to the sick who relapsed 
 after the excitement had passed. 
 48 
 
BeaUns &s tbe prai^er of 3faitb 
 
 To my mind, also, it is an objection 
 to this system as it is nearly universally 
 practiced, that the cure is effected so 
 commonly through the instrumentality 
 of some faith-cure practitioner. There 
 seem to be high-priests in the religion 
 of faith-cure, through whose instrumen- 
 tality the work is usually accomplished. 
 If the Lord is present with his health- 
 giving power, seeking admission into 
 every heart, we ought to be able to re- 
 ceive Him without the aid of a persua- 
 sive agent, whose flowing language and 
 magnetic presence may induce the state 
 of piety and of faith which shall pro- 
 duce the result. 
 
 The faith-cure system, then, meets 
 with these several objections from the 
 New-Church point of view : That it 
 seeks its purpose through the prayers 
 of pietism rather than through the 
 channels of spiritual character; that it 
 places spiritual life, or association with 
 God, in what is exceptional ; that it is 
 apt to lead to spiritual unhealthiness 
 49 
 
Ip0l5cbia0f0 
 
 and infatuation ; and, last, that it re- 
 quires high-priests as agents for its 
 practice. 
 
 If it be said that the prayer for heal- 
 ing is not intended to move God, but is 
 only a mode for bringing him who prays 
 into the right attitude, then we may 
 reply that in such case the faith-cure 
 system ceases to be a separate system, 
 but is brought under the category of 
 mental healing. Prayer in such case 
 is only a mode for bringing the mind 
 into the right state of confidence for 
 the effective operation of spiritual 
 forces in the body, and this second 
 theory of healing through the soul be- 
 comes simply a section of the first. It 
 is, under such an interpretation of it, a 
 mode of mental healing, and as such I 
 certainly have no objection to urge 
 against it. 
 
 But what shall we say then of the 
 Lord's acts of healing, and of his prom- 
 ises to us, promises I have already al- 
 luded to } Are they not intended to 
 
 50 
 
Mealing f)^ tbe ipra^^er ot Jfaitb 
 
 be really believed and practiced ? This 
 is a momentous question, and it is 
 asked by earnest and honest souls, and 
 I would give it the most solemn con- 
 sideration. 
 
 As I understand the teachings of di- 
 vine truth we are not to look upon the 
 miraculous healing performed by the 
 Lord, nor even that by his disciples, as 
 constituting a just ground for a belief 
 in similar methods of healing to-day. 
 There are two reasons why those facts 
 do not warrant such a belief. The first 
 is because they were given as evidence 
 of the Lord's mission and of that of 
 his disciples, a reason which does not 
 apply at the present time. While they 
 are not exclusively to be regarded as 
 of this character, since the Lord did 
 not wholly found his claims upon them, 
 yet to a certain extent at that time 
 they were used as such evidence. The 
 disciples made this use of them, and in 
 at least two instances the Lord ap- 
 pealed to them. When the disciples of 
 51 
 
1P6^cbta6i0 
 
 John came to Him, asking whether or 
 not He were the One who should come, 
 the Lord did not reply directly, but in- 
 stead referred to his miraculous works. 
 On another occasion the Lord said: 
 "If ye believe not my word, yet be- 
 lieve for the very works' sake." 
 
 This doctrine is clearly set forth in 
 the following passages from Sweden- 
 borg's "Divine Providence" and "Apoc- 
 alypse Explained : — " 
 
 "As the Jews could not by the in- 
 ternal principles of worship be led to 
 represent spiritual things, therefore 
 they were led, yea, forced and com- 
 pelled to such representation by mira- 
 cles. . . . But after the Lord mani- 
 fested himself, and was received and 
 acknowledged in the churches as the 
 eternal God, miracles ceased." (Divine 
 Providence, 132.) 
 
 " The reason why the Lord healed 
 various persons according to their faith 
 was because the first and primary prin- 
 ciple of the church was that they should 
 52 
 
Bealfng b'Q tbe ipra^^er of jfaftb 
 
 believe the Lord to be God Almighty, 
 for without that faith no church could 
 have been established." (Apocalypse 
 Explained, 815.) 
 
 But is not God unchangeable, the 
 reasoner asks, the same yesterday, to- 
 day, and forever ? Why should there 
 be such a thing as '* an age of mira- 
 cles ? " The same God should do to- 
 day what He did eighteen centuries 
 ago. 
 
 But though God does not change, 
 man does ; and God appears differently 
 to each according to each one's state. 
 And this not only to the individual, but 
 to the race-man as well. In the Jewish 
 representative of a church there were 
 what are called "miracles" which do 
 not take place now, just as in infancy a 
 wise father does for his child what he 
 does not do for his adult son or daugh- 
 ter. 
 
 And, secondly — and this is the es- 
 pecial reason why I do not regard the 
 faith-healing which accompanied the 
 53 
 
P6i2cbfa0l6 
 
 Lord's first coming as indicating a doc- 
 trine in reference to the external health 
 of the men of the church — the Lord's 
 deeds were correspondential represen- 
 tations of his divine mission. The 
 Lord came to the world to overcome 
 hell and remove spiritual evil — to 
 make it possible for a man to be spir- 
 itually saved. This, his actual mission, 
 is represented by his external life upon 
 the earth. The curing of physical dis- 
 eases in certain individual instances, 
 represents the infinite curing of corre- 
 sponding spiritual evils for all human- 
 ity. This doctrine, that the Lord by 
 his omnipotence saves us from our spir- 
 itual infirmities in accordance with our 
 faith and life, and not that men in fu- 
 ture ages could in like manner be 
 healed, is the truth embodied in the 
 fact of the miraculous healing per- 
 formed by Him. 
 
 Hence we read in the " Apocalypse 
 Explained": "The third reason why 
 faith in the Lord healed those who were 
 54 
 
KcaKna bs tbe pxdi^cx of Jpaltb 
 
 cured was that all the diseases which 
 the Lord healed represented and thence 
 signified spiritual diseases, to which 
 natural diseases correspond, and spir- 
 itual diseases cannot be healed except 
 by the Lord, and, indeed, by looking 
 to His divine omnipotence, and by re- 
 pentance of the life, wherefore also He 
 sometimes said. Thy sins be forgiven 
 thee; go, and sin no more." (815.) 
 
 But having said all this to show that 
 we are not now to have miraculous 
 healing of the body in answer to 
 prayer, as in the days of the disciples, 
 I have not destroyed nor intended to 
 destroy a real doctrine of faith-cure. 
 I have simply substituted another in 
 its place. We still have the doctrine 
 that there may be a physical healing 
 through the prayer of faith. Only in 
 this new doctrine we look upon the 
 prayer not as a means of moving God, 
 but as an instrumentality for bringing 
 the mind into an effective state of will- 
 power, conviction, concentration, and 
 55 
 
of receptivity to the divine influx for 
 throwing off the disease. Faith-cure, 
 so-called, under this understanding of 
 it, becomes one of the modes of curing 
 the body through mind power. 
 
 But there is a doctrine concerning a 
 divine healing of the body through the 
 soul much more interior than anything 
 I have as yet spokon of ; a healing 
 which comes to the disciples of the 
 Lord to-day in correspondence with 
 their spiritual life. This teaching tells 
 us that there will be and is now a ful- 
 filment of these promises in another 
 and an infinitely better way than any 
 healing of the body through the prayer 
 of faith that has ever been taught. 
 What this new and better doctrine is 
 will come before us later. 
 
 56 
 
VI. 
 
 METAPHYSICAL HEALING 
 
 THE third school of doctrine con- 
 cerning the healing of the body 
 through the soul, is known under va- 
 rious names, as Christian Science, Men- 
 tal Healing, Mind Cure, Metaphysical 
 Healing, etc. All these systems are 
 founded on the philosophical principle 
 that spiritual things are the only reali- 
 ties of existence, and that all material 
 things, so called, are but the expression 
 of what is spiritual. Some schools 
 hold that there is no such thing as mat- 
 ter, and others give to matter an exist- 
 ence. God as the only reality is abso- 
 lute health ; there is no such thing as 
 disease, the appearance of disease be- 
 ing simply the outer expression of the 
 belief of mortal mind. Sickness and 
 57 
 
suffering are thus made to be the crea- 
 tion of mental illusion, and possess no 
 reality in themselves. Man is essen- 
 tially a child of God (God's thought), 
 and thus is inmostly divine, and as such 
 incapable of illness. 
 
 To be healed of sickness, therefore, 
 one need only come into the right men- 
 tal state. The convictions of his mind 
 from whence comes the appearance of 
 his illness, being changed or removed, 
 the illness immediately disappears. 
 Sickness has no more existence, accord- 
 ing to this theory, than the picture 
 upon the screen before the stereopticon 
 has a reality answering to its appear- 
 ance. As it ceases to exist the moment 
 the slide is changed, so sickness ceases 
 to exist the moment the mental state 
 of which it is the expression is removed. 
 In order to understand the system prop- 
 erly, it should also be known that the 
 mental states of people impress each 
 other, that there is a community mental 
 state, and that the apparent ailments of 
 58 
 
/IBctapb^alcal Mealing 
 
 the flesh may be founded, not on the 
 mental state of the individual who is 
 the sufferer, but upon the mental state 
 of the society of which he is a member. 
 Infants and children depend upon this 
 general mental conviction, and all are 
 very largely under its dominion. 
 
 Metaphysical healers have adopted 
 various methods for bringing about the 
 desired mental states in the patients 
 whom they purpose to cure. The first 
 and most natural course they pursue is 
 to lead the subject by any considerations 
 whatever that will move him to an ac- 
 ceptance of their doctrines concerning 
 the nature of sickness and the proper 
 methods for its removal. If the patient 
 can be led into the conviction that his 
 sickness is due to a certain mental state, 
 and that it will disappear as that state 
 is laid aside, a great part of the work is 
 accomplished. 
 
 Having brought their patient into a 
 right state of conviction, mental healers 
 next seek to lead him into what I have 
 59 
 
IPs^cbiaefs 
 
 called concentration. The object of 
 concentration is to so fill one with the 
 desired conception that he will be led 
 to ignore everything inconsistent with 
 the end to be attained. A very com- 
 mon way for bringing this about is by 
 the repetition of sentences. Mr. Wood, 
 in his "Ideal Suggestion," prints on 
 some of his large octavo pages short 
 sentences, having but one sentence on 
 the page, in as large type as the page 
 will admit. This the patient places 
 before himself, absorbs himself in its 
 contemplation, until he becomes, as it 
 were, saturated with the idea. Thus, 
 for instance, the sentence, ** I am well," 
 is printed in great black letters across 
 the page. Upon this the man fixes his 
 eyes intently, gazing upon it with un- 
 wavering steadiness, and reiterating the 
 words in his thought until his very 
 mental fibre becomes so permeated with 
 it that every thought or feeling incon- 
 sistent with it is driven from him. 
 Mental healers also practise the 
 60 
 
^etapbsslcal Mealing 
 
 fourth mode of leading the mind into 
 a healing control of the body, which I 
 have called *'the influence of subjec- 
 tion," or of the control of one mind 
 by another. I have known these prac- 
 titioners to request their patients to 
 yield themselves wholly to them — thus 
 rushing in where angels fear to tread ! 
 The most common of their modes of 
 practicing this control is by what is 
 called the " silent treatment." In this 
 the practitioner, without any external 
 evident communication with the sub- 
 ject, brings him vividly before his mind 
 and addresses him mental questions and 
 affirmations, seeking thus to bring con- 
 victions to what they call the uncon- 
 scious mind. By this method, which 
 avoids all resistance on the part of the 
 patient, they seek to impress the con- 
 viction upon him that there is no such 
 thing as sickness, and hence that he 
 himself is not ill, and thus to lead him 
 out of the mental state which is the 
 cause of his apparent sickness. 
 6i 
 
Ip012cblasl0 
 
 How ought we to think of this system 
 of healing? In what respect is it or- 
 derly and right ? In what respect is it 
 disorderly and to be avoided ? 
 
 The mind-cure advocates are right in 
 exalting the power of the soul over the 
 body. They are right in affirming the 
 substantial reality of spiritual things, 
 and the relative unreality of natural 
 things. It is a good thing, too, to ap- 
 peal to mental forces to effect the re- 
 moval of natural diseases ; and they are 
 right in advocating a life of repose and 
 of trust to the powers of the mind to 
 remove their disabilities, and to bestow 
 upon them all necessary power for main- 
 taining health. There is certainly a 
 field of vast and not yet realized useful- 
 ness in the possible treatment of bodily 
 ill through the mind. There must be 
 orderly and effective ways of doing this, 
 and so far as any one is acomplishing 
 this, we must bid him God speed in his 
 work. 
 
