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 5th chapter of the Gospel of John.

This will show you how beautifully the ancient story tellers told of the two distinct outlooks on this world - one, the limited three-dimensional focus, and the other, the fourth-dimensional focus.

This story tells of an impotent man who is quickly healed. Jesus comes to a place called Bethesda, which by definition means the House of Five Porches. On these Five Porches are unnumbered impotent folk- lame, blind, halt, withered, and others. Tradition had it that at certain seasons of the year an angel would descend and disturb the pool which was near these Five Porches. As the Angel disturbed the pool, the first one in was always healed. But only the first one, not the second.

Jesus, seeing a man who was lame from his mother's womb, said to him, "Wilt thou be made whole?" John 5:6

"The impotent man answered him, Sir, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pool - but while I am coming, another steppeth down before me." John 5:7

"Jesus saith unto him, Rise, take up thy bed, and walk." John 5:8

"And immediately the man was made whole, and took up his bed, and walked, and on the same day was the Sabbath." John 5:9

You read this story and you think some strange man who possessed miraculous power suddenly said to the lame man, "Rise and walk." I cannot repeat too often that the story, even when it introduces numberless individualities, takes place within the mind of the individual man.

The pool is your consciousness. The angel is an idea, called the messenger of GOD. Consciousness being God, when you have an idea you are entertaining an angel. The minute you are conscious of a desire your pool has been disturbed. Desire disturbs the mind of man. To want something is to be disturbed.

The very moment you have an ambition, or a clearly defined objective, the pool has been disturbed by the angel, which was the desire. You are told that the first one into the disturbed pool is always healed.

My closest companions in this world, my wife and my little girl, are to me when I address them, second. I must speak to my wife as, "you are." I must speak to anyone, no matter how close they are, as "You are." And after that the third person, "He is." There is only one person in this world with whom I can use the first person present and that is self. "I am," can be said only of myself, it cannot be said of another.

Therefore, when I am conscious of some desire that I want to be, but seemingly am not, the pool being disturbed, who can get into that pool before me? I alone possess the power of the first person. I am that which I want to be. Except I believe I am what I want to be, I remain as I formerly was and die in that limitation.

In this story you need no man to put you into the pool as your consciousness is disturbed by desire. All you need do is to assume you are already that which formerly you wanted to be and you are in it, and no man can get in before you. What man can get in before you when you become conscious of being that which you want to be? No one can be before you when you alone possess the power to say I AM.

These are the two outlooks. You are now what your senses would deny. Are you bold enough to assume that you are already that which you want to be? If you dare assume you are already that which your reason and your senses now deny, then you are in the pool and, unaided by a man, you, too, will rise and take your couch and walk.

You are told it happened on the Sabbath. The Sabbath is only the mystical sense of stillness, when you are unconcerned, when you are not anxious, when you are not looking for results, knowing that signs follow and do not precede.

The Sabbath is the day of stillness wherein there is no working. When you are not working to make it so you are in the Sabbath. When you are not at all concerned about the opinion of others, when you walk as though you were, you cannot raise one finger to make it so, you are in the Sabbath. I cannot be concerned as to how it will be, and still say I am conscious of being it. If I am conscious of being free, secure, healthy, and happy, I sustain these states of consciousness without effort or labor on my part. Therefore, I am in the Sabbath; and because it was the Sabbath he rose and walked.

Neville

As Neville said (THINKING FOURTH-DIMENSIONALLY):
“To the natural mind, reality is confined to the instant called now; this very moment seems to contain the whole of reality, everything else is unreal. To the natural mind, the past and the future are purely imaginary. In other words my past, when I use the natural mind, is only a memory image of things that were. And to the limited focus of the carnal or natural mind the future does not exist. The natural-mind does not believe that it could revisit the past and see it as something that is present, something that is objective and concrete to itself, neither does it believe that the future exists.

To the Christ mind, the spiritual mind, which in our language we will call the fourth-dimensional focus, the past, the present, and the future of the natural mind are a present whole. It takes in the entire array of sensory impressions that man has encountered, is encountering, and will encounter.

