New Thought is reaching people who cannot pray.

 

William James wrote in The Varieties of Religious Experience, p.78:

I am Not Body.

I have physical expression, but am not body.

I have never seen my friend, nor has he beheld me. I have never even seen myself. Matter has been seized upon by the life-forces,—or mind,—and built up into a form of sensuous expression. All potency resides in spirit, and all material organisms are the products of its orderly energy. Life sets up its own animated statues with perfect correspondence. The color and tone of mentality come out in every form and feature. Every mental picture of the past is trying to outwardly embody itself, even though years have intervened. It is infallible law that we show forth, and are, the total composite of past thinking. Let us put away pride, and admit that all primary causation is from within. We charge our ills to the weather, water, air, climate, draughts, dampness, work, cold, bacteria, malaria, and contagion. These may be occasions, but our receptivity is the primary and real cause.

I deny the rule and tyranny of body, but affirm its utility as a servant and instrument. I will think such things as I wish embodied.

I am spirit. I rule.

A Christmastide Musing

 

The ringing of Christmas chimes ushers in another joyful season, during which reciprocal love finds its most copious overflow. Every living principle has a rhythmical movement, for the law of action and reaction is universal. As we slowly wind up the spiral of human ascent it is, therefore, normal to find recurring pulsations of unusual strength. Like the floods of spring time, these accentuated hours represent the great periodic rise of human interest and affection, the mingled currents of which refresh and enrich human life and experience. There are brought to the front those diviner faculties in man, which in the ordinary stress of daily routine are latent, or at least comparatively inactive. The exuberant spirit of such a season is a temporary object lesson of a coming steady and continual state of consciousness toward which, through moral and spiritual evolution, the world is tending.

Outside of and beyond the inspired historic associations connected with this anniversary, it is especially profitable to observe it on account of the exercise it gives to a soul-force of the highest and divinest quality. The principle which dwells back of the innumerable Christmas activities, many of which may seem trivial and unworthy, is that which alone will finally assure the salvation of the world.

I am not a body.

I am free. LESSON 199

I am Not Body.

I have physical expression, but am not body.

What Is Disease?

http://www.jamesallenlibrary.com/authors/henry-wood/symphony-of-life/what-is-disease

Published in

How to Obtain Our Own

What is "Our Own"? "Our Own" is just what we create for ourselves. There is nothing higher for us than the things we know, but there are always increasing grades of knowing. —Julia Seton Sears, M.D.

What if just by BEING you, you could change the world?

What is it you love in your life right now that you haven’t allowed yourself to know that you love because other people don’t, and you’re not supposed to? Dr Dain Heer

2015 is the year for the application of the ideas that have been given you.

Take a mental inventory of what you are thinking, feeling, doing, and saying, when it comes to your money, and your state of wealth and abundance. Replace phrases like, "I can't afford it" with

New Thought is often confused with New Age.

New Age is made up of people who are genuinely seeking for better answers to the problems of life, genuinely seeking the spiritual path. New Thoughters know where the path is, because they are already on it, even if they fall off once in a while. New Thoughters know enough to keep an open mind, but not to “dabble in the occult,” which Charles Fillmore warned against. Without abandoning their Western roots and rationality, they learn from Eastern ideas and practices, especially the ones about centered attention and balance. As Joan Cline-McCary puts it in her book about Divine Science founder Malinda Cramer, Malinda Cramer’s Hidden Harmony [1],

We never know how little our faith till we see how astonished we are at the demonstration.

"The study of Heredity, spiritual anatomy and physiology is highest of all. The key to this study is your own soul. Study yourself; -gain possession and mastery of your own spirit and you hold the key not only to the heights of liberty, but the key that unlocks imprisoned souls." Mary Weeks Burnett M. D. *

.

" There was no lesson yesterday, and about noon Mrs. Dawn came after me to go with her and Mrs. Browning, her hostess, to the dentist's, as Mrs. Browning had to have a tooth extracted. We started, treating her all the way with the quieting, reassuring thoughts that allay fear. Before she went in we agreed to hold that thought.

"When Mrs. Browning went into the office, we remained in the waiting room thinking as intently as possible :

Mental Pictures, Distant Healing, Absent Healing --- Health and the Inner Life

To this day, so the anthropologists assure us, there are savage peoples who believe that distant members of the tribe may be telepathically influenced. The principle that "like affects like" is common to both ancient and modern mind cure. For example, an act performed upon a certain part of the body is supposed by some savage peoples to produce a corresponding effect upon an absent individual. In some tribes it has been the custom for the wives of the distant warriors to gather round the fire at home and put themselves through the operations which their liege lords were supposed just then to be going through, and hence to aid them to conquer. There is scarcely a tenet in the mind-cure faith of to-day that cannot be paralleled by a corresponding belief in ancient or savage times. In all ages and among various peoples there have been periods when belief in unusual powers have been prevalent.

God is here!