 But my utterance of this " God speed " 
 62 
 
/iBetapb^slcal Healing 
 
 must not be misunderstood. It does 
 not mean an endorsement of the doc- 
 trines of metaphysical healers, nor of 
 their practices. Their theories, like the 
 theories of faith-cure practitioners, and 
 of all other would-be teachers, must be 
 subjected to the usual tests of doctrinal 
 confirmation before acceptance. 
 
 Again, besides repudiating all author- 
 ity in their doctrines, we feel bound to 
 point out certain errors and certain dan- 
 gers which sometimes appear in mind- 
 cure practices. In the first place, mind- 
 cure advocates are very apt to deny the 
 reality of natural things, with a kind of 
 absoluteness entirely unwarranted by the 
 doctrine of the supreme reality of spir- 
 itual things. This last is true doctrine. 
 Swedenborg very distinctly declares 
 that " whatsoever in universal nature 
 does not have correspondence with the 
 spiritual world, has no existence, having 
 no cause from which it can exist, and 
 hence subsist " (Arcana Coelestia, 571 1). 
 But even so, though these appearances 
 63 
 
possess no reality whatever in them- 
 selves, they do possess a kind of reality 
 derived from the reality of their causes. 
 If there be no such thing as sickness, 
 there is at least such a thing as the 
 mental state which produces the appear- 
 ances of sickness, and sickness therefore 
 possesses that mental state as a reality 
 within it. This is true of all appear- 
 ances ; and idealists, from the disciples 
 of Berkeley down, have made a great 
 mistake in denying all reality to appear- 
 ances, because they do not possess that 
 kind of reality which the natural man 
 attaches to them. And sickness, though 
 we are prepared to admit that in itself 
 it has no power, and thus that it does 
 not possess the kind of reality we at- 
 tach to it, must be considered as having 
 within it the reality of its spiritual 
 cause. 
 
 Secondly, mind-cure practitioners 
 make a mistake in their absolute re- 
 jection of natural curative agencies. 
 For even though their doctrines be 
 64 
 
/iBetapbssical Bealfn^ 
 
 correct concerning the forces of the 
 mind as the only proper instrumentality 
 of cure, natural means, because of the 
 faith people have in them, are thus 
 practically among mental instrumental- 
 ities, and have as valid a ground in ex- 
 perience for a faith in them as the 
 mind-cure system itself. Swedenborg, 
 in treating of the relation of spiritual 
 forces to disease, declares that though 
 the causes of disease are in the spiri- 
 tual world, the Divine Providence con- 
 curs with natural means of healing 
 (Arcana Coelestia, 5713). The fact is 
 that our mind-cure friends are not quite 
 consistent here, for the reiterated read- 
 ing of a sentence which they practice 
 for the purpose of inducing a certain 
 mental state, is as truly a taking of 
 medicine as would be swallowing a pel- 
 let for the same purpose. 
 
 In the third place, we note the danger 
 arising from the too intense concentra- 
 tion of the mind upon one limiting idea. 
 Insane asylums have many monoma- 
 65 
 
niacs who become thus diseased by con- 
 fining themselves to the field of thought 
 and life to be derived from one idea. 
 When one becomes thus possessed he 
 is mentally monstrous, just as the ab- 
 normal enlargement of any individual 
 organ of the body makes one monstrous 
 physically. And then the appearance 
 of cure which such concentration of 
 mental application accomplishes, is cer- 
 tainly magical ; that is, it is an appear- 
 ance without a corresponding reality. 
 It is like the effect of a local anesthetic, 
 which relieves the pain but does not 
 remove the disorder. I once held an 
 interview with a physician who had had 
 the care of a number of patients who 
 had passed through the Christian Sci- 
 ence experience. They had seemed for 
 a time to have been cured, but the dis- 
 ease, they discovered later, was still 
 with them. It was working on in the 
 system without declaring itself by means 
 of the usual significant symptoms. The 
 effect of Christian Science on these 
 66 
 
/IBetapbi^sfcal Healing 
 
 patients, this physician informed me, 
 seemed to be merely to suppress symp- 
 toms. The patients supposed that they 
 were well because their pain was gone. 
 And this recalls the case of the friend 
 to whom I have already alluded, whom 
 I look upon as a victim to this infatua- 
 tion. The Christian Science healers 
 were able to make her for a time un- 
 conscious of the pain, but they could 
 not affect the derangement. 
 
 Another thing which we have at 
 times found in the practice of this sys- 
 tem of mental cure is that persons who 
 appeared to be benefited by going to 
 a metaphysical practitioner, and who 
 seemed to be well, needed to keep uf*. 
 the constant practice of communicating 
 with the healer. An absence for a 
 short time would bring about the lassi- 
 tude and depression of the old ailment. 
 I have known those who for year after 
 year were obliged to keep up this asso- 
 ciation with a curer in order to main- 
 tain themselves in their cured condi- 
 67 
 
dition. In my judgment, this is hyp- 
 notic — an abnormal dependence upon 
 another. If the system be orderly and 
 right, the patient should be able sooner 
 or later to walk alone — to receive from 
 the divine source of life the strength 
 wherewith he is held in health and 
 strength. 
 
 Again, I must speak a word as to the 
 orderliness of what they call their " si- 
 lent treatment." Assuming that it is 
 possible to approach the mind of an- 
 other by a method of thought directed 
 towards him, and to get at his mind 
 above his consciousness by certain 
 thought-questions and affirmations ad- 
 dressed to him, the question still re- 
 mains as to^ whether it be right thus to 
 influence him. It has seemed to me 
 that only within a certain very limited 
 field, if ever, and as a temporary expe- 
 dient in an emergency, it may be allow- 
 able, somewhat as it is allowable to 
 carry a sick or a wounded man upon a 
 stretcher, which it would be intolerable 
 
 68 
 
^etapbsBlcal IHeaUng 
 
 to do as a constant practice for well 
 men. 
 
 But " silent treatment " as a constant 
 method for keeping each other well, is 
 of very questionable orderliness in this 
 respect, that it secures an entrance to 
 the control of man's mental states by a 
 secret, I am almost prepared to say, a 
 clandestine method. It is a well-known 
 principle of regeneration that it can 
 only be accomplished as man in the 
 conscious exercise of his faculties on 
 the most external plane of his life ac- 
 knowledges the commandments and 
 obeys them. Man's external and con- 
 scious life is the instrument of his indi- 
 viduaHty and personality. Anything 
 which is accomplished in him above his 
 consciousness and without some cooper- 
 ation of his conscious effort, is not he. 
 Hence the Lord declares that He 
 "stands at the door and knocks." He 
 never steals his way into the mind by 
 an inner door. Is it proper for one of 
 us to insinuate himself into a chamber 
 69 
 
of our neighbor's life into which the 
 Lord would not intrude ? To formulate 
 this question is to answer it. 
 
 Nay, more ; is not the " silent treat- 
 ment " open to the most serious abuses, 
 since by that method the evil-disposed 
 man may learn to creep into the un- 
 conscious minds of his associates, and 
 there argue with his unsuspecting vic- 
 tims in favor of false doctrines and evil 
 practices ? Is it not a two-edged sword 
 that may cut in either direction, and 
 that is as likely to cut the wrong way 
 as the right ? 
 
 I am happy to state in this connec- 
 tion that I have known a number of 
 metaphysical practitioners who never 
 treat a person by " silent treatment " 
 unless he invites it, and who seek by 
 every means to lead a subject to treat 
 himself, and thus to get as soon as pos- 
 sible away from the leading strings of 
 the healer. 
 
 To sum up our judgment of the mind- 
 cure, metaphysical healing, and all kin- 
 70 
 
^etapbi^sical Mealing 
 
 dred forms of the treatment of sick- 
 ness, we may say that since there doubt- 
 less is a vast power of the mind over 
 the body which we may make use of for 
 our welfare, we may surely take advan- 
 tage of this power under the teachings 
 of the New Church. The doctrines of 
 these various healingisms are not to be 
 trusted, and many of their practices are 
 magical and dangerous. We may and 
 should seek all orderly benefits which 
 can be secured by the rule of the mind 
 in the body, without resorting to the 
 visionary doctrines, nor to the subtle 
 practices of any of the schools of men- 
 tal healing. 
 
 71 
 
VII. 
 
 CHRISTIAN SCIENCE AS TO 
 ITS DOCTRINES 
 
 CHRISTIAN SCIENCE is more 
 prominent than any other form 
 of mental heahng. It even sets out to 
 be a church, professing to bring to man 
 a new theology, a new philosophy, and 
 a new priesthood. Its more enthusias- 
 tic disciples look upon it as constituting 
 a Second Coming of Christ. Beginning 
 with a " Mother Church " in Boston, it 
 is extending its organized societies all 
 over this country, and I understand 
 over other countries as well. It is erect- 
 ing costly houses of worship. It is 
 gathering great numbers into its fold. 
 Some of our New-Church people have 
 been attracted by it, and I am moved 
 to give to it especial consideration. 
 72 
 
Cbrf0tlan Science as to Ifts 2)octrlne0 
 
 Regarded as an external movement, 
 the special features of the Christian 
 Science branch of mental healing are : 
 (i) That a woman, possessing a striking 
 and unique personality, stands at its 
 head, and claims to be the original dis- 
 coverer of Christian Science, and its 
 only divinely authorized expounder ; (2) 
 that the book she has written is held 
 as the only authoritative text book of 
 doctrine for the new system ; and (3) 
 that the organized body whose head she 
 is, is the only genuine and truly legit- 
 imate body of believers in the new 
 church of Christ. 
 
 If now we read this divinely author- 
 ized book, and seek to learn from it what 
 constitutes its claim for supremacy, we 
 are astonished at three unexpected fea- 
 tures. The first is, that it is strangely 
 lacking in rationality in substance, 
 mode, and form. Logical sequence and 
 order we look for in vain. It gives no 
 satisfactory response to an intelligent 
 and honest intellectual inquiry. 
 f3 
 
lP012Cb(a0f0 
 
 The second feature is the immanence 
 of the author's personaUty. When I 
 first read " Science and Health " I was 
 more impressed by Mrs. Eddy's insist- 
 ence upon her claim to be the first and 
 only discoverer of the principle of Chris- 
 tian Science, than I was at any efforts 
 she made to explain or illustrate that 
 principle. 
 
 The third feature that will impress 
 the wondering reader is the claim to 
 dominion which is vested in Mrs. Eddy. 
 This claim is more evident in the growth 
 of the organized system than in the 
 book. We find that this new religion, 
 this professed Second Coming of Christ, 
 this so-claimed advance upon all that 
 has ever been in the world before, is a 
 radical hierarchy. This dominion seems 
 to be especially exercised in suppressing 
 intellectual freedom among the disciples 
 of the new faith. Those who conduct 
 services in their worship are not allowed 
 to deliver themselves of original preach- 
 ing, or set forth a rational exposition of 
 74 
 
Cbristian Science as to Ute Doctrines 
 
 their tenets. The services consist of 
 reading from the Scriptures, and from 
 "Science and Health," with some sing- 
 ing. In this respect this so-called 
 "Church of Christ Scientist" is like 
 the most external and the least spiritual 
 of the Christian denominations, the 
 Church of Rome. It is the dominion 
 of a female Pope, without the reason 
 for such rule as the successor of Peter 
 can urge. 
 
 If we advance to a deeper examina- 
 tion of Christian Science, and inquire 
 into its philosophy and theology, we 
 shall find some striking peculiarities. I 
 will pass by its extreme idealism, which 
 it holds in common with all schools of 
 mental healing, differing only in possi- 
 bly being more radical than others, on 
 which I have already commented, and 
 call attention to its teachings concern- 
 ing God and concerning the Word. The 
 idea which any religion presents of God 
 is its qualifying and characteristic fea- 
 ture. "A correct idea of God," says 
 75 
 
P012cb(a6i0 
 
 Swedenborg, " is in the church like the 
 sanctuary and altar in a temple, and like 
 a crown upon the head and a sceptre 
 in the hand of a king on his throne," 
 Christian Science presents a conception 
 of God, and here we should make our 
 most earnest examination if we would 
 get at exactly and truly what it is, and 
 hence learn how we should think of it. 
 
