III

The Meaning of Reincarnation

(1954)

This is one of Murphy’s most original and little-known books. I think it possesses peaks and valleys in terms of insight. But it is worth reading to experience the best of his arguments and to question the lesser. Let me state up front that I do not agree with, nor am I sure a more seasoned Murphy would agree with, his conclusions here about the thought patterns of parents resulting in illness or disability of a child. Murphy himself later moved away from that perspective to suggest that the pool of thoughts of all humanity, extending to antiquity, could be the responsible factor. I do not share that view either, since it borders on randomness which con flicts with the rest of his philosophy. Rather, I think that in this sphere we experience many laws and forces; the law of mind is ever operative but it is impacted by other experiences in our physical framework, just as gravity is impacted by mass. I explore this in greater detail in One Simple Idea and The Miracle Club. To Murphy’s credit, I believe that certain of his insights coalesce with primeval Vedic ideas about reincarnation, especially when he writes about all of humanity emerging from and returning to original thought substance. In this regard, Murphy’s ideas about reincarnation run closely to the outlook of Madame H.P. Blavatsky. I include this rare book not to instill belief but to provoke question and search.

—MH

1

The Meaning of Reincarnation

The time has come in the field of New Thought thinking, living, and practice to make a clear-cut decision as to what to do with the mill-stone labelled, “Reincarnation,” which is discovered hanging from both oriental and occidental necks.

The highest light in the theory of reincarnation is melioristic; that is, man is becoming better by the slow, exoteric process of putting on and off different habiliments of flesh and emotions. Nothing is done in this unconscious process, rooted in mere habit transmission about the ringing challenge: “Be ye perfect even as your Father in Heaven is perfect.”

New Thought Philosophy and application must not capitulate to a racial error perpetuated by the pronouncements of unillumined men. We should get started in the “business” about which Jesus so earnestly labored. Let us begin the program with tenacity of purpose and perseverance by putting on the Garment of Christ which is Wisdom, Truth, and Beauty instead of the garment of “poor man, rich man, beggar man, and thief,” through the weary cycles of time-spaceframes of reference.

Einstein has with great labor brought us to the gate of the Temple Beautiful. The false Gods of time and space have been toppled over, and become mere relativities before that “Which is, and Which was, and Which is to come, the Almighty.”

We now stand naked before the gates stripped of all disguises and “but little lower than the angels,” ready to take our just place at the right hand of Cause—The Father. This means essentially the willful cessation of the automatic, weary round of rebirths, refleshing ourselves in the menial garments of the slave to carnal, materialistic thinking and living.

The scientific, mental thinker looks at the theory of reincarnation from a new standpoint altogether. The scientific thinker starts with, “the pattern on the Mount,” wherein man is one with God, and starts from there.

We must cease building an edifice based on a slow-paced dream wherein millions of human beings—east and west—have been laid in the Procrustean bed of karma and reincarnation to arise retailored in garments ill befitting an invited guest to God’s Wedding Feast. If you do not wear the proper garment which is the royal, seamless robe, you will be cast out again into the outer darkness of spiritual ignorance.

By believing in the theory of reincarnation, or countless cycles of carnal rebirths, I believe you drift from safe mooring, and fall from spiritual grace.

What is your concept of God? The Bible gives you the answer: “The high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy.”

Atomic, H-bombs, and other thermo-nuclear weapons are knocking at your doors calling upon you for a new Declaration of Emancipation from all traditions and false beliefs of man—no matter how time-honored on oriental altars. Let us begin to put out all karmic, purgatorial fires by true faith and conviction in God’s Love and Beauty here and now, and press on to the virgin fields of consciousness. You must not be deterred by a mirage of mere meliorism. Refuse to be satisfied by anything but the promised land of Spiritual Reality.

In materia-medica circles it is customary to discard the textbooks of yesterday’s pathologies and nostrums. Likewise, you must discard the old garment of “sick man, poor man,” and arrive at the hour of decision in your own mind where “none but the best wine” of spiritual wisdom shall be put forth for the guests who hunger for a more wholesome fare.

The new, nuclear physics with great courage and faith has also without hesitation discarded the gross atomistic concepts of yesterday. Their courage and faith have demonstrated their own miracles, such as nuclear transubstantiation, time-space fusion, television, radio, inter-atomic energy, etc. Science is also beginning to kneel and pray before the Altar of Being.

By laboring in the vineyard of your own mind, you, too, can bring forth better fruit. The Bible explains the course of action which the student of truth must take in these times when the Holy Spirit is being “poured upon all flesh.” All unworthy concepts must go into the limbo of spiritual ignorance; foremost among these stands this well-regarded theory of reincarnation, whereby mole-like progress is decreed by age-old, earth-bound thinking.

When Jesus said, “My kingdom cometh not with observation of, lo here! lo there!” was he not anticipating the relativity of time-space concepts? When he declared: “Behold now is the accepted time!” “Believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them!” “Before Abraham was, I am!” was he not collapsing time and space in this “business” of soul-saving and man redeeming from the thraldom of erroneous oriental and occidental beliefs?

Jesus demonstrated instant resurrection, thereby short circuiting all reincarnation lagging on the way to the promised land of spiritual realization.

Become now a true, mental scientist, and agree with the bold declaration: “Behold, I make all things new.” “I have overcome the world.” “Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me.” The me means the conscious, inner realization of God’s Presence in you and in all men.

Free yourself mentally from the belief in self-imposed fleshy, psychologically imprisoning embodiments. The “sons of God” must “leap for joy” beneath “the morning stars” of Light, Love, and Truth which light up the heavens of your own mind.

Once I prayed for a friend who believed he was the victim of karma, that he had to suffer, and that God was punishing him. A healing of his mind and body followed; this was God reincarnated or made manifest in a body ill at ease or in disease. The malignant growth was stopped, and the glory of God was made manifest. This glory waits “neither for time nor tide,” but is instant with the One Presence which always comes with healing on Its wings.

Leave all lesser altars and idols, and come before God with a pure heart and noble purpose. True reincarnation is the birth of God in the mind of man, where man becomes seized with a Divine frenzy and becomes God-intoxicated. The Spiritual rebirth comes to the man here and now who goes on a great psychological, spiritual feast in peace, happiness, and joy; then he begins the task of Divine regeneration, resurrection of God’s ideas, and ascension into the bosom of God’s Eternal Love.

Emma Curtis Hopkins tells of a wonderful event recorded in the archives of a state penal institution; this is the essence of it: A man was sentenced over half a century ago to be hanged. In the interim between his sentence and its time of fulfillment, he sought the Face of God, which means the Truth about God. If I look at your face, I recognize you. Look to God and His Love; there is no condemnation there. God does not condemn or judge any man. “All judgment is given to the son.” You are the son, and you are always judging yourself by the concept and beliefs you entertain. You are always choosing thoughts; thereby passing judgment on yourself. God sees you perfect. The Perfect One cannot see imperfection. When man rises in consciousness to the point where he forgives himself and cleanses his mind and heart, the past is forgotten and remembered no more.

Karma, or reaping what you have sown, turns out to be inexorable only as long as you do not pray or meditate on the Truths of God. As soon as you pray, you rise above karma, and the unpleasant consequences of past mistakes begin to be wiped out. No matter how awful the crime,—be it murder, or any other heinous offense,—it can be expunged from the mind together with all the punishment that would ordinarily follow. Mere reading of affirmations and perfunctory prayer will not change matters. A deep hunger and thirst for God’s Love and Grace, plus an intense desire to transform, is essential to wipe out the punishment that must otherwise follow negative and destructive thinking.

I have known murderers to become completely transformed by an inner realization of God’s Presence; they were completely reborn; they were so changed that it would be impossible for them to repeat the mistakes of the past.

The murderer of whom Emma Hopkins speaks sought the Face of the All-Good. He had read that God was “the bad man’s deliverer,” and this man had committed the murder for which he was sentenced. To the great confusion and perplexity of the officers of the law, when the man was led to the gallows, the platform of which would tip ordinarily at the slightest weight, became firm the moment the condemned man stepped upon it. They tried again and again to no avail, until finally he was given his freedom.

Did not the efficacy of the High Watch halt the so-called karma of the ordinarily mandated treadmill of cause and effect, and enable this murderer to step off into a new order of emancipated consciousness and experience?

The Love of God indeed passes all understanding, and It does illumine the path we tread. The wonders and blessings of God know no ending.

Modern science is beginning also to penetrate the wonders of the world; it says that we live in an ever-changing, fluidic universe of dancing forces, and that the universe is a mental phenomenon. The ultimates of science are on precisely the same footing as our intuitions of Goodness, Truth, and Beauty of God. Our reason must listen to the subtler voices of intuition and revelation. With a new vision religion and science may both understand the mystic overtones of this ancient meditation.