Man through a careless or mistaken consciousness separates himself from God, and this produces infelicity and dis-ease. Thought confers subjective realism either upon ideal entities or upon seeming bad conditions. What we dwell upon we become, or at least grow like. Thought must have an outlet, otherwise it stagnates. God is the great normal Reality for it to rest upon. Consciousness must be open to the divine harmony, else it becomes disorderly and abnormal. It takes on character from that to which it links itself, — God, if it be God; change and discord, if materiality. It is therefore easy to be outwardly and morally correct and yet be un-Godly. The highest human consciousness is that of God, and this is "Godliness which is great gain." To change from a controlling self-consciousness to a ruling God-consciousness, is to find harmony and health. The vision must be clarified so as to behold God everywhere, within and without, as all Life, all Love, and All in All. Discord cannot long abide the divine companionship. Take the NAME, and through the medium of the outer eye engrave it on the tablet of the inner consciousness.

GOD

IS

HERE

Henry Wood (1834-1909)

Be afraid of nothing that you eat, drink, or wear. Step boldly out into whatever line of business you choose. Wear this shield in your heart: and "We shall not die - we are Spirit not flesh forever more."  Emma Curtis Hopkins] Drops of Gold Jul 20

Mental Healing (II) : Metaphysical Healing

The present decade has experienced an intense interest in mental healing. This has come as a culmination of the development along these lines during the past half century. It has shown itself in the beginning of new religious sects with this as a, or the, fundamental tenet, in more wide-spread general movements, and in the scientific study and application of the principles underlying this form of therapeutics.

Many have been led astray because, being ignorant of the mental healing movements and vagaries of the past, the late applications, veiled in metaphysical or religious verbiage, have seemed to them to be new in origin and principle. No one could consider an historical survey of the subject and reasonably hold this opinion. It is on account of the ignorance of similar movements, millenniums old, that so much, if any, originality can be credited to the founders.

. . .

What we may designate "Metaphysical Healing" originated with Phineas Parkhurst Quimby (1802-1866). The movement was important, not so much on account of what Quimby himself was able to accomplish by it, as because of the work that has been carried on since by at least three of his pupils. He was born in Lebanon, New Hampshire, and in early life was a watch and clock maker. In 1840 he began experimenting with mesmerism, and accounts of these experiments were published in the Maine papers of that time. After this he developed a system of mental healing of his own, practising it in different towns in Maine for some years. About 1858 he settled as a practitioner in Portland and remained there until his death. I shall quote brief extracts in his own words, which portray his system.

"My practice is unlike all medical practice. I give no medicine, and make no outward applications. I tell the patient his troubles, and what he thinks is his disease; and my explanation is the cure. If I succeed in correcting his errors, I change the fluids of the system and establish the truth, or health. The truth is the cure. This mode of practice applies to all cases."

"The greatest evil that follows taking an opinion for a truth is disease."

"Man is made up of truth and belief; and, if he is deceived into a belief that he has, or is liable to have, a disease, the belief is catching, and the effect follows it."

"Disease being made by our belief, or by our parents' belief, or by public opinion, there is no formula to be adopted, but every one must be reached in his particular case. Therefore it requires great shrewdness or wisdom to get the better of the error. Disease is our error and the work of the devil."

