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Thoughts unuttered are not unknown to the
infinite Intelligence comprehending them, to whom a desire is prayer, and no
loss can occur from trusting God with our desires, to mould and make higher
before they are evolved in action. But prayer has its motives, and what are
they? To make him better that prays, or to benefit his hearers, to inform the
Infinite of what he is ignorant, or to be heard of men? First, are we benefited
by praying? Were God a person to be moved by the breath of praise, or less than
Infinite in understanding, or changing in Love and Wisdom, He might do more
good because of our petitions, and grant them on the ground of the petitioner,
in which case lip-service were an advantage not to be overlooked. But God is
Love, and do we ask Him to be more than this to man? God is Intelligence, and
can we inform the infinite Wisdom, or tell of our needs, the infinitesimal part
already comprehended? Do we hope to change perfection in one of its
arrangements, or shall we plead for more of the open fount, pouring in all we
will receive, and more cannot be given? Does prayer bring us nearer the divine
source of all being and blessedness? then it is the prayer of works and not
words; asking to love God never made us love him, but this desire, expressed in
daily watchfulness and assimilation
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to the divine character, moulds and fashions us
to His image.
The danger of audible prayer is, that we fall
into temptation through it, and become an involuntary hypocrite. First, by
uttering what is not a real desire, and secondly, consoling ourself under sin
with the recollection we have prayed over it. Hypocrisy is fatal to
Christianity, and praying publicly, we often go beyond our means, beyond the
honest standpoint of fervent and habitual desire; if we are not yearning in
secret and striving for the accomplishment of all we ask, ours are "vain
repetitions, such as heathen use." If our petition is sincere, we shall labor
for what we pray, and be rewarded by "Him who seeth in secret and rewardeth
openly." No expression of them can make our desires more, or less, nor gain the
ear omnipotent sooner by words than thoughts. If every petition in prayer is
sincere, God knows it before we tell Him, and letting it remain honestly before
Him we incur no risk of overtalking our real state.
Prayer is sometimes employed, like a catholic
confession, to cancel sin, and this impedes Christianity. Sin is not forgiven;
we cannot escape its penalty. Being sorry for its committal is but one step
towards reform, and the very smallest one; the next step that Wisdom requires
is, the test of our sincerity, namely, a reformation. To this end we are placed
under stress of circumstances where the temptation comes to repeat the offence,
and the woe comes for what has been done until we learn there is no discount in
the law of retribution, and we must pay the uttermost farthing. The measure we
have meted will be measured to us again,
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full and running over; Christians and sinners
get their full measurement, but not here; a follower of Christ, for centuries
to come, must drink his cup; ingratitude and persecution will fill it to the
brim, but God pours the riches of joy into the understanding, and gives us
strength as our clay. Sinners flourish as the green bay tree, but looking
farther, David saw their end.
Prayer cannot change the science of being, for
goodness alone reaches the demonstration of Truth. A petition for another to
work for us, never does the work required of us. To address Deity as a person,
perpetrates the belief of God in man, which impedes spiritual progress and
hides Truth. We reach the science of Christianity only through demonstration,
but here, our good will be evil spoken of, and falsehood will war against
advancing Truth. Principle should govern man; person can pardon but not reform
the sinner. God is not a separate Wisdom from the Wisdom we possess, and the
talent He hath given to be used we must improve; therefore, to call on God to
do our work for us, is vainly supposing we have little to do but to ask for
pardon and re-commit the offence. If prayer cherishes the belief sin is
forgiven, and man better because he prays, it is asking amiss; for he is worse
if the punishment sin incurs is kept back, or he thinks himself forgiven when
he is not. Prayer is impressive; it gives momentary solemnity and elevation to
thought, but does a state of ecstacy produce lasting benefit? Looking deeply,
and metaphysically into these things, we find a reaction takes place,
unfavorable to understanding and sober resolve, and the wholesome perception of
God's requirements; also that personal
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sense, and not Soul, produces these moods of
feeling. If spiritual sense guided men at such times, there would grow out of
those ecstatic desires, higher experiences and a better life; self-examination,
and more purity. A self-satisfied ventilation of ecclesiastical fervor never
made a Christian; verbal prayer embraces too much error to forward this great
purpose. First, it supposes God a person influenced by man, making the divine
ear a personal sense instead of the all-hearing and all-knowing Intelligence,
to whom every want of man is understood, and by whom it will be supplied.
Again, what we desire, and ask to be given, is
not always best for us to receive, in which case the infinite understanding
will certainly not grant our request; therefore what avails it with God bow
much a man prays? When we pray aright, we shall "enter into the closet; " in
other words, shut the door of the lips and in the silent sanctuary of earnest
longings, deny sin and sense, and take up the cross, while we go forth with
honest hearts laboring to reach Wisdom, Love, and Truth. This prayer will be
answered, insomuch as we shall put in practice our desires. The Master's
injunction was to pray in secret; to desire to be better, and let our lives
attest the sincerity of that desire. Are we really grateful for the good we
receive? then we shall have more, and never until then, and avail ourselves of
the blessings we have, and this will thank God more than speech. >From the
Intelligence that numbers the very hairs of our heads, we cannot conceal the
ingratitude of barren lives by thanking Omnipotence with our lips, while the
heart is far from Truth. When we vainly imagine gratitude is a mere
expression
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of thanks, we had better examine our hearts and
learn what is there, and this will show us what we are, and is the only honest
expression of ourselves.
