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THE 
 
 Ji_ 
 
 THE SOUL: 
 
 ITS POWERS, MIGRATIONS, AND TRANSMIGRATIONS. 
 
 h~L 
 
 t / 
 
 
 
 By F. B. DOWD 
 
 "For these things that appear delight us, but make the things that appear nof , 
 hard to believe ; or the things that appear not are hard to believe." 
 
 — Uermes. 
 
 (fee 2 \ i 
 
 John R. Rue, Jr., Printer, No. 43 South Fourth Street. 
 
 -I 8 8 2.— 
 

DEDICATION. 
 
 To John Heaney, of Buckley, Iroquois County, 
 Illinois — him of the great soul, lofty mind, and 
 loving heart- — " Door of the Temple of the Rosy 
 Cross" — are these pages most respectfully and lov- 
 ingly dedicated, by 
 
 The Author. 
 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 To provoke thought, and thus lift the world out of the rut into 
 which it has fallen, the following pages have been written. The 
 soul is no common or vulgar thing; and all approximation thereto, 
 in thought, must be transcendental. This work claims to contain 
 the fundamentalprineiples of all religions — the PHILOSOPHY OF MAN- 
 HOOD, and the road leading to a true life and immortality, 
 here, on this poor, much abused earth. " This is a matter-of-fact 
 age," and " the day of miracles has passed." That is, those things 
 which unaccountably happen, which were formerly ascribed to 
 GOD, have rome a little nearer home, and are now ascribed to 
 nature. What satisfaction there is in a name, especially to child- 
 ren ! The superstition of the past, and of the stars, narrowed down 
 to that of "the ape" and "the mud!" Instead of the facts of 
 observation, I have attempted those of logic and common sense. 
 Darwin and Huxley have narrowed the mind down to a contem- 
 plation of the mud " protoplasm," but I call you to a contemplation 
 of man and his possibilities. I came, and found this beautiful earth 
 fanned by the breath of deadly poison, which men, in the very agony 
 of breathing, call life. I go ; but in going, I would leave it a little 
 purer for having been here. I am satisfied that man is the' archi- 
 tect of himself, and of all conditions, from "protoplasm" up ; and 
 it has been my effort to stir him upward to the creation of things 
 worthy of himself. This year, 1881, is the close of an epoch in 
 the world's history. It will, indeed, be sad, if we follow in the 
 
bloody track of our forefathers downward. We have now an 
 opportunity, next year, of cutting loose the shackles that chain us 
 to the corpse of the past. Shall we make the attempt ? Reader, 
 study these pages ; the great ideas are merely shadowed, and are 
 left crude and bare of detail, for you to clothe as your mind shall 
 open to the grasping. Do not deny what I have written without a 
 full and clear comprehension of the ideas. 
 
 It is not claimed that this work is wholly Rosicrucian. The 
 sublime principles of this fraternity are not conveyed in this manner ; 
 but enough is given to enable the thoughtful and earnest searcher 
 after truth to get a glimpse of the glory hidden, even now, as in the 
 past. It is not the loud sounding bells of a sabbath morning, nor 
 the roaring of organs and voices; neither is the high-toned oratory 
 of the officiating priest, true worship ; neither is it the means, how- 
 ever charming and gratifying, which move the infinite to the 
 answering of prayer. Remember, "silence is strength;" noise 
 confuses. It is a an empty sound," which silence comprehends 
 not, or in the comprehension of it, loses it. The unwavering, 
 persistent, incomprehensible (by us) thought, is the sustaining and 
 noiseless moving power of the universe; and he who hath most of 
 it is the most prayer-answering God, and in and by virtue thereof 
 he is the greatest prayer. 
 
 F. B. DOWD. 
 
 (vi) 
 
 ■i 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 I. THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 In this matter-of-fact age the existence of God is 
 seriously questioned by the greatest thinkers. The reason 
 is obviously in the definitions which the religious world — 
 more especially the Christian — gives to the term. The 
 very nature of reason precludes the idea of the existence 
 of a Thing above, separate and apart from the relation- 
 ship of things. Reason cannot transcend its own source. 
 That which is seen and known as nature — it being an in- 
 finitude of objects and phenomena— is considered as 
 sufficient. And to reason and observation it does seem 
 so. But if we undertake an analysis of this tiling we call 
 nature, we shall find it fully as remarkable and as con- 
 tradictory as to suppose a Supreme Being as its maker. 
 The antipathies of things show no one source. There 
 seems, even to broad and deep reason, two principles at 
 war with each other ; equally so to the fool they appear. 
 One cannot be the cause of the other — nor can they be 
 self-adjusting and regulating. Why? Because to us — 
 not even to our reason— no thing is self-existent nor self- 
 supporting. Everything in existence is dependent upon 
 something else. If there is an exception to this, it can- 
 
not be a Thing. If we pass by things in our thought, 
 and descend to principles, they also are dual and antago- 
 nistic. To suppose Good to be the principle, and evil 
 its mere effect, is an absurdity, for one is as real as the 
 other ; and the evil is as much the cause of good as good 
 is the cause of evil. We are so constituted that defi- 
 nitions are a necessity of all growth, intellectual as well 
 physical. All nature is an effort to define itself. But 
 what is it that is defining itself in this warfare of elements 
 — this clashing of interests? Is it not something hidden 
 away alike from feeling or observation and reason ? The 
 things or principles that clash are patent — we think we 
 know them. All are conversant therewith, from the 
 lowest worm that crawls to the loftiest intelligence ; 
 whether it be named pleasure and pain, or God and the 
 Devil, or positive and negative. But that something — - 
 which is struggling up out of the rock, water, air, and 
 mud, into forms of beauty, use and deformity—as if to 
 make itself known in multitudinous ways — what of it? 
 Suppose we name it power ! It is neither positive nor 
 negative — neither good nor evil — but in the definition of 
 itself becomes either good or bad, or indifferent. Power 
 is that which supports all things, and we can well say it 
 is neutral, for in itself there is no duality, . But pause a 
 moment and think; even power has its antagonist- 
 weakness ! Is there the weakness of nothi?ig? Is power 
 limited to things, or even to principles? Again : where 
 can weakness be found save in things ? So power and 
 weakness' must be an attribute of things ; but -where they 
 come fr)m is unknown. 
 
~~9 — 
 
 But what is a principle ? If we can grasp a principle 
 we have a foundation upon which to stand. It is as easy 
 to define a thing as a principle. A principle is that 
 which is self-existent. Ihere can be only one thing in 
 existence that is not derived from something else. What 
 if it be a formless and boundless ocean ! having nothing 
 that can be predicated of things — neither fire nor that 
 other thing that extinguishes fire ; but perhaps a fire, by 
 the side of which the sun is black — or a light the op- 
 posite of our daylight, by the side of which the night and 
 the day are alike — in which worlds float like specks, or 
 as animalculae in water. We call good a principle, when 
 it is only our way of estimating the phenomena of life. 
 Think you there is any good where there is no sense 
 to feel? So good and evil, being only our estimate, 
 must belong to its — and we are the principle after all. 
 We judge by reason of sense. Then may not sense be 
 that formless, unchangeable, infinite something that is not 
 a thing — that hidden and undeflnable fire whose sparks 
 are our thoughts, and whose warmth is our life? Afire, 
 whose quenching by the Infinite will gives forms of 
 matter in the cooling — to be fanned into a blaze by a 
 breath of his life— things all luminous within, darkened 
 outwardly as if by a contraction of the sense? May not 
 sense be the Infinite substance of all space? in which 
 thought is as the rolling of worlds, and it, pulsating with 
 motions and emotions, whispers and voices that do not 
 strike upon our dull senses — so stupid are we. Even our 
 atmosphere pulsates as a breath, and the ether vibrates 
 to every voice or thought, and the " aching void" far 
 
— 10 — 
 
 beyond all suns, worlds and universes — that void of 
 nothingness where God is enthroned as u the over-soul' ' 
 of all — even there the tremblings of thought and feeling 
 meet an answering response ! What do we know after 
 all? We know this : It is sense that is trying to define 
 itself in this contradictory manner we call nature. Out 
 of it and into it come so-called principles, laws and 
 things— as the breath going out and coming in. It is 
 the actor, the cause, the source of a mighty river called 
 life. 
 
 There are other senses of which we have never 
 dreamed — as the unknown is beyond the known. How 
 small and weak is the latter compared to the former! 
 How small the possible in comparison to the impossible ! 
 Is the Supernatural the impossible ? Then how great 
 and vast it must be ! It is natural to grow in knowledge, 
 but the things unknown are infinite — they are all in our 
 ignorance. How vast it is compared to our knowledge ! 
 Is ignorance the Supernatural? The light that flows 
 from the sun is small compared to the limitless darkness 
 that hovers around its radius. Is the darkness the 
 Supernatural? The above is greater than the below. 
 Is it to be wondered at that men have universally looked 
 up to God ? However vast nature may be there is some- 
 thing still above it, which, although incomprehensible, 
 still has an existence to every thinking mind. My nature 
 is limited by my knowledge of myself and my relation- 
 ship to others. So nature is a limited thing, as my mind 
 is my limit. May not this nature, after all, be merely a 
 mental product, as the good and evil of it is? A mental 
 
-11- 
 
 product ! not of one, or even of a race, but of all minds 
 in unison ! Is all nature outside of us, or is it within, as 
 a wondrous mystery hidden in our ignorance. 
 
 Is not the impossible within us, the same as weakness, 
 and ignorance, and darkness? 
 
 Education is nothing but the opening of a " door," or 
 the lighting of a lamp in a dark place, through which 
 things before unknown appear to us as the possible, and 
 are very simple. The circumstances of our lives are all 
 within us, as the possibilities of our natures, but hidden 
 from us in our ignorance, till our acts flow out as a light, 
 showing us merely a few things of the many still lying 
 back in the infinite darkness of the unexplored beyond. 
 The hidden is infinite. We are hidden from ourselves, 
 and know not the wondrous powers lying back of our 
 smallness. Even we are astonished at the wondrous 
 skill of this thing we call man, which is but the super- 
 natural revealing itself to us. It is very close to us — 
 possibly it may be us ! hidden from us, as all things are 
 hidden from the infant's closed eyes. I feel so, at least 
 at times, when I forget the narrow limits of this life, and 
 it is my effort herein to show what acts are the greatest 
 lights in this infinite darkness of ignorance, so that per- 
 adventure some one more gifted than I, may possibly sur- 
 prise the Supernatural himself some day with the torch, 
 lighted not by man . 
 
 It may be an idle task to search for God, but he has 
 given us questioning minds, and every instinct of nature 
 prompts us to ask, " Who and what is God?" and I 
 realize that the world grows by each apparent or pre- 
 
— In- 
 tended solution of it. Possibly God joins himself to us 
 in this way from out the shoreless darkness of our own 
 natures. 
 
 The first letters of God's alphabet is nature. They 
 are multitudinous — for each object is a letter. What is 
 the word ? " The word of God " is the sense of all these 
 things when reduced back from the contradictions of 
 multiplicity to one. It then becomes intelligible to sense 
 of a limited capacity. For nothing less than infinity can 
 comprehend the meaning of all things. But the sense of 
 the finite mind is the same as that, of the infinite mind. 
 All things are in one, and exist in it and of it, but not 
 from it. 
 
 In this infinite variety of things—this multiplicity of 
 objects — this division of the one — the mind goes back in 
 search of the first principle, the foundation from which 
 they all spring. This infinite principle of power is sense. 
 The vast oceans of space pulsate with sense. The worlds, 
 suns, stars and objects of space are each and all held to- 
 gether and kept in place by sense. All things are sus- 
 pended in an ocean of sense. Nay ! things are sense — 
 and sensible, if the darkness would roll from off our souls. 
 Sense is the only thing in existence that comprehends 
 things. To comprehend is to enclose, or envelop. God 
 reveals himself to the sense of things. In fact, he is 
 sense itself. 
 
 God exists not as an objective, but as a subjective being 
 — not separate and apart from nature, but as the creative 
 principle thereof, residing in all and permeating all that 
 is. In this view the supernatural becomes comprehensi- 
 
— 13 — 
 
 bie. It is the soul of nature and objects : hence God is 
 objectified in his works. He who looks for God as an 
 object to worship will find many on the road to power, 
 but he who looks for God within himself will feel the 
 fullness of satisfaction and power, which God gives to all 
 who love the good and true. That which is unchangeable 
 is supernatural and eternal. In nature things are 
 mutable. Matter may be divided till there is nothing 
 left of it. Analyze a thing, and you have nothing left of 
 it save a little dross. Take a chair for example. What 
 is it ? A few pieces of wood put together for use. Take 
 it to pieces and the chair vanishes. Burn the wood and 
 we have ashes. Melt the ashes and we have some other 
 substances to which science gives names. But where 
 and what is the chair ? Is it a mere name ? or is it a 
 substance ? It is an effect — a result of the combination 
 of pieces of wood. If it is an effect, where and what is 
 the cause? I answer, the chair was first an idea con- 
 ceived in the mind of some man, and came out of the man, 
 and was formed in matter for use. Bat the real chair is 
 an idea, and hence it is as indestructible as man himself. 
 The same is true of all things that man makes. They 
 come out of man as the light of his intelligence illuminates 
 the darkness of his ignorance, wherein infinity exists. 
 Nature is matter, motion and space, but the sense of it is 
 the supernatural. It interprets itself, as I am feebly try- 
 ing to do. Each man must interpret for himself, and 
 his interpretation will be himself merely, as the sense of 
 his mind illumines the darkness within. Space is a 
 vacuum in which things exist in motion, or in sense. It 
 
— 14— 
 
 is the "over-soul," and comprehends or includes all. 
 This is the supernatural. The sense of a thing gives it 
 motion, and in motion things gestate, as in a womb, and 
 grow, or become materialized. 
 
 At the centre of things there are no things, neither is 
 there any motion there. Perfection and stagnation exist 
 at the centre. The centre is a vacuum, and is the soul. 
 
 All worlds wheel around centres, and centres are souls, 
 and souls are Gods. In God ("The Over-Soul") all 
 things are possible— in nature, where soul is a centre, the 
 impossible exists, because here is ignorance, darkness 
 and weakness. "He who limits things by his narrow 
 sense is a fool," says Hargrave Jennings, one of 
 England's great Rosicrucians \ and I say, whoever limits 
 the possible shows his weakness and want of compre- 
 hension. We do not know what exists in nature. We 
 know very little, and what little we know is a damage to 
 us, save as it shows us our weakness and the power and 
 infinitude of the possible. To return to ideas. 
 
 We are as we think : ideas rule and govern all action 
 and all growth. Ideas are souls — entities of all being — 
 unchangeable and indestructible; they exist in the spirit ; 
 the atmosphere is the spirit of the earth, and in it are the 
 souls of vegetation having been evolved from the earth. 
 They hover around, and when conditions are favorable 
 they descend according to the law of attraction and 
 affinity, and spring up in the soil of vegetation. Vege- 
 tation does not depend altogether upDn seeds, it springs 
 spontaneously from the earth. To illustrate : when a 
 young man, my father burned several coal pits on one 
 
 H 
 
-15- 
 
 bed during the winter ; the next fall, in passing by, I 
 saw several plants, commonly called the Mullen, growing 
 in the old coal bed. The Mullen plant was unknown in 
 that part of the country previously. A man in Northern 
 Iowa dug a well over one hundred feet in depth. The 
 great pile of clay lay there in the sunlight and dark- 
 ness, wept over by dew and rain, scorched in summer 
 and froze in winter, till the next year it produced a 
 crop of weeds that were not to be found anywhere in 
 all the country round about. 
 
 It is a well known fact to the pioneers of the wilder- 
 ness of northern Pennsylvania (and, I suppose to, other 
 woodlands) that on a newly cleared piece of woodland 
 when the soil is killed by burning, "fire-weeds" spring up 
 almost as thick as the hair on an animal's back. 
 
 There is such a thing as chemical affinity; and the 
 earth being prepared by heat or in any other manner 
 makes "conditions" for new or old forms of vegetation 
 to come into existence. The earth's atmosphere is all 
 alive with ideas — ideas of vegetables, animals and men — ■ 
 all waiting for favorable conditions to enable them to be 
 born into existence. Ideas are infinite in number and 
 variety, corresponding to all conditions from mineral up 
 to man. They are the soul-life and volition of matter? 
 and they enter into matter at every point where condi- 
 tions are favorable. A scientist told me the other day 
 that a drop of nitric acid applied to a piece of fresh 
 broken granite rock, revealed under the microscope 
 numerous living beings similar to animalculse found in 
 stagnant water. " This," said he, " proves that the solid 
 
— 16 — 
 
 rock is full of life." But it proves no such thing. It 
 simply shows that the union of the acid with the rock 
 produced motion there, and wherever there is motion 
 there is a magnetic current, and forms having life spring 
 into existence — not that they were any more in the rock 
 than in the acid, or that of necessity they were in either. 
 I hold that all forms are ideas materialized, that ideas are 
 eternal, but forms are evanescent. The sunlight gives 
 color to vegetation ; color is an idea, but, although the 
 foundation of color may reside in the mineral of plants, 
 yet we all know that the sun develops it. A child de- 
 velops in utero, but who does not know that the soul 
 comes through the father? Matter is the mother; spirit 
 is the father. 
 
 In every atom of matter is a vacuum — else there would 
 be no attraction — for matter crowds upon vacuum and 
 hence takes form, and vacuum is the womb of matter, 
 into which ideas are attracted whenever moved by a 
 magnetic current. 
 
 All life and organization are dependent upon this cur- 
 rent, and this is dependent upon the formation of a 
 magnet, or the union of the positive and negative, the 
 acid and alkali, the father and mother. As spirit is the 
 father, and as ideas (souls) come from the Father, so 
 does spirit baptize matter, impregnating it. " God is a 
 spirit." So the supernatural is a spirit, and will beget 
 itself in matter whenever conditions are favorable. It is 
 upon exactly the same principle as the generation of 
 mosquitoes in stagnant water. Low weak forms are gen- 
 erated in low conditions. Ideas ? being soul, are food 
 
-17 — 
 
 for souls. Hence man grows in creative and original 
 power through his reception of ideas. Ideas take root in 
 the soil of man's mind according to its condition, exactly 
 as vegetation springs up in the soil of the earth. If the 
 soil be poor the vegetation will be inferior If the mind 
 be low and vulgar, tae ideas attracted will be inferior ; but 
 ideas of whatever grade or kind are a creative power % 
 There is a spontaneity of mind as well as of earth. That 
 which springs up of itself is generally weeds, but the most 
 delicious fruits are produced by effort — culture. The 
 higher the culture, the nearer the approximation to the 
 supernatural. To show the road thereto is my object. 
 
 Look you at the burrowing worm, and at the soaring 
 eagle ! Step up, slowly, laboriously, from the lowest 
 form, step by step, to the highest form of life known on 
 this planet — man. Do you stop here? And because your 
 poor sight sees no higher form will you deny its existence ? 
 Do you see intelligence graded from the snail to the loftiest . 
 intellect, and then, by your narrow sense, limit grada- 
 tion of power ? Behold the grass of the fields ! the lilies 
 of the valley ! Then look aloft, by day or by night, at 
 the wondrous manifestation of an intelligent power, and 
 blush in shame at your presumption. 
 
 We grasp a little of knowledge, a little of life, a little 
 of spirit by the five senses, but the vital principles of 
 science and of human action are only grasped by the 
 loftiest reason. This is intuition. Are you a reasonable 
 being, and yet limit God by denying him ? If so, your 
 reason is of the lowest order ; it is destructive ; it is not 
 God -like and creative. Analyze matter in the crucible of 
 
— 18- 
 
 thought — dissect all forms with the scalpel of reason, and 
 then when you are done with your work tell me what you 
 know. If your work has not inspired you with a love of 
 the unknown mystery surrounding and dwelling within 
 all things, you are an egotist. If you cavil at names you 
 are a fool. Are you an artist? Then take your inspira- 
 tions from one who works eternally, and never makes a 
 failure. Are you a mechanic? Go study the suspension 
 bridges the spider makes, and the comb of the honey bee, 
 or the mechanism of a tree. I need not multiply words. 
 Whatever you are, or whatever you aspire to be, the power 
 is waiting for you — -the paterns are spread out for your 
 study. 
 
 The supernatural is in all, and. is subservient to our 
 wishes. But it is our work to make conditions — these 
 have no limit. There is no interference — you can be just 
 what you like to be ; but growth is slow. Why hurry ? 
 Is not eternicy for us? It is the hurry and worry of life 
 that destroys power. Trouble and vexation destroy 
 health and pleasure, and these are all there is of value. 
 All things are suggestive, for they are ideas ; they call us 
 out of ourselves to revel in the infinite. Is there no sug- 
 gestion that comes to you, kind reader, of the superna- 
 tural ? Is there no intuitive feeling that speaks to you of 
 immortal, undying power? Do you not, in your better 
 moods, long to drink at the fountain of life, pleasure and 
 individuality? If not, lam sorry for you. Ideas give 
 fulness of life and pleasure — the greater the idea, the 
 greater fulness and power. What idea is greater than 
 the supernatural ? 
 
— 19 — 
 
 We talk glibly of the laws of nature, as if they were 
 fixed and immutable ; but they are set aside by every 
 habit which disgraces the race. Furthermore, modern 
 times are rife with accounts of the dead appearing to the 
 living, and of the living appearing as the dead : of levi- 
 tation and the moving of substance without a motive 
 power, etc., etc. The suspension of any one law of 
 nature proves beyond all question that all are subject to 
 the same power, and all may be suspended or rendered 
 inoperative. 
 
 II. PRINCIPLES OF NATURE. 
 
 I believe in definitions; but all definition is arbitrary. 
 To define a thing is a creation. That nature exists is a 
 certainty, but when we come to define it we shall find it 
 not so simple. We define things in order that we may 
 understand each other. 
 
 We speak of nature as if it was an entity — an indivi- 
 dual thing. But the fact is, there are myriads of things 
 and conditions in nature which are parts thereof. In all 
 this diversity, there must be a something the intellect can 
 seize upon as a. fact upon which to stand while we search 
 in this whirl of atoms and worlds for a stationary 
 principle of being. To find that, which is common to 
 all, is to find the real. If nature is divided into parts, 
 it exists as a whole; every part must have something 
 common to the whole. 
 
 To analyze a part, is to analyze the whole, for the 
 same laws inhere in an atom, as in a world. An atom 
 
— 20- 
 exists by the same laws that the earth does ; and its modes 
 of action are the same. The law whereby matter coheres 
 and gathers together, is attraction. This is a binding force. 
 But the law that dissolves atoms, and throws them off, is 
 the law of repulsion. These two — the positive and the 
 negative — constitute the laws of motion. Everything 
 exists by virtue of motion ; but there is a point where 
 there is no motion. That point is the centre from 
 whence motion takes its rise. At the centre of the earth 
 there is no up nor down, no positive nor negative ; it 
 is simply vacant of these things — /. e. all things exist here 
 in solution, as it were — or conditionless. 
 
 Things differ in nature. Shall we say, then, that 
 nature does not exist because there are so many natures? 
 By no means: for there are two laws/ acting in all 
 conditions, which belong to that real nature, which is 
 the substratum. They flow out from it as the positive 
 and negative flows from a magnet. As there is a neutral 
 point between the positive and negative, a point where 
 neither exists; so nature is a neutral ground, lying between 
 antagonistic forces. 
 
 Nature may be likened unto a magnet ; which, in itself, 
 moves not, but sends out positive and negative forces. 
 To a thing belongs motion and space ; without motion 
 nothing could exist. It is motion that fills the void, and 
 prevents nothing from asserting its sway. Things in 
 motion must have space to move in ; so all things are 
 triune in manifestation. A thing is composed of two 
 visible and one invisible points ; one visible point is space 
 in which it exists; the other is the thing itself; but the 
 
— 21 — 
 
 third, or invisible point is its motion. The earth and 
 space surrounding it are visible, but its motions are 
 invisible. It stands still, and we are always on the top. 
 The soul of nature is motion, or rather, that which pro- 
 duces motion. Hence, the third part of things, which 
 is the most important part, is invisible. Matter, space 
 and sense are the three things which constitute nature. 
 Matter needs no definition. Space is known, and is 
 relatively a vacuum ; but the sense thereof is known not 
 by visibility. The relative proves the absolute, the same 
 as a part proves the whole. A relative vacuum proves 
 an absolute vacuum ; as relative sense proves an absolute 
 sense. Existence is that which is visible, or that which 
 comes en raport with visible things. The invisible and 
 the unknown are the absolute. The nearer we approach 
 the unknown the more we are entering the realm of 
 power, and losing our hold on visible and tangible 
 things. The nature of a thing is its conditions, and 
 these conditions are only its mode of action. As there 
 are only two laws of action — if those laws are followed 
 to their source we shall find nature herself totally stag- 
 nant and indifferent. 
 
 I am aware there is a class of thinkers who claim that 
 there is no inertia, and that "nature abhors a vacuum." 
 This may be true, but it is far, very far, from 
 evident. It is just as logical to claim that nature is ' 'one 
 vast whole," and that it is not made up of parts or 
 conditions. I claim, that inertia is a condition in which 
 no motion or life is visible, or that is known ; and this is 
 the dividing line between the two great contending powers, 
 
— 22 — 
 
 attraction and repulsion. Furthermore, I claim that a 
 vacuum exists in matter — the source of its attractive and 
 repulsive power, and that said vacuum is foreign to 
 nature, i. e. a prisoner in conditions. Its efforts to free 
 itself give rise to motions, analagous to combustion. 
 This is, indeed, the soul of things. 
 
 That nature is a relentless, unfeeling, remorseless 
 power, needs no argument. It moves on, regardless of 
 the waste of worlds, or the sacrifice of life or forms. 
 To nature, death is the same as birth and life, as if it 
 were a stranger. 
 
 Nature suffers not ; neither does she enjoy. Remove 
 sensation from nature and it is neither good nor evil. 
 The earth, water, air, electricity, the sun, moon and 
 stars, without something to make comparisons, are all 
 indifferently good or evil alike. There can be no good 
 or evil save to things that suffer and enjoy. This indif- 
 ference corresponds to ignorance, for out of indifferent 
 nature comes all of life, even as knowledge springs from 
 ignorance. Absolutely nature exists only as sense, in 
 which view we are nothing, and matter is nothing ; but 
 we, as relative beings, know literally nothing of the 
 absolute. Hence, the folly of reasoning from an abso- 
 lute standpoint. 
 
 It is claimed, that evolution is the law of nature. 
 This is partly true, for evolution is due to repulsion. 
 Repulsion is the first law of existence, and is the male 
 principle, from which sprung the female principle — 
 attraction. (See the allegory of Adam's rib.) All motion 
 is circular ; and matter thrown from a centre must re- 
 
— 23 — 
 
 turn in time. There are no straight lines in existence. 
 The returning current of a magnet is negative, or female. 
 Revolution is the law of nature, inasmuch as it includes 
 both repulsion and attraction. A circle is symbolic of 
 eternity. The soul, in its efforts to free itself from con- 
 ditions, projects a magnetic stream from itself, which de- 
 scribes a circle in its motion. As magnetism (or, more 
 properly, spirit) moves in chaos— that part of the current 
 which is negative or female — polarizes or combines mat- 
 ter from chaos — and thus peoples space with stars or 
 worlds. The negative is the combining current. It is 
 formative. The earth upon the same principle evolves 
 spirit from itself, i. e., dissolves and throws off matter in 
 a refined state, which in its return deposits the germs of 
 vegetation, animals or man, upon and in the earth's sur- 
 face, impregnating it, and they grow. Growth is motion 
 — or evolution of spirit, and involution of matter from 
 the unknown, chaotic state, combining into forms. 
 Growth is only matter in motion, according to the laws 
 of motion, which are circular or revolutional. Evolution ! ! 
 Indeed ! It is not half of the truth. What of involution? 
 Like the light from a candle, refined matter is being 
 evolved from matter, which radiates round about, and as 
 constantly returns, bringing from the unknown something 
 of the infinite to combine in forms of beauty and use. 
 Transient and fleeting as these forms may be, they each 
 and all contain souls struggling for freedom, and the 
 ocean from whence they came ; the stream of life, flows 
 downward, and not upward. God is above— but things 
 being less are beneath. Causation is hidden in the bosom 
 
24 
 
 of mystery and the darkness of the impenetrable shadow ; 
 but effects follow the light, and flow on ever as worlds, 
 suns, stars, and human beings. 
 
 All matter, all life, all forms, and all mind is involved 
 in an unfathomable mystery, which enters into existence 
 in the light, taking form as matter and thought. If this 
 were not so, matter would become less and less by its 
 action ; for light is but the consumption of matter. The 
 evolution of matter is the involution of God, which in- 
 creases as light increases. 
 
 But oh ! the mystery of the night surrounding us ! 
 Who can fathom its depths? Who can explore infinitude? 
 Things reside in the shadow from which they come 
 stealthily into the light for a little time — then steal away 
 into the shadow again. Man with his torch gropes his 
 way slowly and with cautious steps in the thick darkness, 
 and anon some grotesque shape comes partially in view 
 — then disappears as if the light had dissolved it. The 
 darkness, rendered more intense by the presence of light, 
 crowds around before and behind; and upon the confines 
 of light — in the twilight of being — the formless takes 
 form, and such as can bear the light march in serried 
 columns along with man. 
 
 The light we carry is what we have learned. It en- 
 ables us to see and define that which otherwise were 
 formless. 
 
— 25 
 
 WHAT IS LIFE? 
 
 To define, life is to live : for in our efforts to define 
 a thing or principle, we unconsciously become like that 
 which we attack. Analysis without definition is destruc- 
 tion. To define life is a herculean task. Life is a mani- 
 festation of something having power to feel which resides 
 in an organization. All things visible are simply effects 
 of some hidden cause — causes are always hidden. The 
 true mode of reasoning is from effects towards causes, 
 which, receding as we advance, we only approximate. 
 Life, as we understand it, is a result of the union of soul 
 and spirit. It is impossible to tell what a thing is ; any 
 word or name that expresses what we mean is the best 
 we can do. The Word of God is the meaning of God ; 
 and the word of Life is the significance thereof, which is 
 the object of this book. It is the desire of every earnest 
 person to know why we are here ; and in order to answer 
 the question, it is better to explain modes of action than 
 to multiply names. I look upon life as matter and sense 
 in union or in motion : for all motion is the cause of union 
 of atoms. As I have said before, motion is the soul or 
 sense of things. The laws of motion are the laws of 
 combustion, for they are the same. Everything reminds 
 us of the fire out of which we came, and to which all 
 things return in the last analysis. 
 
 To find a something common to all forms of matter- 
 animate and inanimate — is to find that real nature I am 
 trying to define ; that will be a fact as real as existence itself; 
 that fact is that which we feel and know. In other words, 
 
— 26 — 
 
 that perception of life which comes through the five 
 senses, and not through that higher or intellectual sense. 
 
 By virtue of these five senses the earth appears as an 
 undulating plain, with the sun rising, moving over head, 
 and setting at night. We are always on the top of the 
 earth, and the heavens are above. 
 
 No mode of reasoning can make us feel that we are 
 half of the time underneath — or standing out sideways in 
 space. That this is owing to our relationship to the earth 
 I freely admit, but the knowledge we have gained 
 through the exercise of the higher intellect sets aside the 
 basic facts of existence, and proves them a delusion of 
 sense. Now which is correct? May not the facts of in- 
 tellect be a delusion of sense, also ? There is no absolute- 
 ness in man, save his existence. 
 
 These same senses cause us to feel pleasure and pain. 
 Are they real ? or is it a delusion of sense? These senses 
 tell us of the up and the down, and the reversal of our- 
 selves is death. We instinctively love pleasure, which 
 we call good, and elevate it as God. But we dread 
 pain, and avoid it as the devil, which is low down and to 
 be kept down, if possible. Reason as you will, sail 
 around the globe, explore space and measure the stars, 
 and then teach that there is no high and no low, no good 
 nor evil, no up nor down ; but still common sense remains 
 — as nature remains — a solemn protest against the light of 
 the intellect as a guide to those deep and fundamental 
 principles of existence ; which to be of any value must 
 bring pleasure instead of pain. Human reason leads the 
 soul to nothing; while the universal instinct warns man 
 
— 27 — 
 
 of the evils of pain and death, — as if creative genius has 
 planted in man a something in which the brute shares 
 — that causes him to dread death, and to value life. 
 And furthermore an instinct that tells him of a nature 
 long since forgotten, save in legend; of the unnatural 
 state in which he now lives, or rather suffers, and of a 
 supernatural state to which he may attain. 
 
 The common sense of atoms teaches them to lie 
 still in their places in obedience to attraction, and the 
 same teaches them to fly when set free by repulsion. 
 The same laws make all things related, and all life one 
 homogeneous whole. We are relative beings, and as 
 such, logic, to be of any use, must be relative also. 
 Common sense corresponds to indifference or to inertia, 
 because it is ignorance. But what is the knowledge 
 worth which destroys common sense and the naturalness 
 of things? That which destroys nature, destroys happiness. 
 
 Who so bold as to assert that the wisdom of man adds 
 to his happiness? The first manifestation of nature is 
 law or action, which is two-fold, as I have stated. This 
 must be nature, which, as a cause, is superior to effects, as 
 an artist is superior to his works. Man, as an effect of 
 nature, is inferior, but God, who is the Author of nature, 
 is superior to all. Nature cannot be infinite, for it is 
 particled, and is bounded and limited as a whole. There 
 can be only one thing in existence as an absolute entity. 
 The word is superior to the letters composing it, but the 
 sense is superior to both. Thoughts are letters of an 
 unknown alphabet, nature is the word, God is the sense. 
 That which destroys the word takes away the sense. The 
 
— 28 — 
 
 thought of the age is that there is no God ; such is the 
 unnaturalness of man. The life-principle is one homo- 
 geneous whole ; it cannot be particled * it is the same in 
 worm as in man. The little life of one thing is just as 
 potent, and as great for that thing, as the greater life is 
 for another. If the life of one thing is immortal, then 
 all life is. But the life may be beaten out of a thing by 
 processes, to be explained hereafter, so that it, as a thing, 
 has no self-supporting power. 
 
 Everything is dual — " Male and female created he 
 them," — darkness and light, ignorance and intelligence, 
 cold and heat, evil and good, opposites, antagonists, all 
 go hand in hand — inseparable. There is nothing known 
 but has its opposite ; and one being given, the other 
 may be found close at hand. Furthermore, the third 
 thing, that which makes the triangle of imperfection, 
 resides always within the two visible parts. Two things 
 being placed side by side are said to be in contact ; but 
 there is always something between them, which prevents 
 them from becoming one, for absolute contact is oneness. 
 That which separates things is condition. Distance is 
 condition. If all things were in like condition, they 
 would fuse and blend so that all form would be lost. 
 This third thing — that is not a thing — this something 
 intangible and immaterial, I call the soul of things \ for 
 by virtue of it things exist and have motion. Distance 
 is space, and space is a vacuum. Hence all forms have 
 souls, for there is a condition or distance between all 
 forms. That which is visible and tangible has its antago- 
 nist or opposite. Its antagonist is that which destroys 
 
— 29— 
 
 it, and not that which sustains it. Indifferent nature 
 is antagonized by life. All life which has volition preys 
 upon and sustains itself by that which has no volition. 
 This is very evident in herbivorous animals, but not 
 quite so evident in the carnivora ; though when we stop 
 to consider that the flesh of the sheep is due to vegeta- 
 tion, upon which it lives, it becomes evident how the wolf 
 feeds upon vegetation which has gone through a chemical 
 change in the form of the sheep. After death all things 
 are indifferent. Flesh is as indifferent after death as veg- 
 etation. Nature, then, being visible, has its visible 
 antagonist. The antagonist of nature being life, the 
 highest type of life calls for our attention : that is, man. 
 
— 30 
 
 III. THE UNNATURAL. 
 
 What is man ? He is the highest form known, con- 
 taining in himself the greatest quantity of life, the most 
 intelligence, the greatest will, the most creative power. 
 Indifferent nature corresponds to darkness, ignorance, 
 weakness, want of power. The ancient philosophers called 
 the earth "the egg of the night." Out of darkness all 
 things come. Ignorance is the mother of all conditions ; 
 in ignorance we begin this life, and struggle towards the 
 light of intelligence ; from the miasmatic swamps of 
 ignorance come all conditions that we war against. A 
 certain form contains a certain amount of life, and 
 wherever there is conscious life there is pain and pleas- 
 ure. Life gives pleasure, but its deficiency causes pain. 
 To increase life is the road to pleasure ; the deficiency 
 of life causes the unnatural to appear, viz : pain. 
 Indifferent nature is as full of life as it will contain, and 
 we have no reason to suppose that there is pain or 
 pleasure therein. But to me nature seems in an ecstacy 
 of growth and decay, and that man, by violation of 
 laws, has fallen beneath the floor ecstatic, into an ocean 
 of tears, whose waves alternately howl with storms of 
 agony, or sing with zephyrs of melodious pleasure. 
 
 But the moment consciousness came into existence, 
 coupled with will and power to act, having volition as 
 
 ■^HHHHHH^H 
 
— 31 — 
 
 freedom of action, that moment commenced the creation 
 of conditions altogether different than had previously 
 existed. I care nothow slow the process, — it takes ages 
 to produce some things. Every worm that burrows 
 in the earth, everything that crawls upon its surface, every 
 bird that plucks a seed or eats a worm, every animal that 
 crops the herbage of the plains, or that devours other 
 animals, up to man, who tunnels the earth, plows the 
 ground, or improves vegetation, fruits and animals \ he 
 who scans the heavens, fathoms and bridges the oceans, 
 and subdues and subjugates all other things, these are 
 all creators — creators of conditions : conditions wherein 
 there is less of harmony, less of fulness of life. The 
 action of will is exhaustive, especially its over-actio?i, 
 which comes from ignorance of the laws of action. . In 
 our ignorance of the future we get an imaginative idea 
 of some great good, to be derived from doing some 
 certain thing. Immediately we set about it, and, being 
 led captive by the object in view, regardless of heat and 
 cold, hunger or thirst, pain or pleasure, we rush along 
 till exhausted. Exhaustion is disease. It is unnatural ! 
 All disease is unnatural. It comes from action !— the 
 action of a Free Will. That man should be the most 
 unnatural being in existence, comes not only from his 
 freedom of action, but from his greater range of action, 
 his greater power of thought, invention, and imagina- 
 tion. If nature be considered indifferent, man antago- 
 nizes it in every particular. He is a being of thought, 
 judgment, memory, imagination, craft, love, and will. 
 Pride and ambition are his ruling traits. Many there be 
 
— 82- 
 
 who claim that all things are natural ; that there is no 
 above or below nature; that man cannot violate or go 
 contrary to nature's laws. The inevitable conclusion 
 derived from the foregoing is, that man is a mere 
 machine, moving only as he is moved upon. That there is 
 no such thing as volition: no high, no low, no merit or 
 demerit, no good, no evil. Any man with common 
 sense knows such conclusions to be false. Why? Be- 
 cause it is contrary to experience, and every- day /#<;&• 
 of existence. By virtue of our organization, by virtue 
 of the conditions of our very existence, there exists the 
 up and down, the high and low, etc., and any con- 
 clusions of logic, which set these mundane facts aside, 
 are based on false premises. 
 
 What a demon nature or God must be, to hold us 
 responsible for the violation of laws, when we have no 
 power to help ourselves. But, they assert further, that 
 there is no violation of law ; that nature's laws cannot 
 be broken. I simply say, Gentlemen, you know better ; 
 anyone of common sense can see the absurdity of such 
 ideas. Do we not surfer for the violence we do to 
 ourselves ? Most assuredly. Then why does nature, or 
 God, necessity, or fate make us suffer for doing that 
 which we cannot help doing ? Man is of necessity a law 
 maker, and, in his ignorance, cannot conform to nature's 
 laws. To conform to nature would be to revolve in an 
 eternal circle ; but man, in striving for the new, breaks 
 through the circle of ignorance and indifference, and 
 gets hurt in so doing. Thus he becomes diseased 
 by his own act. I freely admit that he cannot help 
 
— 33 — 
 
 violating the law on account of ignorance, but each act 
 or violation is a creation, and is more pleasing toyman 
 because it is his own. And furthermore, the ignorance 
 we complain of is in ourselves, and not in surroundings. 
 Thus we compel ourselves to act ; each act creates light, 
 and light is the object of our existence. Evil is our 
 teacher. It is wisely ordered that we shonld .suffer ; for 
 that increases action or light, to which we are responsible, 
 and by which all are judged. We are nature, necessity, 
 or fate. 
 
 "Whatever is, is right ! " No, indeed : the reverse is 
 nearer the truth. There is nothing true to its condition; 
 if things were true and right, there would be no need 
 of improvement, and no possible room for it. There 
 would be no foreshadowing of a better state of things : 
 no aspirations, no longings, no heart aches, nor weariness 
 of soul. There is little of right and truth in ail things ; 
 just enough to give us a taste of the good, and make us 
 dissatisfied with our present condition, and spur u s 
 on to effort to better it. No man can climb who is at 
 the top of the ladder. Truth and right are far, very far, 
 above us, but we get flashes and gleams of the glory 
 occasionally, which shows us where we stand on the 
 ladder. Hideous, weird, fantastic shapes glare out of 
 the darkness beneath, but above us is light, truth, 
 knowledge, love, glory, harmony. Nature is harmony, 
 but the unnatural is discord. Man is unnatural because 
 he is less than nature. He pretends to love nature, but 
 in reality he despises it. We are creatures of art. We 
 
y 
 
 — 34 
 
 are made up mainly of hereditary and acquired habits. 
 These have become a second nature, which we admire. 
 This second nature I call the unnatural. True, nature 
 keeps along with us in our downward course, and fights 
 manfully against disease ; restoring us in sleep, and 
 adapting itself to our vices and crimes. It is our volun- 
 tary powers which ruin us, but it is the involuntary 
 which gives us what little health we have. When we 
 forget ourselves in sweet sleep, nature asserts itself; and 
 even then the abnormal habits of our daily lives prevents 
 her work. There is very little indifferent sleep. We 
 are too intense; the intensity of the day disturbs the 
 night. We cannot forget that which we love : our daily 
 avocations, our graspings, our hoarding up, our over- 
 reaching of each other : these haunt us in our sleep. 
 Nature must play second. Our natural habits we are 
 ashamed of, and hide them away as we cover our naked- 
 ness. We take no lesson even from innocent! childhood 
 — glimpses of the kingdom of glory — but our earliest 
 recollections are pointings of the finger of shame. 
 
 To be dignified is the glory of civilization. To 
 suppress natural laughter, and smile instead, is grand ; 
 to " put the best side out," and to conceal the natural; 
 to pretend to be greater, or better than we are ; to 
 think more of our looks, walk, manners, clothing, and 
 the wealth we have robbed the poor of — this is civiliza- 
 tion. To turn away from one poorly clad, not deigning 
 an answer to a civil question; to look coldly in the eye 
 of a stranger, without speaking when accosted, because 
 
-35 — 
 
 you have not been introduced : this is dignity ; this is 
 fashionable. To bow down to kings, Popes, priests, and 
 the nobility ; to shout and hurrah when they show them- 
 selves ; to toil to support them in their pomp and 
 idleness ; to march in serried columns to deadly strife with 
 each other; to murder each other without enmity — 
 this it is to be civilized. The earth is drenched with 
 human gore, and her fair fields are rich with the bone- 
 dust of humanity. The glory of one nation is the de- 
 struction of another. What for ? To perpetuate the dam- 
 nable and unnatural idea that some men are better than 
 others ; that some were made to rule while others were 
 made to serve. Man has made this earth one vast pande- 
 monium — a cesspool, out of which come malarial vapors 
 and malarial beings, distorted in body, deformed in 
 mind, dwarfed in spirit. 
 
 Look at the diabolical crimes—the fiendish actions of 
 men, the wrong and outrage — at the deadly diseases con- 
 stantly on the increase in type and malignancy — and 
 then say, if you can, that these things are natural. I can- 
 not. Alas ! how we degrade nature or God in the bare 
 idea. Not willing to assume the responsibility that 
 nature puts upon him, he, ADAM-like, hides behind the 
 fig leaves his nakedness, and ascribes to fate, nature, 
 chance or necessity the actions he is ashamed of. ' i Forced 
 into the world, forced through it, and forced out again," 
 he thinks force will bear the blame, suffer the penalty, 
 and take all the responsibility of his actions ; while at 
 the same time he is groaning under adversity, and suffer- 
 
—36 — 
 
 ing from disease resulting from his own acts, which he 
 might have avoided with a little knowledge and self- 
 control. 
 
 The natural and the unnatural go hand in hand, as 
 matter and sense, body and mind, the voluntary and in- 
 voluntary, ignorance and knowledge — the same as the 
 opposite poles of a magnet. The moment the two poles 
 unite, there is no longer a current — the poles cease to 
 exist. But so long as the poles are separated, or con- 
 nected by matter in a different condition, the magnetic 
 current, like a stream, passes from the positive to the 
 negative. But unite the poles so that there shall be no 
 opposing conditions between them, and the magnet 
 ceases to be a magnet. The telegraphic wire, making 
 the circuit of the earth-, or a portion of it, carries messages 
 back and forth, but it emits sparks, and leaves its messages 
 only where the line is disconnected. If you say the current 
 exists, although not visible, when the connection is perfect, 
 you assert that which cannot be demonstrated. The two 
 poles of a battery being connected by a wire, no current 
 is perceptible, and I have no way of knowing of a current 
 only as I form a part of the circuit with my body. I 
 then feel the current passing through my nerves. This 
 feeling is produced by the resistance of my nerves. The 
 matter of which my body is composed is not in the same 
 condition as the matter composing the wires, and, 
 although both may be good conductors, yet these con- 
 ditions of matter serve the same purpose as a disconnec- 
 tion of the poles \ and there where the obstacle is, the 
 force is patent. 
 