The only reason you and I are functioning as we are today, and are not aware of the greater outlook, is simply because we are creatures of habit, and habit renders us totally blind to what otherwise we should see; but habit is not law. It acts as though it were the most compelling force in the world, yet it is not law.”

The belief that you already ARE or HAVE that which you desire.

Joseph Murphy (1898 - 1981) was New Thought minister ordained in Divine Science and Religious Science and author.

Murphy was born in Ireland, the son of a private boy's school headmaster and raised a Roman Catholic. He studied for the priesthood and joined the Jesuits.

In his twenties, an experience with healing prayer led him to leave the Jesuits and move to the United States, where he became a pharmacist in New York (having a degree in chemistry by that time). Here he attended the Church of the Healing Christ (part of the Church of Divine Science), where Emmet Fox had become minister in 1931.

In the mid 1940s, he moved to Los Angeles, where he met Religious Science founder Ernest Holmes, and was ordained into Religious Science by Holmes in 1946, thereafter teaching at the Institute of Religious Science.

A meeting with Divine Science Association president Irwin Gregg (The Divine Science Way - Irwin Gregg ) led to him being re-ordained into Divine Science, and he became the minister of the Los Angeles Divine Science Church in 1949. For 28 years his lectures were attended by 1300 to 1500 people every Sunday.

In the next decade, he married, earned a PhD in psychology from the University of Southern California and started writing.

Murphy was influenced by Ernest Holmes and Emmet Fox, both well known writers on New Thought principles, but his academic background was in Eastern religion. He spent many years in India, and was an Andhra Research Fellow at the University of India.

Dr Murphy spent a good part of his life studying Eastern religions, and was a scholar of the I-Ching, the Chinese book of divination whose origins are lost in history. Joseph Murphy, Ph.D., D.D., was a world-renowned authority on mysticism and mind dynamics.

He died in 1981.

His works:
• THIS IS IT: The Art of Metaphysical Demonstration (1948)
• The Miracles of Your Mind (1953)
• Peace Within Yourself (1956)
• The Power of Your Subconscious Mind (1962)
• The Miracle of Mind Dynamics (1964)
• Prayer Is the Answer (1965)
• The Amazing Laws of Cosmic Mind Power (1965)
• Your Infinite Power to Be Rich (1966)
• The Cosmic Power Within You (1968)
• Secrets of the I Ching (1970)
• Psychic Perception: The Magic of Extrasensory Perception (1971)
• The Cosmic Energizer: Miracle Power of the Universe (1974)
• These Truths Can Change Your Life" (1979)
• How to Use the Laws of Mind (1980)
• Songs of God (1982)

In reality we are all dreaming; when man fully awakens he knows that planets are thoughts, suns and moons are thoughts, and his own consciousness is the space which sustains them all. He begins to realize that the whole world is a thought. For example, he becomes aware of the fact that the body is not real, but it is a thought or idea held in consciousness. The body has no life apart from consciousness. He realizes that there is absolutely no reality to matter or the body of man; it is a group of ideas and opinions. Man gives life to ideas and opinions as long as he believes them. When he disbelieves the errors, these ideas have no life in them.
Man was never born and he will never die. There is no death. Death is an idea that exists in the minds of men. As long as man believes in death, he must witness and experience it. Man has no beginning and no end; he always was, just as God always was, is and shall be. “God and man are one.” “I am my Father are one.”
THIS IS IT: The Art of Metaphysical Demonstration
Church of Divine Science
1948

Why should one who works hard in metaphysics always seem to lack?

Because he has not really applied metaphysics. I am not speaking of a mamby-pamby approach to life, but a daily application of the law of consciousness. When you appropriate your good, there is no need for a man, or state, to act as a medium through which your good will come.


Living in a world of men, money is needed in my every day life. If I invite you to lunch tomorrow, I must pick up the check. When I leave the hotel, I must pay the bill. In order to take the train back to New York my railway fare must be paid. I need money and it has to be there. I am not going to say, "God knows best, and He knows I need money. "Rather, I will appropriate the money as though it were!