 We find in the Christian Science idea 
 of God two conceptions, both utterly 
 repellent to our New-Church teachings. 
 The first is its pantheism. *' God is 
 Mind ; and Mind is all." There is noth- 
 ing in the universe excepting God. Thus 
 Christian Science comes to us as an 
 uncompromising monism. All the teach- 
 ers of this modern movement delight 
 in calling themselves monists. Not 
 that monism in itself is necessarily a 
 falsity, nor that all forms of dualism 
 are true. There are great varieties in 
 monism, and in dualism. In their radi- 
 cal forms each is equally preposterous. 
 
 In radical dualism we are taught that 
 76 
 
Cbdatian Science as to 1Ft0 S)octrine0 
 
 there are two opposing original and self- 
 existent forces ; thus two Gods, a good 
 God and a bad one. It had its origin 
 in Persian mythology, and crept into 
 the Christian Church in the form of a 
 belief in a supreme devil. Its influence 
 is also shown in the prominence and 
 power of hell as they have been repre- 
 sented in the church of the past. In 
 the earlier forms of Christian theology 
 Christ himself was taught to be a sac- 
 rifice to the devil. I need not dwell 
 upon this dualistic conception. It is 
 inconceivable, and from the New Church 
 is absolutely rejected. 
 
 On the other hand, radical monism, 
 pushed to its extreme, is uncompromi- 
 sing pantheism, and if logically carried 
 out to its bitter end (and its end is 
 spiritually bitter), it teaches that every- 
 thing is God, and makes reabsorption 
 into deity man's final destiny. 
 
 Now the Christian Science idea of 
 God meets with the two unanswerable 
 objections which set themselves against 
 11 
 
P6^cbia0i6 
 
 all radical monism : the first is raised 
 by man's intelligence, and the second 
 arises from the needs of man's love. 
 
 The intellectual objection to monism 
 is founded in the very structure of the 
 mind, for some form and degree of dual- 
 ism is a necessity of thought. We can- 
 not form an idea without it. There 
 cannot be a conception of an up, with- 
 out a correlative conception of a down. 
 We cannot think of an ego without 
 some sort of a thought of a non-ego. 
 God cannot be an object of any mental 
 contemplation whatever, unless there be 
 an idea of a non-God with which to 
 compare and contrast it. Christian Sci- 
 entists themselves while using the most 
 extreme expressions of monistic affir- 
 mations, talk of "mortal mind" and of 
 the "errors " which spring from it, and 
 thus show by their language the neces- 
 sary presence of dualistic conceptions in 
 their thinking. If monism were true 
 in the extreme form in which it is taught 
 in Christian Science doctrines, there 
 7S 
 
Cbrtstian Science as to ITts Doctdnee 
 
 could be no *' mortal mind " and no 
 "error." In fact, Mrs, Eddy, in her 
 little book on " Unity of God," does 
 say that " strictly speaking there is no 
 mortal mind." If there were no dualism 
 in some form, degree, or appearance, 
 there could be no idea of dualism, much 
 less could there be any language ex- 
 pressing it. 
 
 Another intellectual difficulty with 
 the Christian Science idea of God, is 
 the impossibility under it of accounting 
 for creation, and its disorders, suffer- 
 ings, and sin — or for the appearance 
 of these last if they be not real. If 
 there be no such thing as disease and 
 wrong, then why should they seem to 
 be ? If they are the hallucinations of 
 mortal mind, whence then came mortal 
 mind ^ and how came what are mere 
 hallucinations into positions of such 
 prominence, and force, and life.'* And 
 if " strictly speaking there is no mortal 
 mind," how does it happen that this 
 thing which " strictly speaking " is not, 
 79 
 
lP0)3Cbla5fs 
 
 appears to be so much in evidence? 
 And what is creation, and what is the 
 end, purpose, and idea of the whole ap- 
 pearance of life and experience of mor- 
 tal mind ? 
 
 All these most logical questions, 
 questions that can be rationally an- 
 swered under a doctrine of dualism 
 which makes them a factor in the oper- 
 ation of the divine love and wisdom, 
 are impossible of satisfactory solution 
 under the Christian Science idea of 
 God. 
 
 A still more serious objection to the 
 Christian Science monistic conception 
 of God, is that under it we can find no 
 satisfactory destiny for man. I know 
 that the Christian Scientist feels strong 
 at this point, and will be surprised at 
 such an objection. Does not Christian 
 Science teach that man is a veritable 
 part of God ? he asks. And what can 
 you desire better than that ? Have you 
 a higher ambition than to be divine .-* 
 
 But however satisfactory this may be 
 80 
 
Cbrl6tlan Science ae to ITts Boctrines 
 
 to the natural-minded man, to the spir- 
 itual-minded man right here is the most 
 fatal defect of the whole system. The 
 very essence of divine love, that which 
 impelled God to create, and that which 
 thence constitutes the very substance 
 of all genuinely heavenly love in what- 
 ever degree or form manifested, is that 
 it should love some one out of self. To 
 find one's self inherently sufficient unto 
 himself, is to the spiritual man death. 
 To love others, and thus to have the 
 ends and purposes of one's life in the 
 neighbor, is the warp and woof of every 
 love that is heavenly. It is the very 
 end of creation. All true spiritual 
 blessedness consists in a union in love 
 with others. The differences in the 
 nature of those who are the constituent 
 parts of such a union are the very 
 ground of the blessedness. 
 
 This is illustrated in all forms of 
 
 neighborly charity, and is in its height 
 
 shown in the ultimate form of human 
 
 personality which is dualistic, male and 
 
 8i 
 
Ip6i5cbfa0i0 
 
 female ; and whose very summit of 
 blessedness is provided for in the heav- 
 enly union of these differing parts — 
 that is, in marriage. 
 
 In his relation to God, therefore, man 
 realizes the blessedness of his own life, 
 not by finding himself to be in his own 
 self-sufficiency God (God forbid !) but by 
 conjunction with Him ; and God at the 
 same time realizes the end of his love 
 by union with man. It is because God 
 and man are opposite to each other in 
 their attributes, and not because man 
 is inmostly divine, that their conjunc- 
 tion is of such surpassing sweetness. 
 That man was made " in the image " 
 and " after the likeness " of God, means 
 that to man was given by creation the 
 capacity of receiving and responding 
 to the love and the wisdom of God, and 
 not that he should possess these things 
 inherently in himself. Man in his like- 
 ness to God may be compared to the 
 glove which is made " in the image " 
 and " after the likeness " of the hand, 
 
 83 
 
Cbrigtfan Science as to ITte Doctrfnea 
 
 but which accomplishes the purpose of 
 its manufacture not by possessing in 
 itself inherently the attributes of the 
 hand, but by possessing the capacity of 
 being conjoined to the hand, and in such 
 conjunction, and by virtue of it, receiv- 
 ing of the hand's warmth and life. 
 
 Every fact of human experience, 
 struggle, and achievement confirms this 
 doctrine, and however delicious to self- 
 love the thought of self-divinity may 
 be, no one who has once tasted the 
 depths of peace, joy, and innocence 
 which flow into the soul from conjunc- 
 tion with the Lord, will see in the Chris- 
 tian Science monistic doctrine anything 
 other than a device of the natural man 
 — selfish, superficial, and unsatisfac- 
 tory ; a fruit which is bound to turn 
 to ashes. 
 
 The second feature of the Christian 
 Science idea of God is that He is to be 
 thought of as Principle, not Person. 
 There is an assumption of vast superi- 
 ority on the part of those who use in- 
 83 
 
definite terms in describing God, over 
 those who think of Him as Man, and 
 especially over those who address Him 
 in terms of personal love. To call Him 
 "Principle," and similar vague terms, 
 and to renounce the very idea of think- 
 ing of Him as a person, neither elevates 
 nor enlarges the real idea one has of 
 God. It gives indefiniteness, not great- 
 ness, and substitutes the primary and 
 disorganized conditions of matter as rep- 
 resenting God in the place of the most 
 highly-organized forms of life. Obscu- 
 rity has often been mistaken for depth 
 in literature, and vagueness has with 
 equal frequency been mistaken for gran- 
 deur in thought. However broad the 
 idea which the word " Principle " may 
 express, the conception which any one 
 gets from the meaning of the word is 
 necessarily as narrow as he ; and how- . 
 ever limited the signification of the 
 word person may seem, its meaning 
 can be as grand under any individual's 
 interpretation of it as his capacity is 
 84 
 
Cbrfstfan Science as to fTts Doctrines 
 
 grand. One's conception of God is 
 limited by his capacity, and no indefi- 
 niteness in the meaning of a word can 
 remove that limitation. One's concep- 
 tion of God may be made by any one 
 as grand as is his capacity, and no lim- 
 iting word need make it smaller. Here 
 is a most momentous, but often forgot- 
 ten or unrecognized principle. 
 
 The question as to the form in which 
 we should image God before us, whether 
 as a Person or as Principle, is not de- 
 termined by the question as to what 
 He is in himself, for the form He is in 
 himself is necessarily beyond all hu- 
 man conception ; but it is determined 
 by the question as to what form will 
 give us the best idea we are capable of 
 receiving. Every conception possible 
 to us is necessarily infinitely below the 
 reality, which transcends man's furthest 
 imagination. What God is in himself, 
 no one can know. This transcendent 
 attribute of God is called in the lan- 
 guage of the doctrine of the Trinity, 
 85 
 
lpBl2cbfa6f6 
 
 the Father. The question as to the 
 form in which we should picture God 
 is determined by the question as to what 
 will convey to us the best thought we 
 can receive — what is the truest idea 
 we can get hold of ? This is called the 
 Son ; this is the form in which we 
 should think of God. 
 
 Now God should be thought of as a 
 Person not because such personality as 
 we can think of in any way equals Him, 
 but because that is the form in which 
 we can attain unto the highest and tru- 
 est conception of Him we are capable 
 of receiving. The limitations of the 
 personality in which we image Him, are 
 ours not his. But in addition to this, 
 in addition to the question of the high- 
 est conception we can acquire of Him, 
 in person only can we conceive of actual 
 love — and God is love in its most ac- 
 tual sense. When Mrs. Eddy reasoned 
 that because God is love, therefore He 
 is not in Person, she was reasoning back- 
 wards. We should say, God is love and 
 86 
 
Cbrfstian Science as to "ITts Doctrines 
 
 therefore we should think of Him in 
 Person. Love out of person, is unthink- 
 able ; and those who imagine that they 
 think of such love, if intelligently and 
 honestly they analyze their idea, will 
 find that they are not thinking of love, 
 but of ether, or atmosphere, or the 
 subtle force of atoms. 
 
 But what has Christian Science to 
 give us in the place of Person ? It 
 gives us vagueness, emptiness, nothing- 
 ness. God by these terms is associated 
 with an atmosphere, or with ether, or 
 with vibrations of heat and light, and 
 thus with mechanical and inanimate 
 things, instead of being associated with 
 love and wisdom, and thus with the 
 things of the mind which are the higher 
 forms in which creation is revealed to 
 us. To quote from my little work on 
 "The Christ of God " : — 
 
 " As we look out into the world we 
 find creation exhibited in grades. Low- 
 est is the mineral, above that is the 
 vegetable, then the animal, and high 
 87 
 
Ip012cbia0f6 
 
 above the animal is man. God is infi- 
 nitely above all. Where should we look 
 logically for an adequate expression of 
 Him other than in the highest of Hi^ 
 creations, in man ? God cannot be 
 most efficiently expressed in minerals, 
 however great be their masses, since 
 minerals are the very lowest things of 
 nature ; nor in the vegetable, which is 
 the very humblest expression of an ap- 
 pearance of life ; nor yet in the mere 
 animal, which possesses no moral life, 
 and is inferior to man. If God would 
 reveal Himself to us as a Being above 
 us, He must construct the form in which 
 He would make Himself known out of 
 the very highest and the best of the 
 things that He has made, and the very 
 height of all that He has made, which 
 has come within the field of our vision, 
 is character. This is the surpassing 
 pearl compared with which all other 
 things sink into insignificance. Moun- 
 tains and oceans, the forests and all the 
 glories of vegetation, and all other works 
 88 
 
Cbrf0tfan Science as to ITts Boctdnes 
 
 of nature, are relatively as nothing when 
 compared with the glory and the honor 
 which pertain to heavenly character, the 
 inestimable possible possession of a man. 
 If God would with the greatest effi- 
 ciency present Himself before our eyes, 
 in the terms of human character He 
 has the supreme language for His pur- 
 pose." 
 
