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 -Christian Cults 
 
 SPIRITUALISM 
 THEOSOPHY 
 CHRISTIAN SCIENCE 
 
 BARRINGTON 
 
Bnti-Cbdstian Cults. 
 
 AN ATTEMPT TO SHOW THAT 
 
 Spiritualism, SPjerigoplnj anb OTtjrtsttan Same 
 
 ARE DEVOID OF SUPERNATURAL POWERS AND 
 ARE CONTRARY TO THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 — BY — 
 
 A. H. BARRINGTON, A.B., B.D., 
 
 Rector of Christ Church, 
 janesville, wis. 
 
 WITH A COMMENDATORY BY 
 
 THE BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. 
 
 Milwaukee, Wis.: 
 THE YOUNG CHURCHMAN CO. 
 
 London: 
 SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON & CO. 
 
A* 
 
 
 
 a 
 
 copyright by 
 The Young Churchman Co., 
 
 3*MS*^ 
 
 1st COPY, 
 
Gommen&ators* 
 
 To the Reader: 
 
 '"THE request to commend this book, coming from a 
 
 valued Presbyter in this Diocese, and also a dear 
 personal friend, is one to which I very cordially give 
 heed. If only to testify publicly to my warm confidence 
 in him, as a devoted servant of God, in the Ministry of 
 His Church, the request could well be granted. 
 
 But beyond this range of personal feeling, one is 
 always glad to commend every honest effort made to 
 stem somewhat, if it may be, this wholesale delusion of 
 the reading public, going on to such a wide extent 
 to-day, by the many clever tricksters, the enchanters, 
 the smooth and easy talkers, the magicians of every 
 degree — great and small — male and female — who come 
 before the public daily with their wares for sale: the 
 new philosophies, their recently patented systems of 
 religion, their fresh panaceas for all our many human 
 
ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 ills ; and who do thus, in a strange measure, bewitch the 
 public eye; and withal do most egregiously fool the 
 people, lead many weak and unstable Christian folk 
 away from the old faith, aside from the rough and nar- 
 row path. 
 
 "Cults," these are well called; make-shifts, patent 
 medicine processes; and all thoroughly "Anti- Christian 
 Cults," most veritably and far too effectually, they 
 always prove to be. New they also are, in one sense; 
 and yet not new, in a more true and exact sense. Old 
 and very old, full of decay and moral rottenness ; full of 
 foul odors and intellectual poison, and the germs of a 
 fatal spiritual disease hid beneath — as all history well 
 shows. Old ghosts of old-time heresies, they are — each 
 one. Ghosts that will not lie down in their graves ; sure 
 to rise again each passing century, or even decade; 
 assume some new and more fanciful dress, perhaps a 
 shade more picturesque and fashionable than before; and 
 so they live again, parading the old lie under changed 
 terms and in smart language ; beguiling many weary 
 and sin-laden souls, fooling the people, attracting the 
 unwary, shaking the unstable; as the latest fashions, the 
 last mental "cult," the newest and freshest "religion" 
 always has done, always will do : something that has 
 come to "reform," to supersede and dethrone the old. 
 
 Nor are we at all hopeful or expectant that these 
 innumerable "ghosts" will ever permanently die. Stop 
 them all to-day, and they will all rise up again on the 
 
COMMEND A TOR Y. 
 
 morrow, at least in some other place, and in some other 
 way. " There is nothing new under the sun," not even 
 in these subtle lines of moral and intellectual heresies. 
 And so the long spiritual combat of truth against error, 
 of the Church against the devil, of Christ against Belial, 
 of God against the worldly mammon of unrighteousness, 
 shall ever go on — until "this tyranny be overpast"; 
 and until that bright day of "the new Heavens and the 
 new earth " shall come; w r hen this slow 7 probation of our 
 earthly schooling is done, under the patient discipline 
 of Almighty God; and until His "Fulness of Time" 
 shall be accomplished. We w r ell know Who and What 
 shall win, in that Great Last Day; but we "know not 
 the times or the seasons, w 7 hich the Father hath placed 
 in His own Power." For this culmination we can only 
 patiently wait, and lovingly " w 7 ork our work betimes," 
 until that Day shall dawn, and our many earthly 
 shadows shall "flee away." 
 
 Yet, let us welcome each and every earnest effort made 
 by every preacher of the old-time Gospel, every lover of the 
 changeless Creed of the passing ages, as he does his share 
 in upholding the Eternal Truth of God, and the Revela- 
 tion of Jesus Christ; each one standing in his own lot, 
 where his Master may have placed him, narrow though 
 that lot is, modest and humble though his effort may 
 seem to be. Hence, our humble prayer and our affection- 
 ate hope is, that the blessing of God may rest upon this 
 book, now issuing from the press, sent out by our dear 
 
ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 brother for the helpful reading and the reasonable com- 
 fort of his many friends in the Church; and we trust also, 
 for the help of some others who are beyond and without. 
 We well know he sends it out, not for the purpose of 
 controversy, but from a heart and mind full of devotion 
 to the Adorable Person of Jesus Christ our Blessed Lord, 
 "Who of God is made unto us, our Wisdom, our Right- 
 eousness, our Sanctification,and our Final Redemption." 
 Isaac Lea Nicholson, 
 Milwaukee, Bishop of Milwaukee. 
 
 Whitsun: 1898. 
 
Butbor's preface* 
 
 HTHESE lectures were written for, and delivered before, 
 the parishioners of Christ Church. They are pub- 
 lished in the hope that they may enlighten others who 
 are being led astray by Spiritualism, Theosophy, and 
 Christian Science. Sooner or later they must find, to 
 their sorrow, that though there be elements of truth in 
 each of these cults, yet in scope and purpose they are 
 false, subversive of the Christian Faith, and totally 
 unable to afford true comfort and consolation. 
 
 Among the many books used in preparation of these 
 lectures, we would specially mention Earth's Earliest 
 Ages, by G. H. Pember, M.A., and Hypnotism, by Dr. 
 Albert Moll. 
 
 Christ Church Rectory, 
 
 Janesville, Wis., 
 
 Eastertide, 1898. 
 
Uable ot Contents* 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The Case Stated. . 11 
 
 Spiritualism 26 
 
 Spiritualism. II 40 
 
 Theosophy. I 66 
 
 Theosophy. II 79 
 
 Christian Science. I. . . 108 
 
 Christian Science. II. 133 
 
 Conclusion 158 
 
Anti-Christian Cults. 
 
 Ube Case Stated 
 
 \\ 7 ELL spake Rabbi Gamaliel of old when 
 he cautioned the Sanhedrin to "take 
 heed" as to what they intended to do con- 
 cerning the new faith, which was increasing 
 w^ith such alarming rapidity. "Take heed 
 .... lest haply ye be found even to fight 
 against God." He referred to incidents in the 
 history of the chosen people and then declared : 
 "If this counsel or this work be of men, it 
 will come to nought ; but if it be of God ye 
 cannot overthrow it." 1 
 
 1 Acts v. 34-39. 
 
12 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 CHRISTIANITY IMPREGNABLE, CHRISTIANS 
 UNSTABLE. 
 
 That Christianity is of Divine origin and 
 part of the eternal plan and purpose of the 
 Almighty, we have not the shadow of a 
 doubt. That it can be overthrown, is impos- 
 sible. We are not, therefore, alarmed about 
 its ultimate success. Nothing could be further 
 from our thoughts. Men do, however, u fight 
 against God" They are timid, and too easily 
 turned from the straight and narrow path. 
 They are readily deceived and to their own 
 hurt. They, like the Athenians of old, are 
 attracted and won over by anything new 
 and strange, till, actually hoping for more 
 light, they are plunged further into darkness. 
 Too many (if there were but two or three, it 
 were too many) — too many are being deceived, 
 and blinded, and led astray to-day, by the 
 false hopes, and promises, and claims of cer- 
 tain religious yet anti-Christian cults which 
 in vain would undermine the truth as it is in 
 Jesus. Undoubtedly, like other fads which 
 spring up in the night of darkness rather 
 
THE CASE STATED. 
 
 than in the light of eternal truth, these shad- 
 ows of good shall come to nought, as they 
 are unquestionably of men ; but, in the mean- 
 time, the effect upon the adherents of such 
 substitute religions cannot but be disastrous. 
 History repeats itself and there is no reason 
 to note an exception here. Light and life 
 are found only in the service of Almighty 
 God. To deny Him or to assume to worship 
 Him, while rejecting the light that He has 
 given us, is to plunge into darkness and to 
 invite disaster. Therefore we plead earnestly, 
 lovingly, and in all sincerity, with those who 
 have willingly listened to these false and de- 
 ceptive ways, to turn from these vanities to 
 serve the living God. 
 
 ISRAEL'S PLIGHT. 
 
 Gamaliel's counsel was ignored, that the 
 chosen people might "even fight against 
 God." Behold the result ! They were looking 
 anxiously forward to the coming of their 
 Messiah, rightly basing all their fondest 
 hopes upon Him, yet when He came they 
 
14 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 would not accept Him, they could not abide 
 His counsels, but their rejected Messiah is 
 to-day the Christ of history. 
 
 It is written: "Cursed is everyone that 
 hangeth on a tree," and the Jews in their 
 desire to heap ignominy upon the hope of all 
 the earth, though His own people, hanged 
 Him to a tree; but behold, the Cross was 
 transformed into the throne of the Lord of 
 lords and King of kings, and Jesus was 
 lifted up thereon, "that whosoever believeth 
 in Him should not perish but have everlast- 
 ing life." 
 
 The Jews consigned their Messiah to the 
 tomb, and from that very moment the glory 
 of Israel faded, while the curse which they 
 would invoke upon their Redeemer has fast- 
 ened itself upon that people even until now. 
 
 Israel sealed her doom at Calvary, yet out 
 of the sepulchre arose " The Light to lighten 
 the Gentiles;" and how the nations, that 
 have seen that great light, have been illumi- 
 nated; how they have advanced; how they 
 ^ave prospered; how completely have they 
 
THE CASE STATED. 15 
 
 distanced the nations who are in darkness; 
 how they are still advancing (and that not so 
 much intellectually as morally); all this is due 
 to the preaching of the Gospel, to Christian- 
 ity ; and yet there are those who would give 
 it up for some passing fancy, that can only 
 lead them back into darkness, uncertainty, 
 despair. How many of us realize how very 
 much of the present civilization and enjoy- 
 ment of life, is directly and solely due to the 
 religion of Jesus Christ ? 
 
 THE POWER OF CHRIST. 
 
 As Dean Alford has said: "That which 
 is most deeply w r orking in modern life and 
 thought is the mind of Christ. His name has 
 passed over our institutions and much more 
 has His Spirit penetrated into our social and 
 domestic existence." 
 
 John von Miiller, the famous Swiss histo- 
 rian, declares: "Christ is the key to the 
 history of the world. Not only does all har- 
 monize with the mission of Christ; all is 
 subordinated to it." 2 
 
 2 Lorimer's Argument for Christianity, 61, 62. 
 
16 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 And the great German philosopher, Fichte, 
 says : " We and our whole age are so rooted 
 in the soil of Christianity and have sprung 
 from it; it has exercised its influence in the 
 most manifold ways on the whole of our 
 culture, and we should be absolutely nothing 
 of all that we are, if this mighty principle had 
 not preceded us." 
 
 Dr. Lorimer in his admirable work, The 
 Argument for Christianity, says : "In France, 
 there is a magnificent cartoon, by Paul Chen- 
 avard, representing what may be termed the 
 palingenesis of human society. The great 
 picture is divided into two horizontal zones. 
 In the upper one we have a flaring, noisy, 
 triumphant procession of the imperial Caesar. 
 There are lictors, generals, banners, spoils, 
 prisoners, elephants, eagles, and indeed every- 
 thing to suggest insolent and unchallenged 
 power. But the lower zone is pervaded by 
 the feeling of silence, obscurity, patience, and 
 suffering. It discloses the primitive Christians 
 at prayer in the catacombs, which they have 
 dug to serve them both as chapel and grave, 
 
THE CASE STATED. 17 
 
 beneath the throne of the emperor. The con- 
 trast is complete, and like all master-pieces of 
 art, tells its own story. It teaches that the 
 pagan civilization of Rome, when at the height 
 of its strength and splendor, and when entirely 
 oblivious to danger, was being steadily, 
 though slowly, undermined ; and was inevi- 
 tably doomed to give place to a new order, 
 born of a new and despised creed. It is well 
 known that the patricians, the philosophers 
 and even the plebs of the eternal city, held in 
 contempt a religion that had a cross for its 
 altar and an alleged malefactor for its hero. 
 But notwithstanding this supercilious self- 
 confidence, Christianity, weak, unattractive, 
 and unostentatious, was destined to triumph 
 and to give to history a new channel and a 
 new course of development." 3 
 
 How completely has it triumphed ! How 
 it has revolutionized the laws, the customs, 
 the ideas, the very feelings of men until it has 
 marvellously improved their condition. Well 
 
 3 P. 60, 61. 
 
18 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 may Lowell say : " There cannot be found a 
 place on this planet ten miles square, where a 
 decent man can live in decency, comfort and 
 security, supporting and educating his child- 
 ren, unspoiled and unpolluted ; a place where 
 age is revered, infancy protected, manhood 
 respected, womanhood honored,, and life held 
 in due regard — where the Gospel of Christ 
 has not gone and cleared the way, laid the 
 foundations and made decency and security 
 possible. " 
 
 CHRISTIANITY AND INTELLECTUALITY. 
 
 Now we sometimes hear it claimed, that a 
 greater degree of intellectuality has been 
 attained in the past than has yet been pro- 
 duced under the enlightening influence of 
 revealed religion. What if it prove true? 
 Christianity shall never bow down before it, 
 for who does not know that the intellectual- 
 ity of passed ages was hopelessly mixed with 
 debauchery and every kind of wickedness. 
 To-day the worldly exalt the intellectual, but 
 Christianity would humble even them, be- 
 
THE CASE STATED. 19 
 
 cause sin is universal, and they are not 
 excluded from its power; because the edu- 
 cated and the gifted are truly said to have 
 done more to bring dishonor upon civiliza- 
 tion and to threaten society with ruin than 
 the unendowed ; because again it is true that 
 " perverted education, misdirected shrewd- 
 ness and calculating self-regard,' ' can do 
 more to trouble and degrade mankind than 
 can possibly be equalled by the desperation 
 of poverty and the evil design of illiteracy 
 combined. 
 
 We unhesitatingly admit, however, that 
 the world had learned much in the way of 
 art and literature before the advent of the 
 Light of the world, and that Greek culture 
 and Roman jurisprudence have had a marked 
 influence over even our present civilization. 
 But when we hear men bemoaning the lost 
 arts and saying, e.g. , that we never again shall 
 see the equal of the pyramids of Egypt or the 
 hanging gardens of Babylon, we can but say 
 (albeit somewhat impatiently) that Christ- 
 ianity is not concerned with such things. 
 
20 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS, 
 
 Christianity aims to build character, to teach 
 men how to live righteously. It does not ig- 
 nore the intellectual in man, nor has it any con- 
 troversy with all true science. It encourages 
 to the utmost, if it does not take the lead, in 
 the effort to teach man u how to speak, how to 
 write, how to think, how to build cathedrals, 
 paint pictures, and compose sweet songs;" 
 and the educational feature is a strong char- 
 acteristic of all its foreign missions, but it 
 especially teaches men how to curb their pas- 
 sions, how to restrain their violence, how to 
 enjoy their freedom, how to promote the 
 well being of one another. In a word, it 
 would knit into one communion and fellow- 
 ship the world of men, through the mystical 
 Body of Christ. It would destroy enmities, 
 dispel all variance, heal all differences and 
 bind all classes and conditions of men into 
 one loving and beloved brotherhood, under 
 the Fatherhood of God, through Jesus Christ. 
 It teaches that the only warfare to be main- 
 tained is that against the common enemy 
 of mankind, sin; while it strives to lessen 
 
THE CASE STATED. 21 
 
 the ills and woes of man, to assuage pain 
 and sorrow, to dispel darkness and misery. 
 It would suppress all injustice and selfishness 
 in man and enlarge his sympathies, provoke 
 him to deeds of beneficence, and instill in 
 him the principles of rectitude, that men may 
 live soberly, righteously and godly in this 
 present world/ ' 
 
 THE KINGDOM OF CHRIST. 
 
 Again, with the author of Ecce Homo, we 
 ask : What is the Kingdom of Christ ? 
 
 " It is a world which, whatever its sins, its 
 distance from ideal excellence, has recognized 
 as the standard of its actions the law, which 
 the Son of God spake on the Mount ; a world 
 where before His coming only a few wise and 
 good men held somewhat of these precepts, 
 and dreamed, like Plato, of an imaginary 
 republic, but never in their wildest thoughts 
 believed that society could be other than the 
 selfish, and corrupt, and earthly thing they 
 saw about them ; yet every one of these lofty 
 maxims has mastered the conscience of men, 
 
22 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 every one has been received as the acknowl- 
 edged pattern of private, of social, of human 
 goodness ; when every good thus far attained 
 has sprung from the unselfish spirit there 
 enjoined, and even in the midst of unbelief, of 
 superstition, of worldly policy, this spirit 
 to-day labors not in vain ; when every reform 
 in the outward condition of mankind, every 
 hope of liberty, and peace, and social justice is 
 but the undespairing aim of men who believe 
 that there is such a thing as a redeemed hu- 
 manity ; and this Christendom with its bles- 
 sings, its hopes, its toils, its immortal aspira- 
 tions, is the growth of the Word He spoke on 
 the Mount, He wrought on the Cross. Ecce 
 Homo ! Behold the Man ! Behold the relig- 
 ion of the Son of God and the Saviour of 
 mankind/ J 
 
 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS AND THEIR ADHERENTS. 
 
 Behold the religion that men would give 
 up. From this, they turn aside to be com- 
 forted by the unreal in Spiritualism, to be 
 mystified by the wonders of Theosophy, to be 
 
THE CASE STATED. 23 
 
 captivated by the deceptive cures of Christian 
 Science. 
 
 What these anti-Christian cults, which are 
 making inroads into the Household of Faith 
 are, we shall attempt to show in succeeding 
 chapters. We would now simply seek to 
 know who they are that have recourse to 
 them. 
 
 First; there are those who would gladly 
 be rid of the sense of responsibility for the 
 deeds done in the flesh. They may approve 
 of what is right but they do not do it. They 
 like neither to be compelled to do what is 
 right in the sight of God nor to suffer the 
 consequences of the evil that they have done. 
 This is the law of God and man, but they 
 would readily be attracted by any cult that 
 claimed to destroy the reality of sin or that 
 so expanded the idea of God as to destroy 
 His Personality and make of Him an all- 
 comprehensive and all-comprehending non- 
 entity. It is useless, however. We must all 
 appear before the judgment seat of Christ, 
 that " every one may receive the things done 
 
24 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 in his body, according to that he has done, 
 whether it be good or bad." 
 
 Next, there are those, poor souls, not well 
 grounded in the faith, who know not what 
 the Church and Bible teach, who have not 
 experienced the comforts of religion and are 
 ignorant of the purposes of the Almighty. 
 When afflictions come upon them, or even 
 adversity, they cannot realize that the Al- 
 mighty may have meant it for some good end, 
 as He does not willingly afflict or grieve the 
 children of men. At first they are stunned, 
 next they rebel, then they turn from the only 
 help in time of need, to the vanities and 
 deceptions of human ingenuity. 
 
 The last class are those who see not in the 
 religion of Jesus something to be incorpo- 
 rated into and give true character to their 
 daily life, something to can-3' them out of 
 themselves into the world of loving sympathy 
 and beneficence, whose indolence and selfish- 
 ness are at the root of all their ills. These 
 might interest themselves in the mysterious 
 and uncanny or they would selfishly assent 
 
THE CASE STATED. 25 
 
 to any system or cult that would rid the 
 world of all pain and suffering. Do they not 
 know that the Master Himself " went not up 
 to joy but first He suffered pain: He entered 
 not into glory before He was crucified? So 
 truly our way to eternal life is to suffer here 
 with Christ." 4 ' It is the will of God. His 
 eternal purpose cannot be changed. He sent 
 His Son into the world that the world 
 through Him might be saved. He sent His 
 Son to be the Light of the world and marvel- 
 lously has He dispelled the darkness. Let us 
 then not be led astray and deceived by the 
 false counsel and works that be of men, but 
 let us open our hearts more and more to the 
 truth as it is in Jesus, that we may be forever 
 illuminated by the light of truth and life. 
 