— 37 — 
 
 Matter and sense (or mind) are the two poles of an 
 invisible magnet. Sense is no more a result of matter 
 than matter is a result of sense. They both exist, and 
 are mutually dependent, not upon each other, but upon 
 the magnet. In the magnet we glimpse the super- 
 natural in the magic mirror — nature, inertia, indif- 
 ference, as an image of the real reversed. 
 
— 88 — 
 
 IV.— BODY AND SPIRIT. 
 
 Man is the ultimate, or fruit of the tree of life. The 
 lower orders of aminate creatures may be termed the roots, 
 trunk, branches, leaves, etc., — but man is the fruit. 
 Some say "he is an epitome of the Universe." This is a 
 mistaken idea. Men differ one from another as the lower 
 animals differ, or the various orders of vegetables. The 
 apple is a species of fruit, but there are many varieties 
 of apples. However much men differ in looks, form, 
 manners and disposition, there is one peculiarity notice- 
 able in all, viz : the correspondence to the lower orders. 
 We all resemble, more or less, some variety of the 
 lower orders ; and the less the resemblance the further 
 is the removal therefrom. Some have the tiger, lion, 
 vulture, hawk, eagle, sheep, goat, cat, lynx, ox, owl, ser- 
 pent, various kinds of fishes, etc., etc., " ad infinitum ," 
 predominating. Some by their build and motions show 
 that they have just come up out of the water — or, 
 possibly, may be going back into it. Man is an epitome 
 of the elements he has developed up through. We carry 
 something of what we have been along with us — viz : 
 the spirit. 
 
 And some men, having developed up through certain 
 elements, are an epitome of those elements, but not of 
 others. Elements are infinite ; but power is not based in 
 elements, neither can immortality be predicated therein. 
 
— 39- 
 
 Animals are but vegetables cut loos© at the roots ; man 
 differs from them only in degree. He has all that they 
 have, and a little more, generally, in some directions; 
 but some animals are nearer human than some men. 
 According to Darwin, man has descended from the ape. 
 According to my notion, there is as much logic in saying 
 that the ape is a degenerated man. "It is a poor rule 
 that won't work both ways." If a man ascends he also 
 descends. We make distinctions, in our ignorance of 
 principles, which, in reality, do not exist. If an animal 
 can develop into a man, a man may go down to an ani- 
 mal. Progression is no more a law than retrogression. 
 If man ever had a beginning, he certainly must have an 
 end, no matter how long it may be delayed. If he pro- 
 gress eternally, he certainly cannot always remain man. 
 Progress means change, growth to better conditions, and 
 conditions change the form and nature. If man never 
 had a beginning, he can never have an end. But, sup- 
 pose this idea to be true, and progression without retro- 
 gression to be the law of being, is it not a little strange 
 that man is no higher in the scale of being after having 
 been eternally progressing ? Remember, the eternity of 
 the past is the same as that of the future. Why is he no 
 greater if he has always existed and been always growing ? 
 If he is merely an infant on this earth, is it logical to 
 conclude that he will remain the same and still keep on 
 growing eternally ? The distinctions we make between 
 things are merely arbitrary. Life is one. Man has no 
 more right to immortality than the brute. Man, in his 
 
— 40 — 
 
 pride and egotism, claims for himself a special creation 
 and existence after death, but denies it to the brute. This 
 is not a logical deduction. Man is a name merely 
 that we give to a manifestation of life to distinguish it 
 from other manifestations. We make distinctions to 
 which we give names, which are very satisfactory to 
 most men. Like the Arkansas man, who, when accosted 
 by a traveler, asking information about his way, instead 
 of giving the information desired, cocked his hat over 
 one eye, struck an attitude, and asked the traveler, "What 
 mought your name be, sir?' ' Names are very satisfac- 
 tory to children, but he who seeks for principles, cares 
 little for names. But in order to convey ideas, and to 
 be understood, and to distinguish one thing from another, 
 names are important. iC Man," then, is the name given 
 to the highest type of life we are acquainted with on 
 this earth, and the term body is applied to the visible 
 part. But the real man is an idea — as much so as that 
 represented by any piece of mechanism. (See defini- 
 tions of ideas in previous parts of this work.) In order 
 to a more perfect understanding of man and his powers, 
 we will divide him into parts— but the distinctions herein 
 made are arbitrary, and do not really exist. Man is com- 
 posed of body, mind, spirit, and soul ; or in other words, 
 the ego, the thought, and the thing thought of — or 
 power, motion, and the thing moved. But these things 
 are an unity. There can be only o«ne principle in existence. 
 The moment you admit two, one bounds and limits the 
 other. Very suggestive of the positive and negative 
 poles of a magnet. Laying all speculation aside, we do 
 
41 
 
 not know what " infinity " is, more than we know what 
 man or anything else is. If we should, at some time, 
 discover what it is, it would, after all, be only another 
 name added to our vocabulary. I cannot find a name 
 for "her who is nameless ," that third thing — the mother 
 of power and weakness — of God and of nature. The 
 loftiest thought cannot go beyond the realm of things— 
 for thought belongs to things. The most fertile imagina- 
 tion cannot find a field that does not exist, in which 
 to revel. 
 
 The insane is as real as the sane, although we may not 
 think it desirable or healthy. Perhap? there are some 
 who love insanity. Who shall say that the dividing line 
 between sanity and insanity is a fiction? That dividing 
 line — that neutral ground — is the body, — matter. 
 
 Science is unable to tell us of all the substances that 
 compose the human form. There is something which 
 escapes the closest analysis, or the most subtile and 
 searching thought. The scalpel fails to find the spirit — 
 so science fails to find aught but the dross of these bodies. 
 There is a something hidden away in matter that holds 
 each atom in its place— aye ! and gives form to all 
 atoms —which is master, and yet a prisoner : lord, but 
 yet a servant. There is a something in matter lying latent r 
 which is not heat nor flame, but which, when let loose, 
 produces heat, flame and combustion. It is the "Fire" 
 the ancient Magi worshipped. It is not magnetism, nor the 
 astral fluid, neither is it light, nor electricity; for these are 
 but effects of its freedom. There is a spark lying dor- 
 mant in matter, which, when aroused by friction, decom- 
 
— 42 — 
 
 poses all forms. If set in motion gently and by degrees, 
 it refines matter and causes growth, attracting and repel- 
 ling matter. If struck out by violence, it produces con- 
 flagrations and destruction. Worlds are sustained and 
 destroyed by this spark of fire. It is a useful servant to 
 man, but when it gets beyond his control it is a cruel and 
 remorseless master. This Fire is the Spirit. It is in 
 all things, and is the life thereof. In fact, things are but 
 forms of spirit condensed. Life is a liberation of 
 spirit. All matter evolves from itself an aura, pecu- 
 liar to its condition. This aura is produced by the 
 gentle motion of things, in growth and in death. All 
 atoms are in motion, for spirit is ceaselessly active. 
 Swedenborg says there is a sphere belonging to and 
 surrounding all things. It is more perceptible in some 
 things than in others. Baron Reichenbach instituted a 
 series of experiments with various metals and stones 
 which he submitted to sensitive persons in a darkened 
 chamber, and has written a work in which he claims the 
 same thing as true, so far as tested by him. This 
 aura I term spirit, or a result of the action of that 
 hidden fire, which has been worshipped in ancient days 
 as God, in honor of which the eternal altar-fires were 
 kept burning, and men bowed down to the sun and 
 worshipped Him as the most perfect symbol of fire, or 
 God. All matter is undergoing change, and this change 
 is growth, and growth is life, and life is the freeing 
 of fire or spirit. All matter is in a state of combus- 
 tion; some forms slowly, others with great intensity. 
 This combustion may not be perceptible to our dull 
 
— 43 — 
 
 senses, but that only proves our blindness. Growth is 
 the throwing off effete matter and taking on new. 
 This is exactly the case with violent combustion. A 
 burning pile throws off heat, smoke and flame, and 
 draws to itself the atmosphere, which, rushing in, com- 
 bines to increase the conflagration. This rushing in is 
 but the baptism of matter with fire, which cannot exist 
 without. The body may be likened to a furnace : it 
 must be fed with fuel ; and the atmosphere must 
 meet that fuel in the system, or no fire is kindled 
 and no heat generated. The lungs are the bellows 
 which fan the fires of life. The pores of the body are 
 escape pipes. The atmosphere is the aura or spirit of the 
 earth, and all things on the earth live by inhaling it. 
 Thus it may be seen that the spirit of one thing may sup- 
 port another. Spirit absorbs spirit by combination, the 
 same as fire absorbs the atmosphere. 
 
 The body may be likened to a horse-shoe magnet, or 
 a combination of them. The legs are suggestive of one ; 
 the arms of another. We are, in fact, a combination of 
 magnetic motors — or ; possibly, a galvanic pile. May not 
 our food furnish the alkali, the atmosphere the acid, the 
 union of which sets free the spirit (fire) of food, causing 
 motion, heat, combustion, growth, and life. May not 
 the liver correspond to the zinc, and the lungs to the 
 copper plates of a battery ? Connected by acids and al- 
 kalis in the system, a current is evolved, which dissolves 
 and decomposes food as fire does wood. The fire thus 
 set free from food becomes the aura (spirit) of the organ- 
 ism in which it was set free. Thus our spirits are made 
 
— 44 — 
 
 up in part from that which we eat. There can be no 
 combustion without the union of matter and atmosphere. 
 That union is the fusion or blending of all forms into one, 
 and that one is formless, viz., fire or spirit. Power re- 
 sides in the formless. In the imponderables there is 
 freedom, and without freedom there is no power mani- 
 fested. To a spirit in bondage there is the darkness of 
 matter, but a spirit set free is living light, an immortal 
 fire, which consumes matter as the light of a lamp con- 
 sumes oil. God is Fire, for " God is a Spirit, and they 
 who worship Him must worship in spirit and in truth." 
 Matter is but fire that is quenched. All it needs is bap- 
 tizing with a spark from God, and it begins to burn and 
 glow with life as embers in a furnace glow with light. 
 There is not an atom in the body that is not vibrating 
 with the electric or magnetic fires which animate all things. 
 It is, indeed, burning with a lurid and weird intensity truly 
 amazing. And we might behold 'the grand and sublime 
 spectacle if it were not for the obtuseness of our dull and 
 materialistic senses. If once beheld, we would no longer 
 wonder at the vast amount of fuel required daily to sup- 
 port this ethereal flame called life. 
 
 The light emitted by these walking furnaces — these 
 torches, these living machines — varies in intensity and 
 volume, according to the nature and quality of the mat- 
 ter in combustion. Some lights are electric, radiating far 
 and near ; so it is with some men. Others, again, are 
 small, and emit a soft, mild light. Others, again, give out 
 only a spark ; but most bodies are so undeveloped that the 
 
— 45 — 
 
 fires of life smoulder, and emit nothing but a fitful gleam 
 now and then, amid vast volumes of smoke. 
 
 This light emitted by all living beings — nay ! by all 
 things mundane and supermundane— *> the spirit, ' It is 
 the spirit of matter in combustion which constitutes the 
 aura of plants, animals and men. The laws of combus- 
 tion are the laws of the universe, and they are the laws of 
 magnetism, — action and reaction, attraction and repul- 
 sion, an outgoing and incoming current — this is all. Hang 
 a gold coin on the positive pole of a galvanic battery in 
 a solution, and a piece of brass or copper on the negative 
 pole in the solution, but not in contact with the coin, and 
 the result is, the positive galvanic current dissolves the 
 gold and carries it over to the negative, where it is deposited 
 upon the piece of brass. Electro-magnetic physicians 
 know that they can increase the vital powers of any por- 
 tion of the system by the application of the negative 
 electrode thereto ; and that they can reduce. the action of 
 any part by the application of the positive. 
 
 Thus it is demonstrated that matter is dissolved and car- 
 ried from one part of the system to another, where it may 
 be deposited, or even carried out of the body. Now, we 
 know that the female principle is the productive, or the 
 principle wherein matter is combined into forms of life, 
 and that the masculine is the principle from which such 
 life or matter comes in solution, as the gold from the 
 positive electrode. Every human being is a magnet, 
 which evolves a positive force from itself, which dissolves 
 and appropriates to the body material of various kinds 
 from food, and conveys it to renew the decaying tissues. 
 
— 46 — 
 
 while it also repels and eliminates that which is devitalized. 
 But the negative principle or force is not evolutive, but 
 receptive, in which the positive deposits its burden of 
 spirit. Thus is the body constantly renewed by a process 
 little thought of, viz : that of impregnation and gestation. 
 All motion is magnetic; and this is only another name 
 given to the manifestation of fire-- combustion. All things 
 are in a state of combustion — some gently : this is growth 
 and progress; others with intensity, as a conflagration, in 
 which the body is reduced to ashes, and the life of it back 
 " to God who gave it." 
 
 If attraction overbalance repulsion there is a slow com- 
 bustion, a smouldering of the fire, in which other forms 
 of matter appear (charcoal for instance). This is ex- 
 actly the case with nature ; the half-extinguished fires of 
 life preserves the form for a space of time. But notice 
 the slow and certain change of form from infancy to old 
 age, showing that repulsion is master after all. If repul- 
 sion overbalance attraction there is a rapid conflagration, 
 and forms of matter disappear in smoke, vapor, heat and 
 flame, to nothing — " not even to the blue sky." It is to 
 attraction that childhood owes its ruby cheeks and lips, 
 and its exuberance of life. The immortal fires sparkle in 
 its eye, and glow in its soft and rounded flesh through 
 which it shines, ere shame has come to crimson the cheek 
 and brow with a more lurid light, with a more intense 
 combustion, in which the forms of youth change rapidly. 
 To repulsion we owe the lustreless eye, palid cheek, the 
 grey hairs and wrinkles of age ; aye ! the death of the 
 body comes through excess of repulsion. A proper bal- 
 
— 47 — 
 
 ance is marriage, in which more things are generated 
 than has yet been dreamed of. 
 
 The aura or spirit obeys the same laws. The positive 
 contains the seminal principle, which it deposits, when 
 it meets the negative, which immediately returns to 
 the body (the womb) with its new found treasure, with 
 elements of spirit that combine in the system with posi- 
 tive elements, forming new blood, new tissue, new vigor. 
 Violent combustion is destructive to forms of matter, but 
 the compounds resulting therefrom are of incalculable 
 value to mankind. The ashes of wood are a compound 
 resulting from combustion, but how much of its chemi- 
 cal properties come from the atmosphere is not known ; 
 nor is it known how much came from that invisible fire 
 or spirit which resides in a negative state in the air we 
 breathe and burn. Science, a great thing in the eyes 
 of Professors, but is a mere infant as yet. It may be a 
 promising baby, but it still needs nursing. The body is 
 condensed aura or spirit, which liberated by motion 
 flows around it as light flows from a candle, passing out 
 positive and returning negative. The condition of the 
 matter (body) in combustion determining the brilliancy 
 and power of the light. Of the constituent elements of 
 the body, science says there are many, and goes on 
 to name them. But, gentlemen, with all respect for your 
 knowledge, your analysis and tests, your acids and 
 crucibles, I must say I question your conclusions. Why ? 
 Because a dead body is not the same as a living one. 
 The moment it is dead it is in another condition ; the ele- 
 ments are changed and continue to change till there is 
 
— 48 — 
 
 nothing left of them. Analyze a dead bone, (you cannot 
 analyze a live one), and you get compounds to which you 
 give names ; but names prove nothing. In your crucible, 
 retort and receiver the spirit of the universe is adding it- 
 self to your work ; in fact, it is doing the work itself. 
 You do not know how much of your own spirit enters 
 into combination with the elements you are manipulat- 
 ing. Then why such a parade of knowledge ? We don't 
 yet know the first letter of the alphabet of science. Take 
 a tub of earth and weigh it; then in it plant a seed. After 
 a time you will have a tree ; remove the tree, and again 
 weigh the tub of earth, and see how much less it weighs. 
 You will find that the tree is made up almost entirely 
 from the atmosphere ; which, indeed, is the spirit of the 
 earth. Forms are a condensation of the invisible. 
 
 The earth is none the less for having produced inani- 
 mate and animate things. A mother is not made less by 
 child-bearing. The light of a lamp is not lessened by 
 lighting other lamps. The human brain is not reduced 
 by giving thought and ideas to the world, but its capacity 
 is increased thereby. It is said that "man is like a candle : 
 when the light goes out he is no more." I do not agree to 
 this. Light is an effect of combustion \ so is the mani- 
 festation called life. But light is greater than oil, as 
 spirit is greater than matter, or as motives are greater 
 than acts. 
 
49 
 
 V.— THE MIND, 
 
 We have many so-called sciences of mind, prominent 
 among which is phrenology. This is recognized as a 
 science by most thinkers. The brain is recognized as the 
 organ of the mind, and mind is treated of as an entity — 
 the soul. I regard mind as an effect of organization. It 
 is a something the soul has developed to enable it to 
 come in contact with, and to handle matter. The idiot 
 has no mind, but he has the power to suffer and enjoy. 
 Now, it cannot logically be held that sense is mind, or 
 that instinct is mind ; infants have no mind, but 
 they have the capacity to develop mind. Thus mind is a 
 thing that grows and dies like a vegetable. Mind is a 
 manifestation of the soul, composed of various powers or 
 faculties. My mind is a machine I have made. It be- 
 longs to me, as my body or my coat belongs to me. It 
 is my property. I may be robbed of it as I may be of 
 my money. True ! When my mind is gone I am driven 
 back, as it were, to a condition where sense remains, but 
 memory, reason, judgment and will are not. Mind is to 
 me what the rudder is to a ship. By the use of it I sail 
 my frail bark over the stormy seas of this life. Without 
 it I am drifting like a piece of drift-wood wherever the 
 waves toss me. As a man without property is considered 
 nobody, so man without a mind is, in fact, a cipher. 
 
— 50-, 
 
 As sense is the first manifestation of the soul, mind is 
 the second, and the body is the third. But to observation 
 the reverse seems to be true, inasmuch as the body seems 
 first, mind second, and the soul blank. 
 
 Sense surrounds the soul as the atmosphere surrounds 
 the earth, and constitutes a sensorium upon which all 
 things are photographed, all sounds vibrated, all thoughts 
 and emotions reflected. It is sense which separates 
 things, holds each atom and each body in place, and esta- 
 blishes the relationship governing. It is the sense of a 
 thing which constitutes it a thing. Without sense things 
 could not exist. Without feeling there is no contact. 
 Without hearing, no sound ; without light, no colors, no 
 beauty nor deformity. Sense does all things : it is God. 
 The awakening of our dull senses is like unto an egg in 
 incubation. The soul is the germ. The sense is the 
 beautiful arrangement and adjustment of vital elements 
 hermetically sealed up in a shell (body). Without this 
 sealing up, this isolation or insulation, this partition be- 
 tween us and God, we could not exist. These bodies 
 stand guard over our souls to preserve individuality. They 
 are our preservation from the Infinite. The lightnings 
 are chained down, bottled up, suspended in liquid form 
 in the egg, as fire quenched by water in wood, coal, or 
 storm-cloud. These bodies are important. Their quality 
 varies, according to the power contained therein, as 
 the shells of eggs Vary. They subserve the end of solidi- 
 fying the fire into organic life. When that is accom- 
 plished the shell becomes rotten, and the fully- developed 
 chick works its way out, into a new life, or, rather, another 
 
— 51 — 
 
 stage of the same life, for there is only one life — the life 
 of sense or of God. " Except a man be born again, he 
 cannot see the Kingdom of God. 11 "The Kingdom of 
 God" is only another and higher stage of life, and no man 
 can enter it save through the gestation and birth of a 
 Divine Body. Ah ! the mysteries of being. Thou in- 
 significant egg ! Thou holdest in solution the incom- 
 prehensible mystery of God and eternity ! In thy 
 darkened chambers God is waiting ! Thy spherical form 
 speaks of revolution as the primal law of all being ! 
 tf Hermetically sealed " — so secure from curious eyes, so 
 full of " the elixir of life," and yet so fragile ! Thou art 
 the flame-tip liquified ! Pure, beautiful thing ! Con- 
 taining in thyself infinity, soul, mind, body and spirit ! 
 What doth thy hatching signify if it be not immortality? 
 Thy wings speak of flight and liberty, thy lungs of inspir- 
 ation, thine eyes of light, beauty, immortality and the 
 beholding of it. Thy instinct speaks of intuition and all 
 knowing ! Even the hovering of the Hen over thee 
 typifies the " brooding " care, and life-giving power of 
 the Holy Spirit ! Art thou evolved from the "black 
 muck," thou pure, white thing? Can mud see? or can 
 it make eyes like thine ? Can it think ? or can it evolve 
 a thought 'or a thing capable of thought? 0', rather, 
 didst thou not descend, little chick — as descends the 
 glory of the night — from " the mystery of the shadow?" 
 As an egg in incubation receives heat, first in the shell, 
 and secondly in the albumen, so do impressions come to 
 the mind through the body by contact with the outer 
 world. The heat which causes growth of vegetation, * 
 
— 52 — 
 
 animals and men comes from without, and it is through 
 pressure, contact or impressions. Nature is to man what 
 the hen is to the egg. Physical contact is required to 
 warm up and influence things that have little sense ; but 
 to those who have mind, there is a spiritual contact or 
 impact, far more potent and far-reaching. It is con- 
 sidered that man has five senses : feeling, hearing, seeing, 
 smelling and tasting. But I claim that there are many 
 faculties of the mind, and only one sense. Sense is 
 nearest the soul, the mind comes next. Through the 
 mind the sense receives the fire which quickens the germ 
 in the soul, or the egg. Sense may be said to be feeling. 
 We see a lovely flower- — we feel pleasure. If it be 
 some horrible sight we are pained. We may see it at a 
 distance, but the effect is the same. We come in contact 
 with that which we see, hear and smell, as much as we do 
 by taste or touch. We see sights that electrify us. We 
 hear sounds that startle and urge us to action, as much 
 "as if we had been struck a blow. We come in contact 
 with things and phenomena at a distance by sight and 
 hearing, of things nearer by touch and smelling, but it 
 is all feeling after all. The nerves of taste are only a 
 little more acute than those of the hands. We smell the 
 aroma of a rose, and we know it is near, although it may 
 be hidden. We are in contact with the rose, for we have 
 received something from it that has made an impression 
 upon. us. Its spirit has met ours, and entering in, has 
 added some fuel to the fire burning within. New com- 
 binations have been formed within us, and the rose has 
 • added its fire to ours. Our spirits glow with a purer 
 
 ■■■ 
 
light from the contact of love and beauty. All things 
 grow by pressure, contact or impressions. The impres- 
 sions we receive in our journey through life, from the 
 gentle caress of love to the discord and clash of opposing 
 conditions, are but for the reception of that Divine fire 
 we worshipped in the past. Each object we meet im- 
 parts its fire ; each experience we have, from the joys of 
 a mother's heart to the despair of the hopeless, is from 
 the pressure mother nature gives, as she warms and 
 hatches her brood. If we live properly we grow stronger 
 and stronger in all that makes the true man, till the rot- 
 ting shell (this body) bursts, and we fly away to realms of 
 immortal life. 
 
 Pressure comes by attraction, and this produces 
 
 * 
 
 growth by the gentle heat generated thereby; but the 
 contact which comes by force is from repulsion, and is 
 death by conflagration. Fire struck out by force is de- 
 structive. By attraction we receive what we need, but by 
 force more than we need, and often that which is sick- 
 ening. Ask the pale, sickly mothers of the land if this 
 is not God's truth ! There is a mental or spiritual con- 
 tact of things, whose limit is unknown. It is not possi- 
 ble for us to think of a thing, principle or state of 
 being that does not exist somewhere, within or without 
 the domain of il nature." To think of a thing intensely 
 is to see it in the mind; and this sight is clairvoyance. To 
 see a thing is to feel it ; this is contact, pressure, impres- 
 sions. The pressure upon the brain of a thinker shows 
 the power of thought and its contact. The pleasure he 
 feels in giving birth to that which he hopes will do the 
 
— 54- 
 
 world a great good, shows the baptism with fire we read 
 of in the Scriptures. Thought is the lightning's flash. It 
 penetrates. It is the sunlight. It warms and gives color 
 to life. It dwells in all things, for all things are sugges- 
 tive of thought. TRey provoke us to think. If we will 
 not think, they send the plague, the famine, and a slow 
 decay. There are some rotten eggs in every nest. 
 Thought calls us out from ourselves, from our knowledge 
 of our weakness and follies — and then we are great. To 
 dwell in thought among the stars is to be in contact 
 with the Gods, and to receive from them what otherwise 
 we should not have. Thought is a stimulant : it intoxi- 
 cates. To be drunk with thought is to provoke mirth, 
 like any drunken man. 
 
 The sun illumines a little space on the earth, but the 
 darkness is before and behind, and all around. Like a 
 coward it flees away as the sun approaches, and like a 
 coward it follows close behind, as follows the past upon 
 the present. We cannot stand still : we must move on. 
 The little thought we have flashes out into the dark- 
 ness before and behind. Memory looks back at the 
 gloom of almost forgotten joys, and from the dim twi- 
 light of the past come the ghosts of evil deeds. Our 
 weakness and follies appear gigantic. They are alive and 
 active, but the little good we have done is scarcely percep- 
 tible — is feeble, is crowded back, like a small boy in a crowd. 
 Thought flashes a ray of hope — of prescience ; and the 
 world follows its light with a deathless trust. For it, 
 they tax themselves to build churches and to support an 
 army of priests. For this ray of light, this spark of 
 
— 55 — 
 
 Divine fire, they go hungry and in rags, patiently. Who 
 shall say there is not a pressure here, a contact as close as 
 that of matter, impressions that move the souls of man- 
 kind ? We gain knowledge, laboriously, in the collection 
 of facts ; but these facts must be digested by the mind be- 
 fore they can be of use. Thought, reason, analysis, are 
 the stomach of the mind. Here the fire is extracted 
 from facts, as life is from food in the physical stomach. 
 Doubt is indigestion. He who digests the facts and phe- 
 nomena of Hie, and still doubts the immortality of man, 
 has mental dyspepsia. He does not get the fire, and 
 consequently his spiritual nature lacks warmth. He who 
 properly digests the facts of life grows warm and tender, 
 and stronger in his trust towards others. He dreams of 
 immortality, for its fact is impressed on his mind. In 
 his dreams the mind becomes telescopic, and he sees that 
 which the doubter scoffs at. But, nevertheless, he grows 
 stronger and stronger in his belief. 
 
 Long years ago I became very much interested in clair- 
 voyance. I wished to attain the power. I read much 
 and thought more. Sat in " circles," used magnets, in- 
 sulated stools, galvanic bandages; in fact, exhausted all 
 the methods within my reach, but with the exception of a 
 ftw " clouds" and " flashes of light," my spiritual sight 
 remained obscured. It was late one stormy night in 
 winter, in the little cottage on the hill, overlooking " the 
 father of waters," that, after having lain on a couch for 
 an hour as usual, with a huge magnet in contact with my 
 head, I retired to bed, feeling sad and low-spirited. I 
 lay for a time listening to the moaning and wailing of the 
 
— 56 — 
 
 winds, and pondering upon the subject which at that time 
 engrossed my entire being. All at once I became con- 
 scious of a presence in my room. It was intensely dark 
 to the natural eye. but I saw clearly an old man, tall and 
 majestic, with a lofty brow, deeply plowed with thought- 
 lines • mild, gentle expression, long, white beard, and hair 
 that fell on his shoulders. He held in his hand a brass 
 rim, inclosing a circular glass. ' He held it up and 
 asked me to examine it. I did so and found it a mirror. 
 He called my attention to the fact that it not only 
 reflected objects, but retained the images impressed there- 
 on. " This," said he, " is the human mind, which ordi- 
 narily has the power of Reflection and Retention" 
 (memory). He then pressed his thumbs upon the 
 glass, holding the rim with his fingers. It sunk with much 
 difficulty under the pressure to the depth of the rim. The 
 glass then seemed a shade smaller, but was still enclosed 
 as before by a brass rim. I looked in .the dish-like 
 mirror, and it seemed clouded ; and strange, fanciful ob- 
 jects flitted across its surface. Again he applied the pres- 
 sure, and with some effort the disk became deeper. 
 Again I looked ; the clouds had partially disappeared, and 
 dimly seen, deep down in the mirror, as if in the far 
 distance, a lurid light sent fitful gleams across the surface 
 in the mirror. Said he : "The mind, like this mirror, has 
 the power of elongation. Like this, the two first sections 
 are very difficult to start ; but these accomplished, and 
 the rest come easily." And he shoved rim after rim out 
 to the number of seven, and then bade me look. I 
 looked, and lo ! the wonders of the universe were 
 
revealed. The light was clearer than the brightest 1 
 ever saw. The ineffable glory of creative principle 
 flashed like lightning upon my brain. I could not bear 
 the steady flame, and turned my wondering eyes to the 
 face of " the stranger.' ' He smiled and said : " The 
 mind has a telescopic power, little known to mortals. 
 When once attained, there are no secrets that may not be 
 discovered." And then he and the " Magic Mirror" 
 were gone. But I have not forgotten the lesson. 
 
 In these pages, if you can comprehend the ideas, you 
 will find a verification of its truth, and the guide-posts on 
 the road to power. We can never know a thing or princi- 
 ple except by contact therewith. Ideas grow in the mind 
 as vegetation grows in the earth. Thoughts are the letters 
 of a word ; the word is part of a sentence. A complete 
 sentence or a combination of incomplete sentences, con- 
 tains an idea. The word is the beginning of speech, or 
 the first materialization of an idea. Hence St. John 
 says, "In the beginning was the Word." Now we may 
 think and think till we are exhausted, but if we conceive 
 no idea, and think it out to a clear and perfect definition, 
 it will do us no good ; it is like a plant struck by frost, 
 or withered by drouth. But if, in our analysis of facts, we 
 conceive an idea — no matter how vague— and dwell upon 
 it in thought, it gradually takes form and grows to ma- 
 turity. Maturity is a perfected idea. When an idea is 
 matured in the mind it enters into the soul, and becomes 
 an integral part of the thinker, and he is changed thereby. 
 
 We are changed by our thoughts. That which leads 
 us upward towards the good is expansive ; hence, creative 
 
— 58— • 
 
 of power : but that which is debasing leads downward, 
 and is contraction, hence destructive to power. The 
 soul expands by fire, but contracts for want of it. Fire 
 is power; and weakness is for want of it. It will be seen 
 from the foregoing that the mind occupies an important 
 position. 
 
 Everything that reaches the soul must pass through it 
 in the form of ideas. For the soul is an idea itself, and 
 nothing can enter the soul that is foreign to it. Fire is 
 the spirit in which ideas reside. If man were natural, 
 there could be no progress, for he would be in a state of 
 indifference. But, being unnatural, he is progressive and 
 intense — i.e., insane in his mind. The real appears to 
 him as unreal, and the unreal as the real. From this 
 cause he looks upon the body as the man, and the mind 
 as the effect of the body — like " the blaze of a candle' ' 
 — and laughs at the idea of a soul or spirit. This state 
 of the mind is termed natural. I call it unnatural. But 
 we cannot help being unnatural on account of our ignor- 
 ance. Ignorance always blunders—weakness always falls. 
 The first act of the natural was a fall, for he w T as ignorant. 
 When fallen he struggles to stand erect, for he has 
 knowledge of an erect posture. The unnatural is pro- 
 gressive. 
 
 The mind is not a thing, but rather a law or mode of 
 action of the soul. It is a duality — "two in one." The 
 natural and rational are the two, which, united in har- 
 mony, are the Divine One. The Divine is first of all — the 
 sensorium of the soul, as evidenced by the intuition and 
 innocence of childhood, and the instinct of animals, etc. 
 
 wmmm 
 
— 59 — 
 
 From it comes all that exists. In the creation of man 
 instinct was suspended by a reversal, or depolarization of 
 it, in which it was dissolved as it were and scattered, and 
 became the seeds of many faculties. Each and every 
 faculty of the mind has instinct as its foundation. This 
 scattering or division of instinct may have been, and un- 
 doubtedly was, a slow process, occupying many ages. 
 Man is the only thing that comes into existence totally 
 helpless, totally blank of intelligence : hence it must have 
 culminated in his creation. The tossing waves of instinct, 
 torn from the depths of creation's ocean, tossed to moun- 
 tain heights, and beaten to froth, subsided in a great calm ! 
 Anon, a breath of the Infinite fanned the great deep, and 
 man sprang into being ! This calm is a great rest of na- 
 ture as she gathers her forces for another effort ; it is the 
 soul as it expands; the vacuum that provokes motion. 
 The tornado was coming ; all nature held its breath in 
 expectancy ! It came in the shape of mind . Ever 
 since its advent there has been no more calm. From sun 
 to sun, fom star to star, from pole to pole, from centre 
 to circumference, there is agitation. Nature seems torn 
 from her moorings. Her steady and quiet ways seem 
 broken in upon as by a God. She is all turned topsy 
 turvy. And she, good dame, has joined in the mad 
 revelry, as at her own nuptials. Nature seems to have 
 departed from her usual methods ; an innovation has been 
 made, as if the absent Lord had returned, or a god had 
 descended ! From this point — from this great calm, this 
 rest and expansion, this birth — work is the law. The 
 first effort was a failure because there was no guide, no 
 
--60 — 
 
 knowledge. A failure! Such a thing was unknown to 
 nature. Astonished and bewildered, the soul shrinks and 
 collapses in giving the awful thing birth ! A failure ! If 
 being forced back from multiplicity to unity — if being 
 compelled in a new creation to go back to the starting 
 point — indifferent sense — to work outward again to mul- 
 tiplicity — if this be a failure, then man is a failure. And 
 every man who weeps over the weaknesses, follies and 
 sufferings of poor benighted humanity, recognizes it as 
 such. Every man who has an idea of improving the race 
 knows there is something wrong. But nature, like an 
 over-indulgent mother, says to her child : " It is no fail- 
 ure, my child; try again." And sinking herself in her 
 great love for him, becomes the involuntary powers of 
 her child. For her spoiled child she bears patiently 
 every abuse. She breathes for him while he sleeps. She 
 labors as he directs; while he, visionary that he is, is busy 
 building castles in the air. She walks, if he says walk ; 
 he takes no thought of the distance or the steps : all 
 he has to do is to direct her. If he fails to point the 
 way, through forgetfulness, she goes astray, for she seems 
 to be blind ; but she keeps on walking till he says stop. 
 If, in his perversity, he takes up some habit that will event- 
 ually ruin him, she adapts herself to his whim, and carries 
 it on without his volition, even to his death ; when he for- 
 gets it, she reminds him of it. In his sleep she still labors 
 for him to restore the waste of his unnatural life ; still 
 whispering " Try again. 17 If he hates, she keeps it in 
 his mind. If he resolves to commit some crime, she as- 
 sists him as readily as to do a good act, always whisper- 
 
_81 — 
 
 ing, " Try again.'" If an incurable disease attacks lief 
 child, she fights for him while he directs, and in the man- 
 ner that he directs, but when he loses control she joins 
 forces with the adversary to hurry on the work of disso- 
 lution. Even in death she reminds him of his habits. 
 Nature seems to be a blind force, and indifferent thing, 
 if it be a thing. She knows nothing, feels nothing ; she 
 simply furnishes us with the power to think and feel ? 
 whispering, " Try again /" 
 
 It is no fiction, — the fall of man, — -but it is an allegor- 
 ical representation of a truth : or, in other words, the effort 
 of a great mind to explain the life we live — the principles 
 of being. The acts we do furnish the light of experience. 
 The man who trusts in himself and walks out boldly gains 
 the most. He who trusts in God, although the happiest, 
 gains the least knowledge. If we fall and hurt ourselves, 
 we have the freedom to climb up again. And though we 
 may not climb back to the same place, we may go higher. 
 
 Ever since the " fall," man has been scaling the pre- 
 cipices of his weaknesses and failures. The point I call 
 your attention to is this: All acts have their beginning 
 and inception in the mind. Hence all violation of law, 
 with their attendant pain, disease, weakness, and death, 
 spring from mind. All violation is a creation. Hence 
 all creation is a mental product. As acts flow from the 
 mind, so matter flows from the mind; for acts material- 
 ized are matter. This being so, the more Divine the 
 mind is, the greater will its creative power be. The evo- 
 lution of matter from itself having any quality or form, 
 or the dissolving of matter already formed, by the sus- 
 
-62 — 
 
 pension of atomic laws, is logical, and within the range 
 of man's power, as a Divine Being. As a creator, all 
 creation is in his grasp, and he is therefore the architect 
 of himself, and his heavens or his hells. The conception 
 of a thing is the beginning of its growth. Hell grows 
 out of our minds : so also does heaven ; but hell is largest. 
 So also a Divine body may be grown by conception, ges- 
 tation and birth in the mind. 
 
 Hell is fed by our desires to see our enemies suffer, and 
 from a spirit of retaliation and revenge. 
 
— 63 — 
 
 VI.— THE DIVINE MIND AND BODY. 
 
 The natural mind is the common mind. It receives its 
 impressions through the five senses ; or, in other words, 
 wholly from external nature. To it belong observation, 
 memory, and reflection. All things of this mundane 
 sphere reflect themselves upon the mind as in a mirror. 
 This mind grows and expands by the collection of facts, 
 but the conclusions of it are material as the facts them- 
 selves. For this reason the natural mind cannot conceive 
 of a spiritual or future state of existence ; its utmost 
 powers enable it only to reach the plane of knowledge, 
 or the manipulation of matter. The knowledge gained 
 by it is the sciences and philosophy of material things ; it 
 adapts man to this " bread-and-butter life." Its analysis 
 is destructive; hence to it belongs doubt, skepticism, 
 unbelief, and the impossible; pride, lust, hate, fear, 
 avarice, deceit, and invention are its controlling powers. 
 The interior of this mind being closed up, there is no 
 reflection from any other way than from without. The 
 soul is denied, because it cannot be seen or handled ; its 
 presence is unfelt, by reason of the hardness and opacity 
 of the natural — or, more properly, the unnatural—mind. 
 
-64- 
 
 It cannot feel from within, but is conatantly drawn out- 
 ward by sight, sound, and contact. It is the "wide- 
 awake" mind. Its highest faculty is the invention of 
 machinery, building of railways, cities, etc., — -all of a 
 material character. But it is progressive, inasmuch as it 
 expands by its stretch after the new, and its effort to per- 
 fect that which it conceives. 
 
 Conception is always superior to the production. The 
 true artist fails to come up to his ideal, because the colors 
 in his mind are pure, while the colors of his picture, 
 being a compound of matter, are dead. It is a mere 
 material thing, void of soul. If he could, by looking at 
 the canvass, project from his mind the picture he sees in 
 his mind, project the colors from himself— without 
 brush, paints, or pencils—- on the canvas, it would come 
 up to his ideal. This power does not belong to the 
 natural nor to the rational, but to the Divine Mind. 
 
 The Divine mind does not exist to the natural mind, 
 because it cannot come in contact therewith. The natural 
 develops into the rational, which expands to the Divine. 
 The natural, by expansion, opens the interiors, through 
 which impressions come from the unknown. If these 
 impressions are not rejected the mind becomes luminous. 
 This illumination is rationality. Impressions from within 
 awaken the mind as with a new life, and it gradually 
 turns within — thus reversing itself. This is the beginning 
 of magnetization, which is a turning inward of the eyes 
 and the sight—the beginning of the glory. 
 
 The natural may be compared to the flint, and objects 
 to the steel. The fire struck out is a mere spark, which 
 
— 65— 
 
 vanishes away and is lost; but the rational is a steady 
 flame, flowing from the Divine, making malleable and 
 luminous the entire man. Seeds deposited in the earth 
 first soften, then enlarge, before the germ can come forth. 
 The natural mind is the seed planted in the soil of the 
 body, but the rational is the tree; the fruitage is the 
 Divine ; which, indeed, grows not out of the ground, but 
 descends, as the* Spirit, to bless all who partake thereof. 
 This is the bread that comes down from Heaven, of 
 which if a man eat he shall not die. 
 
 To the rational belongs the innocency of childhood, 
 with its simplicity and credulity. Instead of sagacity 
 there is intuition ; instead of deduction there are visions 
 and revelations. One might naturally think that ration- 
 ality came with age ; and so it would, if there was no 
 retrogression. Our daily lives cloud the surface of the 
 mind with a film, through which the flint scarce pene- 
 trates ; hence there is no fire evolved by the friction 
 incident to this life. We become insulated during the 
 mad rush for- wealth, and the magnetism that gives 
 growth and expansion passes by us. The real age and 
 life of a man dates from his conscious progress in the 
 good and pure. The real death dates from the time one 
 becomes conscious of being bad, and does not forsake his 
 evil ways. There are some children who are older in 
 soul-growth than some old men or women. There are 
 some persons who retrograde from earliest childhood ; 
 others progress for some years, then turn downwards ; 
 others, again, are bad in early life, then suddenly, or 
 slowly, turn to progress upward. We may pity the old 
 
— 66 — 
 
 person who is hard. Progress softens the mind, and thus 
 the whole man expands. The Divine mind is first ; next 
 is the rational ; the last and outermost is the natural. 
 The natural corresponds to matter, the rational to spirit, 
 the Divine to soul. The Divine mind is the sensorium 
 of the soul, which surrounds it as a translucent film, 
 which expands and contracts. Attraction expands it ; re- 
 pulsion contracts it. It is the sensorium that is the seat 
 of consciousness ; the events of life are all photographed 
 upon it. All the emotions that are experienced give color 
 to it. The various strains of music and discord leave 
 their impression on it. The voiceless universe affects it 
 also. What we have been in previous states of existence 
 is brought forward by the sensorium into this life ; and 
 the sound of the voice, the build of the body, the facial 
 expression, the laugh, the color of the eyes — all these, and 
 more, tell what we have been doing, and what we have 
 been in the long eternities of the past. 
 
 Upon the inner surface of the sensorium ideas exist — 
 in the " Holy of Holies," wherein God's voice is heard. 
 Upon its outer surface symbols of those ideas are pro- 
 jected, which, descending into the rational according to 
 its condition, as descends the ovarian ^tgg y there becomes 
 impregnated by the nature of things. The nature of 
 things is the spirit of things, viz : Fire. The spirit dies 
 in the impregnation, and is born (after gestation) into 
 the natural mind reversed — /. <?., instead of being spiritual 
 it is material. // is a mere reflection of the Divine Mind, 
 a reversed image, as your face in a mirror. For this 
 reason we get no absolute truth. Ideas are reversed and 
 
 HH 
 
— 67 — 
 
 distorted from having been impregnated by the spirit of 
 what has been. In the same manner spirit is changed 
 into matter, and becomes part and parcel of these 
 bodies. For instance, you have a wound ; the pain is a 
 telegram to the sensor ium of the soul ; the idea to restore, 
 though unconscious to you, is immediately projected by 
 the soul into the sensorium, or Divine mind, where it 
 meets spirit and is impregnated, and, descending, deposits 
 life in the form of new matter in the wound. Thus are 
 the injured tissues fed, like a child in embryo, till the 
 parts are restored. But there is a decay of the injured 
 parts before and during the restoration. Flow tenderly 
 and carefully we nurse and dress an ulcer, thus causing it 
 to give way to new and healthy flesh. Matter is but 
 spirit reversed. Substance is substantial; it does not 
 change, but spirit and matter do change in becoming 
 reversed. The decayed matter of an ulcer is the return 
 to spirit, and matter in formation is spirit condensing : 
 which is effected by that third and incomprehensible 
 thing—the soul. These material bodies are but an ulcer, 
 so to speak, upon a Divine and substantial body, which 
 the soul is striving to free therefrom. But in most of us 
 this Divine part is destroyed, swallowed up, eaten through 
 and through as by ulceration. The substance of the 
 Divine Body is an idea of it. Matter, without an idea, 
 fails or lies dormant ; but with an idea it rises up and walks 
 erect as man. Aye ! and with an idea of it he rises up 
 to be a god. 
 
 Ideas revolve in cycles of time as worlds revolve in 
 space. Hence, " there is nothing new under the sun." 
 
— 68- 
 
 We get a glimpse of the Divine in childhood and in first 
 love: But the fog soon— alas ! too soon — rises and ob- 
 scures the sun. In the reversal of ideas the external, or 
 the last, appears to be first. Causation appears on the 
 surface of things, and life and mind seem as the effect of 
 matter. 
 
 Religious ideas are of the soul ; its symbols — being 
 projections thereof — are reversed images which the world 
 worships. The esoteric is lost in the rubbish of the exo- 
 teric, as the soul is lost in matter. But it flows on in 
 cycles, vast in extent, and gradually works out of the 
 rubbish, and asserts itself as miracle. The age of miracle 
 is near at hand ! The cycle of the soul is nearly com- 
 pleted ! Already we can see the first dim twilight of the 
 rising sun ! 
 
 From the worship of the Divine — the one, the first 
 mathematical number — we have gone down to the num- 
 ber nine in the absurdity of addition, and now in that 
 constellation we worship many gods — our forefathers. 
 But the absurd nine will pass away, and the next cycle 
 will be the union of the Immortal 1 — symbol of creation 
 and the beginning— with (10) symbol of the soul. 
 The Father and the Mother at last united, the Son (the 
 Divine mind) will appear on this earth. Thus we re- 
 volve in a numerical circle from one back to one again. 
 