Quimby made many wonderful and mostly speedy cures, and although he wrote out his system, it has never been published. Among his patients was Mrs. Patterson from Hill, New Hampshire, who went to Portland in 1862. She had been a confirmed invalid for six years. To quote her own words, published in the Portland Evening Courier in 1862, she made a rapid recovery. "Three weeks since I quitted my nurse and sick room en route for Portland. The belief of my recovery had died out of the hearts of those who were most anxious for it. With this mental and physical depression I first visited P. P. Quimby, and in less than one week from that time I ascended by a stairway of one hundred and eighty-two steps to the dome of the City Hall, and am improving ad infinitum. To the most subtle reasoning, such a proof, coupled, too, as it is with numberless similar ones, demonstrates his power to heal." Mrs. Patterson, afterward Mrs. Eddy, proclaimed after his death a doctrine very similar to Quimby's. She called it "Christian Science," a name Quimby applied to his teaching, although usually he called it "Science of Health."
Another patient of Quimby's was Julius A. Dresser, who visited him first in 1860. Of him Mr. Dresser says: "The first person in this age who penetrated the depths of truth so far as to discover and bring forth a true science of life, and publicly apply it to the healing of the sick, was Phineas Parkhurst Quimby of Belfast, Me."
Rev. W. F. Evans was still another patient and disciple of Quimby's. His testimony is as follows: "Disease being in its root a wrong belief, change that belief and we cure the disease.... The late Dr. Quimby, of Portland, one of the most successful healers of this or any age, embraced this view of the nature of disease, and by a long succession of most remarkable cures ... proved the truth of the theory.... Had he lived in a remote age or country, the wonderful facts which occurred in his practice would have now been deemed either mythical or miraculous."
These three, Messrs. Evans and Dresser and Mrs. Eddy, proved to be Quimby's most famous patients and disciples. Evans became a noted and voluminous writer on mental healing, Mr. Dresser has been identified with the New Thought movement of which his son H. W. Dresser is probably the best exponent, and Mrs. Eddy ruled the Christian Scientists with a rod of iron.
Warren F. Evans visited Quimby twice in the year 1863, and at these times obtained his knowledge of Quimby's methods. Up to this time he had been a Swedenborgian clergyman, and his beliefs enabled him the better to grasp the new doctrines. On the occasion of the second visit he told his healer that he thought he could cure the sick in this way, and Quimby agreed with him. On returning home he tried it, and his first attempts were so successful that he became a practitioner, using only mental means, and continued in this work. He wrote several books on the subject of mental healing, the first one, The Mental Cure, appearing in 1869, six years before Mrs. Eddy's Science and Health.
Perhaps, strictly speaking, the New Thought movement does not come within the scope of our subject, except as we see in it an outgrowth and application of the Quimby doctrine, for two reasons. In the first place, its purpose is mental hygiene rather than cure, and it is all the more valuable for that. Of course, in establishing hygienic practices many disorders are cured, but prevention is the main feature. The second reason why we might perhaps not include it in a résumé of the healers is that it is intended to be for the use of the individual to prevent his employing a healer of any kind. The same objection, however, would do away to some extent with a discussion of Christian Science. The principles of New Thought are that the mind has an influence on the body, and that good, sweet, pure thoughts have a salutary effect, but the opposite ones injure the body. Don't worry, don't think of disease, don't look for trouble, but fill the mind with the opposite positive thoughts and life will be happy and the body will be well. The doctrines are expounded differently by the various leaders, and emphasis is laid on different points, some emphasizing more fully the religious aspects of the movement, for example. The principal writers on the subject are H. W. Dresser, R. W. Trine, H. Wood, and H. Fletcher.
Mrs. Mary A. Morse Baker Glover Patterson Eddy (1821-1910) was born at Bow, New Hampshire. After a precocious and neurotic childhood, she united with the Congregational Church when seventeen years of age. At the age of twenty-two she married George Washington Glover, probably the best of her husbands. His death, six months later, was followed by the birth of her only child and a ten years' widowhood. During this time she stayed with her relatives and had long periods of illness, principally of an hysterical character. She then experimented to some extent with mesmerism and clairvoyance. In 1853 she married Dr. Daniel Patterson, an itinerant dentist, from whom she got a divorce, and as Mrs. Patterson she went first to "Dr." Quimby in 1862. She visited Quimby again in 1864, at which time, with some others, she studied with him. After Quimby's death she began teaching what she then called his science. For the next few years she wandered from town to town about Boston in straitened circumstances, healing, teaching, and endeavoring to found an organized society. It was not, however, until 1875 that the organization was formed in Lynn, and later in the same year appeared her Science and Health. The years since then have been filled with controversies in the law courts and newspapers, caresses and blows from the ruling hand of Mother Eddy, and numerous developments from small beginnings, until now over one hundred thousand are identified with the organization. These are almost without exception proselytes from other churches.

From THREE THOUSAND YEARS OF MENTAL HEALING

BY

GEORGE BARTON CUTTEN, Ph.D.

1911

Promise Yourself.

Christian Daa Larson, Christian D. Larson, C.D. Larson (1874 – 1962) , beloved author of his now famous Optimist Creed[1], was born February 1, 1874. His parents were newly arrived Norwegian immigrants who settled in the prairie wilderness of North Winnebago County, Iowa.
In 1894, urged by his parents, Christian entered a Lutheran seminary. But on a train trip to the seminary in Minneapolis an event occurred that would change the course of Christians life. A book by a Unitarian minister was left on the seat next to him, and after reading it several times it became the catalyst for his break with orthodox theology. Larson completed the first year at the Lutheran seminary but knew he would enroll in a liberal theological school the following year. He attended Iowa State College and a Unitarian theological school in Meadville, Pennsylvania In his early twenties he became interested in the Mental Science teachings of Helen Wilmans, Henry Wood, Charles Brodie Patterson and others. These logical teachings suited his analytical mind and provided a point to him where theology and science could meet and combine to provide a practical and systematic philosophy of life.
He was an outstanding and highly influential early New Thought teacher and leader. A prolific writer of New Thought books, he believed that people have tremendous latent powers which can be put to use for success with the proper attitude. Christian first located in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1898. In January 1901 he organized the New Thought Temple[2] at his residence, 947 West 17th St. In September of the same year he began publishing Eternal Progress, which was for several years one of the leading New Thought periodicals with a circulation of over a quarter million. It was while he was acting as editor for Eternal Progress that his prolific writing career of over forty published books began. Among the best known are: Poise And Power(1907), The Great Within(1908), Mastery Of Fate(1910), The Ideal Made Real(1912), Thinking For Results(1912), The Hidden Secret(1912), Mastery Of Self, Your Forces And How To Use Them(1912), How To Stay Well(1912) and The Pathway of Roses(1912) which sold over over a million copies and was translated into eight languages.
[1] The Optimist Creed was authored in 1912 by Christian D. Larson, appearing in his book Your Forces and. How to Use Them. It was adopted as the Optimist Internationals Creed in 1922.