 4 Prayer Book Office for the Sick. 
 
Spiritualism* 
 
 ITS CLAIMS, MANIFESTATIONS AND PHE- 
 NOMENA. 
 
 T^HE problem of life and death is indeed a 
 mystery. What is before lis? How are 
 we to triumph over the temptations that 
 allure us, the difficulties that beset us and the 
 obstacles that lie in our path, so as to accom- 
 plish the purpose for which we were sent into 
 the world ? But above all, what becomes of 
 us? What are man's condition and circum- 
 stances after death ? 
 
 A DEAD FAITH. 
 
 With a dead, worthless faith, many 
 go through life, carelessly indifferent to 
 these things, living in the narrow, selfish 
 
SPIRITUALISM. 27 
 
 enjo3 r mentof the hope of temporalities. With- 
 out the comforts and benefits of a holy 
 Christian living, they are suddenly brought 
 in pain and sorrow to confront the great 
 problems of life. With no preparation, they 
 ask with a cry, that pierces our hearts : 
 "What is the purpose of life? What is the 
 meaning of death ? Where is my loved one ? 
 Why, if there is a God, was I not warned and 
 prepared for this great trouble that is come 
 upon me ? ' ' Painfully they are made to realize, 
 at such a time, the truth of S. Paul's words : 
 "Now we see through a glass darkly," enig- 
 matical^, as every phase of life is then an 
 enigma to them. Hopelessly they admit that 
 "now we know in part," and what they do 
 not know of life, makes it full of mystery to 
 them. The only solution is through faith in 
 Jesus Christ, but they have not learned to 
 walk by faith rather than by knowledge; their 
 faith is dead, and so the door of peace, and 
 comfort, and hope is closed to them. We 
 cannot chide them, but we do pity them and 
 pray that the Almighty "who does not will- 
 
28 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 ingly afflict or grieve the children of men," 
 would sanctify this affliction to their good, 
 and in spite of their faithlessness, selfishness 
 and rebelliousness, might "so fetch them 
 home" again to His flock that they might 
 henceforth enjoy the "comfort of a reason- 
 able, religious and holy hope." I say: "Fetch 
 them home again," because they know that 
 there is a much more perfect vision, a much 
 more complete knowledge than that now 
 vouchsafed them ; but they are not willing to 
 wait, till all shall be revealed. They want to 
 know now and so they turn from the religion 
 of Jesus Christ to attempt the impossible and 
 seek through forbidden ways to peer into 
 that which Almighty God has concealed be- 
 hind an impenetrable veil. 
 
 SPIRITUALISM. 
 
 Their faithlessness, their despair, their 
 eagerness for more light makes them easy, 
 not to say willing, victims of that relic of 
 those ancient heathen religions, whose priests 
 trafficked upon the ignorance and supersti- 
 
SPIRITUALISM. 29 
 
 tion of the people, who lived in darkness and 
 had not yet seen the Great Light. I refer, of 
 course, to Spiritualism. It is not new. It 
 has existed in some form or other almost 
 from man's infancy. It is based upon the 
 assumption that the spirits of the dead can 
 and do communicate with the living, through 
 the agency of peculiarly constituted persons 
 called mediums, and that certain physical 
 phenomena, which transcend all known nat- 
 ural laws, are produced by direct action of 
 spirits or by spiritualistic power imparted to 
 mediums, or others peculiarly susceptible to 
 such influence. A partial truth lies at the 
 root of this error, for the spirit of man does 
 not die, but continues to exist after separa- 
 tion from the body; in addition to this, we 
 are more influenced by spiritual powers, as 
 we go through the earth-life, than we imagine. 
 Aside from these facts, we see in Spirit- 
 ualism nothing but useless and profitless 
 imposition, deceit and trickery, accompanied 
 by most mercenary motives. Moreover, if 
 these mediums are influenced by spiritualistic 
 
30 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 powers, they are the powers of darkness not 
 of the light, for they are subject (if at all) to 
 evil spirits and not to the spirits of departed 
 saints. 
 
 MODERN SPIRITUALISM. 
 
 Spiritualism was revived in, or, we may 
 say, Modern Spiritualism dates from 1848, 
 through the Voss or Fox sisters of Hydes- 
 ville, New York, who called attention to the 
 various rappings that occurred when they 
 were present, and who devised a code of com- 
 munication whereby conversation could be 
 carried on with the supposed intelligence 
 alleged to produce these sounds. From this 
 circumstance, quite an impetus was given to 
 Spiritualism and large numbers of circles 
 were established both in this country and in 
 Europe. To what purpose are these circles 
 or seances held! Manifestly to record the 
 wonderful table tipping, raps, automatic 
 writing with pencil or planchette or ouija 
 board, writings in a folded slate without vis- 
 ible means, trance-speaking or letter-writing; 
 the production of physical phenomena, such 
 
SPIRITUALISM. 31 
 
 as lights, musical sounds, playing upon vis- 
 ible or invisible instruments, bringing flowers 
 or other material objects into closed rooms, 
 the materialization of hands or complete 
 human figures, spirit photography, floating 
 in the air without visible means of support, 
 etc. Such manifestations and phenomena, it 
 is claimed, prove the genuineness of spiritual- 
 istic communications ; and such communica- 
 tions are alleged to be the attested proof of 
 the survival of the departed who furnish 
 instruction in moral and philosophical knowl- 
 edge. 
 
 SPIRITUALISM OF NO BENEFIT SPIRITUALLY, 
 MENTALLY, INTELLECTUALLY. 
 
 Now in the first place, we have reason to 
 thank" God that the reality of the life beyond 
 the grave does not depend upon the flimsy 
 prop of Spiritualism, but on the fact of the 
 resurrection of Jesus Christ. 
 
 In the second place, what moral ben- 
 efit could possibly follow from these alleged 
 spiritualistic manifestations, the purpose of 
 which is to attempt that which God in 
 
32 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 His wise providence hath thought wise not 
 to permit, or to make clear that which 
 God will not now reveal? What comfort 
 can the afflicted possibly derive from the 
 materialization of a hand or arm or even 
 of the whole body of a departed friend, which 
 cannot be touched, but must be viewed in the 
 dim, uncertain light in which evil revels? 
 What solace can be derived from the silly 
 twaddle said to be a message from the spirit- 
 land? What lack of considerateness, not to 
 say love, is manifest in the alleged spirits of 
 our departed communicating with us through 
 a third party, a stranger, and then only upon 
 the assurance that like the Gypsy fortune- 
 teller, we must cross the hand of the medium 
 with silver? Unfortunately the days of 
 superstition and humbuggery are not over, 
 and it would seem that the people like to be 
 deceived, even as Jeremiah said of old : " The 
 prophets prophesy falsely and the priests 
 bear rule by their means and my people love 
 to have it so." 1 
 
 i Jer. y. 31. 
 
SPIRITUALISM. 33 
 
 But surely, there can be no moral grand- 
 eur, no uplifting of the soul, no broadening of 
 the mind, no advance in the way of righteous- 
 ness, not even any real or lasting comfort in 
 such things as these. In fact in no respect 
 has Spiritualism enlightened, advanced or 
 benefitted mankind. 
 
 In the third place, as to knowledge, moral 
 or philosophical, Spiritualism affords none. 
 It has done, it is doing, nothing for the intel- 
 lectual improvement of mankind ; it is not a 
 benefit mentally or morally. Indeed its man- 
 ifestations are not from the spirit-land and 
 its phenomena are in no sense supernormal. 
 
 IT IS DECEPTION. 
 
 Its spirit rappings are declared to be 
 physiological, as one of the Fox sisters is said 
 to have admitted that the rapping by which 
 they started the modern phase of Spiritualism 
 was produced by a dislocation of their knee 
 or other joints and suddenly snapping them 
 back again. 2 
 
 2 Before her death she is said to have retracted this 
 confession. 
 
34 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 Slate-writing is simply a trick of legerde- 
 main, spirit letter-writing is deceit, spirit 
 photograph nothing but composite pictures, 
 materialization undoubted tricker} r , while 
 many mediums, having been worsted, have 
 admitted that they practiced deceit. 
 
 INVESTIGATIONS. 
 
 Most intelligent commissions have investi- 
 gated the claims of Spiritualism. The Ley- 
 bert commission, from the University of Penn- 
 sylvania, after a thorough yet unprejudiced 
 examination, declared that they could not 
 discover a single novel fact and that they 
 could employ men to do the same things done 
 by mediums. The Italian commission, before 
 whom the Neapolitan medium, Madame Pal- 
 ladino, held sittings, was rather unsatis- 
 factory, some being convinced of the super- 
 normal character of the phenomena, others 
 being unable to offer any satisfactory explan- 
 ation. This may seem to favor the claims of 
 spiritualists who seek to convince by ocular 
 demonstration, not by unassailable testi- 
 
SPIRITUALISM. 35 
 
 monv; but the same claim can be made by 
 prestidigitators. With them, we know it is 
 trickery; or rather skill in deceiving their 
 audiences, they admit it; yet we cannot 
 explain how it is done. Moreover, the most 
 expert of them stand ready to duplicate any 
 phenomenon done by mediums, and that not 
 by occult powers, but their own skill. We 
 know too that the jugglers of India and 
 Egypt are marvellous adepts, but we do not 
 know that any supernormal powers are at 
 their command. 3 The story has been pub- 
 lished of the great prestidigitator, Kellar, 
 seeing an Egyptian juggler perform a hang- 
 ing in the open before a multitude, when the 
 rope came down from above, as from the 
 clouds, at his command. No success in the 
 attempt to explain this feat was made by 
 Kellar until he brought a mirror with him, 
 and w^hen it did not reflect the rope (showing 
 that there was indeed no rope to be reflected) 
 Kellar concluded the whole throng was hyp- 
 notized. The field of hypnotism, or mesmer- 
 
 3 Narrated from memorv. 
 
36 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 ism, presents the widest opportunities for de- 
 ception, for making things that are not, as 
 though they did appear, for making people 
 see things that are not. It affords ample 
 opportunity for bewildering and deceiving 
 people, but without the necessity of having 
 recourse to spiritualistic communications at 
 all. If there be anything in what is known 
 as the odylic force — that mysterious power 
 developed in connection with the brain as the 
 nerve centre, and by which it was attempted 
 to account for the phenomena of animal mag- 
 netism — it is only another link in the chain of 
 evidence that demonstrates that these mys- 
 terious phenomena are distinctly physiolog- 
 ical, and in no way dependent upon spiritual- 
 istic communication. 
 
 LIFE'S MYSTERIES AND SPIRITUALISM'S 
 UNSUBSTANTIATED CLAIMS. 
 
 We need not to be assured of the truth 
 of S. Paul's assertions, "now we see through 
 a glass darkly .... now we know in 
 part." Life is full of mysteries, and what 
 
SPIRITUALISM. 37 
 
 little we see reflected as we are passing 
 through, makes it one vast enigma. We 
 are puzzled, perplexed. We know so little 
 that it seems to make the problem of life the 
 more difficult of solution. 
 
 We would know more, and Spiritualism 
 comes forward w r ith the claim that it can 
 communicate with those beyond the veil, and 
 through such means is enabled to clear our 
 vision and give us that more perfect knowl- 
 edge that we crave. It would substantiate 
 its claims, not by unassailable testimony, but 
 by ocular demonstration, by manifestations 
 and phenomena. But these evidences have 
 so often been detected as fraudulent, mediums 
 have so repeatedly admitted trickery, com- 
 missions have so many times declared that 
 there was nothing supernatural therein, pres- 
 tidigitators so confidently declared their 
 ability to reproduce any phenomena said to 
 be done by spiritualistic power and have sub- 
 stantiated such claims, there are so many 
 ways by which all these things maybe shown 
 to be physiological phenomena, that the con- 
 
38 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 elusion is irresistible: Spiritualism does not 
 and cannot substantiate its claims. Its 
 manifestations and phenomena in no sense 
 prove that they are due to spiritualistic com- 
 munications or powers. 
 
 CHRIST THE SOLUTION. 
 
 We, however, are passing through this 
 earth-life but once. Who then, amid all the 
 trials, sorrows, perplexities and mysteries of 
 life, can afford to place any confidence, can 
 hope for any comfort, from that which is sur- 
 rounded with so much fraud, deceit and un- 
 substantiated claims? 
 
 On the other hand, Luthardt, in Funda- 
 mental Truths says: " Man is a question; 
 the word of Christ is its answer. Man is an 
 enigma; the word of Christ is its solution. 
 In an algebraical equation of three known 
 quantities and one unknown, viz., X, the 
 value of X being found, the correctness of the 
 solution is proven by its perfect accordance 
 with the other quantities. And the case here 
 is exactly parallel. The word of Christ 
 
SPIRITUALISM. 39 
 
 satisfies the equation of our nature ; it is the 
 solution of the X, of the unknown quantity 
 within us." 
 
 Let us not, then, ask for the impossible or 
 try to circumvent God and peer into the 
 unknown, but let us walk by faith through 
 life ; with Christ as our guide, let us abide in 
 the truth as it is in Him. Then may we look 
 confidently forward to the time when we shall 
 see face to face "and know as we are known." 
 
Spiritualism. 11T* 
 
 SUBJECTION TO SPIRITS. 
 
 TN considering the manifestations and phe- 
 nomena whereby it is attempted to show 
 the power of Spiritualism, we found the 
 claims of spiritual communication not proven 
 and the manifestation and phenomena so 
 surrounded with trickery, deceit and fraud, as 
 to be unworthy of any consideration what- 
 ever. Continuing the subject of Spiritualism, 
 we would say of those honest, earnest and 
 learned men who accept the claims of spirit- 
 ualistic communications in good faith, that 
 the weight of evidence is against them and 
 that men, learned men, may be earnest, sin- 
 cere, positive, and yet be mistaken. 
 
 SPIRITUAL EXISTENCE. 
 
 We believe in spiritual existence most 
 certainly. We believe that w r e still shall 
 
SPIRITUALISM. II. 41 
 
 live, though the body crumble in the dust. 
 S. Paul, speaking by inspiration, says : 
 "Put on the whole armor of God that ye 
 may be able to stand against the wiles of 
 the devil. For we wrestle, not against flesh 
 and blood, but against the principalities, 
 against the powers, against the world rulers 
 of this darkness, against the spiritual hosts 
 of wickedness in the heavenly pi aces/ ' Thus 
 forcibly is declared a super- terrestrial exist- 
 ence, that the air is infested with these imma- 
 terial beings, whose purpose is to tempt, to 
 deceive, to lead astray. 
 
 If these be the fallen angels, then there is 
 the multitude of the heavenly host, who left 
 not their first estate. And no one will dispute 
 the assertion that in the doctrine of angels, 
 yea in the very being of God, the Bible 
 teaches spiritual existences. 
 
 MAN'S SPIRIT. 
 
 Man is made in the image of his God. That 
 image must be spiritual, as God is Spirit, and 
 
42 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 it is the spiritual in man that does not 
 die. 1 
 
 Where, then, does man's spirit go at death ? 
 It is not left to roam in the earth or to drift 
 through the air. Christ said to the penitent 
 thief upon the Cross : " To-day shalt thou be 
 with Me in Paradise/ ' the beautiful Garden 
 of Eden, transferred from earth, the abode of 
 the blessed saints in light. 
 
 Moreover, S. Peter declared that during 
 those three days when our blessed Lord's 
 spirit was separated in death from His human 
 body, He went and preached unto the spirits 
 in prison. 2 In our Lord's parable of the 
 rich man and Lazarus, we find the rich man, 
 after death, to be in a place of torments, from 
 which there was no escape and which was 
 separated from the place where Lazarus and 
 Abraham were (Paradise) by " a great gulf." 3 
 These passages would indicate that the spir- 
 its of the departed are confined in a region, 
 beyond the earth, yet short of heaven, w r hich 
 
 1 See Heb. xi. 39, 40 ; Matt. xxii. 30. 
 
 2 1. S. Pet. iii. 19. 3 §. Luke xvi. 23. 
 
SPIRITUALISM. II. 43 
 
 the Church defines (none too definitely, be- 
 cause she knows only in part) as the " place 
 of departed spirits/ ' 
 
 THE INTERMEDIATE STATE. 
 
 We next inquire: "What has ever been 
 learned concerning this Intermediate State 
 from those who have appeared from the dead? 
 Absolutely nothing. Moses and Elijah, who 
 appeared on the Mount of the Transfigura- 
 tion and were seen of Peter, James and John, 
 talked only with the Lord. 
 
 We turn to the son of the widow of 
 Zarephath. to the son of the widow of Nain, 
 to Lazarus, the brother of Martha and Mary, 
 ' whose body lay four days in the grave, and 
 we find their lips sealed. There were those 
 who came forth from the grave at the resur- 
 rection, but they left not a word for living 
 humanity. 
 
 Calling to mind S. Paul's being caught up 
 into the "third heaven' ' and "hearing un- 
 speakable words" which he declared "it was 
 not lawful for a man to utter," 4 shall we not be 
 
 ±11. Cor., xii. 2-4. 
 
44 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 justified in concluding that the uniform silence 
 of those who have tasted of death , is because it 
 is "not lawful" for men to speak on such 
 matters ; it is forbidden of God ? 
 
 Moreover, in our Lord's parable, we 
 remember Dives pleaded with Abraham to 
 send Lazarus to his five brothers, who were 
 still living, "that he may testify unto them 
 lest they also come into this place of torment." 
 To his plea: "If one w^ent unto them from 
 the dead, they will repent," Abraham replies : 
 "If they hear not Moses and the prophets, 
 neither will they be persuaded, though one 
 rose from the dead." 
 
 COMMUNICATING WITH THE DEAD. 
 
 As the Lord gave the Jews Moses and the 
 prophets, so He hath given us the Church and 
 the Bible, to lead us into the way of truth 
 and life. These are more persuasive than one 
 returning from the dead ; and the inference is 
 plain, that no communication shall be sent 
 from the dead to help those who will not be 
 satisfied with the Gospel of Jesus Christ. 
 For in that Gospel we behold the merciful 
 
SPIRITUALISM. II. 45 
 
 God's message to fallen men that alone can 
 be effectual in turning them from their sins. 
 
 Moreover, it is impossible to find in the 
 Holy Scriptures any sanction for the consul- 
 tation of the dead. Moses and Elijah on the 
 Mount of the Transfiguration represented the 
 saints of the Lord, both being clothed in 
 glorified bodies like His own ; but when Peter 
 would make them tabernacles, indicating 
 that he would have them remain and abide 
 on earth again, behold the vision was swept 
 from his sight by a cloud, out of which was 
 heard the Voice : " This is My Beloved Son ; 
 hear ye Him; " thus plainly teaching that they 
 should seek Him alone. 
 
 Again, with the possible exception of 
 Samuel (and we firmly believe that Saul 
 was deceived, possibly hypnotized, when he 
 thought he " perceived Samuel appearing to 
 him through the machinations of the witch 
 of Endor" 5 ) — with this possible exception, 
 there is not in Scripture the slightest intima- 
 tion of even the possibility of any communica- 
 
 5 1. Sam., xxviii. 
 
46 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 tion between the departed in the Lord and 
 those who still remain on earth. 
 
 More than this, the Bible nowhere inti- 
 mates that the departed can even see what 
 may be taking place on the earth. "In one 
 instance" says Pember, "it seems to be 
 assumed that they cannot. For the Good 
 Shepherd, after finding the lost sheep, calls 
 His friends and neighbors and bids them 
 rejoice with Him. Now His neighbors are 
 probably the angels, for they dwell where He 
 is, and it is not unlikely that the spirits in 
 paradise are His friends. ' Henceforth/ He 
 said to His disciples, * I call you not servants : 
 for the servant knoweth not what his lord 
 doeth : but I have called you friends ; for all 
 things that I have heard of My Father, I 
 have made known unto you.' 6 It would 
 seem, then, that whenever any poor wanderer 
 is brought back to the fold, the Lord calls the 
 spirits of his relatives and friends who have 
 already entered into rest, tells them that the 
 lost is found, and rejoices with them in the 
 
 6S. Tohnxv. 15. 
 