How empty are the conceptions of Deity that
admit theoretically, the omnipotence and omnipresence of God, and then would
inform the supreme mind, or plead for pardon that is unmerited, or for
blessings poured out liberally. If we are not grateful for Life, Truth, and
Love, but return thanks to them, we are insincere, and incur the sharp censure
bestowed upon the hypocrite. The only acceptable prayer in this case is to put
our finger to our lips and remember our blessings.
Praying for humility with however much fervency
of expression, is not always to desire it. If we turn away from the poor and
set aside their judgment, we are not fit to receive the reward of that which
blesses the poor. When confessing to a very wicked heart, and asking to have it
laid bare before us, do we not know more of this heart than we are willing our
neighbor should know, and if a friend informs us of a fault, do we listen to
the rebuke patiently and credit what is said, or rather join in thanks that we
are not as other men? It is many years that I have been more grateful for a
merited rebuke than for flattery; the only real sting is the unmerited censure,
the wicked falsehood that does no one any good.
Do we love our neighbor as ourself, or because
we do not, should we pray to be given this love and expect it because of
asking, while we pursue the old selfishness satisfied with having prayed for
something better, without a single evidence of the sincerity of this re-
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quest by living consistent with that prayer. If
selfishness gives place in us to Love, we shall love our neighbor and bless
them that curse us, but can never meet this great demand by asking for it;
there is a cross to be taken up, before the reward is given.
Do we "love the Lord our God with all our heart,
Soul, and strength?" This includes much, even the surrender of all personal
affections and personal worship; it is the ultimate of being, the science of
Life that recognizes only the consciousness, Spirit, wherein Soul is our
Master, and sense without a claim. Are you willing to leave all for Christ,
Truth, and be reckoned with sinners? Have you reached this point? No. Do you
really desire to attain it? No. Then wherefore make long prayers about it, and
ask to become Christ-like, when these are the footsteps of our dear Master; if
unwilling to drink his cup, wherefore pray with the lips to be partakers of it?
The only consistent prayer is, to do right so far as we understand the right,
and to walk in the light so far as we receive it, even though it be with
bleeding footsteps, and let our real desires and works be rewarded by the
Father who, seeth in secret. The whole world will not understand Christianity
for centuries to come. When we are good enough to take His cup of earthly
sorrows, we shall have it, and until we are, and do drink of it, all the vain
repetitions that heathen use can never reach the demonstration that Jesus gave
and instructed his followers to give, as the test of Christianity, saying, "And
these signs shall follow you." We learn in science the necessity for Christians
to suffer in this wicked world of sense, insomuch as they oppose it, and
are
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helping to destroy it, therefore it would
destroy them. Anciently, in Japan, they conveyed a praying-machine through the
streets, stopping at the doors to earn a penny grinding out a prayer. But in
the belief of higher civilization, we pay for prayers in lofty edifices.
Experience teaches that we receive not the good we ask for inaudible prayer.
Petitioning a personal Deity is a misapprehension of the source and means of
all good and blessedness; therefore it cannot be beneficial, and we receive
not, because, as the scripture saith, "We ask amiss, to consume it on our
lusts."
Suffering for sin is all that destroys it; every
supposed pleasure of personal sense, will furnish more than its balance in
pain, until the belief of Life and Intelligence in matter is ultimately
destroyed. We are not rid of mortal experiences, of sin, sickness, or death, at
the change called death; we cannot reach heaven, the harmony of Life, except we
understand the Principle of harmonious being, that alone destroys personal
sense and error. Seeking is not sufficient to destroy error; striving to enter
into the straight and narrow way of science, is all that will enable us to do
it. Spiritual attainments are the preparation for heaven, and that which opens
the door to a higher understanding, even the Life that is God. The petitions to
a personal Deity bring to man only the results of his belief; they cannot
obtain Truth, Life, or Love. We know that a desire for holiness is requisite to
gaining it, but if we really desire this above all else, we shall lay down all
for it; first learn your willingness to do this, and then you may calculate
safely on the only practical way of reaching holiness. Prayer cannot
change the
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unalterable Truth, or give us the understanding
of it; but a desire to know and do the will of God is necessary, and also a
symptom that we are growing wiser; but this desire needs no expression from the
lips; our lives express it.
Asking God to heal the sick has no effect to
gain the ear of Love, beyond its ever-presence. The only beneficial effect it
has, is mind acting on the body through a stronger faith, to heal it; but this
is one belief casting out another; a belief in God casting out a belief of
Sickness, and not the understanding of the Principle that heals being. Jesus
said, a kingdom divided against itself cannot stand; a belief is not the
science of being that heals the sick, and casts out sickness on the ground that
sensation and Intelligence are not in matter; the Truth of being is what
destroys error. Exchanges of the same commodity are the mere merchandise of
mind, and not science. Deity interposes not in behalf of one, and not another,
who adopts the same measures in prayer. If the sick recover on the platform of
prayer, it is the result of individual belief. All may avail themselves of God
in science as a present help in trouble. Love is impartial, and universal in
its adaptation and bestowments; the open fount, that saith, "Ho! every one that
thirsteth, come ye, and drink."