Promise Yourself

To be so strong that nothing can disturb your peace of mind.
To talk health, happiness, and prosperity to every person you meet.
To make all your friends feel that there is something in them
To look at the sunny side of everything and make your optimism come true.
To think only the best, to work only for the best, and to expect only the best.
To be just as enthusiastic about the success of others as you are about your own.
To forget the mistakes of the past and press on to the greater achievements of the future.
To wear a cheerful countenance at all times and give every living creature you meet a smile.
To give so much time to the improvement of yourself that you have no time to criticize others.
To be too large for worry, too noble for anger, too strong for fear, and too happy to permit the presence of trouble.
To think well of yourself and to proclaim this fact to the world, not in loud words but great deeds.
To live in faith that the whole world is on your side so long as you are true to the best that is in you.

He was a one time honorary president of the International New Thought Alliance(INTA), along with such stalwarts as W.W. Atkinson, Horatio Dresser, Charles Brodie Patterson, and Annie Rix Militz, he was one who exercised considerable influence over Religious Science founder, Ernest Holmes. As early as 1928, C. D. Larson began to appear in Science of Mind Magazine and to be a part of the major teaching courses, becoming a member of the permanent staff.
It was the same Christian D. Larson whose book, The Ideal Made Real, nineteen years earlier introduced Ernest Holmes, founder of the Institute of Religious Science in Los Angeles, to the New Philosophy inspiring him to go forward in learning and practicing the art of mental treatment, i.e. expanding beyond physical healing to the Control of Conditions. Ernest Holmes and his brother, Fenwicke, took a correspondence course with Larson. According to Fenwicke, Ernest had been studying the Christian Science textbook, Science and Health, but was so impressed with Christian Larson's New Thought writings that he abandoned the Christian Science textbook in favor of Larsons work “The Ideal Made Real”. In the biography of his brother, Ernest Holmes: His Life And Times, Fenwicke Holmes elaborates on the influence of Larson and Ralph Waldo Trine on that of his brother.
Christian D. Larson passed away at the age of 87 in 1962.
[2]The New-Thought movement in Cincinnati, Ohio, owes its origin to Christian D. Larson(Christian Dee Larson), (a great influence on Ernest Holmes), who in January, 1901, organized the New Thought Temple, at his residence, 947 West Seventeenth St. In September of that year Mr. Larson began to publish Eternal Progress, for several years one of the leading New Thought periodicals. In November, 1902, Sunday morning services were inaugurated. At this service fifteen minutes' silence was a leading feature, A little church building seating three hundred people was secured in 1904. Mr. Larson resigned in 1907, and was succeeded by Paul Tyner, in November, 1908. Harry Gaze was the next leader, and then Miss Leila Simon[1], in 1912.

The History of The Cincinnati Temple
Excerpted from A History of the New Thought Movement, 1919
Horatio W. Dresser
1919
Chapter 11
OTHER ORGANIZATIONS

On January 27, 1963, the Unity Center of Practical Christianity located on Madison Road in Oakley and the New Thought Temple merged into the New Thought Unity Center.
During the late 1890’s, two groups of “pioneers in thought” who were interested in the new science of mental healing then sweeping the country, met together in thought, feeling, and effort. These groups were called “The Company” and “The Perfectionists.” They were members and friends of what is now called the New Thought Unity Center. In 1898, one of these groups found a teacher, Christian D(aa) Larson, who invited them to hold their meetings in his residence on West Seventh Street. In addition, some interested families opened their homes in the suburbs of Cincinnati and in Covington and Newport, Kentucky. The following year the group entered into a more definite organization and rented a space in the Odd Fellows Temple. It is this group that founded and built our present facility. From the documents of that time, we find the first purpose statement from the incorporation papers of the New Thought Temple:

The purpose of the New Thought Temple is

“to provide a universal church without fixed creed, dogma, or ritual, where all people may worship God, and where they may study the Principles and Fundamentals of New Thought in all of its phases, as a Philosophy, a religion, a science and the practice of sane, sensible and spiritual living.”

The first financial report of the fledgling Temple stated that it believed the “success, prosperity, and a splendid outlook for the coming year to the new financial methods put into practice….All contributions are voluntary, neither solicited nor urged. When money is needed for the many activities, an intelligent application of God’s law of supply is the means by which money has been forthcoming. Through the law of love, harmony and intelligent cooperation with God’s law of universal substance, the New Thought Temple has demonstrated adequate supply for all its needs, with good surplus."
Christian Larson was a teacher/lecturer of progressive ideas, who had come to Cincinnati in October of 1898. He traveled a circuit throughout Cincinnati and its suburbs, including Covington, Newport, and Dayton, Ohio. In a letter to the New Thought Temple in 1925 as they researched their own history for the dedication ceremonies in 1926, he explains,

“ …We aimed in all these lectures to cover the widest field possible, giving special emphasis to the high idealism, which at the time, was the inspiring note of the New Thought Movement. We gave special attention to healing; and that work at times was very extensive."

In the fall of 1907, Dr. Larson gave up the leadership to devote all his time to writing. Recalling the beginning of New Thought in Cincinnati, Dr. Larson stated,

"All pioneer work is well supplied with problems, difficulties, dark days, misunderstandings and criticism; we had our share and more. But everyone connected with the movement continued to hold to the high vision, and I am pleased to say that some marvelous results were attained, both in healing and spiritual development."

