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 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 
 
Kingdom of God. 
 Only Believe. 
 
 What is Christian Healing. 
 
 BY 
 
 G. F. & M. E. CHAPMAN, 
 
 17 HOWARD STREET, - - - MALDEN, MASS. 
 
 THREE PAPERS ON PRACTICAL CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 On and after January 1st, 1888, 
 MRS. M. K CHAPMAN, 
 
 WILL RECEIVE 
 
 PATIENTS AT HER RESIDENCE, 
 
 17 Howard Street, Malden, Mass. 
 
 Absent Treatment if desired. All correspondence 
 promptly attended to. 
 
Christ the Healer. 
 
 A SERIES OF 
 
 LETTERS ADDRESSED 
 
 Investigator of Christian Science. 
 
 By G. F. CHAPMAN. 
 
 BOSTON : 
 
 H. H. CARTER & KARRICK, 
 
 No. 3 Beacon Sfreet. 
 
 1888. 
 
• cr 
 
 l0f coso* 68 *' 
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1888, 
 
 By G. F. CHAPMAN. 
 
 
CHRIST THE HEALER. 
 
 Dear Friend : 
 
 You appear to be very sincere in wishing 
 to find out what true healing is, and I will 
 gladly do all in my power to help you; but 
 the way in which you are trying to learn is 
 so different from the way in which I have 
 been led, that the only aid it is possible for 
 me to give you will come by acquainting 
 you as far as I am able with the revelation 
 which has come to me. 
 
 I cannot, if I would, investigate the subject 
 of healing by the light of natural science, as 
 you are trying to do. Such study requires a 
 kind of knowledge that I lack. Nor would 
 the question be really settled, to my think- 
 ing, even if the theories of the mental healers 
 should be either established or destroyed by 
 scientific tests ; for, if it be Christian healing 
 of which the world stands in perishing need, 
 
6 CHRIST THE HEALER. 
 
 moral as well as physical regeneration, the 
 cure must be wrought by something more 
 powerful than any medicine with which 
 material science deals. 
 
 Through trying experiences and sore 
 afflictions have I been led to see that it is 
 the teaching of the Holy Spirit, and not the 
 precepts of worldly wisdom, that brings men 
 to a knowledge of the truth and reveals to 
 them the way of eternal life. " Acquaint 
 yourself with God, whom to know aright 
 is life eternal, " is the burden of scripture. 
 "This is life eternal,'' said our Lord in his 
 memorable prayer, " that they might know 
 thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, 
 whom thou hast sent." 
 
 The diseases from which men suffer 
 belong not to the body alone, but affect 
 the mind also, and have their source or 
 cause in the wrong beliefs and actions of the 
 human race. The evils of life did not begin 
 when certain bodily maladies first appeared 
 among men ; the trouble dates back to that 
 period in the history of mankind called " the 
 Fall." The Fall implies a previous state of 
 
CHRIST THE HEAEER. / 
 
 perfection, and the conclusion seems most 
 reasonable that true healing is accomplished 
 by the redemption of the world through 
 Christ. To answer your question, then, my 
 friend, and solve the problem about which 
 so many people are earnestly thinking, it is 
 necessary to learn what that perfection was 
 from which mankind fell, what the fall itself 
 implies, and what true salvation means. 
 
 The only authority on this subject with 
 which I am acquainted is the Bible; and, 
 while I am not wise enough to understand 
 the truth, much less to enlighten you, a deep 
 sense of the meaning of Holy Writ has been 
 given me, which, if I can express it, may 
 enable others to perceive the same glorious 
 light that is shining in upon my once dark- 
 ened mind. 
 
 When Jesus was born in Bethlehem of 
 Judaea, a few wise men from the East saw 
 his star and hastened to worship him as the 
 promised Christ; but most of the people 
 among whom he was brought up failed to 
 recognize his true character. And later, 
 when he went about the villages and high- 
 
CHRIST THE HEALER. 
 
 ways of Palestine doing the work of him 
 that sent him, his own nation, which he 
 fain would save, rejected his claims and 
 treated him as an imposter. While consid- 
 ering this fact, the question often arises, 
 Does the world, to-day, understand the true 
 Christ any better than the Jews did in the 
 time of Jesus ? 
 
 The common belief of Christians is that 
 the Saviour of mankind came in the fulness 
 of time in the person of Jesus, the only 
 begotten Son of God, and that men who 
 died before he appeared on earth were 
 saved, if at all, by faith in a promised 
 Messiah. Men to-day do not seem to 
 understand, any more than the blind Phari- 
 sees did eighteen hundred years ago, that 
 the names " Christ " and " Jesus" stand for 
 two distinct truths that ought not to be 
 confounded. The birth of Jesus, the man, 
 was, indeed, the beginning of the Christian 
 era; but Christ, the only begotten Son 
 of God, was not born of Mary, and dwelt 
 in the bosom of his Father before the 
 human race began, when the morning stars 
 sang together. 
 
CHRIST THE HEALER. 
 
 On the supposition that Jesus and Christ 
 are identical, the first chapter of the Gospel 
 according to St. John is an unsolved riddle; 
 but, admit the other view, and the sacred 
 words become luminous with a divine mean- 
 ing. In the beginning, when, as stated in 
 Genesis, God created the heavens and the 
 earth, was the Word, that is, Christ, and the 
 Word was with God, and the Word was 
 God ; for Christ declared, " I and my Father 
 are one." All terrestrial things were made 
 by him ; life was in him ; he was the light 
 that shineth in darkness ; he was in the 
 world, and the world was made by him, and 
 the world knew him not. "No man hath 
 seen God at any time," says verse 18th; 
 " the only begotten Son, which is in the 
 bosom of the Father, he hath declared 
 Him." 
 
 In my own experience, a new light broke 
 in upon the vexed problems of life when my 
 eyes were opened to perceive the true 
 teaching of the Bible, as I believe, in regard 
 to Christ ; and it may surprise you, as it did 
 me at first, to learn that the key to the 
 
10 CHRIST THE HEALER. 
 
 mystery of Christ is contained in the account 
 of the creation, as given in the first and 
 second chapters of Genesis. 
 
 As that account is commonly read and 
 explained, the true sense, as I now under- 
 stand it, is not made clear. It is usually 
 considered to be descriptive of the first 
 appearance of the visible world of the 
 senses, — of men and beasts, birds and fishes, 
 trees and herbs, as we see them now — 
 and no account is taken of the immaterial 
 substance that constitutes the true prototypes 
 of the forms seen in the natural world. 
 
 What is often spoken of as the " Six Days' 
 Creation " I understand to be a presentation 
 of God's idea or pattern of the yet unformed 
 world, as a spiritual reality. By reading the 
 opening verses, we find that God's creation 
 was unlike that which we now behold, for 
 it was without form and void. In the 
 beginning it was not visible, for darkness 
 was upon the face of the deep. Nor did 
 it become active until the Spirit of God 
 moved upon the face of this dark abyss. 
 Then, at his command, appeared day and 
 
CHRIST THE HEALER. 11 
 
 night, dry land, vegetation, sun, moon and 
 stars, fowl of the air, fish of the sea, beasts 
 of the field, and man, made in God's own 
 image. But these were not the external 
 forms of the visible creation, but their spiritual 
 prototypes, the original patterns or models 
 after which the visible things of this world 
 were to be formed. God created the spiritual 
 realities that are represented to our senses 
 in what we call nature, but the realities them- 
 selves exist as the spiritual idea of the 
 Creator, without visible form and void of all 
 material qualities. 
 
 This may appear at first to be a strained 
 interpretation of the account given in the 
 first chapter of the Old Testament, but is 
 it not the correct one ? If the account in 
 the first chapter describes the external 
 creation, how could it be true, as stated 
 in the first verse of the second chapter, 
 that " thus the heavens and the earth were 
 finished, and all the host of them ? " The 
 external creation did not cease; it is in 
 progress to-day, as we very well know, and 
 has been going on through all the ages 
 
12 
 
 CHRIST THE HEALER. 
 
 in which man has inhabited the earth. It 
 will continue through all time. Generations 
 come and go. Races of men are exter- 
 minated, and new races take their place. 
 Earlier forms of animal and plant life become 
 extinct, and other forms spring up in their 
 stead. 
 
 The Bible writers speak of the creation 
 as still going on, and the Psalms especially 
 abound with expressions to show that their 
 author considered the creative works of the 
 Lord as continually going forward : The 
 heavens declare the glory of the Lord, and 
 the firmament showeth his handiwork. By 
 the word of the Lord were the heavens 
 made, and all the .host of them by the breath 
 of his mouth. He gathereth the waters 
 of the sea together as an heap ; he layeth 
 up the depth in storehouses. From the 
 place of his habitation he looketh upon all 
 the inhabitants of the earth. He fashioneth 
 all their hearts alike. Come, behold the 
 works of the Lord, what desolations he hath 
 made in the earth. Which by his strength 
 setteth fast the mountains. Now visitest 
 
CHRIST THE HEALER. 13 
 
 the earth, and waterest it. How terrible art 
 thou in thy works ! Come and see the 
 works of the Lord. He ruleth by his power 
 forever. The Lord is a sun and shield. 
 Oh that men would praise the Lord for his 
 goodness, and for his wonderful works to the 
 children of men. He turneth the wilderness 
 into a standing water, and the dry ground 
 into watersprings. And there he maketh 
 the hungry to dwell. His work is honor- 
 able and glorious. The Lord is my strength, 
 and is become my salvation. This is the 
 day which the Lord hath made. Thy hands 
 hath made me and fashioned me. He 
 causeth vapors to ascend from the ends of 
 the earth ; he maketh lightnings for the 
 rain ; he bringeth the wind out of his 
 treasuries. One generation shall praise thy 
 works to another, and shall declare thy 
 mighty acts. I will speak of the glorious 
 honor of thy majesty, and of thy wondrous 
 works. Thy kingdom is an everlasting 
 kingdom, and thy dominion endureth 
 throughout all generations. The Lord is 
 righteous in all his ways, and holy in all his 
 
14 CHRIST THE HEALER. 
 
 works. He sendeth forth his commandment 
 upon earth : his word runneth very swiftly. 
 He giveth snow like wool : he scattereth 
 the hoarfrost like ashes. He casteth forth 
 his ice like morsels : who can stand before 
 his cold? He sendeth out his word and 
 melteth them : he causeth his wind to blow, 
 and then waters flow. These and many 
 other familiar passages show, not only that 
 the psalmist considered that the elemental, 
 creative forces operating in nature are the 
 direct will and power of the Lord, but that 
 creation is going on, and is not a finished 
 act. 
 
 Nor can we read Psalm cxxxvi. without 
 perceiving that the Lord, to whom the 
 author ascribed all the wonderful works 
 wrought in his time, is the same being who 
 originally created the objects seen in the 
 external world ; for he plainly says : O give 
 thanks unto the Lord of lords: . . . To 
 him that by wisdom made the heavens, 
 stretched out the earth above the waters, 
 made great lights — the sun, moon and 
 stars ; that smote Egypt, brought out Israel 
 
CHRIST THE HEALER. 15 
 
 from among them, divided the Red sea, led 
 his people through the wilderness, gave them 
 the land promised to their fathers, and 
 bestowed upon them all the blessings they 
 enjoyed. The same positive truth is also 
 clearly set forth in the verses of Psalm civ. 
 
 From what has been cited, as w T ell as 
 from much other evidence that might be 
 easily adduced, it is certain that the external 
 creation has not come to an end, and that 
 the " heavens and the earth, and all the host 
 of them," that were "finished" when "on 
 the seventh day God ended his work which 
 he had made," must be something else. 
 