Prayer to a person, affects the sick as a drug
that has no efficacy of its own, but borrows its power from faith and belief in
matter. The drug does nothing in the case, insomuch as it has no Intelligence.
The Principle of man, and not a person, produces all good.
Seeking the Science of Life, and not content
with a
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material sense of things, gives hungerings and
thirstings after righteousness, because it reveals the perfect Principle on
which Life and immortality are Avon. A wordy prayer may afford a sense of quiet
and self-justification, but this makes the sinner a hypocrite. We never despair
of an honest heart, but those spasmodically face to face with their wickedness,
and always seeking to hide it, are the indexes that correspond not with
contents, the counterfeits of true manhood, that hold secret fellowship with
their own sins. Such are spoken of in the scripture as whited sepulchres full
of uncleanness, "making long prayers," etc.
If the author of much apparent fervor and many
prayers is sensual and insincere, what is the mental comment of those
understanding the science of being? That if be had reached the standpoint of
his prayer, this would not be the case. If our silent thoughts support the
conclusion that we feel all the aspiration, humility, gratitude and love they
pour forth, this is enough to know of our Christian estate, and it is greatly
wise not to deceive ourselves or others; nothing is hidden that shall not be
revealed. Professions and prayers, we regret to say, cover a multitude of sins.
Christians rejoice that the secret beauty and bounty of their being, though
hidden from the world, is known to God; self-abnegation, purity and Love, are a
constant prayer. It is the practice and understanding of our God-being, that
gains the ear and right hand of Omnipotence, and calls down blessings infinite.
Trustworthiness is the only foundation of faith; without a fitness for holiness
we shall not receive it, nor yield faithful adherence to it.
"God is Love;" more than this we cannot ask;
higher
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we cannot look; beyond this we may not go. To
regard God a person that forgives or punishes sin, according as His mercy is
sought, or unsought, is to misunderstand Love, and institute prayer as the
safety-valve for wrong-doing. Do we ask Wisdom to be merciful to sin, then "We
ask amiss to consume it on our lusts;" and to forgive sin without punishment,
allows the sin to multiply, and this is neither mercy nor Wisdom. A magistrate
may remit a criminal sentence; but this is no benefit morally to the criminal,
and has only saved him from one form of punishment. The moral law that alone is
capable of justifying or condemning, still demands man to go up higher, or meet
the penalty of a broken law that punishes to compel this progress. Personal
pardon of sin -- and there is none other -- for Principle, never pardons sin,
leaves man free to commit anew the offence; if indeed he has not suffered
sufficiently from sin, to turn from it with loathing. Truth entertains no
pardon for error, but wipes it out in the most effectual manner.
Asking God to pardon sin, is a "vain repetition
such as heathen use." Habitual goodness, is praying without ceasing, in which
motives are made manifest by the blessings we bestow, whether these are, or are
not acknowledged, and attest our worthiness to be made partakers of Love. We
cannot pray aright, and believe that God, who is the same yesterday and
forever, is changeable or influenced in the least by a mortal sense of what man
needs. He who is immutably right, will do right, without being reminded of it;
and the wisdom of man is insufficient to select from God. We would not stand
before a blackboard, and pray the Principle
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of mathematics to work out a problem for man;
nor should we ask the Principle of all good to do a work already clone, and
which we have only to avail ourselves of, that is, to understand, in
order to receive its blessings. The Principle of man must be reflected by man,
else he is not the image and likeness of the patient, tender, and true, yea,
the one altogether lovely; and to go higher than this, and understand
"God is Love," is the work of eternity.
"When thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and
when thou hast shut the door pray to the father which is in secret, and thy
father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly."
The closet signifies the sanctuary of Spirit,
its door opening on Soul, and not sense, opening to Truth, God, and closing on
error. The father in secret is the Principle of man, unseen to personal sense,
the infinite Intelligence that knows all things, and rewards according to
motives, regarding mind only and not speech. The "prayer of the righteous" that
"heals the sick," is after the manner our Master taught, when he bade his
students enter into the Spirit of prayer, the door of personal sense closed,
lips mute, and man in audience with his Maker, where, Spirit instead of matter,
and Soul instead of sense are understood the standpoint of being, even the
Principle thereof, that destroys sickness, sin, and death. Thus the power of
Life, Love and Truth, will destroy sin, sickness, and death, and enlarge the
capacities of man, revealing his God-given dominion over earth; but remember,
also, that "none but the pure in heart shall see God"; shall be
able to take this scientific position of prayer, in which personal
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sense is silenced, and Spirit the master of man.
After a momentary cessation in the belief and dream of Life in matter, whereby
Life, that is God, unfolds itself, comes the understanding and consciousness of
dominion over the body that casts out error and heals the sick, and you speak
as one having authority. We have taught our students the footsteps to this
prayer; let them answer to-day, have they followed them. A great relinquishment
of material things must precede this advanced spiritual understanding; 'isms
but retard it, and mediumship more than most things. This prayer is not faith;
it is demonstration; it heals the sick and advances man in the scale of being;
it recognizes the falsity of personal sense and the Life that is Soul.