SPIRITUALISM. II. 47 
 
 knowledge that His beloved and theirs is 
 reconciled to the Father, and will soon join 
 their happy and never ending fellowship. 
 But if it be necessary for Christ to announce 
 this good news to the blessed spirits, it is 
 clear that they cannot be watching their 
 friends who are still in the flesh." 7 
 
 ANGELS. 
 
 Scripture speaks repeatedly, however, of 
 the ministry of angels, but we are to bear in 
 mind that they communicate with man not 
 of their own volition, or because influenced 
 by man, but as the express messengers of 
 God, sent of Him for some specific purpose, 
 sent to reveal God's eternal truth. But angels 
 are not disembodied spirits, neither are they 
 the glorified forms of the departed of this 
 world. They are a distinct creation, nor can 
 we be like unto them until after the resurrec- 
 tion. 8 
 
 EVIL SPIRITS AND DEMONS. 
 
 But the Scriptures do also speak in no 
 uncertain measures of evil spirits which war 
 
 7 Earth's Earliest Ages, 344. »S. Luke xx. 35, 36. 
 
48 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 against the soul and seek to lead men to 
 destruction, and S. Paul urges us to put on 
 the whole armor of God, because we have to 
 wrestle against "the spiritual hosts of wick- 
 edness in the heavenly places, " 9 who are 
 undoubtedly emissaries of "the prince of the 
 power of the air, the spirit that now worketh 
 in the children of disobedience.' ' 10 
 
 If, therefore, as S. Paul says : "The work- 
 ing of Satan is with all power and signs and 
 lying wonders," 11 and the air swarms with 
 rebellious spirits, though they be forbidden 
 to communicate with man, or to influence him 
 to evil, we need not be surprised at the dis- 
 obedience, occasional manifestation and open 
 interference in the affairs of men, of these 
 rebellious spirits. 
 
 I.-SCRIPTURAL REFERENCE TO COLLUSION BE- 
 TWEEN EVIL SPIRITS AND MEN.-O.T. 
 
 In the Scriptures we find repeated al- 
 lusions to the dealings between men and 
 evil spirits, and of the latter taking pos- 
 
 9Eph. vi. 12 (R.V.). lOEph.ii. 2. 
 
 nil. Thess. ii. 9 (R.V.). 
 
SPIRITUALISM. II. 49 
 
 session of the former. In the enumera- 
 tion of those who thus have fellowship 
 with demons, and thereby claim super- 
 normal powers, Pember enumerates "the 
 sacred scribes;" 12 said to be identical with 
 the medium writers of to-day; u the wise 
 men;" 13 wizards, who claimed greater than 
 human power through intercourse with su- 
 pernatural beings ; the diviners by omens or 
 spirit communications ; the mesmerist, obtain- 
 ing oracles through his subject; the augurs, 
 divining by flight of birds, etc.; those using 
 incantations or magical formulas ; the spell 
 binders, who used charms or amulets; the 
 consulters of demons; the knowing ones (i.e., 
 through associating with spirits); the necro- 
 mancers or seekers of the dead; the whisperers 
 or mutterers ; the star-gazers ; the deliverers 
 of monthly predictions from observations ; 
 the sorcerers and astrologers, mentioned by 
 Daniel. 
 
 II. -N. T. REFERENCE. 
 
 In the New Testament, mention is made of 
 the magi, priests who interpreted dreams and 
 12 Gen. xli. 8. ^Ex. vii. 11. 
 
50 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 omens, who were soothsayers, who seemed to 
 be acquainted with the practices of modern 
 spiritualism ; the pharmacists, those who use 
 drugs, whether for poisoning or as a magic 
 potion, who were sorcerers; and those who 
 practiced curious magical arts and traf- 
 ficked in amulets. "It will be observed," says 
 Pember, "that demoniacal arts fall readily 
 into three classes. The first comprises all 
 kinds of divination by omens, tokens and for- 
 bidden sciences; the second, the use of spells 
 and incantations as a means of accomplish- 
 ing what is desired; and the third, every 
 method of direct and intelligent communica- 
 tion and cooperation with demons." 14 
 
 I.-SCRIPTURAL CONDEMNATION OF COMMUNI- 
 CATION WITH EVIL SPIRITS. -O. T. 
 
 Pember believes in the willing commun- 
 ication of men with evil spirits or demons, 
 and the Bible would seem to admit and con- 
 demn the practice, " Thou shalt not suffer a 
 
 14 See Pember's Earth's Earliest Ages, pp. 256-265. 
 
SPIRITUALISM. II. 51 
 
 witch to live," 15 says the Law. And, again, 
 "A man or a woman that hath a familiar 
 spirit, or that is a wizard, shall surely be put 
 to death ; they shall stone them with stones ; 
 their blood be upon them." 16 
 
 Again, the Lord declared of the Levites 
 that they should not learn to do after the 
 abomination of the nations in the land of 
 promise: " There shall not be found among 
 you any one that maketh his son or his 
 daughter to pass through fire, or that useth 
 divination or an observer of times, or an 
 enchanter, or a witch, or a charmer, or a 
 consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, 
 or a necromancer." 17 
 
 The frequent condemnation in the Law of 
 the practices of all kinds of sorcery was neces- 
 sary in order to destroy the influence of the 
 Egyptian art among the chosen people, and 
 to prepare them against similar arts in the 
 land of promise. 
 
 Saul, probably at the instigation of Sam- 
 uel, set about to exterminate these evil-doers 
 
 is Ex. xxii. 18. is Lev. xx. 27. ** Deut. xviii. 10, 11. 
 
52 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 so vigorously, that the few that survived 
 practised only in secret. And if, in his dis- 
 tress at his latter end, Saul himself consulted 
 the witch of En dor, we are told the crime 
 sealed his doom. 18 
 
 II. -CONDEMNATION IN N.T. 
 
 If in the Old Testament witches, necro- 
 mancers, dealers with familiar spirits and 
 sorcerers of any and all kinds are commanded 
 to be destroyed, so in the New Testament we 
 read that " the fearful and unbelieving and the 
 abominable .... and sorcerers and idol- 
 aters and all liars are to have their part in 
 the lake that burneth with fire and brim- 
 stone, which is the second death.' ' 
 
 IDOLATRY AND DEMONOLOGY. 
 
 1. This entire system of abominations was 
 found of old to be associated with idolatry. 
 Now the Bible does assuredly seem to recog- 
 nize spiritual existences behind the idols of 
 heathenism and declares that these existences 
 are demons. It does not dispute therefore the 
 fact of their being- but the truth of their pre- 
 
 18 I. Chron. x. 13. 
 
SPIRITUALISM. II. 53 
 
 tensions. Thus the Lord is said to have pun- 
 ished the gods of the Egyptians when he slew 
 the first born of man and beast. 19 And when 
 Jehovah is declared to be the "God of gods 
 and Lord of lords/' 20 to be highly exalted 
 above all gods, to be feared above all gods, it 
 must be that these gods, with whom He is 
 contrasted, are real existences. In Deut. 
 xxxii. 17 it is said, " They sacrificed unto 
 demons, not to God; to gods whom they 
 knew not;" and Ps. xcvi. 5, according to the 
 Septuagint, reads : " For all the gods of the 
 nations are demons but the Lord made the 
 heavens." 
 
 2. In the New Testament S. Paul says: 
 "For though there be beings called gods, 
 whether in heaven or upon earth — as there 
 actually are gods many and lords many — yet 
 to us there is One God the Father — and One 
 Lord Jesus Christ." 21 
 
 Again, it is S. Paul that says : " The things 
 which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to 
 demons, and not to God; and I do not wish 
 
 19 Ex. xii. 12 ; Num. xxxiii. 4. 
 
 2 Deut. x. 17. 21 I. Cor. viii. 4-6. 
 
54 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 you to have communion with demons. Ye 
 cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup 
 of demons. " 22 
 
 As Pember says : "An idol, the creation of 
 man's fancy, is nothing; but it is not possible 
 that men could be moved to worship noth- 
 ing; there is a real power behind them. The 
 heathen think they are sacrificing to Deity; 
 but their offerings ascend to demons, and by 
 their sacrificial feasts, they establish a fellow- 
 ship with unclean spirits, similar to that 
 which exists between Christ and His Church. 
 It is plain therefore that the evil spirits which 
 haunt the air are the beings whom the 
 heathen worship, the inspirers of oracles and 
 sooth-say ers, the originators of all idolatry, 
 the powers that are ever striving by divers 
 means to subjugate the human race to their 
 sway." 23 
 
 SPIRITUALISM A PART OF THE SYSTEM OF 
 DEMONOLOGY. 
 
 As we read the Scriptures understanding^ 
 
 then, we readily infer that from ancient time 
 
 22 I. Cor. x. 19-21. 23 Earth's Earliest Ages, 240. 
 
SPIRITUALISM. II. 55 
 
 aerial forms, visions, oracles, sooth-saying, 
 spirit writing, voices of the unseen, magnetic 
 healing, in fact, spirit communications, aug- 
 uries, omens, tokens, lucky and unlucky days 
 and numbers, potions, amulets, charms, 
 fetiches, relics, are part of the countless pre- 
 scriptions of demoniacal systems. But modern 
 Spiritualism revels in spirit communications, 
 spirit writings, visions, oracles and such like. 
 Therefore modern Spiritualism too is part of 
 this demoniacal S3^stem, part of the plan of 
 Satan, to bring men under the influence of 
 demons and evil spirits. 
 
 MIND READING. 
 
 But it is asked : How do you explain the 
 wonderful things revealed by mediums con- 
 cerning past and future? Dean Hart, of 
 Denver, writes that when an undergraduate, 
 spending his vacation in his father's parish in 
 a Yorkshire dale, there came there a conjurer, 
 Signor Barnado, with a clairvoyant who 
 would describe articles given the conjurer by 
 the audience or repeat sentences silently 
 
56 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 recited. A friend of the Dean's was at the 
 time off at his trotiting grounds. Knowing 
 well the room in which he sat, the Dean wrote 
 him to ask him to be examining his fly book 
 at 9 o'clock p.m. At that hour the Dean stood 
 up in the audience and said to the conjurer: 
 "I have a friend thirty miles from here. I 
 want to know what he is doing and where he 
 is": declaring that he knew what his friend 
 w^as about. Continuing in his own words : 
 " He put the question to the blindfolded girl, 
 and she began to describe my friend to the 
 life, fresh face, his blue spotted necktie, his 
 gold spectacles, the mahogany furniture, the 
 green figured cloth on the table, the fluted 
 silver candlesticks; he was reading a book. 
 'What is it about?' asked Barnado. 'I do 
 not know' said the girl. 'Turn to the title 
 page and read it.' 'There is no title page.' 
 Then suddenly after a short pause, she said, 
 'It's about fly-fishing.' Now, I said, what is 
 the name of the village? Barnado asked me 
 if I would tell him, and he would stand near 
 me, and away from the platform, but I replied 
 
SPIRITUALISM. II. 57 
 
 that I preferred not to do so. He then asked 
 the girl if she could tell, and after a moment 
 or two, she rightly replied : ' Pateley Bridge/ 
 As this very interesting episode was in pro- 
 gress, I found she was reading my mind. As 
 I arranged the furniture in the room, so did 
 she; as I pictured the fluted silver candle- 
 sticks, so exactly she described them ; and if I 
 had put on the end of my tongue that my 
 friend was fishing at Timbuctoo, she would 
 have said so." 24 
 
 Thus was the power of the medium ex- 
 plained without the aid of spirits. And we 
 firmly believe that all their wonderful power 
 of healing and revealing can be explained by 
 means of the subjective mind, the doubled 
 consciousness and hypnotic suggestion. 
 
 COMMUNICATIONS FROM EVIL SPIRITS ADMIT- 
 TEDLY FALLIBLE AND UNRELIABLE. 
 
 If there can be anything supernormal in 
 Spiritualism, however, it is due not to com- 
 munication with the spirits of our blessed dead 
 
 24 "A Way That Seemeth Right." Hart. pp. 53-54. 
 
58 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 but to evil spirits , to demons who are evidently 
 lying in wait to deceive. Thus, Croesus, the 
 king of Lydia, is said to have consulted the 
 Delphic oracle before giving battle to the king 
 of Persia. The Pythoness declared : " Croesus, 
 if he cross the Halys, will destroy a great 
 empire/ ' Too late he learned that the empire 
 to be destroyed was his own. 
 
 Ah, whoever consults with evil that 
 does not have to pay dearly for it! For 
 these utterances of demons are always uncer- 
 tain, deceitful and meant so to be. So true 
 is this, that a canon of Spiritualism reads : 
 " That communications from the spirit world, 
 whether by mental impression, inspiration, 
 or any other mode of transmission, are not 
 necessarily infallible truth ; but, on the con- 
 trary, partake unavoidabVy of the imperfec- 
 tions of the minds from which they emanate, 
 and of the channels through w^hich they 
 come, and are, moreover, liable to misrepre- 
 sentation by those to whom they are ad- 
 dressed. "25 
 
 25 See Earth's Earliest Ages 339. 
 
SPIRITUALISM. II. 59 
 
 If this is not a sufficient admission of the 
 unreliability of such alleged communications, 
 then T. L. Harris, in the Spiritualist, for June 
 25th, 1875, writes : " There is no dependence 
 to be placed on the mere verbal statements of 
 spirits as to their real belief. One class de- 
 ceives purposely ; they are simply flowing into 
 your general thought, and coinciding with 
 devout convictions, for the purpose of obtain- 
 ing a supreme and ruinous dominion over 
 your mind and body. Another class are sim- 
 ply parasites, negatives, drawn into the per- 
 sonal sphere of the medium, and seeking to 
 sun themselves in its light and heat by ab- 
 sorbing the vital forces, on which they feed, 
 and by. means of which they, for a time, 
 revive their faded intelligence and apathetic 
 sense. To the Mohammedan, they confirm 
 the Koran; to the Pantheist, they deify 
 nature ; to the believer in the Divine Human- 
 ity they glorify the Word." If these demons 
 do reveal things through mediums how 
 utterly unreliable and useless such revela- 
 tion is. 
 
60 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 PURPOSE OF DEMONS TO DECEIVE. 
 
 In the case of demoniacal possession, of 
 which mention is made repeatedly in the New 
 Testament, the demon at times assumes com- 
 plete control over the subject in whom it 
 dwells. When cast out, as in the case of the 
 Philippian damsel, who had a spirit of divin- 
 ation (7i£., Pythonian spirit), which S. Paul 
 cast out, 26 the subject has no longer this 
 alleged supernormal power. 
 
 If, therefore, these demons take possession 
 of human subjects in order to interfere with 
 the affairs of men, if their purpose is to de- 
 ceive, if they are so uncertain that no depend- 
 ence can be placed in them, if they can only 
 give opinions and are compelled to .confess 
 that they know no more than we do, why 
 should any mortal be so wickedly foolish as 
 to waste time, money and faith consulting 
 them? 
 
 If, in the whole Bible, there is not a single 
 instance of these spirits of the air influencing 
 men for good, in the words of Isaiah why 
 
 2 6Actsxvi. 16-20. 
 
SPIRITUALISM. II. 61 
 
 should we inquire of them that have familiar 
 spirits and of wizards that chirp and mutter : 
 should not a people inquire of their God? 
 For the living should they inquire of the 
 dead ? ^ 
 
 GOD'S CONDEMNATION OF THE PRACTICE OF 
 CONSULTING DEMONS. 
 
 Moreover, has not God said in the terrible 
 words of the Law : " The soul that turneth 
 after such as have familiar spirits, and after 
 wizards, to go a whoring after them, I will 
 even set My Face against that soul, and will 
 cut him off from among his people? " Thus 
 would God punish those who consult demons. 
 
 SPIRITUALISM ANTI-CHRISTIAN. 
 
 Now the great abomination of this Spirit- 
 ualism, ancient and modern, is that it is 
 founded in direct defiance of the laws of God, 
 and is based upon an idolatrous substitution 
 of evil spirits (demons) for the Living God. 
 
 But we have called it Anti-Christian, and 
 S.John declares: "This is Anti-Christ, who 
 denieth the Father and the Son." We have 
 
 27 Is. viii. 19. 
 
62 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 already seen how it adapts itself to Moham- 
 medan, Pantheist, or Christian, as the case 
 may be. As for the Christ, it ignores Him as 
 the Saviour of mankind. It speaks of the Son 
 of God as a divine efflux, of the Father and 
 the Son as one Person, of Christ as a power- 
 ful medium and as a teacher to be classed 
 with Buddha, Confucius, Zoroaster. It blas- 
 phemously alleges of the Holy Spirit, that He 
 is the female element in the Godhead or that 
 He is the Holy Breath. It would put com- 
 municating spirits (demons) in the place of 
 God the Holy Spirit. 
 
 Notwithstanding the Gospel declares that 
 "now is the accepted time," and that the 
 Lord warns us that the destiny of man is 
 fixed in the intermediate state — in the joys of 
 Paradise or in the throes of the place of tor- 
 ment — Spiritualism teaches that man may 
 repair in that state the errors of a mis-spent 
 pilgrimage on earth, and that he passes 
 through seven spheres. 28 
 
 It teaches that " all crime is unpardonable 
 
 2* Earth's Earliest Ages, 364. 
 
SPIRITUALISM. II. 63 
 
 and could only be wiped out by personal 
 and not by vicarious atonement, as falsely 
 taught " 29 in Holy Scripture. 
 
 Thus it is seen that Spiritualism, though 
 outwardly tolerant, is really opposed to 
 Christianity. It would destroy belief in God 
 and the Saviour. It would substitute for 
 revealed religion a cult that abounds in 
 deceit, trickery and fraud, and that is 
 unscathingly condemned and forbidden in the 
 Bible. It claims ability to reveal that which 
 God has not made known, by a power given 
 through communication with the spirits of 
 the departed. It has, and can have, no com- 
 munication with the spirits of those who are, 
 according to the Bible, imprisoned in the 
 place of departed spirits. If it has any super- 
 normal powers at all, it is due to demons 
 who take possession of mediums, evil spirits, 
 the spiritual hosts of wickedness in heavenly 
 places, against whom we wrestle, the emis- 
 saries of the Prince of the powers of the air, 
 and the Prince of this world, against whose 
 
 2 9 Ghost Land, p. 43. 
 
64 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 wiles we need to put on the whole armor of 
 God, that we may be able to stand. 
 
 While we may not be able to define the 
 powers of these evil spirits, yet we know, 
 from the admission of spiritualists, that 
 their communications are "not infallible 
 truth," but partake of " imperfections," and 
 that these spirits " deceive purposely"; yea, 
 their purpose is primarily to deceive, to lead 
 away from the truth, in order to strengthen 
 the power and kingdom of Satan. And shall 
 we willingly be deceived ? 
 
 Ah, trust not to lying lips and deceitful 
 tongues. There is much that we would like to 
 know about this world with its sorrow, toil 
 and pain, but a merciful God has willed it other- 
 wise. It is not necessary, it is not best for 
 us, therefore we will not forsake God and the 
 Saviour, to be imposed upon by those who 
 claim power to peer beyond the impenetrable 
 veil and reveal what God wills not to reveal. 
 Instead we will accept God's plan of salva- 
 tion and redemption, and trusting upon a 
 merciful Father, leaning on a loving Saviour, 
 
SPIRITUALISM. II. 65 
 
 comforted by the sanctifying Spirit, we will, by 
 the grace given us, strive to fulfil our destiny 
 in life, do good in our generation and look 
 confidently forward to a reunion with our 
 dear departed, and to the time when we shall 
 see face to face and know as we are known. 
 
A 
 
 TTbeosopbs. I. 
 
 ITS ORIGIN AND PURPOSE. 
 
 FEW years ago heralds went forth 
 throughout the land to proclaim, with 
 sound of trumpets, a World's Parliament of 
 Religions. It was to be held in connection 
 with, an adjunct of, a sort of side light to, 
 the World's Fair. It was seized upon by the 
 promoters of the latter, just as a^^thing else 
 would have been, which they thought might 
 be of financial benefit to them in their great 
 undertaking. The real object, however, was 
 not to advance the cause of that Divine 
 organization, the Church Universal, which 
 has done so much for the enlightenment and 
 happiness of all mankind, which has shown 
 
THEOSOPHY. I. 67 
 
 itself to be the leaven which can and is, grad- 
 ually yet surely, leavening the whole world, 
 but in the hope that it might pave the way 
 for a sort of composite religion of marts con- 
 coction and an universal brotherhood. 
 