We must live boldly!
We must go through life as though we possessed what we want to possess.
Do not think that because you helped another, someone outside of you saw your good works and will give you something to ease your burden.
There is no one to do it for you.
You, yourself must go boldly on appropriating what your Father has already given you.
Neville, 1948

"Imagining creates reality"

Neville Lancelot Goddard (1905-1972) was an influential Metaphysics teacher and New Thought author.

Born on Barbados in the British West Indies, Neville was the fourth child in a family of nine boys and one girl.

One day some of them were playing near an old wind-swept hut by the sea. A seer lived in the hut and told them their fortunes, The older sons would go into the professions, into medicine, into business. The predictions for them came true. The Goddard family is one of the most prominent and influential families on the island.

"Do not touch the fourth one," the seer said, pointing to Neville, "he has a special mission to perform in the world – from God." And to Neville, "You will journey to a distant land and spend your life there."

Under unusual circumstances, he met a black Jew, named Abdullah, who lectured on Christianity.

He was seated in the auditorium waiting for the lecture to begin, when the speaker - who had never met Neville came down the aisle from the rear of the auditorium to the stage.

"You are late, Neville!" Abdullah said, "six months' late! I have been told to expect you."

From this introduction, Neville studied with Abdullah seven days a week for seven years.


"Abdullah taught me Hebrew, he taught me The Kabbalah, and he taught me more about real Christianity than anyone I ever met," Neville declared.

Neville originally came to the United States to study drama at the age of seventeen. In 1932 he gave up the theater to devote his attention to his studies in mysticism when he began his lecture career in New York City. After traveling throughout the country, he eventually made his home in Los Angeles where, in the late 1950’s, he gave a series of talks on television, and for many years, lectured regularly to capacity audiences at the Wilshire Ebell Theater. In the 1960's and early ‘70s, he confined most of his lectures to Los Angeles, New York, and San Francisco.


Neville once said that if he was stranded on an island and was allowed one book, he would choose, The Bible, without hesitation. If he could squeeze in more, he would add Charles Fillmore’s Metaphysical Dictionary of Bible names, William Blake, (“... Why stand we here trembling around, Calling on God for help, and not ourselves, in whom God dwells?”) and Nicoll’s Commentaries. These were the books he recommended at his lectures.

"Learn how to use your imaginal power, lovingly, on behalf of others, for Man is moving into a world where everything is subject to his imaginal power," he taught.

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

HOW TO TEACH YOUR CHILDREN THE VALUE OF MONEY (June 25, 1910)