“Of all existences I am the source

The continuation, and the end.

I am the germ;

I am the growth;

I am the decay.

All things and creatures I send forth;

I support them while yet they stand without;

And when the dream of separation ends,

I cause their return unto myself.

I am the Life,

And the wheel of the Law,

And the way that leadeth to the Beyond—

There is none else.”

2

Does The Bible Teach Reincarnation?

Reincarnation is God incarnating again and again. It is the One Being coming back repeatedly.

Troward says, “If a thing is true, there is a way in which it is true.” Let us see the way in which Reincarnation is true. In reading the ninth chapter of Luke, we find these words, “Now Herod the tetrarch heard of all that was done by him: and he was perplexed, because that it was said of some, that John was risen from the dead; And of some, that Elias had appeared; and to others, that one of the old prophets was risen again. And Herod said, John have I beheaded: but who is this, of whom I hear such things? And he desired to see him.”

Herod means the world-mind, race belief, and acceptance of the traditions of the past. Such a mind believes it is John the Baptist risen from the dead or Elias come again, but what it fails to see is that it is always God coming forth as a quality or mood of man.

The people in the days of Jesus believed in reincarnation, but everywhere in the Bible, as we shall point out, Jesus rejects the belief completely. If you read this book with a fixed belief in your old ideas, you will not really grasp what is being written. You only hear what you are ready to receive. Many hear what they want to believe. Where will you find the authority for the Truths of the Bible? They are within yourself! Your subjective or Invisible Self is the authority; It knows all, and It will illumine your conscious mind.

Herod is the tetrarch; the latter means the fourth part of the province, or the ruler of the fourth part of a country. You have four parts: You are spiritual, mental, emotional, and physical. The physical, or the body, is the tetrarch referred to. The body, or the worldly belief, is that a man dies and comes back in another body in cycles of 500, 800, etc. The man with the worldly belief desires to see Jesus, but he cannot. Jesus symbolizes the Truth.

Truth is an inner perception; It is subjectively perceived and understood. You say, “I see,” when you comprehend, or understand the solution to a knotty problem. Many people believe that we come back again and again, in order to expiate for our sins committed in former lives. They believe they have to work out their karma until they are free from bondage. It is a solace and a comfort to many people to realize that their misfortunes and troubles are due to errors in their past lives. This belief is indeed a panacea; it answers their problems; puts them at ease, and it acts as an opiate to these poor people.

Again I wish to emphasize that Jesus does not teach reincarnation, as commonly understood. He teaches a spiritual rebirth. Let us examine the third chapter of John: Jesus said to Nicodemus, “Verily, verily, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the Kingdom of God. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter the second time into his mother’s womb, and be born? Jesus answered, Verily, Verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and the spirit, he cannot enter the Kingdom of God.”

Nicodemus means a ruling state of consciousness within man; he is still wedded to the old thought of a physical or carnal rebirth; yet he is dissatisfied, and is seeking light. He is a man of the Pharisees, meaning that he is one who adheres to the letter of the Law, but lacks the spirit which giveth life. He represents the average man of today who does not know that his own Awareness, Beingness, or Consciousness is God, his Creator, Redeemer, and Saviour. Let us see this drama or dialogue as taking place within man.

When Jesus says, “I am the Truth,” he is not referring to himself as a man, but to the Principle which he teaches.

“I AM” means Pure Being, Life, Awareness, Consciousness, or The Unconditioned One. Our “I AMNESS” is God. “I am all things to all men.” This Formless Awareness becomes that which man conceives It to be; this is the law of believing—the corner stone of life which the world rejects. When we read the word, “Verily, Verily,” it means stop, look, and listen! To be born again means a spiritual rebirth—the birth of God in man.

Nicodemus, or man seeking, questions the Truth, asking, “How can a man be born when he is old?” The average man thinks of God as far off; he considers heaven as a place to which he goes when he leaves this plane. He fails to see that anyone can enter the second time into the mother’s womb, psychologically, and be reborn spiritually. Man can enter the womb of God again and again, and be reborn mystically. The womb of God is man’s own inner feeling.

Here is how you may enter the womb of God and be reborn: Get still and quiet by relaxing the mind and body. Detach yourself from the old way of thinking and form a new concept of yourself, a new estimate. Meditate on the reality of this new concept to the point of conviction. Imagine and feel the reality of the new ideal; live with it; envelop it in love; woo it; then the ideal will be resurrected in you, and you will become a changed man.

I knew a murderer one time who confessed to me that he had killed a man. He had an intense desire to transform himself, and be reborn mentally and spiritually. I wrote down the qualities and attributes of God for him. He began to still the wheels of his mind. For fifteen or twenty minutes several times daily, he would quietly, silently, and lovingly claim and feel that God’s Love, Peace, Beauty, Glory, and Light were flowing through his mind and heart, purifying, cleansing, healing, and restoring his soul. As he did this regularly, these qualities and attributes of God were gradually resurrected within him. In other words these qualities came out of his mother’s womb, which was his own feeling or mood as he prayed.

One night this man’s whole mind and body, as well as the room he was in, became a blaze of Light. He was actually blinded like Paul by the Light for awhile. He said to me that all he could remember was that he knew the whole world was within him, and that he felt the ecstasy and rapture of God’s Love. His feeling was indescribable. It was in other words the moment which lasts forever. He was a changed man; truly he expressed the real Incarnation of God in his mind and heart. He began to teach others how to live, and I am sure he is still doing it somewhere.

He was born of water and the spirit. Water will take the shape of any vessel into which it is poured, so will your mental attitudes and beliefs assume form and shape in your world.

Spirit is a feeling, a mood, or animated state of consciousness. To be born of water and the spirit is, therefore, to begin to think in a new way; to get a new mental attitude, and to begin to feel the joy of the answered prayer within you.

Let us take a simple illustration. Suppose you wish to be a great teacher of God’s Truths: Close your eyes tonight. Still your body. Imagine you are expounding hidden mysteries or the Truths of the Bible to others, and that they are being illumined and inspired. In your imagination, you see the multitude; feel the reality of it; realize the wonder of it all. Dramatize it within yourself! You are the actor in the drama. (“Act as thou I am, and I will be.” This is an old philosophical quotation containing a great Truth). Feeling yourself as being the great teacher, living, and acting the role in your imagination, you are focused on your ideal, and you become one with it as you remain persistent. As you regularly enter this meditative state, you will touch Reality, and you will objectively express what you subjectively saw and felt.

Your true rebirth is when you leave the kingdom of man and his false beliefs, and enter the Kingdom of God and His Glory within you.

3

Are We Victims Of Karma?

We must not be wedded to a belief in karma (evil that has to be expiated here in life). As long as man believes that he is going to be punished, he suffers the consequences of his false beliefs, ideas, and opinions.

To believe that God is punishing you for the mistakes of the past is to have a false concept of the One True God. Whatever concept you hold of God, has its effect on your life. If you have a false, superstitious concept of God, there will be confusion and chaos in your life.

Ask yourself, “What do I really believe as true about God?” Your answer is the most important thing in your life; it must come from your heart. It is not adequate to say, “I believe in God.”

For example, begin to believe that God is Omnipotent, All Wise, Boundless Love, Infinite Intelligence, and Infinite Perfection, and that what is true of God must, therefore, be true of you; for God and man are one. God is man made manifest; the Formless and the formed are one, the Unconditioned and the conditioned are one. Spirit and form are one. Life and its manifestation are one.

If you really believe in your heart that God is All Love, Light, Truth, and Beauty in the same way as you believe you are alive; then everything in your life will begin to change. All the departments of your life will begin to improve, such as, your health, wealth, love, and expression; you will go from glory to glory, and your good will multiply exceedingly until “the day breaks and the shadows flee away.”

To believe that we must come back again and again to work out our karma or suffer for past misdeeds is a sort of an opiate; it dulls the mind and destroys the body.

I have heard people say, “This is my karma; I cannot overcome this; you know, I must have done something bad in a former life.”

This is a form of alibi which acts as an anaesthetic to dull the senses. We must really see the foolishness of such a belief. It is a complete contradiction of the teachings of the Bible and the Ageless Wisdom. Jesus healed the blind man immediately; thereby rejecting all such beliefs.

The only loss, limitation, restriction, or evil in the world is our belief in loss, our belief in limitation, our belief in restriction, and our belief in evil or disease; this is known as the “son of perdition,” or sense of loss spoken of in the Bible. “Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.” “And their sins and iniquities will I remember no more.”