 Strange ; but it is not an original idea, for 
 one of the alleged purposes of the Theoso- 
 phical Society is to form the nucleus of an 
 Universal Brotherhood. 
 
 THEOSOPHY DEFINED. 
 
 Theosophy, as its name implies, is con- 
 trary to the generally accepted views of 
 S. Paul concerning the wisdom and knowl- 
 edge of God, that His judgments are unsearch- 
 able and His ways past finding out. 1 The- 
 osophy is one of those wisdom religions 
 which claim to have " special (if not complete) 
 insight into the Divine nature and its consti- 
 tutive moments and processes. " .... 
 "The Science of the Wisdom of God. " "It 
 starts with an explication of the Divine 
 essence and endeavors to deduce the phenom- 
 
 1 Rom. xi. 33. 
 
68 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 enal universe from the play of forces within 
 the Divine nature itself.' ? 2 " It sees no insolv- 
 able mystery anywhere, thrown the words 
 chance and coincidence out of its vocabulary, 
 and affirms the omnipresence and omnipo- 
 tence of law and perfect justice. It postulates 
 an Eternal Principle, unknowable except in 
 its manifestations, which is in and is all 
 things and which, periodically and eternally, 
 manifests itself and recedes from manifesta- 
 tion — evolution and involution. It affirms a 
 spiritual condition after death and number- 
 less flesh and blood lives on this and other 
 planets. In its practical working, it is a 
 most vicious fatalism. It destroys the free- 
 dom of the will. It leads man through the 
 world (or worlds) according to inexorable 
 law. It speaks of a justice that knows no 
 mercy under any circumstances. Its doc- 
 trines are based upon the ipse dixit of an 
 adept, a Mahatma, and there is no appeal 
 from their "say so." It must be accepted 
 absolutely. 
 
 2 En. Britannica. 
 
THEOSOPHY. I. 69 
 
 ITS CLAIMS AND ASSUMPTIONS. 
 
 The evolution of man is not, it claims, 
 carried out on this planet alone, but is the 
 result of many worlds and different condi- 
 tions of spiritual and material development ; 
 and the earth is one link in the chain of many 
 worlds. "All individual spiritual entities 
 must pass through the successive worlds of 
 the system. " This is the evolution of man. 
 
 Theosophy is claimed to be a religion, a 
 science and a philosophy: "A religion, be- 
 cause it aims to know, to become and there- 
 fore to worship, truth ; a science, because it 
 examines by strict analysis all processes in 
 nature in order to discover that which is ; a 
 philosophy, because by logical synthesis from 
 the facts of nature discovered by science, it 
 discloses the laws that underlie phenomena 
 and govern the universe." 
 
 Its tendency, however, is not to make the 
 truth clearer, but to further mystify; it 
 claims ability to explain all things, yet it does 
 not do so, but asserts that man is not in 
 
70 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 a condition to understand; it assumes too 
 many theories as facts ever to substantiate 
 its claims. It assumes the theory of evolu- 
 tion; it assumes the doctrine of re-incarna- 
 tions ; it assumes that there are such beings 
 as Mahatmas; that they can explain all 
 mysteries, and that they can and do com- 
 municate with man. These fundamental 
 principles of Theosophy are not, and cannot 
 be, proven. 
 
 ORIGIN. 
 
 Moreover, Theosophy, this very old cult, is 
 distinctly and avowedly pagan in its origin, 
 and paganism is an emanation from the 
 powers of the air, whose aim is the propaga- 
 tion of evil among men; and whose gods, 
 though false, are real, as implied in the Bible, 
 and are to be identified with the evil spirits 
 which interfere with the affairs of men, so as 
 to perplex, deceive and lead astray. Theos- 
 ophy, then, might well be called an emana- 
 tion or, considering its claims, a revelation 
 of evil spirits. 
 
THEOSOPHY. I. 71 
 
 Now , as in the days of Gnosticism , we know 
 there was an attempt to bolster up the decay- 
 ing heathen philosophy and religion by amal- 
 gamating with Christianity . So in these latter 
 da\^s, w^e find another attempt at amalgama- 
 tion in the hope that Theosophy may be the 
 leaven that will so permeate as to completely 
 change the blessed religion of Jesus Christ. 
 
 "We are told," according to Pember in 
 his admirable work on this subject, "that 
 Occultism is the wisdom of primal ages, a 
 revival of the only true philosophy, held by 
 all the great teachers of the world and com- 
 municated to the Initiates of the Mysteries. 
 And w T e are admonished that Christianity, 
 although it did contrive to displace the old 
 religions in the West, has proved a failure; 
 and that we must, therefore, return to that 
 which is better, and confess to the superiority 
 of ancient sages." 3 
 
 THE BROTHERHOOD. 
 
 By means of certain heathen symbols 
 which Christianity has purified and pre- 
 3 Theosophy, p. 36. 
 
72 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 served, it is claimed that Occultism has been 
 handed down from the times of the Mysteries 
 to the present. " The only Brotherhood now 
 mentioned in the outer world," says Pember, 
 "is one which extends its branches through- 
 out the East and of which the headquarters 
 are reported to be in Thibet." 4 Through the 
 advance of modern science and the develop- 
 ment of evolutionary philosophy, w^hich fitted 
 men for further instruction, these Brothers 
 determined to communicate with the world 
 and influence its science and religion. They, 
 however, were too " etherealized " to associ- 
 ate with "coarse human nature," therefore 
 they must w r ork through "intermediaries." 
 
 THE AMERICAN MISSION. 
 
 The first of these "intermediaries," we be- 
 lieve, was Madame Blavatski, grand-daughter 
 of Princess Dolgorouki. Born in Northern 
 Russia, in 1831, she married at seventeen, 
 Gen. Blavatski, who was 43 years her senior. 
 
 4 See Earth's Earliest Ages p. 400. 
 
THEOSOPHY. L 73 
 
 She left him after three months. 5 She is said 
 to have spent thirty years in the study of oc- 
 cult pursuits and travel, and is reputed to have 
 practiced Spiritualism. In 1857, she was 
 undoubtedly in Thibet. The following year 
 she was thrown from her horse and sustained 
 a fracture of the spine, and her pln^sical con- 
 dition was such that we are not surprised 
 that she was susceptible to hallucinations 
 and queer notions. Then she spent seven 
 years under the immediate direction of the 
 Brothers ; she was initiated, then instructed 
 for her mission and finally sent out into the 
 world to influence its religion and philosophy 
 with the doctrines of Occultism. She seems 
 to have come to America to begin her mission, 
 and in 1875 formed theTheosophical Society. 
 
 ITS OBJECTS AND THEIR ATTAINMENTS. 
 
 The objects of the society are said to be 
 threefold : 
 
 1. "To form the nucleus of a Universal 
 Brotherhood without an}' distinction what- 
 
 5 See Theosophy, p. 17. 
 
74 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 ever/' yet in undoubted opposition to the 
 Brotherhood of man under the Fatherhood of 
 God through Christ Jesus. 
 
 2. "To $tudy ancient literature, religion 
 and science" — evidently with the idea of 
 destroying the claims of Christianity as the 
 only true religion. 
 
 3. "To explore the hidden mysteries of 
 Nature and the latent powers of man," with 
 the idea of destroying belief in a personal 
 God and Father of us all. 
 
 4-. A fourth object, not as yet boldly 
 affirmed, is the destruction of Christianity, 
 declaring it, as we have seen, to be a failure, 
 so that we should "return to that which is 
 better and confess to the superiority of 
 ancient sages." 
 
 If we ask, how are these objects being 
 attained, we are referred to the work : Hints 
 on Esoteric Theosophy, 6 in which we learn 
 that in 1880 the Bombay branch sent a mixed 
 delegation of Hindus and Parsees to assist in 
 founding a Buddhist branch in Ceylon, and in 
 
 6 See Earth's Earliest Ages, p. 403. 
 
THEOSOPHY. I. 75 
 
 1881 the Buddhists reciprocated by sending 
 delegates to Tinnevelly to assist in organiz- 
 ing Hindu branches, and that they, with Col. 
 Olcott, the first American 7 captivated by 
 Madame Blavatski, were " received with 
 raptured welcome inside a most sacred Hindu 
 Temple/ ' This same work sends out the state- 
 ment that in 1883 they had seventy branches 
 in India "and many thousands of Mo- 
 hammedans, Buddhists, Parsees, Christians, 
 officials and non-officials, governors and 
 governed, have been brought together by its 
 instrumentality. " Apparently they are satis- 
 fied with its levelling powers. Theosophy 
 does not condemn any of these religions but 
 would explain them. It would draw all men 
 of whatever religions together on the same 
 level, and so has its Buddhist branches, Hindu 
 branches, Parsee branches. They are not 
 asked to change their religions but simply to 
 accept the theosophic explanation of them. 
 
 7 In 1875 Col. Olcott went to Vermont, as representa- 
 tive of a New York paper, to investigate the spiritualistic 
 manifestations of the Eddy Brothers. There he met 
 Mme. Blavatski, and soon became a willing disciple. 
 
76 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 Nominally Buddhists, Hindus, Parsees still, 
 they are really Theosophists only. Thus 
 they allow us to believe that one can be a 
 Theosophist and a Christian at the same 
 time, a manifest impossibility. See how it is 
 working. It sets forth a universal brother- 
 hood, a popular idea that attracts attention. 
 It advises a study of the ancient w r orld 
 religions, to keep its adherents interested, 
 with the possible idea of investigating 
 for oneself and increasing one's knowledge; 
 a worthy motive. It takes the symbols and 
 doctrines so long cherished in the Western 
 world and attempts to bring out an esoteric 
 theosophic truth underlying the Christian 
 error. Then, as published in Isis Unveiled^ 
 it furnishes authenticated accounts of all 
 crimes and misdemeanors, schisms and here- 
 sies, controversies and litigations, doctrinal 
 differences and Biblical criticisms and revi- 
 sions, with w T hich the press in Christian 
 lands teem, and sends them to " Palestine, 
 India, Ceylon, Cashmere, Tartary, Thibet, 
 
 8 Isis Unveiled, Vol. I., pp. 41-42. 
 
THEOSOPHY. L 77 
 
 China and Japan, in all of which countries it 
 has influential correspondents. " Its objects 
 with us then, may all be reduced to one — the 
 overthrow of Christianity and the supplant- 
 ing of all other religions with the idea of 
 establishing Theosophy or Occultism as the 
 one religion of the world. This shall be 
 brought about when the twelfth Messiah 
 shall come and, harmonizing the perverted 
 teachings of his predecessors, shall establish 
 "an universal religion which shall recognize 
 the Messiahs of all nations.' ' 
 
 THEOSOPHY VS. CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 Behold, then the purpose of putting all 
 religions, including Christianity, on a level, 
 namel\ r , that out of them as superior, yea, 
 supreme, may be evolved an universal reli- 
 gion, and that, Theosophy. 
 
 With all our worldliness and insincerity, are 
 we ready to give up the religion of Jesus Christ 
 for any Eastern mysticism? Are we ready 
 to put the religion of Jesus Christ on a level 
 with those ancient religions w T hich with all 
 
78 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 their claims, with all their age, have done and 
 can do so little for the advancement of man- 
 kind? Are we ready to acknowledge the 
 superiority of ancient sages, over the best 
 thought of the Western world to-day ? Are 
 we ready to give up ourselves into the power of 
 a system that claims ability to explain all 
 things, yet cannot? Are we ready to return 
 to heathen darkness and civilization? The 
 one way to do so, is to give up the blessed 
 religion of Jesus Christ. If you are not ready 
 for these things, then " beloved . . . beware 
 lest ye also being led away with the error of 
 the wicked, fall away from your own stead- 
 fastness/ ' 
 
Ubeosopbs Iff ♦ 
 
 ITS LEADING DOCTRINES AND FALSE 
 POSITION. 
 
 TN considering the origin and purpose of 
 Theosophy, we found that it is of pagan 
 conception, an attempt through the " superi- 
 ority of ancient sages" to build up the old 
 world religions, drag Christianity down to a 
 level with them, and so harmonize them all, 
 that out of them would spring an universal 
 religion, which, necessarily would be Theoso- 
 phy. It does not attack, directly, Christian- 
 ity or any other of the world's religions but 
 it would explain the doctrines and S3 r mbols 
 that we hold so dear according to theosophi- 
 cal truth, which of course would eliminate 
 
80 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 every Christian belief, hope and purpose 
 therefrom. We turn now to its doctrines. 
 
 DOCTRINES-A PERSONAL GOD. 
 
 First, as to our God and Father. We are 
 told that the ui Father in heaven' is a well 
 known esoteric phrase for the Higher Self, and 
 to pray * Our Father, who art in heaven' is, 
 in the initiate's mouth, an attempt to ' medi- 
 tate on and aspire to the Higher Self.' ' 
 
 Theosophy does not, cannot, admit a 
 personal God. It is based upon evolution 
 and is pantheistic, as proclaimed by Mrs. 
 Besant. To admit the Being of a personal 
 God and Creator, the Supreme Ruler of the 
 Universe, to whom all creatures do bow and 
 obey, would be to destroy the claims of 
 adepts, the authority of Mahatmas, and 
 undermine the foundations upon which 
 Theosophy stands; but to say: " God is all 
 and all is God," while not a dangerous 
 admission, is a convenient way of robbing 
 the Deity of all authority, without denying 
 Him actual existence, but the theosophist in 
 
THEOSOPHY. II. 81 
 
 denying a personal Deity must deny in reality 
 the religion of Jesus Christ, the revelation of 
 a personal God and Father. 
 
 The interplanetary ether, called in Occult- 
 ism, arteal fluid, is declared to be the first 
 manifestation of " Substance, " that which 
 sub-stands all phenomena ; and its ultimate 
 expression is what we call matter. " x Spirit 
 and matter are but different states of the one 
 substance. The substance of soul and all 
 things and the substance of Deity are the 
 same. The life of this Substance is called 
 God, who, being the Living Substance, is 
 both Life and Substance, i.e., two in one. 
 What is called (theologically) the Son and 
 the Word, which proceeds from these two, is 
 "the expression of both and is potentially 
 the Universe ;" but the term, "Son of God," 
 is a "title assumed by all Initiates, that 
 implies the assimilation of the Ego and the 
 Higher Self, as does the expression : ' I and 
 My Father are One,' " 2 while the Holy Spirit 
 
 iSee The Perfect Way, pp. 17, 18. 
 2 See Preface to Theosophy. 
 
82 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 is looked upon as the female element in the 
 Deity. 
 
 CHRIST. 
 
 Christ is declared to be a title given to all 
 triumphant initiates who have passed the 
 symbolical crucifixion and have become the 
 anointed masters of all nature. 3 Our blessed 
 Lord then is declared to be simply an Initiate, 
 not the Christ but a Christ or an adept who 
 has passed through many transmigrations 
 and has turned His life to best account by 
 development of the higher faculties and 
 qualities of man, 4 and He is associated with 
 Osiris, Mithras, Crishna Dionysus and Bud- 
 dha. Kenealy's Commentary on the Apoc- 
 alypse mentions eleven Messiahs: Adam, 
 Enoch, Fohi, Brigu, Zoroaster, Thoth, Moses, 
 Lao-Tseu, Jesus, Mohammed and Chenzig- 
 Khan. While these " Messengers " only af- 
 fected particular nations for the most part, 
 and their doctrines, through the corrup- 
 tion and ignorance of men, seemed contra- 
 
 3 See Article in Lucifer, October, 1891. 
 
 4 See The Periect Way, p. 226. 
 
THEOSOPHY. II. 83 
 
 dictory,yet a twelfth Messenger is to appear, 
 who is to harmonize the perverted teachings 
 of his predecessors and establish " a universal 
 religion which shall recognize the messiahs of 
 all ' nations." ' 
 
 THE TRINITY. 
 
 The doctrine of the Trinity is after this 
 manner : " The Divine Substance is, in its orig- 
 inal condition homogeneous. Every monad 
 of it, therefore, possesses the potentialities of 
 the whole. Of such a monad, in its original 
 condition, every individual soul consists. And 
 of the same Substance, projected into lower 
 conditions, the material universe consists. It 
 undergoes, however, no radical change of 
 nature through such projection ; but its mani- 
 festation — on whatever plane occurring — is 
 always as a Trinity in Unity; since that 
 whereby Substance becomes manifest is the 
 evolution of its Trinity. Thus — to reckon 
 from without inwards, and below upwards — 
 on the plane physical, it is Force, universal 
 Ether, and their offspring the Material 
 
84 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 World. On the plane intellectual, it is Life, 
 Substance, and Phenomenon. On the plane 
 spiritual — its original point of radiation — it 
 is Will, Wisdom and the Word. And on all 
 planes whatever, it is, in some mode, Father, 
 Mother, Child." 5 Thus with daring blas- 
 phemy would Theosophy "explain" to its 
 own satisfaction the Christian doctrines con- 
 cerning God, the Father Almighty, Maker of 
 Heaven and earth and of all things visible and 
 invisible, Jesus Christ His Only Son our Lord, 
 and the Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of 
 Life, three Divine Persons yet only one God. 
 
 MAN. 
 
 Turning to man, we find according to this 
 revival of the ancient religions, which history 
 comments on as one of the epidemics which 
 break forth during the last quarter of a cen- 
 tury — according to Theosophy, man is not a 
 creation of God but the result of development 
 in the process of evolution. 
 
 s The Perfect Way, pp. 17, 18. 
 
THEOSOPHY. II. 85 
 
 EVOLUTION OF MATTER. 
 
 Now Matter is a state of the One Sub- 
 stance, the all God, but inferior to the other 
 state, Spirit. The all God then is not equally 
 developed. He, therefore, may aspire to the 
 Higher Self and meditate on the time when 
 He shall be all Spirit. He is not then perfect. 
 Hence the development of the inferior state, 
 through evolution, by which the Material 
 Universe, which is the Divine Substance pro- 
 jected into lower conditions, shall attain to 
 the higher. 
 
 To support this theory, the homogeneous 
 monads of the Divine Substance are alleged 
 to be incarcerated without individualization 
 in something material. This latter must be 
 God, for all is God. The monads of God are 
 imprisoned in the lower conditions of God, 
 but by whom, is probably one of the mys- 
 teries of Occultism. 
 
 Who or what starts the process is perhaps 
 another of the mysteries, but when started, 
 it is described as follows in The Perfect Way: 
 
86 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 " There is no mode of Matter in which the 
 potentiality of personality and therein of 
 man, does not subsist. For every molecule is 
 a mode of the universal consciousness. With- 
 out consciousness is no being. The earliest 
 manifestations of consciousness appear in the 
 obedience paid to the laws of gravitation and 
 chemical affinity, which constitute the basis 
 of the later evolved organic laws of nutritive 
 assimilation. And the perception, memory, 
 and experience represented in man are the ac- 
 cumulations of long ages of toil and thought, 
 gradually advancing, through the develop- 
 ment of the consciousness, from organic com- 
 binations upward to God. Such is the secret 
 meaning of the old mystery-story which re- 
 lates how Deucalion and Pyrrha, under direc- 
 tion of Themis (wisdom) produced men and 
 women from stones. " 6 
 
 " Passing then at length from the mineral 
 Kingdom, " says Pember, 7 "the monad is 
 manifested in the lowest modes of organic 
 
 6 The Perfect Way, p. 19. 
 
 7 Earth's Earliest Ages, p. 409. 
 
THEOSOPHY. II. 87 
 
 life, and at this point is individualized by self- 
 generation, and becomes a soul or nucleus to 
 the cell in which it manifested itself." "And 
 once formed, it is capable, on the breaking 
 of its cell, of passing into and informing 
 another cell." 8 
 
 Progress is then made through a series of 
 lives through the vegetable and animal King- 
 doms to man. 
 
 THE SEPTENARY BEING. 
 
 So wonderfully has this process been car- 
 ried on that man is found to be a " septenary 
 being," for while there are but "four elements 
 which constitute him," according to the Per- 
 fect Way, i.e. the material body, the astral 
 body, the soul or individual, and the Spirit or 
 Divine Father, and life of his system, yet the 
 soul here is a trinity. Thus Judge and Sinnett 
 give man's classification as: (1) The Body, 
 (2) Vitality, (3) Astral Body, (4) Animal 
 Soul, (5) Human Soul, (6) Spiritual Soul and 
 (7) Spirit. The last three form a trinity. 
 
 s The Perfect Way, p. 18. 
 