 The idea of heredity carries us back to our forefathers, 
 and we lay the blame of our follies upon them ; but they 
 went back to Adam ; Adam laid the blame on the devil ; 
 the devil lays the blame on God, who created and edu- 
 cated him for that purpose. Thus in thought man makes 
 
 ■^■■■a 
 
— 69 — 
 
 God out a demon, inferior to the lowest of humanity in 
 sympathy, and superior to the devil in cold malignity. 
 What absurdity ! 
 
 Why not accept what we know as the truth? We 
 know that our acts make and unmake us, and that we 
 suffer and enjoy through our own acts. What I am my 
 acts in this life and other stages of existence have made 
 me. I am but an action, and every act I do adds to or 
 diminishes my power to create, to enjoy, to surfer, and 
 to be. I am the numeral one— the first and the last. 
 When, in the progress of life the soul expands to the outer- 
 most being, and becomes the over-soul instead of the 
 inner, then shall the Father (Spirit) be one with the 
 Mother (soul), and the Divine mind (the Son or sun, 
 symbol of Divine light and knowledge,) shall illumine the 
 night of matter, and all secrets which lurk in darkness 
 shall stand out in their naked deformity. ' ' Then shall 
 no one say to his neighbor, know ye the Lord, for all 
 shall know Him from the least to the. greatest." This is 
 the Trinity, and the real significance of the Father, Son, 
 and Holy Ghost. Spirit, the Father, God ; Soul, 
 the Mother, Holy Ghost ; Mind, the only begotten Son 
 of Spirit, or of God. The union of spirit and soul is 
 typified by marriage ; creation is typified by children, as 
 the son or mind begotten. As an idea reversed or 
 dwarfed becomes monstrous, this idea of the Trinity, 
 Divine as a symbol, has been rendered unnatural by the 
 loss of its Divine intent, and doubly damned by the en- 
 forcement of unnatural statute law r s. 
 
— 70 — 
 
 The natural becomes the rational by development, 
 and the same is true of the rational. Many there be who 
 do not believe in the Divine. To me Divinity is the 
 noblest and best part of humanity— a beacon light, far 
 above us, luring us upward and onward to real manhood 
 and Godhood. All rationality is negative, but natural- 
 ness is positive. 
 
 The spirit flows out and in. As it flows out it dissolves 
 and carries away effete or dead matter into the atmos- 
 phere, when it becomes the life of something else ; this 
 is a positive current. As it flows in it brings with it the 
 spirit* of other things, with which it has mingled in its 
 revolutions around the body; for, like everything in mo- 
 tion, it revolves. In this mingling the spirit becomes 
 negative, and returns to the body; so all spirit that builds 
 up the waste of the body is negative. The negative is 
 feminine, and all formation takes place therein. Ration- 
 ality is the negative mind. All art and mechanism is 
 
 Light and the Soul. — The Berlin Gegenwart, of Nov. 15, 1879, contains a 
 rep rtof experiments made by Dunstmaier to te t the accuracy of Jager's theory, 
 thatthesoul of every man and animal is to besought for in the characteristic odor 
 exhaled in each case. Dunstmaier, who unites in his own person the ph ysiologist 
 and metaphysician, was, uutil these experiments convinced him of his error, an 
 outspoken opponent of Jager's views. He is now, however, an enthusiastic 
 convert. Dunstmaier's method was no doubt suggested to him by his familiarity 
 with experimental science. He considered that light and the soul — if the soul 
 is an olor — a>e both radiated, and that light can be, as it were, collected and 
 fixed by a photographic plate covered with iodide of silver. What body, now, is 
 as sensitive to odors as iodide of silver is to lig t? Evidently thenerves of smell 
 in a dog. In the centre of the laboratory a cage containing twenty hares was 
 placed, and a dog was admitted to the room. He at once made violent efforts 
 to get at the hares, which, of course, in their terror, rushed to and fro in the 
 cage. After two hours of this torture the dog was killed, the nerves of smell and 
 the mucous membrane of the nose removed, and rubbed up in a mortar with 
 
— 71 — 
 
 due to rationality. All aggressive acts and destruction is 
 due to the positive or natural mind (as I have termed it 
 in this chapter for the sake of simplicity). The Divine 
 mind is that incomprehensible and out-of-the-way mind 
 — that third thing, standing guard between the two, 
 wherein they meet and become one. Now, this meeting 
 of the spirit with matter, and its transformation from 
 spirit into matter, is a strange and mysterious thing. 
 The spirit itself is not life, but it contains the germ which 
 comes to life in the third thing, which contains in itself 
 the power of generation. Mind is the connecting link 
 between matter and spirit — hence it is in the mind that 
 transformation is effected. This mind becomes Divine 
 by unfoldment, which, indeed, is nothing more than a 
 union of the natural with the rational. In the way we 
 look at things from without, the Divine is evolved, but in 
 reality the Divine contains the natural in itself, and is 
 first in the order of creation. There is Divinity in all 
 
 glycerine and water. The twenty hares had been exhaling their souls for two hours, 
 and the dog, during all his panting and sniffing, inhaling them for the same 
 length of time. The glycerine might be expected, then, to contain a certain 
 quantity of the soul of the hare, the main characteristic of which is, of course, 
 timidity. That this was the fact the following experiments seem to prove : A 
 few drops of the extract were administered to a cat ; she ran away from some 
 mice instead of pouncing upon them. By the subcutaneous injection of only 
 two cubic centimetres a large mastiff was rendered so cowardly that he slunk 
 away from the cat. By a similiar experiment, in which, however, a young 
 lion in a menagerie played the part of the hares, Dunstmaier succeeded in isolat- 
 ing the soul substance of courage and in transmitting it to the other animals. 
 Still more interesting experiments showed clearly that these " psychotypic '"' 
 glycerine extracts had a decided effect on the human species. Thus, after 
 swallowing a small dose of psychotypic timidity, D.instmaier had not the courage 
 to believe in his own discovery. This effect soon passed off, however. — London 
 Medical Record. 
 
— 72 — 
 
 things, as there is life in all. We speak of the mind as a 
 thing, having an organ, the brain, and a location therein, 
 but we know of no such thing. The mind may, and 
 probably does, come to a focus in the brain as a great 
 centre of perception ; but I have good grounds to main- 
 tain that it occupies every atom of the body — even to the 
 toe-nails and hair ; and that it surrounds the soul, separ- 
 ating the spirit from it, and that it is the great laboratory 
 of the Infinite, in which spirit is transformed, and matter 
 receives its quickening power, and is transfigured, trans- 
 posed, or rendered up to the Infinite as an incorruptible 
 substance. Jesus was in possession of the Divine mind. 
 It was not possible for Him to be sick, to suffer pain, or 
 to die, savq, as He willed it. He did not die, only in 
 appearance ; neither did His body ascend, only in ap- 
 pearance, but was transposed. This transposition is a 
 vanishing away out of sight. Read of the transposition 
 of Philip, in Acts viii., 39-40. Andrew Potts, of Harris- 
 burg, Pa., told me — and the same was corroborated by 
 several truthful men who witnessed it — that he vanished 
 out of the sight of his friends at the depot, when they 
 were about to take the cars for a town six miles down the 
 road, and that when the cars arrived at that station he 
 was already there, talking with a Friend who was waiting 
 for the train to escort the friends to his house. 
 
 Jesus' life and death was to show mankind that He 
 was the same as they, and to show them the possibilities 
 of human nature. A teacher, to be acceptable, must not 
 be too far removed from his pupils. Had Jesus mani- 
 fested the powers of a God, vanished from the cross, etc., 
 
— 73 — 
 
 He would have converted the Jewish nation in a day, 
 and they would have worshipped Him as God. But 
 what good would that have done ? Lo ! the world has 
 been worshipping Gods for countless ages, and some por- 
 tion has been worshipping Jesus ever since His crucifixion, 
 but what good has it done ? 
 
 The Doctrines of Jesus are sublime in their truth and 
 simplicity — but very much, of the most value, has never 
 been penned. It has been urged against him that he 
 taught that which, if practiced, would subvert civilization. 
 On the contrary, it would redeem mankind from barbar- 
 ism and idolatry, and make men civilized in place of 
 semi-savage. ' i Greater works than these shall ye do, 
 because I go to the Father.' ' " By their fnrits shall ye 
 know them." " These signs shall follow those that be- 
 lieve." Who believes? 
 
74 — 
 
 VII.— GENERATION OF MIND. 
 
 It is the weakness of matter which compels it to lie dof- 
 mant and still in one place ; this it is which causes it to 
 fall down when not supported. Gravitation is only an- 
 other name for weakness. So it is with mind. That 
 which is under law is weak, and the more materialistic 
 the mind is the weaker it is, and the more bound by law. 
 Mind is law, but the thing moved and governed is matter. 
 To fulfil the law, then, is to perfect the mind, and the 
 matter under it ; for law makes matter, and imparts every 
 quality to it— motion, weight, buoyancy, etc. To the 
 perfected mind all mundane things are under, or enclosed 
 in it, as a large circle encloses smaller ones. There is no 
 such thing as perfecting nature — it is already perfect. 
 Neither can an imperfect thing generate a perfect thing. 
 The imperfect changes by rising up to, and receiving the 
 perfect within itself. Thus the wise man works through 
 nature, not against it ; and mastering its modes, methods, 
 laws and minds, transcends them all ; and looking back, 
 becomes a spectator rather than an actor. This is the 
 fulfilment of law, or in other words, the being filled 'full 
 of mind. For as we ascend in the scale of power, we be- 
 come rmre and more, involved^ or enveloped in mind^ 
 
— 75 — 
 
 which, penetrating through and through, illuminates the 
 spirit, and gives buoyancy and fluidity, or malleability, 
 to the matter composing the body ; thus connecting it 
 with other matter, to influence, control, mould and fash- 
 ion it for use, as one uses his hands. In order to pass 
 from one nature, or mode of existence, into another, gen- 
 eration and birth are necessary. This involves a sleep. 
 The spirit worlds are of this nature. In order to go be- 
 yond them — to the realm of absolute power, the germs of 
 the mind must be ripe. We are here for the purpose — 
 some of us, at least— of generating mind ; not merely to 
 spend a few years in amassing wealth, or in toiling to 
 support bodies. Those in whom the mind is not half 
 generated remain in this nature to try it over and over 
 again. Unripe germs will not grow. To pass into the 
 nature or " Kingdom of God" a regeneration is neces- 
 sary, because it is an incomprehensible nature to this finite 
 mind — hence the entire man must be re-made. The 
 body is of no account. Mind is that which determines. 
 Some minds are of no account. Fate determines. The 
 truly generated mind may, and does, regenerate the man, 
 and endow him or her with supernatural power and im- 
 mortal life, here on this earth. That which ensues at the 
 death of the body is simply generation, and not a regen- 
 eration ; for in the regeneration the body is changed in 
 quality consciously, by the joining to it of the Divine 
 Mind. There is no sleep or trance in this ; it is effort ; 
 not physical, but mental effort, in the destruction of 
 things that disturb the harmony. 
 
— 76 — 
 
 There are many enemies to human progress, prominent 
 among which are the following of a downward or retro- 
 gressive series, which are antagonized by an upward or 
 progressive series. They may properly be termed Pow- 
 ers — one of Light, the other of Darkness. 
 Powers of Light, Powers of Darkness. 
 
 f i. Revelation. ( i. Ignorance. 
 
 \ 2. Joy. ( 2. Sorrow. 
 
 ( 3. Temperance. j 3. Intemperance. 
 
 ( 4. Continence. ( 4. Concupiscence. 
 
 ( 5. Justice. ( 5. Injustice. 
 
 ( 6. Communion. ( 6. Covetousness. 
 
 ( 7. Truth. ] 7. Deceit. 
 
 I 8. Good. \ 8. Envy. 
 
 ( 9. Light. ( 9. Fraud. 
 
 (10. Life. \ 10. Wrath. 
 
 — Hermes. 
 
 Revelation may be known by its imparting a great satis- 
 faction, rest, or joy to man. Joy is prolific, since it is the 
 feminine of ideas. As Revelation drives away ignorance, 
 so joy drives away sorrow — or prepares the mind to resist 
 sorrow, and to be self-sustaining in its completeness — to 
 stand calm and tranquil amid life's changing scenes, and 
 be content and happy despite adversity. Temperance in 
 all things is revealed as the source of health, and immedi- 
 ately is siezed upon by the mind, and when it has grown 
 apace, Continence, the feminine of it, is evolved. And 
 they two drive away Intemperance and Concupiscence. 
 When this is accomplished the mind is as clear as a pol- 
 ished mirror. The turbid waters of selfishness and lust 
 have subsided, and Justice, stripped of vindictiveness, 
 stands revealed as mercy, and becomes the ruling power 
 
— 77 — 
 
 of the mind. Then comes Communion, the feminine of 
 Justice, and Injustice and Covetousness flee away. There 
 is now no feeling of " mine and thine* ! left in the mind. 
 All things are pure, and all things are common. The 
 communion of the sexes, of races, of spirits, angels, and 
 Gods, is effected, and the mind trembles with its fulness 
 upon the confines of absolute truth or oneness of being. 
 The soul has now ascended to the seventh sphere, and is 
 pregnant with male and female twins — "the Truth of 
 Good, and the Good of Truth, ' ' which in due time are 
 born into the conscious mind, whereupon deceit and envy 
 take their departure. In the light of truth all distinc- 
 tions and differences disappear, and all things are good. 
 But this light reveals another light — dimly seen at first — 
 far away upon the backgrounds of the soul — fitful and 
 fleeting, obscured by passing shadows, it grows brighter 
 and comes nearer — an immortal tight, in the centre of 
 which is the germ of another life— of an immortal sub- 
 stance called "the Tree of Life." It slowly enters into 
 the mind, and descending from thence enters into and 
 transforms the changeable matter into a substance at once 
 homogeneous and not particled. The man is no longer in 
 light and in life, but light and life are in him. The In- 
 finite is no longer without and far away, but it is with- 
 in ; not divided and separated from, but the integral part 
 of all being, tangible, visible and intelligible. The im- 
 possible does not belong to this life, and flees away upon 
 its approach, or is not. The darkness and ignorance 
 which forms the background of the soul, in which we are 
 hidden from ourselves, has been withdrawn, and we are 
 
— 78 — 
 
 revealed as the Over-soul itself, containing all life and 
 forms within. We are no longer involved in law or mind, 
 for we contain all of these, and are conscious thereof. 
 And we use them as we now do our hands and feet. Man 
 is master of all his soul embraces. This is the proper 
 generation of mind, wherein the body and spirit are re- 
 generated. To such, death is not, for death is a weak- 
 ness. The intuitions of a ripened mind are as broad and 
 deep as the universe, but those of a small or an unripe 
 mind are weak and shallow. Hence the necessity of mu- 
 tual culture — not in the acquisition of earthly knowledge, 
 but in the effort to grasp creative power — philosophy, as- 
 tronomy, etc., in their broadest and deepest aspects. 
 Philosophy is the highest of all studies. It wings the soul. 
 Truth is so little known that it is folly to waste words in 
 argument ; but speculate, think, entertain and master all 
 ideas thereto ; imagine, grasp at the Infinite Mind, and 
 bring it into yourself, for in the effort the mind expands, 
 stretches out and grows. What if you accept an error to- 
 day? You can change your opinion to-morrow ! Above 
 all things, beware of fossilization. 
 
 Had Jesus healed the whole world in a day, it would 
 have been sick again in a few weeks, if not days. He 
 did not teach worship, but manhood, as a Divine thing. 
 He taught salvation as flowing from works, and not from 
 his merits or blood, or from the worship of him, or 
 anything else but principle. He taught the influence and 
 value of belief; and also of several kinds of baptism — of 
 water, of fire, and of the Holy Ghost ; and also of a bap- 
 tism which he should undergo at his death. We are left 
 
— 79 — 
 
 to conjecture what baptism he meant when he said, " He 
 that believeth and is baptized shall be saved," etc. (See 
 Mark, xvi., 16, 17, 18). Bat we are not left in doubt 
 in regard to its being the baptism with water, for the 
 Christian world has been "sprinkled," "poured" and 
 "plunged" in water for eighteen hundred and eighty-two 
 years; and where are the " signs" he said should fol- 
 low as an evidence of salvation ? He said he was the 
 bread of life; to eat thereof was to be immortal. Now, 
 the truth is, he was teaching the same thing I am trying 
 to illustrate, and his ignorant apostles, or some one 
 else, have got it mixed up and distorted, in order to deify 
 him. He said the bread of life came from heaven ; and 
 also that " the Kingdom of God is within you." He also 
 spoke of another birth, and of sight, as a result of that 
 birth. Baptism with water is a symbol of purification in 
 order to the reception of another Baptism, viz., that of 
 fire. The Baptism with water is typical of the softening 
 and the making tender (as a seed) the natural mind, so 
 that it may expand or revolve in its growth towards 
 rationality. The softened, tender, sympathetic, open- 
 ing mind, inhales the fragrance of another life, and 
 it buds, blossoms and bears fruits which are a blessing 
 to all. Its blossoms are a sight of the kingdom of God, 
 and its fruit is the entering into the spirit of all truth, and 
 the birth of a Divine Body, indestructible and eternal. 
 Bathing assists the will in the healing of the body, and in 
 the subduing of the heat of passion. Water opens the 
 pores of the body— belief opens the mind ; the first for 
 the reception of magnetism (spirit), the latter for the re- 
 
— 80 — 
 
 ception of ideas, which are, indeed, of the soul (Holy 
 Ghost). 
 
 This is the building up of a divine body of a superna- 
 tural substance, from the atmosphere of a thought- world. 
 We need not die, if we only know how to live. But what 
 can we say of a world of men who think of nothing but 
 vanity, and for the serious part of life hire the thinking 
 of it done? The thoughts doled out from millions of 
 pulpit-grinders every seventh-day are but the effluvia of 
 the past, the exhalations of the dead. What kind of sub- 
 stance do they furnish for a dying world ? Is this the 
 " bread of life ? " Is there a spark of original fire in it ? 
 He who depends upon books for his inspiration is but an 
 exhumer of the dead. The heavens are as open to-day 
 as when Isaiah, gazing aloft, said, " Lo, I am God ! and 
 I change not; therefore, ye sons of Jacob, are ye not de- 
 voured.' ' The same power is waiting for us to reach up 
 and take that existed in the olden time for him they nailed 
 upon the cross. The tables of the Infinite are spread, and 
 loaded, but no one will be compelled to partake. Help 
 yourselves, is the universal law. 
 
 At the tomb of Lazarus, in view of a body lying stark 
 and dead, with the smell of death, and the mould of the 
 grave on his pallid lips, with eyes that gazed the Infinite 
 out of countenance with their unflinching audacity, He 
 of the magic Will said, u If a man believe in me he shall 
 not die." Did he mean physical death? Most assuredly 
 he did. Take this as corroborative : in speaking to the 
 Jews at another time he said, " Your fathers did eat man- 
 na in the wilderness, and are dead; but I am the bread of 
 
life which came down from heaven, of which, if a man 
 eat, he shall not die,"— meaning the same death the 
 fathers died in the wilderness, viz : physical death. And 
 yet, in the face of these positive declarations of the In- 
 spired One, the pulpit organs grind out a spiritual explana- 
 tion. They make Jesus' work apply to a future state, 
 when he intended it wholly for this life. The Hermetic 
 Philosophers, the Alchemists, and the Rosicrucians, have 
 all believed in and taught the doctrine of eternal youth, 
 and sought for the " philsopher's stone, " and the " elixir 
 of life ;" and Jesus taught that life was within the King- 
 dom of heaven, which i ' is within you ; ' ' and laid the 
 foundation-stone, Belief. 
 
 The fakirs of India cause a shrub to grow out of the 
 ground, blossom, bear its fruit, and ripen it, all in one 
 short hour. And it is no phantom fruit, for it is passed 
 around and divided among the bystanders, who eat there- 
 of. Scores of travelers have witnessed this feat, and 
 many have written of it, but my authority is a gentleman 
 of veracity who was born and reared in India. It is done 
 under circumstances which utterly preclude the idea of 
 jugglery or trick of any kind. They know and say it is 
 the power of the will that does it. But there is no growth 
 to their power. Why? Because they have no higher 
 ideas of human powers than the manipulation and pro- 
 duction of things. They are not a progressive people. 
 They are at their highest point. It remains for the An- 
 glo-Saxon race to go higher ; for it is a higher race. 
 
 Jesus said, " Greater works than these shall ye do, be- 
 cause I go to the Father/ ' And it would have proved 
 
— 82 — 
 
 true had they made the conditions. It remains for us to 
 make the conditions, which are, to work for that baptism 
 with the Holy Ghost and with Jire, viz : the union of 
 spirit and soul. Water makes the body soft, tender and 
 pure. Baptism is to be submerged, swallowed up in the 
 spirit, which is the beginning of a new life with wondrous 
 powers, generative of new matter — a divine essence, su- 
 perior to death and dissolution, which in appearance re- 
 sembles this body, but which, in fact, is not mortal. It 
 was this body which Jesus, Moses, Elijah, Philip, 
 Enoch, and several Rosicrucians of the olden time are 
 reputed to have had. This was why Jesus said, " I will 
 lay my life down; you cannot take it." This Divine 
 body may die, if corrupted by the desire to die. Thus St. 
 John could live, notwithstanding he was plunged into a 
 cauldron of boiling oil, till he desired to die. The Divine 
 body is not a spiritual body, hence it is no apparition, or 
 materialized form dependent upon a medium and condi- 
 tions. It is totally subject to the will, and as it is pro- 
 jected/^^ the mind, it may be drawn back into the mind 
 again, and thus disappear. Or it may change and be- 
 come some other form. This was why the Disciples failed 
 to recognize Jesus on the way to Emmaus. "He ap- 
 peared to them in another form," says Mark. But when 
 he had blessed the bread and broke it, he was himself 
 again, they recognized him, and then he disappeared. 
 At another time he stood in their midst, and as they 
 doubted, he said, " Feel my flesh and bones, for ye know 
 a spirit hath not flesh and bones.* ' The doctrine of the 
 metempsychosis of the soul is as true as it is old. All 
 
— Se- 
 ttlings are in the divine mind, and are projections thereof 
 by Divine Will and Love. Hence, man, when he rises to 
 the Divine, has the same powers, so far as he is concerned, 
 as an individual. Thus, he may clothe the naked, feed the 
 hungry, heal the sick, raise the dead, walk upon the water, 
 still the tempest, or visit the GoD-worlds at will. When 
 that good time comes we will not need to take thought for 
 to-morrow. Then we can " give to everyone that asks," 
 and "he that would borrow" we need not "turn away." 
 Then " whatsoever ye shall ask shall be granted," not be- 
 cause ye ask in anybody's name, but because then we may 
 say with Jesus, " I and my Father are one." Then there 
 shall be no high and no low, but as brothers we shall 
 dwell together, and the nations shall learn war no more. 
 Then shall " the lamb and the lion lie down together," 
 and " the knowledge of the Lord cover the earth as the 
 waters cover the great deep." Then good-bye to mam- 
 mon and to a civilization whose glory is "an eye for an 
 eye and a tooth for a tooth,"—" whoso sheddeth man's 
 blood, by man shall his blood be shed." 
 
84- 
 
 VIII.— ATTRIBUTES OF MIND. 
 
 That which can be ascribed to the mind is an attribute 
 thereof. We have to do now only with a few. In my 
 view, all things mundane may be attributed to mind, but 
 distinctions are necessary to illustration. All attributes 
 of the mind are dual— " Male and female created he 
 them." They antagonize each other ; one leads upward, 
 the other "downward — or inward and outward. All de- 
 velopment is in expansive curves, from one to many; then 
 in contractive curves, back to one again, of a higher or 
 lower order. Nothing moves in direct lines. The ex- 
 pansion of the soul is her effort to gather power ; her con- 
 traction is her effort to use that power. This is focaliza- 
 tion. All power, to be of use, must be focalized. Intel- 
 lect is the eye of the soul, which must be focalized in or- 
 der to attain clear sight. The rays of the sun in diffusion 
 gently warms, and brings out many hidden forms from 
 the earth; but in concentration, fire is evolved, which con- 
 sumes or obliterates these same forms of matter which 
 were evolved by its gentle rays. Even the granite moun- 
 tain would vanish away as a vapor, if the light of the sun 
 was all turned upon it. Yea, more ! even the solid, beau- 
 tiful earth would evaporate into the imperceptible — not 
 even into blue sky — if the sun's forces were all turned 
 upon it. Focalization is the destruction of the old, and 
 the birth of the new. Intellect corresponds to the sun, 
 
not only in form, but in power. It is to mind what the 
 sun is to the earth. Its darkness is ignorance, its light is 
 the birth and life of many things. The diffusion of its 
 light causes the mind to radiate into many channels, or 
 attributes, in the growth of which the soul is expanded. 
 But intellect is not satisfied with this ; and when it isdis- 
 satisfied it begins to contract itself for another and a 
 mightier effort ; it turns all its light upon one point of 
 the darkness, which, like an opaque night, surrounds and 
 pierces through— as a burning of it into another life, or 
 another method of this one. This is the begetting of an- 
 other intellect (intuition) from this old one, which has 
 been consumed, or left behind as a charred and blackened 
 ruin. The door of intuition once opened, there is no more 
 use for observation, memory, thought or reason ; its light 
 penetrates the depths of all mystery ; language becomes 
 automatic; and, without thought or effort, ideas flow in as 
 the waters of a mighty river ; all reasonable needs are 
 supplied as if by magic. To such, if any there be, I can 
 say, with Jesus, " Take no thought of what ye shall say, 
 neither take heed for to-morrow." 
 
 Man, considered . as a whole, is the focus of all forces 
 beneath and above him. The essential qualities of ail ani- 
 mation are in him, and find their focal point in the mind ; 
 hence the mind is composed of instincts, disunited or at 
 war with each other, the harmonious union of which is 
 the beginning of a new order or genus. Intuition is in- 
 stinct humanized. We scarcely know what intuition is. 
 There is plenty of sagacity and instinct in the world, but 
 very little intuition. To it belongs all the spiritual gifts 
 
-86 — 
 
 we know of. Intuition is the seed of the tree of life. All 
 seeds attract heat, moisture, etc., before they can project 
 the shrub or tree ; hence, the first law of intuition is at- 
 traction, which is the feminine, or the law of all medium- 
 ship. All inspiration, prophecy, healing, clairvoyance, 
 clairaudience, psychometry, and all other spiritual mani- 
 festations, come by attraction. I am aware it is a physi- 
 cal condition • but the body is affected by our mental 
 states as a thermometer is affected by heat and cold. At- 
 traction depends upon attentioii. As a mother nurses her 
 child by constant attention, so an attraction depends upon 
 attention. As a tender mother nurses and cares for her 
 only child by unwearied watchfulness and attention, so are 
 the gifts of the Spirit obtained and perfected. Intuition 
 is the seed of the tree of life, and the various attributes 
 of the mind which lead to gifts of the Spirit are its trunk 
 and branches. 
 
 The loftiest mind has not yet fathomed the depth and 
 height, and multiplicity of spiritual gifts. They are all 
 attributes of the mind, which, ascending spirally in cycles 
 from the natural to -the rational, at last bask in the bosom 
 of the Divine mind. It is all within, waiting the baptism 
 of fire, which comes by action. " Dead here, slumber- 
 ing there, latent in all save a few," we look upon it as 
 miraculous ; as a manifestation especially ordered by 
 Deity for a favored few. Mediums arrive at a certain 
 stage of development, and there stop ; then wonder why 
 the gifts gradually die. (See chapter on Mediumship). 
 The mind is a trinity in unity ; that is, it is animal, men- 
 tal and moral. The external mind corresponds to physi- 
 
— 87- 
 
 cal nature, and is called the animal ; the intellect corre- 
 sponds to fire — the spirit ; the moral corresponds to the 
 soul. There are seven attributes of the mind, each im- 
 parting a certain quality peculiar to itself. They have 
 their antagonists, as follows : 
 
 Experience, I. 
 
 1 1 . Belief /\ Unbelief, II. 
 III. Hope / \ Fear, III. 
 
 IV. Knowledge / \ Ignorance, IV. 
 
 V. Trust / \ Distrust, V. 
 
 VI. Love / \ Jealousy, VI. 
 
 VII. Will / \Reverence,VII. 
 
 To the mind belongs quantity and quality. Quantity 
 gives momentum, but quality gives elasticity and buoyan- 
 cy. The attributes of the mind each has its antagonist, 
 as shown in the above diagram. They both grow out of 
 experience, but they are as opposite as day and night in 
 the influence they exert upon us. Each exists by oppos- 
 ing the influence of its opposite ; the life of one is the 
 disease and death of the other. There is not life enough 
 in the mind to feed them both to fulness, so they strive 
 with each other for the lion's share. 
 
 The fundamental principle of this life is experience. 
 To it belong observation, memory, thought and investi- 
 gation. We all begin and end with experience; if we 
 try, we cannot escape it ; we must experience something. 
 The experiences of some, however, are as trivial as that 
 of a root which grows in the ground ; according to the 
 experience, so is the growth. We revolve in circles in 
 our growth. Every experience is a circle — a triangular 
 circle, of which belief, hope and knowledge are the an- 
 
— 88 — 
 
 gles. Knowledge is the ultimate of every act, of every 
 experience, and is twofold in its effects, viz : good or 
 bad. It either adds to, or diminishes, human happiness. 
 The nature of the knowledge gives it its effect, *>., it im- 
 parts a certain quality to the mind conducive to happiness 
 or misery. That which imparts rest, peace and tran- 
 quility is conducive to health and happiness ; but that 
 which causes dissatisfaction, unrest and agitation, con- 
 duces to disease and unhappiness. 
 
 BELIEF AND HOPE. 
 
 The great fundamental principle of Christianity is "Be- 
 lieve, or you will be damned.' 9 This presupposes that 
 man has power to believe as he likes. This is undoubted- 
 ly a truth, as regards some men, while there are others 
 who are controlled entirely by evidence, or, at least, by 
 what appears as evidence to them. To convince a man 
 of a truth, it must appear to him as a psychological power. 
 It must appear so fascinating as to carry his will captive 
 through his love ; then the evidence supporting it will ap- 
 pear very plain and logical. When the antagonist of be- 
 lief overbalances belief, />.,when persons are ofaskeptical, 
 doubtful, incredulous turn of mind, they are, as a general 
 thing, not easily influenced ; they are inflexible, and be- 
 come fixed in opinions to which they become devoted. 
 This devotion is the same out of the church as in. It 
 closes the mind upon all sides, save the one through 
 
• — 89 — 
 
 which they look. They become bigoted in their one 
 idea, which is a creed they are bound to sustain. Unbe- 
 lief is the beginning of strife. It is a contradiction, and 
 strife is sickening. The unnatural man fights for his opin- 
 ions and against the opinions of others ; but the natural 
 man loves repose, and is indifferent to opinions of others. 
 Strife is of hell, and perhaps it is good for the unnatural, 
 but there is no health or life therein. Now, unbelief, be- 
 ing a negation or contradiction, it has within itself the 
 spirit of agitation, which sets in motion discordant men- 
 tal elements, antagonizing belief, which is of the soul — of 
 intuition — the condition of childhood. The spirit of be- 
 lief is that of childish innocence and credulity — of trust, 
 hope and confidence. Hence it is peaceful and restful to 
 the soul — so expansive. He who does not believe in 
 immortality fails to do so because he feels not the pulsat- 
 ing heart of God within himself. Let him who believes 
 keep silent till he knows the truth and can demonstrate it, 
 if he desires good results to himself. I do not believe in 
 strife, but let those who do, join battle. 
 
 That a man cannot believe except from evidence, is 
 true ; but one man receives evidence from without, while 
 another feels it within. We cannot accept a thing as 
 truth except it be in harmony with our inmost feelings. 
 He who really believes in God believes in his own power 
 to become God-like ; but he who believes in the devil 
 knows of him, for he feels him within. We all instinctive- 
 ly believe in that which we love. We believe in that 
 which harmonizes with us. Mental assent is no belief; 
 
— 90 — 
 
 it may be forced out by fear, or love of appearance, or 
 popularity, or gain, but the real belief is what we live. In 
 view of this, Paul says, " As a man thinketh, so is he." 
 Belief is the fundamental principle of soul-growth. The 
 credulous man stands higher spiritually than the incredu- 
 lous. Why ? Because all growth and real power depends 
 upon the absorption of Divine fire, and belief opens the 
 pores. All magnetizers are aware that belief and fear 
 cause receptiveness. Fear is based upon belief. The be- 
 lief in the " harmful Gods" has diseased mankind through 
 the cold, malarial influence of fear. We do not fear that 
 which we know; it is the unknown we dread. True belief 
 also gives hope, and hope casts out fear and imparts cheerful- 
 ness. Belief in that which we fear is not a belief, but an 
 apprehension that the thing threatened, though unknown, 
 may be true. This apprehension or fear creates a tremb- 
 ling'and quaking as of an ague. It is disease. 
 
 He who believes in himself reposes in himself, and 
 achieves success; but he who doubts himself is afraid of 
 his shadow, and achieves nothing. Achievement is the 
 acquirement of knowledge — as riches. But he who 
 achieves nothing, knows nothing, and is poor ; hence he 
 is dissatisfied with himself and others. He who knows 
 least of himself trusts himself the least, and is afraid and 
 doubtful. As of himself, so of others. We judge others 
 by ourselves. He who has the most trust and confidence 
 in others has the best and highest knowledge— -first of him- 
 self, secondly of others. He who knows the most of 
 money knows the least of mankind. He trusts money, 
 
— 91 — 
 
 but not manhood, for his knowledge leads him to distrust 
 mankind. Knowledge gives confidence or destroys it. 
 Woe be to him whose knowledge diminishes his trust. 
 Remove the little confidence we have in each other, and 
 all friendship and sociability would cease. Nations and 
 governments could not exist, and progress would be at 
 an end. Confidence is the diviner part of us. It is the 
 child-nature— that which is " of the kingdom of heaven." 
 Woe to him who has little or no confidence in mankind, 
 for he has none in God. Sleep is sweet to the trustful 
 soul, for God dwells within, and bars the door of dark- 
 ness through which devils creep when we are off our 
 guard. I have heard men boast of their doubts, -of their 
 unbelief and incredulity. But to me it is an evidence of 
 smallness of mind. Religion has become the laugh and 
 grimace of the world; by reason of the want of compre- 
 hension of its votaries, and of the unbelievers. He who 
 worships symbols is an idolater, and rightly provokes the 
 mirth of others ; but there is something sublime in prin- 
 ciples which always commands respect. The underlying 
 principle of all religion is the same, and is as old as hu- 
 manity. True, out of this principle-— this fire-faith of the 
 olden time—has grown up dwarfed and hideous forms of 
 religion, at war onew T ith the other, as man wars with man, 
 or nation against nation. But the principle is still Divine, 
 and universally breathes of the brotherhood of man, and 
 the Fatherhood of God. Who is there who, in con- 
 templating the wonders of creation, has not felt the leap- 
 ing of flame thoughts, as if in rapture— the kindling of a 
 
— 9$ — 
 
 divine fire within that leaped and glowed with a fervent 
 heat, melting our hardness of nature, our skepticism and 
 unbelief in the wisdom of creative genius ? Ah ! who has 
 not gone hence from this closet of worship feeling like a 
 coward, humbled and weak as the publican and sinner 
 who smote upon his breast, and cried, " Father, forgive 
 me, a sinner ! " I repeat, it is the small-minded, weak 
 man, who quenches the fires of his own soul by his doubt 
 and skepticism. To gaze aloft at the stars and rear not 
 out of your own soul a spiritual temple of principles for 
 the guidance of life's actions — for the use of mankind — 
 and instead, only spend our time in tearing down the 
 house wherein our neighbor worships, is unworthy of 
 manhood. Power is that which builds anew — not that 
 which destroys. It takes genius to build an edifice, but a 
 rat might undermine and topple it to the ground. Doubt, 
 skepticism and unbelief are so many walls surrounding us, 
 isolating and insulating us from each other, and keeping 
 us far from the realms of power. In proportion as we 
 know a person to be truthful do we trust ; their love for 
 truth is natural ; and it is our nature to believe in truth ; 
 and whenever we find it, we trust it, and hope for its in- 
 crease and perpetuity ; and when we know of it we love it, 
 and will its spirit to be ours. Belief, hope, knowledge, 
 trust, love and will, are all of kin to truth, and he who 
 cultivates these graces shall yet be filled with righteousness. 
 Hope is based in belief. " It is an anchor to the soul." 
 In proportion as I believe a thing do I hope for its truth. 
 In proportion as I believe in others do I hope for their 
 
— 93 — 
 
 health and prosperity. We rest in our hopes. The grave 
 looks less desolate to the hopeful soul. Cheerfulness and 
 smiles are hope's children. The unbelieving are the 
 hopeless and the dissatisfied , he who believes in nothing, 
 hopes nothing ; the hopeless are the desperate. Which 
 road will you follow, dear reader, for the truest know- 
 ledge ? Do doubts and skepticism stand in your way, and 
 choke and strangle belief? Destroy them, then, by not 
 paying attention to their croaking. Forget your doubt 
 by keeping in your mind and constantly before your eyes 
 that which you love, or that which you would like to be- 
 lieve in and be. It is by the attention we bestow upon 
 little things in the mind that makes impassable mountains 
 of them ; forget, or refuse to behold them, and they be- 
 come mole hills. 
 
 Have you an enemy — one whom you can scarce endure ? 
 You know no good of him. This feeling does not make 
 you happy — better destroy it speedily. Visit him in his 
 prosperity and in his affliction frequently ; talk with him ; 
 interchange ideas with him ; enter into his life-plans and 
 hopes. In process of time you will find some weakness 
 in him that will arouse your pity, which is not far from 
 friendship. The ingredients necessary for success in this 
 is, first, a desire on your part to bring about the result, 
 if for nothing else than your own peace of soul ; second, 
 a belief in your ability to accomplish what you undertake ; 
 third, a cheerful hope of success ; fourth, a true knowledge 
 of yourself — of your self-control, and psychological power, 
 and of extraneous means to affect him physically, such as 
 
94 — 
 
 gifts, or good and unobtrusive acts. My word for it, be- 
 fore you are done with your man you will be surprised at 
 the amount of good feeling and friendship that will be 
 developed between you. Perhaps he fancies you have 
 done him a wrong. If you can possibly find some flaw 
 in yourself, go and accuse yourself to him and beg his par- 
 don ; accuse yourself for the very things you know he is 
 guilty of, but never accuse or upbraid him. But if you 
 do this with doubt and unbelief in your heart of any good 
 in him, your eyes will look your distrust, and he will be 
 driven away from you as from a reptile. Control begins 
 at home. Which road will you follow, reader — belief or 
 unbelief, in order to make the most of yourself? Which 
 leads to power ? 
 
— 95 — 
 
 IX.— -ATTRIBUTES OF MIND.— Continued. 
 
 KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 It is said that "knowledge is power.' ' This maybe 
 so in one sense, but let us examine and see wherein it is 
 true. There are different kinds of knowledge, some of 
 which are a destructive power. The knowledge of this 
 world is based on facts gathered through experience. All 
 the facts known have reference to matter, and things rela- 
 ted thereto. So the relationship of things is the sum 
 total of human knowledge as founded on facts. Is destruc- 
 tion power? It is not reasonable to call that power 
 which destroys health and happiness ; in fact, weakness 
 is a more fitting name for it. Of course, there is force 
 manifested in destruction ; but it cannot be said to come 
 from knowledge. To illustrate : In the construction of 
 an edifice, some mistake, blunder, or oversight, leaves a 
 defect in some important part, and after a time, in some 
 manner — even in the settling of the building it falls to 
 the ground, and in a moment the labor of years, not- 
 withstanding the knowledge of many skilled artisans, 
 may be ruined through the weakness of ignorance. Shall 
 we say, then, that ignorance is power? It would be 
 just as logical as to say that knowledge is power, unless it 
 can be shown that knowledge has some real and lasting 
 benefit to confer. Is such the fact ? Is there anything 
 
— 96 — 
 
 real in our much-boasted knowledge? Man's happiness 
 and health is of more importance to him than anything 
 else in existence ; and that which will confer the greatest 
 amount of these upon the greatest number must be real 
 power. It is claimed by the church that the knowledge 
 of God will do this. This, indeed, might be the case if 
 there was any such knowledge in existence. We know 
 nothing whatever of God ! Nature we see every day, 
 but all any one actually knows of it could be put in a 
 very small compass. All we know is that which happens 
 under our immediate observation. That which happens 
 in one place may be known to a few persons in that 
 locality; but that which happens in another place is 
 unknown to them. So, it is easily seen that that which 
 any one person actually knows of nature and its phe- 
 nomena is very small. The most of what we think we 
 know is mere hearsay. In the sciences even, we shall 
 find the same weakness. Chemistry is based upon ex- 
 periments made during past centuries to the present date, 
 which experiments, indeed, illustrate wonderful myste- 
 ries. But what is really known save the effects of certain 
 combinations? A person learns how to produce the 
 phenomena, and to repeat the names, etc., of the chemi- 
 cals and the products, and he forthwith imagines he 
 possesses a wonderful amount of knowledge, and is 
 immediately dubbed "Professor." The bulk of the 
 knowledge is in a long catalogue of names intended to 
 mystify the ignorant to the glory of the " Professors." 
 It is certainly a great thing. For gunpowder was invented ; 
 forthwith war became a u science." " Military tactics" 
 
— 97 — 
 
 are a great thing ! The possession of this knowledge helps 
 a man up wonderfully! To be " major," or "gen- 
 eral," or "colonel," is to be up in the clouds ! They 
 tread upon the earth as if they disdained it ; butchers, 
 pillagers, ravishers ! the destroyers of peaceful homes ! 
 What a power ! The science of government is built upon 
 the blood ye have shed. What a store of knowledge it 
 takes to be a legislator, governor, president or king ! 
 To make laws to hang the lowly, and to enable those 
 who have knowledge to escape. Look you at the vast 
 sums of money spent yearly to keep the government of 
 even one State running. (Now, we are not regretting 
 the money, but are thinking of the aching limbs and 
 backs that toil year in and year out to support this cursed 
 display of knowledge.) For why does this government 
 system exist? So that millions of soldiers may be kept 
 in worse than idleness ; so that hosts of the so-called great 
 may live without toil ; so that the ill-gotten gains of the 
 rich may be guarded, and they protected in their legal- 
 ized swindling and high-handed robbing — so that the 
 millions may be kept subservient to the few. All legis- 
 lation and governments are based upon the false and 
 illogical assumption that ' ' the dear people' ' need force 
 to compel them to do right. Is not this assumption based 
 in ignorance of the real character of mankind ? What 
 kind of knowledge is it that springs out of falsehood ? It 
 is a lie from foundation up. Look how you have multi- 
 plied legislation till the law books exceed the brains of 
 the world. Law is now a science, about which its pro- 
 fessors differ as much as the professors of theology do 
 
— 98 — 
 
 about religion. To keep this hydra-headed monster alive 
 colleges are built and sustained, wherein the^ most 
 promising youth of the land are immured to bleach, fade, 
 and grow prematurely old, in order to earn — what ? 
 Legal quibbles, technicalities, and precedents, whereby, 
 in the great majority of cases^ justice may be defeased. 
 In the great (?) courts of law the best talent is generally 
 arrayed against justice, and in favor of wrong. Law 
 signifies rule, and rule signifies a king and " nobility' ' — 
 false distinctions among men. Why do they exist ? So 
 that the few can fatten upon the toil of others ; so that a 
 few can ride in coaches, dressed in the finest fabrics, 
 while the many can walk, (or "tramp," as it is now 
 fashionable to call it), and go in rags. A short time ago, 
 I saw a man lying under a bridge. I asked a Methodist 
 "divine," with whom I was talking, why that man was 
 lying there? "Oh! I don't know," said he; "I sup- 
 pose it is some tramp laid down there to rest. I have no 
 use for that kind of people." And the law is for the up- 
 holding of that spirit. They nailed the poor " tramp" 
 of Galilee upon the cross in the olden time. Ah, me ! 
 What a world of knowledge this is. Chemistry has given 
 birth to the science of medicine ; another assumption 
 based in ignorance. It assumes that disease is a thing of 
 the body, and that physical substances — drugs — have 
 power to cure it. Bah ! The more medicine you take 
 the sooner you die. The whole system is mere guess- 
 work. Anatomy and physiology may be termed sciences ; 
 but they are merely the observation of the body. When 
 it comes to the application of their facts to practical 
 
— 99 — 
 
 utility, aside from surgery, "humbug" expresses its real 
 knowledge. And yet, see how the arm of the law is 
 thrown around its army of cormorants and extortionists 
 to protect them in their robbery of the ignorant toilers. 
 You tell them that all diseases spring from the mind, and 
 *%&& the vital forces ancTdrugs can never cure, and they 
 stick up their aristocratic noses with a sneer and a laugh. 
 What a wonderful science! Then, again, there is the 
 church ; what a power it is ! "By their fruits shall ye 
 know them." What are its fruits? Its basic principle 
 is the authority of a musty old book — "the Bible' ' — 
 over which a ceaseless strife is kept up as to its real mean- 
 ing. Thoughts, and legends, hearsay narratives, so -called 
 facts of the long ago, called "holy." An assumption of 
 an overruling Providence who answers long-drawn words, 
 accompanied with "holy" hands uplifted, and eyes 
 turned upward, in public and in private, to be seen and 
 heard of men ; a Providence who loves some and hates 
 others : an idea at once at variance with the sun that 
 shines, and the rain that falls, and with every instinct of 
 a true human being, and which all nature, animate and 
 inanimate, stamps as an assumption of ignorance, based 
 in the lust of rule. A pretence of holiness, and of 
 humility, to conceal the rottenness of greed, lust and 
 pride. Its principle is that of king-craft and priest- craft : 
 the few ruling, and living by the toil of the many. 
 Church, science and Slate — a trinity of hell in which 
 devils are hatched. Pride is the floor of it. Is it igno- 
 rance or knowledge ? Knowledge gives the power to 
 rule ; but it is the ignorance of the masses, and of the 
 
— 100 — 
 
 many honest and good men who preach and uphold this 
 thing, which is the foundation. There may be some 
 knowledge about it; but ignorance exceeds it, as the sky 
 exceeds the small earth. This assumption of holiness 
 is a falsehood from first to last, and its direct influence 
 is to create the feeling that one man is better than 
 another. " Am I not a' child of God? And you are a 
 child of the devil. Lo ! I am better than you ; because I 
 am holier than you, and God loves me, and hates you." 
 Such is the unspoken voice of the christian world \ but it 
 sounds very loud. One day is to be kept holy • but the 
 other six are unholy ; the days of toil — of the production 
 of the necessaries of life — these are unholy days ; idleness is 
 holy ! What a mockery of true manhood, and the truth ! 
 No wonder the world runs mad with the idea to get rid 
 of toil ! The church teaches that it was a curse put upon 
 man. Of course, he is at liberty to escape it if he can, 
 and the priests and aristocrats of the world are doing it 
 upon the hard-earned bread of the ignorant dupes. Why 
 should I feel holier at one time than at another? And 
 how am I to enter into holiness ? To be happy is to be 
 holy, and mankind find their health and happiness in the 
 alternation of rest and exercise. Is one any holier than 
 the other ? ' ' All nature says no, and he who teaches 
 differently simply shows his ignorance. Jesus was of the 
 same opinion. When we speak of knowledge, we speak 
 of truth. Jesus was dumb when asked, ' i What is truth ?' ' 
 All knowledge is relative ; there is no absolute know- 
 ledge. So knowledge, in order to conform to truth, 
 must deal in the relationship that man sustains to others. 
 