[1]

Because of the growth her leadership generated, the society moved to the Mansion on Gilbert Avenue. A storeroom in the Provident Bank Building near Peebles Corner served as an office, a library, a reading room, and a classroom. To understand the gift this woman gave those she led, read the following quote from Horatio Dresser’s book History of New Thought (published in 1919): "My first New Thought service brought out an audience of less than twenty-five people. Two years later I spoke constantly to from twelve hundred to fifteen hundred people. From the outset, I considered the work of the New Thought Temple entirely separate from personality. It was not mine, but impelled by the Spirit of God, and it is this conviction and consecration that is the moving Power of the New Thought Temple. My first thought from the beginning of my ministry and today is, “If you believe God’s power, prove it.If you teach health, harmony, and prosperity, furnish the actual proofs.
"My first move was to refuse to recognize the poverty-stricken consciousness of the New Thought Temple actually. I firmly set aside all gratuitous invitations from members who offered their homes for classes, etc., and also refused to house the activities in cheap rooms. As we had no money, this was a radical step. My first classes were held in my own apartment, situated in the best part of Cincinnati. The Sunday services in a hall seating one hundred people. In less than three months we had outgrown this hall, and my apartment classrooms. Before the end of the first year, we had audiences of five hundred and were finally crowded out of a large auditorium and were compelled to rent hundred to accommodate the people who wished to attend the Sunday services."
So for the Temple membership, as membership increased, the idea of a Temple Building began to assume more definite form. The Thursday evening class—an experience and healing meeting—included as part of its program a silence for building the temple, using the following affirmation:
I now build the Temple of the Lord God Almighty in perfect, visible form. It is a Divine Center through which higher Spiritual Forces of Love, Peace, Wisdom, Strength, Power, Faith, Fellowship, Health, Wealth, Companionship and Joy, now come forth into the world.
The idea began to manifest and on March 17, 1916 ground was broken for the new Temple.

New Thought, Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia and Ossian Everett Mills

The influence of the New Thought movement on Mills and Sinfonia was recognized by Rollin M. Pease (Supreme Historian, 1926-1934) in his words “A symphony of life our Master led.” In keeping with other references in his text, this is an allusion not only to a heroic figure, but also to Mills. The Symphony of Life was a book written by Henry Wood in 1901, which achieved world-wide fame. Wood’s writing was described as

“semi-mystical philosophy which professes to solve the mystery of the connection between mind and matter.”

A literary review described The Symphony of Life as “interpretations of the ‘higher evolution’ that has been in process in the thoughts of men” and said,

“Mr. Wood is not an extremist concerning the healing power resident in the new philosophy of life. What he says on this point is sane, and would commend itself to the approval of all schools of thinkers. The essays contain much that is suggestive and valuable on the art of making life beautiful and happy.”

The works of Henry Wood were concerned in large part with mental healing.

“The principles of New Thought are that the mind has an influence on the body, that good thoughts have a salutary effect and bad thoughts are injurious.”

The New Thought incorporated the views of Rev. W. F. Evans, a Swedenborgian clergyman, who became a noted and voluminous writer on mental healing. Evans was a disciple of Phineas Quimby (as was MBE, principal founder of Christian Science), who practiced methods in America similar to those of Swedenborg and Chevalier de Barbarin, who influenced the beginning of the spiritualist movement in Europe. In his 1908 book The New Old Healing, Henry Wood describes the healing power of music (http://pvrguymale.blogspot.com/2011/12/music-as-healing-power.html). One cannot fail to see the clear alignment of this New Thought philosophy on music with the musical aesthetics of subjectivity and feeling discussed earlier.

“Our very genesis was not really a beginning after all, but indeed the product of a personality - Father Mills.”

Some distinguished members of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia Fraternity