 Now, I cannot give any learned reasons 
 for what appears to me so plain a truth that 
 no one need miss it, that the Six-Days' 
 Creation was the making of the spiritual 
 prototypes, after which God in his infinite 
 wisdom designed the future visible universe 
 to be fashioned. These existed as his ideas 
 from the beginning; and we, being finite, 
 cannot conceive of a time when they did not 
 exist. When at God's simple word, these 
 spiritual prototypes flashed into being, he 
 
16 CHRIST THE HEALER. 
 
 pronounced them good, and all being finished, 
 he rested from his work, and left the 
 expression of these ideas or prototypes in 
 external forms to be carried out, as described 
 in the second chapter of the Book of 
 Genesis, 
 
 On reading this chapter, we observe that 
 the first three verses record the fact that 
 God had finished the Six-Days' Creation, 
 that he rested on the seventh day, and for 
 that reason that he blessed and sanctified it. 
 Now, mark the peculiarity of the verses that 
 follow. The creating power is designated 
 by a different name. No longer is it God, 
 the Father, who performs the work ; but the 
 Lord God is thenceforth spoken of as the 
 creator. Up to this time the Lord God had 
 not caused it to rain upon the earth, and 
 there was no man. Why this abrupt change 
 in the appellation of the Creator ? And how 
 is the statement that there was not a man to 
 be reconciled with the text of the twenty- 
 seventh verse of the previous chapter, 
 which says : " So God created man in his 
 own image, in the image of God created 
 
CHRIST THE HEALER. 17 
 
 he him ? " Let us consider the last query 
 first. 
 
 It appears very plain to me that the 
 creation of man spoken of in the first chapter 
 refers to that spiritual prototype, which is 
 the real man and perfect image of God. In 
 the seventh verse of the second chapter it 
 appears that the Lord God gave visible 
 expression to the spiritual model which God 
 had created, by forming a material repre- 
 sentation of it "of the dust of the ground.'' 
 God created a spiritual prototype, the Lord 
 God formed an external resemblance to that 
 model. God created the one perfect image ; 
 the Lord God formed a being out of matter, 
 which represented to the senses as far as was 
 possible, the image of God which was its 
 prototype. 
 
 The query, " Why this abrupt change in 
 the appellation of the Creator?" is answered, 
 if we accept the truth of the statement that 
 God had already finished his creative work, 
 and that the forming of the external or visible 
 creation was and still is a work carried on 
 by the Lord. By this it is not meant that a 
 
18 CHRIST THE HEALER. 
 
 totally different power assumed and earned 
 forward the work of creation, for that would 
 imply the existence of more than one deity. 
 The name Lord God, and the name Lord, as 
 frequently used throughout the Bible, refer 
 to the spiritual likeness of God, the account 
 of which is given in verses 26-7, of chapter 
 first, where it is called man. 
 
 When God said " Let us make man in our 
 image,'' it was not the first specimen of the 
 corporeal, earthly man that was created ; 
 this ''image of God" was God's ideal man, 
 the spiritual prototype, of which each indi- 
 vidual of the race is the physical expression. 
 This was the real and perfect man, to whom 
 power was given to people the earth with 
 corporeal beings to represent him, and all 
 varieties of animal and vegetable life, formed 
 after God's idea. 
 
 Again, this perfect image of the Father 
 was Gods only begotten son, existing from 
 the beginning, whose prerogative it was to 
 create all lower orders of terrestrial life. 
 Me is the Lord, who made the heavens and 
 the earth, the sea, and all that in them is. 
 
CHRIST THE HEALER. 19 
 
 He is the Lord, who appeared as Christ, in 
 the person of Jesus of Nazareth, and became 
 the savior of the world. 
 
 The creation of the spiritual prototypes 
 had been finished, and a new mode of the 
 divine creative power was manifested as the 
 Lord God, maker of the forms of the visible 
 or external world. In the Psalms he is 
 called " the Lord, our maker," the Lord who 
 " made the heavens and the earth." " It is 
 he that hath made us and not we our- 
 selves." — Psalms c, 3. " Who laid the 
 foundations of the earth, that it should not 
 be removed forever." — civ., 5. " The works 
 of the Lord are great, sought out of all them 
 that have pleasure therein." — cxi., 2. " Let 
 them praise the name of the Lord : for he 
 commanded, and they were created." — 
 cxlviii., 5. 
 
 Paul's testimony on this point, as given in 
 the first chapter of Hebrews, and elsewhere, 
 is very clear. The meaning is plain that 
 the Lord, who in the beginning laid the 
 foundation of the earth, is the only begotten 
 Son of God, whose throne is for ever and 
 
20 CHRIST THE HEALER. 
 
 ever. Still further is this view confimed if 
 we now compare chapter v., 5 : " So also 
 Christ glorified not himself to be made an 
 high priest ; but he that said unto him, 
 Thou art my Son, to-day have I begotten 
 thee." In Colossians 1., the same apostle 
 reiterates this view ; for he says " Who [the 
 Son] is the image of the invisible God, the 
 first-born of every creature : For by him 
 were all things created, that are in heaven, 
 and that are in earth, . . . And he is 
 before all things, and by him all things 
 consist," — Verses 15-17. In this connec- 
 tion read also II, Corinthians iv., 4 : " Lest 
 the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, 
 who is the image of God, should shine unto 
 them." I. Corinthians, x., 4, 9 : " And did 
 all drink the same spiritual drink : for they 
 drank of that spiritual Rock that followed 
 them : and that Rock was Christ." " Neither 
 let us tempt Christ, as some of them also 
 tempted, and were destroyed of serpents." 
 Acts vil, 37, 38: "This [Christ] is that 
 Moses, which said unto the children of 
 Israel, A prophet shall the Lord your God 
 
CHRIST THE HEADER. 21 
 
 raise up unto you of your brethren, like unto 
 me ; him shall ye hear. This is he that was 
 in the church in the wilderness with the 
 angel which spake to him in the mount 
 Sina, and with our fathers: who received 
 the lively oracles to give unto us." Colos- 
 sians i., 18 : "And he is the head of the 
 body, the church : who is the beginning, the 
 first-born from the dead ; that in all things 
 he might have the pre-eminence." Ephe- 
 sians iv., 12, 13: " For the edifying of the 
 body of Christ: Till we all come in the 
 unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of 
 the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto 
 the measure of the stature of the fulness of 
 Christ." John 1., 1, 14, 18 : " In the begin- 
 ning was the Word" [Christ]. "And the 
 Word w T as made flesh, and dwelt among us, 
 (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the 
 only begotten of the Father,) full of grace 
 and truth." "No man hath seen God at 
 any time ; the only begotten Son, which is 
 in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared 
 him." John in., 35: "The Father loveth 
 the Son, and hath given all things into his 
 
22 CHRIST THE HEALER. 
 
 hand." John viii., 58: " Jesus said unto 
 them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before 
 Abraham was, I am." John xvn., 5 : " And 
 now, O Father, glorify thou me, with thine 
 -own self with the glory which I had with 
 thee before the world was." Matthew xxn., 
 45 : " If David then call him Lord, how is 
 he his son ?" Matthew xvi., 16: " Thou 
 art the Christ, the son of the living God." 
 Mark viii., 29: "Thou art the Christ." 
 
THE FALL. 
 
 If the correct interpretation of the many 
 texts now cited make it evident that Christ, 
 the only begotten son of God, existing from 
 the beginning, is the creator of the external 
 world, as declared in the second chapter of 
 Genesis, you will find it easy to perceive 
 that this only begotten Son is the one 
 spiritual or real man, of which the race 
 of corporeal men are the visible expressions. 
 
 To perceive this is very important ; for 
 when we realize that there is only one real 
 man, who is the spiritual prototype, having 
 power to form an indefinite number of 
 material expressions of himself, we can 
 better understand how it is that the real man 
 is perfect, and cannot be affected by what is 
 called disease and sin. We see also that 
 it is through Christ, as a perfect prototype, 
 that we have any idea at all of divine 
 oerfection. 
 
24 THE FALL. 
 
 And lest my use of the term tl corporeal 
 man " lead any one astray, let me explain 
 that by it I intend to designate an individual 
 of the human race on earth, with all that 
 belongs to him as a personality ; not his 
 physical body alone, but his soul as well ; 
 and my reason for calling this creature a 
 " corporeal man " is merely to distinguish 
 the external expression of the one real man 
 from the prototype itself. 
 
 Adam and Eve were the perfect outward 
 or material expression of the one real or 
 spiritual man, who was created male and 
 female ; for the Lord God " breathed into 
 his nostrils the breath of life, and man 
 became a living soul." But it was not Adam 
 who exercised dominion over all the lower 
 orders of creation. He was what the Hebrew 
 meaning of the word implies, the earth man, 
 that is, the earthly or visible expression of 
 man. He had no life of himself, but derived 
 his life from the breath of his creator, the 
 spiritual man. He could do nothing of 
 himself, but was the external organ through 
 which the power of the real man was made 
 manifest on the earth. 
 
THE FALL. 25 
 
 The same truth is taught in the parable 
 of the Vine and the Branches, recorded in 
 the fifteenth chapter of the Gospel of John. 
 Christ, the spiritual man, is the true vine, 
 the Father is the husbandman, and external 
 or corporeal human beings are the branches. 
 How forcibly does Jesus here teach the 
 lesson that the external man has no life or 
 power in himself, but is wholly dependent 
 on the vine. He is simply the outward 
 expression of the spiritual man, and is 
 created only as a medium through which 
 the spiritual will expresses itself. 
 
 We see, also, that it was not the spiritual 
 man that fell, but the corporeal man. The 
 lapse of Adam, or the earth-man, from a 
 state of perfect innocence represented in 
 Genesis as expulsion from the garden of 
 Eden, took place when the branches were 
 broken off from the vine, and the external 
 was no longer a true expression of the 
 spiritual or real. How this fall came about 
 is explained in Romans i., 2 1-25 : " Because 
 that, when they knew God, they glorified 
 him not as God, neither were thankful ; but 
 
26 THE FALL. 
 
 became vain in their imaginations, and their 
 foolish heart was darkened. Professing 
 themselves to be wise, they became fools, 
 and changed the glory of the uncorruptible 
 God into an image made like to corruptible 
 man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, 
 and creeping things. Wherefore God also 
 gave them up to uncleanness through the 
 lusts of their own hearts, to dishonor their 
 own bodies between themselves: who 
 changed the truth of God into a lie, and 
 worshiped and served the creature [corpo- 
 real man] more than the creator [spiritual 
 man] , who is blessed for ever." 
 
 When the fallen man realized in a measure 
 his true condition and began once more to 
 turn his gaze toward the Vine, or true light, 
 the question naturally arose, Where am I? 
 But to his darkened mind it seemed like the 
 voice of God calling to him, and saying, 
 " Adam, where art thou ? " With this came 
 the knowledge that he was separated in 
 thought from the spiritual source of life, and 
 hence was generated the fear of danger ; 
 and he sought to cover himself from the 
 
THE FALL. 27 
 
 light which revealed the fact of his dis- 
 obedience. 
 
 The sign that man had fallen was that he 
 came to know good from evil ; for we read 
 in Genesis ill., 5: " For God doth know 
 that in the day ye eat thereof [z. e %} of the 
 forbidden tree], then your eyes shall be 
 opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing 
 good and evil." As if the tempter had said : 
 After eating that fruit, ye, who are now 
 simply the corporeal external expressions 
 and mediums of the Lord, shall become to 
 yourselves what ye now think God is. 
 
 Is it not remarkable, also, that the knowl- 
 edge they were forbidden to acquire, is the 
 very knowledge which the Christian churches 
 now think it most needful for men to have? 
 Great emphasis is laid on the cultivation of 
 a tender conscience, that is quick to distin- 
 guish what is right from what is wrong. 
 But the Lord God said to our first parents: 
 " Of the tree of the knowledge of good and 
 evil, thou shalt not eat : for in the day that 
 thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die" 
 
28 THE FALL. 
 
 If that assertion was true then, it is true 
 to-day, and will be always true. What then 
 are we to infer, but that the knowledge 
 of good and evil, that is the power to 
 discriminate between what is right and what 
 is wrong is the sign that men are smitten 
 with spiritual death ? Or, in other words, 
 the branches have ceased to abide in the 
 vine from which alone they could draw their 
 life? 
 