88 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 The Spirit or Atma, the Spiritual Soul or 
 Buddhi (being the highest power of intellec- 
 tion, that which discerns and judges) and the 
 Human Soul, the Manas or Mind. This, "the 
 real man/' "uses certain agents to get in 
 touch with nature in order to know him- 
 self." 9 These are found in the lower four 
 principles in man, the Animal Soul, or the 
 passions and desires, the Life Principle, the 
 Astral Body and the Physical Body. These 
 four material constituents are transitory and 
 subject to separation and disintegration, 
 even as " all the organs of the body are sense- 
 less and useless when deprived of the man 
 within." 10 
 
 RE-INCARNATION. 
 
 The physical body is absorbed at death 
 into the material elements whence it came 
 forth. The astral body, which can be pro- 
 jected from the material body and made ta 
 appear at a distance, is the connecting link 
 
 9 See Ocean ofTheosophy, pp. 32-34. 
 10 Ocean of Theosophv, p. 34. 
 
THEOSOPHY. II. 89 
 
 between the ethical and the corporeal, and, 
 though it may exist for a while after death 
 and hover over the body, is at length dissi- 
 pated in and absorbed by the plane of its sub- 
 stance. The life energy does not cease at 
 death but continues its vibrations in the 
 myriad of lives that make up the cells of the 
 body, yet no longer animating them. These 
 four elements belong to the perishable part of 
 man, disappearing at death and reappearing 
 at every new birth. The trinity is the thinker, 
 the individual that passes from one existence 
 to another, gaining experience at each re- 
 birth but advancing or receding according to 
 its deeds in the previous life. In each succes- 
 sive life, one is to others as a new personality 
 but in the complete process he is "one indi- 
 vidual conscious of an identity, not dependent 
 on name, form or recollections of personali- 
 ties." n 
 
 This is the doctrine of reincarnation, one 
 of the fundamental principles of Theosophy 
 
 11 See Article Theosophy by W. Q. Judge in Johnson's 
 Encvc. 
 
90 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 and necessary to its other scheme of evolu- 
 tion, as there could be no evolution of a 
 human soul without some such idea of trans- 
 migration. Connected with these reincarna- 
 tions is the doctrine of Karma, or justice, 
 whereby they explain the misery and suffering 
 in the world and any national, racial or indi- 
 vidual condition is the direct result of the 
 past thoughts or actions of the Egos. The 
 condition of each re-birth is determined by 
 the results of the preceding life according to 
 an inexorable law. The thoroughh^ evil 
 human souls are finally- bereft of the spiritual 
 tie and doomed to annihilation. 
 
 NIRVANA. 
 
 The pure soul, after many reincarnations, 
 at length rises to the supernatural state, 
 ''relinquishes its existence for the being from 
 which it was originally projected ; but returns 
 with conscious individuality and the full 
 advantage of all its experiences. And, return- 
 ing, it becomes reunited with the Deity, pre- 
 sumably a pure spirit; so that we must 
 
rHEOSOPHY. II. 91 
 
 conceive of God as a vast spiritual body, con- 
 stituted of many individual elements all 
 having but one will, and, therefore, being one. 
 This condition of oneness with the Divine 
 Will and Being constitutes what in Hindu 
 mysticism is called the celestial Nirvana." 12 
 " Though becoming pure spirit, or God, the 
 individual retains his individuality. So that 
 instead of all being finally merged in the One, 
 the One becomes manv. God becomes mil- 
 lions." 13 If God be all, and all is God how- 
 ever, what difference does it make ? If God is 
 millions, millions are God. Now, that there 
 is no personality to God, is an important doc- 
 trine of Theosophy, but millions are God, 
 God is millions, therefore, there is no person- 
 ality to the millions who have attained to 
 God ; if no personality, then no individuality, 
 if no individuality, then nothing but — in fact 
 there is nothing to such existence; and is not 
 Nirvana practically nothingness or annihila- 
 tion? If so, then after all these processes of 
 
 12 Theosophy, p. 25. 
 
 13 The Perfect Way, p. 19. 
 
92 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 reincarnation, with all the troubles and 
 sorrows, the trials and sacrifices of each life, 
 the end, whether you take the regenerate or 
 degenerate course seems to be utter annihila- 
 tion. 
 
 THE FALL. 
 
 " The fall of man does not mean . . . . 
 the lapse .... of particular individuals 
 from a state of perfection. ... It means 
 such an inversion of the due relations of the 
 soul and body of a personality already both 
 spiritual and material, as involves a trans- 
 ference of the central will of the system con- 
 cerned from the soul .... to the body, 
 and the consequent subjection of the soul to 
 the body, and liability of the individual to 
 sin, disease and all other evils which result 
 from the limitation of matter." 14 Each indi- 
 vidual, of whichever sex, is declared to be a 
 dualism, body and soul, exterior and interior, 
 masculine and feminine — "he the without, 
 she the within." Woman is affirmed to be 
 the proper head of creation, and the subjec- 
 
 14 The Perfect Way, 215, 186. 
 
THEOSOPHY. II. 93 
 
 tion of the feminine to the masculine in the 
 individual was the Fall, and the outward and 
 visible sign of the Fall is the subjection of 
 woman to man in the world. And it is stated 
 that only by "the complete restoration, 
 crowning and exaltation of the woman, in 
 all planes, that redemption can be effected." 15 
 
 THE ATONEMENT. 
 
 Now while the Atonement (at-one-ment) 
 is declared to be the unification of the Body, 
 Soul and Spirit in the individual, continually 
 aspiring to the Divine Spirit, until they con- 
 stitute one harmonious system under control 
 of the central Will, and redemption consists 
 of a series of acts, spiritual and mental, typi- 
 fied by the six acts of the Lesser and Greater 
 Mysteries, yet the course of human souls, 
 released from their incarcerations in stones, 
 is, that after they have progressed so as to 
 "know the truth/ ' they will be able — whether 
 Jews, Christians, Buddhists, or Mohammed- 
 ans — to unite in a universal belief of the doc- 
 
 15 See Theosophy, pp. 414, 415. 
 
94 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 trine that sin is expiated by transmigrations 
 and in the worship of "the Great Goddess. " 
 Probably this is the " twelfth Messiah, " and 
 a female, the " Second Eve and the Mother of 
 all Living." 
 
 In this system they speak of mind, intelli- 
 gence, consciousness and will, as attributes 
 of Deity, and yet deny the existence of a Per- 
 sonal God — a manifest contradiction. Pos- 
 sessing these attributes, God must of neces- 
 sity be a person, but Theosophists are con- 
 tent to simply deny that which controverts 
 their whole theory. But neither have they 
 need of a Saviour. Man can redeem himself 
 and expiate his sin by transmigration. He is 
 made perfect through suffering. " To deprive 
 any one of it by putting the consequences of 
 his acts upon another, so far from aiding one, 
 would be to deprive him of his means of 
 redemption."} 6 
 
 KARMA. 
 
 There can be no substitution, no pardon, 
 no alleviating circumstances. The conse- 
 16 Perfect Way, 218. 
 
THEOSOPHY. II. 95 
 
 quences of man's thoughts and acts follow just 
 as surely, and in the same ratio, as effect fol- 
 lows cause, according to that inexorable law 
 that govern all things animate and inanimate. 
 What then is man, according to Theos- 
 ophy, but a mere passing phase in its process 
 of evolution? As soon as his soul is released 
 from incarceration in the rocks, and he be- 
 comes a sentient being, he finds himself sub- 
 ject to inexorable law. This is Karma or 
 Theosophical justice, "the ethical law of 
 causation." It is unchangeable and remorse- 
 less. It cannot be set aside. It has to be 
 met and fully satisfied. Prayer then becomes 
 a mockery ; your piteous cry in agony for 
 mercy, is simply lost upon the wind; your 
 sincere profession of repentance is utterly 
 powerless to effect the consequences of your 
 act upon yourself ; a mistake of judgment 
 counts the same as a deliberate purpose to 
 sin, and so, too, the mother who would 
 relieve her child of the suffering occasioned b} r 
 accidentally burning its finger would be de- 
 priving it of its means of redemption. 
 
96 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 This is Karma, "the most important of 
 the laws of nature," "the universal law of 
 harmony/ ' "the twin doctrine to re-incarna- 
 tion. " 17 Your present condition was settled 
 as a consequence of your acts in a previous 
 life, and your acts in the present life will 
 determine your condition when you again 
 become incarnate. You have not the slightest 
 recollection of a previous existence, and so 
 cannot profit by it. You must get as much 
 satisfaction as you can from the fact that, if 
 your condition is one of poverty and obscurity 
 to-day, in a previous existence, of which you 
 have no recollection, you may have been as 
 rich as Croesus and of royal blood, or that 
 upon the next turn of the cycle you may go 
 up or down according to the unintentional 
 mistakes you may make in this life. 
 
 MAHATMAS. 
 
 Now on what grounds are we to give up 
 our belief in a Personal God, Who is a merci- 
 ful and heavenly Father, in a loving Sav- 
 
 17 Ocean of Theosophy, p. 89. 
 
THEOSOPHY. II. 97 
 
 iour Who redeemed us with His own precious 
 blood, in a sanctifying Spirit Who is the 
 " Lord and Giver of Life," in the ever blessed 
 Trinity who is so marvellously enlightening 
 the world, according as man is enabled to 
 comprehend ? Upon what grounds are we to 
 give up the glorious Gospel which has lifted 
 man in the West out of Eastern darkness and 
 misery, which fills him with a progressive 
 spirit, which makes it possible for him to 
 enjoy life here and to be eternally blessed 
 hereafter? Upon what grounds are we to 
 give up the joys, the benefits, the comforts of 
 the religion of Jesus Christ, and turn back 
 to take up with a machine sort of religion 
 which makes man a mere process in the evo- 
 lution of matter into spirit? 
 
 Theosophy says man "has never been 
 without a friend, but has a line of elder 
 brothers, who continually watch over the 
 progress of the less progressive, preserve the 
 knowledge gained through aeons of trial and 
 experience, and continually seek for oppor- 
 tunities of drawing the developing intelligence 
 
98 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 of the race, on this or other globes, to con- 
 sider the great truths concerning the destiny 
 of the soul." 18 Now these "highly developed 
 men," "perfected from other periods of evolu- 
 tion," are variously called Masters, Adepts, 
 Brothers, Initiates, Mahatmas, meaning 
 great souls — these invisible beings who ap- 
 pear and disappear at will, who travel from 
 place to place with incalculable rapidity — 
 these are they who know all things, who can 
 explain the Mysteries, who told Madame 
 Blavatski all she knew of the Theosophy, 
 who enlightened Col. Olcott, who so inspired 
 the writers of " The Perfect Way 11 that they 
 claim not to be its authors. Yet these 
 " etherealized beings cannot be seen by 
 'coarse/ ' materialized ' " mortals, only by 
 those who have been evolved into the same 
 plane of consciousness. 
 
 Of course Theosophy can in this way assure 
 us of the truth of its theory ; it can explain 
 all things, for the Mahatmas know the truth 
 and understand all the mysteries. They can 
 
 18 Ocean of Theosophy, p. 3. 
 
THEOSOPHY. II. 99 
 
 explain but do not, because you have not 
 attained to the same plane of consciousness, 
 and so could not comprehend what was com- 
 municated. You by chance meet a little boy 
 hurt, disconsolate and crying as if his heart 
 would break. You try to soothe him, and 
 say, u Cheer up, little man; some day you 
 may be President." So Theosophy sa\<s to 
 the disconsolate beings of earth, who crave 
 the explanation Theosophy claims to have 
 but does not give: "Cheer up; man is only 
 18,000,000,000 years old. 19 You are not 
 now on such a plane of consciousness that 
 you can understand. You must be evolved 
 (ground out in this machine) again and again 
 and after one or two million years of such 
 reincarnations, you may become an adept, a 
 Mahatma, and know all things ; few ever 
 attain to such heights, but it is possible, even 
 for you. In the meantime, you must be con- 
 tent with what the Mahatmas think you are 
 able to understand, and you are to have 
 implicit faith in it as coming from them. 
 
 19 Ocean of Theosophy, p. iii. and 18. 
 
100 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 The only adepts specifically mentioned are 
 the Asiatic Brotherhood, and they are invisi- 
 ble ; too ethereal to communicate with coarse 
 mortals, and need intermediaries ; so that you 
 do not get the ipse dixit of the Mahatma at 
 first hand but must depend on the assertion 
 of the intermediary. 
 
 CLAIMS AND THEIR EXPLANATION. 
 
 Theosophists talk of telepathy, mind read- 
 ing, hypnotism and the alleged astral body 
 which can be projected from the material 
 body. They claim power to influence people 
 separated from them by great distances; 
 give ocular demonstration of their occult 
 powers, and then, if you cannot explain 
 their phenomena, w^ould have you admit the 
 truth of their claims and assertions. Like 
 Spiritualists, they would convince you by 
 ocular demonstration rather than by indis- 
 putable testimony which cannot be furnished. 
 Not having such testimony, however, we 
 prefer to explain its phenomena and allega- 
 tions. We would again refer to the subjective 
 
THBOSOPHY. II. 101 
 
 mind. We would see a basis for the theory of 
 an astral body in the double consciousness, 
 a basis for the theory of reincarnations in the 
 fact of life after death. So much then for the 
 modicum of truth underlying the system. 
 As to the invisible Asiatic Brothers flitting 
 around the world in ghostly form and making 
 communications to the select, it is nothing 
 but a scheme advanced to aid in deception. 
 Thus we are not surprised to hear that Mme. 
 Blavatski, the founder of the society, was 
 "an artist in chicanery and a trickster, not 
 only for gain but also for glory. " 20 It ap- 
 pears 21 that the Society for Psychical Re- 
 search investigated the marvellous transpor- 
 tation and duplication of objects and the 
 miraculous conveyance of Mahatma letters. 
 The result was a revelation of trickery. 
 Dishes broken, as if by accident, were picked 
 up, tied in a cloth and put in the Shrine and 
 the door locked. In a few moments the 
 
 20 "Mme. Blavatski and Her Dupes," Current Liter- 
 ature, Feb., 1898, p. 104. 
 
 21 See same article, Current Literature, pp. 105, 106. 
 
102 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 dishes were found as good as new. This was 
 said to be done by Mahatmas but it was for- 
 gotten to be stated that the accident was 
 premeditated, that the Shrine was connected 
 with Mme. Blavatski's bedroom and that 
 when those dishes were purchased in Madras, 
 duplicates w r ere also procured. 
 
 Again, the mortar in one of the interstices 
 between the blocks of wood in a ceiling of a 
 room in a certain house being scraped out, 
 a letter in the well-known handwriting of a 
 Mahatma was inserted and held in place by 
 a thread. When the conversation led up to 
 the proper subject, at a given signal, an 
 accomplice would pull the thread and the 
 letter from Mahatmadom would fall to the 
 floor. By mere accident a package of the 
 Chinese envelopes in which the letters, " ac- 
 tually " conveyed from Thibet, were wont to 
 appear, were found by M. Solovyofif, and 
 Madame Blavatski said to him: M What is 
 one to do, when, in order to rule men, it is 
 necessary to deceive them ; when they will 
 not accept even the doctrines of Isis Unveiled 
 
THEOSOPHY. II. 103 
 
 without the sanction of miracles ; when their 
 very stupidity invites trickery, for almost 
 invariably, the more simple, the more silly, 
 and the more gross the phenomenon, the 
 more likely it is to succeed ? " 
 
 So it would seem that from the very foun- 
 dation of the cult, it is surrounded with 
 fraud, trickery and deceit. 
 
 BROTHERS, ADEPTS, M AH ATM AS-USELESS CRE- 
 ATIONS OF THE IMAGINATION. 
 
 The whole scheme of Theosophy, however, 
 with its theories of evolution and re-incarna- 
 tions, is made to depend on these alleged 
 Mahatmas, the Masters of the Mysteries and 
 communicators of the truth. But who are 
 they? " Highly developed men." 22 But since 
 the world began, there has not been one 
 single authenticated instance of a mortal, in 
 the flesh or out of the flesh, returning from 
 the dead, to communicate with the living and 
 reveal things known to them, because they 
 have passed into the higher life and see things 
 clearer. 
 
 22 Ocean of Theosophy, iii. 
 
3 04 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 Passages in the Bible, cited in a previous 
 lecture, prove that when man dies he goes to 
 a definite place, "the place of departed spir- 
 its," either Paradise or a "place of torment " ; 
 that they are " spirits in prison," i.e., confined, 
 and cannot get back to earth to communicate 
 with the living or to be re-incarnated. There 
 is absolutely no proof of such beings as Mahat- 
 mas and consequently no such communica- 
 tion of the alleged truth of Theosophy. If, 
 however, Theosophy can demonstrate any- 
 thing not hitherto known, it shows that the 
 Eastern religionists have had some insight 
 into the phenomena of the subjective mind of 
 man, long in advance of their brethren of the 
 West, and not yet thoroughly understood. 
 Pember then may be right in saying, "the 
 whole system of the mysteries was communi- 
 cated by the fallen angels," 23 and with the 
 object of destroying faith in the Lord Jesus 
 and prolonging the reign of the Prince of this 
 world. 
 
 23 Earth's Earliest Ages, p. 421. 
 
THEOSOPHY. II. 105 
 
 THEOSOPHY VS. CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 Look into this evil system of evolu- 
 tion, re-incarnation, fatalism and annihila- 
 tion, which mystifies rather than instructs, 
 which claims the power to explain all things 
 yet cannot. Compare it with the religion of 
 the glorious Gospel, with all that it has 
 accomplished for the enlightenment and ad- 
 vancement of man, for his peace, his comfort, 
 his happiness, here and hereafter; how it fills 
 him with hope; how, as he lends himself to 
 its influence, it lifts him unto a higher and 
 higher plane of righteousness, punrtry and 
 sanctity, not in alleged future lives but in 
 this life. And is there a soul who has 
 enjoyed the privileges of living in Christian 
 lands, and who knows of the darkness, 
 wretchedness and slavery of heathenism, that 
 is going to acknowledge the " superiority of 
 ancient sages ; " that will relinquish the hope 
 of the Gospel for the inexorable law of Karma 
 or Fatalism; that will turn from the truth, 
 as it is in Jesus, because of the alleged sayings 
 
106 ANTI-CHRIS TIA N C UL TS. 
 
 of alleged beings called Mahatmas ; that will 
 renounce the Kingdom of Heaven for Nirvana 
 or annihilation ; that will refuse henceforth, 
 to offer tip on bended knee a prayer to " Our 
 Father, Who art in heaven"; to cry out for 
 pardon unto the Merciful Saviour and to 
 plead for the sanctifying influence of the Holy 
 Spirit, in order to be declared a part of the all 
 God who is being evolved from gross matter 
 to pure spirit ? 
 
 The old world religions have had their 
 time and proved themselves unable to ad- 
 vance humanity. To what purpose then 
 would you study them ? That universal 
 brotherhood is a great way off, if we all have 
 to wait till we are sufficiently evolved, that 
 we can be initiated into the Lodge and be- 
 come an adept, a brother. Through the 
 inspiring and enlightening influences of the 
 Gospel, we, in the West, are gradually learn- 
 ing more and more of the hidden mysteries or 
 intelligent forces in nature and of the latent 
 powers or psychic forces in man, so that as far 
 as the objects of Theosophy are concerned, it 
 
THEOSOPHY. II. 107 
 
 really has no reason for being. We turn from 
 it in disgust, and, falling on bended knee, pray 
 to "Our Father, who art in heaven," to 
 "lighten our minds more and more with the 
 light of the everlasting Gospel," that we may 
 serve Him faithfully in our generation and be 
 gathered to our fathers ' 4 having the testimony 
 of a good conscience; in the Communion of 
 the Catholic Church ; in the confidence of a 
 certain faith; in the comfort of a reason- 
 able religious and holy hope; in favour with 
 Thee our God and in perfect charity with the 
 world," 24 through Jesus Christ our Lord. 
 
 24 Praver Book. 
 
Cbtisttan Science* f . 
 
 ITS ORIGIN AND METAPHYSICAL AND THEOLOG- 
 ICAL TENETS. 
 