• Andrew Carnegie, 1835–1919 (Alpha Honorary 1917; founder of Pittsburgh's Carnegie Steel Company which later became United States Steel; Philanthropist; Namesake of Carnegie-Mellon University, Carnegie Hall, and numerous libraries; By virtue of his birthdate, most likely to be the "third Sinfonian to be born", behind Theodore Thomas, born earlier in 1835, and Major Henry Lee Higginson, born in 1834)
• George Eastman, 1854–1932 (Alpha Nu Honorary 1927, Alpha Alpha National Honorary 1941(?); founded Eastman Kodak Company, invented the roll of film, namesake of Eastman School of Music)
• Elmer Bernstein, 1922-2004 (Gamma Omega 1964; American film score composer known for The Ten Commandments, The Man with the Golden Arm, The Great Escape, The Magnificent Seven, Meatballs, To Kill a Mockingbird, Ghostbusters, and Airplane!).
• John Cacavas, 1930–present (Iota 1951; Composer of music from television shows including Hawaii Five-O, Kojak, The Bionic Woman, and Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, the films Airport 1975 and Airport '77; wrote the theme song for the 2005 video game Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories. The song, "March Popakov Remix", was sampled by DJ Danger Mouse and is used frequently in the game).
• Bill Conti, 1942–present* (Beta Omega 1960; Film and television composer, including Rocky, the James Bond film For Your Eyes Only, Dynasty, Falcon Crest, Cagney & Lacey, and the ABC Evening News) • Nelson S. Riddle, Jr., 1921–1985 (Gamma Omega Honorary 1967; Bandleader, Arranger, Orchestrator; Noted for the soundtrack of the 1960s Batman television series and movie)
• David Rose* (Gamma Omega Honorary 1968; Wrote music for The Red Skelton Show and Bonanza; Known for 1962 Billboard #1 hit The Stripper; Married to actress Judy Garland)
• Thomas Dewey, 1902–1971 (Epsilon 1920, Alpha Alpha National Honorary 1946; Governor of New York, 1943–1955; Republican nominee for President of the United States, 1944 and 1948; Author of Journey to the Far Pacific (1952) and Thomas E. Dewey on the Two Party System (1966). In addition, Dewey served as president of the Epsilon Chapter at the University of Michigan and as the Fraternity's supreme historian from 1922 to 1924.)
• Frank De Vol, 1911-1999 (Gamma Omega Honorary 1962, Sometimes simply known as "De Vol", American arranger, composer and actor; Recognized for his television theme tunes for Family Affair, The Brady Bunch, and My Three Sons, the latter of which was a hit single in 1961. As an actor, appeared in several TV series, such as I Dream of Jeannie, Bonanza, Petticoat Junction, The Brady Bunch, Get Smart (at least 2 appearances as Prof. Carleton), and The Jeffersons (where he portrayed a sad jingle-writer who moved into Mr. Bentley's vacant apartment), as well as the movie The Parent Trap)
• Nelson Eddy, 1901–1967 (New Zeta Honorary 1936; Baritone & Actor, performed at 1941 inauguration of Franklin Delano Roosevelt)
• Art Gilmore, 1912–2010 (Chi 1934; Radio Personality; T.V. Announcer for The Waltons, The Amazing Howard Hughes, The Red Skelton Show, Garner Ted Armstrong & The World Tomorrow; Actor, Moonbeams, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Adam-12, Dragnet)
• Andy Griffith, 1926–present f (Alpha Rho 1946; Starred in title roles in The Andy Griffith Show, 1960–1968, and Matlock, 1986–1995)
• Lyle Russell Cedric "Skitch" Henderson, 1918–2005 (Original conductor for The Tonight Show and The Today Show)
• Sy Mann (Pianist & Arranger for The Arthur Godfrey Show)
• Mitch Miller, 1911–present ‡ (Record producer, host of 1960s show Sing Along With Mitch of "follow the bouncing ball" fame)
• Fred Rogers, 1928–2003 f (Xi Psi Honorary 1987; Creator and host of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, 1968–2001) • Bo Diddley, 1928-2008 ‡ (Eta Omega Honorary 1999; Rock & Roll pioneer, Member Rock and Roll Hall of Fame) • Lee Loughnane, 1946–present (Kappa Phi 1965; founding member of Chicago rock band) • James Pankow, 1947–present (Kappa Phi 1966; founding member of Chicago rock band)
• Walter Parazaider, 1945–present (Kappa Phi 1964; founding member of Chicago rock band) • Glenn Hughes (singer), 1950–2001 (Kappa Pi 1970; founding member of The Village People, 1970s gay iconic pop band) • Ruben Studdard, 1978–present (Omicron Delta 1997; pop singer, [2003 American Idol winner])
• Shay Watson (Iota Nu 1994, founding member of Watson and Nash)
• Jimmy Webb, 1946–present (Pi Tau Honorary 1969, American songwriter, known for "Up, Up and Away" and "By the Time I Get to Phoenix". His songs have been recorded or performed by Glen Campbell, The 5th Dimension, The Supremes, Richard Harris, Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley, Isaac Hayes, R.E.M., and Chet Atkins, among others.)

Enlightenment ideals. In these groups men gather strength, support, and inspiration to advance music through their fraternal bonds, their shared devotion to spiritual ideals, and the earnest search for Truth and Beauty.

"So, let us, you and I, for the sake of our brother man, individually strive by example and influence to lift the standard of thought and conduct from the low level of selfishness and self-indulgence up to the lofty realms of aspirational thought and self-denial." Ossian Everett Mills (What are the Possibilities of Sinfonia: Optimism Runs High in Phi Mu Alpha, 1912)

“Music as a Healing Power”

from The New Old Healing by Henry Wood, 1908.

The systematic use of music as a therapeutic agent has engaged the attention of a few specialists during the past few years, though but little general interest in the subject has yet been awakened. We congratulate ourselves upon the modern cultivation of voice and instrument, and yet have little appreciation of their possible restorative potency.

A general impression prevails to the effect that almost every art or science back in the past ages was but crude, or rudimentary, in comparison with the standard of to-day. And many would think, at first glance, that music as a healing instrumentality is but a recent development, whether it be mostly a fad, or otherwise. But the most superficial investigation of the subject will show that the present philosophy of musical healing is but a slight modern revival of principles which have been far better understood in times long past than in this self-satisfied era.

In reality musical restoration is but a variety of mind cure. Through the awakening of certain emotions which take hold upon the nerve-center, a change is produced in the status of the whole organism.