Only as we rise above sensuality and sin, can we
reach its standpoint. Prayer addressed to a person, prevents our letting go of
personality for the impersonal Spirit to whom all things are possible. We
cannot serve two masters, if we are sensibly with our body and consequently our
words, and regarding Omnipotence a person, whose ear we would gain, we are not
Soul, Life, Love and Truth, and therefore not in the harmony of being and
oneness with the Father, "In demonstration of the Spirit and power." Make it a
conscious reality for a single moment, that Life and Intelligence are not in
the body, and you are without sensation in the body, and if sick, will find
yourself well; sorrow is turned into joy, when we become conscious Soul, able
to govern the body with Life, Truth, and Love; hence those words of our Master,
"I and the Father are one," that wrought such blessed works, and "greater works
than I," (in the flesh) "ye can do, be-
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cause I go to the Father." The scientific
position of Intelligence is Soul triumphing over sense.
Absent from the body and present with the Lord
is not ecstacy or trance, but a realization of the science of Life, as laid
down in this volume; it is obedience to the law of God, governing the body by
Spirit instead of matter; therefore our Master said: "After this manner pray
ye"
Our Father, which art in heaven,
Hallowed be thy name;
Thy kingdom come,
Thy will be done on earth as it is done in
heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread,
And forgive us our debts as we forgive our
debtors, And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil,
For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and
the glory forever."
The following is the spiritual signification of
the Lord's Prayer:
Harmonious and eternal Principle of man,
Nameless and adorable Intelligence,
Spiritualize man;
Control the discords of matter with the
harmony of Spirit.
Give us the understanding of God,
And Truth will destroy sickness, sin, and
death, as it destroys the belief of intelligent matter,
And lead man into Soul, and deliver him from
personal sense,
For God is Truth, Life, and Love
forever.
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Atonement is oneness with God; it is Life,
Truth, and Love fulfilled, whereby sickness, sin, and death, are destroyed.
Jesus of Nazareth explained and demonstrated his oneness with the Father, for
which we owe him endless love and homage, although at the time of his labors he
received less gratitude and honor than other men. His mission was both
individual and collective; he did Life's work right in justice to himself, and
to show us how to do ours, but not to do it for us, or to relieve us of a
single responsibility in the case. He taught us the way of Life, its Principle
and proof, demonstrating what He taught, that we might understand its
Principle; how it healed the sick, cast out error, and triumphed over death.
Jesus was more the idea of God than a man can be whose origin is less spiritual
than his, therefore he demonstrated higher than others the Principle of being,
even his oneness with God. He understood the science of those sayings of his,
"I am the Truth and Life," "I and the Father are one." Any reference to himself
was made to Christ, the Principle of the man Jesus, for he called not
Intelligence man, but God. It was not to a person, but to Truth, Life, and
Love, he looked to destroy sickness, sin, and death. The mission of Jesus was
to demonstrate the science of Life, he was its idea, even the chosen of
Principle to prove God, and what God does for man.
Belief had established the false conclusion that
God was in matter; that Truth and Life were in man, and man was mortal,
sinning, sick, and dying. He wished to show, this belief was the very opposite
of Truth, and that Spirit was not in matter, hence the death of the cross and
the re-appearance of Jesus according to
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his scientific statement of Life, namely,
"Though you destroy this temple (body) yet will I (Spirit) build it again."
"I," the Life, Substance, and Intelligence of the universe, and man, am not in
matter that you can destroy. His beautiful metaphors and parables of the tree
and its fruit; the fount and stream; the tares and wheat; the sower and
husbandman, etc., explained Intelligence and Life not mingled with sin and
death. He laid the axe of science at the root of the "tree of knowledge " to
cut down all that embraced opposite doctrines; hence error's hatred of him, and
Truth's approval. This more pure, and spiritual idea, named Jesus, destroyed
the beliefs of Life in matter, and gave to man the understanding of the
Principle of being. Those students who followed his instructions and example,
loved and honored him, and those who did not, hated and dishonored him. The
former cast out error, and healed the sick with Christ, Truth; the latter, only
in the name of Truth. Of the seventy he taught, but eleven remained faithful,
showing how far the science he taught and demonstrated, was apart from the
acceptance of the world of sense. And when Christ, Truth, cometh again, will he
find faith on earth? Over eighteen centuries ago, "He came to his own and his
own received him not." Those professing Christ are sometimes the first to
reject Truth, if it collides with their beliefs; even its severest persecutors
have been of this class. The honest fishermen who bad little to leave, were
those who left all for Christ, Truth, until progress compelled the change, and
the learned Paul stepped forth for Truth.
When a teacher of music demonstrates by some
masterly performance, the harmony of music, he gives
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the proof of a Principle that the learner must
understand; but if this demonstration included also a nameless sacrifice, we
should admit, the Principle of it was not only harmony, but Love. This was the
precious import of our Master's teachings and demonstration; he proved the
science of being not only by destroying sickness, sin, and death, but the
significance of Life without death, and in this proof was embraced big Love.
Error had hoped to destroy Truth, and kill Jesus. Those for whom he laid down
all worldly honors, and bore their infirmities that through his stripes they
might be healed, were his accusers. So will it be to-day, Christian martyr; he
who best understands the Truth of being, will be most falsified, pursued, and
condemned.