 COR some unexplained reason the last quar- 
 ter of a century seems to be favorable to 
 the attempt to restore the ancient religions 
 and undermine the Gospel of Jesus Christ. 
 So far, then, as their hostility to the Gospel is 
 concerned, Theosophy and Christian Science, 
 which originated about the same time, go hand 
 in hand. Both were given to the world in 
 1875, and both owe their origin to a woman. 
 Another strange coincidence — Madame Bla- 
 vatski dabbled in Spiritualism for awhile, 
 but met with an accident in Thibet, being 
 thrown from her horse, and while in a del- 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. I. 109 
 
 icate state of health, when one's mind is 
 easily affected, is said to have passed seven 
 years under instruction of Mahatmas and to 
 have emerged in 1875, ready to instruct the 
 world in Theosophy. 
 
 Mrs. Eddy, being in poor health in 1862, 
 consulted a distinguished mesmerist, one P. 
 P. Quimby. Later she, too, met with an acci- 
 dent which, according to physicians, must 
 prove fatal. She cured herself, however, 
 before the next noon. She went into retire- 
 ment, and, after three years, she came to the 
 conclusion that her recovery was in accord- 
 ance with spiritual laws that could be known 
 and utilized. She then began to teach and 
 write. The result was her great work. 
 Science and Health (the 132nd edition of 
 which is before us), was written, but not 
 given to the world till 1875. 
 
 NAME. 
 
 Mrs. Eddy claims to be the original dis- 
 coverer of her method of healing, and to have 
 been the first to use the term Christian 
 
110 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 Science for this alleged Metaphysical Healing. 
 Now a patent medicine vender, putting a cer- 
 tain nostrum upon the market, gives it what- 
 ever name he chooses and has a certain pro- 
 prietary right to that name, which may in 
 time have a decided marketable value. So 
 Mrs. Eddy is entitled to all the honor and 
 emoluments that may be attached to the 
 name "Christian Science." So far as her 
 theory is concerned, however, we hope, before 
 we get through, to show that she has discov- 
 ered a subtle force or power in man, the 
 nature of which is not yet well known, but 
 has been used by others, under various names 
 for ages, and that Christian Science itself 
 does not do the healing. When we pause to 
 inquire into the appropriateness of the name 
 given to this method, we find it a misnomer, 
 because it is not Christian and it is not 
 science. 
 
 NOT CHRISTIAN. 
 
 It is not Christian, for it denies the Christ 
 of history, and invents another. It claims to 
 be founded upon the Holy Scriptures, yet, 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. I. Ill 
 
 whenever they controvert any of its tenets, 
 they are twisted and perverted in the effort 
 to assign to them an unnatural and false 
 interpretation. Thus in Science and Health, 
 the sole authority for the doctrines of Christ- 
 ian Science according to Mrs. Eddy, its 
 author, a distinction is made between Jesus 
 and the Christ. " Jesus was the Virgin's Son. 
 . . . . Christ is not properly a synonym 
 for Jesus. " Evidently Christ is not synonym- 
 ous but identical with the Holy Ghost, as 
 Mrs. Eddy saA r s : " Throughout all genera- 
 tions, both before and after the Christian era, 
 the Christ, as the spiritual idea — as the Holy 
 Ghost, the Comforter — has come, with some 
 measure of power and grace, to all those pre- 
 pared to receive Him." Again, when "the 
 disciples were first called Christians, " it is a 
 common notion that they were so called after 
 a person, not an idea, not even after a 
 "title," 1 but after the Person to Whom that 
 title "the Christ" belonged. When "the 
 
 1 All quotations in this chapter, unless otherwise 
 noted, are from Science and Health, 
 
112 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 people were in expectation and mused in their 
 hearts of John whether he were the Christ/ ' 2 
 they had reference to that Person who was to 
 come to fulfil prophecy. When then Andrew 
 said to Peter: " We have found the Christ/' 3 
 he brought him to Jesus. But when in re- 
 sponse to the question : " Whom say ye that 
 I . . . . am?" Peter declared of Jesus: 
 "Thou art Christ, the Son of the Living God.' ' 
 Mrs. Eddy declares it means : " The Messiah 
 is what thou hast declared — Christ, the divine 
 idea of Truth and Life, which heals mentally." 
 We have no hesitation in saying that the 
 words bear no such interpretation and that 
 a theory based on such forced and false inter- 
 pretation of the Word of God cannot be 
 Christian. 
 
 NOT A SCIENCE. 
 
 As to its claims to be a science, Dr. 
 Jewell well says: " Science reaches truth 
 only through investigation, experiment and 
 
 2 S. Lukeiii. 15. 
 
 3 S. John i. 41. 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. I. 113 
 
 disco very — not through revelation. ° 4 Mrs. 
 Eddy, however, declares God fitted her for 
 "the final revelation of the absolute princi- 
 ple." "Science is classified knowledge, but 
 here is no intelligible classification what- 
 ever. " 5 " Science aims not only to be exact 
 in its statements but also to set forth . . . 
 logically the truth of its conclusions. But 
 Christian Science appears to rely wholly upon 
 mere assertion, iterated and reiterated with- 
 out an\ r semblance of close or systematic 
 reasoning; " 6 and finally, as it simmers down 
 to a method of "mind healing," being with- 
 out classified knowledge in one homogeneous 
 field of truth, it is not a science at all but at 
 best can only claim, like surgery or medicine, 
 to be an art which is "the application of 
 knowledge or skill in effecting a desired 
 result." 7 But under whatever name we 
 investigate it, whether as an art or science, a 
 religion or philosophy, we will find that it 
 cannot stand the test of common sense. 
 
 4 Claims of Christian Science, p. 14. 
 
 5 Ibid. p. 14. 6 Ibid. p. 15. 7 Webster. 
 
114 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 FOUNDATION. 
 
 Mrs. Eddy, who discovered this Science of 
 Metaphysical Healing in 1866, says: " God 
 had been graciously fitting me, during many 
 years, for the reception of a final revelation 
 of the absolute Principle of Scientific Mind- 
 healing." " No human pen or tongue taught 
 me the Science contained in this book, Science 
 and Healthy and neither tongue nor pen can 
 overthrow it ... . the Science and Truth 
 therein will remain forever/ ' " Christian 
 Science is indivisible. There can be but one 
 method of teaching." 
 
 Quoting Rev. x. 1, 2, 9, concerning the 
 angel from heaven with "the little book" 
 and the command to eat it, she makes the 
 angel to be " Divine Science which, when 
 understood, is Truth's prism and praise," 
 and " the little book" to be the revelation of 
 Divine Science." Then she declares: " Mor- 
 tal, obey the heavenly evangel. Take up 
 Divine Science. 8 Read it from beginning to 
 end. Study it, ponder it." 
 
 s At $3.00 per volume. 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. I. 115 
 
 THE SECOND COMING OF CHRIST. 
 
 Again, the discovery of this healing power 
 is declared to be the second coming of Christ, 
 or the second coming of the Gospel of " peace 
 on earth and good will to men." 
 
 In her letter, read at the dedication of the 
 Christian Science church in Chicago, last No- 
 vember, Mrs. Eddy refers to a prophecy of 
 Daniel in order to make the same claim. 9 
 
 This seems dangerously near blasphemy in 
 the person who, in the desperate attempt to 
 found her theories upon the eternal verities, 
 alleges that she was " called of God to pro- 
 claim His Gospel to this age"; that Christ- 
 ian Science is of " Divine origin"; that 
 Jesus practised according to its rules ; that, 
 though He loved mankind, and gave the holy 
 commission to His Apostles to preach and 
 teach, yet He " left no definite rule for demon- 
 strating His Principle of healing and prevent- 
 ing disease," so that it remained unknown 
 until " discovered through Christian Science." 
 
 9 See Chicago Tribune, Nov. 15, 1897. 
 
116 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 I say this is dangerously near blasphemy, 
 so near that, unless its claims can be firmly 
 established, it is blasphemy. But with such 
 plenary inspiration, such marvellous revela- 
 tion, such sure foundation, such unquestion- 
 able sanction, such wonderful "demonstra- 
 tion" as witnessed in the miracles of Jesus, 
 we might reasonably expect to find in 
 Christian Science, called also Divine Science, 
 Spiritual Science, Science of Being, or Science 
 (the terms are interchangeable), the perfec- 
 tion of art, and we are amazed beyond meas- 
 ure that its discoverer could so far forget her 
 ' 'calling" as to declare that she u takes no 
 patients and declines medical consultation." 
 
 ITS PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 Reserving the consideration of its thera- 
 peutics and its popular craze for a subsequent 
 lecture, we turn to examine its philosophy 
 and theology. 
 
 The fundamental propositions of Christ- 
 ian Science summarized in the four (to the 
 author) self-evident propositions, are : (1) God 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. I. 117 
 
 is All in all; (2) God is Good, Good is Mind; 
 
 (3) God, Spirit, being all, nothing is matter; 
 
 (4) Life, God, omnipotent Good deny death, 
 evil, sin, disease — disease, sin, evil, death deny 
 Good, omnipotent God, Life. 
 
 4 'The metaphysics of Christian Science, 
 like the rules of mathematics, prove the rule 
 by inversion. For example : there is no pain 
 in Truth and no truth in pain; no nerve in 
 Mind and no mind in nerve; no matter in 
 Mind and no mind in matter; no matter in 
 Life and no life in matter ; no matter in Good 
 and no good in matter." 
 
 BERKELEYISM. 
 
 What meaning is intended to be conveyed 
 by the above propositions, what proven, it 
 would be difficult to say. It may be taken 
 as a specimen of the unintelligible character of 
 a most pretentious work but one that is found 
 to be a most illogical, disconnected, bewilder- 
 ing and incomplete conception of the idealism 
 of Bishop Berkeley. Bishop Berkeley, 1685- 
 1753, one of the profoundest thinkers in an 
 
118 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 age of grea t men— that of Locke, Swift, Butler, 
 Addison, Pope and others — contended for the 
 unreality of all things outside of his own 
 mind. He was carried to extreme views by 
 his opposition to the materialism and athe- 
 ism of the time. However, his " system " was 
 neither consistent nor complete but much of 
 it remains sound. In brief, he contended that 
 matter has no independent existence, but is 
 an idea in the supreme mind, which is realized 
 in various forms by the human mind. With- 
 out mind nothing exists. Cause cannot exist 
 except as it rests in mind and will. All so- 
 called physical causes are merely cases of 
 constant sequence of phenomena. Far from 
 denying the reality of phenomena, Berkeley 
 insists upon it; but contends that reality 
 depends upon the supremacy of mind. Ab- 
 stract matter does not and cannot exist. The 
 mind can only perceive qualities of objects, 
 and infers the existence of the objects from 
 them ; or, as a modern writer tersely puts it : 
 The only thing certain is mind. Matter is 
 a doubtful and uncertain inference of the 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. I. 119 
 
 human intellect. 10 Mrs. Eddy repudiates the 
 charge that her ideas are borrowed, but when 
 the underlying principle of her system may be 
 tersely expressed in the declaration that " mat- 
 ter is non-existent, mind, and mind alone, 
 exists," we find a striking similarity of ideas. 
 "The ' discovery ' of Mrs. Eddy must be lim- 
 ited to the practical application of this prin- 
 ciple to human life. She insists that as mat- 
 ter does not exist we should always treat it 
 as non-existent. In this, she is truly original ! 
 The few anti-materialistic philosophers have 
 never attempted to carry out this principle." 11 
 Concerning this "matter " which is defined 
 as an " illusion "" intelligence .... in non- 
 intelligence," "sensation in the sensation- 
 less," Mrs. Eddy writes: "Nothing we can 
 say or believe regarding matter is true, except 
 that matter is unreal and is therefore a belief." 
 
 THE SENSES. 
 
 If we appeal to the senses to controvert 
 this statement, we are met by the declaration 
 that "the material senses cannot bear reliable 
 
 1° World's Best Lit., Vol. IX., p. 1804. 
 11 Churchman, April 11, 1896, p. 490. 
 
120 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 testimony. " "Any supposed information 
 coming from the body or from inert matter, 
 as if they were intelligent, is an illusion of 
 mortal mind — one of its dreams " — for 
 " Christian Science sustains with immortal 
 proof, the impossibility of any material sense, 
 and defines these so-called senses as mortal 
 beliefs, whose testimony can neither be true 
 of man or his Maker. " " The corporeal 
 senses are the only sources of evil or error. 
 Christian Science shows them to be false; 
 since matter has no sensation, and no or- 
 ganic construction can give it hearing and 
 sight or make it the medium of Mind .... 
 A wrong sense of God, man and creation is 
 non-sense or want of sense.' ' 
 
 We cannot refrain from the declaration 
 that there is much "non-sense" found in 
 Christian Science, which attempts to over- 
 throw the well-nigh universal testimony of 
 mankind that matter does exist and that the 
 evidence of the senses are trust worthy. Yet 
 it is the very object of Christian Science to 
 dispel this error, this belief of mortal mind. 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. I. 121 
 
 Another object is, to arouse man out of a walk- 
 ing dream. " The history of error is a dream 
 narrative. The dream has no reality, no in- 
 telligence, no mind; therefore the dreamer and 
 dream are one; for neither is true or real." 
 " Mortal existence is a dream," and "there 
 is not any more reality in the waking dream 
 of mortal existence than in the sleeping 
 dream." Man then has been compared to one 
 suffering from delirium tremens, everything 
 that he senses is an illusion of mortal mind, 
 but "Mind (immortal mind) must be found 
 superior to all the beliefs of the five corporeal 
 senses and able to destroy all ills." "Sin, 
 sickness and death are to be classified as 
 effects of error." We do not suffer. We think 
 we do, but it is all an error, an illusion. We 
 are not ill. Indeed, "sickness is an illusion 
 to be annihilated by Mind. Disease is an ex- 
 perience of mortal mind." 
 
 MIND. 
 
 We must, however, distinguish between 
 Mind and mortal mind. 
 
122 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 Mind is the "only Principle, Substance, 
 Life, the one God; the only I, the only Us.' ' 
 ' • The only exterminators of error are the great 
 truths that Good, or God, is the only Mind." 
 "Mind is immortal, and as Mind is never 
 sick, so man cannot be." 
 
 " Mortal mind accepts the erroneous mate- 
 rial conceptions of life and joy," and is 
 "nothing claiming to be something, an error 
 creating other errors ; .... a belief that life 
 substance and intelligence are in and of mat- 
 ter, the subjective states of error," etc., the 
 material senses. " Mind is the grand creator, 
 and there can be no power except that which 
 is derived therefrom." "The struggle for 
 the recovery of invalids goes on, not between 
 material methods but between mortal minds 
 and immortal Mind. The victory will be on 
 the patient's side only as immortal Mind, 
 through Christian Science, subdues the human 
 belief in the disease." Now "mortal mind 
 and body are one. Neither exists without 
 
 the other "Mortal matter, or body, 
 
 is but a false concept of mortal mind," and is 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. I. 123 
 
 full of mortal belief or error ("a supposition 
 that pleasure and pain — that substance, intel- 
 ligence, life — are existent in matter"), "and 
 must be changed by immortal Mind/' and 
 not by "drugs and hygiene" or any kind of 
 "medication." "Drugs and hygiene oppose 
 the supremacy of the Divine Mind. Drugs 
 and inert matter are unconscious, mindless," 
 and consequently have no power. When the 
 sick recover by the use of drugs, it is the law 
 of general belief, culminating in individual 
 faith, which heals." But of course the drugs, 
 not being themselves real, and their power 
 being an illusion of mortal mind, cannot heal. 
 Metaphysical healing is purely mental. And 
 thus it comes about that, as matter is non- 
 existent, the material body, which does not 
 exist save as an error of mortal mind (which 
 is nothing, a belief, an error) is led to believe 
 through the senses (which are false and de- 
 ceptive) that it is afflicted with sickness or 
 disease (which are in turn illusions of mortal 
 mind). Then Christian Science puts forth its 
 power to heal this sickness (which is not a 
 
124 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 reality), by dispelling the illusion suggested 
 by the false, lying and cheating senses 
 (though they are "impossible") that sick- 
 ness exists in a material body that does not 
 exist; while the power to heal through Chris- 
 tian Science is demonstrated by means of these 
 same untrue, impossible, corporeal senses. 
 
 ITS THEOLOGY. 
 
 We turn now to its Theology. God is 
 declared to be Divine Principle, Life, Truth, 
 Spirit, Mind. God is All in all and all is 
 God. "Nothing possesses reality or exist- 
 ence except Mind, God." God is the only 
 Life, the one Spirit. He fills all space, and is 
 "engirdled with the fatherhood and mother- 
 hood of Love." As Elias represents the 
 Fatherhood of God through Jesus, so the 
 Revelator (see Rev. xn. 1, 2) completes this 
 figure with woman as the spiritual idea or 
 type of God's Motherhood, and so we find 
 the first petition of the Lord's Prayer blas- 
 phemously transposed into : " Our Father and 
 Mother God, all harmonious." This reminds 
 us of Pantheism, and when we are told that 
 
CHRIS Tl AX SCIEXCE. I. 125 
 
 man is the compound idea or reflection of 
 God or Mind, and is therefore eternal, that he 
 has no separate mind from God, not a single 
 quality underived from Deity, no life, no intel- 
 ligence or creative power of his own, but 
 reflects all that belongs to his Maker and 
 co-exists with God and is eternal : and then 
 consider that all reality is Spiritual, we have 
 here a sort of Spiritual Pantheism. As for 
 
 THE BLESSED TRINITY. 
 
 the Blessed Trinity : " Father is the name for 
 Spirit." "Jesus is the name , of the Son of 
 Alary" who "in the flesh (mortal body) was 
 appointed to speak to mortals in such a form 
 of humanity as they could understand as well 
 as perceive," i.e., through corporeal sense, a 
 false faculty and illusion of the mind. " Christ 
 expresses God's spiritual and eternal idea. 
 The name is synonymous (identical) with 
 Messiah and alludes to the spirituality which 
 was taught, illustrated and demonstrated in ' 
 the life whereof Christ Jesus was the embod- 
 iment. " 
 
126 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 The Holy Ghost, or Spirit, reveals this 
 triune Principle, and is expressed in Divine 
 (Christian) Science which is the Comforter, 
 leading into all Truth. 
 
 Now while it must be admitted that these 
 ideas of God and the Blessed Trinity cannot 
 be proven from the Bible, and we know that 
 "all mortals are egotists, " yet it seems to 
 reach the height of absurdity to claim that 
 Christian Science is the Comforter. 
 
 MAN. 
 
 Man is declared to be perfect, as God is per- 
 fect, immortal, co-existent with God, "incapa- 
 ble of sin, sickness and death, inasmuch as he 
 derives his essence from God," and is insep- 
 arable from Him. "Mortals are man's 
 counterfeits," "material falsities .... 
 errors made up of sin, sickness and death, 
 which must give place to the facts which 
 belong to immortal man." Man is not "a 
 'material habitation for spirit, but is himself 
 
 spiritual To the senses, man appears 
 
 to be matter and mind united ; but Christian 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. I. 127 
 
 Science reveals him as the idea of God, and 
 declares the corporeal senses to be mortal 
 and erring illusions." 
 
 SOULS. 
 
 The term souls or spirits is as improper as 
 the term gods. Soul or Spirit signifies Deity 
 and nothing else. There is no finite soul or 
 spirit. Those terms mean only one existence.' ' 
 God is All and all is God. God is Spirit, man 
 is spirit, man is God — which is Pantheism. 
 When, then, man is so very spiritual, we are 
 not surprised to learn that " evil is an illusion 
 and error has no real basis." That "the 
 only reality of sin, sickness and death is the 
 awful fact that unrealities seem real to human 
 belief. Sin is identical with sickness and healed 
 in the same way." It is a "species of insanity, 
 i.e., an "hallucination," even as the inmates 
 of asylums are " well defined instances of the 
 baneful effects of illusion on mortal minds 
 and bodies." 
 
 Think, if such nonsense can be believed, 
 how wicked it would be to punish a criminal 
 
128 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 because he is insane; how wrong for the 
 author of Christian Science to declare that 
 those who use her " discoveries, " without 
 * ' giving proper credit, ' ' are guilty of a " breach 
 of that divine command in the Hebrew deca- 
 logue: 'Thou shalt not steal,'" when they 
 were only laboring under an illusion; how 
 shocking it would be to those who in their 
 shameful wickedness break all the command- 
 ments of the decalogue, to tell them that evil 
 is an illusion or to reveal to them the "awful" 
 fact that these horrible unrealities seem real 
 to human belief. How quickly they would 
 turn and repent of their evil. 
 
