WHAT IS HIGHER THOUGHT?
The Unity of the Spirit is
found to result in perfect Liberty; the old sequence of Karma has been cut off,
and a new and higher order has been introduced. In the old order the line of
thought received its quality from the quality of the actions, and since they
always fell short of perfection, the development of a higher thought-power from
this root was impossible. This is the order in which everything is seen from without. It is an inverted order.
But in the true order everything is seen from within.
Now the healthful influence
of the movement known as "The Higher
Thought" consists precisely in this--that it
sets itself rigorously to combat this debilitating doctrine of submission. It
can see as well as others the beauty of weakness leaning upon strength; but it
sees that the real source of the beauty lies in the strong element of the
combination. The true beauty consists in the power to confer strength, and this
power is not to be acquired by submission, but by the exactly opposite method
of continually asserting our determination not to submit.
The true presentment of the Higher Thought contains
no "negative propagandism." It is everywhere ranged on the side of
the Affirmative, and its great object is to extirpate the canker which gnaws at
the root of every life that endeavours to centre itself upon the Negative. Its
purpose is constructive and not destructive.
Resolution passed October,
1902, by the Kensington Higher Thought Centre.
"That the Centre stands for the
definite teaching of absolute Oneness of Creator and Creation--Cause and Effect--and
that nothing which may contradict or be in opposition to the above principles
be admitted to the 'Higher
Thought' Centre Platform.
"By Oneness of Cause and Effect is
meant, that Effect (man) does consist only of what Cause is; but a part (individual
personality) is not therefore co-extensive with the whole."
This Resolution is of the
greatest importance. Once admit that there is any Power
outside yourself, however beneficent you may conceive it to be, and you have
sown the seed which must sooner or later bear the fruit of "Fear" which is the entire ruin of Life,
Love and Liberty. There is no via media. Say we
are only reflections, however accurate, of The Life, and in the admission we
have given away our Birthright. However small or plausible may be the germ of
thought which admits that we are anything less in principle than The Life
Itself, it must spring up to the ultimate ruin of the Life-Principle itself. We
are It itself. The difference is
only that between the generic and the specific of the same thing. We must contend
earnestly, both within ourselves and outwardly, for the one great foundation and
never, now on to all eternity, admit for a single instant any thought which is
opposed to this, the Basic Truth of Being.
The leading ideas connected
with Higher Thought are
(I) That Man controls circumstances,
instead of being controlled by them, and
(II) as a consequence of the
foregoing, that whatever teaches us to rely on power
borrowed from a
source outside ourselves
is not Higher
Thought; and that whatever explains to us the Infinite source of our own inherent power and the consequent limitless nature of that power is Higher
Thought. This avoids the use of terms which may
only puzzle those not accustomed to abstract phraseology, and is substantially
the same as the resolution of October, 1902.
Mental Science
A point on which students of mental
science often fail to lay sufficient stress is the completeness of man—not a
completeness to be attained hereafter, but here and now. We have been so
accustomed to have the imperfection of man drummed into us in books, sermons,
and hymns, and above all in a mistaken interpretation of the Bible, that at
first the idea of his completeness altogether staggers us. Yet until we see this
we must remain shut out from the highest and best that mental science has to
offer, from a thorough understanding of its philosophy, and from its greatest
practical achievements.
.
In contemplating the relations between
body, soul, and spirit, between Universal Mind and individual mind, the
methodised study of which constitutes Mental Science, we must never forget that
these relations indicate, not the separateness, but the unity of these
principles. We must learn not to attribute one part of our action to one part
of our being, and another to another. Neither the action nor the functions are
split up into separate parts. The action is a whole, and the being that does it
is a whole, and in the healthy organism the reciprocal movements of the
principles are so harmonious as never to suggest any feeling than that of a
perfectly whole and undivided self. If there is any other feeling we may be
sure that there is abnormal action somewhere, and we should set ourselves to
discover and remove the cause of it. The reason for this is that in any perfect
organism there cannot be more than one centre of control.
New Thought
This recognition by the individual of his own identity with
Universal Spirit is precisely what forms the basis of the New Thought; and thus
at the outset the two systems radiate from a common centre.