— 101 — 
 
 Now, inasmuch as there is only an approximation to 
 knowledge, man must depend upon his perception of the 
 truth as his guide to the basis of such relationship. This 
 perception comes through much thought, and is an in- 
 tuition or a revelation of the truth. So, power, to be of 
 use, must be guided by perception or revelation. This 
 comes to man by the exercise of his mind— in freedom. 
 Revelation to one man will not do for another, except as 
 it helps him to see ; nor will the revelation of one age do 
 for another; for the race progresses, or grows beyond 
 the perceptions of a previous race. Now power exists ; 
 but it is no more in knowledge than in other attributes of 
 the mind of equal radius. Kindness may have but little 
 knowledge of itself, and yet we all know there is more 
 moral power in it than in mere knowing. Knowledge is of 
 no use to the soul save in the opening of the mind to a per- 
 ception of the true relationship of things. In the lower 
 orders the law is for the strong to prey upon the weak ; 
 but man, in proportion as he rises above the brute plane, 
 comes under the law of equality, and it is revealed to 
 him as a great truth. His knowledge of his relationship 
 to others has changed, and he now no longer preys upon 
 the ignorance and weakness of others. The law is equal 
 rights in freedom. He knows now that power comes 
 through union of feeling and brotherly love, which no 
 knowledge on earth can give. Knowledge is not power, 
 but it is the road to power, if you can find it ; but that 
 which seems to be the road may be a blind. The ex- 
 periences of life all have a tendency, when looked at 
 rightly, to wean us from its toy shows and vanities. 
 
— 102 — 
 
 Facts are of value only in this. The swift-fleeting years 
 rudely tear the illusions and delusions of youth from every 
 true man of mature age. What, in reality, is the know- 
 ledge of this earth worth beside the bed of death, or at 
 the grave ? The half-witted clown with an abiding hope 
 and confidence in spirit-life hath more power under such 
 circumstances than all the millionaires in the world with- 
 out. Fower is in self-sustaining calmness — not in 
 money, nor in knowledge. The knowledge that binds a 
 man to this life by the development of pride, egotism, 
 and self-sufficiency, is a curse, and a source of weakness 
 instead of power. The knowledge that makes one all 
 alive to the woes and misfortunes of others lifts him out 
 of the soulless laws of business, and upward to a recogni- 
 tion of the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of 
 man. This is the knowledge that gives power. This is 
 the knowledge that sustains in all trying hours. 
 
 Such claim very little knowledge, but much love. The 
 knowledge of this world — of matter and its laws — 
 are for this world, and are true to our senses while in it, 
 but are not applicable to other worlds or other senses. 
 It may be — nay, it is possible — to develop senses in this 
 life adapted to another mode of existence, where pleas- 
 ures are real, and life is earnest and enduring, and your 
 sciences of no account, and your gold as vapor. Is such 
 knowledge real power ? Yes ! but it is not knowledge, 
 but a gift of the Spirit through the death of these sublunary 
 things. It is not of the intellect, but of intuition. 
 
 Oh, how blind and dumb we are ! We behold the 
 miracle of the rising sun daily, or feel it in a perpetual 
 
— 103 — 
 
 motion within and around us ; but instead of being de- 
 lighted at having discovered the finger-marks of the Infi- 
 nite, we say, "Oh, that is natural !" Child-like, we are 
 satisfied with a name ; that ends the discussion ; ' 'I know 
 what that is ! That is nature." 
 
 Men of science will explain the laws of digestion with 
 a flourish of names, and wonderful erudition ; but what 
 does all this knowledge amount to ? Diseases outgrow 
 your remedies. We do not know why food in one 
 stomach changes into elements to sustain life, and in 
 another is converted into acids and filth'. Indigestion ! 
 Ah ! another name to explain away ignorance, and to 
 shove God further away from recognition. 
 
 Such is knowledge — an excuse to hide our shame — our 
 ignorance. We do not know how much or how little the 
 Infinite adds himself to us, or withholds himself from us in 
 our eating, drinking, sleeping, waking, thinking or talk- 
 ing. But when I tell you that the vital substance of these 
 bodies comes from the intangible — the unknown and im- 
 material, the supernatural— instead of from the food we 
 eat, you say, " That is all theory • that is speculation or 
 conjecture." I grant that sientific knowledge is good 
 enough so far as it goes— and that is merely to combining 
 and compounding matter for use — and the use has proved 
 destructive to man's best interests. It has filled the world 
 with egotism, materialism and unbelief. It teaches that 
 death is a fact \ fxedand certain. But it will yet be demon- 
 strated that death is a mere disappearance, and that the 
 disappearance is not a fact except to the blind — blinded 
 by this world's light. Knowledge is the basis for conjee- 
 
— 104 — 
 
 ture. He who does not believe in conjecture is an un- 
 believer, (trusts only in facts, physical, tangible, and shuts 
 the windows of the soul through which we may gaze upon 
 fields of infinite beauty, and behold truth in its purity), and 
 ■ there rests satisfied. He who believes nothing except 
 what he knows, is a very small pattern of a man, for in 
 point of reality he knows nothing. The man who 
 ties himself to " facts " is like a fly in a spider's web : 
 he is not satisfied. There is a wail within him, 
 as of a drowning babe. It is only when he can forget 
 himself and his doubts that he is happy. When you have 
 gone through the whole gamut of experiences, and find 
 reality and permanence in nothing, and vanity and vexa- 
 tion of spirit as the sum total of this life, you have then 
 reached the plane of knowledge. This takes the egotism 
 out of a man. He is then empty and receptive of Divine 
 influences, and is led to trust, and to have confidence in 
 creative wisdom. Trust leads to love of God in his works — 
 not of objects, but of a principle embodied, and working 
 in objects. Thus it may be seen that the road to power 
 starts at belief in God. He who believes has Hope. 
 Hope is cheerfulness and happiness. Truly we believe 
 in that which harmonizes with our feelings. To believe 
 in a thing through fear is not belief in this sense, but 
 rather a conviction of experience, far beneath belief. It 
 is a shock, an agitation, wherein there is no rest or satis- 
 faction. All conversions through fear testify to this truth. 
 He who is converted through fear has no intuition ; hence 
 he is not called from above, but from below. Intuition 
 does not come from without, hence no practicing can 
 
— 105 — 
 
 awaken or open it. Instinctively we fear that which is 
 not in harmony with us. How, then, can we believe in 
 that which we fear? We always desire to destroy that 
 which gives us pain. The fear of God is a pain which 
 the world tries in vain to remove by sacrifices, prayers, 
 and flattering ceremonies. Fear does not lead to know- 
 ledge, or blending of natures, but to unreal and erron- 
 eous views of God and of each other. It builds walls 
 around us, as a citadel in which to defend ourselves. It 
 isolates man from his fellows, and arms nation against 
 nation. We fear that which we hate, and love and serve 
 that which we are in fellowship with. Fear springs from 
 belief, but it is in a descending scale : it is beneath and 
 not above. The fearful are not the hopeful. Hope is the 
 anchor of the soul. It is God's garden in the soul ; the 
 Eden wherein the tree of life and of knowledge grow side 
 by side. With hope, the poor in their hovels can live in 
 palaces built in air. Without hope, the rich in their 
 palaces live in real hovels. Conjecture is stirred in the 
 mind by the last expiring wave of heat that descends from 
 Divine fire, as it deposits its ashes as the facts and forms 
 of existence. Belief is the flame-tip ; hope the glow of 
 the red flame \ knowledge is where the flam? bursts forth ; 
 unbelief is cold ashes. Right belief is belief in man, and 
 it inspires hope in man, and gives a correct knowledge- of 
 man. This is a correct knowledge of God. How can we be- 
 lieve in God when we do not believe in man ? How can 
 we have hope in man when we fear him, and hold aloof 
 from each other ? How can we know God when we 
 really do not know any thing in existence ? 
 
— 106 — 
 
 I. Let us investigate all things ; for this is experience. 
 
 II. Let us believe in all things; for there is a spark of 
 good in all, and the wisdom of the Creator may be found 
 therein. 
 
 III. Let us hope all things ; for the good manifests itself 
 in hope. Be of good cheer, for all is well. The hopeless 
 are desperate. 
 
 IV. Let us know all things ; for the essence of things is 
 fire ; and he who knows the most is the purest, having 
 been purified of his pride and vanity by the absorption of 
 the essence of things. 
 
 This is the mundane circle — the four elements — 
 the four points of the compass. He who has passed 
 around this circle has returned to the point from whence 
 he started, viz : nature — indifference. He is a child 
 again, without pride or egotism, hence is receptive to the 
 Divine influences, which leads him in a supernatural man- 
 ner upward to the abode of the gods. Those who re- 
 turn to this point are capable of going higher. 
 
 We all revolve in the mundane circle in quest of 
 knowledge. Some gain a little, others a great deal. To 
 some it imparts trust or confidence in man (or God) ; 
 others grow misanthropical, and become soured on the 
 road, and trust no one. Acid is cold; it kills the warmth 
 of the blood, and gradually, but surely, extinguishes the 
 fires of life. Distrust is acid. We become fixed in our 
 opinions on the circle, and branch off, either upon the 
 upward or the downward road. Some, however, revolve 
 in the circle of knowledge all their lives, and still have 
 no opinions of anything outside of the mundane circle. 
 
— 107 — 
 
 It is said that only fools have confidence in mankind ; 
 but this is a mistake. The best and greatest men the 
 world has ever known have been child-like in their trust 
 ful nature. The rogue and the knave are never trustful. 
 We have existed previous to this life; and we come 
 here from above or below, bringing the aroma of 
 the world we came from with us. There are three 
 grades of mind, corresponding to the three general con- 
 ditions of Spirit-life. This world and this life are a battle- 
 field between the celestial and the terrine worlds, an in- 
 termediate state where souls are given a chance to ascend 
 higher if they choose. There are many grades of being, 
 both ascending and descending ; and man mentally and 
 physically corresponds thereto. The spirit of the world 
 you will inhabit after death is within you y and as sure 
 as fate will gravitate to its home when freed by death. 
 The spirit of the terrine world begets all manner of vices 
 and diseases, whose culmination, unless healed, is total 
 loss of all power and consciousness. All love and humane 
 affections come from the celestial. All things die in love, 
 and all things are born of love. The extremity of grief is 
 beginning of joy. The last throb of pain is the first throb 
 of pleasure. Ecstacy is close upon the confines of des- 
 pair. The extreme woes of hell vomit out souls purified 
 by fire. Extreme knowledge strips a man naked of his 
 egotistical garments, and shrouds him at the gate as if for 
 burial. 
 
 This is the death of knowledge : the state of the mind is 
 changed ; it has reversed its polarity. His intuitions begin 
 to work in his despair of life, and he receives that which is 
 
— 108 — 
 
 to the soul what knowledge is to the mind, or food to the 
 body. Intuition begins where worldly knowledge ceases. 
 Its methods are inductive, instead of deductive. To the in- 
 tuitive, knowledge comes by impact rather than by con- 
 tact. All revelation comes through intuition. The fore- 
 going is the secret of all conversions. The despair of 
 the sinner, when at its culmination, dies. Its death is the 
 birth ofecstacy, which many mistake for the regeneration. 
 But it is perfectly natural that pleasure should follow 
 pain : hence there is nothing supernatural in conversions. 
 The deeper and more heartfelt the despair, the greater 
 the pleasure that follows it, and the more real and lasting 
 is the conversion. But God's Spirit comes through intui- 
 tions — spontaneously, by labor and constant and un- 
 wearied attention — by purification of the mind, and a 
 preparation of the body for its reception. It is natural 
 to believe in the supernatural, but unnatural not to be- 
 lieve in it. 
 
-109 
 
 X.— FAITH AND KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 The most fatal enemy of the soul is doubt. He who 
 doubts his own powers cripples himself. He who for- 
 gets his doubt rises superior to himself. He who be- 
 lieves in, and has confidence in himself, has more power 
 than he who doubts his own powers. Moreover, the 
 more confidence a man has in others the greater is his 
 friendship, and the more friends he has. Friendship is 
 the measure of influence, and, consequently, of power. 
 (In order to simplify, I will only speak of belief, know- 
 ledge and faith in this chapter.) Out of belief comes 
 knowledge ; and out of knowledge comes faith, or, rather, 
 that which approximates faith and makes it possible, viz : 
 Intuition. Perfect faith comes from perfect knowledge ; 
 but inasmuch as we are imperfect beings, and, con- 
 sequently, have no perfect knowledge — not even of our- 
 selves, and still less of others — how can we even approxi- 
 mate a definition of faith ? much less a knowledge of the 
 powers it may confer upon its possessor ! Why scoff at 
 the sayings of Jesus, when we do not even know what he 
 meant by faith ? He certainly estimated its value very 
 highly, for he said : " If ye have faith like a grain of 
 mustard seed, ye shall say to the mountains, be ye moved 
 and cast into the sea, and it shall be done." It is 
 
— llO- 
 evident he coupled it with the will, for it could be done 
 by a command \ and no prayer or supplication is even 
 hinted at. What great thinker ever extolled doubt ? or 
 taught that it ever conferred any great blessing upon its 
 possessor ? Not one ! It is simply a destructive power — 
 a negation; it builds nothing; it destroys all that it 
 touches. 
 
 A desire to know the truth is commendable. Respect 
 for others leads to the interchange of ideas and investiga- 
 tion. This is good. Never doubt a proposition till you 
 are sure you thoroughly understand it. Never doubt the 
 truth of another till his falsehood is a demonstrated fact. 
 Knozv a thing before you reject it. Be hospitable to the 
 wayfarer : for although you may be imposed upon many 
 times, you may some time entertain an angel. Some 
 thoughts are angel-sent. Said a Materialist to me : " Am 
 I to entertain a proposition simply because you assert it ? 
 Suppose you say the moon is made of green cheese — am 
 I to accept it? That is too absurd!" Such puerile 
 arguments are used by pretended thinkers. It is as logi- 
 cal to say the moon is " made of green cheese" as that a 
 a flower is made of mud. Either one is absurd ; but the 
 self-same elements enter into and compose the sun, moon, 
 stars, earth, light, thought, and "green cheese" Such 
 are the arguments the doubter is driven to to sustain a 
 semblance of logic. 
 
 Knowledge is the ultimate of mental action, and if at 
 its highest point, or apex, it meets the spirit world with 
 sufficient intensity to become impregnated with a desire 
 for something grander, and a more lofty idea of human 
 
— Ill — 
 
 nature and its possibilities, with riot merely an idea " to 
 know good and evil," but to know the good, and to have 
 power to do it under all circumstances. Then, indeed, 
 it may truly be said to be the road to power. As such I 
 recognize it. Analyze, sift, digest all the facts and 
 phenomena of this existence ; weigh the stars and suns of 
 space, and trace them in their eternal voyage ; dissect 
 the human form, and search the convolutions of the brain, 
 and, if at the end, you have no belief in the divinity of 
 creative power, no belief in the spirit that has escaped 
 your telescope, your scalpel, and your scales, tell me not 
 that your knowledge is the road to power. For real 
 power is repose, rest, trust, confidence, and harmony. 
 That which brings no satisfaction and rest is destructive. 
 So, knowledge may build up the soul and expand it, or it 
 may contract and weaken it. If knowledge makes a man 
 egotistical and proud, it does him harm ; but that know- 
 ledge which causes one to realize how small and insigni- 
 ficant he is, and how very little he knows, and of how 
 little value that knowledge really is to him, makes one 
 negative, and receptive to the world of intelligences which 
 surround him. Then it is that they come near and speak 
 to his soul, and he conceives an idea of "Brahm," 
 " Allah," "Jehovah," "Jove," or "God." 
 
 The knowledge of facts is good, for it expands the 
 mind ; and when the mind is sufficiently expanded, it 
 leads to deep thought, reverie, abstraction ; and abstrac- 
 tion opens the door of the soul, viz : the imagination. 
 The imaginative are the credulous. Power does not 
 come from one thing alone, but from the all — the Infinite. 
 
— 112 — 
 
 Knowledge is necessary to weakness and infancy ; but for 
 the gods there is no knowledge — it is simply faith- 
 Faith includes all things of an inferior nature, as the 
 ever-arching dome of heaven encircles all within it. It 
 is beyond all knowledge ; then who can explain it, or 
 who can understand it ? It is to the soul what knowledge 
 is to the mind. As we can only approximate knowledge 
 mentally, so we can only approximate faith intuitively. 
 According to our knowledge, so is our faith. In exact 
 proportion as we know wife, children and friends, do we 
 have faith in them. Knowledge is not predicated upon 
 anything but truth. It is not satisfactory to merely know 
 that a thing is false. We must know the truth in order 
 to be satisfied, and to be made whole and clean. As you 
 know yourself, you have faith in yourself. As you know 
 God you have faith in him. All that the mind can grasp 
 of anything is that which appears, and this appearance is 
 a revelation of something hidden. It may come in 
 dreams or in visions, or in reverie, or in contemplation, 
 reading of books, or conversation ; or listening to sermons 
 or lectures may provoke the conditions necessary to in- 
 duce revelations ; but in whatever way it may be induced, 
 it is subjective ; it is a union with the thing thought of — 
 a oneness of spirit and being. You have faith in yourself 
 because you are at one with yourself. You have faith in 
 your wife in exact proportion as you are one with her. 
 Faith in things changeable, and hence untrue, is destruc- 
 tive; because they desert you and leave you empty. 
 Faith is a power which comes to man as a revelation, in 
 the expansion of the soul, when the mind is closed up ; 
 
— 113 — 
 
 laid away, as it were, or suspended — lield in abeyance. 
 Then things sublunary disappear, and the ineffable glory 
 appears ; and, entering in, is one with souL-giving power 
 undreamed of by mortal man. Faith steadies, sustains 
 and fortifies the will ; combines all spirit in one. The 
 powers of dissolution and of creation are of faith. It is 
 effortless. It is the suspension of all mundane laws. 
 Knowledge is of no account, only as it assists one to 
 enter into the Spirit. Then it is set aside, as a man 
 having scaled a wall, and not being obliged to return, 
 throws the ladder down. Think you this faith and 
 power can come to us ? Nay ! We must ascend to it 
 through a regeneration in the Spirit, and by a birth of the 
 Spirit. It is another mode of existence, to be entered 
 only through birth. Salvation is from weakness, disease 
 and death, and thus from hell ; for hell is an outgrowth of 
 these. We work the best we can to prepare the way ; but 
 we make mistakes and failures in our ignorance, and fall 
 continually. But faith is a gift of the Spirit in answer to 
 our intentions and aspirations. In faith there are no 
 mistakes nor failures. It is not possible to lose faith when 
 once attained. How is it possible for a child, after it is 
 born, to become as it was prior to birth? Faith is 
 universal. There is no one or particular faith. There 
 is no such thing as "the faith ;" consequently faith 
 cannot be lost, any more than God can be. Talk about 
 "falling from grace,'' and "losing the faith!" Non- 
 sense ! They never have any to lose. There is a fall, 
 however, in the pretense of possession. The pretender 
 always falls. 
 
— 114 — 
 
 It is the habit to speak of faith as a something akin to 
 belief— as blind — as less than knowledge. But this shows 
 our ignorance. Faith is to the Divine mind what know- 
 ledge is to the natural, Through and by knowledge 
 things of use are produced and multiplied in the earth. 
 Through and by faith matter is evolved from the spirit, 
 which, from a chaotic, formless state, takes form such as the 
 will may determine. By this method Jesus made bread 
 and fish for the hungry multitude. A few loaves and 
 fishes were sufficient to furnish a nucleus of attraction, 
 when, in obedience to his will, his Spirit flowed in and 
 assumed the form desired. In view of this principle of 
 evolution, he said, " If ye have faith like a grain of must- 
 ard seed ye may say to this mountain, be ye moved," etc., 
 " and it shall be done." " First seek the kingdom of 
 God, and then all other things shall be added unto you." 
 The kingdom " is within you ; " it " is at hand ;" it " is 
 like unto a pearl of great price ;" or Ci like a little leaven 
 which a woman hid in three measures of meal." The 
 meal is a type of the body, mind and spirit. The wisdom 
 of things is seen in their mechanism; the order and 
 harmonious arrangement and adjustment of parts, and the 
 ease and perfection of motion without jar or friction. 
 The same is true of the mental and spiritual man as of 
 the physical. The jar and friction of this life is what 
 wears out the machine called man. Each and every 
 atom of the body is in motion, and they are in health 
 well poised and lubricated. This is harmony. But 
 when there is not a proper balance of all the essentials, 
 there is a discordant friction of parts, and a loss of power, 
 
— 115 — 
 
 motion, health, and vigor. The soul furnishes the 
 lubricator, viz : magnetism. I call your attention to the 
 fact that the great balance-wheel — the regulator, love — is 
 sadly out of line. 
 
 The kingdom of heaven is harmony, power, eternal 
 youth, life, innocence, and peace. The principal 
 element of the kingdom is wisdom born of love and will. 
 If love be lacking, or be of a low, vulgar order, the 
 wisdom born of her will be inharmonious, and the king- 
 dom is that of disease. By wisdom, through faith, are all 
 things made. But if the wisdom be inharmony, and the 
 faith be small, or none at all, what can you expect to flow 
 from the spirit; or, what quality of life will be gen- 
 erated? 
 
 Bear constantly in mind, kind reader, that when I 
 speak of God, I speak of your power of will and love. 
 When I speak of wisdom, I have reference to the harmony 
 of yourself. Harmony means a great deal. Harmony 
 means oneness ; no conflict ; no opposing elements ; no 
 warfare between the flesh and the Spirit. "The lamb 
 and lion have lain down together.' ' Remember, health 
 is altogether due to what little harmony we have. The 
 greater the harmony, the more wisdom. The greater the 
 wisdom, the more life, peace, rest, pleasure. Discord 
 wears us out. The best of us scarce last half a century, 
 and that length of time is enough to disgust most people 
 of life. We are scarcely able to generate magnetism 
 enough to keep this human machine in order more than 
 fifty years at the utmost. Now, were the love pure 
 and innocent, and the will strong and God-like, the 
 
— 116 — 
 
 wisdom or harmony of the machine would be more per- 
 fect, and the life evolved, or the spirit set in motion, 
 possessed of such power that mountains might be dis- 
 solved; or bread, fish, flowers, clothing, or human forms 
 evoked at pleasure, and the machine possessing such 
 power could wear on eternally without friction or age. 
 "Greater works than these shall ye do, because I go to 
 the Father" (Spirit.) The dark and noisesome earth — the 
 fiery constellations of heaven, with their countless hosts, 
 all exist by the will of God, and are sustained by his love 
 and wisdom. But he lies slumbering as in a tomb in 
 the things he has made. The mighty mountains piercing 
 the clouds, crowned eternally with purity, as a flame-tip, 
 tell us in their vomitings of fire — in their groaning, and 
 shaking, of the nature of him who sleepeth beneath. 
 Tombstones are they, flame-shaped and spiral, marking 
 the resting place of the infinite. They show the oozing 
 out of his power, and the aroma of his presence fills 
 space, things and men with his returning consciousness, 
 which, when fully returned, will swallow up all things as 
 matter in fire. The changing forms— the mutability of 
 things — is due to the fire which dissolves, changes, and. 
 combines matter. The will baptizes the fire as with 
 water, and thus in wisdom preserves forms, and per- 
 petuates life. It holds it in check, and regulates the 
 heat so that we are not consumed. This is the esoteric 
 meaning of tbe baptism with water. If the will can re- 
 strain the fire through its exercise, it also can unchain the 
 lightnings and vomit out flame, which, though unseen, 
 shall not be unfelt, and which, meeting things on the way, 
 
— 117 — 
 
 passes through, dissolves, and causes them to disappear 
 noiselessly, in decency and in order. The same hidden 
 and unseen power drove back the lightnings in their mad 
 revel on " dark Galilee' ' at the simple words, " Peace ! 
 be still." 
 
 It is the unnaturalness of man that keeps the Infinite 
 under. We cannot return to nature, but we can rise up 
 to the supernatural, and still exist. We suffer pain, be- 
 cause of the deficiency of fire. How easy for the strong 
 will to turn a flame upon the dark door of it, and exorcise 
 it as if by magic. We are full of darkness and sorrow, 
 because we are vacant. How easy to be full if we are 
 only wise ! 
 
 To attract the fire and hold it by baptism is fulness ; 
 which, indeed, is life-pleasure; nay! ecstacy, beside 
 which trance is as a dream. In purity all power resides. 
 Fire renders all things pure. It reduces, refines, purifies, 
 and illuminates all things. Fire flows from love. But 
 you do not know what love is. You think it hath some- 
 thing of sex in it ; and so it has, for sex is a symbol of it. 
 The -ecstacy of a virgin soul when first baptized by the 
 contact of a spirit, all in harmony, is a poor expression 
 of love in its abstruse sense. But it is the best I have. 
 Love is not the soul; but it is the highest and most 
 ecstatic emotion the soul can feel. It moves the whole 
 sensorium of the soul, and by its motions evolves a 
 spiritual fire that burns in the nerves like a volcano. As 
 a volcano vomits out molten earth and mineral, so fire, 
 trained by the will (baptism) decomposes all dross and 
 baseness, which it eliminates from the system, leaving 
 
—US- 
 nothing but the pure metal. Beware of the fire, it you 
 are impure ! it will leave not a vestige of you, soul, mind 
 or body. Love builds up or destroys. Slow, lingering 
 decay is as certain as rapid combustion. Nothing comes 
 out of God's crucible but immortal beings. 
 
 
-119 
 
 XL—THE SOUL. 
 
 " The soul that sinneth, it shall die." — Bible. 
 
 I have already defined the soul as a vacuum, and here- 
 in appears the impossibility of it. The sublime and the 
 ridiculous are so closely united that sometimes one is 
 taken for the other. Modern philosophy, backed by 
 science, says there are no vacuums ; that ' ' nature abhors 
 vacuums' ' — thus virtually admitting their existence; for 
 how can nature abhor that which has no existence ? It 
 is not possible to conceive of a thing which has no 
 foundation or existence. The supernatural is denied, 
 also, and that shows the weakness and nakedness of 
 philosophy. The soul is supernatural, and it is a vacuum ; 
 but it is not given to ordinary minds to comprehend this. 
 How can the natural mind believe in that which nature 
 abhors ? We instinctively try to destroy that which we 
 abhor, and the mind that rejects a proposition is at 
 variance therewith, and its thought is that of destruction. 
 
 No man can conceive of the supernatural, except he 
 have a something in himself in harmony with the idea. 
 The soul is a vacuum — it is supernatural, because nature 
 cannot destroy it; and that which is hidden is always 
 superior to that which is visible. Soul corresponds to the 
 feminine principle in nature, but this correspondence 
 
— 120 — 
 
 does not. make a natural thing of it at all. It is not a 
 thing, but that which gives birth to things. Attraction is 
 the feminine of nature, but this is not the soul, but that 
 which the soul produces as a governing law in nature. 
 In nature, things are moved by contact and by impact. 
 Operations by contact are always downward. We cannot 
 operate upwards, save as we receive that which is superior 
 from above by impact. This is the way of the spirit. 
 Spirit is natural, unnatural, terrine, and celestial, 
 and may become supernatural by working itself out of the 
 laws governing those four grades of spirit ; or, in other 
 words, by becoming master of all of nature's methods, 
 operations, modes of action, etc. This is within the 
 range of man's powers. This nature in which we exist is 
 not infinite. There are other natures. This is a peculiar 
 one, in which motion is the law. Perfection of motion is 
 the ultimate of this nature. Perfection is stagnation, of 
 which we know little. The perfect union of soul and 
 spirit is the supernatural, but the spirit is swallowed up 
 by soul in such union. 
 
 This union was called " Nirwana" by Gottama, 
 which Hardy, the translator of Budhism, says means 
 annihilation. But he mistakes. It is an existence out- 
 side and above all human comprehension. Hence 
 the difficulty of explaining it. All spirit is fire; but 
 spirit outside of soul has quality, quantity, sound, and 
 colors ; which are lost in the fusion or oneness of soul and 
 spirit. "Things of the spirit are nonsense to the com- 
 mon mind." Soul is not a thing, save it be united to 
 spirit, neither can we conceive of it save in imagination. 
 
— 121 — 
 
 To conceive of the soul is to make a thing of it — thus 
 man creates his own soul as a thing. Without such con- 
 ception the soul is formless, and there is no permanence 
 or reality to its existence, i. e. 9 it takes any shape, accord- 
 ing to circumstances and conditions. To give form to 
 the soul, then, is man's highest work. The souls of 
 vegetation and animals have no fixed or durable form. 
 The same is true of some men. All perfect forms are 
 spherical, and the Rosicrucian symbol of a winged globe 
 is a type of a perfected soul. Some Rosicrucians claim 
 that the soul is located, or has its equator at the pit of the 
 stomach in the solar and semi-lunar pexus, with one pole 
 in the brain and the other in the sexual organs. This is 
 undoubtedly true of a perfected soul. But in its imper" 
 feet state it is in every atom of the body, and cannot be 
 withdrawn therefrom save by death. The lungs are the 
 physical representation of the soul's wings. All flights of 
 thought depend upon inspiration — a breathing in, as it 
 were, of another atmosphere, from a thought- world. The 
 perfect soul can leave the body at will, and fly away to 
 realms more vital than this. But the imperfect is held 
 fast to the atoms in which it is anchored by demerit. The 
 perfect soul and spirit can make and dwell in any kind of 
 a body it chooses, and dissolve it at will. There is a 
 vivifying and vitalizing, exhilarating and exalting influ- 
 ence comes by deep and protracted breathing; but in 
 thought there is a deeper, broader, higher, and more pro- 
 found exaltation, because it touches the sensor ium of the 
 soul itself. Breathing is physical; thought is mental; 
 but meditation is the poising of the soul's wings for flight- 
 
— 122— 
 
 There are some thoughts which take hold on the filth of 
 hell, which they stir up to the degradation and damnation 
 of the thinker ; there are other thoughts which elevate 
 the soul and exalt the thinker. In neither case does the 
 thinker go outside of himself in his thought, albeit he 
 imagines that he does. In order to become an epitome 
 of all, man must pass through all, which can be done 
 mentally; for the true man lives in his mind. He must 
 dissect himself, and analyze all his passions, motions, 
 emotions, motives, etc., -and master them all. They are 
 the steps in his ladder of progress. He must begin at the 
 bottom to climb. The sexual and love nature are at the 
 foundation of existence. God has so ordered it that 
 man's greatest happiness, as well as his greatest woes, 
 spring from this source. If there is anything impure 
 about it, it is in the mind of him who so estimates it. Of 
 all acts the sexual is the most potent, for herein man ap- 
 proaches the nearest to the portals of Divine creative 
 energy. Here, in the veiled temple of women's body, 
 God baptizes matter with his Spirit, and lo ! it becomes 
 an immortal being, having in embryo all the pt>wers of 
 God himself. Is there anything degrading about this ? 
 The true man and woman love their children. The 
 great solace and pride of their lives are offspring ; they 
 are a result of this relation, of which we may only speak 
 in whispers, and over which a pall must be spread. As 
 if God has made something of which man is ashamed. 
 In this relation soul meets soul in an ecstatic blending of 
 Spirits, and a watchful God bending low from on high 
 "broods over the Holy of Holies" in the temple, and 
 
— 123 — 
 
 accepts the sacrifice, consumed with fires of love, and 
 entering in, is born of woman. " The Immaculate Con- 
 ception" is the result of a perfect union of man and 
 woman. The resulting child must, of necessity, be supe- 
 rior to the parents, for such is " the Christ, the Son oi 
 the living God," not of a dead one, for dead Gods pro- 
 duce half men and women — devils in human form. " We 
 are dead in trespasses and sins." A virgin typifies purity 
 of Soul. "The Holy Ghost" is "the Holy Spirit," 
 or a pure Spirit. Now, the union pf such produces " the 
 only begotten Son of God ; for God cannot be incar- 
 nated in impurity, save as a progressive being. The only 
 way God can be begotten of man, or in man, is through 
 purity. But what is purity? What is sin? Disobe- 
 dience of law is said to be sin. Without law there could 
 be no sin, for there would be no standard, or regulator 
 of action. This is an idea as true as nature, and as old 
 as humanity. The writer of Genesis expressed it in an 
 allegorical manner, or as a fable or parable. Law is, 
 after all, only a mode of action. But of what action is 
 sin predicated? Sexual action! Nothing more, and 
 nothing less. Strange idea ! And wherein is its truth ? 
 A virgin is pure; but a mother — a fully developed 
 woman — one whose love-nature has. had full expression, 
 is impure / I am not one to scoff at an idea hoary with 
 age, which has had the respect and reverence of the good 
 and great for untold centuries. This vague legend or 
 tradition, of the fall of man, must have a foundation in 
 truth, for it belongs to all races and nations. And this 
 is also proven by the present condition of mankind, which 
 
— 124 — 
 
 I have set forth under the head of The Unnatural. It 
 is a matter of little or no consequence how it happened, 
 but it is of vital importance to know wherein the fall con- 
 sists. The ancients wrote aliegorically. The fundamen- 
 tal truths were not for the multitude, hence they were 
 hidden away in parables, or conveyed in language in- 
 tended to mislead. All knowledge of value was fast 
 locked in the temples, and taught only as mysteries to 
 the initiated. But in their writings the truth is mani- 
 fested occasionally, especially to him who has "the keys." 
 The ancient wise men, seers, and prophets, were deeper 
 versed in the mysteries of nature than we are, hence some 
 of them stood nearer to God, and received truth more in 
 its purity and simplicity. 
 
 The fall of man was the fall of the soul from its perfect 
 spherical form to a diffused or atomic state. To a per- 
 fect soul the emotions are perfectly subject to the will, 
 and any part of the system may be affected in any manner 
 desired zuithout the pi'ovocation of contact with objects. 
 Before the fall woman was a subjective or spiritual being, 
 (taken from Adam while in a trance, as I will more fully ex- 
 plain hereafter) — a materialized spirit, with which Adam 
 copulated, thus preventing her return to a subjective con- 
 dition. When the soul fell to an atomic state, subjective 
 things became objective, and contact of things became 
 necessary to produce emotions of pleasure and pain. 
 Adam did not need the contact of copulation to produce 
 ecstacy, for it could be produced without — by will, and 
 that without waste of virility. And the command was 
 that he should not copulate. Such, evidently, were the 
 
— 125 — 
 
 views of the ancient philosophers, as I will try to explain 
 further on. The scientific world is mad with evolution- 
 ism. Darwin has sunk modern thought low down in the 
 mud ! Protoplasm is God ! It appears to sense that 
 out of mud come flowers and fruits. This appearance, 
 however, is the same as that the sun rises and sets — the 
 earth flat, etc. It is a delusion. That which appears is not 
 the whole truth ; the most vital truths do not appear to 
 observation. A plant or tree grows up out of the mud, 
 but the flowers and fruits descend. There is a descent as 
 well as an ascent, and at the point of union there is gen - 
 eration. This is nature's copulation. Plants, flowers, 
 fruits, living things, eyes, ears, thought and feeling, do 
 not ascend out of the ground, no more than the stars or 
 the sun-light does. There is a mystery connected with 
 all things which is insoluble, and the ancients deserve as 
 much respect for their effort to explain it as Darwin and 
 Huxley. 
 
 Man grew, and still grows, as plants and animals do ; 
 but who knows how they come, or from whence ? If 
 thought lies perdu in the mind, is it any less an unfathom- 
 able mystery, or any less worthy of adoration than if i* 
 be enthroned in the stars or in a God ? It is just as logi- 
 cal to suppose that sense makes the mind as that mind 
 evolves sense. In view of these things, I turn to Plato, 
 Socrates, Pythagoras, Gottama, Appolonius, Jesus, 
 Zoroaster, Hermes, Moses and God, for my inspira- 
 tion. Realizing that inspiration is as potent now as of 
 old, I ask Jesus and Appolonius if disease and death are 
 not a delusion of sense. They answer, " Tney are!" 
 
— 126 — 
 
 Far away in the dim and shadowy past some one con- 
 ceived an idea, and wrote that God said : " In the day 
 thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." Is it not true ? 
 Is this life ? If so, I do not want more of it ! But 
 this is more death than life. The loftiest mind has not 
 yet conceived of real life. This is, indeed, one long- 
 drawn sigh of anguish ; a mad dance of demons ! A 
 scramble and a rush after toys. If this is life, and all of 
 it, then, indeed, is God or nature a demon, enacting 
 an awful tragedy, for 'tis worse than a farce. Man dies 
 for lack of vitality ; which, indeed, is virility, and virility 
 springs from love, wherein it is generated. So all dis- 
 eases, pains, and death itself, spring from an abnormal, 
 or unnatural action of love, or the sexual nature. Un- 
 doubtedly the ancients understood the " fall of man" to 
 be a fall of the blood. The laws of Moses support this 
 conclusion. The rite of circumcision — the rites of puri- 
 fication — the sacrifices with^r^, and the shedding oi blood, 
 and the obscure narratives of the old Testament show- 
 that they considered sin as sexual. The same idea seems 
 to have been entertained by Jesus, for he said : " Woe 
 unto you," etc., "verily I say unto you the harlots go 
 into the kingdom before you." Why were harlots named 
 instead of other criminal classes? And again : " Some 
 men are born eunuchs; others are made so by men; 
 others make eunuchs of themselves for the kingdom of 
 heaven's sake." This, when rightly understood, does 
 not mean castration. The Buddhist priest who has 
 attained the power of " Irdhi, (the power of levitation, 
 of walking upon the water, or of passing through the air, 
 
— 127 — 
 
 or of visiting at will any of " the three worlds/ ' or " the 
 Brahma Lokas"), has no sexual desires at all, and is as in- 
 competent as an eunuch ; but he has all his organs perfect. 
 He has, by a certain course of training, turned his virility 
 upward and inward, instead of allowing it to flow down- 
 ward, and outward, in the commission of what St. John 
 calls sin. Turn to the first Epistle of John, iii., 9, 
 and you will find the real definition of sin, "Who- 
 soever is born of God doth not commit sin; for his 
 seed remaineth in him, and he cannot sin, because he is 
 born of God." Loss of virility, then, must be sin. Con- 
 nect this with Gen. iii., n : "I will put enmity be- 
 tween thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her 
 seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his (?) 
 heel." The word "his" here means her. (It has not 
 yet been settled what the serpent here spoken to means. 
 Theology calls it " the devil ; but the serpent is the sym- 
 bol of wisdom). Seed here spoken of must mean the 
 same spoken of by John, for the bruising of it is all too 
 apparent in all the hospitals and medical museums of the 
 world. 
 
 Read God's admonition of Cain prior to the murder of 
 Abel : "If thou doest well shalt thou not be accepted ? and 
 if thou doest not well sin lieth at thy door, and unto thee 
 shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him." 
 Strange language to use in order to deter one from doing 
 wrong, to tell him he should become ruler by sinning. 
 " Onan " was slain by the Lord because sin lay at his 
 door — i. e., wasted (Genesis xxxviii., 11). What is a door 
 but a place of egress ? Let him who reads think. But we 
 
— 128 — 
 
 are not dependent upon the Bible and conjecture for what 
 we believe upon this subject. Buddhism, five hundred 
 years older than Christianity, numbering 369,000,000 
 adherents, containing all the principles that Jesus taught, 
 and much more, teaching the way to supernatural power 
 and " Nirwana," is sexual from the first to last. All 
 birth is sexual, hence " the second birth" spoken of by 
 Jesus must have reference thereto. The curse put upon the 
 woman : " I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy con- 
 ception" was a sexual penalty, showing that " the fall " 
 was a fall of the blood ; and as if in corroboration of 
 this idea, nature weeps tears of blood periodically from 
 the mysterious recesses of woman's body. Woman, of all 
 God's creatures, is the only one so accursed. The 
 atonement is of blood and of love. Through woman 
 came the fall, and through the virgin soul must come im- 
 mortality. Salvation is woman's work. By the shatter- 
 ing of the soul into atoms, it lost control of the vital 
 essences, nerve aura, or fire of the body ; hence man/f// 
 under the control of his passions, and love became in- 
 verted. Hence man is the reverse of what he primarily 
 was, and disease takes the place of that divine ecstacy 
 which is his heritage. " The sins of the fathers are visited 
 upon the children to the third and fourth generation." 
 No sins but those of the blood are so visited. Love is the 
 life of the blood, hence in the Scriptures blood typifies 
 love. The blood of the sacrifice of the lamb, and of the 
 atonement, all refer to love. Man's passions are not 
 love, but its lowest expression— its inverted expression. 
 To attain to life and love in its purity the foundations of 
 
— 129 — 
 
 God's Temple — man — must not be rotten. If rotten, 
 it must be made new. How Herculean the task ! How 
 gigantic the work ! No wonder Jesus said : " Except a 
 man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of God." 
 None but a God could reveal these things of the soul to 
 man ! As I said before, I say again : Meditation is the 
 poising of the wings of the soul for flight, and the most 
 potent meditation is that wherein passions are crucified. 
 Man is an angular being, and in order to attain perfection 
 these angles and triangles must be worn off. Your 
 character and disposition (not your reputation) is indi- 
 cative of the form of your soul. The man who revolves 
 through life, like a jagged rock — crashing, knocking, 
 bumping, grinding, flaying, and demolishing objects that 
 stand in his way, is far from being a true soul. True, he 
 may get the angles knocked off ere he gets through his 
 journey ; but the journey of the soul is infinite, and it 
 takes countless ages of experience to round out a soul to 
 a durable and permanent form, and then, when all the 
 angles and corners are chipped off, it may be a very 
 small thing, scarcely possessing any consciousness at all. 
 But whatever its size may be — provided it is not a monad — 
 it retains its form, and in the lapse of time and the in- 
 crease of consciousness, the dim past becomes more and 
 more vivid and real, till at last all previous stages of ex- 
 istence become a matter of memory. In whatever form 
 it may be imprisoned, the character manifested will be 
 harmonious and peaceful. The true rounding off of 
 angles is done by the chisel of thought from within. We 
 are the architects of our own selves. We build by our 
 
— 130 — 
 
 thoughts and acts the temples or hovels we inhabit. 
 Some, indeed, live in caverns, or, reptile-like, in holes in 
 the ground. Some inhabit the great deep, and lie in the 
 slime at its bottom. Soul orbits differ as the orbits of the 
 planets ; hence the ages of souls are not alike. Some re- 
 volve in small orbits ; they make a revolution with great 
 rapidity. Others, again, revolve in orbits so vast that 
 millions of ages are as a second of time, or a degree of 
 distance as from one universe to another. Stations there 
 are on the way of the soul, where rest is taken, and new 
 forms made ; mysteries explored ; other laws learned, and 
 the soul enlarged. There is no end save to weakness ; 
 universe after universe stretches away illimitable. Sense 
 makes boundaries ; but soul overleaps or breaks down all 
 barriers. A mere creature here ! A nothing, to be 
 scoffed at, doubted, and destroyed by sin, it becomes in 
 its flight stronger and stronger, larger and larger, till it 
 becomes a creator and governor of worlds, and the 
 architect of universes and of other souls. We are merely 
 halted here on our eternal voyage to learn of this peculiar 
 nature — to master its secrets and mysteries. When we 
 have done so, we will go on our way. Some souls are 
 older than others; but no soul can leave this earth 
 unfledged. You cannot leave till you have learned all 
 that is to be known of it, and mastered all its creative 
 forces and laws. True, we have a rest occasionally, of a 
 few thousand years, in some of the heavens or hells of 
 spirit-land or the GoD-worlds, from which return is not 
 only possible but certain ; not merely to communicate, 
 but to be re-incarnated. We sometimes leave our bodies 
 
— 131 — 
 
 in deep sleep, and visit strange places, see strange faces, 
 and learn many new things, which we bring back in part 
 to our waking state. Waking state ? Indeed ! The real 
 waking, conscious, living state is when this physical is in 
 a deeper sleep than the deepest trance. The more globu- 
 lar the soul is, the more easily it may detach itself from 
 the atoms first, and then and lastly from the body. This 
 detaching is a drawing together, or contraction, or abstrac- 
 tion of itself, in which is health. 
 