BELOW is a copy of a letter given by a woman to her young daughter on the day of her Commencement. I (Elizabeth Jones Towne) wrote it, at her request.
It would have been more economical for her if she had brought her daughter up in these same ideas. But it is never too late to mend, better Commencement Day than Wedding Day, or never!
The same idea has been used with several other persons I know of, both boys and girls, and it has worked like a charm. Most young people only need a little direction in this matter, and a little encouragement to practice and keep at it, and they soon begin to reap the joy which comes from doing anything well.
After the habit is formed it is no trouble to so manage money that it affords a constantly increasing savings account, in addition to the solid satisfaction of COMMANDING one's income and one's self.
In the next chapter there is a second letter, a complement of this one, a letter which is helping several boys and girls to work out their own salvation.
Here is the letter, which was headed:
FOR MARY
June 25, 1910
Believing that one of the essentials to a happy and successful life is the knowledge and practice of properly managing money, and Believing that every girl should learn this as well as every boy, and Believing that in order to learn the management of money every girl must have an allowance and certain necessaries to buy out of that allowance; that she must learn to manage money by doing it when she is young, and while her mistakes need not be too costly,
Therefore, I have resolved to celebrate your Commencement Day by making you an allowance of per month — with a few strings attached!
To facilitate the learning of proper management of money, I will for six months pay your allowance in four equal installments on the 1st, 2d, 3d and 4th Saturdays of the month. This will enable you to avoid getting into a big hole toward the end of each month through being too reckless near the first of the month.
Now for the strings:
First, you are to so manage your money as to keep entirely free from debt. You are to buy nothing at all until you have the cash in hand to pay the entire amount.
Second, you are to ask for no extra money to make the allowance larger, nor even hint for it! And you are not to make a single complaint about the amount being too small! You see the lesson you are to learn is the lesson of getting along cheerfully inside of your allowance. When you have learned to do this well, you may find your allowance gradually increasing, but until you thoroughly learn this lesson your allowance is to be rigidly enforced and no increases even hinted
at.
Third, you are to buy with your allowance a certain number of the necessaries. This plan will enable you to so manage money as to make due allowance for necessaries before you invest in luxuries.
After a little practice you will find that you need in all things to make yourself a perpetual allowance to cover THE UNEXPECTED which is never twice alike but is always cropping up in every person's life. The Unexpected is dead sure to happen every day, and your allowance to yourself should be great enough to enable you to meet it without strain — without getting into debt and with a little surplus over. If you do this you will be happy and satisfied in your heart over all your business expenditures. If you do not make sufficient allowance for the Unexpected
which is always cropping up, you will be everlastingly regretting expenditures after you have made them, and you will always be unsatisfied and unhappy in yourself. Good management of money will eliminate a very great many unpleasantnesses and unhappy feelings, and the little things you do without you will never miss in a week's time! Command your desires as well as your money, and you will increase your happiness fourfold. Out of your allowance you are to buy all your necessaries, including hosiery, with the exception of your dresses, hats, and coats, and whatever underwear and shoes / consider necessary.
Beginning with your Commencement Day I will give you the allowance payable as hereinbefore stated. And I promise to give you the free use of this allowance, provided you keep your end of the arrangement.
Also I agree to let you learn by your own mistakes, and to refrain as far as possible from criticizing your expenditures or adding any more strings to those already mentioned. Every girl makes mistakes and every girl learns by those mistakes. I am aiming to give you the opportunity to make these mistakes and learn by them while you are still young, while the expense of such mistakes cannot be so great as it might be later.
If at the end of six months, you have managed your money so as to keep well inside the debt line, at the same time looking out well for the necessaries before spending on the things which are less necessary, I will increase your allowance and turn more of the necessaries over to you to be managed as you will; and I will likewise pay your allowance all in one installment at the first of the month, instead of in four installments.
Signed,

Here is Letter No. 2:
FOR MARY
June 25th, 1910
Believing that any person's income, whatever it may be, is not well managed unless each month shows an addition to a savings account, and Desiring you to realize that I am very anxious to have you manage your money well, that you may get out of it and out of your future life all the peace and happiness which comes from an income well managed,
Therefore I have decided to make you a special inducement to save money out of your regular allowance.
Here is the inducement:
First. If, at the end of one year, you have lived according to the terms of your allowance, and can show me in addition a savings account equal to ten per cent of your entire allowance for the year, I will give you a present of twenty-five dollars cash, to be used for anything you wish which does not happen to come within the terms of the allowance agreement. These savings amounting to ten per cent of your allowance must not be eked out by extra money presents which may
come to you from relatives or friends.
Second. If, at the end of one year, you can show me a clear slate, no debts and no grievances against the size of your allowance, and in addition a savings bank account amounting to at least fifteen per cent of your entire allowance for the year, I will give you a cash present of fifty dollars, which you are to use exactly as you please.
The saving of money is just as necessary as the paying of bills for the absolute necessities of life.
Here is a little item that will help you in managing your allowance.
When you get your allowance at the beginning of a week or month divide it into four allowances for yourself.
First. Set aside the amount of money you must spend for absolute necessities.
Second. Set aside the sum which you determine upon to add to your savings account.
Third. Set aside another sum to cover THE UNEXPECTED things which may crop up before your next pay day, such as extra expenses of visits or treats, charities, etc.
This division will leave you a fourth sum which you can conscientiously spend before your next pay day for things which are not necessaries, in case your fund for non-necessaries runs out before your next pay day.
Don't make the mistake of encroaching on your fund for The Unexpected until you have received your next allowance. Then when you divide up your next allowance you can add your left-over fund for The Unexpected to your new fund for the non- necessaries, and you will have a little extra to spend for all such things before your next pay day.
If you will practice this a few weeks or months you will find yourself getting into the spirit of it and thoroughly enjoying the sense of power and self command which will come to you from managing money so as to have plenty at all times for any of The Unexpected things, with a steadily growing savings account in addition.
Later you will find yourself almost unconsciously dividing your income in this way so that you will never run short and will always have a savings account growing. Until this becomes a habit you will find it necessary to hold yourself religiously to your subdivisions of the allowance. Only by so doing can you quickly grow the habit — and the satisfaction which comes with the habit.
If, at the end of a year, I find that you have not only managed your allowance well, but that you have also managed your present stock of clothing well, I will increase your allowance and turn over to you more of your necessaries to buy. I would like to turn all your buying over to you, and give you an allowance sufficient to cover it, but I do not feel that I can afford to do it until you demonstrate step by step that you can really be trusted to manage money for your own well-being and happiness. Rest assured that the better you manage your allowance the more
inclined I shall be to increase it and leave the responsibilities all to you.
It is possible that you will some day marry! Remember that this learning of the problem of managing your income will eliminate at least fifty per cent of the chances for friction between you and your husband. So in making a success of this managing of money you are already helping to build the harmonious home every girl desires and hopes to have. And the things which you could get for your home with your money savings are only a drop in the bucket compared
with the solid satisfaction and capable management which you could put into making that home an ideal one.
Signed,