But I suppose the feature of the New Thought which is the greatest
stumbling-block to those who view the movement from the outside is the claim it
makes for Thought-power as an active factor in the affairs of daily life. A
ridiculous claim, a claim not to be tolerated by common sense, a trespassing
upon the Divine prerogative, a claim of unparalleled audacity: thus the casual
objector. But this claim is not without its parallel, for the same claim was
put forward on the same ground by the Great Teacher Himself as the proper
result of "the Son's" recognition of his relation to "the
Father." "Ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you";
"Whatsoever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive, and
nothing shall be impossible unto you"; "All things are possible to
him that believeth." These statements are absolutely without any note of
imitation save that imposed by the seeker's want of faith in his own power to
move the Infinite. This is as clear a declaration of the efficacy of mental
power to produce outward and tangible results as any now made by the New
Thought, and it is made on precisely the same ground, namely, the readiness of
"the Father" or Spirit in the Universal to respond to the movement of
Spirit in the individual.
.
Jesus' conception of prayer was the very opposite. He bids us
believe that we have already in fact received what we ask for, and makes this
the condition of receiving; in other words, he makes the essential factor in
the mental action to consist in Absolute Certainty as to the corresponding
response in the Infinite, which is exactly the condition that the New Thought
lays down for the successful operation of Thought-power.
.
… a few words on the attitude of the New Thought towards the
current forms of religious opinion may not be out of place.
…
Of course we must be rigidly unyielding as regards the essence of Truth--that must never be sacrificed--but as representatives,
in however small a sphere, of the New Thought, we should make it our aim to show others, not that
their religion is wrong, but that all they may find of life-givingness in it is
life-giving because it is part of the One Truth which is always the same under
whatever form expressed. As half a loaf is better than no bread, so ignorant worship is better than
no worship, and ignorant faith is better than no faith. Our work is not to destroy this faith and this
worship, but to lead them on into a clearer light.
For this reason we may assure all inquirers that the
abandonment of their customary form of worship is no necessity of the New
Thought; but, on the contrary, that the principles of the movement, correctly
understood, will show them far more meaning in that worship than they have ever
yet realised. Truth is one; and when once the truth which underlies the outward
form is clearly understood, the maintenance or abandonment of the latter will
be found to be a matter of personal feeling as to what form, or absence of
form, best enables the particular individual to realise the Truth itself.
.
A deeply interesting subject to the student of the New
Thought movement is to trace how exactly its teaching is endorsed by the
teaching of the Bible. There is no such thing as new thought in the sense of
new Truth, for what is truth now must have been truth always; but there is such
a thing as a new presentment of the old Truth, and it is in this that the
newness of the present movement consists. But the same Truth has been repeatedly
stated in earlier ages under various forms and in various measures of
completeness, and nowhere more completely than in the Scriptures of the Old and
New Testaments. None of the older forms of statement is more familiarly known
to our readers than that contained in the Bible, and no other is entwined
around our hearts with the same sacred and tender associations: therefore, I
have no hesitation in saying that the existence of a marked correspondence
between its teaching and that of the New Thought cannot but be a source of strength
and encouragement to any of us who have been accustomed in the past to look to
the old and hallowed Book as a storehouse of Divine wisdom. We shall find that
the clearer light will make the rough places smooth and the dim places
luminous, and that of the treasures of knowledge hidden in the ancient volume
the half has not been told us.
The Bible lays emphatic stress upon "the glorious
liberty of the sons of God," thus uniting in a single phrase the twofold
idea of filial dependence and personal liberty. A careful study of the subject
will show us that there is no opposition between these two ideas, but that they
are necessary correlatives to each other, and that whether stated after the
more concentrated method of the Bible, or after the more detailed method of the
New Thought, the true teaching proclaims, not our independence of God, but our
independence in God. Such an enquiry naturally centres in an especial manner
around the sayings of Jesus; for whatever may be our opinions as to the nature
of the authority with which he spoke, we must all agree that a peculiar weight attaches
to those utterances which have come down to us as the ipsissima
verba from which the entire New Testament has been developed; and if an
identity of conception in the New Thought movement can be traced here at the
fountain-head, we may expect to find it in the lower streams also.
.
I take it for granted that my readers are well
acquainted with the part assigned to the principle of Affirmation in the scheme
of the New Thought. This is often a stumbling-block to beginners; and I feel
sure that even those who are not beginners will welcome every aid to a deeper
apprehension of this great central truth.
The Hidden Power And Other Papers
upon Mental Science
by
Thomas Troward
1921
No comments:
Post a Comment