 Sleep is better than medicine. The cause of disease is 
 the close relation, or contact of the soul to the atoms of 
 the body. The withdrawal of the soul permits the spirit 
 to enter any diseased part and restore it. The soul is 
 foreign to nature, and its imprisonment therein corrupts 
 nature. It abhors nature as much as nature abhors it, and 
 it is bound to get out of it, in one way or another — either 
 by growth or decay, or by both. From my boyhood I 
 studied and practiced phrenology, and studied myself 
 closely. Wishing to make the most of a defective organ- 
 ization, I strove to cultivate myself to the utmost of my 
 abilities. But knowing my many defects, I felt often dis- 
 couraged and dissatisfied with myself. One night, in 
 deep sleep, I was outside of my body. There it lay be- 
 fore me, a mere lump of plastic clay. I said : Oh, you 
 defective thing ! If I had had the making of you, I 
 would have made that head far different. A voice said : 
 "Fix it over to suit yourself/ ' I immediately went to 
 work upon the plastic head, and moulded it to my notion, 
 and then got into my body and tried it on. It did not 
 suit me. Again, I got out and remodeled it, with the 
 
— 132 — 
 
 same result. Time after time I essayed to make it over 
 to my notion, but without success, till at last the head 
 was all out of shape ; in fact, it was no longer human. 
 And the joke of it was that I could not get it back to its 
 original shape. In my perplexity the voice said : " Trust 
 in creative power ! Make the best use you can of your 
 head, and by and by you will have a better one." Then 
 I awoke, and since then I am content to work and wait 
 in harmony with nature, and not find fault. Some of us, 
 at least, are double at times. Nature is not partial to in- 
 dividuals. The way to power is open to all. "Many 
 are called, but few are chosen!" Why? because few 
 choose to struggle up the stream, when it is so easy to 
 float, like drift-wood, downward. 
 
 To crucify the loves is a superhuman task, and so re- 
 pugnant to man's everyday life and thought that most 
 men will turn aside from my book in disgust and con- 
 tempt; and yet there is so much talk in the churches 
 about "taking up the cross!" Alas for unbelief! 
 Whence comes the celibacy of the Catholic priesthood ; 
 the asceticism of India, and the peculiar tenets of the 
 Essenes? — amongst whom, it is said, Jesus was "de- 
 veloped." They did not marry, and held property in 
 common, as did the early Christians. They held, as we 
 of the Rose Cross hold to-day, that marriage, as now 
 understood and practiced is unnatural. The asceticism of 
 Catholicism, if it was not borrowed from Buddhism, is 
 synonymous with it, which existed long before Gottama's 
 time, who lived five hundred years before Christ. But 
 no matter how old asceticism may be, or how much it 
 
— 133 — 
 
 may have been practiced, or how much spiritual power 
 may be attained thereby, it is the exoteric of religious 
 ideas, as much so as any of the forms and ceremonies. 
 The esoteric has never been, and never will be, given to 
 any but the initiated. It is the much-talked-of "Phil- 
 osopher^ Stone/' and " Elixir of Life" — the least of 
 all known. This subject, however tedious it may be, 
 is intimately connected with the soul, for it is the soul 
 of Rosicrucia, as well as all religious systems. It is not 
 asceticism which gives purity — it is only a method for its 
 attainment. It is from the thought that all things come. 
 "Not that which goeth in at the mouth defileth a man, 
 but that which goeth out." Sin defiles, for it " layeth at 
 the door." The greatest sin a man can commit is the 
 waste of the life a good and beneficent Creator has given 
 him for his use, and not abuse. Promiscuity is a mockery 
 of God. The awful diseases that spring from it show the 
 nature of the sin committed — its defilement, and its curse 
 As the very ground withholds its rest, peace and strength 
 from a murderer — as God said it should from Cain — so 
 woman withholds her spirit from the debaucher. 
 
 The painful or pleasurable action of any part of the sys" 
 tern is due to the presence of the soul in that part. If the 
 soul be withdrawn from any part, that part has no sen- 
 sation, and the spirit, taking the place of the absent soul, 
 builds anew the part afflicted. If the spirit be overcome 
 by a strong magnetizer, and the soul thus driven back, re- 
 pelled or forced out, the body has no sensation, and am- 
 putation or other painful surgical operations may be per- 
 formed without the subject being aware of it. This fact is 
 
134- 
 
 well authenticated. This power of withdrawal of the soul 
 resides in every one who has a will. It does not depend 
 upon the magnetizer at all, but upon the well-regulated 
 action of the will. Self-magnetization is a well-known 
 fact among Spiritualists, and practiced by all mediums 
 to a certain extent. But it is too limited to be produc- 
 tive of the results above spoken of. Paralysis is the ob- 
 struction — through insulation — of the spirit in its free 
 passage through the system. The soul is left alone in a 
 paralyzed body or limb, without the spirit to give life and 
 power — as all power depends upon movements of spirit, 
 which is effected by its union with the soul. Body is 
 merely the connecting link between the two. The par- 
 tial withdrawal of the soul is indicated by vibratory mo- 
 tions in the nerves, which, being extended, produces ec- 
 stacy, then trance, or insensibility. Those who follow 
 sitting in circles are aware of this. 
 
— 135 — 
 
 XII.— MIGRATION AND TRANSMIGRATION. 
 
 I have already spoken of progression and retrogression, 
 as balancing each other in motion. The symbol of the 
 Cross in a circle is illustrative of this. The upright, or 
 " Phallus/ ' indicates the law of progress ; the horizontal 
 line the cross of the law — retrogression, or the fall of 
 man \ while the circle is the sigma of eternity, or of revo- 
 lution. Man, in growth and decay, is simply matter in 
 motion, and he must conform to the laws of motion ; i. e., 
 he revolves in an orbit, as worlds do. All life is one ; 
 man differs from the animals only in form and the amount 
 of life and mind he embodies. Life has no beginning 
 nor end ; but forms begin, grow, decay, and end. The 
 law that governs one form governs all. Forms are 
 not progressive to any great extent, but mind is. Con- 
 sciousness is the highest manifestation of life. Man and 
 animals both exist after death, for power cannot die. It 
 takes ages for matter to progress up to a form perfect 
 enough to manifest consciousness and thought ; so it takes 
 ages for it to retrograde to a loss of it. Even form does 
 not change suddenly ; death itself is powerless to effect 
 any material change in the form ; but the rough garment 
 of the soul merely is cast aside by death, and the spiritual 
 body is immediately formed — fashioned in the mould of 
 
— 136 — 
 
 the mortal body. But this body, being like the natural 
 body, composed of spirit condensed, is subject to the law of 
 vastation in the spiritual worlds, the same as here. Con- 
 sequently the form changes, as the soul comes nearer and 
 nearer to the surface of the body. As a man is here, so he 
 will commence on the other side. If he is progressive 
 here, he continues to progress till the merit he has ac- 
 quired in this life is exhausted, then he will commence 
 retrograding. If he is retrograding here, he will continue 
 on the other side, till he reaches, in the lapse of ages, per- 
 haps, a state of unconsciousness in which he is re-incar- 
 nated in some other form. Life is like the revolutions 
 of a wheel ; or as the succession of the seasons ; or as 
 day and night. There is no such thing as existence with- 
 out change ; and change is alternation, as a rising up and a 
 falling down ; though in cycles both vast and small. Re- 
 pugnant as these ideas may be to modern taste, they are 
 certainly based in logic ; and if age gives any prestige to 
 anything, this must take the precedent, for the transmi- 
 gration of the soul is the oldest religion known to man. 
 Upon the tombs of ancient Egypt there is sculptured in 
 the rock a picture of Osiris seated on a throne, and hu- 
 man beings ascending upon a stairway to him. In front 
 of him they seem to divide. Those on the right still re- 
 tain the human form, but those on the left are animals. 
 Furthermore, there are more people in existence who 
 entertain this belief than otherwise. If you read our Bi- 
 ble, you will see that the Jews believed in it ; and Jesus 
 also. (Mark ix., n, 12, 13.) Also see Matthew xvii., 
 10, 11, 12, 13, and xvi., 13, 14; also xiv., 2, 3. Now, 
 
— 137 — 
 
 for the logic of it : An eternal existence, based upon the 
 pleasure of a changeable God, is too absurd to think of, but 
 all Christendom holds to such a view. A beginning 
 proves an end. This we sh^w to be an illusion of sense ; 
 for a beginning is only apparently so as regards the life, 
 while it is really so in reference to the form. You had 
 an existence as an infant, but no recollection of it. You 
 also existed in utero, but the mode of that existence was 
 altogether different from life since your birth. You also 
 had an existence as a spermatozoa, and swam around in 
 a drop of semen as a whale does in the ocean, and fought 
 with and destroyed other spermatozoa weaker than your- 
 self. It took a microscope to see you then, but you were 
 a conscious, living being, having the power of volition. 
 Beyond this, science cannot follow you. But we can 
 reasonably believe that you existed in an unconscious 
 state in your fathers veins ; and who can know you were 
 not conscious even then ? Shall we assume to deny it, 
 because, in our ignorance, we are unable to find you ? Is 
 not the air full of infinitesimal life, that we know no- 
 thing of? We know that you, as a spermatozoa, died in 
 the womb before you became a child. Who knows that 
 you had not just died before you became a spermatozoa ? 
 And who knows but that you might have been butchered, 
 as a lamb, a little while before ? What is all this life for 
 which swarms in the air, and walks upon the land, or 
 swims in the sea? Was it created as a mere pastime for 
 man's benefit? Or, is it not more reasonable to think 
 that it is all rushing upward towards pefection ? — the fit- 
 test going up and the unfit going down. Darwin shows 
 
— 188 — 
 
 the law of "Natural Selection." Man! proud and 
 haughty egotist that thou art, Nature thinks as much of 
 a mosquito as she does of you ! You gestate in water the 
 same, and go out of life in like manner as a mos- 
 quito does. But you make a greater fuss about it. Aro- 
 gate nothing to yourself because you are a little higher 
 than the poor, patient, dumb brute you drive. Treat them 
 kindly, for you know not how soon they may become 
 human, and pay you in your own coin for your brutality. 
 " Thou shalt not kill," was written upon Mount Sinai by 
 one who knew what he was about. The Rahats of Buddh- 
 ism are not allowed to knowingly tread upon a worm, or 
 to take any life whatever. We are all related, and anon 
 change places with each other in the revolutions of the 
 great wheel of Infinite Power. We know not the effects 
 of violence and bloodshed upon ourselves and others. 
 Note the changes of form and feature from infancy to old 
 age, and see how many times the Identity is lost in a 
 few short years — lost to all save yourself and those in con- 
 stant association. The slowness of the change makes no 
 difference in fact. How often is it said of one returned 
 after an absence of a few years, ' ' Why, how you have 
 changed ! I hardly know you ! " Think you those 
 changes will cease at death ? I do not. 
 
 It is the desire of every man who believes in immor- 
 tality, to retain consciousness and identity. We are rather 
 in hopes that we will lose some traits — those which we 
 despise ; but we would scarcely desire to be something 
 else after death, unless we could be more God-like. This 
 much-talked-of identity is but little understood. I am not 
 
— 139 — 
 
 the same person I was forty years ago, no more than one 
 wave on the ocean remains the same tili it is beaten upon 
 the shore. As wave flows into wave, so life passes into 
 forms of matter. A ripple here and a wave there ; a tem- 
 pest here and a calm there. Such is life ! The great 
 wave sinks into the small one, or rises into the large one ; 
 but whether great or small, the calm levels all. The soul 
 has power to identify itself according to its consciousness 
 of what it has been. It identifies itself in many ways, by 
 looks, acts, or by the narration of incidents fresh in the 
 memory of both. But if memory is lost and the form has 
 changed, what good is there in identification, even were it 
 possible ? which it is not. I fee I that I am the same being 
 I formerly was, because I remember the long ago — there 
 has been one continuous chain of events that have gradu- 
 ally borne me along — there has been no great shock or 
 disconnection of the current ; but a shock sometimes inter- 
 rupts the continuity of things. Especially is this true in re- 
 gard to memory. The most valuable things are the easiest 
 disturbed and destroyed — as we understand destruction. 
 How weak, and yet how subtile and strong is memory ! 
 The past, with its multitudinous experiences, sights, acts, 
 sounds, etc., fails to keep along with us. They drop out 
 by the way, as one wearied falls down to rest, and we look 
 around at the end of the journey for the companions of 
 the way, and are surprised at the smallness of the num- 
 ber we see. And even those that keep the closest to us 
 are the hideous ones we would most gladly have left be- 
 hind. Perhaps we have taken extra pains to outrun or to 
 evade some of them — but memory drags them along with 
 
. —140 — 
 
 almost supernatural power. The greater part of our life 
 is made up of indifferent acts of which we take no note, 
 and which make little or no impression on memory's 
 page, but the great events stamp themselves ineffaceably 
 upon the soul. Memory being, then, the means whereby 
 existence continues in the consciousness, its culture be- 
 comes of paramount importance, as regards identification. 
 Memory is the soul of genius. We do not know but 
 that the thoughts of the mind are half forgotten memo- 
 ries of previous existences ! And Intuition may be but 
 a perception of the past and future, in which we have 
 always been as now. Our past lives are as a half forgot- 
 ten dream. Some little thing calls it up, as from the 
 deep, more or less vividly to our consciousness. There 
 are some things which destroy memory ; so, also, there 
 is a way of cultivating or of increasing its power. The 
 opening of the mind to what has been is culture of 
 memory ; the closing of the mind to that which has been 
 is the decay and loss of memory. 
 
 Memory is the outward or material part of conscious- 
 ness, as the body is the outward of mind. Hence, to 
 increase in consciousness and soul-power is to expand 
 the memory or the inmost of mind — the sensorium. 
 Action is expansive, but inaction is contractive. 
 
 Bear in mind, now, that by action I do not mean phy- 
 sical or mental action, but soul action. The soul is the 
 principle of all existence, and is the cause of all action ; 
 but its first action is the evolution of a principle which is 
 the governing motive or power of every act. The mo- 
 tive is the life of an act. Motives are dual — good and 
 
— 141 — 
 
 bad. The absence of a good motive leaves the act defi- 
 cient of its life or expansive power. Hence, the absence 
 of good is the evil, which is contractive. The- absence 
 of strength is weakness ; of sight, blindness ; of intelli- 
 gence, ignorance, etc. That which increases, power is 
 good, for it leads up to God. Good is the only absolute- 
 ness of mind — for, as I said before, it is our estimate — 
 which descending into acts related to other acts, becomes 
 a relative good, u e. 9 partly good and partly evil ; for it 
 may be good for some, but evil for others. Good, then, 
 which is the least harmful to others, must be the nearest 
 approach to absoluteness, and thus to the truth. There 
 comes from motives a certain quality which they impart 
 to every act ; and as acts are graded from low to high, so 
 does quality vary. Now, the good of an act is meritori- 
 ous, but the evil is not, and it imparts another quality to 
 spirit, called Demerit. For spirit is action ; and the 
 motive of the act is its spirit — or the quality thereof. 
 Spirit is graded from the purest white, through all grades 
 of color down to the lowest black. The darker the spirit 
 the more inert it is, for power resides in spirit according 
 to its color. It is the merit of an act which gives spirit 
 its purity of color, but the demerit of it saddens the color 
 of spirit and thus destroys its buoyancy. Merit is the 
 concentrative power of spirit, for it draws all the colors 
 together as in a focus, or prism of white light, or oneness; 
 but demerit is a downward action towards matter — a 
 scattering or refraction of rays — as of many from one in 
 which colors appear — and power disappears in the falling 
 of it, or in its diffusion. Principle is merit, but the 
 
— 142 — 
 
 absence of principle is demerit. Now, it is necessary to 
 know what a principle is, in order to a comprehension of 
 this recondite subject. A principle is a union of the two 
 highest mental attributes into one spirit. Thus, Love and 
 Will united are good, if they unite in truth, and they 
 cannot unite in anything else ; for that which is false is 
 at variance — as a division. Truth unites, but falsehood 
 dissevers. The soul of merit is the love of truth, and 
 truth is freedom. Thus is merit expansive of the Soul's 
 consciousness, but contractive of the mind. Demerit 
 springs from a want of love of truth, and is a disunion of 
 love and will, hence, is void of principle. In disunion 
 there are differences, which lead to aggressive acts — or acts 
 against freedom. 
 
 Aggression is the soul of demerit. The object or mo- 
 tive of an act gives merit, provided the object be for the 
 good of others. There is merit in all love, of whatever 
 name or nature, and it is this that supports life. But 
 there is demerit in hate and revenge, and all passions 
 which confer no good upon self or upon others, and this 
 it is that shortens life, and makes it a continual agitation, 
 and a death in life. 
 
 The expansion of consciousness is due to merit, but 
 the contraction of it to demerit. In the expansion of 
 consciousness the soul transcends mere mind, and one be- 
 comes conscious of a truth, even without a reason for it. 
 Thus, the past and future rise up in the mind in symbols, 
 or impresses itself as a sensation or feeling. The spirit- 
 worlds may be reached in this way without trance or ob- 
 jective vision. It is a conscious contact of minds, things 
 
— 143 — 
 
 and principles. Consciousness meets consciousness in 
 this expansion, and the conditions of any state of being 
 may be known. It is a ready reader of character, mo- 
 tives, capacities, past and future events, etc., etc. But 
 the small consciousness is confined and limited by demerit 
 — it reaches little or nothing beyond itself. Merit is ac- 
 quired by acts of love ; it sets the spirit free. Freedom 
 is life and joy. I am aware that some claim there is no 
 freedom of action, and consequently no merit or demerit 
 therein. But we know better. 
 
 Now, how, or in what manner does spirit rise or be- 
 come luminous by merit ? The spirit has the power to 
 extract life from all substance or spirit, with which it 
 comes in contact, as it radiates in space from the body, 
 and merit is that which increases this power of absorption 
 or appropriation, while demerit destroys that power. 
 Merit eliminates the tenacity or clingingness of spirit, by 
 reason of which it is held to the surface of things ; thus 
 giving it power to penetrate deeper into the inner essence 
 or spirit of substance, and to extract the finer essences 
 thereof. Merit increases the radius of spirit in this man- 
 ner, and it feeds upon all things, for there is no repug- 
 nance to any. But whatever it may come in contact with 
 it only takes that which is according to its own quality. 
 Now, every object it meets takes something from the spirit ; 
 hence, weakens it. Demerit increases taste and re- 
 pugnance, and in this manner limits the freedom and 
 radius of spirit, thus compelling it to feed upon " husks," 
 often to its weakness and disease. He who is indifferent 
 gets the good of all, and his spirit is fat. But he who likes 
 
— 144 — 
 
 and dislikes the most, is poor and lean in spirit. These 
 are basic principles of power and progress. Disease 
 originates in this manner. As the beating of the heart 
 throws the blood to the extremities, so does spirit pour 
 out in the pulsations of will. As blood purines itself by 
 contact with the air, in like manner is spirit purified by 
 the contact of pure things. " To the pure all things are 
 pure." The more indifferent you are, the purer you are, 
 for to the indifferent all things are alike — one. 
 
 No man exists in any condition very long after he is 
 tired of it. The man who is forced to exist passes rapidly 
 out of one mode of existence into another, becoming less 
 and less as the circles narrow to the going out. Demerit 
 is that which compels us to exist — but not with a contin- 
 ual consciousness thereof. To increase in power, and 
 the pleasure it alone can confer, requires effort in the 
 acquisition of merit. Merit prepares the spirit, by giving 
 it buoyancy and elasticity. The future life is similar to 
 this. As we come here by force and go out by force, so 
 we enter spirit-life and pass through it. But death is not 
 a birth, and there is not necessarily a growth there as here. 
 The spirit, being a mortal thing, is often diseased, which, of 
 course, weakens it. The laws of demerit are vindictive, 
 and all debts due under it must be paid, and death is the 
 penalty of violated laws. Now, since the mind violates 
 the law whereby the body becomes diseased, the mind is 
 the thing that must die. Physical death is only typical 
 of the real death of consciousness. There are things that 
 wake not up after death, till they awaken in another form 
 — mosquitoes, for instance. This is death followed by a 
 
~ 145 — 
 
 birth into another form, but the form of man containing 
 more spirit and greater consciousness, continues after 
 death. But I am satisfied that many never awaken, or if 
 they do, they remain on the earth hovering around me- 
 diums ; by this means striving to get back to their old 
 habits and vices — thus sapping the spirits of mortals of 
 vitality. Such have an ephemeral existence, and at last 
 fall asleep, and are again born upon this earth. But there 
 are many who lose not consciousness for a single moment, 
 and who are not aware they are dead till some time after : 
 to such death is not a birth into another form, and 
 scarcely into another existence. It is just upon the con- 
 fines of another existence into which the good walk deeper 
 and deeper, and out of which the bad are kept by their 
 own inclinations : not only in this, but in all the starry 
 worlds. 
 
 In this world, as well as in all the planet worlds of space, 
 every man must stand upon his own merits, and fall by 
 his own demerits. There is no such thing as the trans- 
 fer of merit or demerit from one person to another. 
 Merit may be driven wholly out of the spirit, as colors 
 may be washed out of cloth. This is done by the accu- 
 mulation of demerit. So, also, demerit may be driven 
 out of the spirit in the same manner, by making its colors 
 brighter and brighter, by the accumulation of merit. The 
 reason is simple enough : Spirit is the light of the body 
 — its brilliancy is determined by the merit acquired in 
 some previous existence or succession of existences. The 
 brilliancy of the light may be increased by improving the 
 quality of the oil in the lamp as you replenish it. But 
 
— 146 — 
 
 no other light, no matter how brilliant it may be, can make 
 yours one whit brighter, by being placed near by. You 
 can only change the quality of your light by effort in the 
 acquisition of merit. A pure spirit can only impart to 
 you as you render yourself receptive thereto ; and even 
 then it can only give you the crumbs which fall from its 
 table. But crumbs of spirit are better than mountains of 
 gold, for they are health, power, immortality. 
 
 Good acts have an influence upon the body in more 
 ways than one. To do good, because it is easy to do so, 
 is meritorious ; but there is much more in a good act 
 done when the inclination is the reverse. An act may be 
 forced out by sympathy — which is good, because sympa- 
 thy is a result of merit acquired in a previous existence — 
 but it may not have much merit in it as an addition to 
 that previously acquired. An act done without sympathy 
 for the sole purpose of increasing good, without any hope 
 or expectation of a reward, has the highest merit therein. 
 A man does not act thus except from deep and profound 
 meditation upon the true relationship of things. Merit 
 is the substance of the celestial worlds, and he who med- 
 itates deeply, attaches himself thereto by the elevation of 
 his spirit, and incorporates it into his spirit according to 
 his acts. Thus, it becomes part and parcel of his body, 
 driving out demerit. In like manner could all diseases 
 be healed, were it not for the demerit of former exist- 
 ences. Demerit must be worked out patiently and slowly. 
 In some cases it takes numerous births in the human form, 
 attended with a constant effort, with the object — to get 
 rid of the succession of existence where there is nothing 
 
— 147 — 
 
 but an alternation of pleasure and pain constantly before 
 the mind, and an idea to enter upon a state of being al- 
 together out of all comprehension. (( He that would save 
 his life shall lose it, and he that would lose his life for my 
 sake (the sake of principle) shall save it." — Jesus. To 
 teach the way upward is the object of this book. 
 
 Principle is the magnet which holds the man steadily 
 to the polar star of power. Mercy is full of merit, if 
 forgiveness comes from the motive to do good. They 
 that do good because it is easy and natural, have their 
 reward as they go along. But he who does good contrary 
 to his nature, through a mastery of himself, lays up great 
 merit in store for a future life— verily his reward shall be 
 great. 
 
 To feed the hungry through pity is good, but to feed 
 them with the reflection that by so doing you will help 
 them in the acquisition of merit is far better. It is better 
 to do kindly acts and say kind words without feeling, than 
 to feel and not say or do. Both are good, but one is 
 greater than the other. A small meritorious act may ele- 
 vate one to the seventh heaven — but he cannot stay there, 
 for when his oil is burned out he must return for more. 
 He will return of his own accord, for he will be in dark- 
 ness without merit. This earth is the only place wherein 
 merit can be acquired. A little merit will carry a big 
 load of demerit into heaven, but it cannot remain for 
 want of buoyancy. Every act we do, every thought we 
 think, and every word uttered, affects some one else, and 
 we do not know the extent of its influence. Hence, all 
 creation is bound together in the bonds of sympathy. 
 
— 148 — 
 
 This is a result of demerit. The Heavens are fast 
 anchored to the Hells, and there can be no perfect bliss so 
 long as one poor soul suffers. A chain is not stronger than 
 its weakest link. 
 
 No one can escape the meshes of sympathy without 
 cutting all its chords. Is this done by love, think you ? 
 Nay ! but by indifference. The love of principle is 
 indifference towards objects. This is the first and great- 
 est commandment — to love principle ! The next is love 
 all things as you do yourself. This is indifference ; for 
 when one loves a principle with all the intensity of his being, 
 he has no self-love nor love of anything on God's green 
 earth. Now the only principle in existence is Freedom. 
 Neither Power, nor God, nor Spirit are possible without 
 freedom. Look you at the host of martyrs for Freedom ! 
 They loved principle better than self, wife, children or 
 friends — they were swallowed up in the love of God's 
 freedom ! This is indifference to things. Indifference is 
 " the door " through which merit descends to man, and 
 through which souls ascend to God. 
 
 We are all sunk in a psychologic sleep — the falling into 
 which was effected by sympathy. Those to whom this 
 life is the most real, are in its deepest phase. They can- 
 not perceive the illusion of it, nor the ineffable glory of 
 awakening out of it, and the becoming a spectator of 
 one's own self and of others. This becoming a spectator is 
 the stepping out of the illusion, as out of one's self, in 
 which state things are visible in spirit only, or as another 
 existence. It is like a peering under the floors of conscious 
 life, as into a great darkness, wherein things become less 
 
— 149 — 
 
 and less distinct; or as a passing through a wall of dark- 1 
 ness into a great and indescribable light, and, looking back, 
 behold things as luminous — involved in will, psychologiz- 
 ing each other ; in which sleep they dance with pleasure 
 or howl and writhe in anguish, as if in fire. Occasion- 
 ally one gets tired, and seats himself in some obscure 
 corner to look on. The gods seeing him thus meditative, 
 drop down into the mists of sympathy, thus approaching 
 him in condition, rack his thought and increase his weari- 
 ness to dissatisfaction and a great unrest— or to hunger and 
 thirst after something permanent and real. Have you, 
 too, reader, become wearied of illusory joys, that slip 
 through your fingers in the grasping, as a phantom eludes 
 mortal touch? Become indifferent, then, to the love of 
 life, and gradually the pain and pleasure of it will pass 
 out of your recognition. Follow me in the culture of 
 Will, and learn the way to " the door." Space will not 
 permit me to dwell upon this theme, prolific as it is. 
 Volumes might be written, and still the darkness could 
 no more comprehend the light now than in the olden 
 time. 
 
— 150 
 
 XIII.— THE WILL. 
 
 " Men fail, sicken and die, through feebleness of will. ,, 
 All the potencies of man reside in the will. To its exer- 
 cise is due all motions—physical, mental and spiritual/ 
 Will is God, and i( God is a Spirit." Therefore, the will 
 employed in an act is the spirit thereof, or the motive, or 
 moving force. ' Man is the focus of above and below— of 
 without and within. Hence he is susceptible to influ- 
 ences from each, That some are more open to impres- 
 sions from within than others, is evident ; and the same 
 is true as regards externals. The will is liable to be led 
 captive and enslaved by., either— aye, to be subjugated 
 and destroyed ! But there is a point where the will is 
 self-poised and free in its action. As the will is the 
 spirit of every act, it gives quality to acts. There seems 
 to be a warfare between externals and internals, as to the 
 possession of the will. How oft do we see it verified, 
 that li A man convinced against his will, is of the same 
 opinion still. M We act as we like to act-— we think as we 
 like to think. We can see very plainly that which we 
 like to see, and shut our eyes very closely against that 
 which we do not like. Evidence has but a feeble effect 
 upon the will. Evil comes from without— or, rather 
 from that which is within being overpowered and capti- 
 vated by that which is without, or foreign to ourselves ; 
 
— 151 — 
 
 while the good comes from within, or by the subjection 
 of the outer by the inner. The objectifying of that which 
 is within is idolatry. The subjectifying of objects is the 
 destruction of forms, and the resolving of things back 
 to the original essence or oneness from which they spring. 
 This is the digestion of things in the stomach of tl e 
 mind, wherein the fire is extracted which illuminates the 
 spirit, and is the greatest good to man, for it opens the 
 eyes of the soul ; it glows as a light ; it warms as fire ; it 
 nourishes as food ; gives rest and cheerfulness of mind ; 
 enriches the blood ; purifies the love, and fortifies the 
 soul. 
 
 That which is without is transient, fleeting, changing, 
 and impermanent ; but that which is within is durable ; 
 and the deepest hidden is the most durable of all. The 
 will is the only thing that approximates absolute free- 
 dom, and this is not free because of love. Love is 
 worship, and they who love objects are idolaters. We 
 are free to will anything we may fancy, but we are not 
 free to love or accomplish, because we are limited by 
 things foreign to ourselves, which we love or hate, or 
 are indifferent to. Love is worship, but hate is its re- 
 flection, as things tangible are a reflection of the intan- 
 gible. Polytheism and Polygamy are branches of the 
 same tree. In the true rendering they mean the same 
 thing. Polygamy was permitted to the Jews on account 
 of " the hardness of their hearts." The love of God is 
 the love of Woman — not of Wo-Men. But he who loves 
 any for?n is an idolater — the formless principle of pro- 
 duction is the feminine of God. 
 
— 152 — 
 
 It is very difficult to understand the foregoing, save in 
 a sinister light, which is a false light. True love is so 
 far hidden from even the imaginations of men, that an 
 effort to make it known is almost superfluous. That love 
 which is awakened by sight or contact of objects is the 
 dark side — the sinister side — of love. Hence the reality 
 is not love ; it is simply an appearance. But the love 
 that springs from the contemplation of a principle is 
 unchangeable, if it be a true principle, for it springs 
 from light which is real, as God is real. As God is 
 light, so the will is light ; and the love that is produced 
 by will is immortal, because it is pure. That which 
 springs spontaneously from the earth is the weed, bram- 
 ble, and fruit, which man tries to improve. So it is 
 with the loves. That which springs from impulse is 
 considered by civilization as a thing needing punishment. 
 We believe in cool, calm judgment and self-control, as 
 better than spontaneity. This coolness and self-poise 
 comes from the exercise of will. All civilization is due 
 to self-control. It follows, then, as a logical sequence, 
 that if it is possible for man to guide and control his 
 loves, it is far better than for him to be led by his blind 
 passions. Furthermore, if it be possible to create love 
 by any process whatever, it is far better than otherwise. 
 Hence the command to love, not only one another, but 
 our enemies. Such a command is altogether superfluous, 
 if it is not possible to do so. We know how to destroy 
 and disfigure the fair face of nature ; we know how to 
 destroy health and happiness, life and pleasure ; but we 
 know very little of the creative forces. We know what 
 
— 158 — 
 
 it is to have the heart beat quick and tumultuous at the 
 sight of beauty, or at the gentle pressure of the hand, or 
 at the bewitching glance of love-lit eyes ; but we know 
 nothing absolutely of a power to feel anything but dis- 
 gust at a loathsome object. Yet it is within the range of 
 human possibilities to love that which to ordinary minds 
 is repulsive — in fact, to love all, and despise nothing. It is 
 the despising of things that separates us from God or the 
 Supernatural. The first lesson in life is the exercise of 
 Will. We learn to use the muscles, but mental effort 
 precedes it. The first effort is a projection of power into 
 the nerves, which tremble and go astray of the object the 
 infant tries hard to grasp \ but with practice the nerves 
 become steady, and the infant learns gradually to manip- 
 ulate matter — first, in its own body ; secondly, outside of 
 itself. This power comes to the infant out of nothing, 
 as it were, as characters written upon a blank page — 
 nothing — called out into this world of sense by a display 
 of trinkets, colors, sonnets and toys, to be a something 
 manifesting power, force and will. The basic principle 
 of all power and of all development is the will. It is 
 all. Every faculty of the mind, every nerve of the body, 
 centres in it. It is the trunk of the tree of life : all else 
 of man are outgrowths of it. Hence the development of 
 manhood begins and ends in the will. It is the centre- 
 stance of being, from which " the rib " of circumstances 
 was taken (or grew), as Eve from Adam. Will is the 
 first manifestation of soul, or the first faculty it creates 
 for its use. 
 
— 154— 
 
 The will is the great pulsating heart of the Soul— the 
 reservoir of the spirit — which, in its contraction, throws 
 the spirit from itself, and in its openii.g draws it back 
 again. In the supernatural, the will produces, guides 
 and controls the loves, but in the natural (so called) the 
 loves control and guide the will. Naturally, love is a 
 spontaneous emotion, produced by an object of attrac- 
 tion, leading the will captive. But supernaturally love 
 is an emotion forced out by constant, persistent thought 
 of an Ideal, which Ideal is the feminine counterpart of 
 the man, dwelling within him, united to him, absolutely 
 inseparable from him. But he cannot have this Ideal in 
 his consciousness, till, in the purity of his spirit, he rises 
 up to its conception mentally. This is a revelation to 
 him, sometimes in early life, but often in age, forced out 
 by unrequited love, and the burning anguish of dead 
 joys. Thus, man becomes dual in his nature first, after- 
 wards in actual marriage with his Ideal, or love. 
 
 This Ideal is seldom incarnated on this earth, at the 
 same time the man is ; if it ever does so happen, no condi- 
 tion can keep them apart. When they meet, they intui- 
 tively know each other. This is marriage in its divine 
 significance. Man and woman thus united by the " Holy 
 Spirit" is eternal— but considered separately they are not 
 eternal entities, but are interchangeable, i. e. man is liable 
 to become a woman, and woman is liable to become a 
 man in some other birth. The man hater and the woman 
 hater change places after two or three revolutions of the 
 wheel of life. Human progress depends, then, upon will- 
 culture-— and the field to be cultivated is the loves, in 
 
— 155 — 
 
 which and from which all things grow. The will viewed 
 as a mental faculty has its antagonist, which is reverence. 
 
 Once upon a time when intensely musing upon the an- 
 tagonisms of the brain, I fell asleep — but it was not all 
 sleep — when some one came to me, as "the stranger* ' 
 came with the mirror. I did not see him, but he showed 
 me a book. Opening it, he showed me this strange sen- 
 tence : ' ' The will is antagonized by reverence ! In the 
 foretime the Gods, out of fear of man *s ambition, created 
 reverence," I desired to take the book, but he would 
 not permit me, but showed me many blank pages therein, 
 saying : "not now." It was several years before I could 
 accept the strange dogma. But it is true. We are taught 
 that the will must be broken in early childhood, and in 
 order to the salvation of the soul. The opposite is the 
 truth. God does not love slaves nor cowards, and the 
 child whose will is broken is of no earthly account. 
 
 The loves must be tamed — broken, if necessary, by the 
 will — guided by an enlightened understanding. All will 
 is pure power, and should be increased instead of being 
 broken. In meditation there is strength, but in reverence 
 there is weakness — a tacit acknowledgment of a superior. 
 There is a god ! nay, many, but if they are superior to 
 you it is your own fault. You may have been a god 
 yourself at some time, and you may be again with proper 
 effort. That proper effort is not in humiliation. The 
 will is represented in the mind as triune, having three fac- 
 ulties through which it manifests itself, as follows: 
 
 I. Firmness — Determination — Stability. 
 
 II. Self-esteem — Independence — Self-poise. 
 
 III. Continuity — -Tenacity— Continuativeness. 
 
— 156 — 
 
 A proper balance and harmony of these three consti- 
 tute a perfect will. The weakness or excessive develop- 
 ment of either one weakens the will. As intimated above, 
 an enlightened understanding is the only true guide for 
 the will. This enlightenment is illumination of the mind 
 — clairvoyance. There are many degrees of lucidity, but 
 the highest degree is the perception of principles — of 
 " principalities and powers." The inmost and the outer- 
 most of being is connected by the imagination. It stands 
 between the will and the loves ; hence, all the operations 
 of the will must be through the imagination. It is the 
 " magic mirror" of the mind, through which the soul 
 scans the horizon, or upon which the universe may be 
 made to impinge — not in vague and shadowy forms, many- 
 colored or kaleidoscopic, but in reality, either black or 
 white. It is prolific ; for herefrom comes all of art, 
 science, literature and beauty, as well as the horrible, 
 grotesque and sinister. Crimes are brooded over and 
 hatched here in the imagination. In this fairy land is 
 death enthroned, for that which is born is the death of 
 something else. This is magic ground from which things 
 grow by the conjuring of the will. Here things dissolve 
 themselves and expose their deformities ; and here hideous 
 things are enrobed in garbs angelic. Here religion has 
 its stronghold — for in this the gods show themselves to 
 man. Maligned, abused, scoffed at, the jeer and laughter- 
 provoking thing yet rules the world. Disrobe man of 
 the imagination and what is he ? A brute — worse than 
 savage. His very flesh covers itself with hair, as if to 
 hide its coarseness and vulgarity. But let the imagination 
 
— 157 — 
 
 loose, and the hair grows soft and fine, or disappears. 
 The flesh glows with fires immortal ; the eye loses its 
 savage glare, and man's robes are of the finest texture. 
 The earth, under its rule, is no longer a howling wilder- 
 ness, but is dotted all over with fairy-like splendors — its 
 magic productions. Steam almost annihilates space, and 
 the lightnings flash thought from pole to pole ahead of 
 old time. This is all due to the dreamings of the imagi- 
 nation. 
 
 On the shores of eternity's ocean are greater things 
 waiting for some dreamer to espie and hand down to en- 
 rich mankind. All hail to the dreamers, poets, philoso- 
 phers, preachers, writers and inventors ! They have 
 always left their mark, and always will, as an ineffaceable 
 brand upon the face of humanity. Trust, aspiration and 
 hope have their very roots in the imagination. It is only 
 by virtue of it that the good side of humanity in gene- 
 ral can be discerned. The unimaginative are the doubt- 
 ful, unbelieving and distrustful. Have they ever built 
 anything desirable ? or ever added anything of value to 
 mankind ? Thomas Paine was not an unbeliever. He 
 believed in God and humanity, and he left his mark upon 
 this people that will be known and felt for long ages. He 
 loved a principle, i. <?., human liberty, and worked to es- 
 tablish it. Paine was a dreamer. In his imagination he 
 saw equal rights, and if he lived in this age he would see 
 woman's rights. 
 
 Theories lead the van — practice comes slowly along, 
 like a lumbering wagon, afterwards. The imagination is 
 an infinite field. There are many roads in it, and many 
 
— 158 — 
 
 jungles and angles. All the loves centre here where they 
 impinge upon the will. 
 
 "And God saw that the imaginings of man's heart was 
 continually evil " — i. e., outward. Oh ! that I might im- 
 press upon you the vast importance of looking within ? 
 May not this be the closet into which Christ bade his 
 disciples retire in prayer? What is contemplation but 
 imagination ? What is prayer but the aspirations of the 
 soul ? And what are aspirations but images of the soul. 
 How can we "pluck the mote out of our own eyes' 1 in 
 any other way than by looking within? This plucking 
 out of the mote is nothing but the development of clair- 
 voyance — clear seeing. That is done by the imagination. 
 "If thine hand offend thee, cut it off," etc — what is this 
 but the analysis and destruction of passions that retard 
 and hinder the development of the soul to the kingdom 
 of power? If diseases are ever healed by the imagina- 
 tion, is it not a divine gift — better far than medicine ? and 
 is it not best to cultivate it? If it will heal the sick; if 
 it will make life any more pleasant, for God's sake let us 
 have more of it. 
 
 Three essential elements constitute perfect man, viz : 
 Will, Imagination and Love. These are the positive, 
 negative and neutral. Imagination is the indifferent part 
 of mind, corresponding to indifferent nature — "the 
 door," already explained in previous chapters. It is the 
 " Garden of Eden " out of which man was cast. The 
 same tree of life is there still, guarded by a flaming 
 sword which turns every way. 
 
— 159 — 
 
 What more beautiful type of fire than a "flaming 
 sword?" Fire-flame, that guards the way to the tree of 
 life — consuming all impure things that approach the dread 
 portals of the kingdom of power. The pure only are 
 eternal. Purity is original — this is unchangeable. All 
 originality comes to man through reverie : this is imagi- 
 nation. Man reaches God in ,the imagination. In it 
 God walks and talks with man. It is the creative faculty 
 — not in and of itself, but herein the will conjures things 
 from the unknown, and compels them to appear to the 
 consciousness — first, of himself; secondly, of others. In 
 the imagination, things, ideas, passions, hatreds, loves, 
 vices, etc., may be destroyed — first, as realities within; 
 secondly, as obstacles outside of us. For instance, an 
 enemy may be made sick, and gradually to die, or he may 
 be suddenly killed, by the powerful will of an intensely 
 imaginative man or woman. Or he may be tamed, sub- 
 dued, and made a friend of through and by the same 
 power. God pity the one who would prostitute such a 
 power to a base or unworthy purpose ! 
 
 This is hard to believe, but the rationale is very simple 
 to one of comprehension. But it is not my object to 
 teach these things in this work, only so far as to point the 
 road. 
 
 There is little power among men on account of the 
 want of will. There is plenty of obstinacy and unrea- 
 soning tenacity of purpose. This is due to firmness, 
 which is the projecting or repulsive power of will. By 
 the use of it we project ourselves — first, into the nerves and 
 muscles ; secondly, into objects — obstacles that stand in 
 
our way. Its work is outwardly. We waste our strength 
 and lose ourselves in objects of love, hate, envy and 
 pride. In this projection we leave ourselves empty. 
 Emptiness, like filth, invites disease and death. Projec- 
 tion — repulsion — produces death. {There is a sexual 
 arcana here : let him who reads ponder well.) We die 
 that others may have being. Firmness is what its name 
 implies — hardness. " Firm as the rocks " expresses its real 
 character. It hardens the nerves, muscles and very 
 bones, and also affects the spirit in the same way, rend- 
 ering it viscid and difficult of motion. That which should 
 be fire emitted is but a glutinous mass of molten matter. 
 Instead of emitting jets of fire, flame-tipped, that reach 
 the soul — the empyrean — the throne of the living God — 
 baptizing each other with fire and " the Holy Ghost, " 
 cheering, comforting, exhilarating with divine life and 
 vigor — drawing human souls together in the oneness of a 
 divine love — we emit a force that is like water upon fire 
 — destructive to all real life and happiness — repels man 
 from man, and man from woman, in one universal 
 divorce. Instead of the controlling, persuasive, binding 
 power of will, we have the booming cannon, the dagger 
 and revolver, and the rough-and-tumble fight of dogs. 
 
 The " still, small voice' ' of wisdom is drowned in the 
 deafening roar of countless blood-stained feet, hastening 
 to tread out the wine of human life. In our great marts 
 of commerce, hearts have no more pulsation than the 
 metal that chinks. Firmness— the external of will — 
 hardens everything ! Even human hearts rattle like rocks 
 thrown together. Suppose love to be the only immortal 
 
— 161 — 
 
 thing: how much will be left of mankind after the fire 
 has removed the impurities of it? Not much ! Then roll 
 on your Juggernaut of mammon. Shout and hurrah 
 for kings, priests, popes, bishops, honorables and aristo- 
 crats of every grade — your gods. Dress yourselves in 
 your gaudy shrouds for one universal burial. Marshal 
 your hosts for the grand carnival of death : for what 
 matters the blood of ephemera ? Ye pass away like 
 insects! Another race is coming — one in whom this 
 outward tumult of a boisterous will shall give place to 
 silence and peace, and man shall live till he chooses to 
 die. In this reverence — this antagonist of will — all 
 thrones and crowns take root. King -craft, priest-craft and 
 hero-worship must fail together. This vampire trinity 
 fattens upon the best blood of humanity. It makes slaves 
 and minions of the masses. No wonder they all love and 
 preach worship — it is food, raiment and idleness for them, 
 and toil and rags for the human race. It debases man- 
 kind, because it robs them of self-respect — the central 
 pivot of the will. The idea that you are beneath another 
 cripples you. 
 
