THE RELIGION OF HEALTHY-MINDEDNESS
85
all and which we call God. This is almost unrecognizable unless we live it
into ourselves
actually, that is, by a constant
turning to the very innermost,
deepest consciousness of our real selves or of God in us, for illumination
from within, just as we turn to the sun for light, warmth, and invigoration
without. When you do this consciously, realizing that to turn inward to
the light within you is to live in the presence of God or your divine self,
you soon discover the unreality of the objects to which you have hitherto
been turning and which have engrossed you without.
“I have come to disregard the meaning of this attitude for bodily health
as such, because that comes of itself, as an incidental result, and cannot be
found by any special mental act or desire to have it, beyond that general
attitude of mind I have referred to above. That which we usually make the
object of life, those outer things we are all so wildly seeking, which we so
often live and die for, but which then do not give us peace and happiness,
they should all come of themselves as accessory, and as the mere outcome
or natural result of a far higher life sunk deep in the bosom of the spirit. This
life is the real seeking of the kingdom of God, the desire for his supremacy
in our hearts, so that all else comes as that which shall be ‘added unto
you’ — as quite incidental and as a surprise to us, perhaps; and yet it is the
proof of the reality of the perfect poise in the very centre of our being.
“When I say that we commonly make the object of our life that which
we should not work for primarily, I mean many things which the world
considers praiseworthy and excellent, such as success in business, fame as
author or artist, physician or lawyer, or renown in philanthropic under-
takings. Such things should be results, not objects. I would also include
pleasures of many kinds which seem harmless and good at the time, and
are pursued because many accept them — I mean conventionalities,
sociabilities, and fashions in their various development, these being mostly
approved by the masses, although they may be unreal, and even un-
healthy superfluities.”
Here is another case, more concrete, also that of a woman. I read
you these cases without comment, — they express so many var-
ieties of the state of mind we are studying.
“I had been a sufferer from my childhood till my fortieth year. [Details
of ill-health are given which I omit.] I had been in Vermont several
months hoping for good from the change of air, but steadily growing
weaker, when one day during the latter part of October, while resting in
the afternoon, I suddenly heard as it were these words: ‘You will be healed
and do a work you never dreamed of.’ These words were impressed upon
my mind with such power I said at once that only God could have put
them there. I believed them in spite of myself and of my suffering and
86
THE VARIETIES OF RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE
weakness, which continued until Christmas, when I returned to Boston.
Within two days a young friend offered to take me to a mental healer
(this was January 7, 1881). The healer said: ‘There is nothing but Mind;
we are expressions of the One Mind; body is only a mortal belief; as a man
thinketh so is he.’ I could not accept all she said, but I translated all that
was there for me in this way: ‘There is nothing but God; I am created by
Him, and am absolutely dependent upon Him; mind is given me to use;
and by just so much of it as I will put upon the thought of right action in
body I shall be lifted out of bondage to my ignorance and fear and past
experience.’ That day I commenced accordingly to take a little of every
food provided for the family, constantly saying to myself: ‘The Power that
created the stomach must take care of what I have eaten.’ By holding
these suggestions through the evening I went to bed and fell asleep, saying:
‘I am soul, spirit, just one with God’s Thought of me,’ and slept all night
without waking, for the first time in several years [the distress-turns had
usually recurred about two o’clock in the night]. I felt the next day like an
escaped prisoner, and believed I had found the secret that would in time
give me perfect health. Within ten days I was able to eat anything provided
for others, and after two weeks I began to have my own positive mental
suggestions of Truth, which were to me like stepping-stones. I will note a
few of them; they came about two weeks apart.
“1st. I am Soul, therefore it is well with me.
“2d. I am Soul, therefore I am well.
“3d. A sort of inner vision of myself as a four-footed beast with a
protuberance on every part of my body where I had suffering, with my
own face, begging me to acknowledge it as myself. I resolutely fixed
my attention on being well, and refused to even look at my old self in
this form.
“4th. Again the vision of the beast far in the background, with faint
voice. Again refusal to acknowledge.
“5th. Once more the vision, but only of my eyes with the longing look;
and again the refusal. Then came the conviction, the inner consciousness,
that I was perfectly well and always had been, for I was Soul, an expres-
sion of God’s Perfect Thought. That was to me the perfect and completed
separation between what I was and what I appeared to be. I succeeded in
never losing sight after this of my real being, by constantly affirming this
truth, and by degrees (though it took me two years of hard work to get
there) I expressed health continuously throughout my whole body.
“In my subsequent nineteen years’ experience I have never known this
Truth to fail when I applied it, though in my ignorance I have often failed
to apply it, but through my failures I have learned the simplicity and
trustfulness of the little child.”