How to Use New Thought in Home Life:
A Key to Happy and Efficient Living for Husband, Wife and Children
By
Elizabeth Jones Towne
1915

"BE STILL"

The world outside is filled with noise, clatter, roar and uproar. We cannot change this objective fact, though we can change and even control our relation to it.

But the world inside is all our own. What will we do with it? It may be a most enjoyable realm.

Even in the inner world, we are not alone. There is the "still small voice," but it is noiseless. This is the source from which the long line of prophets, early and later, received their respective messages, to which they gave outward expression.

Let us not deal with this great truth of the trysting-place of the divine and the human, merely as a passing theory, or even a beautiful abstract truth. It must be brought into concrete practice and live in us, if we would realize its power. It greatly helps to bring it home to consciousness to affirm it in the first person singular.

I retire within the sanctuary of soul and bar the door to the external world. The divine voice is interpreted to my inner hearing. I harken to it! I hear it! I feel it! I obey it! I am one with it! I am it! Dualism is merged in unity.
Henry Wood: The New Old Healing (1908)

MENTAL HEALING IS SCIENTIFIC

SCIENCE is systematized truth, as manifested under the operation of law. The great obstacle to the general acceptance of mind-healing has been the mistaken popular notion that its elements were mystical, occult, magical, or capricious. Nothing could be further from the truth. The laws of spiritual science are as exact as those of mathematics. Every hour of positive high affirmation of the ideal perfection of mind and body, tends directly to actualize such conditions. When this principle is intelligently grasped it is at once seen to be scientific. There is no more uncertainty about its trend than there is about our nearing an object if we walk towards it. Even though orderly mental forces may sometimes be set in motion by pure superstition (as through shrines and holy relics), the result is no less logical. The usual limitation of "science" to the realm of matter is its degradation. There is no fact better fortified than that mental states and qualities tend to embody themselves. Thousands of instances, illustrations, and analogies prove such a sequence scientifically accurate.

TWENTY-FIRST MEDITATION.

Henry Wood’s “Ideal Suggestion Though Mental Photography” [1895]

THE REWARDS FOR HIS EFFORTS.

"All wrong-doing arises because of mind. If mind is transformed can wrong-doing remain?" ~ Buddha

Notably among his first cases was the son of a well-known clothing merchant of Sedalia, Missouri, who was healed of locomotor ataxia in the remarkable short period of seventeen days; and another equally astounding case was that of a nine year old, afflicted with infantile paralysis, whose restoration was accomplished in less than six weeks.

Numerous cures of sciatica, chronic stomach and bowel troubles, and all manner of nervous disorders yielded as readily to his treatment and attracted such widespread attention that a business organization was formed and what is now known as the Weltmer Institute of Suggestive Therapeutics of Nevada, Missouri, was founded.