 Selfness is nearest the soul — it is the very vitals of will. 
 Confidence in self inspires self-respect. To take away 
 either is like taking off a leg — we must walk on crutches. 
 To feel inferior is to be so. To feel equal is to grow to 
 be such. The proud and arrogant interiorly feel their 
 weakness, and hence arrogate to themselves something 
 foreign, so as to inspire worship in others. The antago- 
 nist of self-esteem is love of approbation. This love of 
 the approval of others is one branch of reverence. To be 
 
— 162 — 
 
 praised and flattered by a king is something grand, and 
 to be coveted. Humble yourself in the dust for a smile 
 of approval from one crowned. To secure the approval of 
 heaven, humble and debase yourself. In other words, act 
 the hypocrite, pretend humility to superiors, but to those 
 beneath you be lord, king, duke or God. Such is the 
 effect of modern theological teachings. Self-esteem 
 normally gives the feeling of self-reliance, confidence and 
 independence It gives rise to manly equality and self- 
 poise. It is the balance-wheel, the regulator, the pivot 
 upon which manhood, like a compass, rests. 
 
 Self is antagonized by others ; hence, he who gives 
 himself up to please others, gives himself to his antago- 
 nist — viz : that which ruins him by throwing him out of 
 balance. Be yourself; think yourself; learn of every- 
 thing and of everybody; be worthy of your own self- 
 respect: for when you have secured that, the respect of 
 others is certain. Be independent, but, in so doing, 
 remember the rights of others. Rights are equal ; wrongs 
 make inequalities. If you have any selfhood, consult 
 that first of all. Secure in self-respect, you need not fear 
 others, for God approves of self- honor. This is the only 
 glory, and the only way to glorify God. 
 
 Praise is a false wind — it blows no good. Fame ! — 
 what is it, but a breath, shouting huzzas which, prolonged, 
 die away in a hiss ? Breath of the rabble ! the unthinking 
 herd ! One minute exalting you to heaven, the next 
 trampling you in filth. And yet it is said God loves 
 praise. The absurdity is too apparent. We cannot add 
 anything to the Infinite. We can, however, join the 
 
— 163 — 
 
 Infinite to ourselves, and we are glorified thereby. This 
 it is to " glorify God in these bodies, which are His" — 
 or ours in the glorifying. Thus we increase the self- 
 hood—the foundation of all power— will. 
 
 Inordinate self-esteem may have no self-respect at all. 
 Self-respect is based in right, truth and justice. Hence, 
 he who respects others and their rights, has self-respect. 
 He who has no regard for the rights of others, although 
 he may possess a powerful external will, has a weak will 
 interiorly. He is like a tree with a large top, but whose 
 trunk is rotten. Respect is the very foundation of love ; 
 hence, self-respect leads to self-love or egotism. This is 
 an excessive growth from a fruitful soil. Such need 
 pruning. The will, like everything else in nature, grows 
 outwardly to the weakening of its roots. Egotism is the 
 fatal tendency of all aspirations. It is a weakness that 
 must be guarded against. Self-approbation springs from 
 the same source as love of the approval of others — viz : 
 reverence. There is such a thing as self-worship. Ego- 
 tism is to the will what the moss is to trees in " the sunny 
 South" — it dwarfs and finally kills. Strip man of pretense 
 and egotism (which is the same) and what is there left of 
 him ? He who is puffed up and loaded with self-compla- 
 cency and pride is rotten within. Self- gratification is the 
 root of human action. As we grow we send out many 
 branches, but self-gratification supports them all. No 
 matter what pursuit we follow, or what course in life we 
 pursue, that is the prime motive power. The will is made 
 a slave to it. It is the fundamental principle of all reli- 
 gious systems. The so-called kingdom of heaven is based 
 
-164 — 
 
 in it, and hell is filled with the devotees of self-gratifi- 
 cation. Even Buddhism, which claims that there is no 
 self or Ego in reality, holds out the inducement to its 
 votaries of escaping to Nirwana, from the ceaseless and 
 eternal succession of existences. To this end the senses 
 are attacked, and bodily or physical and mental gratifi- 
 cation destroyed, in order to arrive at the gates of 
 ecstacy and power — in order to cease to be* 
 
 So, self is the basis of all, and the only god. Pleasure 
 is the object of all, no matter what road is taken. Even 
 the materialist finds his pleasure in the quiescence and the 
 quintescence of matter. Men get religion through fear of 
 the pains of hell, and in hope of the pleasures of heaven. 
 The Hindoo mother tosses her babe into the murky 
 waters of the Ganges to appease the wrath of her gods — 
 in hopes of a reward. The Fakir of India puts a hook 
 in the quivering flesh of his back and suspends himself 
 for days in mid-air, or stands with hands clasped, in one 
 position, till the limbs are paralyzed, and the finger-nails 
 grow through the palms of the hands, like claws — all in 
 hope of power and pleasure other than that of the earthly 
 senses. 
 
 Some seek the ultimate of life in the carnival of carnal 
 passions, others in mammon worship, others in Govern- 
 ment positions, politics, etc. Is all this universal 
 hunger and thirst — this deathless longing — a mere hallu- 
 cination ? or, is it the index finger of Fate pointing to a 
 
 * This is the exoteric of Buddhism: the esoteric has never been written. 
 Hardy translates their sacred books, but frankly admits that if Nirwana does 
 not mean annihilation, he does not know what its meaning is. 
 
— 165 — 
 
 great truth? Is self capable of becoming infinite in 
 power and pleasure — in this universal changing of con- 
 ditions and polarities ? We of the old school of thought 
 say, Yes. 
 
 Of all the potencies of nature, the I, the Ego, the self, 
 is the only thing beyond comprehension that has a positive 
 and tangible existence. All things else are mere append- 
 ages of it. I speak of my soul, mind, spirit and body as 
 of my coat, or any other property. But when I speak of 
 myself — of "the think' ' and " the feel," — T am at a loss 
 for a definition. To go behind, beyond, above or below 
 myself is impossible. I confront myself at every turn. It 
 is as easy to comprehend God as myself, for the simple 
 reason that I and the numeral one (i), are identically 
 the same. One (i) is the foundation of mathematics, 
 from which all numerals flow forth (arbitrarily and 
 absurdly). In the beginning was one (i) God, one law, 
 one will. From will came many ones by emission, or 
 emanation. One thing cannot be added to another, save 
 by fusion, and even then numbers disappear in the 
 universal one. Add one grain of corn to another; true, 
 the figure 2 represents the number, for convenience, but 
 the addition is arbitrary — there they remain, separate and 
 alone, each an individual thing. In nature there is no 
 addition. Fusion and emanation are the only mathemat- 
 ical laws. Division is as arbitrary as addition. Divide 
 a grain of corn and it loses its individuality. Plant the 
 grain and it emits from itself whole ship-loads, but it 
 loses itself in so doing. Now God emanated from Him- 
 self all things, which, in the beginning, were as like Him 
 
— 166 — 
 
 as one thing can be like another. Perfect man was the 
 first emanation. He existed long before this world or 
 any of the lower orders had an existence. He (man) 
 was all in himself — i. <?., he was the first or great primal 
 law of creation. Laws are modes of action : man is an 
 action of God or will. From man's will flowed all 
 lesser laws or things. The Ego, the I, myself, is an 
 emanation of God — a creative action — the first and the 
 last and the whole — (i). The lower orders are man's 
 creations — degenerated human beings, lesser things, laws 
 or acts. The sage of Genesis simply got the cart before 
 the horse when he said the animals were created before 
 man. Afterwards, however, he rectifies the mistake 
 partly, when he speaks of the " Sons of God" marrying 
 the daughters of men. These " Sons of God" were the 
 primitive men, of which I have spoken. I am the creator 
 of all my acts — they are laws. They flow out through 
 effort of will — being projections of the Ego— myself. Thus 
 God meets man — is man — in the selfhood. The selfhood 
 is God humanized. The selfhood of animals is God 
 brutalized. We can understand how it is possible for 
 man to produce that which is inferior to himself, but it is 
 more difficult to conceive of his creating anything supe- 
 rior. How can the animal evolve man, who is superior 
 in every essential ? How can man progress unless there 
 is something above him to which he is near related ? This 
 relation is found in the selfhood — the central pivot of 
 will. Be very careful, then, reader, how you trifle with 
 yourself. Every thought and act which debases you, /. <?., 
 sinks you in your own inner consciousness , that which 
 
— 167 — 
 
 you wish to hide away in some dark corner of yourself— 
 away from the eye of even yourself — debases God. The 
 day comes speedily when he will sit in judgment upon 
 your every thought and act — and that upon the throne of 
 your own conscious selfhood. Firmness is the moving 
 force or controlling power of this outward sensuous life — 
 the power of aggression, of overcoming obstacles by phys- 
 ical force. It is the masculine of will. 
 
 Self is neutral — hermaphrodite — neither masculine nor 
 feminine. The feminine of will is represented by con- 
 tinuity. Self-esteem, phrenologicaliy, is located just 
 above the crown of the head; firmness, a little in front 
 or above it, at the highest point of the cranium ; while 
 continuity is just below self-esteem— inferior in position 
 and diminutive in size, situated just above the social 
 group, as a mother keeping guard over her children. 
 
 Understand, that the will is a trinity. One part does 
 not act without the co-operation of the others ; they are 
 inseparable. For the sake of illustration and analysis, 
 and to make comprehensible that which follows under the 
 head of will-culture, and to show the rationale — or the 
 modus operandi — of creative power, these distinctions are 
 made. 
 
 The feminine is the attractive, and hence, the productive 
 principle of nature — that principle which collects matter 
 and combines it into forms. The principal office of con- 
 tinuity is the drawing of the spirit together — to a focus — 
 preparatory to projection. There is always a concen- 
 tration of force or energy in all effort, and the greater 
 the concentration the greater will be the power mani- 
 
— 168 — 
 
 fested. The tension of the nerves and muscles is due to 
 continuity — oneness of force and energy. It lays hold, 
 as with hands, of each mental fibre, and guides the fiery 
 steeds of spirit. Spirit obeys mind, but mind is under 
 the will. Continuity is intenseness — continuativeness. 
 Once directed to an object, it fastens itself to the spirit 
 thereof, and, leech-like, sucks its very life out. If conti- 
 nuity be large, one becomes absorbed in any pursuit, 
 object or passion, to the forgetfulness of other things. It 
 cannot let go. This leads to insanity, which is simply 
 the unbalancing of the will. Consciousness is a result of 
 the poising or posing of the will : hence the polarization 
 of the will is the true work of him who aspires to infinite 
 conscious power. The will oscillates, similar to the 
 needle of a compass, or the balance-wheel of a watch, or 
 as a beam very nicely poised. Too much attraction in 
 any given direction, or toa much weight at one end of 
 the scale, causes change of polarities, which is a change 
 in the conscious life of thought, memory, feeling or sen- 
 sation. When this change is extreme, the being is 
 changed, the memory is lost, or judgment is dethroned, 
 and yet the form of the being remains apparently the 
 same ; but the man himself has vacated his throne and 
 become a servant of some other power greater than he. 
 In view of this philosophical truth, we claim that there is 
 no real sanity on this earth, and very little of it in spirit- 
 life^ beneath the abode of the gods. There are no perfect 
 wills. Either firmness, continuity or self-esteem are too 
 weak or too strong fur proper balance and harmony. In 
 this mundane sphere the masculine weighs down the 
 
— 169 — 
 
 feminine, and, worse even than all that, the central dia- 
 mond of the soul — selfhood — is marred and corroded till 
 there is no perfect oscillation or movement. We have 
 moved, like a wagon, so long in one rut that it is almost 
 impossible to get out of it. We have looked so long at 
 the black side of God's sign-board — nature— that it has 
 become luminous to us ; and at the white side — spirit — so 
 little that it has lost its lustre and is forgotten, or, sup- 
 posed at most to be the night of nothingness. This is 
 insanity. A man may be insane in whole or in part : in 
 either case, the will, becoming unbalanced, has lost con- 
 trol in whole or in part. It has lost its grasp. The 
 reversal of the poles of the will is why we have no memory 
 of previous states of existence. The will, by chance, 
 accident, sickness, or by intent, may oscillate back to the 
 point it occupied in some former age, or previous state 
 of being, and the person be exactly what he was spirit- 
 ually at that time, and lose all memory of this life. A 
 psychologized person may be made to feel and act like a 
 dog, while under the influence. Why ? Just because his 
 will is thrown out of balance, and he is what we call, in 
 other circumstances, insane. It is just such effects that we 
 call insanity. In all similar cases of insanity where the 
 psychologist is not seen or known, it is the spirit of some 
 one unknown, either mortal or a spirit. At such times we 
 say he is insane. The consciousness of being remains, but 
 memory — the bridge over the chasms of time — is broken 
 down, but not totally destroyed. It may, however, be 
 reconstructed by the culture of the will, and all remem- 
 brances revived. Continuity is that power which leads to 
 
.-170 — 
 
 forgetfulness of these surroundings — to abstraction and 
 absorption. It is when we become absorbed in some 
 work or passion that we forget our weakness, or what we 
 know of ourselves, and rise up to grandeur and glory. The 
 greatest achievements, the most heroic deeds, the greatest 
 discoveries that bless mankind, are all due to this little 
 feminine faculty of will, which leads to insanity. The 
 diffusion of spirit, the waste of life, the weakness and mis- 
 direction of energy, uncontrollable passions, the want of 
 psychological power, the pains and aches of the body — 
 these are all due to the weakness of continuity, and 
 excessive self-consciousness. This self-consciousness is a 
 rut dug deep by demerit, in which we are all sunk — as in 
 a quagmire. Purity of self is the only help for us — the 
 only lubricator of the will — the only cleanser of this 
 human time-piece. Purity — physical, mental and spirit- 
 ual — cannot be achieved by outward acts. It is an inward 
 effort — an inward fire kindled by the action of continuity, 
 which burns out the dross of these gross natures. This 
 fire is kindled by the accumulation of spirit whenever and 
 wherever attraction overbalances repulsion. 
 
171 — 
 
 XIV. — THE VOLUNTARY AND INVOLUNTARY 
 POWERS. 
 
 The great majority of our acts are involuntary. Even 
 the acts which we think we do voluntarily are mainly either 
 forced or coaxed out of us by an impulse. But, no mat- 
 ter how this may be, we know we have volition, or volun- 
 tary powers, however small they may be ; or no matter 
 how vast the involuntary may be, it is subservient to us. 
 Call it what you like — Nature or God — it is our ser- 
 vant. When once this machine is set in motion, it au- 
 tomatically obeys. A musician, after he has mastered 
 the use of his instrument, does not will each separate 
 motion of his fingers; his mind may be occupied with 
 words he may be singing to the music, but his fingers 
 move fast or slow in accord with the music, and his feet 
 work upon the pedal without attention or thought. So it 
 is with all we do. In doing a piece of work with which 
 one is familiar, the thought wanders away, but still the 
 work goes on. In sleep the voluntary is suspended, /. e., 
 the mind is at rest ; and at times the will also seems to 
 rest, or memory and judgment to be suspended. 
 
 Habits all become automatic, or involuntary. Habits of 
 the body and mind are alike, and yet the voluntary seems 
 to be of the mind : in fact, they are so closely allied, and 
 so interwoven, that it is difficult to separate them, or to 
 define them as separate powers. But we do know that all 
 
— 172 — 
 
 the light we have is of the mind, and all the power of it 
 comes from the involuntary. Voluntarily we do as we 
 think best, but the power to accomplish is the most of it. 
 Thus it seems plain to me that the voluntary powers are 
 merely a thought we have, which thought is all we have 
 to guide us. It is possible that this thought may be so 
 cultivated and enlarged to become as automatic as any 
 habit, and express itself as any involuntary power, even 
 in our sleep. 
 
 Language is a mere matter of culture or habit ; and so 
 of thought, or any of the bodily functions. Indigestion 
 may be cured ; torpid liver made to act ; and constipa- 
 tion of the bowels overcome, by paying constant attention 
 to regularity. By paying little or no attention to the 
 movement of the bowels, thus breaking up nature's habits, 
 their warnings become less and less, and, in time, habits 
 of constipation or inaction intervene. But if you will 
 have a regular time for the evacuation, and pay strict 
 attention thereto, providing an opportunity, whether there 
 is an inclination or not, nature will in time listen to your 
 demand, and furnish the power to remove all obstructions, 
 and give life to the torpid tissues. Such is the force of 
 habit. 
 
 This new life comes through an effort of the will — first, 
 voluntarily, but afterwards as an involuntary power or 
 habit. When it has become habitual, the bowels will 
 notify you of the time, and insist upon your paying atten- 
 tion. It is the same with eating and drinking : if you 
 eat three times daily, you will be hungry at those regular 
 times; but if you have no regular time for eating, hunger 
 
— 173— 
 
 will not come till you think of it. To think of food as 
 of something loathsome will kill hunger. To break in 
 upon the regularity of a habit is to destroy it. To pay 
 attention to anything is to become its slave. Sexual 
 excesses are habits of thought, depending upon regularity 
 for existence. So long as it is a habit, it will demand 
 and enforce attention; but turn the thought to something 
 else, and the voice of the habit gradually grows weaker 
 and weaker, till in time it will take an effort of thought 
 and the conjuring of the will to restore it. 
 
 Small as the voluntary powers may be — perhaps a mere 
 thought, yet it is all there is of us, and our weal and woe 
 depend upon their use. By use the, voluntary becomes 
 the involuntary. Absentmindedness is indicative of the 
 sinking of the voluntary into the involuntary. Such per- 
 sons are more indifferent to outward things than those 
 who are always " wide-awake.' ' This is, indeed, the 
 beginning of trance, wherein some of the very finest 
 orations are delivered. 
 
 This "wide-awake " life is a mere habit, which is de- 
 stroyed by the creation of another, viz : sleep. Sleep is 
 a closing of the eyes to outward things and the turning 
 of the sight inward. It is the same in trance : the first is 
 a sleep, or a partial sleep, of the consciousness ; the latter 
 is a higher degree of consciousness : for the full wakeful- 
 ness of the soul's powers is in a union of the voluntary 
 with the involuntary. This is effected by magnetism, and 
 sometimes in natural sleep ; then we have somnambulism, 
 or sleep-walking, if the soul is unable to quit the body; 
 but if the soul is able to quit the body, we. have prophetic 
 
— 174 — 
 
 visions, or the solving of difficult problems, or the visiting 
 of distant places, spirit- worlds, etc. But in whatever way 
 sleep or trance may be induced, it produces a degree of 
 insensibility in the body. The deeper the sleep, the more 
 insensible the body becomes. Mesmeric sleep is next to 
 death. This may be self-induced, or through the agency 
 of an operator. Calmness and tranquility are necessary 
 to its production, the same as in natural sleep. Calmness 
 allows the soul to expand, and this produces sleep and 
 trance, wherein the body becomes insensible. But there 
 are two ways of producing nervous insensibility : one I 
 have described ; the other is through increased and in- 
 tense activity or excitement. Fits, in which sensibility is 
 lost, are produced by excitement — the cause sometimes 
 visible or known (or, at least, supposed to be), but oftener 
 unknown. 
 
 We know that catalepsy, common to Methodist revivals, 
 known as " the power/ ' is induced by excitement. Chil- 
 dren fall down in fits through the excitement of fear. In 
 intense anger the nerves have little or no feeling. Indeed, 
 there is an insanity comes through anger in which there 
 seems to be no sympathy, reason or feeling. Many a man 
 has been maimed, wounded, and materially injured in a 
 fight, and not been the least sensible of it till the excite- 
 ment was over. So long as the tension of the nerves 
 continues there is no pain. The clenched fist of an angry 
 man feels nothing. The Indian, undergoing untold tor- 
 tures at the hands of his captors, sings his war-song and 
 laughs in the face of his tormentors. Michael Servetus, 
 being roasted on a slow fire made of green wood, by 
 
-^? 
 
 — its— 
 
 John Calvin, composed the following, which he repeated 
 to his tormentor, with a smile of happiness on his face 
 while broiling : 
 
 " This side enough is toasted : 
 Turn me, tyrant, and eat; 
 For, whether raw or roasted, 
 I am the better meat." 
 
 The Christian martyrs while being burned at the stake, 
 sang, prayed and exhorted; assuring the bystanders that 
 it was pleasant " to die for the Lord." In view of these 
 facts, and what we know of ecstacy and the insensibility 
 of the mesmerized subject, is it not at least reasonable to 
 suppose that the will is master of sensation as well as 
 motion ? There is no pain to the strong will. Many a 
 man has endured surgical operations without the use of 
 an anaesthetic, or being bound, and with not a movement 
 in muscle or nerve. Now if pain can be partially subdued 
 by the will it may be wholly so. A man is made many 
 times stronger and many times more enduring by excite- 
 ment ; but the deepest and most power- and health-produc- 
 ing excitement comes from the calming of passions and th e 
 awakening of the higher faculties. There is a spiritual 
 excitement, far more potent and exhilarating than the 
 excitement of any of the passions, in which ecstacy is 
 passed and the soul escapes. It is then that these bodies are 
 proof to the elements, and command the respect of even 
 wild beasts. The Rahat of India seeks some jungle or 
 lonely place, or some dangerous place by the side of 
 some swamp or lagoon, infested by monstrous reptiles, 
 where man fears to intrude ; here he composes himself 
 
— 176 — 
 
 for his meditations, and goes calmly into an unconscious 
 state, and the monsters crawl out and lie down by his 
 side, and sleep also. Never was one known to be 
 harmed by them. (See Isis Unveiled). Is not this 
 the same power by which Daniel commanded the 
 respect of the lions in their den ? The full power of the 
 will does not manifest itself in our normal state ; there 
 must be an excitement of some kind in order to call into 
 play all our powers. But the full measure of power is 
 not in the tension of the nerves and muscles ; it is in the 
 tension of the inner man or spiritual body. This is not 
 a rousing up as of anger, and a propulsion of the spirit 
 outward, but rather a letting go of the nerves — a resig- 
 nation of the soul as in sleep. This is possible only in 
 habit. True culture gives resignation, which, pushed on 
 to extremes, gives power to withstand fire. The Acolyte 
 for the Priesthood of Buddhism must possess super- 
 mundane powers ere he can be admitted. I have been 
 told by a gentleman who was born in India, and lived 
 there until he was twenty-one years of age, that they are 
 tested when they apply for Priesthood by being required 
 to walk over a long bed of live coals of fire with their 
 naked feet, and to do it without hurry, and to come off 
 at the other end without a singe or smell of fire ; if they 
 fail they are not admitted, but are sent back to their 
 practice of meditative rites. D. D. Home is one instance 
 of our own time and country who has manifested this 
 power, as well as that of levitation, by virtue of which 
 Jesus walked upon the water. I might multiply facts 
 " ad infinitum" if it were the intent of this work. The 
 
— 177 — 
 
 past and present are both full of the proof. Search for 
 it, — not alone in the Scriptures of the olden time, but in 
 the living testimony of the present. The will is a magi- 
 cal power ; but its highest magic is in letting go. The 
 strong well-balanced man accepts things as they come 
 with a spirit attuned to the sweet melodies of creative 
 power : and weeps not over blighted joys or withered 
 hopes. He looks above and beyond these things, and 
 his soul is filled with rest thereby. He does not essay to 
 control others, for he has as much as he can do to control 
 himself. By this means he converts his enemies into 
 friends, who come to him, as an oracle, for counsel. His 
 control is far greater than that of one whose whole life is 
 spent in trying to control others. The gigantic evils of 
 this life come from the desire to rule others — or to make 
 others do as you wish them to do. Counsel is far better 
 than rule. Let every one do as they like, but scatter 
 light and knowledge of the true way to happiness and 
 power. Reader, if you have lost youth and happiness — 
 let go! If friends have proved false and ungrateful — let go! 
 If your heart is torn by unrequited love — let go! If you 
 are poor — let go! If you are wealthy — let go! If Provi- 
 dence forsakes you — let go! If you love life — let go! If 
 you are tired of life — let go! If you look back upon your 
 life's journey with regrets— let go! For " He that would 
 save his life shall lose it, and he that would lose his life 
 shall save it." 
 
~ 178 — 
 
 XV.— WILL-CULTURE. 
 
 Let him who aspires to power commence by a close 
 and critical analysis of himself. As will is the extraor- 
 dinary of man, its culture is the culture of the entire 
 man, and the regeneration of him — or another creation. 
 The methods of it will be found as extraordinary 
 as God himself — for how can a thing cultivate itself 
 without God's help? And God's methods are not our 
 methods. 
 
 The three great principles of the selfhood, from, by 
 and through which all actions come are (i) Love; 
 (2) Imagination ; (3) Will. The Imagination is neu- 
 tral, as indifference or nature ; Will is masculine ; Love 
 is feminine. As a husbandman must till the soil in 
 order to make it productive, so must a man culture 
 his loves in order to the production of will-power. As 
 a slave must first overcome his master before he can 
 be free, so must the will overcome its loves : hence, 
 love is the way of freedom, of regeneration, and power. 
 Self-analysis shows impurities which must, as a primary 
 step, be removed. There can be no progress without 
 vastation. The old habits, vices, follies, modes of 
 thought, loves, hates, envy, jealousies, covetousness, 
 fear, pride and egotism must all die and be buried 
 far out of sight as a preparatory step to soul-growth; 
 and will is cultivated and made strong in the subduing 
 
— 1*9— 
 
 of those things which limit its freedom and powei\ 
 Purity is the only thing that cannot be destroyed ; 
 so, the purity of love, will and wisdom are immortal. 
 It is only the semblance of real things which die or 
 change ; hence, that which is supposed to be real love, 
 or real will, or real wisdom, is only the semblance of the 
 real, for they change or die. So, in the regeneration j 
 the semblance must pass away to give place to the real. 
 These bodies are mere reflections of ourselves j which we, 
 seeing in the mirror or mirage of nature, fall in love withj 
 and embracing, die. Now, this law is the same in relation 
 to sex-love — we love the reflex of ourselves which we see 
 in the mirror, called woman. This is not real love, for 
 its operations being downward, we propagate only our 
 kind, or conditions, or emanations, which are antagonistic 
 to us ; while real love propagates new atoms — parts of a 
 divine body, unchangeable and eternal — its operations 
 are upward, and its emanations mingle in the essence of 
 God. 
 
 The infinite is all power, and it is man's field of opera- 
 tion. It encompasses him round about; it bends to him 
 with anything he asks for ; but we must work for what 
 we want. "Not every one that saith, Lord! Lord! 
 shall enter the Kingdom; but he that doeth" — u e.> he 
 that worketh with a will in the right direction. Now the 
 road to power is in the perfection of our nature ; which 
 is in the attainment of duality first. I have already spoken 
 of ideal love, of its conception, growth and union, or 
 marriage in the spirit. Now, the true methods of will- 
 culture have for their object growth. Soul-growth is 
 
— 180 — 
 
 inward, or a letting go of outward things, and a looking 
 forward to the realization of a true life in which true love 
 appears as one with the will, or the female united to the 
 male in real durable oneness of being, or marriage. 
 There can be no union of objects; therefore, man and 
 woman, being separated entities, are not one — neither 
 can be — on this earth : hence, marriage is a semblance 
 or type of a reality, or changeless condition. A union of 
 two in one, or two in spirit. This will be more fully set 
 forth in the chapter on Gifts of the Spirit. Harmony must 
 be first had in the individual ere it can be effected with 
 another, and for this reason a lifetime of effort or culture 
 is necessary, in which things inharmonious or at variance 
 with each other are to be avoided. Owing to the inhar- 
 monies of marriage (and the loss of power therein) the 
 Essenes and Rosicrucians of old discarded marriage as 
 something unreal, and lived lives of celibacy. For 
 this reason the Buddhistic and Catholic priesthood are 
 not permitted to marry. Further reasons are set forth in 
 regard to the nature of sin, to which the reader is referred. 
 In order to destroy that which retards the soul in its 
 flights, viz : sin, its opposite or antagonist must be 
 strengthened ; to this end the whole mind must be given 
 up to the contemplation of such things as make the soul 
 sick and disgusted with sin. This creates another 
 emotion antagonistic to love, viz : feelings of disgust at 
 that which the world is mad after. Love is an emotion. 
 Will is motion, but love is a reflex of it, or an emotion^ 
 or wo-man, because emotions ruin the will or the man in 
 leading it into captivity. The object of love is to join 
 
-181 — 
 
 * 
 
 itself to the will in order to increase power to enjoy, as 
 a loving wife works for and delights in the happiness of 
 her husband. So woman should not unite with man save 
 for the purpose of begetting life, spirit, power. In true 
 marriage, according to the divine intention of it, there 
 are no children ; and no disease ; neither do they die. 
 To have an ideal elevated, pure and full of rest and 
 unalloyed pleasure, is to have the pain of disappointment 
 in realization. It is to kindle a consuming fire at your 
 very vitals, which you are obliged to quench by the will, 
 because no heart answers your heart-throbs ; because all 
 fall short of your ideal love — this it is for him to suffer 
 who aspires to be something more than the common. 
 There is no greatness not born of pain, and there is no 
 pain greater than that of a heart bruised ; so soft is it, 
 and flexible, that it will not break. 
 
 Sexual love has the strongest hold of any of the passions ; 
 it is the hardest for the will to turn from its lust. The 
 effort to idealize love in the imagination is analogous 
 to that of the libertine and debauchee — only one is chaste 
 while the other is impure. The onanist sees in his imag- 
 ination the object of his lust, and thus acting upon his 
 emotions pollutes himself. It is the same with the liber- 
 tine. These emotions that destroy power and the soul 
 are created by an inward action ; and in proportion to 
 the power of concentration is the spirit drawn within, 
 condensed and projected, and thus the life, spirit and 
 power thrown away. But this wasted virility, though 
 lost to the man, is not lost in nature, for it is a protoplasm 
 from which spring infusoria, worms, insects, reptiles, etc., 
 
— 182 — 
 
 which are a curse to the earth and mankind. Your ideal 
 love may not be a very near approach to true love ; but 
 your highest conception of womanly beauty, purity, 
 goodness, truth, grace and excellence, coupled with form 
 and action, is your estimate of it, and as such is your 
 kingdom of power towards which you grow rapidly or 
 slowly as the case may be. 
 
 Control must begin at home — in the selfhood. But 
 how, or in what manner, can a thing culture and control 
 itself? How can the will regulate its own action ? Firstly, 
 then, the will is the nearest approach to freedom of any- 
 thing we know of; love is limited by the sensibilities; wis- 
 dom, by that which we learn ; but will, being free from 
 emotion, is free to produce emotions according to its love 
 and wisdom. So, love and wisdom are the shackles of 
 the will. Now, we do not control that which we love ; 
 that which we love controls us. Hence the necessity of 
 subduing love as the beginning of the road to power. We 
 do not destroy love, but we wean it from sensuous objects. 
 Thus weaned, it becomes at one with the will in its free- 
 dom, and the flights of the soul. This is the At-one- 
 ment — (Atonement.) Love cannot be purified. " There 
 is no impure love," said P. B. Randolph. What we 
 call purifying love is merely the vastating of pretences. 
 Love itself is honest; but this world's love is in pretending 
 to be what we are not. It is the shame, which, in order 
 to hide, God clothed Adam and Eve in the skins of ani- 
 mals. If all the shame were removed from mankind, the 
 little love left would be very small indeed. 
 
 Will-culture is a thing altogether antagonistic to gen- 
 
— 188 — 
 
 eral religious ideas ; for the will is generally consid- 
 ered of the "evil one' 7 — to be broken and crushed. 
 With this idea I am at variance. We have far too little 
 power, and to increase in it is the acme of all religion. 
 It is the false direction of power wherein . evil exists, not 
 in the power itself. To enlighten the mind, then, or to 
 culture the imagination, is to control man's creative 
 powers or loves, and guide them in the right direction. 
 
 All culture 'must begin at home. Begin by a recon- 
 struction of yourself. If you feel that you are superior to 
 others, disabuse yourself of that idea at once. In arro- 
 gance there is no growth of the soul. To feel as you 
 really are, is to feel very weak and very small. In order 
 to rise above the common level, you must be real. To 
 feel equal is to feel real and to be real. Let every man 
 have his opinions in freedom — the rights you claim, freely 
 grant to others. Thus you pluck the motes out of your 
 eye. Judge no man, for you know not their motives. 
 The freedom you claim for yourself, that grant to others, 
 even in thought and feeling — for freedom is the princi- 
 ple of growth — the first and the last, and the only princi- 
 ple in existence. Now he who is bound by love, hate, 
 or any passion whatever, is not free. How can he expect 
 to have power ? Power only comes by freedom. To be 
 free, then, necessitates a cutting loose of the bonds of 
 slavery. To love nothing, to hate nothing, to have no 
 likes or dislikes, to have no prejudices, no tastes, no 
 preferences — this it is to be free. The little power we 
 have comes from freedom. Now let him, who expects to 
 culture his will, bear in mind this fact—that it cannot be 
 
— 184 — 
 
 done for a selfish or mercenary purpose. I am aware that 
 one part of it, viz : firmness and self-esteem may be cul- 
 tivated and increased, but it is not real culture of the will 
 after all, but a throwing out of balance of the will, which 
 is destructive in the main. All power, to be lasting, 
 must descend from the higher to the lower, as a baptism ; 
 and this descent is accomplished by and through the 
 feminine of will — viz : Continuity. The second act of 
 will is in the propulsion of force into the nerve — as in 
 grasping of the hand or in the striking of a blow. But 
 the first effort of will is in the gathering together of force 
 before striking. The latter is an expansion act, like the 
 inflation of the lungs ; the former is an exhaustive act, as 
 the expiration of the breath. Now the first y ox primal, 
 ox foundation of all power is inflation. This is concen- 
 tration, and involves the exercise of continuity. The 
 greater the concentration, the greater will be the power 
 manifested — either in physical, or in mental, or in spir- 
 itual effort. Now, in making a great physical effort, 
 there must be a stimulant or an excitement, in order to a 
 manifestation of the full power of the individual. This 
 excitement, of course, is a mental effort in which the 
 mind expands to its utmost tension of energy, or feeling, 
 or want of feeling, in which a resolution is formed, born 
 or begotten, and the nerves and muscles are braced up — 
 filled to overflowing with force. The whole person ex- 
 pands, as a prospecitve mother, and is eager to deliver 
 itself of its superabundant force, energy or burden. When 
 full to overflowing with anger, love or any passion, we 
 are eager to express it : but the first effort is to be full. 
 
— 185 — 
 
 This is a mental effort in which the will gets its excitement 
 from the dwelling upon wrongs, or love, in the imagina- 
 tion. Now, this " brooding* ' over wrongs, or dwel- 
 ing in thought upon things involves the exercise of con- 
 tinuity. From this it is known that the real power of 
 will comes from the feminine part of it, viz : concentra- 
 tiveness or continuity. It is also evident that the more 
 one believes in the reality of the wrong or love, the fuller 
 they will become of love or anger, and the power of its 
 manifestation will be proportionally greater. Now, this 
 is exactly the case in all occult or spiritual power. The 
 excitement of the will comes from its dwelling upon an 
 idea or an object to be attained and in the resisting of the 
 excitement of the passions. In fact, the culture of the 
 will is in the alternate excitement of the passions, and in 
 subduing the same without expression. For instance : 
 Some one wrongs you a little ; you seize upon it as if it 
 were a sweet and delicious morsel, and by constantly 
 thinking of it in its most aggravating features, and by 
 dwelling upon it, you work yourself into a mental fever 
 in which you feel like "knocking down," "kicking," 
 "shooting" and "dragging out," — but you do no such 
 thing ; but before your passion is too strong for you, you 
 turn your mind to another feature of the wrong, and begin 
 to look upon it as not quite so hideous, after all, and grad- 
 ually it grows less and less, as the excitement cools down. 
 You have not manifested this to the world, but it has had 
 an effect upon you. Your will power has grown in the 
 exercise. Physical power grows by manifestation, but 
 spiritual power, by silently suppressing or repressing it. 
 
— 186— 
 
 If you express your power physically, it is lost to you 
 spiritually. Hence the motto: "Silence is strength." 
 In thus exciting yourself, and then controlling yourself, 
 you are creating power, as well as teaching the invol- 
 untary powers obedience. After practicing for a while 
 this exercise, you will find you are becoming very excit- 
 able, and you can excite yourself even without any out- 
 ward provocation. A jealous person can easily become 
 half crazy about nothing. In this manner you learn 
 how to create emotions of a low order first, and then you 
 gradually step up to emotions of a higher order, such as 
 mirth, love, pity, rapture ; but of all creative emotions, 
 that of love transcends all else. To gaze at a dead body 
 with worms crawling in and out, and look at it as human, 
 and think that that is the end of all flesh, and that you 
 will be the same in a short time, disgusts one fearfully 
 with the follies of life, and tames the passions of any man 
 who thinks at all. This helps the will to gain the 
 ascendency ; but after seeing it once or twice, you can 
 see it in your mind at any time, and thus subdue all low 
 and unworthy thoughts and feelings — this strengthens the 
 the will. " He who keeps death in view seldom does a 
 wrong." The will that cannot create emotions by its 
 own effort is weak : it needs a stimulant. To keep your 
 heart young and full of tenderness and love for your 
 companion, think of her as when you wooed and won 
 her. To destroy your love, think of it in connection 
 with something disgusting and low, and it will speedily 
 die ; but do not be deceived ; some things die very hard. 
 Habits take hold of the vitals. Many who read these 
 
— 187 — 
 
 lines may be able to see what they desire in the mind 
 without physical contact. Such can develop power rap- 
 idly. Others, again, will need some aggravating circum- 
 stances to stir the emotions. To provoke another to 
 anger with words, looks and gestures, and then subdue 
 yourself with a thought, and control and subdue the 
 other by the creations of mirth or grief is a good exercise, 
 but a dangerous one. 
 
 Who can stand and calmly take a blow without 
 resentment? But it was in view of this same subject that 
 Jesus said : " If a man smite you on one cheek, turn the 
 other also." Habits are hereditary as well as acquired. 
 They, like diseases, are hard to cure. All habits of the 
 ordinary man tend outward, and hence are weakening. 
 To be more than ordinary, work against habits. This is 
 done only by creating other and opposite habits. ' ' Does 
 thine eye offend thee, pluck it out ! " or train it not to 
 see objects external, by turning it inwardly. Perhaps 
 you are fond of some particular article of diet — you 
 love the taste of it. Pork, for instance. You first 
 satisfy yourself that it feeds scrofula and the humors of 
 the blood, and you desire to leave it off. You go to 
 work to kill the taste for it by becoming disgusted men- 
 tally with the thing you delight in. It is done by med- 
 itation thus : Imagine a stomach filled with flesh ferment- 
 ing and working like maggots in carrion. Flesh in the 
 stomach, as in the sun, becomes putrid. It is nothing 
 but a bit of corpse dressed and cooked, that I am eating. 
 Behold the market ! hung round and round with corpses, 
 not unlike my own, if it were dressed like these. A little 
 
— 188 — 
 
 while ago they were moving, living beings, like myself. 
 1 know that I become like that upon which I feed. See 
 the swine ! the scavenger of the filth of living things ; 
 what a loathsome object ! and I am his scavenger. "I 
 am naught but a sepulchre full of rotten flesh/ ' Behold 
 the butcher ! A living corpse cutting up dead ones ! while 
 others stand eagerly looking on, with mouths watering 
 like dogs for the feast of rottenness. See the carts laden 
 with corpses !— hurrying away to the meat shops — yet 
 warm with life, holding up their naked, mutilated limbs 
 in mute appeals to heaven against the horrid butchery ! 
 while a demon in human form, sits driving to the char- 
 nel house. By such thoughts persisted in, the taste 
 changes, and the stomach heaves at the sight or thought 
 which we conjure in regard to food or anything else. 
 Thought is sight, feeling, tasting, smelling, etc., all in 
 one. The taste changes, as our thoughts change in 
 regard to it. Just so with all the passions. 
 
 There is no virtue where there is no temptation ; no 
 merit where there is no demerit ; no grace where there is 
 no sin; no power where there are no obstacles. The 
 greater the obstacle overcome, the greater the glory of 
 the achievement. The filthiest thing contains the most 
 life ; but this life is worthless till utilized. 
 
 The will is the husbandman, who, if needs be, drains 
 his ground, enriches, plows, harrows, plants and culti- 
 vates his crop. If he be not slothful, he shall, according 
 to nature's laws, reap his harvest. Se with the aspirant 
 to power ; he must prepare his body , his blood must be 
 filtered, and the acids and alkalis harmonized, and the 
 
— 189 — 
 
 flesh made soft, sweet and glowing. Drugs will not do 
 this. The body must be reached through the mind, or 
 not at all. It is a well-known fact that the imagination 
 affects the body. Fear, disgust, and in fact, all the pas- 
 sions have an effect upon the blood. One may accelerate 
 the action of the heart, while another retards it. All 
 the passions get their excitement from the imagination. 
 So, the imagination is the connecting link between the 
 body and the soul. It is the door between the visible 
 and the invisible worlds of sense. To purify the body, 
 then, the will must affect it through the imagination. 
 The imagination corrupts the blood ; why may it not 
 purify it as well ? That we do not know how this is done 
 is no argument against this proposition. Love tinges the 
 cheek with the glow of magnetic health ; fear congeals 
 the blood ; disgust produces neuralgia, and lust produces 
 consumption. Hate dries up and coagulates the humors ; 
 covetousness produces dyspepsia, — -and so on to the end 
 of the chapter. 
 
 Every passion, and even thought and reason have their 
 roots in the imagination. The effect that things have upon 
 us depends upon the way they are looked at. Beauty 
 and deformity spring alike from the imagination. We 
 receive the spirit of a thing by looking at it — smelling, 
 tasting, hearing — and more than all, by thinking of it. 
 We get the grossness of food by eating it, but the real 
 life of it is extracted by the thoughts we have of it. In 
 other words, the ideas we have in regard to the quality 
 and use of food imparts to it something akin to themselves. 
 
 Thus the body may be gradually changed by diet ; 
 
— 190 — 
 
 not so much by quality as by quantity ; for the will 
 imparts any desired quality. A very sensitive person 
 suffers nausea by the sight of that which is loathsome — 
 to conjure that thing up in the imagination has the same 
 effect. Many a person is afflicted with dyspepsia and 
 other disorders from a settled conviction of the inevita- 
 bleness of it. The idea that you will cure yourself is 
 better than medicine. The idea that you will eat simply 
 because you are obliged to do so in order to live, and not 
 for the pleasure of eating, is better in reality than food 
 or fasting ; but to eat, drink and love for the sole object 
 of attaining immortal power, and not for the sensuous 
 gratification of the appetites or passions, is to work upon 
 the mind, blood, body and spirit as God works— down- 
 ward. This downward operation eliminates the grossness, 
 and leaves the essences or life for your use. Remember 
 this simple thing : All impurities are a result of com- 
 pounding, or of combining different substances, fluids, 
 magnetisms and spirits in one. Purity is oneness. The 
 simpler the diet the better ; one thing is better than three, 
 four, or a dozen. Never eat for pleasure, and eat only 
 when hungry, and stop while still hungry. To test your 
 power of will think of something sickening as you gaze 
 upon your food ; if your stomach rejects the food from 
 that cause, you have no need of any more food at that 
 time — cease eating at once. If you drop your knife, fork, 
 or spoon, or have any such mishap at the table, cease eating. 
 Never think how your food tastes, and never indulge in 
 talk and laughter while eating ; let your thoughts be fixed 
 upon the object to be attained, whether it be the elimin- 
 
— 191 — 
 
 ation of disease, grossness, bad habits, etc., or the building 
 up of the dual divine nature wherein all power resides. 
 
 The one great curse of civilization (?) is gormandizing. 
 We need very little food if the truth were known ; just 
 enough should be taken into the stomach to form a 
 nucleus of attraction for the spirit to materialize itself, or 
 condense and form new particles of blood, nerve and 
 flesh. Behold ! the miracle of the loaves and fishes as an 
 illustration of this principle. Food multiplies itself in 
 the half-filled stomach, when it is left vacant from a 
 principle • but when the stomach is full there is no room 
 for multiplication or condensation to take place, and a 
 filthy, rotting, destructive process takes the place of divine 
 and life-improving process. The life of the body comes 
 from the spirit, and not wholly from the food we take in 
 at the mouth; of course, the full stomach crowds the 
 spirit out, and there is no room left for the action of the 
 spirit therein. Besides, the spirit feeds upon that which 
 is in harmony with it in its passage to and from, and 
 radiation around, the body, and passing into the body 
 deposits therein that life which it has accumulated. Look 
 at Dr. Tanner, fasting forty days ! Look at the fast of 
 Jesus for forty days, and then behold Gottama Buddha, 
 living seven years alone in the forests of Thibet, subsist- 
 ing wholly upon berries and roots ; and at last throwing 
 himself at the foot of "the sacred Kalpa tree," vowed 
 that he would not again taste food until he had achieved 
 his object, viz., the attainment of supernatural energy; 
 and then when so weak with the long fast that he could 
 no longer stand upon his feet, the " Dewas " (celestial 
 
—192 — 
 
 beings) came and fed and nursed him. Did he attain 
 his object ? Look at the results and then judge. He 
 lived about five hundred years before Christ, and died 
 when he got ready (at the age of eighty years); founding 
 the greatest religion that man has ever known, whose 
 adherents numbered a few years ago the enormous number 
 of three hundred and sixty-nine millions, and that with- 
 out violence or bloodshed. (See "Hardy's Eastern Mon- 
 achism.") Those who eat the least have the best health 
 and last the longest. Life is sustained more from the 
 atmosphere and electricity than from the solid food taken 
 into the stomach. It is the essence of things which is of 
 greatest value, and the essence is not limited to the solid 
 substance, but radiates round about as its aura — intangible 
 to our dull senses, but nevertheless existing. It is upon 
 the aura of things that the spirit feeds, and according 
 to the attractive power of the soul is its pasture. So long 
 as the spirit is fat it will feed the body. The glutton has 
 a weak, lean, hungry spirit, and little will-power. The 
 diseased forms which meet the eye at every turn, are 
 evidence of weak, small, spiritless will — and collapsed and 
 angular souls. They present a ravenous multitude, a 
 standing mockery of nature, and a clamorous rebuke of 
 the wisdom of an infinite Creator. When diseased, in pain 
 and trouble, how nice it is to lay the blame on fate, 
 nature or God. But if we would only stop and think 
 that we have to suffer from the malignity or mistakes of 
 the relentless power which compels us to exist, and that 
 no prayers are answered save those of the will, we would 
 philosophically shoulder the power to be as much as to 
 
— 193 — 
 
 do and to suffer. We could then see clearly that the 
 diseases, failures and mistakes, ascribed to fate, are due 
 to our own ignorance, weakness and headstrong folly. 
 We have to bear the consequences of our acts — why not 
 claim the credit of causation ? So long as we can ascribe 
 our acts to circumstances, nature, fate or God, we 
 trust to luck and drift like bubbles upon the frothing 
 deep — effortless. It takes effort to accumulate property ; 
 it takes effort to be a man under all circumstances ; 
 but it costs no effort to be a beggar or a knave. 
 This has become so common that it has given rise to 
 the trite saying, that "man is prone to do evil as 
 the sparks are to fly upward." It is far easier to fall 
 than to climb ; but it hurts fearfully at the bottom. The 
 labor of climbing is pleasant after you get used to it ; for 
 the higher you climb the more vigorous you become, and 
 the purer the atmosphere. Why? Because the climber 
 is ascending towards life, while he who falls is descending 
 towards pain, disease, weakness, darkness, death, and 
 nonentity. Will-culture is the royal ladder, anchored in 
 God's throne, and reaching to every soul. 
 