 To think of God as embodied in a 
 glorified Personality rather than as Prin- 
 ciple, is to see Him in the highest things 
 He has made rather than in the lowest ; 
 it is looking to something above our- 
 selves to image Him to us, rather than 
 to something beneath us. 
 
 Christian Science, in addition to giv- 
 ing us a new idea of God, professes to 
 give us an authoritative interpretation 
 of the Scripture. It furnishes what it 
 calls a "key." But I can hardly find 
 language to describe the utter emptiness 
 and meaninglessness of the Christian- 
 Science interpretation of Scripture, if 
 indeed it is sufficient in amount, definite 
 8q 
 
pBi^cbiasfe 
 
 enough in character, and rationally ad- 
 equate to deserve even the name of an 
 "interpretation." The whole "key" 
 occupies three short chapters in " Sci- 
 ence and Health," the Christian-Science 
 authoritative text book. The first is 
 entitled " Genesis," but it gives an exe- 
 gesis of only four chapters of that book. 
 The second is entitled "The Apoca- 
 lypse," and after referring to a passage 
 of the tenth chapter of the Book of 
 Revelation, gives an exegesis of chapter 
 twelve, and of a few verses of chapter 
 twenty-one. The third chapter of this 
 " key " is a glossary, containing, to use 
 the author's own words, "a metaphys- 
 ical interpretation of Bible terms, giving 
 their spiritual sense, which is also their 
 original meaning." We find in this 
 glossary only about one hundred and 
 thirty words defined. They are largely 
 proper names. I have never been able 
 to discover any law or principle by which 
 the meanings are determined, and none 
 appears to be claimed. Mrs. Eddy de- 
 go 
 
CbdsUan Science as to f ts Doctrines 
 
 clares that there is a spiritual sense to 
 the Word and she not unfrequently uses 
 language symbolically, but I have never 
 found a reference to correspondence as 
 a philosophical principle or even as a 
 fact in the representation of spiritual 
 things. Could anything from a New- 
 Church point of view be more meagre 
 and unsatisfactory ? 
 
 91 
 
viii: 
 
 CHRISTIAN SCIENCE AS TO 
 ITS RAPID GROWTH 
 
 BUT if Christian Science is so un- 
 satisfactory, if it is so wholly il- 
 logical, irrational, fetishistic, and des- 
 potic, how can we account for its 
 rapid growth ? Do not these objections 
 prove too much ? Are they not contra- 
 dicted by the mere fact of the spread of 
 this new denomination ? 
 
 On the contrary, these features, while 
 challenging our wonder, furnish a clue 
 to the interpretation of this phenomenal 
 extension of Christian Science. They 
 show that Christian Science possesses 
 three sources of enormous power with 
 the natural man, and whatever pos- 
 sesses power with that man, develops 
 vigorously on earth. Its first source of 
 92 
 
IRapfO (3rowtb of Cbtfatfan Science 
 
 power is in the extreme naturalism of 
 its doctrines. Above all things the nat- 
 ural man abhors regeneration and re- 
 demption. Every instinct of our self- 
 love for the sake of its own preserva- 
 tion would lead us to renounce the 
 Scriptural and spiritual doctrine that we 
 must be born again. How easy, how 
 satisfactory, and thence how acceptable 
 to the self-love man, to be told that he 
 is already in himself pure and heavenly ; 
 that he need but think himself into di- 
 vinity. All this is on the plane of the 
 natural conceptions, for there is in the 
 Christian Science philosophy, no doc- 
 trine of discrete, or laminated, degrees 
 to save one from the indiscriminate 
 mingling of celestial and terrestrial 
 things. Under these naturalistic teach- 
 ings man becomes like Pharaoh's baker. 
 While like all men he carries three bas- 
 kets above his head with bread, for 
 above every man there are the three 
 heavens with their food for the soul, 
 they are full of holes, and celestial, spir- 
 
 93 
 
itual, and natural things are indiscrimi- 
 nately mingled together. And where 
 they are not kept distinct from each 
 other, the spiritual man dies. The 
 baker loses his head.* Like the doc- 
 
 *See marginal reading of Gen. xi. i6, and read 
 "Arcana Coelestia," 5145, from which I quote the 
 following : " Man's interiors are distinguished into 
 three degrees, and in each degree the interiors are 
 terminated, and by termination separated from the 
 lower degree ; thus from the inmost to the outmost. 
 .. . These degrees in man are most distinct. 
 Thence it is that man, as to his interiors, if he 
 lives in good, is heaven in least form, or that his 
 interiors correspond to the three heavens ; and 
 thence it is that man after death can, if he has 
 lived a life of charity and love, be transferred even 
 into the third heaven. But that he may be such, 
 it is necessary that all the degrees in him should be 
 well terminated, and thus by means of terminations 
 be distinct from one another ; and when they are 
 terminated or by means of terminations are made 
 distinct from one another, every degree is then a 
 plane in which the good which flows in from the 
 Lord rests, and where it is received. Without 
 these degrees as planes, good is not received, but 
 flows through as through a sieve, or perforated 
 basket, even to the sensual ; and then, not being 
 directed to anything on its way, it is changed into 
 what is filthy, which appears to those who are 
 in it as good, namely, into the enjoyment of the 
 love of self and of the world." 
 
 94 
 
IRaplD (Srowtb of Cbrfstian Science 
 
 trine of faith alone in the Old Church, 
 of which doctrine this is a variety, the 
 Christian Science teaching of self-good- 
 ness is an alluring fantasy. 
 
 The second great source of power 
 which Christion Science possesses with 
 the natural man, is from the essential 
 limitation of its idea. I have already 
 considered the almost boundless con- 
 trol which the mind exercises over the 
 body from concentration, and I again 
 call it to mind because with the Chris- 
 tian Science branch of mental-healing 
 it is exceptionally prominent. The en- 
 tire philosophy and religion of Christian 
 Science, with all its doctrines, precepts, 
 and practices, may be epitomized in the 
 one, simple statement of faith contained 
 in the three short words : I am God. 
 It is true that the Christian Scientist 
 might not express himself so baldly as 
 this, but this affirmation is logically in- 
 volved in the Christian Science doctrine 
 concerning man — when that doctrine 
 is affirmed as it is in Christian Science 
 95 
 
without reference to man's choice of 
 divine hfe, and thus without refer- 
 ence to man's permitting himself to 
 be regenerated and in this way attain- 
 ing unto a new birth — that man is 
 God's thought and thus divine. The 
 total elimination of the doctrine so 
 clearly and so forcibly set forth by the 
 Lord in John, that man must be born 
 again, or from above, and that he in this 
 way becomes a son of God, necessarily 
 mvolves the doctrine of self-deification. 
 Now this divine teaching that man must 
 be born again, is absolutely ignored in 
 Christian Science, whence it is that a 
 confirmed belief in the inherent divin- 
 ity of one's own self-life constitutes the 
 whole system in a nut-shell. So plain, 
 so condensed, so attractive to one's 
 self ! could we imagine a more concen- 
 trated morsel of delicious sweetness for 
 the palate of the natural man } 
 
 In their teachings concerning man in 
 his relation to God, the New Church 
 and Christian Science are in exactly 
 96 
 
IHapiD Growth of Cbrlstian Science 
 
 opposite positions. The New Church 
 says : Man as to his self-hood, that is, 
 as to the Ufe that is distinctively his 
 own, is absolutely opposite to the Lord, 
 but capable by regeneration of becom- 
 ing so conjoined to Him, as to receive 
 from Him a divine self-hood, that is, to 
 perceive in himself the Lord's life as 
 his own. But Christian Science teaches 
 the inherent divinity of man, which 
 logically ends in individual reabsorption 
 into divinity. The New Church in- 
 volves as its teaching concerning man's 
 destiny the eternal progression of the 
 individual into an ever more conscious 
 reception of the divine life, a progres- 
 sion in which every step forward makes 
 man ever more alive to the transcend- 
 ent fact that the love and the wisdom 
 by which he is actuated, so far as they 
 are heavenly, are not from self ; and at 
 the same time endows him with an ever 
 more clear and more delightful percep- 
 tion of the truth, that all this blessed- 
 ness is from the Lord. The surpassing 
 97 
 
sweetness of the conjunction of God 
 and man arises from the very fact that 
 man is not God. By this his individu- 
 aUty is continually more distinctly em- 
 phasized at the very moment that his 
 conjunction with God and his identifi- 
 cation with all men in love is perfected. 
 God and man complete each other. 
 To make man inherently God, is to de- 
 stroy this complementalness and oblit- 
 erate man altogether. The Christian 
 Science conception involves this efface- 
 ment of man, and the rational man won- 
 ders how under its teachings mortal 
 mind could ever have come into even 
 the appearance of existing. 
 
 The third source of the power which 
 Christian Science exercises over the 
 natural man, is from the subjection of 
 the individual freedom of its members 
 to a form of socialistic hypnotism. 
 Hypnotism is a word by which is des- 
 ignated that influence of man over man 
 v/hich is made possible by the subject's 
 ceasing to exercise his intelligence, and 
 98 
 
1Rapl& Growtb of Cbdstlan Science 
 
 by his yielding his will. Man's intelli- 
 gence is a divinely provided sentinel, 
 given for the purpose of warning him 
 against those who would improperly in- 
 trude themselves upon him, and of dri- 
 ving them off. Let any man lay this 
 aside, accept some fetich (such as a 
 book, a formula of words, an institution, 
 or a personality), and yield to the stupe- 
 fying doctrine that in some mystic or- 
 acle is vested an authorized dominion, 
 and we have all the conditions which 
 make hypnotism possible. But how can 
 hypnotism extend to so many .? Hyp- 
 notic control is generally supposed to be 
 individualistic — the government which 
 one man sometimes attains over an- 
 other. 
 
 On the contrary, hypnotism exhibits 
 its most virulent nature in its applica- 
 tion to social conditions. In its most 
 powerful form it is communal, and its 
 influence is cumulative as it extends 
 from man to man. At such times hyp- 
 notism is an efficient instrumentality 
 99 
 
f>6T2Cbla5l6 
 
 for spreading infectious mental maladies 
 which, under its sway, break out in a 
 community. When this takes place it 
 requires an especial clearness of vision 
 and strength of will to enable the in- 
 dividual to resist it. The social man is 
 quite as subject to epidemic mental dis- 
 eases, as he is to physical contagions. 
 The historical instance of that kind 
 which, to my mind, best illustrates the 
 present phenomenon, is the wave of re- 
 vivalism which swept over this country 
 in the forties and fifties of this century. 
 In more tragic form the Salem witch- 
 craft madness was such an epidemic. 
 The principle is illustrated by the 
 possibility of stampeding unthinking 
 crowds by shrewd managers. Hence, 
 too, the demoralization of armies under 
 some groundless fear which propagates 
 itself from one to another as though it 
 were an epidemic. The rushing through 
 of improper measures in popular legisla- 
 tive assemblies, is an illustration of so- 
 cial hypnotism. The insanities of soci- 
 
 lOO 
 
IRapiD (Browtb of Cbrlstian Science 
 
 ety fashions often manifest in grotesque 
 form this same principle. The skating- 
 rink craze, which at one time inundated 
 us with an almost resistless flood, though 
 something to smile at, was a remarkable 
 exhibition of the susceptibility of our 
 social human nature to hypnotic influ- 
 ence. 
 
 All the conditions of the Christian 
 Science infatuation proclaim it to be a 
 movement of this kind. It is an epi- 
 demic of hypnotic hallucination ; an as- 
 tounding example of the vast power 
 which comes to a large company of men 
 and women whose freedom of intellec- 
 tual action is laid aside, and whose 
 mental and affectional life are concen- 
 trated on a simple, stupefying concep- 
 tion. 
 
 There is surely an influx of a peculiar 
 kind and degree at this moment flowing 
 in upon the minds of men from the 
 lower regions. There is a great wind 
 in the spiritual world, and it is carrying 
 many along with it. It is necessary 
 
under the circumstances that those 
 whose feet are planted upon a rock of 
 rational and scriptural conviction, should 
 stand firm, that they be not swept into 
 the vortex. 
 
 
IX. 
 
 THE NEW-CHURCH DOC- 
 TRINE OF MIND-CURE 
 
 HAVING thus far discussed the 
 various sects in mental healing, 
 and formed a judgment concerning 
 them, we come to the question of the 
 teachings of the New Church. What 
 have they to tell us concerning the heal- 
 ing of the body through the soul ? 
 