On February 19, 1897, he established the American School of Magnetic Healing in Nevada, Missouri. Weltmer had a great deal of success in curing "people who were considered hopeless invalids" without drugs or surgery. On April 5, 1897, Weltmer began teaching classes on the Weltmer Method of Healing.

"Where every known disease is cured without medicine or surgery".

In establishing an Institution of this character the founders had no precedent to guide them, for this was the first institution of its kind ever established and there were no plans charted for its successful and safe conduct.

In 1899 Professor Weltmer wrote a Mail Course in Magnetic Healing, of which some forty-five thousand courses were distributed among the English speaking inhabitants of all parts of the world. This course was little more than a statement of principles, with instructions for the demonstration of the principles stated.

The Weltmer Institute of Suggestive Therapeutics consisted of a school and sanitarium. The school consisted of a four year program that included courses in the art of healing and the Philosophy of Health, Suggestive Therapeutics, Anatomy, Physiology, and Pathology and resulted in the degree of a Doctor of Suggestive Therapeutics (D.S.T.).

The school also had a correspondence course.

Weltmer was described as a professor, hypnotist, healer, and mystic.

In 25 years, this Sanitarium and School, starting with nothing except a method that would heal, had extended his influence and service to all parts of the world. By means of his personal service, courses and publications, he directly served and benefited more than five hundred thousand people. And each one of these, in turn, in their personal contact with relatives, friends, acquaintances and audiences, extended the benefits of the Weltmer Method, Suggestotherapy to a large number of persons.

By means of its teachings and actual practice, this Institution had developed the Science of Suggestotherapy, which is the twentieth century meant for the healing of the sick, the unhappy, and the poor. Thus it was abreast of the twentieth century developments in other lines of human endeavor.

The Weltmer Method—Suggestotherapy—stood several severe investigations, the most severe of which resulted in the report that:
67 percent of its patients had been cured or permanently benefited.
30 per cent additional were well pleased, and only
3 percent were displeased.

... We are living in an age of advancement and investigation where light is pouring in so distinctly and he who shuts his eyes and scoffs and sneers because others open theirs and see is not only recreant to duty, but does society in general and mankind in particular an irreparable wrong. ...

Weltmer knew the power of the mind to heal. He determined mind affects mind. But he believed in the body (cells, tissue, etc) as a conscious organism capable of restoring health and used his hands as a conduit to transmit or send his intentions to them. (Quimby on the other hand any movements of his hands were strictly to reassure the patient and not all necessary for the healing to occur. Besides Quimby had already disproved the need of the term animal magmetism.).

Sidney A. Weltmer died in Nevada, Missouri in 1930. The Weltmer Institute of Suggestive Therapeutics remained in operation until 1933.

After Weltmer died medical mesmerism waned and was pretty much forgotten. Later healing methods were introduced which adopted Eastern, Theosophical connotations. The terms ‘Medical mesmerism’ and ‘animal magnetism’ were replaced by ‘chakras’ and ‘energy’ and the emphasis on healing shifted from inside to outside.

And none of this was in any way related what so ever to the healing methodology of P.P. Quimby.
Quimby was quite clear:

All is mind.
Your power to heal is within.
As we feel the PRESENCE, we receive an impress of its beauty and perfection.

The Weltmer Institute of Suggestive Therapeutics

[continued from http://pvrguymale.blogspot.com/2011/05/quackery.html]

PROFESSOR SIDNEY A. WELTMER, began the study which developed into his lifetime work, from borrowed medical books, which he read at night and at every other available moment he could spare from his duties as the oldest son of a family trying to dig a living on an eighty acre farm in Central Missouri.

At the age of nineteen he was almost qualified to practice medicine but was advised by the kindly country physician, lender of the precious medical books—to give up his ambition to become a Doctor and devote his energies to checking the rapid course of the disease from which he was suffering. The advice was sound and practical, but was given without a ray of hope, for according to the highest medical knowledge of that day his ailment would undoubtedly prove fatal.