 You cannot carry much grossness, either of body, 
 mind, or spirit, up that ladder. Grossness is always pos- 
 itive, and very difficult to become negative. But the 
 greater the grossness, the greater the power when the 
 victory is won. Paul understood this. He says, in sub- 
 stance: "Where sin abounds grace doth much more 
 abound," I have already explained the reason. It takes a 
 great soul to excel in anything. Great criminals are always 
 men of greatness, misdirected. The mind is a wandering 
 
— 194 — 
 
 vagrant ; like the eye, it wanders restlessly in quest of new 
 things. But " let your eye be single," and your mind 
 will follow after. Look steadily at a speck on the wall — 
 think steadily of one thing— and gradually there steals 
 over you strange sensations, as clouds and flashes of light 
 pass before your vision. To make the mind single — as 
 an eye with the motes plucked out sees only one object — 
 limit the range of thought. In this you are drawing the 
 mind to a focus preparatory to elongation. As the eye 
 with dust therein sees nothing distinctly, so the mind un- 
 trained has no focus, no depth, no clairvoyance ; it wan- 
 ders in a maze of error. 
 
 To call its scattered forces together is a herculean task, 
 but it is small compared to the focusing of the spirit. As 
 involuntary powers follow the lead of the voluntary — as 
 the mind follows the direction of the eye, being fixed 
 when the eye is fixed — so spirit obeys the will. Agitation 
 of the body disturbs the mind ; agitation of the mind 
 distracts and confuses the spirit, so that the will is de- 
 prived of its means to execute. Hence the necessity of 
 calmness. Continuity is that which produces rest and 
 satisfaction, as the love of a woman. It is the feminine 
 of will, and creates by persistent effort. In deep, pro- 
 found meditation, the soul becomes pregnant with great- 
 ness, for the spirit, no longer driven from the soul by 
 outward motions and emotions, slowly comes home to 
 the soul, being called in and projected upward and in- 
 ward. As spirit is fire, or that which produces fire, there 
 is heat produced by its accumulation, which in time 
 blazes forth, at first soft and mild, in great sheets of light, 
 
— 195 — 
 
 afterwards as the forked lightning. This light is life, 
 which feeds the spirit body, and gives it strength and 
 growth. It is in this turning within, this meditation, 
 that the positive will becomes the negative ; and when 
 pushed to extremes, total abstraction or forgetfulness fol- 
 lows; this is Trance. In trance the angels and celestial 
 spirits are attracted, for the whole universe of spirit im- 
 pinges upon the soul, by virtue of its attractive power. 
 The Heavens are opened, and there is nothing hid from 
 the truly great will. It pierces to any centre of power, 
 energy, love, or knowledge, and drags therefrom its 
 secrets. This is indeed the closet wherein Jesus told his 
 disciples to enter when they prayed; and to pray in 
 secret, not letting the right hand know what the left 
 hand doeth. In this way is the answer of prayer possible. 
 " God is a spirit, and they who worship Him must wor- 
 ship in spirit and in truth." To be in a trance is to be 
 enveloped in spirit — to be "baptized with the Holy 
 Ghost and with Fire." No deception, no untruth can 
 enter here. Truth elevates the soul, and is a condition 
 requisite to acquisition of all occult knowledge and 
 power. To be true to yourself is to be true to God. To 
 be true to conditions is to be divested of all fear, dis- 
 trust, and doubt ; these bar the way and close the door. 
 An abiding faith in the Infinity of Power, and belief in 
 the ability of the soul to rise to realms thereof, are essen- 
 tially basic principles of progress. To awaken the soul 
 from its long sleep of the ages, a preparation is neces- 
 sary. All passions must be put to sleep. The temper 
 must be subjugated, and the animosities of nature must 
 
— 196 — 
 
 be destroyed. This is a herculean task to most men, but 
 unless this be done, let no one boast of his will-power. 
 
 The reason is obvious why these conditions are requi- 
 site. The larger the soul the greater the agitation of the 
 elements within its radius ; and the passions being the 
 easiest disturbed are all in excessive activity. This ex- 
 plains why many noble-souled men go to the bad. Those 
 capable of soaring the highest fall the lowest when bereft 
 of self-control. The soul is an absolute calm, and when 
 all things are calm outside it expands itself as if to burst 
 its prison-walls; then the Unnatural rushes upon its 
 prisoner to overcome its power and destroy it. The calm 
 warm sunshine of summer days creates vast vacuums in 
 the atmosphere; then comes the cyclone, the tornado, 
 the lightning. These are nature's passions, which rage 
 till the vacuum is subdued. 
 
 The essential office of the soul is to create, and it does 
 this by motions and emotions. Repulsion drives, dif- 
 fuses, and scatters the spirit abroad. Attraction draws, 
 not only its own to itself, but the aura or spirit of other 
 things, which it appropriates so far as it is able. And 
 this appropriation or fusion of elements is either elevating 
 and life-giving, or is destructive. 
 
 The fire of things is life, and there are no compounds 
 thereof — it is one ; but the aura of things is graded from 
 fire to the grossest stench, which united, forms a com- 
 pound that is not pure. Purity feeds the fire-body, in 
 which death and destruction have no place. Water in 
 agitation becomes pure ; but stagnant water has more life 
 in it than running water. Of course the spirit in con- 
 
«, 197 _ 
 
 centration becomes stagnant for a time, and in this stag- 
 nation, as in stagnant water, life in myriad forms springs 
 into being. But ere they have being in the spirit, by 
 persistent effort of will, in concentration upon the Idea 
 of a Divine body, this life is condensed, or compelled to 
 take form as One. I am aware that there is a spiritual 
 body which forms at death, but it is not an immortal 
 body. This has been seen and described by many clair- 
 voyants, and is spoken of by Paul ; but the Divine body 
 is formed in this body during earth-life, or it is not formed 
 at all. It is not a compound, neither is it corruptible 
 matter. It is not seen by you, but you will know of it 
 by having a feeling of immortal life and undying power 
 within. When perfected, all power in heaven and in 
 earth will be yours — not as a man, but as a God. 
 
 " A mere fancy sketch "— << a picture of a disordered 
 brain !" Nevertheless, it is a shadow of creative power, 
 projected from the realm of the incomprehensible be- 
 yond ! Is there such a realm? If so, does it contain 
 things ? 
 
 To return to our subject. In the concentration of 
 spirit is increased life, sensation, sensitiveness, motions, 
 emotions, and power of all sensuous enjoyments. Hence 
 many fall into the slough of sense on the road, and never 
 get out. 
 
 The body is filled full to overflowing with spirit (mag- 
 netism miscalled), and the entire being vibrates with 
 pleasure-seeking emotions and longings. None but the 
 pure can pass over this bridge; the impure fall at " the 
 threshhold." Monstrous shapes stand guard here — 
 
— 198 — 
 
 '* Cherubim " with "flaming swords*' guarding "the 
 way to the tree of life." 
 
 It is the combustion of the compounds in the spirit 
 which causes the commotion, which, if resisted, they be- 
 come rectified in time. 
 
 The road to calmness, tranquility, peace, is first to be 
 thorougly satisfied in your own mind that such is the 
 only way to health and happiness. I am not going to 
 argue this point, it is the universal instinct of all think- 
 ing, reasonable men — none but savages will dispute it. 
 This point settled, then go to work to attain it. This is 
 done by a constant and eternal watchfulness. As 1 before 
 stated, the passions must be controlled, subdued, and 
 brought into total and abject subjection to the will. This 
 is best accomplished by setting apart one hour each even- 
 ing for meditation. During this hour you think only of 
 the weakness and folly of anger, lust, avarice, envy, etc., 
 dwelling most upon your greatest and most besetting 
 weakness in such a manner as to cause you to loathe 
 yourself; think of all you have done during the day — of 
 the thoughts and feelings you have had, especially dwell- 
 ing upon your failures at self-control ; aggravating your 
 follies, and not trying to excuse yourself in the least. If 
 you feel like asking for help, do so, but in thought only, 
 and that the last thing you do, and as briefly as possible. 
 Compare yourself with the calm, tranquil beauty of a 
 flower, or a twinkling star, and thus take the pride out of 
 your pretended greatness and egotism. Think of the 
 body as needing your utmost care of nursing, as an ulcer 
 
— 199 — 
 
 needing to be dressed and poulticed— not that you love 
 the ulcer, but to assuage its pain. 
 
 Only a few years, and loathsome worms will crawl out 
 and in at its nine orifices, and filthy matter will frost the 
 lips you now curl so proudly. To destroy any feeling 
 create its opposite. Is your heart agitated, torn and lacer- 
 ated with unrequitted love ? Does jealousy steal away your 
 sleep and peace of mind ? Kill it then by clothing in your 
 mind the object in garments of disgust. Rise above it in 
 your thought, and look down upon it with disgust as an 
 eagle passes by carrion. Fix your mind upon its worst 
 and most disgusting aspect; thus forgetting its allurements, 
 the love grows less and less, until at last you wonder that 
 you ever had such a feeling. Analyze, dissect the human 
 heart, turn it over and over, pick it to pieces shred by 
 shred, and see if you can find its main spring — when 
 found, it will be just like your own. Do you hate? 
 Have you an enemy who delights in your woe? Well, 
 kill your hate, and thus your enemy, by learning to love 
 him. " Oh ! that is impossible/' says one. Impossible 
 only to the weak. The will that cannot create love is a 
 mere semblance — a bubble ; it cannot endure. Christ 
 said, "Love your enemies. ,, In order to produce love 
 you must sow the seed first, before it can grow. The 
 seeds of love are respect. In your meditations fix your 
 mind upon him and thus evoke his "similacrum," and 
 compel him to reveal his best nature to you; thus 
 you can find in all some little good to inspire your 
 respect. Culture this, losing sight of his deformities and 
 infirmities of character, for it shall in time ripen into 
 
— 200 — 
 
 love to the building up of yourself and him. Are you 
 superior to your enemy ? If so, it is only in your love 
 or charity, and not in pretence. " Pray for your ene- 
 mies." Desire is prayer, which, to be answered, must be 
 so intense that acts go therewith. To pray for your 
 enemy is to do him good — not in the mere breathing of 
 desire, but by kindly looks and acts. A gentle manner, 
 a kind look, or word fitly spoken, an unobtrusive gift 
 always goes to the heart, and will do more to kill enmity 
 and elevate the soul than all the egotism on the globe. 
 Pride, avarice, envy and malice have no wings, they are 
 monsters of the deep, and have their home in the slime; 
 if you harbor them they will carry you down, down. 
 They leave you as you grow calm and tranquil in love- 
 fulness. If you find you cannot grow in love, go down 
 into disgust, and there wallow till the Divine fire is 
 kindled ; but do not get disgusted with others — your field 
 of labor is in yourself, in your own passions and weak- 
 nesses. 
 
 It is out of disgust, as out of the cesspools of hell, 
 that true manhood and spiritual power takes its rise. He 
 who is not disgusted with his own weaknesses and follies 
 remains in them as a hog in his filth. 
 
 In man's natural state he is indifferent ; hence, to him 
 there is no good nor evil, no high, no low — all things are 
 alike — indifferent. Like the earth without living things 
 to inhabit it, is simply neither good nor evil. But man 
 in an unnatural state is seething, boiling over, raving 
 mad with the fires of lust ; he knows nothing of love or its 
 divinity ; he scoffs at the idea of the soul-union of the male 
 
— 201 — 
 
 and the female as the door to immortal life and Godlike 
 energy. 
 
 All habits arise from and have their life in lust. 
 Sexual habits are no exception, and the rules for destroy- 
 ing the taste for food and drink applies to sex-love as well. 
 
 The fires of lust flow downward naturally. To reverse 
 this downward tendency is to reverse the entire man. 
 The spirit follows the thought, as the thought is con- 
 trolled by physical motions or absence thereof. This 
 turning of the operations upward is done only by an in- 
 creased and extreme action of the brain and nervous 
 system. To charge the brain with blood and increase its 
 magnetic power and action, breathe deeply and constantly 
 through the nostrils— -deep, slow, long drawn inspirations, 
 followed by rapid expirations ; this, persisted in, becomes 
 in time, a habit, which the soul carries on even in sleep, 
 till the barriers of sense give way, and clairvoyance is the 
 result ; but beware of insanity if the mind does not ex- 
 pand first by proper training. The higher mind ought to 
 rule, but unfortunately, in most men, body lords it over 
 mind, lust rules the world. The man who by will rules 
 and controls his passions is nicely balanced ; the man who 
 by will puts his passions to sleep so that they need no 
 watching, has entered already the realm of power ; he has 
 withdrawn the sexual fires from the lower extremities to 
 his brain, and only needs to go one step more to become 
 one of the " Illuminati," i. e>, provided he is a passionate 
 man. ("A passionless man is an infernal monster, not 
 only in this, but in all the starry worlds of space. " 
 P. B. Randolph.) 
 
^ Im- 
 passion being held and controlled by will, and the 
 fires of sex confined to the body, gradually draws to- 
 gether towards the mind • the thoughts collect and run 
 together like a stream of water— shallow and wide at first, 
 spreading away into swamps and marshes — stagnant pools 
 which send up scum and filth, redolent of disease and 
 crime, which, when a channel is dug, collects its waters 
 into a murmuring brook, and gradually becomes a mighty 
 river, purifying its waters by its own motion. The will 
 digs the channel, and gradually draws the thoughts therein. 
 It is hard at first, for they love the freedom of wildwood 
 and slough, where they can bask and sun themselves, and 
 evaporate to nothing ; they wash away the tiny banks 
 many times, but the determined will builds and rebuilds 
 until the banks are mountains high, and the river a pow- 
 erful stream, upon which the soul is borne aloft, and an- 
 gels, descending, meet the lone voyager with comfort and 
 a purer spirit. The heights once ascended, the pathway 
 ever remains, and each succeeding ascent becomes easier 
 and easier. The way once learned, how strong and vig- 
 orous — how full of life, peace, rest, and joy, the scene 
 becomes ! And yet how lowly innocent and childish ! 
 But " the way is a straight and a narrow way." If ye 
 will abide, then dig deep the channel towards the Infinite, 
 and train the fractious thoughts to run therein, until they 
 shall love the way, and all other thoughts be tributary, 
 and run and murmur along the valleys, down the gorges, 
 and leap and dance into the bosom of God. 
 
 By concentration alone can man become powerful. 
 Who can select one idea or thing, and think of that alone 
 
to the exclusion of all other thoughts, for the space of 
 five short minutes ? Not many. Yet there are men who 
 can take one thought, and follow its thread-like form for 
 hours, as it winds its devious way, increasing as it goes, 
 until it flows smoothly and noiselessly into the bosom of 
 the sublime ocean of all truth, wherein they lave to their 
 soul's content. 
 
 Thought comes upon us like the dew upon the earthy 
 but there are places where there is no dew • but such are 
 rocks or dry sands ; there are no flowers whose opening 
 petals catch no dew. Some men are like a pool of water, 
 redolent of filth, whose surface is covered with a yellow- 
 ish-green scum, which comes not from the atmosphere, 
 but from within. This scum settles upon the faces of 
 men, thick here and thin there ; and also upon their 
 lives. It may be seen sometimes with the naked eye ; at 
 other times it flashes out like an adder's tongue, only to 
 be seen with clairvoyant sight. 
 
 This shows that man has only a little time ago come up 
 out of the water ; that some have been out a longer time 
 than others. There are lizards, snakes, frogs, toads, 
 birds, spiders, and God only knows what, walking like 
 men ; but genuine men are scarce. They may be known 
 by their lack of scum. Thought dissipates the scum, 
 meditation annihilates it. Thought is the lightnings of 
 God's universe. Men are lightning-rods. Some are so 
 flat on the top of the head, that they attract nothing 
 from the clouds that overshadow. Such attract from the 
 earth ; their feet take root ; they cannot think, but vege- 
 tate and gather scum, the filthiest of which is Gold ! 
 
Others — and God knows how few they are — by their 
 high, dome-like heads, attract spiritual forces, like the 
 lightnings from the clouds, that shatter and break up the 
 great deeps of their being, searing the outside so that no 
 moss or scum will grow there. Thought burns \ it rolls 
 and turns the brain inside out, giving no opportunity for 
 stagnation. Not so the thought that comes from the 
 earth ; this stagnates and increases filth. 
 
 Purity is oneness. It is the nucleus around which 
 centres all good. It is the magnet of the human soul, 
 and holds our thoughts as one, centred upon the source 
 of all purity, God. 
 
 By thought, man meditates ; and meditation collects 
 the spirit and draws it from outward things to the inner, 
 and leads to abstraction — the forgetting of one's self. 
 Abstraction is the knife that cuts the chords which bind 
 the soul to things. In other words, it finishes what 
 thought begins, and prepares the soul for flight. Mag- 
 netic sleep is its weakest phase. In this, the soul goes 
 not out ; but the subject often has second sight, and sees 
 to distant places ; his power depending upon the com- 
 bined fires of the operator and himself. 
 
 The spirit once concentrated and drawn within, is 
 under the control of the will, and may be projected to 
 any distance, and produce any effect desired, from the 
 impressing of others, and healing the sick, up to moving 
 substances, and the manifesting of phantoms. This is a 
 dual power. 
 
 In the culture of will, there are many things demand- 
 ing attention. The tongue is said to be an unruly mem- 
 
—tim- 
 ber; hence the Rosicrucian adage, " Silence is strength.'* 
 In much speaking is evil. Excitement is injurious ; and 
 the tongue fires and excites passion. The calm man is 
 the strong man. To control others, first control yourself. 
 To control spirit, control your passions. To penetrate 
 the secrets of others, expand your consciousness so as to 
 come en rapport with their inmost being. To feel as 
 others feel, and thus know them, you must rise above 
 them, then descend to them. You are not superior to 
 anything, only in your imagination. Culture this, then, 
 by looking for pictures in it as in a mirror. To get en 
 rapport with another, you must first see him in your 
 imagination ; when seen, command him, and he will 
 obey. Clairvoyance is the road to power; but be so 
 healthily or not at all. The soul is magical ; it can do 
 anything ; produce anything, if it be large enough ; then 
 study to expand it. To project your spirit to any dis- 
 tance, and thus be seen and heard, make the spirit pure 
 so that it can vie with the lightnings in space, and not 
 stick like slime to objects on the way. Your soul cannot 
 travel without a coach, the spirit is the coach. Make 
 yourself double, and then all things are easy. To be 
 divine, forget that you are the devil. Power dwells in 
 silence, and in secrecy — more in thought than in word — 
 more in a look than in a blow, if you know how to look. 
 Many a man has sickened and died, or went crazy, at the 
 wish of another. Many a man has been haunted to death 
 by the strong will of another. Many a man has been 
 made to do the right towards another by that other 
 forgiving him his wrong long before. 
 
— 206-- 
 
 There is more power in forgiveness than in revenge, for 
 the Gods avenge wrongs done to a good man. " Curses 
 come home to roost," but they often do a sight of 
 mischief before they come home, especially when the 
 outraged soul curses. If you feel disgust, can you look 
 love ? Can you look disgusted when you feel love ? If 
 not, "try," for this is will-culture. Can you hold your 
 tongue when another calls you liar, thief, dog ? If not, 
 you are no man ! Dogs snarl and bite at each other. 
 How can you control your spirit, when your tongue is 
 your master? Can you be deaf while another raves? 
 — especially your wife ? If not, then you are under the 
 control of others. Get out, man, by all means I Enter 
 into yourself, as in a " closet," and when you have shut 
 your eyes to sight, and your ears to sound, and your nerves 
 to sensation, you have then "shut the door, "and "what^ 
 ever you shall ask the Father in secret shall be done 
 to you openly." This is worshiping " in spirit and in 
 truth." 
 
 Water is prolific ; all things gestate in water. The 
 waters of the human soul are wrung out of the heart by 
 real or imaginary wrongs. There is no growth without 
 moisture. The dews that give life to vegetation are na- 
 ture's tears. The great soul has a soft, weeping heart. 
 The small soul has no tears in it to shed. 
 
 The true child of " the shadow " has a heart that dis- 
 tils the dews of its sympathy unseen and unknown ; it 
 weeps over the fallen, and suffers in secret at its power- 
 lessness to relieve. It is often sad without knowing why. 
 Even adversity in material things does not affect it, as 
 
*- $07 — 
 
 the shadow which seems to brood, like the night, over it, 
 When the shadow comes closest, — when the sun is ob- 
 scured and the stars give no light, — when hope is well- 
 nigh fled, — look up, child of the gloom ! for the light is 
 near by, hidden in the deep folds of the cloud which rests 
 like a pall over you. It is " the brooding ." of the spirit 
 — your sense — in your disgust of life and love — which is 
 softening and making malleable your heart of stone. When 
 it is cultured enough, it will produce its fruit — the harvest 
 is sure. Prepare your ground, then — dig deep the ditches 
 for drainage and irrigation ; draw together all your forces 
 in order to pierce the gloom. 
 
 The meditations recommended in this work as the true 
 mental and spiritual discipline, are all of a gloomy and 
 sombre character. The reason must be obvious to every 
 thinker. There is a principle underlying this, in perfect 
 harmony with the history of mankind. It is the thought- 
 less who laugh. It is thought which takes the laughter 
 out of a man and drapes him in black — symbol of the 
 fire. Inspiration comes from despair; and hearts that 
 weep are close upon the confines of a great joy, peace 
 and rest. " Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall 
 be comforted." " God chasteneth whom he loveth," is 
 a hard saying, but it is true. The trouble is, we do not 
 know how to make use of the gloom, or the evil of life. 
 We must learn to love the shadow, and to call it to our- 
 selves by a mental effort. " Resist not evil," is apropos 
 here. The great minds who have pierced the gloom, and 
 handed down to mankind light and philosophy, that 
 
enables us to bridge the abyss of death, have been sad- 
 hearted, weeping men. " Jesus wept," but we have no 
 knowledge of his ever laughing. Gottama never smiled 
 after he forsook a crown and his family, for the forest 
 and the yellow robes of Asceticism. Appolonius, Soc- 
 rates and Plato were not laughing men. 
 
 There is a chamber of mourning, veiled and draped in 
 black — in every human heart. We all retire to it at 
 times, but the great-souled oftenest. Here the lurid 
 world loses its glare, and all things become sombre ; 
 the mind here loses its ferocity, and we go forth subdued. 
 Alas for him who does not ! Alas for him whose exper- 
 ience still leaves him hard within ! whose river of life 
 sends out no waters, no tears, no dew of sadness and 
 sympathy over weaknesses and follies, all too apparent ! 
 Such need much thought — nay ! they need the blows and 
 chastisement of fate — the earthquake, the tremblings of 
 fear, the lightning's rending — the agony of disease, dis- 
 appointment, hate, jealousy and despair, to compel them to 
 think. But let him, who would steer clear of these, pro- 
 voke his soul to sadness, by meditations of such a nature 
 as shall make him sick of life and its pleasures. If dis- 
 ease, weakness, pain or sickness bring lucidity of mind, 
 it is well, but if death ensues without it, it is not so well. 
 The mind should grow clearer and stronger from physical 
 suffering, as the soul should expand her wings from men- 
 tal anguish. To love the evil, and invite it, is to make 
 it good. 
 
 At a certain stage of development the soul becomes 
 
— 209 — 
 
 self-sustaining and productive of all that is needed. 
 It becomes magical in its physical manifestations, as it is 
 itself; for the soul is a magical thing, and in its expan- 
 sion — when it has filled the whole man with itself, after 
 having become globular — the body becomes a magical 
 or a divine body. 
 
310 — 
 
 XVI.— SOUL-POWERS AND SPIRITUAL GIFTS, 
 
 There is no limit to man's powers. That which seems 
 a limit disappears or becomes an assistance in the reversal 
 of the thought concerning it. All spiritual gifts come 
 from the lifting of the veil crushed thick and opaque by 
 objective things, or the piercing through of the sight, as 
 a peering under through an opening or rift in the rolling 
 clouds of mundane things. This is about as clear as mud. 
 Let me explain. Mental perception, intuition, or sight 
 of the mind, is in the centre of the intellect ; but it or- 
 dinarily is a dark sun, which becomes luminous by effort, 
 as I have already set forth. Magnetism is a short road 
 to lucidity, but the powers conferred are weak compared to 
 those which come through effort. Magnetization is effected 
 through passivity, and the vacating of thought and will. 
 But it alternates, u e., depends upon conditions which 
 vary, and are sometimes favorable and sometimes unfa- 
 vorable ; and consequently, it is subject to spells — comes 
 and goes, and leads everywhere and anywhere. It is 
 good enough so far as it goes, but it does not go deep 
 enough or far enough. The magnetic sleep is not at all 
 dependent upon purity nor will-power. The luminosity 
 I teach is not a sleep necessarily ; it is a blindness, or a 
 cutting off of externals — a separation of the selfhood 
 from outward influences by the sinking in or absorbtion 
 of the voluntary powers, or the growth of the involun- 
 
— Mi — 
 
 tary to the voluntary, so that they beco one. Mes- 
 meric sleep is the first phase of it. Illumination, when 
 once reached through and by effort of will, is always 
 available. It makes and preserves uniform conditions ; 
 hence it has no " fits or starts/' and makes no failures. 
 When perfect it cannot be lost, for it is death-proof, and 
 its possessor is no subject of any power in existence. He 
 is an immortal being, having divine powers. There are 
 many grades of powers, but I will first speak of sight : 
 first, natural sight; second, clairvoyance ; third, soul-sight. 
 Clairvoyance has several degrees, while natural sight 
 has only one. The first degree of clairvoyance is similar 
 to natural sight : /'. e., it sees only objects, such as read- 
 ing blindfolded; seeing objects at a distance; seeing 
 through matter, etc. It grows by practice, and its pow- 
 ers increase as the lucidity of the brain increases. But 
 lucidity is simply dependent upon the purity of the 
 spirit. Purity focalizes the spirit, but magnetization is a 
 result of a mixture of spirits ; hence it is what I have 
 defined as impurity or an adulteration. It is exalting, as 
 an intoxication ; hence its effects are fleeting and ephem- 
 eral in proportion to the impurities involved. I do not 
 mean by impurities, immoralities at all. Impurity is in 
 the mixture and appropriation of different auras, sub- 
 stances, magnetisms, etc. Magnetic subjects go into the 
 condition and come out of it through the influence of an 
 operator; sometimes in the form, but often out of it. 
 In either case they are subject to the will of another, and 
 the lucidity or exaltation of powers is a result of the 
 union of spirits both in the form and out, which disap- 
 
— 212 — 
 
 pears when the subject is out of the condition. But the 
 effects do not disappear so readily. Often the subjects 
 are a prey to vampires both in the form and out, under 
 whose infernal "sucking" the life is slowly but surely 
 sapped. This is the case with more people — especially 
 women — than many imagine. There is a conscious and 
 an unconscious vampirism. All mediums are not, how- 
 ever, subject to this curse. Space will not allow me to 
 dwell upon this important subject, farther than to add 
 that mediumship is not confined to the ranks of Spirit- 
 ualism. Nine-tenths of all the crimes committed are due 
 to vampirism. A vampire is not necessarily a disembodied 
 spirit; we are just as much spirits now as we will ever be. 
 and all the power that any spirit may have we can have, 
 if we only know how to develop and use it. For that 
 which is not in us cannot exist long as ours. Clairvoy- 
 ance is a mental power, and as the mind becomes more 
 and more luminous by practice and focalization of the 
 spirit, " spiritual gifts " are joined to it, as fruit is 
 joined to a blossom. It is not my object to specify and 
 define these gifts further than is necessary to elucidate my 
 subject. 
 
 Vampirism is one spirit preying upon another. It dif- 
 fers from obsession in degree only. Clairvoyance be- 
 comes deeper and deeper by practice, until it enters 
 somewhat into the penetralia of things, in which its 
 subject becomes alive to influences — aches, pains, phys- 
 ical and mejital states, aspirations, loves, longings, etc. 
 It is now becoming near to another power, viz : the 
 perception of spirit forms, faces, and the hearing of 
 
— 213 — 
 
 voices, or clairaudience. This is, of course, a higher 
 power than mere sight of objects. Spirit pours out in 
 look and gesture, but in speech more than in any other 
 manner. In fact, speech is the highest expression of 
 spirit, and it is more susceptible to culture than looks or 
 gestures, and leads to greater depths of being • and is 
 moreover more reliable, because it does not lead to that 
 idolatry which the sight of beauty and grandeur always 
 does. The beholding of spiritual beings by clairvoyants 
 has led many into the erroneous idea that they have 
 oeheld God, the ineffable One, when, in fact, such sight 
 may be a conjuration of the will of some strong operator. 
 Phantoms seldom speak ; to be reliable, sight and hear- 
 ing should go together. 
 
 The deepest clairvoyance is that where objects, both 
 material and spiritual, are passed by as of no account ; 
 and the ineffable glories of soul-realm glimpsed. This is 
 a sight of spirit, as fire only, and not as objects. This 
 fire or spirit finds a voice suited to the ear of him who 
 will listen. 
 
 Zoroaster said : " When you see the fire, listen to 
 the voice of the fire !" It was in view of this truth that 
 Moses enacted laws against the communicating with 
 spirits ; and in order to preserve purity in the mediums 
 (or priests), tried to confine it to the tribe of Levi. It 
 was for this purpose (purity) that celibacy was enjoined 
 by Buddha. Beyond this mundane sphere — beyond the 
 realm of spiritual things — is infinite knowledge and 
 power. And he who is able to pierce through the shadow 
 which things casts, sees the glories of the spirit-worlds. 
 
— 214— 
 
 But this is all. Forms do not appear from beyond * ' the 
 abode of the gods;" but he who can visit the highest 
 abode may hear the echoes of busy feet, and the whis- 
 perings of incomprehensible and unutterable things. 
 This power I call soul sight; but it is not a sight of 
 things, but of the fire of principles. This power is 
 within all spiritual powers. As the soul is the inmost of 
 the man, so is soul-sight the inmost of intuition. Clair- 
 voyance, psychometry, and clairaudience, are all devel- 
 oped by contact, or the coming en rapport with objects. 
 Their field of operations is in the spirit of things ; but 
 soul-sight is developed by holding the spirit aloof from 
 other things, spirits, etc. And the losing sight of all 
 distinctions or differences of things. It is the distinctness 
 of things which scatters the spirit and confuses thought 
 and mind. We know nothing, because there are so 
 many things to learn. He who seeks the absolute loses 
 sight of the differences of things, and passing inward, 
 reaches the spirit thereof; but instead of entering en rap- 
 port therewith, passes deeper still, beyond all distinctions 
 and differences to the oneness of being — in fact, to the 
 supernatural of his own being. "He that hath a 
 mind to think, let him think;" for, indeed, it is thought 
 which leads to hearing of the Word. This is the real 
 meaning of John : "In the beginning was the Word, 
 and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." 
 He who passes in thought through and beyond things, 
 hears "the Word of God." For God dwells in the inmost 
 recesses of all being, hidden away from all mortal sight ; 
 hence the necessity of destroying the differences of things 
 
— 215 — 
 
 in the mind. The differences among men constitute 
 hell. How easily we are all brothers when we forget our 
 differences. They make enemies of us — enemies to each 
 other and to God. How harmonious we would be if 
 there were no distinctions. Of a truth, this is the road 
 to God. The man who fixes not his attention upon dif- 
 ferences of race, sex, conditions, opinions, names, etc., 
 is a great-souled man, and looks with indifference upon 
 the small things which agitate and disturb mankind. He 
 can lay claim to kinship with God, who loves all alike. 
 Aye, and he holds sweet converse with God in the depths 
 of his own all-knowing intuitive soul ! 
 
 This is the source of all inspiration. God finds voice 
 in the soul, and intuition is but the faint echoes thereof, 
 as it vibrates along the dark and'noisome crypts of being. 
 Alas ! for him 5 who " hath no ears to hear ; " nor " eyes 
 to see " — his darkness must be intense indeed. Let him 
 who would reach the regal powers of the soul sit in circles. 
 For in the mingling of magnetisms is an intense and 
 fierce combustion or war of spirits produced, in which 
 conflagration, great and rapid changes take place ; during 
 which the soul begins to make motions as of a thing 
 coming to life ; it is drawing itself together into shape, 
 leaving the atoms of the body. Motions are usually felt 
 first in the hands, which vibrate somewhat like when in 
 contact with a magnetic battery ; this sensation extends 
 in time to every part of the body in some persons ; in 
 others, it is limited to the hands, arms or head; it deepens 
 in intensity till the nerves begin to twitch and jerk. Now, 
 when you have got thus far, there are two roads open for 
 
— 216 — 
 
 you. If you wish mediuuibhip with any of its multitu- 
 dinous phases, with a band of helpers and a guide, just 
 sit passive and " let it jerk ; " don't expect or be anxious 
 for anything, but let yourself alone, fully resigned to 
 accept whatever may come without doubt or criticism. 
 Think of nothing as nearly as possible, and above all 
 resist no impulse of thought, word or action, " Follow 
 your impulses' ' is the law of mediumship. But if you 
 choose the soul road, you must now brace yourself for 
 an effort ; that effort is resistance — resist all impulses 
 and all motions of the nerves and muscles ; instead of 
 passivity, grasp yourself as with your hands, holding fast 
 in your mind or imagination with the same tension of the 
 nerves as if you were holding something, but without any 
 muscular contraction — this while sitting in the circle. 
 
 To become spiritual, cultivate mind, for this is the 
 door which must, indeed, open before you can walk out 
 into the realms of power. To cultivate mind, increase 
 the activity of the nervous system and its source — the 
 brain. Draw the blood to the brain, by deep breathing 
 and the fixing of the thought upon the object in view. 
 Magnetize yourself one hour every evening by taking 
 hold of the left thumb with the right thumb and forefin- 
 ger, and pressing gently, enough to keep the attention 
 fixed upon it, and think of one thing, say some word — 
 your own name, if nothing else— saying it over and over to 
 yourself constantly. In a short time your object will be- 
 come fixed and constant in your thoughts, and the soul 
 will begin its work. But remember that each effort you 
 make upward will be followed by a revulsion downward. 
 
— 217 — 
 
 and you will find yourself becoming amorous. Resist this 
 impulse, as all impulses : in the course of time, you will 
 see clouds, flashes of light, and faces or forms will peer 
 out of the gloom at you, or form in the clouds. Pay no 
 attention to these things, but keep right on with your 
 exercise. There are many more methods which I am 
 not at liberty to disclose. Things of a physical nature 
 assist the physical, inasmuch as physical nature yields 
 most readily to such things as are like itself, or one degree 
 removed therefrom. To illustrate : a brute yields to the 
 force of a club, but when he is trained a word controls 
 him. So with mankind : some need kings, and soldiers 
 with bayonets, to keep them within humanity's realm ; 
 others stay there naturally, for they understand its 
 unspoken and unwritten laws. For babes, milk and 
 baby- talk; for children, play-houses and stories; for 
 youth, the dance and the opera; for middle age, the 
 rush and rattle, the clash and commotion of business ; 
 for mature man, thought, reason, spiritual things. These 
 are nature's methods of culture. Nature cannot be forced 
 out of one mood into another. Ask yourself, "Where 
 does my love lead me?" and nature or your own soul 
 will tell you truly. If you long to become spiritual, be- 
 gin at once, and that gradually. "Nature allows none 
 to overleap her barriers; they must be beaten down" 
 Don't ask God to teach you, but learn of such as are in 
 harmony with you, even if it be the devil. 
 
 The basis of all understanding is mutual sympathy ex- 
 isting between the teacher and the taught — the actor and 
 the acted upon. To the material in thought, desire and 
 
— 218 — 
 
 action, are the matter-of-fact in nature adapted. They are 
 like it, and hence the spiritual is too far removed from 
 them to be their direct teachers; such need physical 
 training, and to them are physical means necessary. 
 Hence, to such (and in fact, all men are of this class more 
 or less), in addition to deep breathing, the bath, in cold, 
 magnetic water ; a complete and radical change in the diet ; 
 rest instead of exercise ; thought instead of talk ; tears 
 instead of laughter ; darkness instead of light ; emotion 
 instead of motion — these and more are necessary to train 
 the physical before the spiritual can come forth. Spirit 
 is formless, and yet not altogether so. There is a form 
 within these bodies of ours, which is spirit, and yet it 
 hath no form until detached, as it were, from the flesh. 
 All development is a loosening of the spirit from the flesh 
 and the loves thereof; and this loosening is the embry- 
 otic organization of the spiritual body carried on and 
 fully perfected. 
 
 Resist muscular and nervous motion with all your 
 power of will. Keep calm. Never allow any circum- 
 stance to agitate or disturb you ; for here in the degree 
 of motion it is that demons and evil-disposed spirits take 
 advantage of your sensitive and expansive condition, and 
 enter in—first, the nervous system, and secondly, the 
 mind, and control you to your destruction. Music sets 
 you on fire, and you want to dance, sing or shout : keep 
 silent — " silence is strength ! " Never debate ! But let the 
 one object be to keep calm, self-possessed and cool. This 
 is the beginning of self-control and power. It is concen- 
 tration. Think, meditate, read and study — but keep 
 
— 219 — 
 
 silent. Remember there are beings around you who 
 come in connection with you through words, sounds, 
 motions, etc., who, without them, remain ignorant of 
 your object and condition. There are demons and 
 spirits who cannot read the mind, but who can hear and 
 see. 
 
 It is when thrown off our guard, being carried away 
 by strange sensations, thoughts, impulses, motions and 
 emotions, that we are seized upon by the above or below, 
 and carried away from ourselves, as it were, from our equi- 
 poise or balance — self-consciousness dethroned : and we 
 rise or fall according to predisposition. The falling into 
 acts silly and criminal, or less than those of the normal 
 state, is termed " obsession ;" but this, like most names, 
 is an effort to explain that which we do not understand ; 
 an assumption of knowledge ; an excuse we make to our- 
 selves for our ignorance; a distinction made; a difference, 
 visible in extremes, as good and evil, which flow into one 
 another as one ; but to us, and for us, obsession is as real 
 as the evil, and must be avoided. 
 
 Since I commenced writing this book, this subject was 
 forced upon my attention by a series of articles in some 
 one of the spiritual papers ; I cared nothing for the 
 differences of opinion in regard to obsession ; but feeling 
 the necessity of progress in the avoidance of evil, by 
 some persons at least, I sought for a sure, safe and certain 
 preventive of it; I pondered several days upon this 
 subject with no satisfactory result. One night, alone in 
 my tent, a wave of loneliness and sadness swept over me. 
 This had no visible or mundane cause — my health was 
 
— 220 — 
 
 excellent, business was good, money was plenty (for I had 
 "a dime in my pocket/ ' which is enough as long as it 
 lasts), but nevertheless I was low-spirited ; I could neither 
 think nor write, so throwing down my pen I paced up 
 and down until wearied ; I threw myself upon my bed 
 to sleep ; my mind became tranquil as my body became 
 at rest, and this idea of obsession came over me as a 
 problem unsolved. To solve it, I knew of only two ways : 
 One was to come en rapport with the spirit of obsession, 
 and hence become obsessed myself in order to know by 
 experience all about it, so as to show how to avoid it ; 
 the other was by inspiration. 
 
 The first was repugnant to all my thoughts and feel- 
 ings. Under all circumstances I wish to be myself — 
 and only that ; so I turned aside and repelled the spirit 
 by the thoughts of my own individual selfhood, and the 
 determination to be only myself. There are lights, clouds, 
 flashes, faces and forms here at this condition of the 
 mind ; but I, in following my thought, passed them by 
 as of no account. Laughing faces, hideous faces, and 
 monstrous forms looked out of the light at me, and as I 
 passed by, mocked and scowled. Gradually the lights 
 paled, the faces grew dim and finally disappeared, leaving 
 me in intense and opaque darkness. Pulsating, throbbing, 
 vibrating with strange and weird sensations, I glided 
 along down the corridors of the soul as one falling, and 
 slowly, oh ! so slowly, losing myself. All at once, from 
 out the darkness, and close to me, a voice low and 
 soft sounded in my ear : " To avoid obsession, keep the 
 body positive and the mind negative/ ' The voice came 
 
— 221 — 
 
 so suddenly, and was so close to me that I was startled and 
 driven back to myself. There I lay all vibrating with 
 ecstatic emotions, altogether out of the ordinary nature 
 of things, with the words engraved in letters of fire upon 
 my consciousness. To me this was a new idea ; it was a 
 revelation of a wonderful truth, and I cast about for the 
 logic of it, which is this : 
 
 Ordinarily the body is negative, and hence receptive 
 to impressions — physical, atmospherical, and spiritual. 
 The first effect of magnetism is to increase this negative 
 state of the body ; hence, it becomes very impressible 
 and very liable to take on the conditions of others, both 
 in the mundane and the spiritual. The will is the cause 
 of all positiveness of mind, body, and spirit. By its 
 force it is repulsive, and holds at a distance things foreign 
 and injurious. Now, in passivity, the will relaxes the 
 tension of the nerves, and they are unstrung ; in which 
 state, spirits both good and evil can enter into the inact- 
 ive sphere of the spirit, and thus get a lodgment from 
 which to control, in time, the mind, aud subjugate the 
 will. Now, if by any process the body can be kept 
 positive, the spirit is rendered so, also ; and hence, no 
 spirits but those of a negative character will be attracted. 
 Now, it is only positive spirits that seize upon and obsess 
 mortals. They are the repulsive and the deficient — the 
 empty of sympathy and all elements of greatness. The 
 law is for the positive to enter into and control the nega- 
 tive, u e., to beget therein their own devilishness. Now, 
 in rendering the mind negative by constantly keeping 
 down its excitabilities, it is elevated by the motive or 
 
—222 — 
 
 object in view; and as mind can only be acted upon by 
 mind, and is not a receptacle of anything but ideas, 
 minds of a high order, such as have ideas to give, are 
 attracted, and instil their ideas or thoughts of a positive 
 nature into the negative mind ; thus leading the mind 
 upward without disturbing the will in the least. Indeed, 
 such spirits increase the individuality by assisting instead 
 of controlling. Negative spirits never do harm. It only 
 remains for me to explain how the body can be rendered 
 positive, and the mind negative. The tranquil, peaceful, 
 inoffensive mind is negative. This idea of controlling 
 mind instead of nerves and muscles, engages the entire 
 attention and will ; for the mind is not rendered tranquil 
 save by constant watchfulness, and the keeping down of 
 those passions which disturb, agitate, and thus cause filth to 
 rise up as impurities of the blood and spirit. The will 
 thus engaged in rendering the mind negative or tranquil, 
 renders the body positive at the same time, because two 
 negatives cannot exist together, neither can two positives. 
 I am aware it is a reversal of nature's methods, but he 
 who would rise up to power must rise in the mind, or 
 not at all. God dwells in all things alike, but those who 
 seek him cannot find him so readily in some things or 
 conditions as in others. Remember what I have pre- 
 viously said about diet. Don't be in a hurry, for all 
 things grow slowly. Weakness is only an argument in 
 favor of strength, and the small measure of the spirit 
 meted out to us here only indicates the vastness of its 
 extent and power. The impossibilities of our infirmities 
 indicate the possibilities of those who are firm. Then 
 
— 223 — 
 
 doubt not, waver not, but keep steadily, coolly on, up 
 the mountains of difficulty, each one you surmount only 
 reveals more clearly to you the possibilities of your na- 
 ture. The value of things is in their use. Spiritual gifts 
 are of use just now, in the " a-b-c " of man's growth — in 
 the awakening of man's dull senses to the recognition of 
 a future existence and its nature ; but when such becomes 
 universal, as it must in time, what will be their use ? 
 