Musical vibrations can have no direct effect upon the body, as animate matter, but through the ear as a medium they change certain mental conditions which by means of the nervous equipment thrill the organism, and modify its action from head to foot. But human personality is variable, so that any scientific classification, or formula of specific principles, can hardly be laid down with accuracy. While as a rule certain kinds of music may soothe and act as a sedative, and others as a tonic or stimulant, and some as a simple diversion, still subtle individual idiosyncrasy is so variant that it will always remain an important element. In any case, efficacy must largely depend upon the interest and faith of the patient. While the same harmony of concordant sounds in itself will not produce quite the same effect upon different temperaments, the optimistic expectation of each is important. The precise nature of the external means is not significant, but the subjective impression upon the soul is all important.

A comprehensive history of the employment of musical therapeutics embracing all ages and civilization would be of great psychological interest. One comprehensive law would run through all. Great basic principles are proved and even become axiomatic by the examination of a great array of facts and phenomena which occur under conditions often outwardly unlike. These few instances and events might be reduplicated to any extent. From the most ancient historical records, forward, the proofs of musical healing are many and undoubted. Back in the childhood of the race the physician, priest and musician formed a closely related trio for the assuagement of human woes. The occult power of the priesthood, and the charm of melody, were held to be superior to the drug. Notwithstanding superstition prevailed, and oracle, omen and charm were common, they were not entirely irrational or without use. Their effect upon the mind was keenly observed.

There was no cold scientific materialism to cause unbelief, and faith in unseen potency was prevalent and easily aroused.

We moderns may look back with contempt upon the early ages, but were we not too proud we might learn much. While we would not go back to ancient conditions, there was a child-like responsiveness and intuitive spontaneity which possess a peculiar charm and altogether make up an element largely lacking in modern intellection. There is little subtle and delicate poesy in the present era, but rather an all-prevailing prosaism.

Back in the dawn of history in the days of Troy we learn that when the pest rages beneath the city walls it was driven away by music. In Rome 364 B.C. Etrurian flute players dancing through the streets banished the plague which was depopulating the city. The harp cured melancholia as demonstrated in the case of Saul.

Melodious sounds were often effective in freeing the victim of demoniacal possession. Pythagoras wrought wonderful cures through the systematic ministry of melody. Many physicians prescribed music for the recovery from madness. The great Galen recommended melodious strains as an antidote for the bite of a viper or scorpion.

Books enough to make a vast library have been written upon the influence of sweet sounds in disease and many of them are filled with the details of remarkable cases and cures. The disorder treated were in no wise limited to those of a nervous character. The great number of treatises upon the subject were, as a rule, written in Latin and published, notably during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Harmonic compositions, and also sentimental, artistic and immaterial means and methods were utilized to change the current of the human mind and thereby take the man out of himself. An intelligent and persistent effort in this direction would largely provide for the disuse of our modern asylums.

The multiform appliances which have been used to break up abnormally fixed thought are significant, and yet general observation as to the principles involved, is most superficial. If any human being is mentally crystallizing into morbidity he should be jostled or turned about, until a new combination is formed.

Whether music, poetry, sentiment or travel be the external and incidental means for the installation of a new state of consciousness, they are but suggestions in the direction of the great inner Fact. Either of them may be the fulcrum by the use of which the subject lifts himself into a condition of harmony and health.

Uplifting or entrancing vibrations therefore form one of the efficient methods of psychical reconstruction. As a modus operandi, if more freely illogical it may appear what matters it, provided the result be beneficent?

We are ever brought back to the basic and all-inclusive problem: How, and through what appliance, mental or physical, can an adequate and saving faith be evolved and a strong expectation awakened in man?

Henry Wood, The New Old Healing (Lothrop, Lee & Shepard Co.: Boston, 1908)

The "New Age" movement has brought nothing "new".
They've repackaged the "old".

Has Mental Healing A Valid Scientific and Religious Basis?

Tidbits from a paper read before the clergymen's "MONDAY CLUB" at the Channing Building, Boston,1895

Let us now briefly touch upon the practical application of the healing power of one mind as exerted upon another. The fact that thought-vibrations can be projected, and strike unisons in another mind, has been scientifically demonstrated, and few will deny it. Certain persons of highly trained and concentrated power can gradually induce a new quality of consciousness in the receptive mentality of others. A degree of passivity and harmony of purpose in the recipient is necessary. Soon the invalid begins to think differently of himself. The better thought seems to be entirely his own, but in reality he has been assisted. There is no hypnotic imposition, but only the calm, concentrated working of two minds for one result. A re-enforcement, or thought-ministration, is sent to where it is most needed. The healer has no power in his own personality; but his projected ideal, for which he is only a kind of channel, is the working force. With a clear and clean mind of his own, he looks through and beyond the adverse external appearances of the other, striving to awaken a perfect ideal that may at length be brought into expression. He penetrates to where influences are radiated outwards. Gradually visible sequence and manifestation fail into line.

The patient is like a discordant instrument which needs tuning. A successful healer must be an overflowing fountain of love and good-will. He makes ideal conditions present. The patient's mental background is like a sensitive plate, upon which will gradually appear outlines of health and harmony as positively presented.