Being of a religious temperament and seeing an outlet for his ambition to serve, he naturally turned to the study of the Bible. In those teaching he received the inspiration and instruction which restored his health.

He had been exhausted by the continual coughing and the hemorrhage which followed that day a crisis was reached. He seemed all quiet and alone as he sat and read.

The clouds rolled away - the world was beautiful - he was again a part of it. His path to recovery seemed so clear that he wondered why he had ever been ill.


SEARCH: From that time forward he sought in every direction for that which would define and explain the principles underlying the scriptural healing, as done by Jesus and the Disciples, to the understanding of the modern man.

TRUTH: "How can I heal the sick as Jesus did?" was the question, and the answer came without hesitation.

"Lay your hands on the sick and try it as Jesus did."

Surely this simplistic answer could not contain the principle of the great truth he had sought. Yet was it so extremely simple ?

FAITH THE VITAL PRINCIPLE

Faith had been the one thing exacted in all the cases laid out in the Bible and in all the other healing works of the Master and his Disciples. Success seemed to depend upon the amount of faith exercised by the healer and his patients. His own restoration had been the result of his unquestioning belief and faith.

THE CALLING

He endeavored to heal all who applied for treatment and kept a true record of all the cases he treated.

Soon he discovered that something was lacking in those with whom he failed. No response rewarded his efforts to relieve them and be was led, naturally, to compare his successes with his failures. This analysis brought out, with unmistakable clearness, the necessity of teaching the Philosophy as well as practicing the art of healing.

His researches led him far into the fields of Biology, Physiology and Applied Psychology. In these branches of learning he found that thought is basic in all physical expression of any kind whatever; that the healing power is intelligent; is within the patient; and must be the final dependence, no matter what the remedy. All his experiences had pointed this way, and here was positive substantiation of all his conclusions.

The mastery of his own mind as well as the experiences with patients provided the foundation which Suggestive Therapeutics and Applied Psychology is based.

The “Weltmer Method” (aka “Weltmerism”)
“…a system of suggestive treatment aimed at bringing mind and body into harmony…” (Source: 5th Edition of the American Illustrated Dictionary, 1910)


suggestive therapeutics,
n.pl philosophy developed by Sidney Weltmer according to which mind and the body are equal determinants of good health. A faltering belief by the mind can lead to lowered resistance to disease and physical discomfort can influence the person's thoughts, both of which result in the state of disease.
Mosby's Dictionary of Complementary and Alternative Medicine. (c) 2005.

Next: THE REWARDS FOR HIS EFFORTS.

I AM PART OF A GREAT WHOLE and I LISTEN

SIXTH MEDITATION.
HUMANITY is one. I am living and loving, not for myself, but for the race. If I rise, I help to lift all about me, and if I fall, I drag others down. Loving thought, sent out, has a positive healing influence both on sender and recipient. We live the life of humanity, others in us, and we in them. We cannot be saved disconnected from relations. Our highest privilege and office is to be channels through which the divine life shall flow out to invigorate and inspire. The essence of salvation and of true healing is the death of selfishness. If the soul-currents do not course from within outwards, they sink in a deadly vortex. A son of God is one who breaks the chains of captives, opens prison-doors, and proclaims freedom. Giving out, or ministration, is the great and highest law, divine and human. Simple altruism sometimes heals because it lifts consciousness from the lower inharmonious self and turns it outward and upward. Thought sent out in loving waves never returns void. The race is one, and all lines of relationship converge in God. I heal and am healed.
I AM PART OF A GREAT WHOLE

Henry Wood’s Ideal Suggestion Though Mental Photography [1895]





SEVENTEENTH MEDITATION.
I GO into the silence and open my inner hearing to the "still, small voice." The sanctuary of soul is the "Holy of Holies;" the trysting-place of the divine and the human. The tribunal of God is at the soul-centre of man. The divine likeness is here unveiled. It is the "manger" where the Christ- consciousness comes to birth, while external discords are only the beasts of the stall. It is the angel who brings "good tidings of great joy." Here the resurrection takes place, when the stone of the lower self-consciousness is rolled away. Here is the divine affinity which feels its oneness with God. "The kingdom of God cometh not with observation: neither shall they say, Lo, here! or, there! for lo, the kingdom of God is within you. That kingdom includes wholeness, harmony, and health. The sun of righteousness arises with "healing in his wings.''
The Lord was not in "the wind." "the earthquake," nor "the fire," but in the "still, small voice." As we feel the PRESENCE, we receive an impress of its beauty and perfection.
I LISTEN

The first New Thought philanthropist, Henry Wood.