 The condition of perfect innocence and 
 delight, called the garden of Eden, was one 
 in which the inmates knew nothing but good 
 (God). The original sin was finding out 
 that a man may indulge thoughts and feel- 
 ings that are not good ; and when a man 
 has made that discovery, he is fallen. 
 " Sin, when it is finished bringeth forth 
 death," said the apostle ; a statement which 
 tallies exactly with those awful words uttered 
 by the Lord God: " In the day that thou 
 eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." 
 
 The fatal thought that a man might have 
 power of himself apart from the Lord, that 
 
THE FALL. 29 
 
 he might sever himself from the vine, and 
 become a god unto himself, and know of his 
 own knowledge what was right and what 
 wrong, instead of relying wholly on the 
 Lord for guidance, is represented in Genesis 
 as being put into the minds of Adam and 
 Eve by a serpent. It was, therefore, from 
 the lowest " beast of the field/' the most 
 earthy and material source that this fatal 
 ambition sprung. Man turned away from 
 the light to the darkness ; ceased to look 
 upw r ard, and began to look downward ; 
 " changed the glory of the uncorruptible 
 God into an image made like to corruptible 
 man." 
 
 The desire to put a personal will in place 
 of God's will, to act for ourselves and exer- 
 cise our own judgment, instead of being 
 glad, obedient mediums through which the 
 Lord may work, is called in the Bible a 
 serpent, — a sensual, earth-born suggestion. 
 When the children of Israel had sinned 
 while on their journey in the wilderness, 
 they died of serpent bites ; and, curiously 
 
30 THE FALL. 
 
 enough, they were saved from the deadly 
 effects of the poison of sin, by the lifting up 
 of the brazen type of the destroyer, thereby 
 directing the eyes and thoughts of the dying 
 sinners toward the true source of life. 
 
 Thus is the lesson taught over and over, 
 in the blessed Word of God, that as soon as 
 the corporeal man learns to know both good 
 and evil, he dies of the serpent-bite of sin ; 
 and it is only when he forsakes that desire 
 to judge for himself what is right and wrong, 
 and yields himself wholly to the guidance 
 of the perfect man, Christ, that he is saved. 
 
THE SAVIORS OF THE WORLD. 
 
 I have explained to you what the Bible 
 means by Christ, as I understand it, — that 
 Christ is the only begotten Son of the 
 Father, and the Lord God mentioned in the 
 second chapter of Genesis ; he is the real 
 man and spiritual prototype of all corporeal 
 beings belonging to the human race on 
 earth, and the creator of everything finite. 
 I have also considered the teaching of 
 Scripture concerning the fall of man, which 
 was a lapse from rectitude and consequent 
 innocence, induced by the desire to take his 
 life into his own hands, constitute himself 
 a judge of good and evil, and draw his life 
 from the earth, instead of abiding in the 
 vine. From this lapsed and dying condition 
 fallen men could be rescued only by infinite 
 power ; hence the next subject to be treated 
 is the Saviors of the World. 
 
32 THE SAVIORS OF THE WORLD. 
 
 According to my present understanding 
 of truth, Christ, who was made flesh and 
 dwelt among men in the person of Jesus 
 of Nazareth, also appears in every individual 
 human being. Each babe that is born is 
 a new outward expression of the Christ, a 
 visible medium, more or less perfect, through 
 which he manifests himself to the world. 
 Not one is so obscure or degenerate, that he 
 does not in some degree reflect the image 
 of this perfect prototype ; for no one comes 
 into this world absolutely devoid of good- 
 ness, and whatever is good proceeds from 
 the Lord, who is striving to manifest himself 
 through every earthly expression he has 
 made. 
 
 It is true that the children of men, spoken 
 of in the parable as the " branches," do not 
 abide in the vine, and consequently fail to 
 bear fruit. We see painful evidence on 
 every hand that men have turned the truth 
 of God into a lie and serve the creature 
 more than the creator. Yet these unfruitful 
 branches are not wholly severed from the 
 vine from which they derive their life ; for, 
 
THE SAVIORS OF THE WORLD. 33 
 
 if they were indeed cut off, they would be 
 cast forth and withered, as Jesus said ; there 
 would then be nothing to sustain spiritual, 
 or even what is called physical life, and the 
 severed branches would utterly perish. But 
 the fact that the wicked continue to live and 
 enjoy God's bounty proves that every earthly 
 life, however dark, has some vital connection 
 with the divine life which nourishes it. 
 
 All men are expressions of the one 
 spiritual prototype, better or worse mediums 
 of Christ on the earth. And just so far as 
 he is a clear medium for spiritual truth to 
 shine through is each man a savior of those 
 who come within his influence. It is Christ, 
 the truth, pervading the dark world, and 
 operating in the human heart, that redeems 
 and saves the race ; and wherever there is a 
 medium through which the light of truth can 
 shine, be it never so faintly, there is a source 
 of healing and saving grace to mankind. 
 
 The most perfect expression of the real 
 man, that is, the Christ, of which we have 
 any knowledge, was seen in the person of 
 Jesus. He was the savior of mankind. But 
 
34 THE SAVIORS OF THE WORLD. 
 
 there were men living before his time 
 through whom the Christ manifested himself 
 to the world in a special manner, and just 
 such men have lived since his advent. All 
 human beings are saviors, in so far as they 
 reflect that perfect image and likeness of the 
 Father, which is Christ, the spiritual man ; 
 but each age has had its saviors, men 
 endued with a double portion of the Christ 
 spirit, and of some of these we will now 
 speak. 
 
 One of the earliest saviors mentioned in 
 the Bible is Noah, who appeared on earth 
 after the race of men had become very 
 wicked, so that, as we read in Genesis vi., 5: 
 " every imagination of the thoughts of his 
 heart was only evil continually." But Noah 
 found grace in the eyes of the Lord, because 
 "he was a just man, perfect in his genera- 
 tion, and walked with God." The account 
 of his life and deeds given in Genesis clearly 
 indicates that through him the outward 
 human expression of the Christ was pre- 
 served from utter extinction on earth. 
 With him the Lord renewed the covenant 
 
THE SAVIORS OF THE WORLD. 35 
 
 formerly made with Adam ; and through 
 him the branches became once more united 
 to the vine. 
 
 Noah understood, as the people about 
 him did not, the spiritual condition of the 
 world, and that it was the gross sins of 
 those who had forgotten God that were 
 surely bringing about their ruin. He saw 
 too that the only salvation for the branches 
 was in an unbroken union with the true 
 vine, which was Christ, the Lord. Thus 
 through his knowledge of the truth and 
 obedience thereto were some branches saved 
 and reunited to the vine, while many 
 perished, because they had severed their 
 connection with the only source of spiritual 
 life. 
 
 Abraham, the faithful, was in a special 
 sense a savior to the people of his day. 
 The people of the land and his own kindred 
 had made to themselves gods in the likeness 
 of things earthly, and were wholly given 
 over to idolatry, so that they no longer 
 understood the true source of their life. 
 But Abraham still preserved conscious 
 
36 THE SAVIORS OF THE WORLD. 
 
 communion with the God of his fathers, and 
 lived according to the light of truth. He 
 was, therefore, bidden to separate himself 
 from his kindred, and, emigrating to another 
 land, established there the true worship 
 of God, and a purer way of life, that should 
 be a pattern to all mankind. 
 
 The manner in which Abraham is spoken 
 of in Genesis is peculiar, and not easily 
 explained except on the assumption that he 
 was indeed a savior of the people of his 
 time in a special sense. We read that the 
 Lord made a covenant with him, and 
 promised, as recorded in the twelfth chapter, 
 to bless him in a signal manner, and make 
 of him a great nation. The third verse of 
 this chapter contains language not unlike 
 that applied to Jesus himself ; for the Lord 
 said to Abraham, " I will bless them that 
 bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee : 
 and in thee shall all the families of the earth 
 be blessed." So also, in the eighteenth 
 chapter, eighteenth verse : " Seeing that 
 Abraham shall surely become a great and 
 mighty nation, and all the nations of the 
 earth shall be blessed in him" 
 
THE SAVIORS OF THE WORLD. 37 
 
 One cannot read attentively the biblical 
 account of the life and acts of this first 
 of Hebrew patriarchs without perceiving 
 that in him was preserved among his people 
 a knowledge of God, and he was to them a 
 mediator, as in the case of the doomed 
 inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah, for 
 whom he prayed. In like manner w r ere 
 Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph, lineal descendants 
 and successors of Abraham, singled out from 
 their contemporaries, to be in a special 
 sense the saviors of their times. The bless- 
 ing" and covenant of the Lord were with 
 them ; the Christ found visible expression 
 through them more than through any others 
 of their day ; and through them signal 
 blessings were transmitted to all who came 
 within the circle of their influence. 
 
 It is true that, in the Bible accounts of 
 these worthies, we do not see evidence that 
 in them bodily, as in the person of Jesus, 
 "dwelt all the fulness of the godhead." 
 Of none of them can it be said, " He was 
 tempted in all points like as w r e are, yet 
 without sin!' The Christ found only a 
 
38 THE SAVIORS OF THE WORLD. 
 
 partial, not a perfect expression through 
 their lives ; and as mediums of the truth 
 they did not attain the lofty standard 
 revealed to the human race in Jesus, the 
 perfect savior, which was for to come. 
 
 Moses, the great Hebrew leader and law- 
 giver, was a savior of his people in a higher 
 and better sense than any who had preceded 
 him in the history of mankind. His advent 
 on earth resembled that of Jesus in many 
 important particulars. He is first introduced 
 to us as a humble, helpless babe, whose life, 
 like that of the babe of Bethlehem, was put 
 in jeopardy by the edict of a cruel tyrant. 
 The years of his early manhood were 
 passed in obscurity, as were those of Jesus. 
 The Lord manifested his presence to Moses 
 by a flame of fire in a bush, as he subse- 
 quently did to the man Jesus, in the form 
 of a dove. In each case there was heard a 
 voice of assurance. Moses talked with the 
 unseen Christ in the cloud-capped mountain 
 of Sinai ; Jesus held a similar interview in 
 the mount of transfiguration. The former 
 wrought signs and wonders in Egypt, as 
 
THE SAVIORS OF THE WORLD. 39 
 
 proof of his high authority ; the latter did 
 the same thing when he appeared and 
 taught in Palestine. Moses uttered the 
 Decalogue ; Jesus fulfilled it with a pro- 
 founder meaning. Moses delivered his 
 people from bondage, and established them 
 under a new dispensation and a code of laws 
 sanctioned by the Most High; Jesus delivered 
 them out of bondage to the letter of these 
 laws, and revived in them the true spirit 
 of obedience, under the gospel dispensation. 
 Moses was sent by the Lord, as a special 
 manifestation, or material appearance of 
 himself, to the chosen people, just as Jesus 
 was sent in a later age ; for, in Exodus in., 
 10, we read: "Come now therefore, I will 
 send thee unto Pharaoh, that thou mayest 
 bring forth my people the children of Israel 
 out of Egypt." 
 
 That the Lord, or Christ, did indeed 
 appear in the person of Moses, as a special 
 savior of his people seems evident from the 
 text of the song, in which Moses explains, 
 in a condensed form, the spiritual condition 
 of the children of Israel to whom he was 
 
40 THE SAVIORS OF THE WORLD. 
 
 sent. This song may be found in Deuter- 
 onomy xxxu., from which the following 
 verses are taken : 
 
 "Because I will publish the name of the Lord: ascribe 
 ye greatness unto our God. 
 