The teacher of music who demonstrates for the
benefit of others, has by no means relieved them from giving the proof
requisite to show where they stand in science; he rather does this, for their
example that they may understand that which they should demonstrate. Implicit
faith in the teacher, whose self-abnegation and toil have bestowed blessings on
man, will never make Musicians of the learners; they must go and do likewise,
or they are not improving their talents, which, unimproved, condemned them. We
must understand the Principle Jesus taught, at whatever expense, and practice
it, or we are not Christians.
The science of Life that our Master
demonstrated, was not a theory, doctrine, or belief; it revealed a Principle
that brought its proof with it; and this proof was not forms, or systems of
religion, but the science of being, that brought out all the sweet harmonies of
Life. Jesus informed John what the proof of Christ's coming
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was, saying, "Go and tell him the things
ye see and hear; how the sick are healed, the lame walk, the deaf hear, the
blind see, and to the poor the gospel is preached." Tell him what its
demonstration is; and the spiritual John will at once perceive God is its
Principle. Materia medica professed the ability to heal, also, and the
Pharisees to teach Christ, Truth, but they only hindered the success of Jesus'
mission; many of the seventy he had taught, stood in his way also, together
with one who boldly betrayed him into the hands of his enemies. If our Master
had never had a student, he would not have come to the death on the cross; but
his mission would have been unfulfilled, and his history lacked its sweetest
pathos. Through his unmerited persecutions we see the fate of science in a
world of error, and the reception a sensuous world gives the Principle that
contradicts personal sense with Soul.
At the same time that I love Jesus more than all
men of the past or present ages, treading alone a path of thorns, up to the
throne of Wisdom, in speechless agony exploring the way for others, yet I
cannot see that he has spared us one individual experience, or that we have not
the "cup" to drink in proportion to our fitness to drink it and demonstrate
God, above others. To keep the commandments of our Master and follow his
example, is our proper return, and only evidence of gratitude for all he has
done for us; but this is not a personal worship, nor reward to a person; it is
to understand the Principle Jesus taught and proved, and follow, as much as in
us lies, his example; to separate ourselves from the world of error and press
forward to the Life that is Truth and Love. The
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pleasures, frowns, or flatteries of earth, are
but ghosts of nothingness, compared to the prize set before us, "And laying
aside every weight and sin that so easily beset us, let us press forward to the
high calling of God in Christ," putting aside personal self and sense, for
Soul, the Principle of being.
Every pang of repentance, every suffering for
sin, (accompanied with reformatory efforts) and every good deed, stones for
sin. But if the sinner is sorry, and continues to pray, and to sin and be
sorry, he hath no part in the at-one-ment. TO understand God, "Whom to know
aright is Life eternal," is to do the will of Wisdom; and none hath part in
Him, who demonstrates not, in part, the Principle embraced in the teachings and
practice of our Master. If not obeying the science of being according to its
Principle, God, we should have no confidence in man's safety, because God is
good, and man repents. But if we are growing spiritual, and error is yielding
to Truth in our demonstrations of being, and our daily walk and conversation,
we shall say at length, "I have fought the good fight and kept the faith;" for
I am a better man. This is having part in the at-one-ment. If a man stands
still, praying, and expecting because of another man's goodness, sufferings and
triumphs, he will reach his harmony and reward; that man will vibrate, a
pendulum, between sin and the hope of forgiveness; selfishness and sensuality
winding him up to this action, and his growth will be slow. An at-one-ment with
Love and Truth, is to apply the meaning of the Life, and not death of Jesus, to
deeds and a Christian character, and not to cover, or forgive sin, but to
destroy it in the most
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effectual manner. When Truth lays the axe at the
root of error, saying, cut it down, then comes the experiences and sufferings
that cause one, even as a drowning man, to make vigorous efforts to save
himself, and these efforts are what save him.
"Work out your own salvation," is the demand of
Life and Love; and to this end God worketh with you. "Occupy until I come," i.
e., wait for thy reward and grow not weary in well doing. Although your
endeavors are against fearful odds, receiving no present reward, go not back to
error, nor become a sluggard in the contest, and you will find your reward when
the smoke of battle clears away, so that you discern the good you have done,
and your gain from experience. Love often delays to deliver from temptation,
that it may try, and prove you as by fire. If you understand the science of
being sufficiently to have faith in the right, and no faith in wrong, you will
work more earnestly, though more silently, perhaps, in persecution than amid
applause, for your labor is more needed; and the reward of your self-sacrifice
is great, though it be never here. Final deliverance from error, whereby we
rejoice in immortality, boundless freedom, and sinless sense, is not won
through smooth footsteps, nor through doctrines, or pinning one's faith to
personality. Whoso believeth wrath is righteous or appeased by the unmerited
death of a good man, cannot understand God. Justice requires no propitiation
but from the sinner; mercy cancels without pay or sacrifice, and revenge is
inadmissible in Love. The wrath that is appeased is not destroyed, but
indulged, and may require another sacrifice, one being found insufficient;
but these are
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the traits of heathen Deities, and not of our
God, the Principle that is Love.
