I
will explain how I am affected while sitting by the sick. All mankind act
according to their belief without knowing it, so to know how to act
intelligently is to correct a false idea. According to our
natural belief, man is matter. To my wisdom, matter is an idea that is used
like language to convey to another some wisdom that one wishes
to explain to his friend. Here is the difference between myself and the world;
the world believes in matter and everything out of matter is a mystery. I admit matter, but I call it the shadow of our wisdom, so the
natural man's wisdom cannot see itself or matter, nor has any idea of an
existence in a state outside of his belief. I admit both, and
class them both in this way: science and ignorance. To make it clear, I will
call my mesmeric state the light or world of science and to get
into that we must go through the dark valley of the shadow of death. In each state
we carry our own belief, so that when a person is in the light, he knows it not as he ought to know; for if he reasons, his wisdom is of the
world of error, but if he does not reason, he is like a child, ready to be
instructed by science or opinions. To illustrate: I take a
child and create in my own mind a dog. I do not speak it to the child, but all
the time I am with the child, I have the dog before me. My
feelings change the child's mind till our minds mingle or sympathize. At last the
child grows nervous. Now I am acting upon the child, but the child knows it not and I may or may not be aware of the fact. Finally the child
gets so far under my influence that when in the dark, it sees a dog. When the
child's senses become attached to the dog, it becomes a real
animal and if I am angry when I create it, the dog will be angry. This produces
fear and anger in the child and it becomes fretful; it feels
nervous and at times sees the dog in the dark. This is the way one mind acts on
another ignorantly.
The
science is to correct this error. This has been the study of the ancient and modern
philosophers; phenomena take place every day and persons are affected by them, but how to account for them has never been discovered.
This is the question, How are all these things produced? We hear people, male
and female, talking about some mysterious something. One
tells some witch story, another a spiritual experiment that is unaccountable,
and some say this is all humbug. There is still another class
pretending to be in the secret that warns you against all the above and points
you to a God of their invention who knows all things, which
He has revealed to them. Others pronounce them bigots and superstitious and say
we do not know anything about another world and that it is all a mystery. These are as superstitious as the others. There are some who
have their fortunes told who say they do not believe a word of it; yet
everything told them was true.
These differences
embrace all mankind but do not contain one word of science. They
are the working of error to arrive at truth. The child laughs at the superstition
of his father and tries to account for his belief in the phenomenon but establishes error almost equal to his father. In this way, error
has been changing, not knowing that it has changed. The progress of true wisdom
is so slow that the children of one generation do not see the
change but speak of the generation of their fathers. The son listens to his
parents explaining the superstition of their age, not knowing
that the ignorance of the one is equal to the ignorance of the other. So the
world goes on from one generation to another. Now I want my children,
when I am out of sight to the world of opinions, to say when they hear persons
declare that medicine never cured a person "that is just what father used to say; here is what he says about it." When they hear it
said that disease is the invention of man and is nothing but a continuation of
Salem witchcraft, and that the priests' opinions are the
relics of heathen superstition, and Jesus opposed the whole of it, I want them
to show how it has been foretold and laughed at. Here is
where I stand.
In looking back at
the Salem witchcraft, when the judges sat in council judging their
fellow men for being witches or wizards, the accused testifying against their best
friends, believing themselves bewitched, just ask yourself if these very people rich and poor, low and high, were not like the people of
our age. And will not the people of the next generation laugh at the folly of
our age? It is twenty years since I first embarked in what
was one of the greatest humbugs of the age, mesmerism. At that time, the people were as superstitious about it
as they were two hundred years ago in regard to witchcraft.
Now see the change; today the phenomena of mesmerism are admitted as much as
those of electricity. And those who oppose it stand in
society on a level with those who believe in ghosts and witches. The opposers
of all science are the material to establish the truth of any
phenomenon, right or wrong. In religion, the more absurd, the more opposition
and therefore the more material to work with, for to oppose a phenomenon
that you admit is to be ignorant of what you oppose. For instance, if a man
opposes the science of mathematics, he must be ignorant. And if a person should show him or explain a mathematical problem which he
cannot see through, if he is a person capable of investigating, he will listen
to the explanation. And if that is not satisfactory, he will
not deny the phenomenon, though he may not believe the explanation. I have had
some experience in regard to man's belief and I know that the
wisdom of man is not properly defined. Man's wisdom is like his wealth. It does
not follow that a man is as rich as he appears, but when he
dies and his debts are paid, then you will see how much he is worth. So it is
with wisdom; the man who is rich in public opinion today may be
a beggar tomorrow; his wisdom is all of this world; when science comes to reckon
and test his wisdom, he falls and is buried in the ground with all those minds that make a show of wisdom. I cannot give a better
explanation of such wisdom than to quote Paul
again, where he says all men have knowledge. Knowledge
puffeth up but charity or science edifieth. Charity is a word well calculated
to embrace what we call science, for a truly scientific man is never puffed up, but like charity his science is his wealth.
The wisdom of the
world is flattery; it puffs man up. Then he continues, If a man thinks
he knows anything, he knows nothing as he ought to know, but if he loves God which
is science, the same is known to him. The position of the scientific man has neither place nor magnitude. It has length and breadth
without thickness; it is in its own element, out of opinion. The wisdom of man
has place, a starting point, magnitude and matter. When a man
is out of matter or opinion, he is in science. This holds good in all science.
Science is to correct all error or phenomena that the natural
man cannot correct intelligently. Now when a phenomenon is produced called
disease, the causes are unknown; therefore man invents reason
to account for it. His reason is the cause of his trouble; his disease is not
the cause but what follows. To illustrate, you tell me I "look sick."
I say I do not feel sick; in fact I don't know what you mean
by the word, so you have to invent some story to tell me or explain by some
intelligent sign. I lay my hands on my left side; you ask me
what I feel. Now if I had never heard of sickness or disease, I should not know
what to say, neither would I be frightened, so it would pass
off without anything of any account. But you tell me that people often die with
just such a feeling as I have. This starts me, although I have no idea what you mean, my feelings not containing danger or
trouble, but your opinions trouble me exceedingly. I begin now to twist and
turn, not knowing what to do. This convinces you that I have
disease of the heart and you try to explain to me what I have and how it
affects a person. By mesmerizing me into your belief you
disturb my mind and create the very idea you have invented; and at last I die
just as you foretold. All this is disease and you made it. If I had never seen you nor anyone wiser than myself I should not have died.
PPQ October 1861
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