 ADAM. 
 
 In explaining original sin we get an idea 
 of Christian Science exegesis, for we are told 
 ' ' the word Adam is from the Hebrew, adamah, 
 signifying red, color of the ground, dust, noth- 
 ingness. Divide the name Adam into two 
 syllables (two words), and it reads A dam, 
 i.e. , an obstruction. This suggests the thought 
 of something fluid, of mortal mind in solu_ 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. I. 129 
 
 tion, of the darkness which seemed to appear 
 when 'darkness was upon the face of the 
 deep/ and matter stood as opposed to Spirit, 
 as that which is accursed. Jehovah declared 
 the ground — matter — accursed ; and from this 
 earth, or matter, sprang Adam, although God 
 had blessed the earth 'for man's sake/ From 
 this, it follows that Adam was not the ideal 
 man for whom the earth was blessed. " 
 Adam then stands for "error ; a falsity ; evil ; 
 a curse ; nothingness ; the belief in original 
 sin." Was ever greater ignorance and ab- 
 surdity combined in a single argument ! 
 
 ANTI-CHRISTIAN. 
 
 We are not surprised that a system that 
 denies the unreality of the senses and all 
 things material, would declare the Scriptural 
 account of creation as recorded in Genesis to 
 be "allegorical" and prefer an alleged spir- 
 itual rather than literal interpretation of 
 the Word of God. But when, though speak- 
 ing kindly of the Lord Jesus, this system 
 would attempt to deprive Him of His Divine 
 
130 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 Sonship and Equality with the Father Al- 
 mighty; has no need of Him as Saviour of 
 mankind ; would take away as unnecessary 
 His pardoning power; would destroy His 
 atonement; would controvert His vicarious 
 sacrifice; would change the idea of Baptism; 
 w^ould declare the institution of the Blessed 
 Sacrament " foolish in a literal sense/' and 
 that if Christ, Truth, is Immanuel, God with 
 us, no commemoration is necessary, notwith- 
 standing the words : ' ' Do this in remembrance 
 of Me;" when it declares that man has the 
 same body after death as before, and that he 
 is immortal, and so men do not have to 
 come to Christ Jesus "that they may have 
 life/' and that He may "raise them up at the 
 last day" — whatever we may think of the 
 members thereof, the system is decidedly anti- 
 Christian. It is illogical, inconsistent, unrea- 
 sonable. It cannot stand the test of common 
 sense. It cannot stand alone, and so it bol- 
 sters itself up on the Blessed Gospel of Jesus 
 the Christ to which it is as false as false 
 can be. 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. I. 131 
 
 But, then, we know that the testimony 
 of our senses can be relied upon. 
 
 We know that matter is real. 
 
 We know, when our conscience convinces 
 us of sin, that sin is there ; it is no illusion. 
 
 We know with S. John that "If we say 
 we have no sin we deceive ourselves and the 
 truth is not in us." 
 
 We know that this whole system, which 
 is against our own senses and our personal 
 experience of life, is w r rong from beginning to 
 end. 
 
 We know too what the Prayer Book 
 says: That we may "be made like unto 
 Christ by suffering patiently adversities, 
 troubles, sicknesses. For He Himself went 
 not up to joy before He suffered pain; He 
 entered not into His glory, before He was 
 crucified. So, truly, our way to eternal joy 
 is to suffering here with Christ." 12 And the 
 sufferings of our Saviour have moved more 
 men to repentance and reformation than all 
 other moral forces combined, and, more than 
 
 12 Prayer Book Visitation of the Sick. 
 
132 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 all others, have deepened throughout the 
 world the sense of the infinite preciousness of 
 personal goodness. And the explanation of 
 this power must be sought in the constitution 
 of the universe and in the nature of man him- 
 self. As Horace Bushnell has masterfully 
 depicted the very universe itself in vicarious 
 sacrifice : 
 
 " Life evermore is fed by death, 
 In earth and sea and sky ; 
 And that a rose may breathe its breath 
 Something must die." 13 
 
 13 Argument for Christianity, p. 270-271. 
 
Christian Science. HIT. 
 
 ITS THERAPEUTICS. 
 
 /CHRISTIAN SCIENCE claims to be the 
 science of metaphysical healing. We ad- 
 mit it to be an art. As an art of healing, then, 
 what has it done ? What can it do ? That pain 
 has been alleviated, that some diseases have 
 been cured by Scientists, we are willing to con- 
 cede. We however defy anyone to prove that 
 such "healing" is due to that illogical, self- 
 contradictory , ' ' non-sensical , ' ' anti-Christ- 
 ian conglomeration, falsely called Christian 
 Science. 
 
 THE DISCOVERY. 
 
 What the author of Health and Science 
 
 " discovered " is a principle of human nature 
 
 ' (yet to be proven most valuable and useful) 
 
134 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 which makes possible the actual cures of all 
 these healers of whatever sort, which was 
 " discovered " and made use of by soothsayers 
 and magi and all that class in the East, long 
 before the Christian era. Not knowing what 
 this principle is, one and all of these healers 
 claim it to be a proof of their respective 
 theory and the power that they possess. Not 
 knowing the scope of its powers or the laws 
 by which it is governed, it becomes a danger- 
 ous force, however, in the hands of the many 
 modern demonstrators, and for the safety of 
 humanity (especially of children) they should 
 be held liable for every death due to the 
 ignorant use of this power. 
 
 THE VIS MEDICATRIX NATUR/E. 
 
 In considering the art of healing in general, 
 we must take into account, as a most impor- 
 tant element, what is called the Vis Medica- 
 trix Nature, the healing or recuperative 
 power of nature. Disease, you know, is an 
 abnormal condition and nature is endowed 
 with a power to restore our bodies to their 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. II. 135 
 
 tnormal state. It is, as we well know, no 
 always able to do this, being at times too 
 completely obstructed; and so it is the 
 province of the learned physician, not to per- 
 form marvellous cures — he does not cure — but 
 to exercise his skill in assisting nature by 
 counteracting, nullifying or removing what- 
 soever hinders its wonderful recuperative 
 efforts. Of this ever active and assertive 
 power of nature, Sir John Marshall, F.R.S., 
 said: " The Vis Medicatrix Naturze is the 
 agent to employ in the healing of an ulcer or 
 the union of a broken bone ; and it is equally 
 true that the physician or surgeon never cures 
 a disease; he only assists the natural proc- 
 esses of cure performed by the intrinsic con- 
 servative energy of the frame, and this is but 
 the extension of the force imparted at the 
 origination of the individual being. M1 
 
 Thus we may understand how one may be 
 restored to health in spite of malpractice and 
 why good nursing is so heartily commended 
 by plrrsicians ; in the one instance, the won- 
 
 1 Buckle}'. Faith Healing— Christian Science } p. 277. 
 
136 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 derful recuperative power of nature has suc- 
 ceeded in spite of the ignorance of the practi- 
 tioner ; and in the other, the nursing assisted 
 nature in a recovery that was made certain 
 and more speedy by its aid. 
 
 THE INFLUENCE OF THE MIND. 
 
 It is well known that the dominant mental 
 state has a wholesome or depressing effect 
 upon the organs of the body, so that many 
 of the ills of which people complain, being 
 imaginary, they may be dispelled by a com- 
 plete and radical change of one's mental 
 condition. "Mental impressions, however 
 produced, it is said, act through the nervous 
 system upon the organs of the body, so as to 
 stimulate or to obstruct their functions. 
 Thus, fright, grief, hope, cheerfulness, deter- 
 mination to get well, or despair, all register 
 themselves in the bodily condition. " 2 
 
 How often have we heard of people said 
 to have frightened themselves into sickness. 
 Caring for the sick, they have in fear conceived 
 
 2 See Shinn's Modem Substitutes for Christianity, 
 p. 4G. 
 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. II. 137 
 
 the idea that they have contracted the same 
 disease. How often through despair and 
 sometimes nothing but sheer laziness, people 
 neglect the body until they become morose, 
 despondent, morbid. They have innumerable 
 aches and pains and require constant attend- 
 ance, medical and otherwise. Here then is a 
 field for marvellous cures by bread pills, 
 colored water, faith, Christian Science, mes- 
 merism, spiritualism and every kind of healing 
 art. Whatever the means employed, how- 
 ever, the underlying fact is that through hope, 
 faith, a desire to get well, through finding a 
 purpose in life, by being given something to 
 do, through imparted cheerfulness, the mind 
 is roused out of its morbid condition, every- 
 thing around one again becomes bright, he is 
 filled with hope and expectancy and in conse- 
 quence, the sluggish organs of the body are 
 so stimulated to activity that all symptoms 
 of the imaginar\^ disease vanish away. 
 
 CHARLATANRY. 
 
 Victims of charlatanry are found in the 
 cases of those who, after severe sickness or 
 
138 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 dangerous accident, are persuaded (in their 
 own minds) that they are hopeless invalids. 
 In illustration, there comes to my mind the 
 instance of a lady who, recovering from a 
 terrible accident, thought that she could 
 never walk again. Her physician declared 
 that there was no reason why she could not 
 walk and at his suggestion, she was left in 
 her arm chair under a tree, one summer after- 
 noon, when a thunderstorm was approach- 
 ing. She was always much alarmed by such 
 storms and when she found that she was 
 forgotten or neglected, she declared she got 
 up and walked into the house and has walked 
 ever since. What a marvellous cure this 
 might have proven, if she had fallen into the 
 hands of a healer, while still under her hallu- 
 cination. Still other cases for the charlatan 
 are those where the patient has passed the 
 crisis and nothing remains to be done but 
 with careful nursing to wait for nature to 
 complete the restoration to health. Often, 
 however, this does not take place as rapidly 
 as desired (due frequently to ignorance and 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. II. 139 
 
 improper care) and so a change of physicians 
 is made or one of the many kinds of healers 
 is called in, and to the latter is given the 
 undeserved, -unearned credit of bringing about 
 the recovery. 
 
 ACTUAL CURES. 
 
 It is admitted, however, that some cures 
 by Christian Science healers and others are 
 genuine, but it is firmly maintained that they 
 pertain to functional, not organic diseases, 
 that is, to those diseases the symptoms of 
 which cannot be referred to any appreciable 
 change of structure or derangement of an 
 organ, and not to those attended with mor- 
 bid changes of the structure of the organs of 
 the body or in the composition of its fluids; 
 or again, to ailments due to " nerval derange- 
 ment" and not to those due to the invasion 
 of microbes. 
 
 PERCENTAGE OF CURES. THE PRINCIPLE. 
 
 Furthermore, it is alleged that five per 
 cent, of those who went to the healer 
 Schlatter were cured. Five per cent, also of 
 
140 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 those incurables who take "The White 
 Train' ' in France to visit the Grotto of 
 Lourdes and who are examined by physicians 
 before and after going, are pronounced cured. 
 Christian Science, it is said, takes no account 
 of its failures. We may therefore place its 
 percentage on a level with those others, for 
 whether we consider the cures of Christian 
 Science, of Schlatter, of Lourdes or other 
 wonder-working shrines, of faith, of mind 
 cures, of mesmerism, of spiritualism, of mag- 
 netic healers, of Indian medicine men, of 
 Hindoo Yogis, of Egyptian Fakirs or of the 
 old Eastern soothsayers before the Christian 
 era, the principle is identical in one and all 
 and so is not only no new " discovery " of 
 this age but is even independent of all these 
 systems, Christian Science as well as all the 
 others, that it is alleged to support. That 
 principle is the same that the fond mother 
 makes use of when, her little child crying with 
 the pain from a burned finger, she gives her a 
 new doll and causes her to forget all about 
 the pain. 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. II. 141 
 
 Grasp this principle and you can explain 
 all these marvellous cures. 
 
 THE PRINCIPLE. 
 
 Let us attempt to get an insight into it. 
 
 I.— PAINLESSNESS— A FREAK OF NATURE. 
 
 It is narrated of one Miss Evatima Tardo, 
 who was born on the island of Trinidad, 
 West Indies, and is now 26 years of age, that 
 she does not know pain and has never had 
 any feeling or sense of touch. It is said to 
 be due to a defect in her nervous system. 
 Snakes bite her, pins are thrust into her body, 
 through her cheek; flesh wounds are made 
 by knife or pistol ball, and she feels no pain. 
 The wounds are not denied, because they do 
 not pain. They are plainly to be seen. They 
 heal very rapidly, however, because of the 
 absence of pain or feeling which in ordinary 
 mortals delays the recuperative powers of 
 nature. Miss Tardo can also control the cir- 
 culation of her blood, when bitten by a snake, 
 allowing the wound to bleed or not, at will. 3 
 
 3 See Minneapolis Journal, Aug. 10 and 14, '97; New 
 York Sunday World, Aug., '97, also Tid Bits, Dec., '97. 
 
142 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 It. painlessness; superconsciousness or 
 
 CONTROL OF THE SENSES. 
 
 From Miss Tardo, we go to the Hindoo 
 lecturer on Vedanta philosophy, in this coun- 
 try, Swami Abhedananda, who in an inter- 
 view in the Sun* (N. Y., Dec. 26, 1897) said 
 concerning our blessed Lord, that, having (in 
 Gethsemane) " reached the state of mind 
 known to Hindus as samahdi or supercon- 
 sciousness, " " there was no pain for Him 
 on the cross ; that the nails driven into His 
 hands and feet excited no more sensibility 
 than they would, if driven into so much 
 wood." He then explained what was " meant 
 by the control of the senses as illustrated in 
 the case of Christ." He tells of a sage, Chai- 
 tanga, who was tested for the control of his 
 senses, by holding some powdered sugar on 
 his tongue for ten minutes and then blowing 
 it off as dry as ever. Again he tells of another 
 sage in India. Outside of the city, robbers 
 had taken him for a spy and chopped off his 
 right arm. He quickly walked back to the 
 
 4 See Literary Digest, Jan. 15, 1898, p. 81. 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE, II. 143 
 
 city. A kind-hearted Brahmin met him, rec- 
 ognized him and fell at his feet, binding up 
 his wound. But the sage was hardly aware 
 that he had been wounded. " His counten- 
 ance glowed with deep calmness and tran- 
 quillity. He had not only withdrawn his 
 senses but he had shut his soul entirely in 
 from his mind." Other sages have been 
 chopped to pieces uttering the declaration all 
 the while that they " could not be killed." 
 Still again, he tells of a friend of his in Lon- 
 don going to see a Spaniard who claimed to 
 have entire control of his senses. Submitting 
 to a test, a doctor drove a needle between the 
 nail and flesh of his thumb. The Spaniard 
 did not wince but went on laughing and talk- 
 ing to his friends. After some minutes, he 
 was requested to relax his mind. Of course 
 when he did so, he was seized with the most 
 excruciating pain and blood began to run 
 from the wound. "It is by such concentra- 
 tion of mind," he declares, "that one is able 
 to separate the soul from the mind and free it 
 from the knowledge of matter." 
 
144 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 These examples show us the possibility of 
 the absence of pain or of a state of uncon- 
 sciousness of both pain and suffering, and that 
 this state of unconsciousness can be brought 
 about through the control of the senses. It 
 also shows within man something that can 
 control the senses. What is this something? 
 
 III. THE SUBJECTIVE MIND. 
 
 The Very Reverend Dean Hart, in his 
 examination of Christian Science says : " It is 
 now beginning to be recognized that the 
 human mind is not one uniform and homo- 
 geneous machine; it contains wheels within 
 wheels. To the close observer, it becomes 
 evident that parts of the mind are capable of 
 almost independent action. It is a common 
 experience with men who are accustomed to 
 speaking in public, that they are conscious of 
 two currents of thought ; the lips pronounc- 
 ing one, and the other part of the mind pre- 
 paring for what is coming next, or probably 
 making some observation connected with 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. IL 145 
 
 their audience, which shall modify their mode 
 of address. We seem to be aiming at the con- 
 clusion that beneath the active surface of the 
 mind, there lies an inactive but recipient 
 mental plane which has been called the sub- 
 jective mind." 5 
 
 That this subjective mind does exist, that 
 it receives impressions and retains them, he 
 declares, is frequently " evidenced in the sud- 
 den recollection of a series of events abso- 
 lutely forgotten" and again by the "com- 
 mon occurrence with persons on the brink of 
 sudden death, w T hen the events of their entire 
 life pass before their mental view in rapid 
 panorama." 
 
 Swami Abhedananda, the Hindu lecturer 
 to whom we have referred before, declares 
 further that by " concentration of mind, the 
 soul is departed from the mind and freed 
 from bondage to matter." 6 He further says 
 that " according to the Vedanta view of 
 Christ, all of us will some day .... 
 
 5 A Way that Seemeth Right, pp. 46-47. 
 
 6 Lit. Digest, Jan. 15, 1898, p. 81. 
 
1 46 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 become Christ, for in every one of us is 
 the pure and sublime soul that shows forth 
 from Him on the Mount of Transfigura- 
 tion. It needs only to be set free, to con- 
 nect itself with this cosmic intelligence that 
 stands behind and directs, evolves and pro- 
 jects all these forms of matter that w^e 
 see." 7 Then he asks: "What do we see in 
 ourselves ? First, the body, then behind it the 
 mind, and behind that something that is 
 conscious of them both. One can often separ- 
 ate all three of them in such a manner as to 
 see their difference. This soul or cosmic con- 
 sciousness behind everything, is able to mani- 
 fest itself in man more freely than in anything 
 else, because of the more nearly perfect form 
 of his mind and body." 8 
 
 THE DOUBLE EGO OR DOUBLED CONSCIOUSNESS. 
 
 We turn from this Hindu then, with his 
 idea of " concentration of mind," something 
 behind both mind and body, this supercon- 
 
 7 Lit. Digest, Jan. 15, 1898, p. 80. 
 s Ibid. pp. 80-82. 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. II. 147 
 
 scions state and from the subjective mind, to 
 the theory of the psychologist, Max Dessoir, 
 of Berlin, concerning the "Doppel Ich," or, 
 Double Ego. He supposes that human per- 
 sonality is a unity merely to our conscious- 
 ness, but that it consists really of at least 
 two clearly distinguishable personalities, each 
 held together by its own chain of memories. 9 
 [An illustration is given in the case of one 
 Barkworth, adding up a long row of figures 
 at the same time that he carried on a lively 
 conversation.] His idea is that there is an 
 unconscious intelligence in man and an un- 
 conscious memory, and that as consciousness 
 and memory are the two elements of person- 
 ality, he concludes that there must be a sec- 
 ond personality. The mental processes which 
 tak place consciously to the man (says 
 Moll), are called the primary consciousness, 
 and those which go on without his knowl- 
 edge the secondary consciousness ; the action 
 of both together is a state of double con- 
 sciousness, or doubled consciousness. 10 Two 
 
 9 Moll's Hypnotism, p. 259. io Ibid. p. 260. 
 
148 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 entirely separate personalities in an individ- 
 ual, as though A carried within himself the 
 personality of B is not to be supposed. The 
 Double Ego is not to be so conceived, but is 
 only a diagram to indicate the fact that 
 psychic processes may go on within us, un- 
 observed, and often yielding no evidence of 
 themselves except their results/' 11 
 
 IV. HYPNOTIC SUGGESTION. 
 
 We turn now to hypnosis, and the peculiar 
 state into which subjects are thrown by 
 bringing into play this secondary conscious- 
 ness. This is entirely a subjective state, by 
 which control is obtained of the physical 
 functions and sensations. Thus the Aissaouas 
 of Constantine, Algiers, are able by means of 
 dancing and singing to throw themselves 
 into a state of ecstacy, difficult to describe, in 
 which their bodies seem insensible even to 
 severe wounds. They run pointed iron into 
 their heads, eyes, neck and breasts without 
 
 n Moll's Hypnotism, p. 260. 
 

 CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. II. 149 
 
 injuring themselves. Behold how the senses 
 may be controlled and by what means. 12 
 
 Now let us understand that this secondary 
 consciousness, which plays so important a 
 part, which Dessoir calls : " The hidden half of 
 our mental life;" 13 which evidently itself 
 brings into subjection the physical functions 
 and sensations, is always amenable to sug- 
 gestion, whether it be external or auto- 
 suggestion. By suggestion, Moll 14 has refer- 
 ence to the commands given to subjects, the 
 promptings and persuasions used to influence 
 them. The clearest definition of suggestion 
 is to be found in the Century Dictionary, 
 namely, " The insinuation of a belief or 
 impulse into the mind of the subject by any 
 means, as by words or gestures, usually by 
 emphatic declaration; also the impulse of 
 trust which leads to the effectiveness of such 
 incitement; " while suggestibilit3 r is defined as 
 "the impression on the mind of an idea, 
 
 12 Moll's Hypnotism, p. 42. 
 !3 Ibid. p. 261. 
 !4 Ibid. p. 36. 
 
150 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 image, movement, which the person repro- 
 duces voluntarily or involuntarily." 15 
 
 Now let us take an example of a healing 
 by suggestion. 16 We wish to cure a head- 
 ache by arousing in the subject the idea that 
 the headache is gone. Spontaneous reflection 
 would prevent this in most waking people, 
 but in hypnosis ideas are more easily estab- 
 lished. If the subject accepts the suggestion, 
 we may be sure that, in the hypnotic state, 
 he does not feel the pain. But now we have 
 to prevent the pain after waking. Either 
 external post-hypnotic suggestion or auto- 
 suggestion will do this. We can make the 
 patient continue to think the pain is gone 
 after he wakes. He need not be conscious of 
 this idea, in the sense of remembering it. On 
 the contrary, the less conscious the idea is, 
 the more effect it will have, because reflection 
 will not struggle against it. Auto-suggestion 
 is the second plan. The patient, finding him- 
 self without pain in hypnosis, may convince 
 
 15 See Wolcott's What is Christian Science, p. 58. 
 
 16 Moll's Hypnotism, p. 346. 
 

 CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. II. 151 
 
 himself that pain is not a necessary conse- 
 quence of his state, and this idea may under 
 some circumstances be strong enough to pre- 
 vent the return of the pain. 17 
 
 Furthermore, suggestibility sometimes 
 exists where there is not evidence that the 
 subject is in the hypnotic state. Dean Hart, 
 in the work before quoted, narrates from the 
 British Foreign Medical Review, a case 
 reported by a naval surgeon as follows : " A 
 very intelligent officer had suffered for some 
 years from violent attacks of cramps in the 
 stomach. These attacks came on monthly, 
 or oftener, and subnitrate of bismuth had 
 been used with good results, but, notwith- 
 standing that the dose was increased to the 
 largest extent that its poisonous qualities 
 would justify, it lost its effects. Sedatives 
 were again used, but while suffering greatly 
 rom the effects of some preparation of opiumf 
 he was told that on the next attack he would 
 be put under the effect of a medicine which 
 was generally believed to be most effective, 
 
 !7 Moll's Hypnotism, pp. 346, 347. 
 
152 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 but which was rarely used because of its 
 dangerous qualities ; but that, notwithstand- 
 ing these, it would be tried, provided he gave 
 his consent. This he did willingly. Accord- 
 ingly, on the first attack after this, a powder 
 . containing four grains of ground biscuit was 
 administered every seven minutes, while the 
 greatest anxiety was expressed (within the 
 hearing of the patient) lest too much should 
 be given. The fourth dose caused an entire 
 cessation of pain. Half drachm doses of 
 bismuth had never produced the same relief 
 in less than three hours. Four times the 
 same remedy was used however with the 
 same result. After that he left the ship." 18 
 This leads the Dean to declare that "thought 
 of any given bodily change tends to the actual 
 production in the body of the change that 
 thought suggests." 
 
 EXPLANATION OF THE CURES. 
 
 We are now in a condition to explain the 
 marvellous cures of functional or even organic 
 diseases whether by Schlatter, the medicine 
 
 is A Way That Seemeth Right, pp. 22, 23, 24. 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. II. 153 
 
 man of the Indians, the mesmeric healer, faith 
 healer, spiritualist, Hindu Yogi, Eastern fakir 
 or Christian Scientist. The principle is one, 
 if the methods vary. With the scientist the 
 patient (subject) is regarded as laboring 
 under a delusion, an illusion, is told that he 
 is not sick, that he has no pain and that he 
 should act accordingly (i.e., as a well per- 
 son.) Here is the suggestion. (If the subject 
 is not actually hypnotized he is under the 
 influence of hypnotic suggestion.) The ten- 
 dency is to produce in the body the change 
 that thought suggests. 
 
 More than this, the suggestion arouses 
 the secondary consciousness, that mighty 
 something within us that controls our sensa- 
 tions and (the senses under abeyance) the 
 body is not racked with pain ; in consequence 
 the healing process goes on more rapidly. 
 Then take into account the fact that the 
 mighty recuperative force of nature (the vis 
 wedicatrix naturae,) always at work, must 
 act more rapidly and successfully under these 
 favorable circumstances, and we see why the 
 
154 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 patient may recover without the use of medi- 
 cine. 
 
 EXCEPTIONS. 
 
 Whensoever these marvellous cures are 
 made then, this is the principle, but it does 
 not always act. In many cases it should not 
 be attempted. Unfortunately for Christian 
 Science, it only makes one exception. It ad- 
 vises that " adjustment of broken bones and 
 dislocations' ' be left to the fingers of a sur- 
 geon, saying, " Christian Science is always 
 the most skilful surgeon, but surgery is the 
 branch of its healing which will be last dem- 
 ons trated." 
 
 ITS HARM FULNESS. 
 
 As Christian Science makes no other excep- 
 tions, its healers who presume to give treat- 
 ment to the afflicted are an actual menace to 
 a community, because they condemn every 
 other kind of treatment; because they do not 
 presume to diagnose a case; because they 
 spurn anatomy and physiology ; because they 
 are grossly ignorant of the power that they 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. IL 155 
 
 possess. We admit in some instances this 
 treatment is successful, but we also declare, 
 that in certain kinds of diseases it is worse 
 than useless to attempt it, as is well known 
 to those who understand what this power is 
 by which such healing is brought about. 
 Being incapable of telling when to use it and 
 when not to use it, and so using it indiscrimi- 
 nately, these so-called healers become danger- 
 ous, a menace to the community. If after 
 having tried it and found it a miserable failure 
 (not because it is useless, but because its 
 power is abused through ignorance) they 
 would then admit such failure and call in a 
 physician before it is too late, it would not be 
 quite so dangerous. But even so, they should 
 not be allowed to practise it, any more than 
 a child should be allowed to play with a 
 razor. If they do practice and a patient dies 
 through their criminal ignorance and negli- 
 gence, why should they not be held for mal- 
 practice the same as any other practitioner? 
 Again, if this science is " divine," if Jesus Christ 
 practised according to its rules, if He taught 
 
156 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 His "students" (disciples) the generalities of 
 this principle as claimed, yet they, like the 
 Master, administered to the afflicted without 
 money and without price. But the students 
 of the author who claimed to be "called of 
 God to proclaim His Gospel to this age," i.e., 
 through her book, Science and Health, turn 
 their treatment to pecuniary benefit and so 
 would seem to put themselves in the class 
 with Simon the sorcerer, who would traffic 
 with the gift of God and was so severely re- 
 buked by St. Peter. i» 
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 We have earnestly and honestly tried to 
 ascertain what there is in the alleged healing 
 power of Christian Science, so called. We 
 have found a principle of action, a principle 
 within man, long used in the East, of more 
 recent discovery in the West, yet bound to be 
 more thoroughly known, which is no more 
 peculiar to Christian Science than to any 
 other of the many mysterious modes of heal- 
 
 !9 Acts viii; 18-20. 
 
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. II. 157 
 
 ing. That principle is of benefit in some kinds 
 of ailments and will be found of more use, 
 when it is more thoroughly understood. The 
 principle will remain when the theory of 
 Christian Science is forgotten. As a theory, 
 it is ill conceived, illogical and in some places 
 utterly senseless. But, above all, while claim- 
 ing to be Christian and to be based upon the 
 Bible, it is decidedly anti-Christian even as 
 its doctrines will be found to be contrary to 
 the truth as it is in Jesus. 
 
Conclusion* 
 
 THE REASON AND THE REMEDY FOR THESE 
 A NTI -CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 TN the consideration of some modern sub- 
 stitutes for the Gospel or anti-Christian 
 cults, we tried to ascertain what there was in 
 Spiritualism, Theosophy and Christian Sci- 
 ence. We found that it was an historical fact 
 that during the last quarter of a century 
 there is ever an attempt made to restore the 
 ancient religions. Spiritualism we know was 
 practised in some of its many forms from the 
 earliest ages in the history of man. 
 
 Theosophy affirms and declares that we 
 should study the ancient religions and " con- 
 fess to the superiority of the ancient sages/ ' 
 
CONCLUSION. 159 
 
 Christian Science, as a healing art, we dis- 
 covered, rests upon the same principle as that 
 which governed the cures of Eastern sooth- 
 sayers and fakirs long before the Christian 
 era. We can, with reason, then, ascribe their 
 prominence to-day to that peculiar epidemic 
 that characterizes the last quarter of a cen- 
 tury, which is decidedly as anti-Christian, as 
 they are. 
 
 SPIRITUALISM. 
 
 We found Spiritualism to be so sur- 
 rounded with fraud, trickery and deceit that 
 it was difficult to find even the modicum of 
 truth necessary to give it any hold upon an 
 intelligent and not a superstitious people. 
 We found its marvellous manifestations and 
 phenomena could all be duplicated by the 
 honest presdigitateur, through his own skill, 
 and, therefore, that it was needless to call in 
 the aid of unseen, disembodied spirits. As for 
 these alleged communications with the spirits 
 of the departed, we learned from the Bible 
 that the spirits of the departed are held in 
 abeyance, confined, imprisoned in some place 
 
160 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 from which they cannot return, and that it is 
 doubtful if they are conscious of what is 
 going on in the carnal world. Wherefore, we 
 conclude that whatever marvellous powers 
 they seem to have are due to mind-reading, 
 telepathy, hypnotism, or some other phenom- 
 ena of the subjective mind, which phenomena, 
 known and made use of in the East for cen- 
 turies, may have been revealed to them by 
 the evil spirits that inhabit the air and in the 
 interest of the Prince of this world, whose 
 limited reign seems to be at its height. 
 
 Spiritualism, in principle, is in defiance of 
 Almighty God, in claiming to reveal that 
 which He does not purpose to reveal. It has 
 no need of a Saviour; it looks forward to a 
 female Messiah, and, contrary to the teach- 
 ing of the Bible that, " now is the accepted 
 time," teaches that our sins can be atoned for 
 hereafter. 
 
 THEOSOPHY. 
 
 Theosophy is a system evolved out of a 
 combination of the doctrines of evolution, 
 reincarnation, fatalism and Pantheism. It is 
 
CONCLUSION. 161 
 
 admittedly pagan in its origin and claims its 
 occultism to be "handed down from the times 
 of the Mysteries to the present. " It cannot 
 admit a personal God, and says the "Father 
 in Heaven is a well known esoteric phase for 
 the Higher Self," but God is all and all is God. 
 It starts with Substance, God, Living Sub- 
 stance, which has two states: the higher 
 spirit and that which is projected into lower 
 conditions, matter. Both, of course, are 
 eternal and the process we see going on in the 
 world is the evolution of matter into spirit. 
 
 Man is not a creature of God, but a result 
 in the development of this process; and he 
 came forth from the rocks. His present state 
 is the result of what he did in a previous life, 
 of which he has no memory or consciousness, 
 and his condition, when next he becomes 
 incarnate, depends upon what he does in this 
 stage of his existence — the king may become 
 the bootblack, the washerwoman, the liter- 
 ateur. So it goes on through the countless 
 ages, up or down, till by regeneration or de- 
 generation man attains to annihilation. 
 
162 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 Pain and suffering, misery and happiness 
 are results of what one has done in previous 
 existence, following the rule of cause and effect 
 and to relieve one of his distress is to interfere 
 with his redemption. Consequently there is 
 no mercy, no pardon, no vicarious sacrifice, no 
 Saviour, only the stern hard road of fate. With 
 woman declared to be the head of creation, 
 the outward and visible sign of the Fall is the 
 subjection of woman to man in the world, 
 and her complete restoration and exaltation 
 is necessary before redemption can be effected; 
 while the progress in the development of souls 
 will lead to the "universal belief of the doc- 
 trine that sin is expiated by transmigrations 
 and in the worship of the Great Goddess. " 
 
 The Holy Spirit is looked upon as the 
 female element in the Divine Substance and 
 Christ is declared to be a title given to all 
 triumphant Initiates, of which there have 
 been eleven, and another is yet to come to 
 reconcile the seeming differences of his prede- 
 cessors and to acknowledge the Christs of all 
 nations. 
 
CONCLUSION. 163 
 
 Of course, Theosophy would reduce Christ- 
 ianity to the level of the ancient religions, 
 that, out of all, it might be acknowledged the 
 universal religion. It does not directly attack 
 the Bible and its doctrines but it would explain 
 them so as to advance its own cause. 
 
 It rests its theories upon the revelation of 
 a line of elder brothers, Christs, Mahatmas, 
 Adepts, Initiates, " highly developed men," 
 " perfected forms of other periods of evolu- 
 tion, " invisible beings of whom great things 
 are claimed, who are alleged to have told 
 Mme. Blavatski and other leaders all they 
 knew of this mysterious system ; but there 
 is not the slightest evidence that such beings 
 exist. Indeed, the Bible would teach that 
 those who have passed from this earth can- 
 not return or communicate with its inhabit- 
 ants. 
 
 Theosophy condemns the trickery of Spirit- 
 ualism yet is not itself free from this same 
 means used to advance its cause, but there are 
 none of its phenomena, that are genuine, that 
 cannot be explained through the secondary 
 
164 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 consciousness made use of by ancient sages of 
 the East, but not known till recent years in 
 the West. 
 
 CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. 
 
 Christian Science we found to be the 
 name given to a theory woven around an 
 alleged discovery of an art of healing, the 
 principle of which, however, has been made 
 use of by all kinds of healers, ancient as well 
 as modern. The explanation is found in the 
 secondary consciousness of man, responding 
 to hypnotic suggestion. Cures are performed 
 in this way assuredly, but there is a most 
 decided limit and it is worse than useless to 
 apply it in all cases. As this is attempted, 
 however, and lives are actually lost in this 
 way, it becomes a dangerous principle in the 
 hands of ignorant healers and should be 
 restricted. 
 
 As a theory, it is the idealism of Bishop 
 Berkeley, attempted to be put into practical 
 every day life. Declaring matter non-existent 
 and nothing real but mind or spirit, it would 
 
CONCLUSION. 165 
 
 counteract, heal, the evil effects, which active 
 nothingness (sin, sickness and death) exerts 
 upon the lives of men but which it declares to 
 be illusions of mortal mind. 
 
 As a science, it is a misnomer, illogical, 
 incomplete, inconsistent and altogether un- 
 trustworthy. As a religion, it is anti- 
 Christian. It twists, perverts and contra- 
 dicts the plain teaching of the Bible and 
 denies the Christ of history to advance its 
 own untenable assertions. If ever there was 
 an illusion, it is what is called Christian 
 Science, which raises a hope in the breasts of 
 its adherents which they will find, when too 
 late, that it is utterly incapable of satisfying. 
 
 But why will people follow after such 
 things? Why should we desire to peer 
 into the future when our own experience 
 teaches us that it is best for us not to know 
 what is in store for us? Why should we 
 desire to explain all things (with the Theoso- 
 phists) when we know that it is impossible, 
 or what satisfaction can it be when we are 
 suffering and in want, while others rejoice 
 
166 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 and have abundance, to know that it is 
 according to the law of Karma and due to 
 something done in a previous existence? Why 
 should we desire to deny the testimony of the 
 senses? Why deny the reality of pain and 
 suffering ? 
 
 We know that this is not a perfect world 
 and that in the midst of its joys and happiness, 
 trouble, toil and pain are sure to come; but 
 we also know that sorrow has its uses and 
 that by reason of the crosses, often grievous 
 that we have had to bear, we have grown 
 purer, nobler, better, happier, so that, though 
 it meant agony to us at the time, we have 
 cause to rejoice that we were made to go 
 through the fiery furnace of affliction. 
 
 THE REASON. 
 
 Why then do men to-day take up with 
 these substitutes for the Gospel instead of 
 taking up their cross to follow Jesus? The 
 reason is plain. They have not learned that 
 " there is none other Name under heaven given 
 among men, whereby we must be saved.' ' 
 
CONCLUSION. 167 
 
 They have not yet acknowledged that the only 
 true religion is the Gospel, the only true hope 
 of salvation that of Jesus of Nazareth. When 
 then they see so many of the household of 
 faith cold, indifferent, listless believers, having 
 the form of Godliness but denying the power 
 thereof, believing in spite of themselves, yet 
 finding no hope and joy and comfort in be- 
 lieving — when they see Christendom divided 
 up into a multitude of sects, caring not so 
 much for the cause of the Master, as for their 
 own sect, unable perhaps to repeat the " Faith 
 once for. all delivered to the saints' ' and " con- 
 tending earnestly " for their own opinions 
 rather than for that — when this condition of 
 things is recognized as existing among those 
 who profess and call themselves Christians, 
 it is not strange that the world should look 
 askance or that others should at times be 
 inclined to advance ideas of their own, even 
 if they are not distinctly Christian. &nd, 
 it must be admitted, just as soon as we 
 depart a single iota from the " Faith once 
 for all delivered" one individual or organiza- 
 
168 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 tion has as much right to advance his ideas 
 and opinion as another, whether Christian 
 or not. It must also be admitted that it is 
 not pleasant to think that we are responsible 
 beings held to account for all that is done in 
 the flesh or that there is but one way of sal- 
 vation, one way to obtain immortal life. 
 With the responsibility of eternity before us, 
 it is not pleasant to think of the uncertainty 
 of the future; or that we must suffer while 
 others know nought but joy; or that our 
 trials and troubles are all needless. When 
 therefore theories are advanced that would 
 relieve us of such things, it is not strange that 
 there are some poor souls that are attracted 
 by them. But 'tis all in vain; God's plans 
 for the salvation of mankind are not to 
 be overthrown by man's connivance. We 
 poor mortals are to walk by faith, not by 
 knowledge; and when trials and tribulations 
 come upon us, as must needs be, our hope, 
 our comfort, is to be found not in denying 
 them but in waiting upon the Lord and hear 
 ing Him say to us as to S. Paul : " My grace 
 
CONCLUSION. 169 
 
 is sufficient for thee ; for my strength is made 
 perfect in weakness/ ' This is the panacea of 
 all earthly ills, which will enable us, not to 
 deny or ignore them but to triumph over 
 them. 
 
 THE REMEDY. 
 
 If then we have found the cause of these 
 ills, for so they really are, have we not also 
 found the cure, the remedy, in a complete trust 
 in an active living faith in the Lord Jesus, that 
 would lead us to proclaim from the housetop 
 if need be, but much better in an holy Christ- 
 ian living, that there is none other name 
 under heaven given among men whereby we 
 may receive health and salvation but only 
 the name of our Lord Jesus Christ ! 
 
 Oh, then that we knew more about the 
 Church of the living God, what it is, what it 
 claims and what it stands for! Oh, that we 
 could realize the mighty power of the Gospel 
 of Jesus Christ; not so much in the past as in 
 the present ; not so much by what it has done 
 as by what it can do for us here and now ! 
 
170 ANTI-CHRISTIAN CULTS. 
 
 Oh, that we might realize the power of 
 Jesus Christ over mankind and in ourselves. 
 Then would we no longer seek in vain to flee 
 the uncertainties, the sorrows, the pain, the 
 anguish to be found in this temporal world, 
 for the Cross and the abundant grace given, 
 would enable us to triumph over them, 
 to rejoice in spite of them — yea, conquerors 
 through our great Redeemer's might, sealed 
 with His eternal Name, we shall find perfect 
 health and eternal salvation, and it may be 
 sung of us as of the Saints in Light : 
 
 "Hunger, thirst, disease unknown, 
 On immortal fruits they feed ; 
 Them the Lamb amidst the throne, 
 Shall to living fountains lead. 
 
 "Joy and gladness banish sighs ; 
 Perfect love dispels their fears ; 
 And forever from their eyes, 
 God shall wipe away their tears." 
 
 The End. 
 
JUN 24 1898 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
 021 100 340 6