 " He is a Rock, his work is perfect : for all his ways are 
 judgment: a God of truth and without iniquity, just and 
 right is he. 
 
 "Do ye thus requite the Lord, O foolish people and 
 unwise? Is he not thy father that hath bought thee? hath 
 he not made thee, and established thee ? 
 
 « * * * Then he forsook God which made him, and 
 lightly esteemed the Rock of his salvation. 
 
 " They provoked him to jealousy with strange gods, with 
 abominations provoked they him to anger. 
 
 " Of the Rock that begat thee thou art unmindful, and 
 hast forgotten God that formed thee. 
 
 "For their rock is not as our Rock, even our enemies 
 themselves being judges. 
 
 " For the Lord shall judge his people, and repent himself 
 for his servants, when he seeth that their power is gone, 
 and there is none shut up, or left. 
 
 " See now that I, even I, am he, and there is no god with 
 me : I kill, and I make alive ; I wound and I heal; neither 
 is there any that can deliver out of my hand." 
 
 There is warrant also for believing that 
 the Hebrew nation produced no savior 
 equal to Moses, until the advent of Jesus 
 himself; for, in the tenth verse of the last 
 
THE SAVIORS OF THE WORLD. 41 
 
 chapter of Deuteronoirry , it is recorded that 
 " there arose not a prophet since in Israel 
 like unto Moses, whom the Lord knew face 
 to face." 
 
 From the time of Moses until the advent 
 of Jesus the Jewish nation had a long succes- 
 sion of special saviors, known as judges and 
 prophets, on whom Christ impressed a 
 double portion of his spirit, and through 
 whom he manifested himself to his people, 
 calling them back to God the Father, and 
 reuniting them to himself, the true vine. 
 Conspicuous among these leaders and 
 saviors of the children of Israel were Joshua, 
 the successor of Moses ; Samson, upon 
 whom, it is recorded in Judges, the spirit 
 of the Lord came mightily at times ; Samuel, 
 who was dedicated by his mother to the 
 service of the Lord ; David, the anointed 
 king and sweet singer of Israel ; Elijah, 
 Elisha, and Isaiah, prophets of the Lord, 
 Ezra, the scribe ; and a long line of worthies, 
 who kept the law and held to the worship 
 of the true God, in a land given over to 
 idolatry and evil. 
 
THE CHRIST IN JESUS. 
 
 Thus far my letters have had reference to 
 the appearance of the Christ during the 
 earlier and prophetic ages of the world's 
 history, ages in which the most perfect 
 mediums reflected but dimly the central 
 light of truth, which is the life of the human 
 race. Yet it seems to me that no prayerful 
 student of the Scriptures can fail to discern 
 the evidence that the long line of righteous 
 men mentioned in the Bible, in so far as they 
 acted under the direction of the Lord, were 
 earthly expressions and mediums through 
 which Christ, the true vine, revealed himself. 
 
 Now, therefore, we may turn our attention 
 to that brightest of all manifestations of the 
 one only begotten Son, in Jesus of Nazareth ; 
 he who came in the form of a servant of the 
 lowest, that he might redeem and save a 
 world lying in darkness and in the shadow 
 of death. 
 
THE CHRIST IN JESUS. 43 
 
 Much might be said, did the object of this 
 writing demand it, on the peculiar signifi- 
 cance of the birth and child-life of this 
 wonderful being, who, even at the tender 
 age of twelve years, began to speak as never 
 man spake. But, since it is rather with his 
 career and mission as a teacher of truth that 
 we have to do, I will pass this topic ; merely 
 remarking that, it seems to me that, only by 
 appearing among men in the humble, yet 
 apparently miraculous manner in w r hich he 
 did, could he have illustrated to his own 
 nation and to the world the true idea of 
 Christ the life of men, redeeming the world 
 unto himself. 
 
 At the time of the advent of Jesus, the 
 Jews as a nation had lost the divine sense 
 of the presence and power of the true God 
 of their fathers, and were paying outward, 
 formal worship to a deity fashioned after 
 their own material and vain imaginations. 
 Jesus came to announce a gospel of good 
 tidings, and reveal to them, in place of what 
 they ignorantly called God, that Christ who 
 was the express image of the Father (true 
 
44 THE CHRIST IN JESUS, 
 
 God), and the Spirit of life. He came to 
 show them the true relation between the vine 
 and the branches, and to verify the words, 
 " Whosoever seeth me seeth the Father 
 also," 
 
 When John, the forerunner of Jesus, 
 announced him as " he, who, coming after 
 me, is preferred before me ; " as " the Lamb 
 of God, who taketh away the sins of the 
 world ; " he, whose shoe-latchet the Baptist 
 was unworthy to loose ; he discerned in 
 Jesus the most perfect expression and 
 medium of the Christ, which had ever been 
 sent among men. John well knew that he 
 himself was not that Light ; but he testified 
 that Jesus, about whom men were curiously 
 speculating, was the true Light, which 
 lighteth every man that cometh into the 
 world. The burden of his testimony and 
 the claim of Jesus himself was, that he came 
 into the world to restore to a race which 
 had lost it a knowledge of the true source 
 of their life ; to assure them that the 
 corporeal man with his external ceremonies 
 and cares was not the real man ; that the 
 
THE CHRIST IN JESUS. 45 
 
 God, whom they so punctiliously worshipped 
 and sacrificed to in consecrated cities and 
 places, was not the true God, who requires 
 a spiritual worship and needs no temples or 
 dwelling-place. 
 
 Jesus came to show men how to rise into 
 the true life by vital union with Christ the 
 true vine ; he also illustrated to them, both 
 by teaching and by example, the power 
 of such a life upon the body of man. Both 
 Jesus and John were confirmed in their 
 belief concerning the mission of the former 
 on earth by what sounded to them as the 
 voice of Christ himself saying, " This is my 
 beloved son, in whom I am well pleased ; " 
 that is : " This Jesus is a man who is to be 
 so pure a medium for truth, that through 
 him I am pleased to manifest myself as the 
 light and life of the world most fully." 
 Henceforth all that men needed to do was to 
 admit the light into the dark recesses of 
 their worldly minds, and as John declared, 
 make a straight path through the wilderness 
 of their own evil, material thoughts for the 
 entrance of the Lord's truth. 
 
46 THE CHRIST IN JESUS. 
 
 Take notice, also, that before entering 
 upon his work as a teacher of men, Jesus 
 descended into this wilderness of common or 
 material thought, that he might contemplate 
 life in its unrenewed phases, and by fasting 
 and prayer, overcome the temptations that 
 lead men astray through the devil of selfhood. 
 Here the man Jesus learned the important 
 lessons that true life is derived from God, 
 and man must live in the spirit, not by bread 
 alone ; that man has no right to presume on 
 divine protection to enable him to carry out 
 purely selfish and earth-born desires, for 
 that is tempting the Lord; that it is not 
 for a man to seek dominion and authority 
 in this world, but to serve the Lord by 
 becoming a clear medium of the truth. 
 
 Having thus tested the power of worldly 
 ambition and the tempter, and become 
 persuaded that there is no life for man 
 except that derived from Spirit, Jesus went 
 forth to preach to men, and let the Christ 
 light shine through him. " And Jesus went 
 about all Galilee, teaching in their syna- 
 gogues, and preaching the gospel of the 
 
THE CHRIST IN JESUS. 47 
 
 kingdom, and healing all manner of sickness 
 and all manner of disease among the 
 people." — Matthew iv., 23. 
 
 The next wonderful thing in the life of 
 Jesus was that, when he had overcome the 
 temptations of his lower self, so that the 
 union between Jesus the man and Christ 
 the Lord became close and vital, so much 
 of the spirit of Christ was reflected in him, 
 that the sick felt the life-giving virtue, and 
 were healed. We do not read that Jesus 
 studied " Christian science " or any other 
 form of mental healing, or that he sought to 
 learn the art of Eastern theosophists and 
 Hebrew cabalists. The inference is so plain 
 that it seems impossible to miss it, that while 
 Jesus was doing the work he came into the 
 world to perform, even while he was 
 preaching the gospel of the kingdom of 
 Christ his father, and calling upon men 
 everywhere to repent, there went out from 
 his sacred person an involuntary influence 
 which healed the sick with whom he came 
 in contact. He was a healer of the soul ; 
 but the cure of the infirmities of the flesh 
 
48 THE CHRIST IN JESUS. 
 
 followed as a matter of course. He healed 
 men of whatsoever diseases they had, not 
 by science^ for he had none ; but the whole- 
 ness of the Christ-life pervading the minds 
 and hearts of those who listened to his 
 divine words, filled them with a new sense 
 of life, that made them whole. 
 
 So clear was the evidence of this fact, that 
 observers like Nicodemus, exclaimed, " We 
 know thou art a teacher come from God : 
 for no man can do the wonderful works 
 which thou doest, except the spirit of God 
 work through him." 
 
 It is impossible to conceive how a man, 
 charged with the mission of saving the 
 world and reuniting mankind to the spiritual 
 source of all life, could consent to lay aside 
 his father's business, while he vied with the 
 physicians and magicians in curing the 
 bodily ailments of the people who flocked 
 about him. It was spiritual wholeness 
 which he sought, — a wholeness that included 
 health to the body, but never produced the 
 latter and least important, without working 
 the greater transformation typified by the 
 " new birth." 
 
THE CHRIST IN JESUS. 49 
 
 It is only on such a supposition that Jesus 
 could have dismissed the messengers sent 
 by John to inquire who he was, with the 
 answer, " Go your way, and tell John what 
 things ye have seen and heard ; how that 
 the blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are 
 cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, 
 to the poor the gospel is preached." 
 
 And how is the spiritual sense of the 
 beatitudes and precepts contained in the 
 Sermon on the Mount to be made apparent, 
 until w^e perceive that Jesus was impressing 
 the Mosaic law, the letter of which his 
 hearers blindly observed, with a new interior 
 life? " Let your light so shine before men," 
 he said, " that they may see your good 
 works, and glorify your Father which is in 
 heaven ; " that is to say : Let the Father's 
 glory — the Christ spirit — be so manifest in 
 your works or conduct, that those who 
 behold you may perceive that your goodness 
 is the life of the Lord shining through you. 
 
 The miracles of Jesus were instances of 
 the visible manifestation of spiritual power, 
 that appealed very forcibly to the material 
 
50 THE CHRIST IN JESUS. 
 
 thought of those who witnessed them. 
 When they saw water turned into wine, a 
 multitude fed in the desert with a supply 
 of food scarcely sufficient to give each a 
 little morsel, a great draught of fishes taken 
 where men had fished all night without 
 taking any, they could not help believing 
 that he who had power to produce such 
 results in the natural world possessed indeed 
 a spirit of which they did not know. 
 
 In this connection, I wish to assert my 
 belief that there is a spiritual condition, not 
 well understood, but which it is possible for 
 men to attain, whereby they may exercise a 
 power over nature and the things of the 
 external world. He, who was creator of 
 everything finite, might easily exercise that 
 creative force in such a way as to produce a 
 given effect at any time. It surely could 
 not be impossible for Christ, the Lord, who 
 created the heavens and the earth, the sea, 
 and all that in them is, to work the change 
 whereby the water became wine, a few 
 loaves were multiplied into a bountiful 
 supply of bread, and a school of fish were 
 
THE CHRIST IN JESUS. 51 
 
 collected in a particular locality. Jesus was 
 so filled with this power of Christ, that such 
 acts were easy to him ; and I cannot help 
 thinking that it is possible for any one to do 
 like wonderful works, who is a clear medium 
 of spiritual power. 
 