 Of course the heavenly doctrines 
 having been committed to writing over 
 a century ago, do not specifically treat 
 of the metaphysical healing of to-day. 
 But their instructions concerning the 
 relations of soul and body, and espe- 
 cially concerning those of the spiritual 
 and natural worlds, are so full and so 
 luminous that they anticipate in many 
 particulars some of the most recent so- 
 103 
 
Ip0^c blasts 
 
 called modern discoveries. This is es- 
 pecially true of the mental healing 
 which is so conspicuously showing it-- 
 self to-day. If Swedenborg had known 
 beforehand what was coming, he could 
 scarcely have better supplied us with 
 the means of coping with these things 
 than he has. 
 
 I divide the teachings of the New 
 Church on this subject into two portions. 
 The first concerns the principles of 
 what we might, call properly mind-cure, 
 or mental healing ; and the second 
 teaches that higher and more interior 
 doctrine concerning the healing of the 
 body through the soul, to which I have 
 already alluded. This second doctrine 
 is so pure, so rational, and so in har- 
 mony with an enlightened faith and life, 
 that I do not know of any other teach- 
 ing that can be compared with it. 
 
 Beginning with the doctrines of the 
 New Church on what we might call the 
 subject of mental healing, we may sum 
 them up under three heads : — 
 104 
 
IRcwsCburcb Boctrine of /iMnds^Cure 
 
 First, all diseases have their origin in 
 the spiritual world, and thus spring from 
 spiritual causes. In this respect our 
 doctrine seems at first sight to resemble 
 the mental-healing principle that sick- 
 ness is derived from the states of the 
 mind. But our New-Church doctrine 
 goes further than to tell us of the mere 
 fact of such origin. It brings out the 
 principle which underlies this truth, de- 
 claring that diseases are under the law 
 of correspondence. This is a doctrine 
 of vast moment, as it makes definite the 
 general teaching that the cause is in the 
 spiritual world. '♦ All diseases with 
 man," we read, " have correspondence 
 with the spiritual world ; for whatsoever 
 in universal nature does not have corre- 
 spondence with the spiritual world, has 
 no existence, having no cause from 
 which it can exist, and hence subsist. 
 The things of nature are nothing but 
 effects, whose causes are in the spiritual 
 world" (Arcana Ccelestia, 571 1). This 
 correspondence of diseases is not with 
 105 
 
heaven, it should be understood. "Dis- 
 eases have not correspondence with 
 heaven, which is the Maximus Hoyno^ 
 but with those who are in the opposite, 
 thus with those who are in the hells." 
 {Ibid.y 5712.) 
 
 This law of correspondence, which is 
 a characteristic feature of the New 
 Church, especially as applied to this 
 subject, is brought out in some detail. 
 Here are passages elaborating this prin- 
 ciple : — 
 
 "Every disease corresponds to its 
 own evil. This is because the all of 
 the life of man is from the spiritual 
 world. Wherefore if his spiritual life 
 sickens, evil is thence derived into the 
 natural life, and becomes a disease 
 there." {Ibid., 8364.) 
 
 " Diseases correspond to the lusts and 
 passions of the mind ; these also are 
 the origins of diseases. For the origins 
 of diseases are . . . also envyings, 
 hatreds, revenges, lasciviousness, and 
 the like, which destroy the interiors of 
 106 
 
•fflew*Cburcb 2)octrfne of /lRfn&s=Cucc 
 
 man, and when these are destroyed, the 
 exteriors suffer and draw man into dis- 
 ease, and thus into death." {Ibid. 5712.) 
 
 "All the internals induce diseases, 
 but with a difference, because all the 
 hells are in the lusts and concupiscences 
 of evil, consequently contrary to the 
 things which are of heaven ; therefore 
 they act upon man from what is oppo- 
 site : heaven, which is the Grand Man, 
 keeps all things in connection and 
 safety ; hell, as being in the opposite, 
 destroys and rends all things . asunder ; 
 consequently if the infernals are ap- 
 plied they induce diseases, and at length 
 death. But they are not permitted to 
 flow in so far as into the solid parts of 
 the body, or into the parts which con- 
 stitute the viscera, organs, and mem- 
 bers of man, but only into the lusts 
 and falsities — only when a man falls 
 into disease, they then flow into such 
 unclean things as belong to the disease." 
 {Ibid., 5713.) 
 
 " There appeared a large quadrangu- 
 107 
 
lar aperture. . . Hence there exhaled a 
 troublesome heat, which was collected 
 from various hells, arising from lusts 
 of various kinds, as from haughtiness, 
 lasciviousness, adulteries, hatreds, re- 
 venges, quarrels, and fightings : such in 
 the hells was the source of that heat 
 which exhaled. When this heat acted 
 upon my body, it instantly induced dis- 
 ease like that of a burning fever; but 
 when it ceased to flow in, the disease 
 instantly ceased. When a man falls into 
 such disease, which he has contracted 
 from his life, instantly an unclean sphere 
 corresponding to the disease adjoins 
 itself, and is present as the fomenting 
 cause." {Ibid., 5715.) 
 
 " The ulcers appertaining to man in 
 his body correspond to the defiled things 
 which are from evils, and pustules to 
 blasphemies ; and they would also be in 
 every evil man, unless he, so long as he 
 is in the world, was in a state of receiv- 
 ing the good and truth of faith ; it is 
 for the sake of that state that the Lord 
 108 
 
H^ewsCburcb 5)octrfne of /IRin^^Cure 
 
 prevents such things bursting forth from 
 evils." {Ibid., 7524.) 
 
 Notice how much deeper this goes 
 than does the general and undefined 
 doctrine that diseases have their origin 
 in the errors of man's mind. It teaches 
 us that there is a law applying to the 
 relations of mental and material things 
 from which we learn that diseases are 
 not mere misconceptions of man's 
 thought-life, but are the expressions in 
 the body of the disorderly states of the 
 soul. 
 
 Secondly, the New-Church doctrines 
 teach that the removal of the spiritual 
 cause of a disease will cure the disease. 
 It was when writing of disease as being 
 the effect of causes in the spiritual 
 world, that Swedenborg says : " On 
 the cessation of the cause, the effect 
 ceases." Much more explicit are the 
 following passages from the "■ Arcana " 
 and from the " Minor Spiritual Diary," 
 in which it is to be especially noted that 
 if the spiritual causes producing the 
 109 
 
p3SCbia0t6 
 
 disease be removed, the diseases them- 
 selves instantly disappear. 
 
 ''That I might know for certain that 
 this is the case, there were spirits from 
 several hells present with me, who com- 
 municated the sphere of the exhalations 
 thence arising, and as that sphere was 
 permitted to act upon the solid parts of 
 the body, I was seized with heaviness 
 and pain, and even with disease corre- 
 sponding thereto, which ceased in a 
 moment, as those spirits were expelled : 
 and lest any room should be left for 
 doubt, this was repeated very many 
 times." (Arcana, 5715.) 
 
 *' As often as diseases exist with man, 
 spirits which correspond to the disease 
 come to him. . . . Such spirits apply 
 themselves to the region where the dis- 
 ease is, and by their presence aggravate 
 it. If such spirits are removed by the 
 Lord, man is immediately restored to 
 health, . . . But since the generality 
 of men do not believe that spirits are 
 about us, all these things are attributed 
 
1Rew=Gburcb Boctrine of ^InO^Cure 
 
 to natural causes." (Minor Diary, 4648- 
 4650.) 
 
 Thirdly, our doctrines teach that 
 natural means are not, therefore, una- 
 vailable. " Nevertheless," says Swe- 
 denborg, after pointing out that the 
 removal of the spiritual cause of a dis- 
 ease would remove the disease itself, 
 " this is no hindrance to a man's being 
 healed naturally, for the divine provi- 
 dence concurs with such means of heal- 
 ing " (Arcana, 5713). The usefulness 
 of natural means is not necessarily in- 
 consistent with the sole efficiency of 
 spiritual instrumentalities, because nat- 
 ural means may often be resolved into 
 incitors of mental states. I notice that 
 Wood, and other advocates of mental 
 healing, prescribe various external acts, 
 and the reading and repeating of certain 
 phrases, for the incitement of concen- 
 tration of the mind. May not a medi- 
 cine, believed in by the patient, be a 
 useful means to bring the required heal- 
 ing state of the mind I 
 
 HI 
 
Ipsi2cbfa0l3 
 
 In the above teachings we have a 
 mind-cure doctrine in the New Church in 
 simple, logical, rational, consistent, and 
 practical form. All diseases are from the 
 spiritual world under the law of corre- 
 spondence. The removal of the spiritual 
 cause removes the disease, but this does 
 not hinder man's being treated naturally, 
 for " the divine providence concurs with 
 such means of healing." Notice that the 
 use of natural means is not sanctioned 
 because of a faith in the force of mere 
 natural instrumentalities, but because 
 "the divine providence concurs with" it. 
 
 There is surely a practical application 
 of these New-Church principles of heal- 
 ing of the body. There must be some 
 way of removing the spiritual cause of 
 a disease for the cure of the disease. 
 But for the moment I pass that by, that 
 we may consider next the characteristic 
 and interior doctrine concerning the 
 healing of the body through the soul 
 which is contained only in the truths of 
 the New Jerusalem. 
 
 1 
 
X. 
 
 HEALTH THROUGH RIGHT- 
 EOUS LIVING 
 
 WE now come to the supreme doc- 
 trine of the healing of the body 
 through the soul. It is more than mind- 
 cure, or any mere metaphysical heal- 
 ing. It accomplishes its effects through 
 something far higher and better than 
 the creative power of thought, beautiful 
 as that is. It is the purifying and heal- 
 ing virtue which flows into the body 
 from one's spiritual life ; and since the 
 Lord in man is the very beginning and 
 ending of the spiritual life, the heal- 
 ing I refer to is from the Lord. For 
 we are taught in our doctrines that the 
 most interior states of the soul as to 
 love and as to wisdom, are the most 
 1=^3 
 
efficient instrumentality for qualifying 
 and determining the conditions of the 
 body as to health and disease. It should 
 not be called mind-cure, but spiritual 
 character-cure. It is not one's thought- 
 life that accomplishes the purpose, it is 
 his life as to righteousness. 
 
 This is a momentous teaching, clearly 
 and forcibly laid down in the writings 
 of the church, yet generally passed 
 over by the reader with little apprecia- 
 tion of its significance. According to 
 our doctrines, man's body is a form cor- 
 responding to the understanding and 
 the will, and thence the interiors and 
 the exteriors of the mind act as one 
 with the interiors and the exteriors of 
 the body. " As man," we read, '' has 
 the Lord constantly before his eyes, 
 which is the case if he is in love and 
 wisdom, he then looks to Jiim not only 
 with his eyes and face, but also with 
 his whole mind and his whole heart, 
 and at the same time with all things of 
 the body " (Divine Love and Wisdom, 
 U4 
 
Hcaltb G^brougb 1Rfabteou6 %ivir\Q 
 
 136, 137). It is still further stated in 
 our doctrines that " it is indeed acknowl- 
 edged that a man is such as his reign- 
 ing love is, yet only such in mind and 
 disposition, but not such in body, thus 
 not wholly such. But it has been made 
 known to me from much experience in 
 the spiritual world, that from head to 
 foot, that is, from the primes in the 
 head to the ultimates in the body, a 
 man is such as his love is " (Md, 369). 
 Hence the condition of the body must 
 be controlled by the soul. 
 
 " If man had lived the life of good, 
 his interiors would be open to heaven, 
 and through heaven to the Lord : thus 
 also the smallest and invisible vessels 
 (it is allowable to call the lineaments of 
 the first stamina vessels by reason of 
 correspondence) would be open also, 
 and hence the man would be without 
 disease, and would only decrease to ul- 
 timate old age, until he became alto- 
 gether an infant, but a wise one ; and 
 when in such case the body could no 
 115 
 
Ipsscbia6i6 
 
 longer minister to its internal man, or 
 spirit, he would pass without disease 
 out of his terrestrial body, into a body 
 such as the angels have, thus out of the 
 world immediately into heaven." (Ar- 
 cana Coelestia, 5726.) 
 
 " With him who is spiritual, the purer 
 blood, which is called by some the ani- 
 mal spirit, is that which is purified ; and 
 it is so far purified as man is in the 
 marriage of love and wisdom. It is this 
 purer blood which most nearly corre- 
 sponds to that marriage, and because 
 this blood flows into the blood of the 
 body, it follows that the latter bipod is 
 also purified by means of it. It is the 
 contrary with those with whom love is 
 defiled in the understanding. But, as 
 was said, no one can explore this 
 through any experiment on the blood, 
 but he may explore it from the affec- 
 tions of love, since these correspond to 
 the blood." (Divine Love and Wisdom, 
 
 423.) 
 