God's wrath vented on his only son, is without
logic or humanity, and but a man-made belief. The beautiful import of this hard
place in theology is, that suffering is an error of personal sense that Truth
destroys, and sin falls, a broken reed, at the feet of Love. The Rabbinical
teachings said, "He that taketh one doctrine firm in faith, has the holy ghost
dwelling in him." But this receives a strong rebuke from our Master, who said,
"Faith without works is dead." Faith, as a belief, is but a pendulum between
nothing and something, holding on to no foundations; but the advanced
understanding that is sometimes misnamed faith, is the evidence gained from
spiritual sense that rebukes the belief of personal sense, and brings out of
experience the Life that is God. In Hebrew, Greek, Latin, and English, the word
"faith" embraces two meanings, viz., "trustfulness" and "trustworthiness." The
first trusts all to another, and the second understands and relies on one's
self. "Lord, I believe, help thou mine unbelief," expresses the helplessness of
a blind faith, whereas "Believe, and you shall be saved," is self-reliant,
trustworthy faith that implies the understanding that brings its own reward.
The Hebrew gives the following signification of the verb, "to believe:" "To be
firm, lasting, constant," and this certainly applies to Truth understood; for
firmness in error will never save man from sickness, sin, or death. An
acquaintance with the original texts, together with a willingness to give up
beliefs founded on dynasties and the wont passions of men, for the advanced
views of
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civilization and the spiritual sense of Truth,
makes the scriptures a chart of Life to man.
Christ and God are words synonymous. Christ
signifies the Soul and Principle of the man, Jesus. The manner of expressing
him in Scripture gives the meaning of this relationship, viz., Jesus, the son
of God, i. e., the idea of Principle, and the offspring of Soul, and not
sense.
Publius Lentulus wrote to the conscript fathers
at Rome, -- "The disciples of Jesus believe him the son of God." Those who were
taught by him the science of being, reached the glorious perception that God is
the only author of man. The virgin mother first conceived this idea of God, and
named it Jesus; the illumination of spiritual sense had put to silence personal
sense with Mary, thus mastering material law and establishing through
demonstration that God is the father of man. The science of being overshadowed
the pure sense of the virgin mother with a full recognition that Spirit is the
basis of being. The idea we call Substance, and Mary named Jesus, dwelt forever
in the bosom of the Father, in the Principle of man, and woman perceived
it because of her more spiritual nature. The belief that Life originates with
the sexes, is strongest in the most material natures; whereas the understanding
of the spiritual origin of man cometh only to the pure in heart. Man and woman,
as ideas of God, i. e., Spirit, meet Soul's expectancy, and are immortal
evidences that Spirit is harmonious, and man eternal. Jesus was the offspring
of Mary's self-conscious God-being in creative Wisdom; hence he was more
spiritual, more the idea of God, and demonstrated
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the science of Life, as others cannot, whose
origin is material. This idea of Truth came to rebuke Rabbinical error; to
point out the way of Truth and Life, and to demonstrate, as it did, throughout
the whole earthly career of Jesus, the difference between the offspring of
Soul, and of sense; of Truth, and error; Christ was God; therefore the
Principle of the man, Jesus, otherwise his Father; Jesus acknowledged no ties
of flesh, saying, "Call no man your Father upon the earth, for one is your
Father which is in heaven." Again, "Who is my mother, and who are my brethren,
but they that do the win of my Father." We have no record of his ever calling a
man father. He recognized God the only Principle of being, therefore, the
Father of all.
Referring to the materiality of the age, he
said,
The time cometh and now is that they who worship
the Father shall worship Him in Spirit and in Truth." Again, foreseeing the
persecution that must attend the introduction of this science, he said, -- "The
time cometh that whosoever killeth you will think he doeth God service." "And
these things will they do unto you because they have not known the Father or
me." In other words, are ignorant of the Principle of being; their father, on
earth and in heaven, being personality instead of Principle; ignorant, also, of
the origin of man, his nature and true existence. The world of error is blind
to the Truth of man, and the world of sense, to Life that is Soul. Jesus was
neither understood in his origin, his nature, or works; not one component part
of his being did the world of sense get right. Even his righteousness and
purity hindered not
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the accusation, he is Beelzebub, the chief of
sinners, a glutton, and the friend of the impure. Christian martyr of the
nineteenth century, does it wrong thee one half as much? then remember, it is
enough for thee "that the servant should be as his Lord," and that you be found
worthy to unloose the sandals of thy Master's faith. To conclude persecution
for righteousness' sake belongs to the past, and that Christianity to-day is at
peace with the world, honored by sects and societies, is to mistake its Very
nature. History will repeat itself; the trials of prophet, disciple, and
apostle, those of whom "the earth was not worthy," await, in some form, the
pioneers of Truth.
Scripture informs us, Jesus read the thoughts of
man, discovering the hidden springs of action, and construing them according to
motive. Perceiving their thoughts, as he walked with his students, he answered,
unasked, questions that needed explanation. This mind-reading was not
clairvoyance, it was absence from the body, a spiritual insight wherewith he
shew the woman of Samaria her error, and convinced her of his superiority over
man, and she went away, saying, "Is not this the Christ," the Truth of man that
discerns the error? His marvellous works are readily accounted for when we
remember, Christ is God, and that Jesus held all that he was, God, and wrought
from the standpoint of his God-being, and this was the science of being.