 The world has been as far advanced in spiritual things 
 in the long ago as now — and probably much further ; but 
 what use was it to them ? They had their oracles and 
 their temples, and gods and guides without number; but 
 all this did not prevent retrogression. The ground must 
 now all be traveled over again. Again must the priest- 
 hood be organized, the temples built, the altars reared, 
 and the fires lighted ; and what is all this for ? Oh, the 
 patience of the Infinite ! In vain are the choicest gifts 
 of heaven showered upon unthankful and unthinking 
 man ! They are all prostituted to devilish ends and 
 aims. The choicest oracles of the olden time led op- 
 posing armies to the slaughter of each other. The 
 prophets of the Lord anointed kings and watched over 
 the welfare of one nation to the detriment of another. 
 Gifts were all prostituted to the attainment of material 
 wealth, grandeur, glory, and fame. All powers were 
 bent and warped to the creation and perpetuation of 
 monstrous distinctions among men, by reason of which 
 war and outrage are the rule, and peace and harmony 
 very rare exceptions. Where now are they ? A slow, 
 lingering decay — an awful disease of the very vitals, or 
 
— 224 — 
 
 the violent conflagration of their own passions hath 
 swept them away. The wand of a magician hath waved 
 across the sky and they are not ! But they have left 
 the diseases which they created behind them in the 
 ruins of their former glory and worship. Their spir- 
 ituality is only a ruin. In vain do men teach and 
 preach; the world goes on in the old beaten track, 
 and religion follows the lead. In vain did the lowly 
 Jesus heal the sick and teach the ignorant. In vain 
 did he cry from the mountains and temples of a rare 
 good life here, free from disease and death. The Jews 
 heard him not — and now — even now I with all our 
 boasted progress and civilization the word of a God is 
 prostituted to mean something he never intended. " If 
 ye believe ye shall not die," is enunciated in words 
 which can have no other meaning. If he had meant 
 what is now preached as the gospel, it was as easy to have 
 said " He that believeth shall not go to heir' as to have 
 said what he did. His teachings from beginning to end 
 show his mission to have been to teach mankind how to 
 live humane lives so as to be healthy and happy. His 
 healing of the sick shows that the gospel was that of physi- 
 cal health and the salvation from disease. His raising of 
 the dead, and his own resurrection, show further that 
 death was a thing to be overcome by living a true life. 
 "And these signs shall follow those that believe," etc. 
 (See Luke xvi., 17, 18). In another place he says, 
 "Greater works than these shall ye do, because I go 
 to the Father." Of what avail are spiritual gifts if 
 their utmost power is t simply to demonstrate another 
 
—235 — 
 
 life without joining this life thereto as one. It must 
 be evident to every thoughtful person that the object 
 of these manifestations is the elevation of the race. 
 And wherein can this be effected, save in the power to 
 enjoy? Where does this power reside, save in health? In 
 vain did Jesus heal the sick if he did not teach the way to 
 continued health ! In vain did he raise the dead if he did 
 not show the way to remain alive ! If they die not in the 
 spirit-world, what need of death here ? All the revela- 
 tions heretofore given have been of an immortal life in 
 some other state of existence. But I tell you of an 
 immortality of this life, I believe Jesus taught the way 
 of its attainment, but it was not understood. I may not 
 be able to point the whole road, but what I have said 
 already must contain the principles of it in part. Man 
 creates himself and all the essentials of his being — his 
 health, happiness, heavens and hells. But hell comes 
 from misdirected effort ; and heaven from well directed 
 effort. Things superior descend as a revelation in answer 
 to a demand, which revelation is an idea — this is enlight- 
 enment. No matter how, or in what manner an idea 
 comes, if it is of a superior character, it is of the light. 
 Hence it is enlightening, and leads upwards. Man must 
 first have an idea of what he wants before he can create 
 conditions superior to things that now are. 
 
 The demand always precedes the supply. Is there a 
 demand for a continuous and happy life here on this 
 globe? Is there a demand for power to create forms of 
 matter for use by effort of will, without the toil and de- 
 moniac scramble after the necessaries of life? There will be 
 
— 226 — 
 
 a demand when man is satisfied of its possibility. Then 
 multiply the mediums ! The spirit-world is drawing near. 
 Soon, spiritual beings will walk among us as men — will 
 heal the sick, cast out devils, multiply bread for the hun- 
 gry, and gold for the greedy, till it shall lose its value, 
 and man turns his attention to the attainment of spiritual 
 powers and gifts. The demand for self-government and 
 peace has already gone up to the Gods, and the answer 
 is coming. The bomb which carried Alexander of 
 Russia into hell, or out of it, was God-sent, in answer to 
 the prayer of many an earnest soul. A full and complete 
 answer is at hand, when the world shall be free, and 
 every man shall be his own king, priest, bishop, pope, 
 and God ! All hail to the mediums and to spiritual gifts 
 of all grades and kinds ! For here is freedom. Let gifts be 
 no longer prostituted by individual ambition, nor to the 
 building of thrones or national glory ! Let the univer- 
 sal anthem be, " Peace on earth, good- will to men ! 
 
 Let us work mentally and spiritually, so that the new 
 temple shall not be made with hands of material sub- 
 stance, but a temple in these bodies— a divine body, 
 wherein God shall be conscious to each one of us. Let 
 us rear altars in our own hearts — altars of love-worship, 
 needing no typical sacrifices of the blood of animals or of 
 men. Let us light the fires of the spirit thereon, which 
 are unquenchable and eternal. 
 
 Man's desires for immortality have been misdirected, 
 inasmuch as his revelations have been of a future life, and 
 not of this. The time has come when revelations must 
 be made of this life and its possibilities — of the present, 
 
— 227 — 
 
 and not of the future. The perfect life of to-day admits 
 no doubt nor fear of to-morrow. A perfect life here is 
 as fully and completely immortal as any life in any world. 
 The idea of living for the future is a false light; it is a 
 material light of "Lucifer, Son of the morning." Happi- 
 ness is not of to-morrow, nor of any future time or world. 
 It is to-day or not at all. All life is of to-day and the 
 present. The future never comes. Salvation is from 
 disease. If you die of disease, you wake up on the other 
 side diseased ; you have to be cured there before you 
 have fulness of life. The same knowledge that saves you 
 there will save you here. Then why not have that know- 
 ledge ? The self-same power that feeds the angels in heaven 
 will feed you here, if it is yours. Then why not open 
 your soul to its reception? Heaven is in no particular 
 place. It is within you if you want it there, with all its 
 angels and powers— -aye ! and its immortal life, also. 
 "In union there is strength." "Again, I say unto you 
 that if two of you shall agree on earth as touching any- 
 thing that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my 
 Father which is in Heaven." (Matthew xviii., 9.) 
 
 This agreement spoken of here is not merely of the 
 mind — it is a union or oneness of spirit, wherein power 
 is multiplied in an unknown ratio. The spirit of one 
 is not as another — they differ in quality, hence there 
 is no agreement : even where minds agree, the spirits do 
 not. Hence the possibility of the truth of the above is 
 in the agreement. Agreement is the kingdom of power. 
 The union of two is of higher quality than one alone; 
 and the more spirits there are in the union the greater is 
 
— 228 — 
 
 the power. But the difficulty deepens when it is made 
 known that two male spirits cannot agree. Agreement 
 is of the male and female. Herein Divinity appears, and 
 power to accomplish all things is manifest. But union of 
 spirit is preceded by mental agreement. Now, the de- 
 mand for immortal power and life on this earth must first 
 be a mental agreement, which, in its perfection and har- 
 mony, will give birth to union or agreement of spirit 
 touching that thing. Bat look you ! Woman is not free ! 
 Alas for the dawn of light! Woman a slave ! Prostituted 
 hy man's selfishness and lust ! How can the prayers of 
 such a monster be answered? "Verily I say unto you/' 
 " the prayers of the wicked availeth nothing." 
 
 Little can be effected without freedom. But let us do 
 what we can in the union of minds. Spirit works by 
 methods beyond the mind ; hence its laws cannot be com- 
 prehended by the mind. (( The kingdom of heaven 
 cometh not by observation," i. e., not through laws of 
 mentality. Spirits are unable to explain it. I believe 
 material is evolved from the medium, and combined with 
 subtle elements in the atmosphere by the effort of the will 
 of some powerful spirit, or by the union of several, into 
 flowers, apparitions, spirit-forms, clothing, etc., etc., and 
 that it will yet be demonstrated that materialized spirits 
 are evolved from the medium. But no matter how it 
 is done, the power that can make a flower, or a piece of 
 cloth, can make gold, fruit, bread, or anything else de- 
 sired. All that is requisite are conditions, and knowledge, 
 or faith, or will, or whatever you feel like calling the 
 power. These manifestations are in their infancy as yet, 
 
— 229 — 
 
 for, although as old as man, they have probably never been 
 properly understood, or so universally understood by 
 spirits of a high and intelligent order as now. They are 
 experimenting, and they understand fully the value of 
 co-operation or harmony. The much-talked-of condition? 
 of spiritual manifestations are nothing more nor less. 
 Jesus, in view of this principle, selected twelve Apostles 
 who were as harmonious with him as men can well be. 
 But the Scriptures are mostly silent in reference to the 
 important part the women who followed him took in the 
 work he did. It is doubtful if he ever explained this idea 
 to them ; probably this is the esoteric part of the Gospel 
 which was never written. It is reasonable to infer as 
 much, for the early Christians had everything in com- 
 mon, thus striving to destroy distinctions and to perfect 
 a union that should enable them to carry out the intui- 
 tions and work of Jesus. (See Acts iv., 32.) "And 
 the multitude of them that believed were of one heart 
 and one soul : neither said any of them that aught of 
 the things which he possessed was his own ; but they 
 had all things common ": that is, the writer thought they 
 were of "one heart and soul" because they tried to 
 be so. Why they gradually lost the gifts of the Spirit 
 must be evident to every reasonable, thoughtful mind. 
 The agreement or union was lost through the gradual 
 growth of distinctions and differences: — first, of mind; sec- 
 ond, of spirit; and third, of material substances (property). 
 Had they perfected the union, instead of proselyting, they 
 would have established the church upon a "rock," and 
 afterwards the growth would have been a steady, healthy ? . 
 
— 230 — 
 
 upward growth ; neither would they have wanted for any- 
 thing, for the kingdom of harmony contains all things. 
 " First seek the kingdom of heaven: then all other 
 things shall be added unto you." 
 
 This idea of union is corroborated in our own time, 
 in many ways, notably so in the work of Dr. Hotchkiss, 
 of St. Louis, Mo., known as " The Dirty Doctor," 
 "The Snapping Doctor," and, as he terms himself, 
 "King of Magnetism." He has performed as many, if 
 not more, miraculous cures of diseases than any healer of 
 our day. In 187 1 he had six apostles, termed by him 
 "Radiators," who sat in a row, at times silent and dumb, 
 behind the class of sick which Hotchkiss treated by 
 simply snapping his fingers. At other times, "as the 
 spirit moved them," they joined in the snapping, or 
 rolled and wallowed in the dirt of his floor, which was 
 never swept. They lived apart from the world as much 
 as possible, and were celibates ; but Hotchkiss had a 
 wife and several other women shut up from contact with 
 other people— -as nuns are kept in a convent. To show 
 how particular he was in regard to his women I will 
 relate the following : Wishing to see Dr. Hotchkiss, and 
 not finding him at his office, I called at his house ; a 
 woman opened the door and asked what I wished. I 
 explained, not finding the Doctor at home, I wished 
 to leave a letter for him, which I offered to her. She 
 drew back as if it were poison, and closing the door in 
 my face, told me to shove the letter under his office 
 door. We know very little of the subtle influence of 
 spirit, or of the effect that the inoculation of one spirit 
 
— 231 — 
 
 into another produces. The shaking of hands and kissing 
 are sometimes injurious. Emma Hardinge visited the 
 Doctor, and has testified to his wonderful magnetic power. 
 He still lives in St. Louis, a very old man, but as lithe 
 and supple as a boy; a man of good education and of fine 
 intellectual powers ; courteous and affable at ti mes, but 
 sometimes very rude. His " Radiators* ' left him in 
 1871 or 1872, I think, and he afterwards had smallpox ; 
 his wife has gone insane, I have been told ; still he heals 
 the sick, claiming that he cannot die till Christ comes. 
 He is not a spiritualist, and is as bitter towards spiritual- 
 ism as any bigot can be. His age is unknown, but un- 
 doubtedly it is very great — so great that he has been 
 termed " the wandering Jew" He is the dirtiest man I 
 ever saw. I might write a not very small book upon 
 his eccentricities, customs, antics and cures ; but he never 
 explains the philosophy of them to anyone; or if he ex- 
 plains anything to-day, he explains it differently another 
 day. I am satisfied that the secret of his power is fast locked 
 in the walls where the women are kept. The power that 
 comes of perfect union or harmony is wonderful. God 
 dwells in it ! ' ' Where two or three are gathered together 
 in my name" — or in oneness of heart, mind, soul and 
 spirit — " there am I in the midst." The principle is 
 what we need — the name or the man is nothing ; but for 
 those incapable of comprehending a principle, the name 
 is of vital importance. Do not destroy a man's idols, if 
 he is incapable of reason. The spirit, by union, ascends 
 higher than if alone ; and God descends upon its tide to 
 bless not merely those who unite, but all the world in 
 
— 232 — 
 
 which they move. Alas ! for the angularities and differ- 
 ences that destroy us. The secret of union is in self- 
 harmony as a foundation : this is good, but two is better ; 
 but if the two be male and female, it is best. Magnetism 
 leads thereto. It behooves me to add, in this connection, 
 that the age of wrong and bloodshed is nearly past. The 
 dawn of a divine government is at hand, wherein the 
 fundamental principle of government is for the moral 
 benefit of the person punished, and not primarily for the 
 protection of society. As a tender and kind father corrects 
 his child for the child's good, and not to vindicate his 
 power or authority in the least, so will society deal with 
 its weak members. @rime will be treated as a disease of 
 the mind, and hospitals will take the place of jails, 
 penitentiaries and scaffolds. Instead of physicians, 
 chaplains and guards, there shall be a few chosen ones 
 who, united in mind and soul, shall pour the psychological 
 power of the angel-world upon criminals of all classes, 
 and they shall be healed ; for under this influence certain 
 organs of the brain may be rendered inoperative, and 
 other organs may be called into activity ; thus the 
 morally weak may be strengthened, and the depraved 
 shall be made to loathe and despise their depravity; this 
 can be done in secret without the criminal's knowledge. 
 Who shall lead off in this great moral work. Psychom- 
 etry will reveal the peculiarities of children and adults, 
 and those needing treatment will be treated and trained 
 without the rod and the dunce-cap. There will be no 
 escape for their criminals, for the mediums will point them 
 out — for his good primarily, and secondly, for the good of 
 
— 233 — 
 
 society. The weak will be known before a manifestation 
 of weakness — or, rather, the commission of crime. The 
 time will come, and that speedily, when from the Temples 
 of the Rose Cross such power shall be breathed out 
 upon the people, so gently, and so peacefully, that none 
 shall be disposed to do any one a wrong. 
 
 The whole people shall join in one grand Psycho- 
 logical effort to banish disease and death from the land. 
 Who shall say it will not be done? Who will be the first 
 to enroll their names among the Temple-builders and 
 pioneers of the millenium ? 
 
 Who is there, of all who read this book, that are 
 willing to "Try?" This is the magic watchword, Try / 
 The principles conveyed in the foregoing pages are 
 sufficient to form a basis of union, and he or she who 
 feels in harmony therewith, and is willing to " Try," 
 will find "The Door" to such union indicated in the 
 dedication of this work. To all such I say : "Knock and 
 it shall be opened unto you ! Seek and ye shall find ! " 
 
— 234 — 
 
 XVII.—" ROSICRUCME." 
 
 Reference has been made in the preceding pages to 
 the Rosicrucians ; and the work in the main is claimed 
 to be an embodiment of their principles : not all bodied 
 forth, however, by any one sect, class, clime or era ; 
 and it is well, in closing, to anticipate the query as to who, 
 what and where are the Rosicrucians ? That will natur- 
 ally arise in the minds of most people, because there is 
 so little known of them. And it is well also as corrobo- 
 rative proof and practical illustration of the principles set 
 forth, to cite a few out of many instances in modern times, 
 wherein the possibilities of our nature is made manifest ; 
 for I hold that God is no specialist, and what one can do 
 another can do in a greater or less degree under the same 
 training and circumstances. At least our motto is, 
 "Try!" 
 
 The Rosicrucians may more properly be termed a 
 fraternity than an order ; albeit many attempts have been 
 made in modern times to materialize it as an order, 
 some of which are a success, though of necessity veiled 
 in profound secrecy. The Rosicrucians are numerous — 
 of all nationalities and all climes ;" but they are scattered. 
 They meet occasionally — not drawn together by "press 
 notices " or the ringing of bells, but by the moving and 
 drawing of the spirit — as " of one accord." 
 They were known in history among the other appellations 
 
— 235 — 
 
 as the Essenes, the Illuminati, etc., but since Christian 
 Rosencrutz's time, as the Rosicrucians. It was eyidently 
 once the universal religion — long ere written history 
 began; for evidences of " FiRE-worship " are scattered 
 over all the earth in the form of Rosicrucian sym- 
 bols. The curious reader is referred to Hargrave 
 Jennings* great work, entitled " The Rosicrucians," 
 published in England. There was a time when all 
 learned men believed in magic, (another term for magnet- 
 ism), and those who studied the occult forces of nature, 
 and practiced the powers derived therefrom, were styled 
 priests, and later, magicians ; but after, the destruction of 
 the Magi of Persia, and during the rise of Catholicism, 
 magic became associated with the idea of diabolism, and 
 was styled " Black Art," and all who practiced it were 
 shunned, and sometimes hunted to death. Wherever God 
 is found among men you will find a spirit of investigation 
 into the mysteries of being, and a corresponding love of 
 freedom : hence, the true man is free to dig deep or 
 take intellectual flights — aye, even to God's throne, and 
 there question him face to face. There is nothing too 
 sacred or secret for him to question for the truth. 
 Recognizing the possibility of the great good, God, and 
 the impossibility of the Devil, they laughed in secret, 
 (for they dared not even smile publicly), at priests, 
 bishops, cardinals and popes, and treasured the ancient 
 lore in cypher, and worshipped the undying, unquench- 
 able fire, while they dwelt in caves, or fled before the 
 terrors of the inquisition. This revived the ancient 
 Pagan secret societies and mysteries. To learn and 
 
— 236 — 
 
 know something more than ordinary is dangerous when 
 such knowledge is unpopular, or, at least, when the 
 masses are ruled by ignorance and superstition. It was 
 at the cost of life to be known as a member of such secret 
 orders — hence arose the proverbial secrecy of the brethren 
 of the Rosy Cross. Time was when no man would admit 
 that he belonged to that mystic fraternity • furthermore, 
 they shrouded themselves in a cloud of mysteries — not, 
 perhaps, with a view of mystifying others so much as 
 from the idea that all power is a mystery, and that 
 "God's ways are mysterious and past rinding out," and 
 they wish to be «God-like. Rosicrucia is intensely and 
 transcendentally spiritual — hence, it has nothing in com- 
 mon with materialism, except intellectually, and even 
 then the conclusions of materialism are all reversed. It 
 has no affinity with this mammon-worshipping age — hence, 
 it has no golden basis or " insurance plan " to lure men 
 into a semblance of brotherly love and fellowship. 
 Unobtrusive, unpretending men, they pass mainly unno- 
 ticed through life; they look with pity upon a world of 
 gold- and treasure-gatherers [as upon children heaping 
 dirt in the streets. No wonder such men are not under- 
 stood ; they are in the world, but they feel they are not 
 of it, and they wish to get done with it as quietly as 
 possible. Knowing they can leave it only by doing good, 
 they are always secretly doing all within their power. 
 Indeed, they are conscious of having been sent here 
 for that purpose— to help the world in its efforts to 
 humanize the race. The Alchemists of the middle ages 
 believed in the " Elixir of Life and the Philosopher's 
 
— 237 — 
 
 Stone,' ' and diligently sought for them. To drink of 
 the former was eternal youth and life; the latter was 
 sought as a universal solvent, in the use of which the 
 baser metals were changed or transmitted into pure, virgin 
 gold. No wonder these men were called insane ; but, 
 nevertheless, they gave the world the principles of chem- 
 istry and medicine. Think you such men were fools ? 
 Nay ! but they had an idea which the masses could not 
 comprehend, and they masked it in material that they 
 could grasp. No philosopher ever supposed for a moment 
 that matter in any form could confer immortality upon 
 any other form whatever, for there is no changeless sub- 
 stance in existence. That there is a power in the human 
 soul capable of eternally renewing youth and beauty is a 
 cardinal doctrine of the Rosy Cross. As to the transmu- 
 tation of metals, it is not only possible, but true. The idea 
 is of kin to the first ; they constitute " the Secret " of the 
 order ; but to the true Rosicrucian the latter is of no 
 value whatever, further than as used in the middle ages as 
 an excuse to stop too close espionage, and to compel the 
 respect, not only of common people, but the patronage 
 and protection of those in authority, for the practice of 
 alchemy, or dealing even with his " Satanic Majesty' ' 
 for the purpose of enriching the earth with gold, would be 
 deemed a laudable avocation. They, at least, found pro- 
 tection in it, although prizing it not — for the true adept 
 has all he needs of all things without resorting to any 
 such resource, for he needs but little. There is a provi- 
 dence for every man and woman who stands high enough 
 in the scale of being to be conscious of it, and to be its 
 
— 238 — 
 
 recipients. The ravens fed the prophet Elijah in the 
 olden time. 
 
 Not every man can be an adept in anything, for this 
 capability is born in a man as genius is. Neither is it 
 possible for every man to be a Rosicrucian, no more than 
 education can impart sense; or no more than a child 
 born blind could be made a master artist by learning the 
 terms used to designate the philosophy of light and shade 
 and blending of colors. There must be an innate feeling 
 of rapture at the bare idea of mystery; a hunger and 
 thirst for the unknown, and a conscious and abiding 
 belief in one's own immortality. Such are initiated with 
 profit to themselves and mankind; for in Rosicrucia's 
 Temple they eat and are filled, and drink to thirst no 
 more. Here they find teachers and brothers. We are the 
 children of "the Shadow/' and we love it, though 
 oft we may not see the way clearly through tear-dimmed 
 eyes, yet we cry out in our anguish, " Not my will, Father, 
 but thine be done ! " And then " the Shadow" reveals 
 . its mystery and departs, leaving the heart chastend and 
 lightened with increased purity and peace. We are cast 
 down in order that we may go higher. Thus, alternately 
 cast down and exalted, we are prepared to meet all the 
 changes of this mundane life. No stoic can be a Rosi- 
 crucian : it requires feeling, and that intensified. Without 
 this, no initiation could possibly impart that baptism of 
 the spirit which gives birth to new or dormant energies, 
 or awakens soul germs of a higher and better life, where 
 will reigns over all, and matter becomes transmutable. 
 Who are Rosicrucians ? I may answer, ' ' By their fruits 
 
— 239 — 
 
 shall ye know them." No better test, or one more un- 
 erring or unmistakable could be given than that given by 
 our Master, " the man of Sorrows" whom they hanged on a 
 cross long ago. Let others speak for themselves ! There is 
 nothing in Rosicrucise to be ashamed of, and I glory in 
 being one, though an humble builder of the Teinple in 
 these degenerate times. There are many pretenders — but 
 " by their fruits shall ye know them." But fruits are not 
 always confined to acts. They are visible to the acute 
 sense, even in the embryo, in the spirit, as fruit may be 
 known in a tree by its buds. I meet many Rosicrucians, 
 and although total strangers, we know each other at sight. 
 The true artist has a feeling which transcends his thought 
 in viewing works of art. It is his best and safest guide 
 to a just and true estimate of what he beholds. God 
 fashions all things and paints them in all colors possible. 
 There is nothing in existence that is not of kin to intel- 
 ligence. They are all suggestive of thought — nay ! they 
 are thoughts 7naterialized. And He has fashioned men 
 with thought-reservoirs, as a flower, for receiving the 
 polen and the dew ; and the Rosicrucian may be known 
 by the stamp that God has put upon him, whether he is 
 conscious of it or not. 
 
 Men who have existed on this earth previous to this 
 existence, as men, have forms, expression and motion more 
 suggestive of peace, rest and harmony than those who 
 have only just commenced life on this planet. The for- 
 mer have more receptiveness, prescience, and intuition ; 
 for they have not wholly forgotten the lessons learned in 
 other bodies; neither have they entirely forgotten the 
 
— 240 — 
 
 friends and companions of that other life; and when they 
 meet they feel a mutual attraction and friendship for each 
 other — a kffiflred feeling, more real than that of the blood. 
 During my studies of nature, and my travels as a lec- 
 turer and practitioner of phrenology and kindred sciences, 
 I have met with many men, and many strange — and, I 
 might say, weird — experiences. I have looked into eyes 
 of all shades of color that contained nothing, but which 
 reflected all the phenomenon of the outer world. Other 
 eyes I have met that looked deep — as into a world of 
 causation, without limit — as looking into an eternal past, 
 and out of which rises up shadows, not dark or many col- 
 ored, but fiery, as it were, or of a burning, melting ten- 
 derness. Such shadows are portents of power. Of such are 
 Rosicrucians. Many such have I taught the true princi- 
 ples of human life and action, and sent them on their way 
 rejoicing. Many a false step have I arrested, and infused 
 hope into the minds of the desperate — aye ! and turned 
 the would-be suicide into the ways of love, labor and 
 usefulness. The evil is always too apparent in the young : 
 the good is mainly hidden. To find the truly good in 
 the soul, and display it to the consciousness, is to make it 
 loved and followed as a beacon of life. The will needs 
 an incentive, high and noble, in order to its growth ; 
 and no matter how lofty one's own ideal of himself and 
 his powers may be, to find them recognized by another, 
 and that other a stranger, is like doubling the powers to 
 its attainment. Alas ! how many of mature years are in 
 doubt and condemnation of themselves, because they are 
 not, and never have been, understood, /. <?., the best part 
 
— 941 — 
 
 of themselves. We long to have the good of ourselves 
 understood, and not the evil. There is a faculty in the 
 soul that causes strangers to recognize each other as 
 friends. Once upon a time, more than a score of years 
 ago, in a Western city, as I walked along seeing and hear- 
 ing nothing, I met a young man — a mere youth. Why I 
 should have looked at him, and he at me, as we met, is an 
 unsolved mystery. We mutually recognized each other, 
 and yet we were total strangers in the flesh. This chance- 
 meeting led to a mutual friendship. We often met for 
 conversation, and I learned that he was a medical student 
 struggling up into nature's mysteries unaided and alone, 
 thinking to solve the mysteries of humanity by studying 
 the various branches of medicine. I gazed into his pale 
 face and lustrous eyes, tinged with a shade of sadness, and 
 I read there an enthusiastic nature, toned down with 
 logic and doubt ; a soul all luminous with the merit of a 
 past eternity, but loaded down with chains forged of 
 doubt. I saw a temperament, strong, sensitive and flex- 
 ible ; and an intellect deep, comprehensive, analytical 
 and subtle, owing its main power to an intuitive per- 
 ception which ruled all the rest. His mind was so nicely 
 balanced and poised, that to fix his thought intently upon 
 one subject for a brief space of time was enough to open 
 his soul to an influx of light, an unerring guide to truth 
 and the right relation of things. This combination would, 
 I perceived, make him an adept in the diagnosis of dis- 
 ease and the selection of the best remedies therefor. His 
 countenance would glow with a weird and mysterious 
 light as I talked with him of the Rosy Cross, and then 
 
-- 242 — 
 
 the doubt would lower his look, the exaltation disappear, 
 and the fiery shadows of his glance change to a dark hue. 
 Bat I conversed long and earnestly with him, for it 
 seemed to us both that we had known each other in a 
 previous existence. And I was anxious to impart to him 
 the knowledge I had gained on these subjects, and 
 demonstrate to him that the science of Rosicruciae con- 
 taind all the powers he sought : and I am satisfied he 
 profited by my labors. I pictured for him a glorious 
 future in the manifestation of a power of healing of dis- 
 ease superior to any known in modern times, and a fame 
 that would immortalize his name, We parted : he to go 
 East, and I to my wandering. Years fled away, and I 
 heard little or nothing of him, till in 1869 or 1870, 
 a remarkable cure that he had effected was reported in 
 the Banner of Light. It seems that a council of phy- 
 sicians had given the patient (who had been under treat- 
 ment several weeks) up to die, stating that death would 
 take place by midnight of that day ; as a last hope my 
 young friend was called in at 8 o'clock p. m., and before 
 the fatal midnight came the patient was cured, and made 
 " every whit whole." At last here was a verification of 
 the truth of my predictions in part, and I watched 
 anxiously for more. The next I heard of him he was 
 professor in some medical college. Then I sat down and 
 grieved over him. I was sad; for "no man can serve 
 God and "Drugs " at the same time ! " 
 
 Time was when man had more faith in the Gods than 
 in physical substances, and diseases were prevented and 
 cured by the use of talismans, incantations, invocations, 
 
— 243 — 
 
 words, thoughts, spells, charms, etc., all of which were 
 mere forms of expression for that spiritual power of 
 which I have spoken, having an effect upon the mind 
 primarily, and secondarily upon the body. But man's 
 spiritual nature has gradually become more and more 
 dense, or physical, and instead of carrying or wearing 
 talismans, charms, etc., as a protection or cure, people 
 now invoke the doctors instead of the gods, and swallow 
 their amulets whole at a gulp ; and yet people die now as 
 then, or as when Moses set up the brazen serpent in the 
 wilderness. 
 
 Gottama said that the most fatal diseases enter through 
 the eye ; and we of the Rosy Cross know this is true ; 
 for through the eye the imagination (in most men) is fed, 
 and the passions may be aroused to the commission of acts 
 unhallowed and unnatural. By reason of which the soul is 
 tainted with moral poison, which in the blood produces 
 venereal infections, hereditary and deadly—the foundation 
 of all known diseases. If disease enters ever, or in any 
 form whatever, through the eye, it cannot be removed by 
 agents which act upon the physical or chemical organiza- 
 tion only, for the reason, it being of a spiritual or 
 psychical origin, it enters directly into and deranges the 
 harmonious action of the spiritual body, which holds 
 supreme control over the physical, To cure these phases 
 of disease the remedies applied must be of a character that 
 will influence directly the subtle, spiritual forces of the 
 individual, and through them produce vital and chemical 
 changes in the physical structure. After the cure above 
 referred to, effected by my friend, I heard nothing of him 
 
— 244 — 
 
 for some time, and I feared he had devoted himself wholly 
 to materialistic science, and ignored his intuitive and spir- 
 itual powers ; but ere long I learned to the contrary, for 
 an account of another of his astonishing cures — which 
 materialism never could effect — was published throughout 
 the States : that of Rev. G. W. Enders, an eminent 
 divine of the Lutheran denomination. The Lutheran 
 Observer, of Philadelphia, Pa., contained the history of 
 Mr. Enders' s case, and of his cure, which was so remark- 
 able that a controversy resulted between Rev. Mr. Enders, 
 Rev. Mr. Lake, and others who were acquainted with all 
 the particulars, on one side, and on the other by a number 
 of "D. D.'s" and "M. D.'s" who knew nothing of the 
 case, but who criticized the publication over the signature 
 of clergymen, of a cure effected by means " not univer- 
 sally recognized and accepted by science and experience," 
 as expressed by them. When I read these articles I re- 
 joiced for my friend, for I realized he had not forsaken 
 his birth-right of power for a mess of scientific pottage : 
 though he is a true scientist and his powers are based upon 
 laws as scientific and permanent as universe. I may here 
 state, the publication in the Lutheran Observer of Rev. 
 Enders's cure was a necessary result or sequence of pre- 
 ceding references which it had frequently made, relative to 
 Mr. Enders's condition during the years of his illness, up 
 to the week previous to his cure, at which time he was 
 reported dying. This being followed in a few days by the 
 news of his complete restoration to health, naturally 
 created surprise and doubt, and inquiries from friends and 
 acquaintances in all parts of the country. 
 
- 245 — 
 
 In referring to this cure, as one of the many as remark- 
 able effected by the same physician, I can be but brief 
 and give only a few points from the published statements 
 made by Rev. Enders, the patient, and other clergymen. 
 He had been an invalid for years ; was paralyzed, and given 
 up as hopeless by several physicians previous to entering 
 the medical institute, where he grew worse until the 
 physician-in-chief of the establishment telegraphed to his 
 friends that he was dying, and also dispatched to Philadel- 
 phia for my friend, the physician who eventually restored 
 him to perfect health. When he arrived, being an entire 
 stranger to the patient as well as the physicians, he made no 
 explanation of what he designed to do, but after examining 
 •the case, placed his hands upon Mr. Enders' s head and 
 bade him " arise and walk," which he did, and continues 
 so to do to this day, as I have taken pains to ascertain, 
 and is fulfilling his mission as a religious teacher. Whence 
 came this power and this life? — from the Doctor? Nay, 
 but from Heaven, the source and great reservoir of life. 
 Did the heavens open especially at this man's bidding to 
 shower a blessing especially upon the Rev. Mr. Enders ? 
 No ! but the soul of the Doctor opened wide its portals, 
 being moved by sympathy, and life flowed into the Doctor 
 and out of his hands into Mr. Enders, who evidently 
 was spiritually receptive. Heaven is always ready to 
 shower its choicest blessings upon a great soul whenever 
 it will rise up to receive it. Heaven never bends down 
 to us — we must rise up to it in order to receive its 
 blessings. 
 
__ 246 — 
 
 This was, I think, in 1876, and the press of the East 
 teemed with accounts, discussions, and efforts to explain 
 the modus operandi by which he performed such wonder- 
 ful results ; and some foreign papers also gave accounts 
 of his mysterious cures. Numerous were the efforts made 
 to explain away these marvelous cures, or, at least, to 
 destroy their supernatural appearance. The religious 
 were divided : some said it was of the " Devil ;" others, 
 ascribing his power to the Holy Ghost ; while the so- 
 called scientific squelched out the marvelousness of it by 
 crying out those stereotyped but meaningless words : 
 "magnetism, humbug, imagination, etc." How satisfy- 
 ing mere names are to most men. Some persons when 
 estimating these extraordinary powers possessed by this 
 physician to relieve suffering and cure disease, deem it 
 either the result of acquired skill or some secret of 
 " magnetism, M etc., which could be imparted to another 
 in words. How far such minds are from comprehending 
 the true nature of the principles of Rosicrucia ! 
 
 Let those* who seek to enter these so-called mysteries 
 here learn of their nature, and know they are reached 
 only by power of soul — so often gained through its agony 
 and travail that gives it "birth into the higher mysteries." 
 
 As the world will be prone to misapprehend the source of 
 the principles and the powers of the soul which I have 
 pointed out as belonging to the Rosicrucian mysteries, 
 I will endeavor to show their highest development to be 
 an expression of soul-growth through discipline and 
 suffering ; and, to do so, have referred to my friend's 
 experience ; for, though that friend and I have met only 
 
— 247 — 
 
 on one occasion since a score of years ago, and have 
 corresponded but very rarely, I have watched his life-line, 
 and find it in the actual the same as it was so vividly 
 portrayed to me in prevision in the long-passed years 
 when he and I conversed on the subject of these hidden 
 and subtle powers of the soul. In that long ago, I per- 
 ceived the key-note of his nature and of his greatest future 
 trial — that which would bring to him the shadow, or 
 rather bring his soul to that shadowy guardian of the 
 temple's portal, with which he would contend to obtain 
 spiritual powers. 
 
 His theory then, in those his youthful days was, that 
 "each individual is but the half of a complete soul until 
 it meets its counterpart — its true companion; and that 
 neither man nor woman can be truly great, spiritually or 
 intellectually, before that true union is formed/ ' To this 
 I would reply, " None can be truly great until they have 
 suffered. ' ' 
 
 I realized his belief on this subject was a fundamental 
 element of his nature, and perceived it would be the rock 
 upon which his earthly hopes would be wrecked. 
 
 Ten years thereafter, being in Philadelphia, I visited 
 my friend of the long ago,* and luckily found him at 
 home. He had recently taken to himself a wife, but 
 his mind was occupied in his profession of medicine 
 and surgery ; for, indeed, he travels far and wide in 
 response to calls to visit the so-called hopelessly sick. 
 To the far West, the extreme South, North and East he is 
 no stranger ; and thousands bless his name. But space 
 bids me hasten to a close. We passed a pleasant time 
 
 * J. J. Jones, M. D., Philadelphia, Pa. 
 
— 248 — 
 
 together in cheerful reminiscences of the past and in con- 
 jectures of the future. 
 
 When I referred to his old-time belief on the subject 
 of " true mating " and true greatness, he replied, " Oh ! 
 this is a practical world, and we cannot allow the romance 
 of our natures to govern us through this life ; you see I 
 have a companion and home, and am trying to fulfil my 
 life-mission by relieving suffering ; ought I not be satis- 
 fied ? " But I saw he was living only the half of his nature — 
 the material, or as he would express it, the " practical." 
 His companion was a lady of fine education, but seemed 
 to possess none of the high aspirations that would have 
 been congenial to her husband's nature. Another more 
 fatal source of dread, I soon discovered in the fact that 
 she was a victim to the morphine habit. My friend ac- 
 knowledged this, but spoke hopefully of redeeming her 
 from the habit ; he was sanguine of success, because at 
 that time he did not know the habit was of many years' 
 duration. 
 
 When my short but pleasant visit was terminated, he 
 accompanied me to the train. As I clasped his hand and 
 looked in his kind, hopeful eyes, I saw their light flicker and 
 go out, leaving a shadow as of night. I was so moved that 
 I could only gasp out, " Good-bye, my old friend ! God 
 bless you ! " And then I left him with the shadow clinging 
 to me. Seated in the cars, I looked at my watch and 
 then settled myself to study the shadow, but it revealed 
 nothing — not even his face. The train whirled on, and 
 time whirled away into eternity, until at the end of ten 
 hours the shadow began to dissipate, and his face seemed 
 
— 249 — 
 
 to emerge therefrom, a shade paler, with the lines deep- 
 ened, and a look with the same fire in it, but the boyish 
 enthusiasm toned down. The setting sun shone for a 
 moment, ere it sunk to rest, upon his upturned face, 
 which was radiant with a spiritual light, and turning his 
 old look upon me he said, "We live for eternity, not merely 
 for a day or a few weary years. What is a little time, or 
 a small shadow of ten years? " And then he disappeared, 
 and the shadow was gone and my heart was light again. 
 Shortly after, I came South and lost sight of him ; but in 
 time I learned that the shadow had fallen upon him, as I 
 had seen it in my vision. That nameless, shapeless mon- 
 ster "guardian of the threshold" of power had hurled 
 him down — not from his fame, his manhood, nor his 
 power — but from his enthusiam, his hopes of earthly 
 happiness, and his ambition to gain the world's approval. 
 
 But " Rosicrucians never fail" is an adage among 
 them ; for that which appears as a failure in the eyes of 
 other men, they look upon as a stepping stone to some- 
 thing higher and better. Everything has its uses, and 
 they always look for the use of what appears an evil. 
 Every soul of worth must be tried and tested, and they 
 that rise up out of deep sorrow, purified and made better, 
 have received nature's stamp of salvation ; for the spirit 
 of nature never errs in the "selection of the fittest " to do 
 its work in the intellectual and spiritual as well as in the 
 physical realm. 
 
 To pass this dark shadow, this " guardian of the thresh- 
 old," the nameless, shapeless monster, to which " despair" 
 is but a faint definition, was the ordeal my friend was 
 
— &50 — 
 
 ordained to undergo, as (Id all others who enter the 
 temple of spiritual power and wisdom. 
 
 Those who have native strength of spirit to pass the 
 ordeal, have power not only to save themselves, but to 
 help others to salvation ; while those who have not, are 
 crushed as bubbles by the wind, and disappear, never 
 more to be known on earth. My friend did not disappear, 
 but with a stoical and dogged resolution plodded on his 
 cheerless and desolate way, dispensing health to the sick 
 and hope to the hopeless ; he was always busy ; but 
 whether by night or by day, in his office or by the 
 bedside of the sick, at home or flying with the speed of 
 steam for thousands of miles at the call of the suffering ; 
 that monster shadow never left his sight ; but, amid all, 
 he had a firm belief and an " abiding faith' ' in his 
 destiny ; and he cast about in his mind for ways to defeat 
 this thing that had impeded his flight; but all the ap- 
 proaches to " the threshold " were guarded by this name- 
 less thing. 
 
 At last there sounded in his soul — as if coming from 
 afar — these words : "Resist not evil; but use it — learn of 
 it." And forthwith he set himself to learn this lesson : 
 that evil is at the foundation of everything, and he that 
 would transcend it must build thereon — not ignore it, nor 
 treat it as an enemy and foe to human happiness, greatness 
 and power. Evil is a friend in disguise. And he learned 
 the deep lesson — that this monster shadow of the soul, 
 this guardian of the mysteries, is an enemy only to those 
 hopes and ambitions that pertain to this, the earthly phase 
 of life ; and, while it crushes those whose lives are 
 
— 251 — 
 
 centred on these selfish hopes and ambitions, to those 
 whose earthly hopes are destroyed and lives made deso- 
 late, and who still remain strong in spirit, it becomes an 
 angel of light, a messenger of joy from the. inner sanc- 
 tuary of divine love. 
 
 This dreaded power that hovers between the world 
 material and the realm of spirit ever meets those whom 
 nature has ordained shall pass the ordeal during earth- 
 life, by bringing its terrible powers to bear upon and 
 destroy the strongest sentiment of that soul that would 
 cause it to cling to earth. The dominant worldly passion 
 or trait of character indicates the point of attack of this 
 enemy, for it indicates the weakest point in the individual 
 nature. Those who live for worldly renown are brought 
 low and made humble ; those who seek wealth are made 
 poor, and those who would wish to create for themselves 
 a home of earthly means, by living for its passive or 
 physical comforts only ; dwelling wholly in their material 
 nature, at the sacrifice of their ideal or spiritual nature, 
 are made homeless, and, perhaps, to feel friendless. And 
 so on, through the gamut of earthly hopes and ambitions, 
 they each and all must be crushed, ere the soul learns 
 the great truth that it is now, in the present, immortal. 
 It must be stripped of its selfish and worldly nature ere it 
 can become strong in its spiritual powers, even as the tree 
 must be trimmed of its useless branches, let them be ever 
 so luxurious, ere it can blossom and bring forth good fruit. 
 These are hard lessons to learn, but my friend learned 
 them ; and he who truly and practically learns them makes 
 a servant of the "Devil," and compels him to undo his 
 
— 252 — 
 
 own work. The ten years had not passed since I met my 
 friend, when the light began to dawn upon his soul. 
 Gradually the shadow faded away, and he became lumi- 
 nous with hope, faith, renewed youth, and growing power. 
 Already his eye, piercing through the gloom of the early 
 morn, espies afar off the descent of the Temple of the 
 Rosy Cross — that temple " not made with hands, eternal 
 in the heavens.' ' And methinks I see him don the mystic 
 garments and fearlessly step across the threshold of the 
 inner temple and clasp the outstretched hands of our 
 grand old masters. Oh ! how the soul thrills with joy and 
 . veneration when, in our mystic scroll, we read the history 
 of those mighty minds of the past. Those sublime masters, 
 Hermes-Trismagistus (thrice master), Gottama, Appolon- 
 ius of Tyane, Pythagoras, Anaxagoras, Socrates, Zoroaster, 
 and Jesus, down through the vista of time, including Cor- 
 nelius Agrippa, Robert Flood, and the host of others in 
 whose great souls burn the same divine fire : yet the world 
 knows them not. Meek and lowly as men, misunder- 
 stood and rejected by the bigoted and ignorant masses, 
 they lived in the light and joy of the higher life. Though 
 persecuted and crucified, they never knew of death, for 
 they had gained immortality while yet in the flesh, and, 
 casting aside of the old garments of clay, only added 
 strength and wisdom to their mental powers. As they 
 were persecuted and crucified by ignorance and bigotry, 
 under the name of religion, so also were they, in a later 
 day, " deified " by the same elements of selfish ignorance, 
 and their true power and glory hidden from mankind 
 under the black cowl of religious tyranny. Notwith- 
 
— 253 — 
 
 standing this dark pall of gloom thrown over their names, 
 their living presence permeates every fibre of the world, 
 and their spiritual influence is felt in the moral atmosphere 
 of reform, which, in its various phases, is ever active to 
 exalt, purify and ennoble mankind. 
 
 Readers, many of you have felt the divine influence of 
 these grand old masters of the Rosy Cross, and were you 
 to lay aside your doubt and egotistic pride, and let your 
 souls become receptive, you, too, would receive power to 
 bless your fellow creatures, to bring health to the sick, 
 hope to the despairing, and the joyous knowledge of im- 
 mortality to those faltering ones who deem the grave 
 God's last gift to man. " Try ! " 
 
 Blessed is he who believes from the force of evidence, 
 but thrice blessed is he who believes without evidence. 
 Lovingly, for the world, written : 
 
 F. B. DOWD. 
 
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 THE 
 
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 THE SOUL: 
 
 ITS POWERS, MIGRATIONS, AND TRANSMIGRATIONS. 
 
 By m. B. DOWD 
 
 PHILADELPHIA: 
 
 John R. Rue, Jr., Printer, No. 43 South Fourth Street. 
 
 —1882.— 
 
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 Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1882, by 
 
 F. B. Dowd, Orange, Texas, 
 
 in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C. 
 
1 
 

v OF c . 
 
 BINDERY 
 1903