 But while Jesus occasionally displayed 
 such power over the elements of nature, he 
 still taught the people that such physical 
 good was not the highest end to be sought. 
 He showed them that it was not the water 
 or wine drunk to quench bodily thirst, but 
 the water of life that men should crave, 
 which, if once tasted, would prevent the re- 
 turn of thirst ; for it would be in them, a well 
 of water springing up unto everlasting life. 
 He bade his followers seek not the bread 
 which perisheth, but the true bread of life, of 
 which, if a man eat he shall never die. And 
 further, he declared that he, the Christ speak- 
 ing to them through his corporeal lips, is that 
 bread of life. " Labor not for the meat which 
 perisheth," were his words, " but for that meat 
 which endureth unto everlasting life." 
 
 Another very important feature of the 
 
52 THE CHRIST IN JESUS. 
 
 teachings of Jesus is his doctrine concern- 
 ing death and the resurrection. He was sur- 
 rounded by those who held that, at the death 
 of the body, the soul or ghost departed to 
 sheol, or the under world, there to tarry for 
 an indefinite period, until a final judgment 
 day ; those who accepted the belief in Hades, 
 borrowed from the Greeks and Romans ; 
 those who believed like the Egyptians that, 
 after death, the soul passes onward through 
 a long cycle of changes, till it reaches the 
 awful tribunal of Osiris, the chief of the 
 Egyptian deities ; those who, like the Sadu- 
 cees, professed to believe in annihilation, and 
 that physical death ends all. To all these 
 people Jesus declared a new doctrine of life, 
 and put a new meaning on what they called 
 death. 
 
 It was to these people that Jesus said : 
 " Verily, verily, I say unto you, if a man 
 keep my sayings, he shall never see death." 
 " Whosoever liveth andbelieveth in me shall 
 never die." " I am the resurrection and the 
 life." To listeners holding the common no- 
 tions about death such words must have 
 
THE CHRIST IN JESUS. 53 
 
 sounded strangely ; and yet, how is it possi- 
 ble to avoid the conclusion that he who 
 uttered them, was not speaking of that 
 change which comes at last to every human 
 body? More sayings are in accord with the 
 declaration of Paul, that, " as in Adam all 
 died, even so, in Christ shall all be made 
 alive ;" and with that other utterance of 
 Jesus : " He that saveth his life shall lose 
 it; but he that loseth his life for my sake 
 shall find it." 
 
 The doctrine of the resurrection announced 
 by the Master, while he stood with the 
 mourners at the tomb of Lazarus, does not 
 seem to me to have any reference to the 
 revivifying of the body. The death he re- 
 ferred to, and out of which he was able to 
 raise mankind, was that spiritual condition 
 into which men come who sever themselves 
 in thought and belief from the true soucre of 
 life, and live as of themselves. He came to 
 revive in the soul the sense of dependence 
 on Christ for spiritual life, to unite the 
 broken branches to the vine ; hence he 
 could say with the utmost propriety, " I am 
 
54 THE CHRIST IN JESUS. 
 
 the resurrection and the life." His mission 
 was through the power of living truth to 
 raise men out of that state of spiritual apathy, 
 in which they had lost vital connection with 
 the true vine, and restore to them real life, 
 by making them conscious of that interior 
 change, which he elsewhere called the " new 
 birth." What he taught was that, until men 
 lose their lives, that is, part with selfishness, 
 they cannot save their lives spiritually. For 
 all real life is derived from the Lord ; and 
 when a man comes to understand and believe 
 this, " even though he were dead, yet shall 
 he live." 
 
THE HEALING CHRIST. 
 
 What I now have to write, in reply to 
 your last questions, bears directly on the 
 subject of mental or Christian healing, about 
 which you are so anxious to learn. It has 
 taken some time to reach this point ; but, 
 believing as I firmly do, that true healing 
 cannot be understood until the Bible doc- 
 trine concerning Christ is clearly appre- 
 hended, I have tried to expound it to you, 
 as it has been shown me, in order to have a 
 sure foundation upon which to base a theory 
 of those remarkable cures, which are puzzling 
 so many curious people to-day. 
 
 As I have already intimated, it seems 
 evident to me that healing, as practised by 
 Jesus, began with a spiritual renovation, and 
 ended by producing moral, then mental, and, 
 finally, physical wholeness. In such cures 
 the steps of the process follow each other in 
 
56 THE HEALING CHRIST. 
 
 natural order ; for the stream is first purified 
 at its source, and then the healing waters 
 carry life and soundness to every part. 
 There may be a bodily change, called a cure, 
 that begins and ends with the material ; but 
 it is not what Jesus meant when he asked a 
 sufferer, " Wouldst thou be made whole ? " 
 He taught that it was the truth that made 
 men free ; free from sin, free from fear of 
 harm, free from the bodily ailments conse- 
 quent on sin and fear. Wholeness was the 
 result of abiding in the vine, a most natural 
 instance of cause and effect. 
 
 I am not one of those who hold that the 
 earthly mission of Jesus was to be a doctor, 
 and go about curing bodily diseases. What 
 happened to those who came under his 
 treatment was only the natural experience of 
 a saved soul ; their sicknesses being the 
 results of sin, of turning away from the 
 Christ-life, when they repented and were 
 reunited to the true vine, a thorough healing 
 could not but result. I do not believe that 
 a man is saved until he is free from sin, — 
 I do not believe he is saved until he is free 
 
THE HEALING CHRIST. 57 
 
 from bodily disease ; but I believe that the 
 last result follows naturally from the first. 
 
 Jesus, when on earth, worked his cures 
 without the use of visible means of the nature 
 of medicines. He also enjoined it upon his 
 disciples and apostles to heal the sick in the 
 same way ; and we find that, after his 
 departure, the same power came to them, or 
 acted through them, for they, too, healed, by 
 invoking the name of their master. 
 
 But while working in this wonderful way 
 themselves, Jesus and his disciples did not 
 condemn the use of other means. They did 
 not need to employ or recommend material 
 agents ; but there is no record of their 
 condemning the use of drugs and mechanical 
 means of helping the sick, because they in 
 their treatment were able to dispense with 
 all these. And the lesson plainly taught us 
 is that, if we have reached a condition in 
 which we do not need the presence of a 
 material remedy, to change the thought in 
 sickness, but can safely rely on the direct 
 operation upon the mind of spiritual forces, 
 we should praise God for this, and pray con- 
 
58 THE HEALING CHRIST. 
 
 stantly that our lives may so reflect the truth 
 that has mercifully been made plain to us, 
 that our brother man may take knowledge 
 of us that we have indeed been with Christ, 
 and be led to glorify God also. 
 
 Nor should we scorn the services of an 
 honest physician or nurse, because we seem 
 no longer to need them. When they admin- 
 ister a medicine to change the thought 
 of the sick, the same power that healed 
 those who sought to be made whole by the 
 Savior brings health to their patients. 
 Medical men may sometimes have mistaken 
 the true province of the remedies they 
 administered, but we have no reason to 
 doubt that they have been the means of an 
 untold amount of good in the past, and will 
 be needed for years to come. It will cer- 
 tainly be a long time before the majority 
 of men will come to believe that the diseases 
 from which they suffer can be cured by any 
 other than physical or medicinal agencies. 
 
 But new light on this subject may come 
 to an honest doctor, as well as to the 
 non-professional ; he may be led to see that 
 
THE HEALING CHRIST. 59 
 
 it is not his medicine that heals, and that it 
 is possible to dispense with material means, 
 and produce even better results. A case in 
 point comes to mind. Not long ago a well 
 known physician, while riding about among 
 his patients, became greatly absorbed in the 
 problem of what, after all, it is that restores 
 health. He knew that the power was not in 
 the drugs ; he felt that it was not in the 
 physician; — What then cured the patients? 
 and how were the sick restored when under 
 the care of so-called Christian healers? He 
 pondered the subject long and anxiously ; 
 and at length it came into his mind that it 
 was "the love of God in the heart" that 
 cured the sick. Nor did he reason unwisely ; 
 for surely we are taught that it is the love of 
 God in the heart that casteth out all fear. 
 
 The doctor had solved the question, and 
 found the secret of health. The love of God, 
 which passeth all understanding of material 
 thought, casteth out all fear; and since fear 
 is the parent of disease, sickness disappears 
 when that is cast out, or destroyed. This 
 perfect love is the motive power in the world 
 
60 THE HEALING CHRIST. 
 
 to-day, working throughout the universe, 
 changing, cleansing, and healing the soul. 
 
 I am often asked how it is that I heal. 
 But I do not believe there is a living being 
 on earth who can explain in a satisfactory 
 manner how this wonderful healing is done. 
 Mental healers generally consider that the 
 power comes to those who study into and 
 accept the peculiar teachings known as 
 " Christian science/' and forms akin to that. 
 But to this view of the case I do not assent; 
 and, in order to make my own position clear, 
 I will give you somewhat in detail my own 
 experience. 
 
 Before attempting this, however, allow me 
 to record my conviction that there is good in 
 all forms of healing, in which it is the earnest 
 wish of the operator to help the sick by 
 leading them to turn away from mere bodily 
 troubles and material remedies, to the one 
 only source of genuine healing power. 
 Hence there should be a spirit of unity and 
 love and not of antagonism between them. 
 And, in fact, the best evidence, and the only 
 evidence that they are working in the spirit 
 
THE HEALING CHRIST. 61 
 
 of Christ, that is, are filled with and controlled 
 by his spirit, is that they entertain a cordial 
 love for each other, and seek each others 
 good as well as each his own. If a person 
 who practises mental healing according to 
 one particular method which he has learned 
 treats all who follow different ways of healing 
 as malpractitioners and evil doers, he surely 
 fails to furnish the best and most reliable 
 proof that he is himself actuated by the 
 spirit of Christ ; and if he calls his own 
 method Christian healing, and condemns all 
 others as unchristian, no good people who 
 understand this will believe that he really 
 belongs to the fold of Christ. 
 
 The possibility of a mental cure or faith- 
 healing is believed in by the church in which 
 I was educated, and I did some very satisfac- 
 tory work of that kind before I made a 
 special study of any special way of using the 
 art. Later I took a course of lessons in 
 what is called " Christian science." It 
 seemed to me, after getting somewhat 
 acquainted with people of this way of heal- 
 ing, that they have gotten hold of one side of 
 
62 THE HEALING CHRIST. 
 
 a great truth, which is grasped more or less 
 firmly ; and in the class I joined there were 
 honest seekers after truth, who were led as I 
 was to attend the course of instruction given 
 by the " Christian science " teacher, hoping 
 to receive important spiritual help. 
 
 The lessons consisted of a series of twelve 
 talks by the teacher, on subjects presented 
 in the following order: First, their doc- 
 trine concerning God ; second, concerning 
 mind; third, concerning matter. We were 
 told, in substance, that God is one ; principle, 
 and not a person ; life, truth, and love ; 
 the only intelligence and substance in the 
 universe. God is omnipotent, omniscient, 
 and omnipresent ; hence he fills all space, is 
 all, and there is nothing else but God. 
 Moreover, God is perfectly good ; hence 
 there can be no such thing as evil ; and if 
 there is no evil, sin, sickness, and death, 
 which are the consequences or effects of 
 evil, have no reality. 
 
 Having assumed what had been asserted 
 concerning God as proved and accepted, the 
 teacher proceeded to argue that all that God 
 
THE HEALING CHRIST. 63 
 
 created must be like himself, perfect and 
 spiritual. The world, therefore, which is 
 the creation of God, and all living creatures 
 are like him, and must be spiritual. Hence 
 all is mind or idea ; and nothing else can be 
 real. To put the case in other words, mind 
 is the only reality, and what men call matter 
 is a delusion, a false belief. There is really 
 no such thing as a body, a tree, a flower, a 
 landscape, a sheet of water, or, in fact, 
 anything that we are wont to call material. 
 
 Of course, the body being unreal, it was 
 easy to assume that the bodily ailments, 
 called disease, cannot be real ; and, since 
 " God is of purer eyes than to behold 
 iniquity," and human beings are created in his 
 perfect image, there can be no such thing as 
 sin and consequent death. Such being the 
 case, one has only to hold these facts firmly 
 in mind, in order to heal the sick. 
 