This is no mere narrow professionalism. Every one should project thought-ministrations of ideals into other minds. We are thinking, not for ourselves, but for the world. Thoughts are positive forces. Even their unconscious vibrations go out in never-ending waves ; but when consciously projected with an aim, their impact upon the resonant strings of other minds stirs them to action. Every ego is a creative centre. Not that he forms anew, but brings something of the Universal into manifestation. Thought-energy, so cheaply valued and so aimlessly squandered, can be made infinitely more valuable than material treasures. We make ideals our own by holding them, and this both actualizes them and gives them to others. Material ownership has but one objective, but a single ideal can be held by thousands. Every owner, instead of consuming it, only makes it richer.

. . .

The highest inner consciousness is the Christ. He is unrecognized so long as we think of ourselves as flesh. He is found when we recognize the true spiritual ego. Blood represents the inmost quality, not the death, but the life. The resurrection is the lifting of the consciousness from the physical to the spiritual. The mind of Christ is the Saviour of humanity. It knows neither sin, disorder, nor death. It confers dominion over the dreams and illusions of mortal sense. It heals, restores, invigorates, and harmonizes, and is no less scientifically exact than religiously fitting. The divine likeness is at the soul-centre of man. Here is the manger where the Christ-consciousness comes to birth. Here the resurrection takes place when the stone of the lower self-consciousness is rolled away. " The kingdom of heaven is within you ; " and that kingdom includes wholeness, harmony, and health.
HAS MENTAL HEALING A VALID
Scientific and Religious Basis?
BY HENRY WOOD
SUBSTANCE OF A PAPER READ BY INVITATTON BEFORE THE CLERGYMEN'S "MONDAY CLUB" (UNITARIAN MINISTERS OF BOSTON AND VICINITY) AT THE CHANNING BUILDING, BOSTON,
JUNE 3rd, 1895

By Imagination We Become

We can think about something forever and never see it in our world,
But, just once, let us feel its reality,
and we are bound to encounter it.
The more intensely we feel,
the sooner we will encounter it.
We regard feelings far too much as effects and,
not sufficiently as the causes of the event of the day.
Neville Goddard – Radio Talk – 1951

THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES

A NEW light is dawning upon the human horizon. Its golden beams are penetrating into the damp, dark caverns of pessimistic realism, and transforming them into the abodes of spiritual brightness and optimism. The divinity of man so long in eclipse that it has seemed well nigh lost is manifestly asserting itself, and indications are not wanting that it is soon to find normal and rightful dominance.

There is an unprecedented condition of fluidity among general conventions in religion, science, ethics, and, in fact, the whole philosophy of life and being. The very fact that opinions, systems, theories, and doctrines were never before so fluidized, is a positive indication that everything will all the more easily rise or fall to the point of its own specific gravity.

A formal, dogmatic, and ceremonial Christianity is giving place to vital spiritual unfoldment that is befitting to man's constitution and being. Faith is newly defined. It is brought from the realm of the dim, distant, and uncertain future, into present reality and positive manifestation. The soul-hunger of humanity is being newly diagnosed, and its satisfaction definitely and intelligently provided for.

There is so much to encourage seekers after truth, that each one should strive, not only to broaden his own horizon, but also to lead his brothers and sisters to higher and more inspiring outlooks. Having in the past regarded inspiration as finished and complete, men have been willing to supinely rest in conditions, mistakenly supposed to be normal, holding in view only some detached fragment of the great rounded Unity of Truth. Like the bone of an animal, or the branch of a tree, such fractional aspects are not only meaningless, but misleading, when out of general relation.

The powers, uses, and possibilities of the human mind, under new interpretations, comprise a new Revelation. It is incomparably more wonderful than the most extravagant accomplishments, and even dreams, of material progress.

For ages men have crowded their energies in the pursuit of new physical and intellectual achievements, anticipating that human satisfaction and felicity were to be found along these lines, if they were persistently followed. But they were mistaken. The spiritual motor of scientific idealism is transcendently greater in potency than if the material dreams had all been actualized.


But an earthy and sensuous realism will only yield, the ground inch by inch ; and there will be " wars and rumors of wars," and other active manifestations of animalism, before the human consciousness is generally developed upon the higher planes. The wonderful significance of the GREAT TRANSITION is yet but faintly imagined, but TRUTH is invincible. In the great upheavals of the present era, nothing that is real in religion, science, or humanity will be destroyed. But the false, the unreal, and the external will be sloughed off. Arrested development will only increase retributive friction.

The established order, which is Good, and which is anchored in Good, will forever remain unshaken. Man is " feeling after " and finding God, both within and around him. Divine revelations, no longer confined to one narrow channel, are being sought after and found in all directions. The more deeply that physical science penetrates in its studies of all phenomena, the more nearly does it come to the divine and spiritual basis of all things.

The rosy dawn of a new and higher evolutionary dispensation already welcomes the eyes of those who occupy the more elevated standpoints. The potential " kingdom of heaven " is within man. As this great truth brightens in human consciousness, there will be a general emancipation from all low and limited conditions. Such an IDEAL is to be held firmly in view until it comes into full actualization.

STUDIES IN THE THOUGHT WORLD PRACTICAL MIND ART BY HENRY WOOD 1896