Can you imagine a God asking you to forgive those who trespass against you, and in another breath refusing to forgive Himself? You are already forgiven in the eyes of God. Forgive yourself now. “He shall call upon me, and I will answer him.” “I, even I, am he that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine own sake, and will not remember thy sins.”

Some people state that it is almost impossible to change certain physical conditions in this life, particularly, if one were born with a congenital disease or deformity. This is a contradiction of everything the Bible teaches, namely, “Behold, I am the LORD, the God of all flesh: is there anything too hard for me?” “I will restore health unto thee, and I will heal thee of thy wounds, saith the LORD.” “Who healeth all thy diseases; Who satisfieth thy mouth with good things; so that thy youth is renewed like the eagle’s.” “I will ransom them from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death.”

A cripple is not healed instantly because of his belief. A man whose finger is amputated, for example, believes he cannot grow another finger; he has been told that by his parents; the textbook he studied says it cannot be done, plus the tradition, and race belief. He now holds a firm conviction that the Living Intelligence which created his finger cannot grow another.

Elsie Salmon in her book, He Heals Today, tells about a child whose three fingers were missing, and how through prayer the three fingers began to grow normally. Jesus said, “Thy faith hath made thee whole.”

In the eleventh chapter of Mark we read these wonderful words, “What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them.” There are no conditions laid down.

It is not necessary that one be a holy man or a great mystic to manifest the innermost desires of his heart. The man we call the murderer, thief, or the person of ill repute could, if he desired, become transformed in the twinkling of an eye; this could be accomplished through a great rise in consciousness, accompanied by an intense desire and hunger for God’s Love and Peace. It is possible for a criminal to completely forget the past; turn within to the God-Presence with all his heart and soul, feeling that he is immersed in the Holy Omnipresence, to be bathed by the Light from Above, and have an inner experience of God’s Glory and Beauty. In the twinkling of an eye he could be changed.

Paul, according to the New Testament, persecuted his fellowmen, testified against them, and had them put to death. He is a shining example of the state of consciousness that can be attained instantly. Paul was illumined on the road to Damascus by turning within, changing his conception of himself, and finding that he really was the son of the Living God. We can do this. If this were not true, the whole teaching of the Bible collapses, and it is false—but it is true, “the same yesterday, today, and forever!” The truth is: We are all that we ever will be now, but we fail to recognize it. The mass-murderer through an interior, God-like change of the heart could in one moment become illumined and transformed.

Begin now to rise in consciousness by contemplating you are the Christed, Illumined One, and that you are doing the works of Him that sent you. We must refuse to believe the statements and theories that it takes a hundred or a thousand years to become healed or illumined. There is no time in God. “That which is to be hath already been.” In other words, you are all that you will ever be Now. Yes, this very instant! Even fifty million years hence will not make any difference to the Reality within you. God cannot learn or become wise. He is All-Wise. All growth, learning, expansion, and contraction are illusions of growth and expansion. How could God suffer? It must be the illusion of suffering.

Dwell on these wonderful words: “But if the wicked will turn from all his sins that he hath committed, and keep all my statutes, and do that which is lawful and right, he shall surely live, he shall not die. All his transgressions that he hath committed, they shall not be mentioned unto him: in his righteousness that he hath done he shall live.” You are told in these verses that if a man will forsake the ways of the past, and begin to practice right thinking, right feeling, and right action, he will transform himself. A new beginning is a new end. Get a new concept of yourself; walk forward in the light.

The Bible tells you, “Behold, now is the accepted time.” And another passage: “There are yet four months, and then cometh harvest? behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields; for they are white already to harvest.” Jesus said to the people in his day that the truths which he expounded were available now. “This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears.”

Do not postpone your good. Why say, “Next year I will be happier,” or “Six months from now, I will be healed.” The Healing Presence is available now. The Divine answer is awaiting you. God knows only the answer. The fulfillment of your desire is now. “Before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear.” The inner meaning of this biblical passage means that before you ask, the answer is already knocking at the door of your mind. Infinite Intelligence has no problems; it knows the solution instantaneously. It is timeless and spaceless. No matter what you are seeking exists Now. “Now is the day of salvation.” “In thy Presence is fulness of joy.”

The joy of God is available now. Do not say, “Some day I will be joyous and free.” Enter into God’s joy now by claiming the joy of God and His Love are flowing through you like a gentle river. It is God’s river of peace and His waters of joy. God’s Love, Beauty, and Power are available now. These Qualitites of God always were, are now, and always will be. Time is psychological; it is a state of consciousness.

If you begin to think that because the earth is moving on its axis every twenty-four hours bringing in day and night, and things are going to be better, you will remain confused. God is here now; the very Presence and Life of you. When you say, “I AM” that is God. We do not speak of God to come. God is here already—your own I Amness—the Eternal Now. Accept your good now; unite with your desire in consciousness. Enter into the finished state of accomplishment. Let your psychological time-clock be, “It is done!” “It is finished!”

Never say, “Oh, next year business will be better.” The time the average man speaks of means his relationship to earth in its diurnal motion, and the position of the sun; it means his relationship to the events of today and tomorrow.

Prolonged desire and failure to realize your heart’s desires give rise to frustration, illness, and neurosis. The ideal, the desire of your heart exists now. It is the concrete living reality in the next dimension of mind. Remember that thoughts are things. Recognize the power of your thought; it is supreme in your life. Go within now, and enter into the mental atmosphere that your prayers are answered—your dreams are fulfilled. Accept your good now. Say from your heart, the thing I am seeking already exists, otherwise, I could not even desire it. I accept the fulfillment of my desire completely now, and I rest in the conviction that “It is done.”

If you are sick, claim health now; feel it; give thanks for your perfect health. The Healing Principle exists now; do not delay your healing or postulate it in the future. As you identify yourself with the Healing Principle there will take place a rearrangement of the atomic structure of your body, and health will be revealed. You will realize the Truth of the statement that, “Now is the accepted time.” I accept my prosperity now—not in some future day. I give thanks for it now—this moment—and enter into the joy of the answered prayer.

4

Inequality of Birth

Many ask the question, “Why is an innocent child born, deaf, lame, or crippled?” We find the same question asked in the ninth chapter of John: “Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind? Jesus answered, Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that the works of God should be made manifest in him.”

The law of cause and effect is a changeless principle. You may consciously use the law. If you have been nursing or misdirecting the law, you can reverse your mental attitude; then you change the sequence of events. “I form the Light, and create darkness; I make peace and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.” This means the LORD (law) can be used two ways.

Our feelings and moods create. What is the nature of your mood? What tone do you strike during the creative act?

For example, if there is someone in the parents’ world whom they hate the sight of, or if there is a voice that they wish they would not hear again, a corresponding expression is brought forth. These are blind and deaf states of consciousness from which blind and deaf children come forth. Whatever “tone” is struck by the parents, a corresponding expression comes forth by the law of reciprocal relationship. The child is not a victim of heredity. In Ezekiel is written: “What mean ye, that ye use this proverb concerning the land of Israel, saying, The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and children’s teeth are set on edge? As I live, saith the Lord God, ye shall not have occasion any more to use this proverb in Israel.”

The only things passed on to children are the moods, mental states, or beliefs of the parents. It is possible, for instance, for anyone to have a son who may become a Shakespeare, Beethoven, Lincoln, or a Jesus, depending on the moods of the parents, or this state of consciousness at the moment of conception.

I knew a tubercular father and mother to give birth to a wonderful boy; he is an illumined soul, and doing remarkable work in the world today.

If you are lifted up in consciousness to the point of acceptance or belief that your son will be a noble, dignified, God-like being you dream of; then according to the law of reciprocal relationship, a corresponding mood or quality of the Infinite comes forth. “The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge,” in this manner. The sins of the fathers are the fears, superstitions, false beliefs, and anxieties which disturb their mind. These moods and mental states are transmitted to the children, and disturb them mentally and physically. Sins are mistakes of the mind or misuse of the law. We sin when we miss the mark of harmony, health, and peace. The bad or evil acts of parents or grandparents can only be transmitted through the mind. In this way the superstitions, fears, and the errors of the past generation are given to the present.

By illustration, a father instills the fear of God into the son by painting a false picture of the Deity; the son grows up believing in a God of wrath, or vengeance, a sort of a despot living in the skies, ruling the world according to his whims and caprice. The son grows up believing these false ideas, and passes them to his own son, and so on for generations.

The Bible says, “to the third and fourth generation.” The numeral three means the conviction of God’s Presence, and man awakening to the real truth about himself. Four means the Love of God made manifest in the mind and heart. All of us have been brought up under the hypnotic spell of the world, its terrors, and false beliefs. We have been expressing illness, confusion, and lack.