 But plain as this theory of the world 
 appeared to the teacher of " Christian sci- 
 ence," I was not so thoroughly convinced 
 but that a number of troublesome questions 
 arose in my mind. " If all sin and pain and 
 
64 THE HEALING CHRIST. 
 
 death be unreal and a delusion," I asked, 
 what is it that is forever struggling with the 
 delusion, and trying to get free from the 
 effects of a wrong belief ?" The answer 
 was, " There is no one struggling or trying 
 to get free ; it is simply a dream or imagina- 
 tion." "Then who is the dreamer?" I 
 asked, still more perplexed. " There is no 
 dreamer," replied the confident teacher ; and 
 I was not disposed to press the matter any 
 further. 
 
 There are many things insisted on as true 
 by those who profess to believe " Christian 
 science " which it is not easy to put faith in. 
 Much must be assumed on the authority 
 of some persons assertion, for which no 
 satisfactory reason is given and no sanction 
 is to be found in Scripture. They affirm 
 that there is no evil, no sickness, no death ; 
 our belief that such conditions exist is only a 
 dream of a dreamer who has no reality ; all 
 is God ; all is good ; all is perfect ; all is 
 harmonious ; you are not sick ; you have no 
 pain ; and this work of healing many consider 
 the most important work in which a human 
 being can engage. 
 
THE HEALING CHRIST. 65 
 
 I would by no means imply that " Christian 
 scientists" are not sincere in their belief, or 
 that a theory that appears so absurd to others 
 does not seem correct to them. It does 
 seem so, and while holding it, many of them 
 apparently do good work as mental healers. 
 But I wish to show you by contrast, in what 
 respects my own understanding of truth and 
 the way to heal differs from theirs. 
 
 I also believe that God is spirit ; that he is 
 the only life, truth and love ; the only 
 intelligence and substance ; and that he fills 
 all space, so that he is everywhere present. 
 I hold, too, that God, through mind, controls 
 all things. But, as to what is termed matter, 
 while I would not quarrel with those who 
 take a different view, I prefer to call it an 
 outward expression of spiritual substance, 
 through which God manifests his omnipotent 
 power. These bodies of ours are the 
 temples of the living God, and constitute 
 with external nature, that continual creation 
 which Christ, the only begotten Son, puts 
 forth from the beginning. 
 
 This created being, whom I have already 
 
66 THE HEALING CHRIST. 
 
 designated in these letters as the corporeal 
 man, had permission, you will recollect, to 
 enjoy everything that is good ; he was inno- 
 cent and upright so long as he recognized 
 his dependence upon the true source of life. 
 But this corporeal man disobeyed, came to 
 constitute himself the reality and source of 
 power; hence he fell from his state of inno- 
 cence, and with this sad lapse came discord, 
 disease, death. I do not annul the force 
 of this belief by declaring that sickness, sin, 
 and death have no reality. They are the 
 proofs of a wrong condition of thought on the 
 part of the victim ; and show that he has 
 departed out of that state of innocence, that 
 garden of Eden, into which nothing evil 
 can enter. What we call evils, though really 
 such to the thinking of the created or corpo- 
 real man, have no effect on the spiritual 
 man, who is Christ ; and whenever we 
 become reunited to him, the only life, as the 
 branch is joined to the vine, then we truly 
 live again, and there is no longer any 
 sickness, sin, or death for us ; we have 
 passed from death unto life ; have lost that 
 
THE HEALING CHRIST. 67 
 
 self-constituted life in the flesh, and have 
 found the true life, which, if a man have, he 
 shall never die. 
 
 While he continues in this fallen condition, 
 man does not understand the true state of the 
 case, or realize his relation to the true vine 
 or source of infinite life. He is like one in 
 a troubled sleep, unconscious of the realities 
 around him, but just enough awake to know 
 that he is under a spell, from which he strug- 
 gles to get free. In this disturbed dream of 
 the senses evil demons and frightful fancies 
 haunt him, and he tries to awake, and dispel 
 the nightmare that holds him fast. If this 
 sleep overcomes him, he passes into that 
 terrible condition, described in the Bible as 
 being dead in trespasses and sins, — a death 
 from which he will never awake until that 
 resurrection morn, when Christ, the true life, 
 shall quicken again that which remains and 
 is ready to die. And this quickening, when 
 it comes to a man is true healing, and works 
 a thorough reform. 
 
 I believe in the terrestrial body of which 
 Paul speaks, on which mind or thought 
 
68 THE HEALING CHRIST. 
 
 operates, either to purify or defile, according 
 to the moral condition of the man ; for " as 
 a man thinketh, so is he." You see, then, 
 that I hold that we have bodies, and are 
 responsible for their safe-keeping ; and if we 
 harbor evil and hurtful thoughts, these will 
 surely be reflected some time in some form 
 on the body. 
 
 It may be well to say in addition to what 
 is already written, that I do not believe that 
 God is in any way the author or cause 
 of evil. In Adam all died ; man is the 
 cause of evil and the only sinner ; but with 
 God all is pure, and in Christ are all 
 spiritually made alive. When, therefore, we 
 are, as Paul expresses it, " hid with Christ in 
 God," we shall become new creatures in 
 Christ Jesus, and free from the power of the 
 law of sin and death. 
 
HOW I TREAT. 
 
 You ask me to explain to you more fully 
 how I treat disease, and how what you are 
 pleased to call my peculiar theology applies 
 to the healing of the sick. These questions, 
 which are the most difficult of any that bear 
 on the subject, I will try to answer, to the 
 best of my ability. But what I have to say 
 on these points has a direct relation to all 
 that I have written thus far, and will not 
 appear plain to you, unless you keep in mind 
 the main facts in regard to Christ and the 
 condition of the corporeal man, as I have 
 tried to set them forth. 
 
 It is true as you observe, that I do not, like 
 those who call themselves " Christian scien- 
 tists," hold that the body and its diseases are 
 nothing. I accept those facts ; but, having 
 done so, I wish to know how such discordant 
 conditions as sickness and suffering came 
 
70 HOW I TREAT. 
 
 about. Was it by holding pure thoughts? 
 Was it by having our minds stayed on God, 
 who will keep him in perfect peace whose 
 mind is stayed on him? Was it by worship- 
 ping the Creator more than the creature? 
 Did these conditions come upon men while 
 they relied solely on Christ, the Lord, as the 
 only source whence they could derive life 
 and power? 
 
 The very fact that sickness and pain have 
 become part of the inheritance of mankind 
 shows that the race has departed from that 
 state of true vital union with the source 
 of life in which it was created. Men have 
 turned away from God to trust in an arm of 
 flesh, and wrong thinking and wrong beliefs 
 have brought them into the sad condition in 
 which we now find them. Men came to 
 believe not only that external nature and 
 their own terrestrial life is more real than 
 spirit and spiritual life, but that the source 
 of life and the power to act are in these 
 external expressions of real and absolute 
 being. This led them to forget the spiritual 
 reality which all the while lies back of their 
 
HOW I TREAT. 71 
 
 individual being, sustaining and enforcing it 
 with power, and to glorify man rather than 
 God, to trust in a material, worldly wisdom 
 more than in that wisdom that is from 
 heaven. Thus man gained the world, but 
 lost his own soul. 
 
 Since the fall, man has seemed to be 
 under the curse of a law of sin and death, 
 from which he could see no door of escape, 
 except that of physical death ; and this law 
 which he recognizes and obeys, makes him a 
 servant and a slave. It would seem, then, as 
 if these evils from which men suffer under 
 the law of sin and death did not originate 
 with God, who cannot be the author of evil, 
 but from some other force operating in 
 opposition to God and his government. So 
 strong is this impression fixed in the common 
 mind, that we find that a majority of men 
 believe there is a principle of evil active in 
 the world, as well as a principle of good, and 
 that the two are antagonistic. 
 
 But we, who hold that one good and 
 perfect Intelligence created all things that 
 exist, and constituted his holy will the law 
 
72 HOW I TREAT. 
 
 by which all force acts, must find a way 
 of accounting for what is called evil, without 
 admitting the existence in the universe of an 
 active principle that does not emanate from 
 the one Creator, but is opposed to him. 
 The right view of the case, it seems to me, is 
 to regard what seems to us evil as a perver- 
 sion of good, and what seems false as a 
 perversion of truth. The sun shines every- 
 where with intense and steady light ; and 
 bathed in that light, all things about us 
 appear as they really are, and assume proper 
 proportions. Yet it is possible to so exclude 
 that light from a given space, a room, for 
 instance, that the objects in that darkened 
 space will seem distorted as we look at them, 
 so that the dim, shadowy outlines of pieces of 
 furniture take the shape of animals, or human 
 forms, or, it may be, of those phantoms 
 of the brain we name ghosts. Just so it is 
 when the mind becomes partially darkened 
 by shutting out the clear light of truth, — 
 objects and relations no longer appear as 
 they really are, but become what our wrong 
 thinking makes them. The truth is not 
 
HOW I TREAT. 73 
 
 changed on that account ; its light is still 
 perfect, and there is nothing but truth ; it is 
 only our finite notion of it that has changed ; 
 and this apparent change comes about when 
 the real man in us is not in authority, and 
 the earth-born selfhood in us assents its 
 opinion of the condition of affairs. From the 
 standpoint of spirit there is always light, and 
 truth, and harmony ; from the standpoint 
 of the bodily senses arise discord and all 
 error. 
 
 It is from these limits of selfhood, this law 
 of sin and death to which we are in bondage 
 through fear, that Christ comes to free us. 
 Paul thanked God that he was delivered 
 " from the body of this death," through Jesus 
 Christ, our Lord ; and every human being 
 who, weary with struggling against a legion 
 of self-constituted evils, comes to Jesus in 
 the right way, finds rest. When we are 
 willing to be mediums through which truth 
 may shine, instead of champions ready to 
 fight the truth, then the shadows and gob- 
 lins of night depart, and the full daylight 
 of the sun of righteousness illumines every 
 dark corner of our mental vision. 
 
74 HOW I TREAT. 
 
 The all-important starting point for a 
 healer to keep in mind is that true healing 
 comes through Christ and in no other way. 
 " Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me 
 clean," expressed the confident belief of a 
 poor sufferer who applied to Jesus ; and this 
 is the ground for every healer to take. 
 When we have a confident assurance that 
 Christ is able to make any patient whole, we 
 have taken the first right step. 
 
 Having taken the attitude of entire reliance 
 on spiritual power, and abandoned all hope 
 or expectation of being cured in any other 
 way, both healer and patient are prepared to 
 claim the Savior's promise that, if we call 
 upon him in the day of trouble, he will 
 answer us and deliver us. We take our 
 patient in prayer-thought to the very source 
 of healing power, realizing that Christ fully 
 understands the case and is able to supply 
 just what is needed to produce the change 
 desired. 
 
 Thus brought face to face with the one 
 perfect life and the power which alone can 
 make perfect ; fully realizing that we are 
 
HOW I TREAT. 75 
 
 not that power, and can do nothing of our- 
 selves to produce the health we seek, we 
 come into a condition of mind to see that our 
 own personal struggles with disease and sin 
 are of no avail ; and that even when we 
 strive to conquer the evil in ourselves by 
 bringing some chosen truth to bear upon it, 
 we make no headway. 
 
 When at length we perceive that, in all 
 moral cleansing, it is God that worketh in us 
 both to will and to do of his own good 
 pleasure, and realize that it is not for us to 
 combat error with truth, but simply to give 
 up our personal will, and in lowly faith let 
 the spirit of all truth shine and work through 
 us, then, and not till then do we become 
 strong with the strength that Christ supplies. 
 Then alone do we come into an attitude 
 where all the power of the universe of God 
 operates in and through us, producing moral, 
 mental, and bodily health. This condition 
 is truly resting in the Lord, choosing to 
 have his will done rather than our own, and 
 waiting in confident expectation, as did aged 
 Simeon, to see the salvation of God. 
 