 The completeness of the healing 
 
 116 
 
IKealtb C:brougb IRigbteous Xfving 
 
 which is described in these teachings, 
 that is, its interiority, is a feature to be 
 noted. It is from centre to circumfer- 
 ence. The very purity of the blood is 
 determined by the marriage of love and 
 wisdom in the soul, that is, by man's 
 regeneration. This is no mere suppres- 
 sion of symptoms. It is the eradica- 
 tion of the very essence of the disease 
 — of that quality in man's blood which 
 makes him susceptible to it. 
 
 It is to be noticed in this doctrine 
 that the health of the body is not the 
 end sought. It is simply the normal 
 expression of the regenerating man's 
 spiritual state. The states of man's 
 body are representative of the states of 
 his soul. To seek bodily health for itself, 
 that is, for the mere physical and selfish 
 comfort of it, is like devoting one's self 
 to attaining the external appearances, or 
 insignia, of a condition, without refer- 
 ence to the thing itself which these 
 signs represent. It may be aptly com- 
 pared with the contentment with the 
 117 
 
outer show of royalty without its author- 
 ity, which a claimant to the throne 
 might possess. Man's body is the very 
 outside of his life, and its health is the 
 orderly expression of the health of the 
 inner life, and in the aims and purposes 
 of life, we should so esteem it. Spir- 
 itual health, or righteousness, is the real 
 thing to be prized, sought, and attained, 
 and then, our doctrines tell us, our phys- 
 ical well-being will follow. 
 
 But is not this doctrine contrary to 
 experience .«* the doubter asks. Who 
 ever heard of any one who was in good 
 health because of his righteousness ? 
 
 Of course we do not hear of such 
 cases, since those who are in good 
 health from righteousness are uncon- 
 scious of the cause of their being well, 
 and would not dream of setting up the 
 claim that it is from their righteousness. 
 Those who, from this cause, are well, 
 are absorbed in the conscientious fulfil- 
 ment of the duties of their callings ; 
 they are shunning their evils as sins ; 
 
Bealtb C^brougb IRigbteous Xiving 
 
 they are leading lives of usefulness and 
 devotion. Their righteousness is some- 
 thing they do not think of, or if atten- 
 tion be called to it, they disavow its 
 being theirs. It is the Lord's, they 
 say. They are simply doing their duty. 
 Those whose blood is pure, and whose 
 bodies are in good health because they 
 live in the Lord, do not pose before 
 the world as examples of righteousness 
 healing; they hang no banners to the 
 breeze to announce themselves. They 
 are simply humble followers of the 
 Lord. Of course we do not know, and 
 least of all do the righteous people who 
 are well from the marriage of love and 
 wisdom in their souls themselves know, 
 who are the ones who are in physical 
 health from righteous living. But 
 though we know them not, have we not 
 reason to think that we have met them .-* 
 Quiet, faithful, self-forgetful, and help- 
 ful, they are in good health as a matter 
 of course. They merely are well, and 
 who is there to let the world know that 
 119 
 
p012Cbiasi0 
 
 their outward health is an expression of 
 their inward righteousness ? 
 
 Are the righteous always well, then ? 
 and can we judge of the state of one's 
 soul by the condition of his body ? 
 
 Certainly not. Environment, hered- 
 ity, misapprehensions on his own part, 
 and other causes, may interfere with a 
 righteous man's appearance of health, 
 though he be in health as to his soul ; 
 and there may be a seeming physical 
 health and strength with an unright- 
 eous man. Upon the judgment of per- 
 sonal character from physical condition 
 we are not warranted in entering. 
 
 In addition to this it should be re- 
 membered that we are in a world whose 
 purpose is to give man an opportunity 
 for being reformed and regenerated. 
 We are in the process. We cannot 
 judge of the final quality of anything 
 while it is being made — man's charac- 
 ter the least of all. And the states of 
 righteousness among men are in a very 
 mixed condition. Mankind is not di- 
 
Healtb tTbrougb IRigbteous Xivfng 
 
 vided into two distinct classes, the 
 righteous and the unrighteous. The 
 unrighteous, so called, are not to be 
 looked upon as wholly such ; nor should 
 the so-called righteous be thought of as 
 having completed their course of spiri- 
 tual purification. There may be in the 
 character which we regard as most 
 heavenly, elements of self-thought and 
 self-life which afford a lodgment for the 
 presence of ill-health. The conditions 
 involved are too complicated to warrant 
 us in basing a judgment of one's char- 
 acter as to righteousness upon the state 
 of his body. 
 
 The recognition of the truth that 
 man's body is not necessarily in this 
 world a reliable representative of the 
 conditions of his soul, is thus set forth 
 in '' Heaven and Hell " : — 
 
 "Though all things of man, as to 
 body, correspond to all thmgs of heaven, 
 still man is not an image of heaven as 
 to e;'cternal form, but as to the internal 
 form ; for the interiors of man receive 
 
heaven, and his exteriors receive the 
 world. . . . For external beauty, which 
 is of the body, derives its cause from 
 the parents and from formation in the 
 womb, and afterwards is preserved by 
 a common influx from the world ; hence 
 it is that the form of the natural man 
 differs very much from the form of his 
 spiritual man. Sometimes it has been 
 shown what the spirit of man was in 
 form, and it was seen that in some who 
 were beautiful and handsome in the 
 face, it was deformed, black, and mon- 
 strous, so that you would call it an im- 
 age of hell, not of heaven ; but in some 
 who were not beautiful, that it was well 
 formed, fair, and angelic." (99.) 
 
 And yet, though all this is true, and 
 most desirably true, for it would inter- 
 fere fatally with our freedom, and thus 
 with our regeneration, if we were to 
 judge of each other's spiritual character 
 from our health, the great law remains 
 that the most interior, the most desir- 
 able, and the most efficient source of 
 
Mealtb G^brougb IRi^bteous Xlvlng 
 
 physical health from spiritual instru- 
 mentalities is spiritual character. This 
 is a very fountain of health, a pool of 
 Bethesda in the soul, into whose waters, 
 after it has been stirred by the angel of 
 divine truth, each may enter for the 
 healing of every infirmity. 
 
 123 
 
XI. 
 
 THE RIGHT APPLICATION OF 
 MENTAL HEALING 
 
 AND now for the application of these 
 principles. The doctrines of the 
 New Church on this subject are not 
 solely matters of theory ; they are for 
 real life. They are not intended for 
 mere talk ; they are for practice. They 
 are not alone for study ; they are also 
 and especially for appHcation. And I 
 know of no teachings that are more 
 easily made use of than the ones I have 
 been presenting from the writings of the 
 New Church. 
 
 And of this I am assured, that wher- 
 ever they are realized in the life of any 
 one, health will surely follow. There 
 are no other mental healing principles 
 more practically efficient than these. 
 124 
 
Zhc IRlgbt Application of Cental Beallng 
 
 How can they become so incarnated in 
 us as to accomplish this so transcend- 
 ent a purpose ? 
 
 Right at the start I emphasize with 
 great earnestness the distinction be- 
 tween what has very appropriately been 
 called mind-cure, and the higher doc- 
 trine, which I have styled righteous- 
 living cure. The former may be re- 
 garded as a kind of medical treatment. 
 While of a higher purity and more de- 
 sirable in practice than the taking of 
 drugs, whether in appreciable or infini- 
 tesimal doses, it belongs to the same 
 plane of thought and application. The 
 practice of this psychotherapeutics 
 does not concern itself with religious 
 doctrine — it is external to all that. It 
 is simply clearing the mind of all those 
 states which obstruct the inflow of 
 health-giving forces from the spiritual 
 world. It may be rightly thought of 
 as one of the schools of the healing art. 
 It operates efficiently without reference 
 to the spiritual faith or life of the sub- 
 125 
 
Psi2cbta0l6 
 
 ject, and regards those states of the 
 mind which affect the operation of what 
 is known as the unconscious functions 
 of the body. 
 
 The principle I refer to is recognized 
 by intelligent physicians of whatever 
 system of practice as a source of phys- 
 ical influence to be appealed to. In this 
 connection I call attention to a recent 
 article on this phase of our subject with 
 which I have been much delighted. It 
 is from Dr. George B. Gorham in The 
 Outlooky and is entitled "The Physio- 
 logical Effect of Faith." In it it is 
 clearly and forcibly set forth that the 
 element of faith as a therapeutic agent 
 should be recognized by physicians, and 
 indeed is so recognized. In this article 
 Dr. Gorham shows that many states of 
 the mind, among the most efficient of 
 which he places faith, affect very power- 
 fully the functional activities of the 
 unconscious processes of the body. The 
 measure of the power of a faith to ac- 
 compUsh these effects is not from its 
 126 
 
^be IRigbt Bppltcatfon of /IBental Mealing 
 
 reasonableness, nor from the power of 
 the object of the faith, but from its own 
 depth. The faith that amounts to what 
 Dr. Gorham calls " a deep, unmistakable 
 expectancy," accomplishes the desired 
 effect. It is here that he who would 
 enjoy health of body from the soul, 
 should begin. He should cultivate this 
 external health-faith, which he can do 
 whatever be his religious convictions, 
 not by seeking new and fantastic meta- 
 physical doctrines, but by simply seek- 
 ing an enlightened application of the 
 doctrines which teach us concerning the 
 power of the mind over the body, an 
 application which will make man's nat- 
 ural life respond freely to the health- 
 giving influxes from the spiritual world. 
 What this means practically is the sub- 
 ject for our first consideration. 
 
 But to descend into details, the mind- 
 cure part of our doctrines may be 
 summed up in this one sentence : All 
 diseases are from the spiritual world 
 under the law of correspondences, and 
 127 
 
if their spiritual causes are removed, 
 the diseases will disappear. This simple 
 but comprehensive formulation of doc- 
 trine is full of practical applications. 
 
 I. Since the causes of diseases are 
 in the spiritual world, and operate under 
 the law of correspondences, and in- 
 deed are evils of that world, the dis- 
 eases are not to be dreaded for what 
 they are in themselves. The actual 
 calamity of illness is in the spiritual 
 evil it externally represents. It is sel- 
 fishness, which is the veritable thing to 
 be dreaded. It is lust, jealousy, unkind 
 thoughts, hatreds, and enmities that are 
 the real ill-health, and to get rid of the 
 uncomfortable representatives of these 
 ills of the spirit (and such representa- 
 tives are all that the sicknesses of the 
 body are), is not in any true way to get 
 rid of the real illness. This should be 
 in our thought if we would, in the line 
 of the New-Church teachings and life, 
 get well. Nor is physical health in itself 
 the end we should seek. It is the spir- 
 
 138 
 
trbe IRlQbt Application of yilbental Mealing 
 
 itual thing represented by health that 
 is to be sought. Health in this respect 
 may be aptly compared with happiness. 
 Pursue happiness directly, and it eludes 
 you. But laying aside your thought of 
 it, devote yourself to a life of useful- 
 ness and truth, and happiness will fol- 
 low you and nestle in your heart. In 
 like manner, health directly pursued, 
 may escape us. But he who conforms 
 to the spiritual principles which pro- 
 duce health, shall have it. For this 
 reason, health should not, as a thing in 
 itself, be placed before any one as the 
 end of life. Aiming at it as an end is 
 forlorn indeed ! He who forgets the 
 question of health and searches for 
 truth and its realization in life, is bound 
 to be well. To express this first prin- 
 ciple of application in other language, 
 I would say : Do not humiliate your 
 spiritual life to the position of means, 
 and exalt your physical health to the 
 position of end in your life's endeavors. 
 Many healers seem to invert the con- 
 129 
 
stituents of life, making the welfare of 
 the body first, and the well-being of the 
 spirit a mere instrument of this. Their 
 religion becomes to them a medicine, 
 or tonic, for the body. They would 
 avoid unkind feelings, or anger, not be- 
 cause they are wrong, but because dis- 
 agreeable physical effects follow ; and 
 would shun uncleanness of thought not 
 because of its uncleanness, but because 
 of its unhealthy physical influence. 
 All this is turning things upside down. 
 Spiritual life should be sought for its 
 own glorious self, while physical health 
 we look for as a matter of necessary 
 sequence. 
 