Now you begin to realize that your own thought and feeling are your destiny; this is the third and fourth generation spoken of in the Bible. It represents a state of mind wherein you know that you fashion, mould, and direct your own destiny by transforming your mind. You begin to reject all the thoughts and beliefs of the past. As you begin to realize the Omnipotence of the Spirit within and the power of your own thought, you cease giving power to anything else. You enthrone the concepts of freedom, peace, and health in your mind, and you live with these ideas, entering into the reality of them. In other words you sense and feel you are a son of God, and heir to all the qualities, powers, and attributes of God. You declare your freedom, and write your declaration of independence and freedom in your heart. You begin to love all things good; the law responds accordingly by opening for you the windows of heaven, and pouring out a blessing that there is not room enough to receive.

The following quotation is from Ezekiel, “As I live, saith the Lord God, ye shall not have occasion any more to use this proverb in Israel.” The word Israel means the man of God, or the mind awakened to the Spiritual Truth. When you are awakened to the Presence of God within you, plus the realization of its response to your thought, you stop looking back on the past; moreover you realize you can overcome the past, and you cease blaming your father or mother, conditions, and circumstances, and you move, onward, upward, and Godward.

When a child is born, it is always the spirit of the One God. “Elias is come already.” Elias means Jehovah or God. The personality, John or Mary, is the sum of the thoughts, feelings, and beliefs of each one of us. We tincture and color the One Spirit by our beliefs and impressions.

Let us say John, who lived in New York, died; then the quality which was John lives in all beings throughout the world. Now, during the creative act in some part of the globe the tone or quality that was John is struck; this could be in China or Japan, or elsewhere, and that quality or mood of the Infinite comes forth. It is not the personality we knew as John coming back, it is the tone of the Infinite coming forth. The same instant that John died, instantaneously the same vibration could come forth in a member of another race and country. Cycles of 500, 600, and 1,000 years have nothing to do with this law. God is Timeless; all tones are in the One. When you play on the grand piano, it will respond according to the notes you strike. Man is the measurer, and the “measure he metes shall be measured unto him.” “Whatsoever he sows, that shall he also reap.” You sow the seed in consciousness, and you reap the fruit of the seed; it will be the exact likeness of the seed sown. Let us sow beautiful thoughts; let our hands play Divine melodies; let our eyes see the beauties of God; let our voices be those of praise and thanksgiving; then we will reap what we sow. It is definitely wrong to believe that you or anybody else are suffering because of errors made in past incarnations, or because of hereditary influences.

They asked Jesus, as we pointed out at the beginning of this chapter, if the blind man sinned or his parents that he was born blind? In those days they believed that the sins of the parents were visited on the children to the third and fourth generation. In other words if a father was tubercular, his children would be also; if the father or mother were lame, the children would be, too. We have learned it is only the mental influence or state of consciousness that is passed on. Others believed the blind man of the Bible was a victim of karma. Jesus rejected completely both theories or beliefs, and turned to the spiritual Power; He healed the man instantaneously.

Those of you who have read Troward know that he teaches that we are all born into the race mind or law of averages, and are bound by the race consciousness until we pray ourselves out of it. Jesus did not say to the man, “You must work out your karma.” No, he healed him instantaneously, for God condemns no one, and though a man is a cripple, he can be healed; if he is deaf, he can hear; he does not have to work out some karma.

No one in the world is condemned to live in a prison of fear, sickness, and pain which he in his ignorance created. He can rise above any circumstance by feeling the joy of the answered prayer within him, and according to his belief is it done unto him.

Mozart, Lincoln, Shakespeare, and Napoleon left their impressions with mankind. We read of their works in history, song, and prose. All of them live in the hearts or the subjective mind of man. A man’s son is his idea or feeling about anything. He can give conception to any state he is capable of conceiving. If a man, therefore, admires or dwells on the qualities and attributes of Napoleon, and would love to give birth to such a son—“as within so without.” During the creative act a Napoleon-like character appears resembling the mood of that man. The dominant mood prevails. In other words, it is the tone struck during conception or creation that determines the nature of the child.

A man eighty or ninety years of age who becomes crippled, blind, or deaf is under the same law as the child in the womb or the cradle. Jesus says, “Except ye repent, ye shall likewise perish.” This means all are immersed in the race or world mind; suggestions of the world are continually impinging upon our consciousness. Our mind receives according to our degree of receptivity.

If we do not think for ourselves, and if we do not cleanse our minds, we will suffer, because we allowed fear, false beliefs, and erroneous concepts of the world to impinge themselves upon us; then the world-mind does our thinking for us, and acts upon us bringing accidents, disease, suffering, etc., into our lives. The world-mind is the mind which believes in disease, failure, misfortune, terror, and superstition. If we do not pray and cleanse our mind regularly, we may also get into trouble. There is no chance or accident; for all is Law. There is a mind, a state of consciousness, which is the cause of all.

When they asked Jesus why the tower of Siloam fell on the eighteen men, he said, “Suppose ye that these Galilaeans were sinners above all the Galilaeans, because they suffered such things? I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.”

To repent means to think in a new way, to transform the mind, to think in one direction, i.e., to think of God and His Qualities, and realize what is true of God is true of you; then you will find that all your ways will be ways of pleasantness; all your paths will be paths of peace.

Suppose you put your hand on a naked wire; you would get burned. Why blame the law of electricity? You must learn the law, and use it to bless yourself and others. It was your misuse or ignorance of the law that caused the burn. It is not God punishing you; neither is it karma that you are working out.

Suppose you jumped into the ocean, and you did not know how to swim, you would drown. It is not your karma; neither is it a vindictive, cruel God punishing you; rather it is your lack of knowledge as to how to swim and keep afloat. The waters will hold up a boat or any man who learns how to swim or navigate.

You can fall off a cliff, because of carelessness in climbing, or paying no attention to the instructor who is teaching you how to climb the Alps. The Law of gravitation is impersonal; in falling you hurt yourself. We hurt and punish ourselves.

Children are at the mercy of the moods, feelings, and atmosphere of the home. Quimby said of children that they are like an old fiddle; anyone can come along and strike a tune on them. Children are like a white tablet on which all members of the family write something. Psychosomatic physicians and psychiatrists are all familiar with the fact that children, until they begin to reason for themselves and pray scientifically, grow in the image and likeness of the mental atmosphere of the home.

A man of ninety is still a child, though he may be a good man in the eyes of the world, i.e., he gives to charity, is kind to neighbors, goes to church, and pays his taxes; yet he has heart trouble, perhaps, cancer, or is crippled by arthritis. You say, “Is it fair? Is it just?” There is only one Law.

If I hold up a horrible painting in front of a mirror, it will reflect exactly the picture held before it. The mind is the mirror; that is why the Law of the Lord is always perfect. Our world is always a perfect reflection of our inner state of consciousness. The above man may have lived in fear; he may be a victim of the various propaganda scares, or it may be the race mind which moved in upon him, and precipitated as certain diseases. If he had prayed scientifically; turned to God, and cast out all fear of any other power; if he had worshiped the One Power only, and loved His Qualities; then he would be one with God. All good would follow him all the days of his life. He would dwell in the house of God forever.

There is not one law for a man ninety, and another for the child in the mother’s womb. No matter what the problem is, we can solve it through prayer; we can forgive ourselves instantaneously, and be healed; this is the glorious Truth.

“Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.” (ISAIAH 1:18).

“And their sins and iniquities will I remember no more.” (HEB. 10:17).

“For thou, LORD, art good, and ready to forgive; and plenteous in mercy unto all them that call upon thee.” (PSALM 86:5).

“He shall call upon me, and I will answer him.” (PSALM 91:15).

“I, even I, am he that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine own sake, and will not remember thy sins.” (ISAIAH 43:25).

You can now detach yourself completely from the past by partaking of a great psychological and mystical feast of peace and happiness. Realize the Presence of God within you, and rise in consciousness to the joyous conviction that you are Now the being you long to be. Continue at regular intervals to do this, until the state is fixed within you which you recognize by a silent, innerknowing. Sustain this silent conviction, and you shall wear the garment of God. It is wonderful!

5

Preventing Birth of Dictators, Despots, Tyrants, Etc.

It is often asked, “Why do we have dictators, despots, and tyrants in the world?” They are extensions in space of the dictator complex present in the hearts and minds of all human beings. By changing ourselves we change our world. The world is ourselves in aggregation.