76 • HOW I TREAT. 
 
 It goes without saying that the state of 
 perfect rest and trust herein described 
 enables one to exercise that love which 
 casteth out fear. It is the sweet confidence 
 and repose of a little child in a parent, who, 
 he is sure will take care of him and do what 
 is best for him. Feeling thus, the trustful 
 soul has no farther anxiety, but leaves all 
 issues in the hands of an infinite and loving 
 Father, who is more ready to give good gifts 
 unto his children than they are to receive 
 them. One who attains such a calm state 
 of mind, a mind stayed on God, cannot 
 worry, does not fear, has no solicitude about 
 the issue of his case ; for he rests in the 
 Almighty arms, trusts in Infinite wisdom, 
 and knows that whether he live or die, the 
 result will be for the glory of God, and the 
 very best thing that could happen. 
 
 Was it not because the condition here 
 indicated, my friend, is the true Christian 
 attitude and spirit, that Jesus so often 
 exhorted those who would enter the kingdom 
 of heaven to become as a little child? And 
 when we enter the presence of that mighty 
 
HOW I TREAT. 77 
 
 power in which we live, and move, and have 
 our being, what are we but little children, in 
 our ignorance and helplessness? Even the 
 puny will we so foolishly set up against the 
 divine will is a power derived from God. 
 Every remedial agency we make use of for 
 the recovery of the sick owes whatever 
 virtue it may have to the operation of God's 
 direct healing power imparted to it or work- 
 ing through it. The very life to which we 
 cling so fondly, and to preserve which we 
 are ready to make any sacrifice, is the 
 spiritual life flowing through us, and nothing 
 of our own. Nay, we ourselves, what are 
 we but various external expressions of the 
 one life that fills all space? 
 
 If this position be the correct one, what 
 are the thoughts with which a healer should 
 regard a patient whom he is called to treat? 
 I have noticed that, in no two cases among 
 those whom the Lord has been pleased to 
 heal through me, has my prayer- thought for 
 them been precisely the same. With one, 
 I seem to plead that he may be brought 
 to Christ and be born again, and realize that 
 
78 HOW I TREAT. 
 
 he is in the presence of the Savior ; another 
 I seem to hold in the prayer that Christ will 
 illuminate his dark mind and thus change 
 the condition of his thought; again, I try to 
 make a patient realize that I have no power 
 to heal or save him, and can only point him to 
 the one savior of all, whom each must accept 
 for himself. These were some of my thoughts, 
 not spoken, of course, only present as a 
 deep, earnest prayer for the patient desiring 
 to be healed. But, after all, it is not an act 
 or a particular thought or prayer that effects 
 the cure ; it is the condition of the healer, 
 reflected upon the mind of the patient in 
 such a way as to change his thought. 
 
 So far as the bodily effect of treatment is 
 concerned, it is felt, of course, in the mind 
 of the patient. He is operated upon, so to 
 speak, through his thought which is changed. 
 But it is not needful for a healer to have any 
 particular theory about the operation of this 
 subtle mental influence, because it is some- 
 thing independent of his own will, that flows 
 out without his seeking to produce the effect. 
 
 The fact that certain persons exert healing 
 
HOW I TREAT. 79 
 
 power in a greater degree than others has 
 led many people to regard it as a special 
 gift, possessed in large measure by some 
 persons, and not at all by others. But if the 
 view of Christian healing set forth in these 
 pages be a correct one, the power to work 
 cures is not a gift, in any such sense as the 
 word is here used, but comes to those who 
 are in a proper condition to be good mediums 
 of truth. Nor is the power of healing limited 
 to the use of some particular method or 
 means. All ways are good ways or bad 
 ways, just in proportion as the person who 
 adopts them is guided by the spirit, which 
 alone can cure. But in no case will the 
 patient be made whole if he seeks health for 
 his own selfish advantage, in order that he 
 may continue to gratify the desires of the 
 flesh. 
 
 After all, explain this mystery of healing 
 and the regeneration of man as we will, there 
 is still something about it we can never 
 understand, and that baffles our deepest 
 research. I do not know how Jesus wrought 
 the miracles of healing ascribed to him. I do 
 
80 HOW I TREAT. 
 
 not know how any case of radical cure is 
 produced. Of course, we may say, as the 
 " Christian scientists" do: "God is Spirit. 
 He is the only intelligence, life, and substance 
 in the universe ; omnipotent, omniscient, 
 omnipresent. He is perfect, therefore his 
 creation is perfect ; and man, made in his 
 own image and likeness, must be a perfect 
 spiritual being, not subject to sickness, sin, 
 and death. These evils, therefore, have no 
 reality, but are delusions and dreams." But 
 does all this formula explain anything, or shed 
 the faintest light on the mystery of healing? 
 I have no doubt that any body may learn to 
 treat disease with success ; nor need he 
 know how the effect is produced, in order 
 that it may come to pass. But I also believe 
 that it is impossible for any man to compre- 
 hend the process of mental cures, or deter- 
 mine what particular mode of treatment is 
 the best. 
 
WHAT IS REQUIRED OF THE 
 PATIENT. 
 
 One of the most difficult things connected 
 with any theory of mental healing is to 
 determine what attitude the patient or 
 subject of healing must take. Many dif- 
 ferent views on this question are held by 
 successful healers : some assert that it is 
 necessary for the sufferer to exercise faith in 
 the method of mental treatment, and also 
 that he believe in the healer ; others, equally 
 sincere, take opposite ground, and declare 
 that it makes no difference with the result 
 of treating whether the recipient have any 
 faith in the means or not. I think, however, 
 that these varying opinions are mainly due 
 to a difference of opinion as to what consti- 
 tutes a genuine cure. You can readily see 
 that a change in the physical condition that 
 a physician would pronounce a cure is a very 
 
82 WHAT IS REQUIRED OF THE PATIENT. 
 
 different thing from a thorough moral reform 
 which ends in the restoration of the sick 
 patient to bodily health after moral soundness 
 is attained. 
 
 " Christian scientists " claim that their 
 treatment reaches beyond a mere bodily 
 cure, and produces a thorough moral trans- 
 formation, so that the subject of it leads a 
 better life ever after. At the same time 
 there are among those who practise what is 
 called mental or metaphysical healing, who 
 aim in their treatment only to produce a 
 restoration to physical health, and are quite 
 content to withdraw their services when the 
 signs of this outward change appear. 
 
 You will perceive from what I have already 
 written, that there are practically two forms 
 of healing, one done on the physical or 
 material plane alone, the other accomplished 
 through the renewing and regeneration of 
 the whole man ; and because the first may 
 take place without involving the second, it is 
 important to keep the distinction sharply in 
 mind while discussing what is required of the 
 patient. 
 
WHAT IS REQUIRED OF THE PATIENT. 83 
 
 While I should not be satisfied with a 
 healing of bodily disease that went no 
 further, I am willing to grant that such a 
 change may be produced by mental means 
 as well as by medicine, and will, therefore, 
 try to answer your questions about it, before 
 proceeding to explain what to me is the only 
 true and permanent healing wrought through 
 the transforming power of the Christ. 
 
 I am well satisfied that there is a natural 
 law of the action of mind upon mind, in 
 accordance with which the thought of one 
 person may be brought so powerfully to bear 
 upon the mind of another as to change his 
 physical condition. We see numerous 
 examples of the operation of this law in 
 every-day life, and can have no reasonable 
 ground for doubt that this personal influence 
 may be powerfully exerted either for good or 
 for ill. The most common instances of it 
 are, perhaps, where one person seeks to 
 control or compel another to a certain course 
 of action against his will. But the same 
 power may be used to promote the welfare 
 of a fellow man. 
 
84 WHAT IS REQUIRED OF THE PATIENT. 
 
 The explanation of this mental phenomenon 
 is very simple. If we grant what all mental 
 healers claim that diseased bodily conditions 
 are nothing in themselves, but are simply 
 the evidence or outward manifestation of 
 discordant mental states and wrong thinking, 
 it is easy to understand how a person of 
 positive character, who thoroughly believes 
 that right thinking promotes and produces 
 health, may so dominate the mind of a sick 
 person as to inspire in him a like belief. 
 A strong personal will may also aid such a 
 healer in getting the mastery of the mental 
 states of the patient. 
 
 You ask how an immoral person may 
 have apparent success in the mental treat- 
 ment of disease, if healing is really a holy, 
 Christian work. Do you not see that the 
 bodily effects I have just described are not 
 apparently dependent on the moral character 
 of the healer, but are the direct result of 
 certain mental influences of which he has 
 made himself a master? Such a healer 
 applies his mental remedies just as a physi- 
 cian applies his medicines, to bring about 
 
WHAT IS REQUIRED OF THE PATIENT. 85 
 
 certain physical effects ; and when this is 
 done his work ceases, because he is not 
 himself in a condition to cure the moral 
 diseases of his patient. People are accus- 
 tomed to regard the physical change and the 
 disappearance of bodily symptoms as the 
 sure proof that a sick person has recovered, 
 and so do not ask for any other evidence to 
 satisfy them that a mental cure has taken 
 place, and is what it is claimed to be. 
 
 I fear that, while they talk a great deal 
 about a higher work and better way of 
 living, many professional mental healers do 
 not, in their own experience, get beyond the 
 plane of the bodily healing just described. 
 This is good as far as it goes, and they who 
 engage in it are not to be despised because 
 they are doing no better ; but such cures are 
 not what sin-sick, perishing men most need. 
 The good results are only temporary, and 
 one who has been cured in this way is liable 
 to have a return of the same malady and 
 need curing again. 
 
 If mankind were suffering from no deeper 
 ills than the diseases that afflict the body, 
 
Ob WHAT IS REQUIRED OF THE PATIENT. 
 
 the kind of healing of which I have spoken 
 would be as good as any other, for it would 
 accomplish all that is desired. Indeed there 
 are many people who do not seem to care 
 for anything beyond their physical comfort, 
 and who consequently prefer just this sort 
 of healing when they are sick, because, while 
 relieving their bodily distress and disability, 
 it does not interfere with the selfish indul- 
 gence of their chosen way of life. At the 
 same time, while such healing is better than 
 none, it is only patching a ragged garment, 
 and cannot in the nature of the case be 
 thorough and permanent, because it affects 
 only the external symptoms of disease, but 
 does not reach the cause. Let us therefore 
 consider the other and more radical kind 
 of healing. 
 
 What I call true healing begins at the 
 heart and produces a thorough change in the 
 whole man. It is directed to the seat and 
 cause of the trouble, which is the evil that 
 is in thought, which produces the discord of 
 which bodily disease is only the sign. 
 
 This higher and broader view of healing is 
 
WHAT IS REQUIRED OF THE PATIENT. 87 
 
 what the Scriptures designate as the new 
 birth ; and if you would grasp my meaning 
 and understanding of the conditions, it will 
 be necessary for you to keep clearly in mind 
 the great foundation truths that I have 
 already explained. We read in the second 
 and third verses of the first chapter of 
 Hebrews Paul's statement that God " hath 
 in these last days spoken unto us by his son, 
 whom he hath appointed heir of all things, 
 by whom also he made the worlds ; who 
 being the brightness of his glory, and the 
 express image of his person, and upholding 
 all things by the word of his power, when 
 he had by himself purged our sins, sat down 
 on the right hand of the majesty on high." 
 
 In this concise statement of the doctrine 
 of the Christ, Paul declares that the same 
 power that created the worlds, being the 
 express image of God mentioned in the first 
 chapter of Genesis, and the prototype of 
 man, is also the redeemer and savior of the 
 human race, and hath himself purged our 
 sins. There is no true and thorough healing 
 then, as I understand the Scriptures, except 
 
88 WHAT IS REQUIRED OF THE PATIENT. 
 
 that through cleansing and purifying of the 
 heart and life that comes to a man through 
 the acceptance of Christ and the operation 
 of the truth that Christ represents. 
 