 2. Much less should we think of dis- 
 eases as divine creations. They are 
 not from the Lord except in the sense 
 that hell and evil, as being permitted 
 by Him, are in that negative way from 
 Him. Disease is no more from the 
 Lord than sin is from the Lord. We 
 must not think of our sickness as angels 
 from the heavenly Father, come to us 
 130 
 
Zbc IRlQbt Bpplfcatlon of Cental Bealina 
 
 in this guise to teach us patience, and 
 to cultivate in us the heavenly virtues. 
 Sickness is, in a nearer or more remote 
 degree, the offspring of sin, the corre- 
 spondent of evil, and is begotten of the 
 devil. Diseases of the body are ma- 
 terial images of selfishness and sin. 
 They are the concrete forms of our 
 lusts. These mental things are their 
 origin and their source of continuance ; 
 and to these spiritual sources of power, 
 we shall learn later on, should we look 
 for their cure. Although we do not 
 pronounce him who is ill a sinner be- 
 cause of his illness, nor judge of him 
 who is well by any similar logic, it is 
 true as a general doctrine that ill-health 
 is from evil and wrong, and must be so 
 thought of. He who inherits a diseased 
 body, while he cannot condemn himself 
 for that which he could not help, still 
 should regard the sickness of his body 
 just as he regards the perversities of 
 his moral disposition inherited from his 
 parents, for which also he would not be 
 131 
 
blamable. That sickness is permitted 
 for a wise purpose we are prepared to 
 admit ; but so, too, are immoralities and 
 all natural evils. We must, therefore, 
 in our thoughts rise above the concep- 
 tion that our diseases are in any way 
 produced by the Lord. They are not 
 His choice. They are not the expres- 
 sions of His divine order. They are 
 not his direct messengers. They arc 
 from wickedness. We should look upon 
 our sicknesses as evidences of the pres- 
 ence of evil spirits ; and we should so 
 think of them and so live in reference 
 to them that those spirits may find noth- 
 ing in us to cling to ; and from our 
 changed spiritual position towards them 
 we may be healed. 
 
 3. Since sickness is not from God it 
 is necessary that we make our faith in 
 that truth practical by renouncing in 
 external word and deed our belief in 
 sickness as a power in itself. This re- 
 nunciation must show itself in the very 
 words of our lips. To begin at the 
 132 
 
^be TRlgbt Application ot Cental Mealfns 
 
 foundation we should remember that 
 making one's ailments prominent in his 
 thoughts and conversation is injurious 
 to the health-giving power of spiritual 
 forces. If in your conversation you 
 treat the sicknesses with which you are 
 afflicted as though they were really 
 enemies of your body, possessing an act- 
 ual self-existent nature, you thereby 
 give them a hold upon you which they 
 would otherwise not possess. To be 
 continually looking into the ill feelings 
 of your body, always examining your 
 pulse, as it were, forever thinking of 
 this ache or that discomfort, analyzing 
 all the strange or peculiar sensations 
 that may come to you, and discussing 
 such matters with others — all such con- 
 duct gives a basis in your mind for 
 the presence of evil spirits who aggra- 
 vate and maintain your ailments. Such 
 methods of thought and conversation 
 are among the things that most do 
 hinder the presence and the efficiency 
 of the health-giving influx of heaven. 
 
 133 
 
Yet it seems as if the dominant 
 habits of polite society made such 
 topics as these the leading subjects of 
 anxious inquiry and discussion. It is 
 the very method which, under the law 
 of spiritual doctrine, would most suc- 
 cessfully fasten disease upon us, and 
 make the spiritual cure of our sicknesses 
 impossible. This may appear like a 
 trifling thing, but it is an important ele- 
 ment in the law of cure by spiritual 
 forces. It is useful to cultivate a habit 
 of healthful thought and conversation. 
 As we avoid the sicknesses of life as 
 our subjects of consideration, we not 
 only thus refuse them a spiritual begin- 
 ning, but we thereby give to the health- 
 producing powers of spiritual life a 
 grasp upon us which will be effective 
 in producing and maintaining good 
 health. 
 
 Another habit of conversation which 
 
 is most closely allied to this naturally 
 
 suggests itself. It is indulging in a 
 
 false sympathy for our friends. We 
 
 134 
 
 I 
 
G;be "Kigbt :appltcatlon of /iBental dealing 
 
 can be sympathetic for a sufferer in a 
 way that will aggravate his malady. 
 We may be sympathetic in a way that 
 will help his recovery. If one were to 
 go to an injured man, tear the bandages 
 from the part that was hurt, start the 
 stanched blood to flowing again, and 
 cause the pain to be renewed, he would 
 be regarded as wickedly cruel. But not 
 less really cruel is that unkind love and 
 sympathy which brings so prominently 
 into thought and conversation the sick- 
 ness of your friends in the expressions 
 of your sympathy for them, that the 
 difficulties are aggravated and the pa- 
 tient made worse. No sympathy for a 
 sick friend is kind that does not help 
 him to be better. And all sympathy 
 that aggravates his ailments, though ex- 
 pressed in the most loving terms and 
 affectionate tones of voice, is surely 
 cruel. Let our association with each 
 other be helpful. All our conversation, 
 the thoughts we cherish, the sphere of 
 our affections, should go forth to help 
 
 U5 
 
all with whom we are associated, to 
 strengthen them against sickness, to 
 weaken the hold of the disease-produ- 
 cing spirits of the other world upon 
 them. Such sympathy, though it may 
 not be replete with sentiment, as is the 
 false sympathy I have referred to, has 
 the divine love within it, and makes the 
 visits of him who can give it like the 
 coming of an angel of heaven. 
 
 There are many other external states 
 to be avoided if we would open our 
 souls in a way to let the divine life flow 
 into our bodies for their healing. We 
 should avoid a struggle in our own self- 
 strength to get well. Healing from 
 spiritual powers is not being made well 
 from the strength of your will-power. 
 In order to demonstrate the power of 
 their minds over their bodies, many, 
 having given to their disease a real 
 character in their recognition of it as a 
 positive power in their lives, arise in 
 their strength of will with the determi- 
 nation to overthrow this power. Thus 
 136 
 
Zbc TRfgbt Application of /Dbental Mealing 
 
 they are really but pitting one part of 
 the mind against another ; they are 
 combating their faith in disease by their 
 faith in their own will. This is like 
 fighting the left hand with the right. 
 The true doctrine is rather that disease 
 in itself has no power, and that the 
 health-giving strength to remove it 
 comes from a life above yourself, which 
 descends into you when you are in the 
 right spiritual state to receive it. It 
 does not involve, then, a struggle, but 
 rather a wise trust. 
 
 4. And especially in this field of the 
 application of mental-healing practice, 
 must we emphasize that familiar doc- 
 trine of the New Church that in spirit- 
 ual, forces is contained all power. All 
 real substance and all real forces are 
 from the spiritual world. Natural forces 
 and natural appearances are but the. 
 shadows of spiritual substance. The 
 sun itself, from which seems to come 
 all the power of the material universe, 
 is only a shadow of the Lord. All its 
 137 
 
powers of heat and light, whose pres- 
 ence brings summer and day and life, 
 and whose absence means winter and 
 darkness and death, are but reflections 
 of the divine love and wisdom, whose 
 presence means spiritual warmth, light, 
 and life, but whose absence is spiritual 
 coldness, darkness, and death. 
 
 And all the myriad exhibitions of life 
 and of the forces of nature are shadows 
 only of the powers of life that come 
 pouring into the world from the realm 
 of spiritual forces. Our souls receive 
 their power directly from the spiritual 
 world. Our bodies receive their power 
 from that world by means of our souls. 
 Our bodies are the shadows of our souls. 
 All their strength, all their character, 
 all their life, not only in general but in 
 particular, come as a constant gift from 
 the presence of the spirit within. Noth- 
 ing can be maintained in the states of 
 the body which has not some hold upon 
 the states of the soul. Apart from the 
 spirit within, man's body is an utterly 
 138 
 
Xlbe IRlgbt Application ot Cental IHealtng 
 
 powerless collection of substances that 
 will quickly be resolved into their origi- 
 nal elements. The body has no power 
 to be anything or to do anything except 
 it be given it of the soul. As the mind 
 of man holds to the doctrine of the 
 power of nature, and of the self-exist- 
 ence of the body, and of the weakness 
 of spiritual things, and of the substan- 
 tial reality of natural things, so have 
 the weaknesses and sicknesses of his 
 flesh a hold upon him. But their hold 
 is in this conception he has of them, 
 and not in any reality they have of 
 themselves. If he repel this concep- 
 tion, he is repelling the power of dis- 
 eased nature. 
 
 He who in the forest at night sees 
 the dim shadows of trees as gloomy 
 monsters surrounding him, is filled with 
 terror ; and these grim fantasies, whose 
 only reality is in the imagination of 
 their beholder, as really control him 
 as though they actually were what he 
 thinks them. In like manner, the ca- 
 139 
 
pacity of the body to become diseased, 
 its ability to control the mind, and to be 
 dominant in this life, has its greatest, 
 if not its only, hold upon existence, in 
 the reality which the mind it rules con- 
 fers upon the body. How transcend- 
 ently important it is, then, if we would 
 be blessed with that healing of the body 
 which the powers of spiritual life can 
 bring us, that we recognize the reality 
 and the power of spiritual things, that 
 we refuse to give material forces con- 
 trol over us by believing in them, that 
 we come under the dominion of the 
 great flowing river of life and strength 
 which comes down through heaven and 
 the spiritual world into our souls from 
 the Lord. The very existence of the 
 material universe is as dependent upon 
 the spiritual universe as a shadow is de- 
 pendent upon the substance that casts 
 it. And yet we turn our backs upon 
 the infinite power and reality within, 
 and resolutely fix our eyes upon the 
 shadow, giving it our allegiance, having 
 140 
 
trbe IRtgbt Application of /IBental Healing 
 
 faith in it, trusting it, and worshiping 
 it — thus by the very action of our 
 thoughts in reference to it, closing our 
 souls to the current of the descending 
 life from above. We must, then, if we 
 would receive the true benefit in the 
 health of our bodies which can come 
 from the spiritual power of heaven, be- 
 lieve in that power. We must accept 
 the doctrine that in spiritual life is all 
 true life, that in spiritual power is the 
 only power, and that in spiritual reality 
 is the only substance. 
 
 But notwithstanding the emphasis I 
 have laid on these applications of the 
 states of the mind to the welfare of 
 the body, it should be understood that 
 they are preliminary only. In doing 
 these things we are bringing the ulti- 
 mates into order. The interior health 
 which flows into the soul from right- 
 eousness may be stopped at this basal 
 point by external misconceptions and 
 by erroneous habits thence. The prin- 
 ciple under which this may take place 
 141 
 
ps^cblasiB 
 
 is pointed out in the " True Christian 
 Religion," in which Swedenborg de- 
 clares that "influx adapts itself to ef- 
 flux," and that "the understanding from 
 above adapts itself to its measure of 
 freedom to speak and publish its 
 thoughts" (814). And in even clearer 
 terms in the " Arcana Coelestia," Swe- 
 denborg says : " It is a universal law 
 that influx accommodates itself to efflux, 
 and that if efl[iux be checked, the influx 
 is checked. Through the internal man 
 there is an influx of good and truth from 
 the Lord, through the external there 
 must be an efflux, namely, into the life. 
 When there is such an efflux, the influx 
 is continual ; but if there be no eflflux, if 
 in the external or natural man there be 
 resistance ... it follows from the uni- 
 versal law just mentioned . . . that the 
 influx of good draws itself back, and so 
 the internal is closed." (5828.) 
 
 It is from the law which is here enun- 
 ciated that it is necessary to assume in 
 the outmost of one's life the right at- 
 142 
 
G:bc 1Rl0bt application of Cental Mealing 
 
 titude toward his maladies, in order that 
 there may be the utmost freedom for the 
 descent of the life of the spiritual man 
 into the very most external states of 
 the body. As one adopts in his outer 
 thought and conversation the four 
 things I have presented, so does he as- 
 sume such an attitude toward his phys- 
 ical self as will give full opportunity 
 for the spiritual states of his soul to 
 descend into his body and dominate it. 
 As one ceases to think of the health of 
 his body as an end of life ; as he ac- 
 knowledges the great truth that sick- 
 ness, like evil, is not from God ; as he 
 renounces a belief in the power of sick- 
 ness in itself, and thence holds to the 
 faith that from the spiritual world comes 
 all power, so is he laying the foundation 
 of what I have called a righteous-living 
 cure. Some go no further, and attain 
 health from these states of mind ; but 
 the New-Church doctrines would lead 
 to a much more interior life and health 
 than is possible from these things alone. 
 