Napoleon still lives. Ghenghis Khan still lives, as do Caesar, and others. Boys and girls learn about these men at their mother’s knees, at school, and in college. They learn about the wars in which their country was involved, and in some instances they are taught to hate the neighboring nations. These children are born with resentment and rage at the wrongs committed by these men. They read avidly of the crimes, atrocities, and act of violence. These states are impressed on their subconscious minds. All of these moods, feelings, and thoughts which are entertained become objectified as conditions, experiences, and events. Whatever is impressed in consciousness must be expressed in the world. Man should not, therefore, be surprised when these tyrants of the past are reborn into our society, because we actually call them forth. It is true in a sense, therefore, that Ghenghis Kahn is reborn or reincarnated. He is the embodiment of the state of consciousness of the people, nation, race, or world; whatever the case may be. It is never a man who lived a thousand or two thousand years ago who is being reborn. It is a state of consciousness that is born again.

We can prevent the birth of tyrants and despots this way: Let each mother place her child on her knee, whisper in his ear that his Father is God, and that he can do the works of God—his Father. As the mother inculcates this great truth into the mind and heart of her boy, he will believe it, and he will become her ideal. “I have been young, and now am old; yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread.”

“I was young” meaning I did not understand the laws of Life; “now am old.” Age is not the flight of years, it is the dawn of wisdom. I am now spiritually wise and understand the way the mind works; then the righteous are never forsaken. The righteous are those who use the Law rightly by right thought, right feeling, and right action.

If parents or teachers teach the Laws of Life—the Truth of Being—to the young, their seed shall never beg bread; this means these children shall never become the beggars, outcasts, thieves, and tyrants of the world. On the contrary, they shall fulfill the ideals of the parents. In other words, the children must fulfill the conviction held by their parents. If parents will impress their deeper mind with wonderful dreams for their boys and girls, then according to their belief, “will it be done unto them.”

By teaching the youth of the nation who they really are, by showing them the Way, the Truth, and the Light, we can build the Kingdom of Heaven on Earth; as a result we will prevent the rebirth of dictators, despots, and former undesirable states of consciousness which are perpetuated by prejudices, racial hatreds, and fear of the unknown. Teach children to dwell on the great Truths of God. Teach them of the great accomplishments of the poets, artists, engineers, chemists, physicists, astronomers, and others. Let boys and girls emulate these great men.

Man gives life to ideas and opinions as long as he believes them. When he disbelieves the errors, these ideas have no power.

Where is the Truth? It is within yourself. “Look within—Search the scriptures,” said Jesus. This means that all has been written in your subjective mind from the foundation. All knowledge is within; all beings that ever lived are within you now. You can project the likeness of any living being, past, or present; for all men are states of consciousness—qualities of mind expressed.

All moods, tones, qualities, and vibrations are within you, because Infinity is within, and Infinity cannot be divided; all is contained in the part. All beings are projections of yourself—the one man.

We must awaken from the dream of limitation, and declare our freedom as sons of God here and now. There are thousands of cases of men who have completely lost their former identity and personality; assumed new lives, entered different professions, and in many cases even remarried. These men were victims of amnesia, or loss of memory concerning their former selves. They could not remember their former wives and children. They had no recollection of their former professions or occupations. They assumed a new role in life; they were changed men entirely, because they had changed their consciousness.

In the spiritual sense we are all victims of amnesia. We have forgotten who we really are, and we tell ourselves that we are worms of the dust. Take, for example, a man who awakens from sleep, and he has completely forgotten who he is; he gravitates to the slums. His friends, knowing what has happened, try to coax him back to his former state. Because of amnesia his former way of life is completely blotted from his memory. He believes his place is in the slums; he only smiles at these old acquaintances whom he no longer knows. He accepts as true the role he now plays. The day comes when his memory is restored, and he awakens to his rightful status. With certainty and promptness he returns to his environment consonant with the dignity of his upbringing. He wonders why he is in the slums. What has transpired is like a dream to him, a dream of the unreality of it all.

We will prevent the birth of the dictator complex and the undesirable state of consciousness when we awaken to the Divine Presence within us. “Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light.” Let us awaken to the Real Presence and Power, recognizing the supremacy of the Omnipotence of the Spirit within, plus the power of our own thought. “Everyone that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price.”

Every boy and girl as well as adults should be taught how to go up the hill of God. “Go up into the hill of God; thou shalt meet a company of prophets coming down from the high place playing music, and thou shalt prophesy with them, and shalt be turned into another man.”

You go up the hill when you turn in recognition to the God-Presence within, realizing God is Boundless Love, All Bliss, All Joy, Indescribable Beauty, Infinite Wisdom, Infinite Perfection, All Glory, and Peace. Dwelling on these Truths of God, you are lifted up.

The Prophets you meet represent the eternal trinity employed in the creation of all things. First is the awareness of the I AM or God-Presence within and its Omnipotence. Second is your idea or desire. Third is the feeling or conviction that your prayer is answered.

The feeling is the conviction that united you with your desire; it is like the nail that joins two pieces of wood together.

The joy of the answered prayer is the music of the three prophets. It is the inner, silent knowing of the soul.

Any man can turn his back completely on the past; forget all the old beliefs and foolish ideas of the race mind; enter into the joyous thrill of being what he longs to be. If you remain faithful in this mood and sustain it, you will automatically become what you long to be.

Begin now—today—by going on a great psychological feast of being a noble, dignified Christ-like person. Begin to see God in all men, sermons in stones, and good in everything. When we do this, all other things shall be added to us. What we need is the spirit of Goodness, Truth, and Beauty in our minds and hearts.

Man’s Life on this plane is like the several stanzas of a poem or scenes of a play; because it really is the One Being dramatizing Himself as the many. Wisdom teaches that illumination or the Great Awakening to our God-hood can happen here and now. “If it be not now, yet it will come; the readiness is all.”

In order to elucidate this point, take a solid, metallic substance, and heat it. The temperature rises, but for awhile it looks as if no change were taking place; however, the moment the degree of heat is reached, which denotes its melting point, it begins to liquefy, thus changing its shape, and seemingly its nature also. Likewise, water can be turned into steam which is invisible, since pure steam cannot be seen. Water, also, becomes snow, ice, and hail; all are different rates of vibration of the One Substance.

When a liquid is changed into a gas, these changes are brought about by an increase in the rapidity of vibration of the constituent particles whether they are solid or liquid. The same law applies to man. What is true on one plane is true on all planes; for God changes not.

Raise your rate of vibration, and transform yourself by lifting yourself up to a high state of awareness through the contemplation of God. In this meditative, quiet, lovely state, enter into the mood or feeling of being what you long to be, and feel the joy of accomplishment. You still the mind, and enter into this meditative mood, by asking yourself, “What does God mean to me?” In this quiet state, your senses are immobilized by focusing your attention on the one ideal—only one. In this sleepy, meditative state your conscious attention is in control. In this wonderful mental, spiritual atmosphere you mold, fashion, and shape all that you long to be, to do, and possess. By constantly praying in this manner, there is an expansion of consciousness; it is like the heat that melts the solid. The day comes when man melts away all inhibition, fears, and doubts, and becomes the God-man here and now. To such a man physical laws and time disappear. This change may come in the twinkling of an eye, like the volatilization of a liquid into a gas.

The man full of worldly thoughts, race beliefs, and third dimensional concepts of things would not conceive of the possibility of awakening to the God-man here and now. But the Power within man is capable of nullifying all human beliefs and man-made laws. We must begin to take our attention away from the limited, human concepts of ourselves; then we shall, like Mozart, compose music at six; statues at seven, and at the age of twelve we will confound the wise men of the world.

Cases are reported where cripples invalided for years leap and run in the presence of fires. In emergencies mothers lift automobiles to extricate their children. Where is this Power? It is within themselves. Fires and emergencies are not needed to stir the God-Presence within. Man can do this in the quiet of his own soul. We create in the “silence.” Truth is lived in the silence; Truth is heard in the silence; Truth is transmitted in the silence; for God abides in the silence.

When you unite with God, you are in union with that which is above and beyond time; surely then you can be free of that which has taken place in Time. If you have a problem, you turn from time and space to the Eternal One within; in other words you go from Time to Eternity. You find rest unto your soul.

6

Have I Lived Before?

One of the interesting factors discussed by many people is that they remember their previous incarnations; furthermore in remarkable detail some say that they were priests in ancient temples giving the period, location, and other interesting highlights. There is no doubt that some people seem to remember previous existences. They relate that the only ways such memories can be explained is that they actually have lived before.

We are all immersed in a great pool of mind, or to point out simply like Quimby did: “Our minds mingle like atmospheres.” Your mind is a great reservoir containing the mental experiences and reactions of the ages. Some clairvoyants are capable of seeing what took place thousands of years ago. The Mind-Principle is neither past nor future. All things coexist in the Mind-Principle as an Eternal Now.