 What men call bodily disease is the out- 
 ward sign and expression of the evil within ; 
 the radical seat of trouble is the sin-sick soul 
 in man, crying out for the " great physician," 
 longing for the balm in Gilead, asking 
 " What must I do to be saved? " 
 
 It is useless and comfortless to offer to 
 such a man a windy theory of the " science 
 of mind," or attempt to relieve his distress 
 by treating the outward symptoms. His 
 trouble is too deep to respond to any super- 
 ficial remedy. Nothing will cure such a case 
 but a power that can save to the uttermost 
 all who apply to him. The words of " men- 
 tal science " fall upon his ear unheeded ; but 
 how eagerly he listens to the voice of Jesus, 
 saying, " Come unto me all ye that labor and 
 are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." 
 
 But how are we to offer this potent soul- 
 medicine to the perishing sinner? and what 
 are the indispensable conditions of cure? 
 
WHAT IS REQUIRED OF THE PATIENT. 89 
 
 I claim that the first step in healing, in every 
 case, is repentance. This strong Bible word, 
 so often misunderstood, contains in its very 
 sense the authority for saying that the 
 external or bodily disease is caused by the 
 evil in the heart. A scholar tells me that 
 the word primarily means to punish one's 
 self. When a man repents he recognizes 
 the sensations of pain that are the direct 
 result of the evil within him ; so that every 
 physical or mental pain which a man feels is 
 an acknowledgment or expression of the 
 deep-seated evil that disturbs his life ; and 
 when by the light of truth he brings again 
 into consciousness these pangs or punish- 
 ments for sin, he repents. 
 
 The next step is confession. " Confess 
 your faults one to another," says the apostle ; 
 and surely a man must confess or admit the 
 facts of his case to himself, or he can never 
 get rid of his sins. This acknowledgment 
 need not be made to a priest or a pastor ; 
 but what is essential is a spirit of honesty 
 that does not deny or cover up the truth. 
 It implies that the subject of it is fully aware 
 
90 WHAT IS REQUIRED OF THE PATIENT. 
 
 of his condition, and does not regard it 
 different from what it actually is. 
 
 Faith is also required of the patient 
 in order that he may be healed. In 
 James v., 15, we read: " And the prayer 
 of faith shall save the sick and the Lord 
 shall raise him up ; and if he have committed 
 sins they shall be forgiven him." Jesus made 
 faith on the part of the applicant a condition 
 of being healed. " Believe ye that I am able 
 to do this? " he asked the blind men ; -and 
 when they assented he touched their eyes, 
 saying, " According to your faith be it unto 
 you." Then to the one who returned to 
 express his gratitude the great Healer said, 
 " Go thy way : thy faith hath made thee 
 whole." To one poor woman who sought 
 his healing aid he said, " Thy faith hath 
 saved thee : go in peace ; " to another, 
 " Daughter, be of good comfort : thy faith 
 hath made thee whole." 
 
 To be truly, thoroughly healed, a patient 
 must exercise ■' faith in God," a confidence 
 in his healing power which amounts to a 
 complete surrender of all other hopes, the 
 
WHAT IS REQUIRED OF THE PATIENT. 91 
 
 abandonment of every other means, and 
 utter reliance on Christ. It implies a readi- 
 ness to forsake every evil thought or desire 
 that stands in the way of recovery, and a 
 belief that the cure sought may immediately 
 take place. In such a state of mind the 
 patient may pray for healing mercy ; others 
 may pray for him that he may be healed ; 
 and his sins may be forgiven. The Scribes, 
 you will recollect, were sorely offended 
 because Jesus, when healing a man sick 
 of the palsy, changed the formula " arise and 
 walk," to " Be of good cheer : thy sins are 
 forgiven thee." 
 
 No truth in the Bible is more plainly 
 taught than this, that healing begins and 
 ends with the forgiveness and cure of sin. 
 Here is the prime cause and seat of the 
 trouble, and no treatment is complete which 
 fails to destroy the germ of the disease, and 
 cleanse that which is within as well as what 
 is external. " Woe unto you who make 
 clean the outside!" declared Jesus, "but do 
 nothing to eradicate the germs of evil hidden 
 within." First cleanse the fountain ; then 
 
92 WHAT IS REQUIRED OF THE PATIENT. 
 
 will all the streams become sweet and 
 wholesome. 
 
 Note too, that Christ is constantly warning 
 his disciples and followers not to mistake 
 any form of superficial and partial cure for 
 true and thorough healing: ''Strive to 
 enter in at the straight gate ; for many, I say 
 unto you, shall seek to enter in and shall not 
 be able." " I am the way, the truth, and the 
 life." "I am the door of the sheepfold." 
 " No man cometh unto the father but by 
 me." " If the truth make you free, ye shall 
 be free indeed." " I am come to seek and 
 to save that which was lost." "There is 
 joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth." 
 " He that forsaketh not all that he hath and 
 followeth me cannot be my disciple." 
 " Many will say unto me in that day, Lord, 
 Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name, 
 and in thy name cast out devils, and in thy 
 name done many wonderful works? Then 
 will I profess unto them, I never knew you." 
 " My disciples are they who do the will of 
 my Father, which is in heaven." 
 
 You perceive that according to the view 
 
WHAT IS REQUIRED OF THE PATIENT. 93 
 
 herein presented, Christian healing and sav- 
 ing faith are one and the same thing. For 
 this reason the burden of the gospel message 
 to sick and fallen men is Faith. " Whatso- 
 ever is not of faith is sin." — Romans xiv., 23. 
 " But before faith came, we were kept under 
 the law, shut up under the faith which should 
 afterwards be revealed." — Gallatians in., 23. 
 " For whatsoever is born of God overcometh 
 the world : and this is the victory that over- 
 cometh the world, even our faith." — 
 I John v., 4. 
 
 Having now explained as clearly as possi- 
 ble my own idea of what in the Bible is 
 meant by true healing, a simple exercise 
 of genuine repentance and faith, I see no 
 necessity to further burden you with any 
 of the theories with which teachers of what 
 is called mental healing are apt to confuse 
 the learner and mislead him in his search 
 after truth. The first form of healing to 
 which I have alluded in this letter is not the 
 kind I approve ; therefore I do not trouble 
 myself or you with any theories about it. 
 Take it for what it is worth, but do not 
 
94 WHAT IS REQUIRED OF THE PATIENT. 
 
 neglect the better way. The door to eternal 
 life is not barred against any repentant, 
 humble seeker for admission. No knowl- 
 edge of any theories of mind or matter is 
 required to enter. " If thou wouldst enter 
 into life keep the commandments." A 
 knowledge of " Christian science," or any 
 other science, is not necessary in order to be 
 saved with a salvation that redeems man 
 from the power and dominion of the law 
 of sin and death, and makes him a child of 
 God, a free-born heir to truth and all of the 
 truth. Repentance, confession, forsaking 
 sin, prayer, faith, lowly obedience to the 
 teachings of the Holy Spirit, — these are the 
 steps in the true healing process, and consti- 
 tute the only doctrines or lessons that any 
 one needs to learn, in order to recover from 
 illness, enjoy the blessing of perfect health, 
 and enter into that heaven of reality from 
 which all sin, suffering and death are forever 
 banished, and all the children of God are 
 one with the Father and with his only 
 begotten Son, Jesus Christ, our Savior. 
 
GEMS BY G. F. CHAPMAN. 
 
 The teaching most needed to-day, is that which 
 teaches man to lose his self-life, and thereby gain 
 sternal life. 
 
 Teach me how to abide in the Vine, then shall I 
 become a powerful instrument of divine healing. 
 
 Teach man to remove the beam from his own eye, 
 then can he see clearly, to remove the mote from his 
 brother's eye. 
 
 You would not judge the beauty of a rose, before 
 it was unfolded. Neither should you judge man's 
 life and character until it is unfolded. 
 
 Are you not trying to get outside of God to find 
 him ? 
 
 Spiritual understanding is not gained through 
 struggling, but by acceptance. 
 
 Do not exhaust all your time in asking, but devote 
 some to accepting and gratitude. 
 
 Humility is the stepping-stone to perfection. 
 
 Perfect love does not excite, but fills with emotion. 
 
 Our nearest and most dangerous neighbor is Self. 
 
 From discord to harmony is not a rapid transit. 
 95 
 
96 GEMS BY G. F. CHAPMAN. 
 
 You cannot lose Self, except in the knowledge of 
 eternal life. 
 
 Mental darkness is not the absence of light but 
 the lack of comprehension. 
 
 God deserves more than constant petitions ; He 
 deserves praise. 
 
 God is not a present help until we are ready to 
 accept his free gift. 
 
 Soul and body healing is but the comprehension 
 of our life source. 
 
 When we are abiding in the Vine, we are only 
 hid from the man of sense, not from spirit. 
 
 If we are abiding in the Vine, why need we 
 trouble about the fruit we are to bear? Certainly the 
 branch cannot bear other than the natural fruit. 
 
 Argument will never convert the world ; truth 
 lived and demonstrated only can. 
 
GEMS BY LAILA E. CHAPMAN. 
 
 Age i 6 years. 
 
 Self-conceit will lead man astray. 
 Vanity is no part of a Christian. 
 Heavenly riches should be desired rather than 
 worldly. 
 
 Human mind is not vast enough to comprehend 
 all truth at once. 
 
 As the rose opens gradually to the sunlight, so 
 truth comes to them that search for it. 
 
 Pen cannot portray nor words express the thoughts 
 of a thinking man. 
 
 Bigotry is a stumbling-block, on the way to the 
 kingdom. 
 
 Love is the corner-stone, 
 That will always stand, 
 On which is chiselled 
 
 The way to the throne 
 By God's own hand. 
 
 97 
 
QUESTIONS. 
 
 Did it ever occur to you, that dominion was not 
 given to earth man, but to the spiritual man (Christ) 
 who was truth and life ? 
 
 What has dominion over the fowls of the air, fish 
 of the sea, and every creeping thing, except truth and 
 life? 
 
 Jacob claimed to have seen God face to face : yet 
 John declared that no man hath seen God at any 
 time, but did you ever realize that the man with 
 whom Jacob wrestled was this man in the first 
 creation, who is the Lord God, hence he saw the 
 (Only Begotten) Son? 
 
 •Did it ever occur to you that those who half 
 believe are the only ones who argue the problem of 
 spiritual life ? because he who has come to the knowl- 
 edge of the truth fully realizes that he cannot prove 
 by controversy the evidence within of immortality. 
 
 Do you know that your condition is either what 
 you make it or what you allow God to make it? The 
 preference is yours. Whom will you serve? Self or 
 God? 
 
 98 
 
MR. G. F. CHAPMAN, 
 MRS. M. E. CHAPMAN, 
 
 TEACHERS OF THE 
 
 Gospel of Christian Healing, 
 
 No. 17 Howard Street, Maiden, Mass. 
 
 Classes formed monthly, beginning September z, 
 
 1888. 
 
 Since the object of this instruction is not the mere 
 art of physical healing, but the reformation that results 
 in godly living, such only as desire the latter are 
 invited to join the classes. 
 
 The aim in these courses of lessons is, first, to lead 
 students to turn from sin and death to holiness and 
 life ; second, to explain how they may live in health 
 and peace, and above the world ; third, to unfold the 
 true meaning and purpose of prayer, especially the 
 prayer of faith that will save the sick. 
 
 ^Mr, and Mrs. Chapman have in preparation 
 a text-book, in which their methods and course of 
 instruction are fully set forth and explained. The 
 book will be ready in time for the use of classes. 
 
 I^p 3 Mrs. Chapman has a private class out of the 
 State during the month of May, and will open another 
 at her residence, in June.