 143 
 
XII. 
 THE SUPREME APPLICATION 
 
 WE now come to the application of 
 the supreme principles for the 
 healing of the body through the soul. 
 All before this have been preliminary 
 and relatively incidental. The healing 
 of the body, which comes from the 
 mental states and habits which I have 
 inculcated so far, is comparatively su- 
 perficial. It consists in the suppression 
 or dissipation of symptoms, and of the 
 dominion of the natural-mind forces in 
 the body. Yet this is the whole field 
 of the operation of the average mental 
 healer, or mind-curist. 
 
 After having recognized, therefore, 
 
 this outer mental practice, and having 
 
 adopted it, we turn to a doctrine within 
 
 this and above it, and, better than this, 
 
 144 
 
Zbc Supreme Application 
 
 a doctrine that is religious ; a doctrine 
 especially high and pure as it is given 
 to us in the New Church. It is the 
 teaching of righteous living, as not only 
 the best spiritual instrumentality for 
 physical health, but as constituting in 
 its own blessedness an end so far above 
 all questions of bodily concern that it 
 should be sought for its own beautiful 
 self ; it is the inculcation of a life which 
 infinitely transcends in importance all 
 questions of our merely physical well- 
 being. 
 
 The sickness of the body, under this 
 conception of the subject, takes its 
 place with the other affairs of the ex- 
 ternal life, as a concern of the material 
 world, and an incidental of life. Like 
 poverty, like bereavements, like all other 
 kinds of the outer misfortunes of life, 
 physical ills become under this applica- 
 tion a matter to turn one's back upon, 
 or to place under the feet. The centre 
 of life, the "pearl of great price," the 
 end that is worthy, that which is an end 
 145 
 
p0SCb!a6f6 
 
 in itself, is spiritual living. As man 
 realizes heavenly truths and heavenly 
 affections in his thoughts and actions, 
 so will his body necessarily become 
 well. Spiritual health is the supreme 
 end, and if that be attained, we may 
 well let the question of physical health 
 take care of itself. The laws of spir- 
 itual living are in the very highest sense 
 the laws of physical health, and while 
 the latter should not be the end of care 
 of our thoughts, it will follow. Shun 
 evils as sins and you will be well. Not 
 for the purpose of being physically well 
 should we shun evils, nor for any other 
 purpose than because they are evil — 
 that is, because they are sins. Bodily 
 sicknesses may be made use of to en- 
 able us to realize what is the nature of 
 sin, but they should not be made the 
 object of our solicitude. It is hatred 
 thaJL is unhealthy, and unkind words 
 should be avoided, as we would avoid 
 hurtful physical habits. Lasciviousness 
 in the mind is an opening toward hell, 
 146 
 
Zbc Supreme application 
 
 through which flows a susceptibility to 
 the diseases which lasciviousness repre- 
 sents. Contempt for others, if enter- 
 tained, is like being inoculated with 
 smallpox ; while every pride of the 
 heart, if cherished, is worse for the 
 body than exposure to a cold-bestowing 
 draft. Righteous living from religious 
 principles purifies the blood in the most 
 effective and interior way. Kindly feel- 
 ings toward the neighbor are more 
 health-giving than the fresh air of 
 spring, bringing vigor and elasticity to 
 the limbs ; and charitable deeds are 
 for the nourishment of man. How sig- 
 nificant in this connection are the Lord's 
 words : *' I have meat to eat that ye 
 know not of," when His " meat " was 
 simply to do the will of His Father ! 
 
 That man should shun his evils as 
 sins is very familiar doctrine, but an 
 added force is given to it by knowing 
 and acknowledging that the evils which 
 we shun are diseases in essence and 
 cause, and that their removal is the re- 
 147 
 
moval of one's liability to the corre- 
 sponding illnesses. That the shunning 
 of evils as sins, which we are taught 
 constitutes the whole of Christian living, 
 is also the supreme instrumentality for 
 realizing the health of the body, is the 
 special teaching which the New Church 
 brings to the subject of the healing of 
 the body through the soul. Righteous 
 living is healthy living in its very es- 
 sence. He who interiorly and truly 
 keeps the commandments is bound to 
 experience the most perfect health ex- 
 teriorly. This is the very inmost of all 
 laws for being well. He who lives in an 
 assured trust in the divine, who shuns all 
 ill-will against the neighbor, who per- 
 forms the duties of his calling faithfully 
 as a service to God, who assumes the 
 attitude toward illness which the New 
 Church teaches him to assume toward 
 poverty and other disorderly external 
 things, is pursuing the course which 
 will most surely bring him in the fullest 
 possible way health of body. 
 
Cbc Supreme Application 
 
 Seeking thus spiritual life as the su- 
 preme end of our being, and making 
 the question of our physical health en- 
 tirely subordinate and secondary, does 
 not mean that we expect poverty, or 
 outer suffering, or sickness. On the 
 contrary, it means that while external 
 prosperity and health, when considered 
 as ends, are secondary, we are assured 
 that the Lord will bestow them. We 
 have need of health and worldly pros- 
 perity, and the Lord knows this and 
 will provide. " Your heavenly Father 
 knoweth that ye have need of these 
 things." They are to be given after we 
 have sought the internal and the real. 
 ** Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and 
 his righteousness, and all these things 
 shall be added unto you." He who 
 would seek the healing of the body 
 through the soul in the highest and 
 truest way, should not seek it by the 
 subordination of the purposes and ef- 
 forts of his soul to physical health, but 
 by seeking " first the kingdom of God, 
 149 
 
f>0SCbia6(5 
 
 and His righteousness," and by know- 
 ing that his physical and temporal well- 
 being shall be " added unto " him. 
 
 This, too, is in line with the words 
 of the New Church, as where we are 
 taught that *<all happiness belongs to 
 those who, from the heart, acknowledge 
 the Lord," and that this happiness " in- 
 volves all things, taken as a whole or 
 individually," including "things celes- 
 tial, spiritual, natural, worldly, and cor- 
 poreal" (Arcana Coelestia, 1422). How 
 comprehensively this promise extends 
 itself to the ultimates of life, and in- 
 cludes man's body and all his earthly 
 interests — "things worldly and corpo- 
 real"! This coincides, too, with the 
 teachings of the "True Christian Re- 
 ligion," where we read that man "be- 
 comes prosperous and happy if he ac- 
 quires for himself wisdom, and keeps 
 his will in obedience thereto ; but he 
 becomes unprosperous and unhappy if 
 he makes his understanding obedient to 
 his will " (588). Note how " prosperity " 
 150 
 
Zhc Supreme Application 
 
 is included among the things which 
 come to man from spiritual life. 
 
 Healing of the body through the soul 
 through righteous living is the divine 
 way of healing. This confers upon 
 man soundness and strength from the 
 centre to the circumference, from firsts 
 to lasts. This healing means God in 
 the soul. It is the incarnation of the 
 Lord in man. 
 
XIII. 
 CONCLUDING WORDS 
 
 IN conclusion, I will, for the sake of 
 a clearer understanding of our sub- 
 ject, dwell upon the two radical distinc- 
 tions which differentiate the doctrines 
 of the New Church from all other teach- 
 ings : — 
 
 First, we have in the New Church 
 the doctrine of discrete degrees, and 
 the accompanying and complemental 
 doctrines of influx and correspondences. 
 These doctrines enable us to keep spir- 
 itual things from natural, and heavenly 
 from earthly. And keeping these dis- 
 tinct is essential to true thinking, and 
 thence to right acting. Classification 
 and distinction — the separation of the 
 good from the bad, and the true from 
 the false — is the very inception of all 
 152 
 
ConcluDing llClor&s 
 
 genuine educational and moral develop- 
 ment. And there can be no correct 
 thought of spiritual things without a 
 knowledge of discrete degrees, and of 
 the principles of spiritual truth associ- 
 ated with that knowledge. 
 
 Among the first and most important 
 of the things which this knowledge ac- 
 complishes for us is salvation from self- 
 deification. It is the most momentous 
 of the benefits that come from the doc- 
 trines of the New Church, that they 
 enable us to believe in God as the one 
 and only source of all things, and yet 
 to be saved from pantheism. No intel- 
 ligent receiver of the doctrines of the 
 New Church can ever imagine himself 
 to be inherently divine. Though ever 
 giving himself to us, the Lord will al- 
 ways be other than we. 
 
 Secondly, in the same line of advan- 
 tage, we have in the New Church a 
 doctrine of the proprium, that is, a 
 doctrine which reveals to us what be- 
 longs to man as his own life, in distinc- 
 153 
 
psiecbiagiB 
 
 tion from what is God's. This life, 
 which is man's very own, and which in- 
 dividualizes him, is the gift of God. In 
 that sense it is from God, and does not 
 have its origin apart from Him. But — 
 and here is the New-Church doctrine — 
 God has so withdrawn the appearance 
 of his authorship of man and of his 
 immanence in man, that man ever ap- 
 pears to live from himself, and in that 
 appearance he is and will forever be 
 other than God. And still further, since 
 our existence as separate personalities 
 is derived from this appearance, our in- 
 dividual immortality is preserved, and 
 its continuance is assured by the opera- 
 tion of this law. 
 
 Since it is an appearance, one nat- 
 urally asks. Is it not a deception, then, 
 and an unreality ? is it not a dream and 
 a fancy ? 
 
 On the contrary, because the divine 
 
 Father has given His life to man, given 
 
 it for the purpose of making it man's, 
 
 and because He has given it actually^ it 
 
 154 
 
Conclu&fng 1KIlor&0 
 
 is practically as really man's as though 
 he held it from self -derivation. This 
 conception of man and of his relation to 
 God, solves the problem of creation, and 
 enables us to think of man as from God, 
 and yet to know that he is not God, 
 and never can be God. Reciprocation 
 is the essential of heavenly love — es- 
 pecially and supremely is it the essen- 
 tial of divine love. For the sake of 
 reciprocation, therefore, man must be 
 always other than God ; and the more 
 interiorly man is united with the Lord, 
 so much the more clearly does he rec- 
 ognize this truth, that he is not God. 
 
 On this subject Swedenborg speaks 
 frequently and forcibly. Here is a pas- 
 sage from the " Divine Providence " : 
 " Love desires to be loved. This is im- 
 planted in it, and so far as it is loved in 
 return, it is in itself and in its own de- 
 light. It is therefore evident that if 
 the Lord loved man only, and were not 
 loved in return by man, the Lord would 
 advance, and man would withdraw. . . . 
 155 
 
P0l5cl)fast6 
 
 The Lord therefore provides for the ex- 
 istence of reciprocality in man. Man's 
 reciprocality is in this, that the good 
 which his will favors and which he does 
 from freedom, and the truth of which 
 he thinks and speaks from volition ac- 
 cording to reason, seem to be from 
 himself ; and that this goodness in his 
 will, and this truth in his understand- 
 ing, seem to be his own ; nay, more, 
 they seem to man to be from himself 
 and his own, precisely as though they 
 were his own. There is no difference 
 whatever^ (92.) 
 
 This doctrine which makes the ap- 
 pearance of self-derivation in man's life, 
 and the maintenance of that appearance, 
 the very divine end in creation, saves us 
 both from the irrational conception of a 
 self-existent force out of God, and also 
 from the monstrous idea that we are 
 God. It is a doctrine that gives us at 
 once a matchless central principle for 
 a true spiritual philosophy, and at the 
 same time it furnishes us a basis for a 
 156 
 
ConcluDing '(KflocOs 
 
 surpassing system of religious thought 
 and life. It saves us both from mate- 
 rialism and pantheism, the Scylla and 
 Charybdis of spiritual and religious 
 thought. 
 
 These New-Church doctrines con- 
 cerning the healing of the body through 
 the soul are the most comprehensive of 
 all teachings. They extend from the 
 surface practices of mental healing to 
 the heights of spiritual purpose and 
 life. They are extremely practical, and 
 apply to every state and condition of ex- 
 perience. They are serviceable to our 
 outmost conditions of mind and body, 
 yet they will always extend above 
 us to lead us on and up to an ever 
 closer conjunction with God, however 
 close may at any time be our walk with 
 Him. They are steps which extend 
 down and out to the humblest followers 
 of divine truth, and up and in far above 
 the heights of man's loftiest attain- 
 ments — to the very Throne. 
 
 And he who keeps them will be sure 
 157 
 
Ip5^cbfa0(5 
 
 of the fruit of his keeping. He will be 
 led ever nearer and more near to the 
 Fountain of Life — to an ever more en- 
 lightened wisdom, an ever more inspir- 
 ing love, and thus to an ever more 
 abundant life. 
 
 THE END. 
 
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