A magistrate who lived at the time of Jesus,
wrote,
His rebuke is fearful," and his strong language
in scripture regarding hypocrisy, confirms this saying, but the stronger
evidence that his reproof was pointed and pungent, is the necessity there was
for it when he
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cast out devils and healed the sick. The only
civility Truth exchanges with error is "Get behind me, satan." There is too
much animal courage, and not sufficient moral courage in Society. Christians
take up arms against error at home and abroad, grapple with sin in themselves
and others, and continue this warfare until they have finished their course,
and thenceforth receive its reward.
If you have triumphed sufficiently over the
errors of personal sense for Soul to hold the balance of power in your being,
you will loathe sin and rebuke it, under whatever mask it appears; and you can
bless your enemies only in this way, but they may not so construe it. We cannot
choose but work out our own salvation on the Principle Jesus taught and
demonstrated, viz., casting out devils, healing the sick, and preaching the
gospel to the poor. A moral coward is unfit to bear the standard of Truth, and
God will never place it in his hands.
A member of the Methodist Church once said to
us, 61 1 hope, when you write your work on science, you will dwell much on the
atonement." After reading these pages, if the "arm of the Lord is revealed " to
that mind, anew she will commence her own work, and with the unction of
primitive Christianity, heal herself and others, and thus gain the liberty of
the sons of God. This is regeneration, and to have part in the atonement, and
to understand wherefore Jesus suffered and triumphed. But Truth, lifting its
voice above 'ology and 'ism, and requiring a reconstruction of man, must be
persecuted, and those not having touched its garments and felt in their body it
has healed them, will persecute it.
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If all those partaking of the sacrament intended
to commemorate the sufferings of Jesus, had drank "his cup," they would have
revolutionized the world; or if all who partake of these symbols to-day, were
Christians, taking up their cross, healing the sick, casting out error and
preaching Christ, Truth, to the poor, it would establish the millennium.
But all who eat bread and drink wine in memory
of Christ, are not ready or willing to drink his cup, and to leave all for
Christ, the Truth and Life, that is God. Then wherefore ascribe to this
willingness with a dead rite, before showing forth in your body, that the Truth
has come to your understanding, that heals the sick, and makes the body holy
and acceptable, that Paul said, was "our only reasonable service." And if
Christ, Truth, has come to us in demonstration, no commemoration is requisite,
for it is "God with us."
"And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and
blessed it, and brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, 'Take eat,
this is my body.' And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them,
saying, 'Drink ye all of it.'"
The glorious sense or proof of that hour is lost
spiritually, when confined to a literal sense, or the use of bread and wine.
The disciples were eating when he prayed and gave them bread. Now this would
have been improper in a literal sense; but in its spiritual, it was natural and
beautiful. Jesus prayed; was "absent from the body and present with the Lord."
His followers silent, humble, patient, self-sacrificing, and strong,
anticipating the approaching hour of their Mas-
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ter's betrayal, sat eating the manna, that
before had fed the persecuted followers of Truth in the wilderness. Their bread
came down from heaven; it was the great Truth of spiritualized being, that
often had healed the sick, and cast out error; their Master had broken,
explained it to them before, and now it was feeding, sustaining them; they also
had borne it from house to house, "breaking," explaining it to others; and now
it comforted them. For this Truth their Master was about to suffer violence,
and his cup of sorrow he must leave to them; he had drank it even with thanks,
after a momentary weakness that said, "Let this cup pass from me," and now
remembering also the cross and crown it bore, he said to his followers, "Drink
ye all of it." Professors of Christ, are you drinking this cup? has the blood
of the New Testament, the sufferings and persecutions that attend a new
understanding of God, been shared by you? have you drank this cup? if not, have
you commemorated Jesus in his "cup?" When the human struggled with the divine,
our great exemplar said, "Not my will but thine be done"; not personal sense,
but Soul be represented by me. This new understanding of the Love that is
impersonal, gives up all for Christ, Truth, blesses them that curse it, heals
the sick, casts out error, raises those dead in belief, and preaches to the
poor.
The rabbi and priest taught a material law, and
it was "An eye for an eye," and "whose sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his
blood be shed "; not so did Jesus, the new testator of God, copy his will; his
law was Love, and "Greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his
life for a friend," but he did this for his
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enemies, showing the Love, the Life and
Truth, that is the at-one-ment with God.
First on the list of Christian duties, he taught
his followers to heal the sick; he attached no importance to dead ceremonies;
it was the living Christ, the Truth, that is Life, that made him the
resurrection and Life to all who follow him. Thus keeping his precious precepts
and following his demonstration in its understanding, we shall indeed drink his
cup and be baptized with his purity, until we sit down with him anew in a
fuller understanding of the Principle of that man, Jesus. "For as often as ye
eat his bread and drink his cup, ye do show forth the Lord's death till he
come."
A belief can never show forth the works of
understanding, and has never yet followed Jesus in his demonstration; to do
this we must consecrate our lives to the Principle for which be was crucified,
and be willing to drink of the cup it brings. "But for this cause many are weak
and sickly among you, and many sleep."