Have you considered the fact that the sensory impressions of all men who ever lived are within you? You can easily tune in to the vibration of some previous experience which someone else had, and think it is your own. The truth of the matter is that the Infinite One is within you. “Be still, and know that I am God.” Your “I AMNESS” is God. God is everywhere and in all things. All that you ever were or ever will be exists now. The “I AM” within you, the Reality or Life of you, has played all roles, has been everywhere, has seen everything, and experienced all things. When you awaken to the truth of your own Being, you will discover you do not have to travel to any part of the world to describe it in detail. Clairvoyants can do this; yet the faculties of clairvoyance and clair-audience are within all men.

You are both God and man. You are both Unconditioned and conditioned. The Unconditioned or Formless, Invisible Life is God within you; This is the Real Self of you.

When you say that you remember having lived in a certain city before, and everything seems familiar to you, it means you are awakening to that which was always known, and which always existed within you.

You may meet a man whom you are convinced you have always known. The reason is he is an intimate of your mood. All tones are within you. You have now becomes aware of that which always existed. All notes and tones are in the piano; the tone you strike always was.

Once I took a trip to Killarney; on arrival I knew my way around. All the streets and the lakes were very familiar to me. When I heard voices, I said to myself, “I have heard these voices before.”

Let us look at this above experience psychologically for a moment. Knowing I was to visit Killarney, the Subjective Self traveled there while I was sound asleep. The Subjective Self really doesn’t have to travel; It is Omnipresent, but we will use the term psychological travel. I travelled there psychologically; conversed mentally with many people; heard their response and voices; furthermore, in that psychological, mental journey, I saw all the beauties of the countryside.

I had been visualizing a wonderful trip; impressed my subconscious mind, and “went to sleep on it.” The subjective knowing all, accepted the suggestion, and dwelt there psychologically.

When I consciously and objectively arrived there, I experienced all the subjective states. What I saw and heard objectively, I had seen and heard subjectively. Of course, I had heard that voice before, and had seen that place before! The real truth is that no one, no matter who he is, can go any place, hear anything, or experience anything that does not already exist. Why is this? Because Infinity is within. God does not have to travel, to learn anything, to experience anything, grow, expand, or contract. All is, and the All is God. All things exist now.

Emerson refers to this Truth when he says, “There is one mind common to all individual men.” Every man is an inlet to the same, and to all of the same. He that is once admitted to the right of reason is made a free man of the whole estate. What Plato has thought, he may think; what a saint has felt, he may feel; what at anytime has befallen any man, he can understand. Who hath access to this Universal Mind is a party to all that is, or can be done; for This is the only Sovereign Agent.

Of one thing we may be certain; it is possible to remember anything that has ever transpired on this planet. It is also possible to see what might happen in the future, except it is changed through prayer. The real truth about you is this: I am referring to the Eternal You—the I AMNESS within you, your own Consciousness, or Awareness. You have been all men who ever lived, who live now, or whoever will live. You have been Jesus, Moses, Beethoven, Lincoln, and Shakespeare. Your Consciousness or awareness has played all roles; It has been everywhere; It has seen everything—all is within It—even the whole universe is within your own I AM-NESS.

Your Consciousness or Awareness wrote all Bibles, and spoke all languages; therefore you—the Invisible Self of you—knows the meaning of every part of the Bible. Ask yourself what did I mean when I wrote the Bible two thousand or five thousand years ago? The Deep Self of you has the answer.

There is only God, and God appears as man—The One Being—forever dramatizing Himself. All men are extensions of yourself. Every man is yourself. Remember there is only One Being. Why think of another? The Life of you is One and Indivisible. It wears many garments. The word humanity means the One Being limiting Himself by his belief in being man.

God cannot die; God cannot be slain. Never, therefore, think of John or Mary as dead; they live forever, as they live on in each one of us, also. A person never dies, The quality, tone, or mood of the Infinite, which was his, always existed, and always will exist. “I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending saith the Lord, which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty.” “I am the Lord, and there is none else, there is no God before me; I girded thee, though thou hast not known me.”

Always remember it is God coming into the world when a child is born. That child is its own father and mother. There is only one Father, and He is “Our Father.” “It is He that hath made us.” The Bible tells you where you came from. “Thou hast been in Eden the garden of God; every precious stone was thy covering.” Eden is the place of Boundless Bliss, Joy, Beauty, and Peace. In other words you came forth from God, the Boundless One, where you lived as God in Indescribable Beauty, Absolute Bliss, Fullness of Joy, Boundless Love, Absolute Peace, All Perfection, and All Harmony. These qualities of God are the precious stones which covered you. You were in the Absolute State before being born. When you came forth, it was God being born, and assuming the form of a child. “Before Abraham was, I am.” This means the same thing; i.e., before any manifestation or form appears, it first comes out of the Invisible—the Formless Awareness of Life called I AM, The Living Spirit Almighty. Where do you go from here when you leave this plane? You go from glory to glory, ever onward, until you awaken from the dream of limitation, and return to the Glory which was yours before the world was.

Job asked the question, “Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth? declare, if thou hast understanding.” Where upon are the foundations thereof fastened? or who laid the corner stone thereof? when the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy? This is a question asked by man of his Inner Self. We have forgotten that we were one with God when the foundation was laid. There is but One God and One Man, and we have made many out of the One. It is God appearing as many—the One in Infinite Differentiation. We are here to discover the joy of living, and return to the Source from whence we came. We are here to awaken. “Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light.” This means that when you awaken, you learn all has been a dream. Yes, all wars, crimes, one’s mistakes, and misfortunes are dreams. All the chaos of the world was simply a night-mare—unreal, to be forgotten and remembered no more. The reality of this awakening is to find oneself in a Kingdom of Love, Peace, and Happiness with the Light of God always shining. Beholding this Truth, dwelling upon It, accepting, and rejoicing in It, we realize that the streams of “manyness” all lead to the Oneness. “For the LORD shall be thine everlasting light, and the days of thy mourning shall be ended.” “The sun shall no more go down; neither for brightness shall the moon give light unto thee; but the Lord shall be unto thee an everlasting light, and thy God thy glory.”

7

The Mystery of Prodigies

There is an account of the early career of Zerah Colburn, published when he was under eight years of age taken from the Annual Register of 1812. This young boy in Vermont struck everyone with astonishment by his extraordinary mathematical powers. He was asked by an investigator how many minutes there were in 48 years; before the question could be written down he replied 25,228,800; also he instantly added the number of seconds in the same period. This child was entirely ignorant of the common rules of arithmetic. He could not perform upon paper a simple sum in multiplication and division. This singular faculty extended not only to the raising of numerical powers, but to the extraction of the square and cube roots of the number proposed, as these and many more complex, mathematical calculations were answered instantaneously by the boy.

Hudson points out in “The Law of Psychic Phenomena” that this child was placed in school, and trained on objective methods of mathematical calculations. It was believed that when he was more mature and grown up, that he would be able to impart to others the powers by which his calculations were made; however his powers did not improve by objective training. Hudson adds this interesting statement: “On the contrary, they deteriorated in proportion to his efforts in that direction, and his pupils derived no benefit from the extraordinary faculties with which he was endowed.” This has been the invariable rule in such cases.

The subjective mind of you, or of anybody, knows the answer to any mathematical problem. As pointed out previously, any note that was ever played, or any song ever sung, is recorded on the Universal Mind within you—your subjective self; furthermore all languages are within. The Subjective Intelligence knows only the answer; It does not have to reason, investigate, calculate, or analyze. The mathematical, artistic, or musical genius is one who is en-rapport with his subconscious mind, enabling him to tap the answers which are there.

Very young children are living in a partly subjective state. There are numerous instances of early, remarkable, musical, mathematical ability which have subsequently diminished as their objective faculties were cultivated.

Quoting from Hudson’s Law of Psychic Phenomena: “Musical prodigies furnish further illustrations of the principle involved; of these the most remarkable is the negro idiot, known as Blind Tom. This person was not only blind from birth, but was little above the brute creation in point of objective intelligence or capacity to receive objective instruction; yet his musical capacity was prodigious. Almost in his infancy it was discovered that he could reproduce on the piano any piece of music that he had ever heard. A piece of music, however long or difficult, once heard seemed to be fixed indelibly on his memory; usually he could reproduce it with a surprising degree of accuracy. This capacity for improvisation was equally great; a discordant note rarely, if ever, marred the harmony of his music. These well-known facts of Blind Tom’s history furnish complete illustration—first of the perfection of subjective memory; secondly, of the inherent powers of the subjective mind to grasp the laws of harmony of sounds, and that, too, independent of objective education. Music belongs to the realm of the subjective.”