Rites fetter the pinions of Soul, they
materialize, and prevent the Spirit, by holding us to the body; for matter
separates from Spirit. We speak of the atonement of Christ reconciling God to
man; but Christ is God, and God propitiates not Himself, and there is nothing
higher to conciliate. Again, Love and Truth are not irreconciled to the idea of
God, and man is this idea. But man being the shadow of Almighty, cannot exceed
Him in Love; or reconcile Truth to error. His students understood the
sufferings, teachings, and demonstration of their glorious Master better than
all this. When Jesus gave up the body material to
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be slain, and afterwards presented it to his
students unchanged, he had proved what he had taught, showing them he was act
dead, and they knew it was proof of the Principle he had before taught, and
disproved our opinions of a future resurrection, or a spiritual body at the
change, called death; his body was a belief of matter, as before, until he rose
to Spirit above the reach of personal sense, and triumphed over the last enemy,
death, as before he had conquered sickness and sin, and this was what his
followers were to commemorate in their lives, so far as they understood his
teachings and demonstration; hence the saying, "The works that I do ye shall
do, and greater."
Theology explains the crucifixion of Jesus, a
pardon ready for all sinners; Spiritualism finds his death necessary only for
the presentation, after death, of the personal Jesus; calling this "a spirit's
return." We differ from both, and while we respect all that is good in the
church, and outside of it, our later consecration to Christ has been on the
ground of demonstration, and not profession, yea, to follow the commands he
gave to those he sent forth. For conscience's sake we dare not cling to the old
belief, insomuch as understanding somewhat the Principle of his proof, the
Life, and not death, that Jesus showed forth, raised us from hopeless disease,
and gave us a triumph over sickness and sin, we never had gained from our
former beliefs and profession of religion.
The efficacy of the crucifixion of Jesus is the
practical Truth it demonstrated for our understanding, and that ultimately will
deliver mankind from sickness, sin and death. This Truth he had before spoken
in their
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midst; but until they saw it triumph over
the grave the disciples were not able to admit and demonstrate so fully its
Principle. Thomas, beholding the idea of it in Jesus, (after his supposed
death) was forced to acknowledge how entire was the proof. From all the
disciples had seen and suffered, they became more spiritual, therefore could
better understand what the Master had taught them. This, therefore, was the
resurrection, for it raised them from the blindness of a belief in God to the
understanding of Him, "Whom to know aright was Life." They needed this, for
soon their dear Master that had just risen to their comprehension would rise
again, higher in the spiritual scale of being, and so much beyond them in
reward for all his faithfulness, he would disappear to their more material
thoughts, and Biblical history would name it the ascension. Ancient prophets
who wrought before Jesus, foretold his coming, and the reception the world of
sense would give Truth; also there is a connection inseparable between their
experiences, and those of every Christian who perceives the idea and accepts
the understanding of God. Jesus, born of a virgin mother, was more of a miracle
to that age, than to this; for even the naturalist is now furnishing reports of
embryology in some species wholly without the male element. The Bethlehem babe
was the nearest approximation since the record in Genesis to the science of
being, in which Spirit makes man; for man born of woman, was the usual advent
of mortal man, and this material belief was what entered Mary's spiritual
conception of Jesus, which accounts for the struggles of Gethsemane, but it
made him the mediator between God and mortal man;
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this lack of entire science in the advent of
Jesus, produced its discord, and met its fate in death. Had his origin and
birth, however, been wholly apart from mortal belief, Jesus would not have been
recognized by mortal man; and "he was the light that was to lighten every man
that cometh into the world;" therefore he must be the mediator, or interpreter
of Truth to error that destroyed error and rebuked personal sense with the
Principle of being.
Jesus never ransomed man, by paying the debt sin
incurs; whosoever sins must suffer. This Christian martyr suffered for the
Truth, that destroyed error, and while it blessed the whole world, was that for
which it hated him; even the sinner must learn Truth, by the things he suffers.
Love is no compromise with sin, and pays no debt of its contracting; but it can
and does point out the way to escape from it and reach the harmony and science
of being. The blood of that righteous man shed by sinners, was a crime that
affords no ground for further sin or a belief of its pardon, it was an
injustice to humanity that the beat man should be sacrificed by the worst men.
Jesus taught the way of escape from sin, but that all that sinneth shall die,
in other words, that sin must be destroyed. Wisdom punishes, instead of
pardons, sin. The terrible effect of our false views regarding the atonement,
is to make a sinner less fearful to sin, believing a tear or a prayer will
secure its pardon; this heightens hypocrisy and suffocates conscience. The time
is not far distant when our theological views of atonement will undergo as
radical a change as those have already done regarding a bottomless pit, burning
with fire and brimstone, and the
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election and fore-ordination of a portion to be
saved or be lost. But for these false views regarding the forgiveness of sin,
ministers and laymen would never break the commandment, "Thou shalt not commit
adultery," and then talk of their love for God, and Christian experience.
The sweet and spiritual significance of the
death on the cross, is Love laying down all of earth to instruct its enemies
the way to heaven, proving what heaven is, and how obtained. We speak of the
blood of Jesus as efficacious to save sinners; it is the efficacy of the Truth
and Love that Jesus taught and demonstrated, which alone can destroy sin; and
sinners are never saved. The blood of Christ was an offering of Spirit and not
matter, a pledge of undying Love. O! highest conceptions of spiritual sense
tell us, what is Love.
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