From the facts in the above quotation it is obvious to perceive that certain powers are inherent in the subjective mind. The Subjective Intelligence comprehends all the laws of nature, as well as the harmony of sounds, laws of mathematics, or harmony of colors. It would seem absurd to think that Infinite Intelligence had to reason inductively. To reason presupposes an inquiry—a search for the answer. How could Infinite Intelligence ask a question? It knows only the answer! To say that God or Infinite Intelligence had to reason, investigate, calculate, or arrive at a conclusion would be to negate and deny the Omniscience of God. The objective, reasoning mind of man is necessary on this objective plane—or this third dimensional world.

While all music is within man, a musician should certainly learn everything he can objectively about it, so that he can better express himself. If, like the great philosophers of old, he heard inner melodies or the music of the spheres, he should have the objective knowledge and education enabling him to write it down as a composition; be able to play it, and give it to the world. The ideal situation is the harmonious accord or rapport of the objective and subjective mind.

I believe that many people now are teaching their children that all Wisdom is within. The intellect of man can be anointed by the Wisdom of God; then his inventive genius will be used to bless humanity.

Intellect must be married to the deep Wisdom and Love of God. The objective mind learns by education, observation, and experience. Supposing you had a dream, and you heard and saw the words of a beautiful poem; if you did not know, for example, the English language, or any language, you could not give it to the world. You express God through your objective senses in your speech, vision, hearing, etc. You are to use your conscious mind to carry out the promptings of the Divine.

In the third chapter of Mathew it relates how Jesus came to John to be baptized. “But John forbade him, saying, I have need to be baptized of thee, and comest thou to me? And Jesus answering said unto him, Suffer it to be so now: for thus it becometh us to fulfill all righteousness.” One of the meanings of the word John is intellect or conscious, reasoning mind; one of the meanings of Jesus is Wisdom of God, or illumined reason. We must not deny the intellect; we must use it wisely.

You may not type, but if you practice, you can type; the same is true with swimming, walking, dancing, etc. If you have a wonderful idea to do something, you must use your intellect to express it; e.g., Jesus is baptized by John, and John says, “Why comest thou to me?” Jesus says, “Suffer it to be done.” Suffer means to allow, or to permit. In other words Jesus is the voice of Wisdom within you coming forth; you are aware of it; therefore you must baptize or use this Inner Wisdom or Voice of Intuition by recognizing It, and seeing It take place in your world. Our intellect or conscious mind does not know the secret of the subjective, or how it works.

Do you know how a seed grows? or how or why a sperm divides? There is a Divine Voice within you which knows the way. It has the secret of all things, for It created all things. Many people think they can write poetry, and all kinds of wonderful music. However it is necessary to go to school and learn to read and write, so that the poetic phrases and the inner, harmonies heard by the inner ear can be suitably expressed. A musician should, therefore, learn the scales, geometry, and mathematics.

When the subjective mind revealed the idea of Insulin for diabetes to the Canadian doctor some years ago, he used his intellect and knowledge of glands, physiology, and chemistry to bring it to pass objectively; thereby millions have been helped, and their suffering alleviated.

Let Jesus baptize John, meaning let the Wisdom of God anoint your intellect. When you do not know the answer or solution, defer to a Higher Guide; This Higher Guide is God’s Eternal Wisdom within you.

Learn everything you can objectively; then proceed through prayer and meditation to awaken the subjective faculties, and you will become that great orator, or statesman, as the case may be.

You are probably asking the question now, “Why do infant, mathematical prodigies lose the gift as they grow older and become educated?” The child is in tune with the Subliminal Self; the subjective mind is amenable to suggestions, and in ordinary education, children are taught to ignore the Subliminal Self. Instead of being taught to draw out the Wisdom that is within, the latter is usually completely neglected, and the faculty atrophies and disappears. It could be preserved in the child by having the teacher impress the child’s mind with the fact that he could always possess the mathematical gift; that he would grow, and expand as he learned the objective rules, figures, numeration, etc. The subjective mind of the child being amenable to suggestion would retain his faculties for “according to his belief,” and that of his teacher, would it be done unto him.

Archbishop Whately who was a mathematical prodigy said that as soon as his conscious mind was exercised and educated, this faculty vanished.

Mozart composed music at five years of age. Before he was consciously aware of the laws of harmony, his subliminal or subjective mind knew them; this is true, also, of all men everywhere if we would awaken to the great powers asleep within us.

It was through the subconscious that Shakespeare perceived great Truths hidden from the conscious mind of man. It was due to this fact that Raphael in his meditative moods was en-rapport with the subjective that enabled him to paint madonnas. It was through this same medium Beethoven composed symphonies.

An outstanding violinist told me one time in Vienna, that for hours at a time, he meditated on music and the laws of harmony. “At times,” he said, “he was lifted up, and could actually hear the music of the spheres.” He added that in these meditative moods, he found himself close to the Universal Pulse Beat and Rhythm of all Creation. He brought forth wonderful music.

Anything any man has done, any man can do. God is within all men, and God is indivisible; therefore, all that is really necessary is for man to awaken to and mentally accept completely these limitless powers within him.

Hamlet must have known this when he said, “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”

The Bible in beautiful, poetic, elegant language says, “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.” We are in the Presence of Infinity. We approach It with a sort of mystic awe, realizing the wonder of it all. Imagine and know that never in Eternity could you exhaust the glory and beauty that is within; that is how wonderful you are.

Your subconscious mind is a storehouse of memory, and can be used to furnish you with any data or information you have ever read. Solomon, a Lithuanian Rabbi, had such a remarkable memory that he never forgot whatever he read. He knew the Bible and The Talmuds by heart, and he could quote easily any passage requested. What he did, you can do, this is fundamental and axiomatic.

There is only one Mind. How are you using It? You can succeed in convincing yourself that you can remember everything you read. The Power of retention of whatever you have seen or read is within you. Charge your mind with the belief that it is possible for you to do so, and your mind will respond the same as any one else’s.

Edgar Cayce could memorize the contents of a book without ever looking in it. The Subjective Self can see without eyes. Clairvoyance and clair-audience are faculties within all of us. We can develop them and quicken them. This has nothing to do with being born again and again in physical bodies. We do not grow or awaken in sidereal time and space. We must ascend the perpendicular beam within ourselves where dwells the Timeless, Spaceless, Formless, Awareness where all things are, and claim our Divinity here and now.

Cayce’s method was to place the volume under his head and sleep on it for awhile. Edgar Cayce had very little ordinary school education. Tuning in on the subconscious mind in sleep or trance state, he was also able to diagnose the ills of patients in any part of the world, even though he knew nothing about materia medica, pharmacology, or the practice of medicine. He simply tapped the Great Unconscious, and according to his belief was it done unto him. All the healings that followed were based on belief.

There is only one Healing Presence and Power in the whole world; whatever method, technique, or process used is a means of aligning with the One Healing Presence. The process of all healing is Faith. These words from the Bible state this: “According to your faith, is it done unto you.”

Many of you have read about the famous horses that Maeterlinck spoke about. One of the horses spelled out the name of the hotel where he was staying. These horses were trained by a modern trainer called Krall. Krall developed a mathematical prodigy, but it was a stallion. This stallion knew how to extract square and cube roots. He learned to read and spell also. The mathematical problem let us say is 16; there follows six blows of the right foot, and one blow of the left foot. The left foot was for tens, and the right foot for units. The horse was taught to read charts containing all letters of the language. Professors and some of the most learned men in Europe investigated these horses and were amazed. These horses solved the most difficult, mathematical problems with a complete sense of abandonment.

Louis K. Anspacher in “Challenge of the Unknown” said that these horses behaved like human, mathematical prodigies. I do not believe that you are now going to say that these horses are incarnations of some former mathematician who lived in time and space. The subjective of the horse is a part of the Great Universal Subjectivity which has the answer to all problems. The unconscious or subjective mind of the horse is amenable to suggestion; the horse’s subjective can by training and repetition be conditioned to respond. The subjective of the horse knows all; for there is only One Mind common to all; we are all immersed in It. The belief and faith of the trainer is also communicated to the horse, and a corresponding response comes forth.

The Wisdom of the ages is within every man, awaiting his recognition and claim. The old Hindu idea of Karma, in accordance with which man was punished by successive incarnations here on earth cannot stand the challenge of Jesus: “Be ye perfect as your Father in Heaven is perfect.”

Plato and others believe in transmigration and metempsychosis sometimes referred to as reincarnation. Plato also taught that man lost his memory at death. “There is nothing lost in all my Holy Mountain.” The subjective retains a memory of everything that has ever transpired.

A drowning man or a man partially asphyxiated sees his whole life instantaneously in every detail; likewise when you pass on to the next dimension the past, present, and future lie stretched before you like a cinema film all in a state of flux.

Nothing is ever lost; a rose that blooms once blooms forever. The modern theory of Time as propounded by Dunne, Einstein, and others was not known in Plato’s day or that of Pythagoras.

Time is a state of consciousness. Why postpone your good? Take it now. Whatever you want to be, whatever you want to know, or discover, already is. You could never become something you are not already. God is all, and Creation is finished.

“Be still and know!” Stillness is not only keeping quiet; it means there must be no inner dissonance, but rather when man goes within himself, he finds perfect and abiding peace. Knowing that God indwells you, makes you live in a world that is ever peaceful.

Failure to realize God’s Holy Presence within causes the average person to live in a series of conditions which grieve him to the end. Man fusses about things which, if he saw them differently, would not cause one moment of unhappiness. In order to awaken to your Inner Powers, and release these God-Qualities within, I suggest that every day of your life you should meditate on Beauty, Love, and Peace. Feel that these Qualities are being resurrected within you. As you meditate daily on this Inner Wisdom and Beauty, feel that you are awakened and illumined like Jesus was. Imagine you are doing the works of Jesus—healing the blind, the halt, and the lame. Sustain this mood; the qualities and powers of God will be resurrected within you. They were always there. You do not create them; you release them. This state of consciousness is not born of woman. The Jesus State of Consciousness is born out of the imagination of man. It is the spiritual rebirth or incarnation of God in your mind and heart. It is your second birth or spiritual awakening.

Meditate from time to time on God and His Qualities. Get immersed in this Holy Presence. By moving inward in meditation, you will feel that your body becomes unreal, and that the earth on which you walk becomes unreal. The external life becomes the dream; the Internal Life awakens; you move further and further inward. Suddenly you find that by going inward you have found the Universe. The suns, moons, stars, and planets are within. You now discover that planets are thoughts; that suns and moons are thoughts; you discover that your own I AMNESS or Consciousness is the realization which sustains them all. You awaken to the fact temporarily in space are moving the dreams of the Dreamer, and the worlds, suns, moons, and stars are the thoughts of the Thinker. Your eyes are closed; He is meditating, and we are His Meditation. It is God meditating on the mysteries of Himself!

8

The Journey Beyond

Believing in the old concept of reincarnation, think of how many former wives and husbands will be lined up to greet us! Maybe someone might have a million wives waiting for him!

In the twenty-second of Mathew it says, “Therefore in the resurrection whose wife shall she be of the seven? for they all had her.”

“Jesus answered and said unto them, ‘For in the resurrection, they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels of God in heaven.’”

The Bible is speaking of mental and spiritual laws. The world takes it literally, and thinks because a woman was married to seven brothers here on this plane, they are wondering whose wife shall she be of the seven, for they all had her, or were married to her.

It was the custom in those days that if a man died leaving no issue, his brother would marry the widow in order to perpetuate the name; if he died leaving no issue, the next brother would marry her, and raise up seed, etc.; this has nothing to do with physical marriage. It refers to marriage of the mind.

Whatever you unite with mentally, and accept, or believe, is a mental marriage. You can have false marriages; i.e., you can believe in a false idea, and you will have children by it. The children will be your health, wealth, business, and social relationship. In other words the Bible is always talking about a psychological death; meaning you must die to that which you are, before you can become what you long to be.

I gave advice to a young man one time who lost five positions in five months. He drank excessively, was irresponsible, shiftless, lazy, indolent, crude, lacking in understanding, zeal, and application. He believed in a heaven afar off—a place where you go when you die.

I explained to him he could prove heaven was here now. He followed my advice and took a course in public speaking, and another course at night school where with diligence, personal initiative, and application he learned the rudiments of the commercial world.

He began to pray for guidance and prosperity by claiming these qualities. He began gradually to die to the “old man,” and to put on the “new man.” He developed enthusiasm, perseverance, stick-to-it-ive-ness, and became foreman of the shop. How happy, spiritual, and joyous he was! He was living in heaven; i.e., he experienced health, harmony, and true expression.

Why postpone heaven? Heaven is here—within you! Peace has not disappeared from the face of the earth; Peace is of God, and God is within you; It is Timeless, Ageless, and Spaceless. Peace is here now in your own mind; tune in on the God of peace, and let His River of Peace flow through you like a summer stream. You do not have to leave this plane to experience peace, joy, happiness, or inspiration. You must, however, die mentally and psychologically; which means you separate yourself from the other false ideas, erroneous opinions, and peculiar ideas about God.

Your ideas control, govern, and rule over you. Enthrone peace, love, and God’s guidance. Live with these ideas; marry them by emotionalizing them in your own mind. You can go to heaven now—not when you die. There is no transforming power in death. Fall in love with honesty, integrity, justice, success, peace, and happiness. Move toward these ideals in your mind. Love will take you there. As you unite with these ideas in your mind, there will be a Divine Marriage, and the children that will come forth will be true place, abundance, and security.

The journey for all men is onward, upward, and Godward. Progression is the law of Life. When man sheds the physical body, he enters into the fourth dimension where he has a fourth dimensional focus. There are as Paul says, “Bodies celestial and bodies terrestrial.” Death of the physical body is like a journey to a new city, or a new dimension of mind.

I love these words from the Song Celestial:

“Never the spirit was born; the Spirit shall cease to be never;

Never was time it was not; end and beginning are dreams.

Birthless, and deathless, and changeless remaineth the Spirit forever;

Death hath not touched it at all, dead though the house of it seems.

Nay, but as one who layeth his worn-out robes away,

And, taking new ones, sayeth, “These will I wear today!”

So putteth by the Spirit

Lightly its garb of flesh,

And passeth to inherit

A residence afresh.”

To say that a man could not pray in the next dimension, and advance spiritually would be to limit The Holy One. Reincarnation—or going to the unmanifest to manifest, or to objectify a greater sense of the Presence—can take place there as well as here. What is true on one plane is true on all planes. We carry over our state of consciousness.

We were met by loving hands here when we came into the third dimensional world; it is reasonable to assume we will meet our loved ones who are in the next dimension when we arrive there after passing from this plane.

We should never really grieve or mourn for loved ones. By radiating the qualities of Love, Peace, and Joy to the loved one who has passed on to the next dimension, we are then praying for the loved one in the right manner. We are lifting the other up in our consciousness; this is truly giving the “oil of joy for mourning.” We rejoice in their new birthday, knowing the Presence of God is where they are. Where God is, there can be no evil. “God is not the God of the dead, but of the living.” Why seek ye the living among the dead?

Realize the loved ones who have passed on are dwelling in a state of beauty and love; then you are lifting them up. They feel your prayers, and thereby they are blessed.

We make them happy by our scientific prayer. Instead of feeling that they are dead and gone, and that their graves are where their bodies are, by an inner mood see them dwelling in a state of indescribable beauty.

Your loved one and all of those you knew on earth, as well as all those people long since gone from the face of the earth, are still living in the next dimension.

For instance, a little child who perhaps died in its mother’s womb, or lived for a day, is a grace note in the grand symphony of all creation. She plays through love in the celestial symphony of the spheres. Through love the child is one with its mother, brother, sisters, and with all men—visible and invisible. The child who lived for an hour, or who died in the womb grows, expands, and unfolds in the next dimension. You will again meet the child; however she will not be a child, but she will be fully matured and grown up.

We are all one; the many, apparently separate, human beings are the notes and chords of the eternal symphony of creation.

The loved ones who have passed on still live, and will live forever; for God is Life, and That is their Life. They are functioning fourth dimensionally. Through love you are one with them. Know that they are immersed in God’s Holy Omnipresence, and rest assured that Jesus, The Great Conductor, leads them in the Grand Symphony of All Creation.

All things in this relative world of ours are expressions of the Absolute. The One Life is expressed in countless modes. It is all One Reality. The One in the many, and the many in the One. The apparent, separate manifestations are notes in the grand symphony. There is a difference in the notes; they are grouped differently into chords and harmonies; yet, we must remember the symphony is one grace note. Somber notes, and notes used to form part of a magnificent opening chord are not separate; they all are the symphony; the symphony is one and indivisible. The composition is One Reality. Every note shares the beauty, joy and the life of every other note. The Life of the whole is in each note. The part is in the whole, and the whole is in the part. You are the Grand Symphony. You (the Real You—I AM) are the Creator and the Hymn of Creation. The Supreme Reality shares the life of all things.

“Everywhere in heaven is paradise. Even though the grace of the Chief Good does not reign there after only one fashion!” The mystery of the Ultimate Reality is multiplicity in unity. Rejoice in your journey back to God; there is no place else to go. It is the flight of The Alone to the Alone.