Henry Wood was one of the very first New Thought authors. His books were widely read both in New Thought circles and far beyond them.

Henry Wood had been a successful businessman before his retirement and, was well-to-do. He began his writing career in 1887 with a book entitled Natural Law in the Business World, which brought him into prominence. This book, recast as The Political Economy of Humanism, sold well, going through a number of editions.

At the age of fifty-four, he was in a mental and physical condition where life seemed a burden to him and an overwhelming depression prevailed, having suffered a long period of chronic neurasthenia, insomnia and dyspepsia, to which he felt there was no promise of recovery or even of partial relief. Medicine and the usual methods brought no relief, so a plunge was made from a supposedly correct moral and ethical life into the practice and philosophy of the "higher thought" with its new ideals.
"I have found something which the world needs and I must give it out.”
He began to write in the field of religion, interpreting the New Thought that had led to his healing. His books included: God's Image in Man, Studies in the New Thought World, The New Old Healing, New Thought Simplified: How to Gain Harmony and Health, and Ideal Suggestion Through Mental Photography. A pamphlet, Has Mental Healing a Valid Scientific and Religious Basis? had sold more than thirty thousand copies prior to 1902. His books appeared in many editions, some reaching seventh, eighth, twelfth, and one going into fourteen editions.

Henry Wood was active in the Important Metaphysical Club of Boston and a frequent speaker and counselor in the formation of larger units of New Thought organization which began to take form in the early decades of the twentieth century, but his great and lasting contribution was made through his books. His New Thought Simplified: How to Gain Harmony and Health presents an excellent and simple formulation of what the New Thought had come to mean during that period.


Horatio Dresser wrote of him as the first to seek to spread the new ideas through publicity. He thinks him representative of "the more rational expression of New Thought" (History of the New Thought Movement, p. 167), and at the same time the first New Thought philanthropist.



"Among New Thought writers he stands as a distinctly representative man, whose reasoning is always characterized by fairness, and comes from a heart of integrity. Like a true philosopher, he is always dealing with principles . . . I have before me his book entitled, The New Old Healing. Here he is dealing only with principles, which underlie all spiritual healing, showing that health, happiness and prosperity are the fruit of a well-balanced scientific mentality. He would have men understand that healing is merely the adjustment of the mentality to principles of truth. This is what constitutes a man a prophet.
"Most truly we live at the dawning of a philosophic age, and Henry Wood is a prophet heralding its coming. . . . He makes it clear that the teachings of Jesus Christ and his wonderful healings rest on the fundamental basis of a spiritual philosophy. The clear province of the New Thought school of writers and teachers is not the abrogation of any Christian principles, but rather to give a better interpretation of those principles, consonant with truth, righteousness and health. . . That man is a noble spiritual being may be set down as Mr. Wood's major premise." ~ Mr. R. C. Douglass [see Master Mind Magazine1, April 1918 to September 1918 (by Annie Rix Militz) page 226]
1 [It has 3 references to Miss Eleanor Mel]

Sects, cults and 2012

PARIS (Reuters) - The tiny southern French hamlet of Bugarach has drawn scrutiny from a government sect watchdog over droves of visitors who believe it is the only place in the world that will survive a 2012 Apocalypse.
A report by the watchdog, Miviludes, published on Wednesday said the picturesque village near Carcassonne should be monitored in the run-up to December 21, 2012, when many believe the world will end according to an ancient Mayan prophecy. Unfortunately New Age didn't ask the Mayans 1st, see past blogs below.
Miviludes was set up in 2002 to track the activity of sects, after a law passed the previous year made it an offence to abuse vulnerable people using heavy pressure techniques, meaning sects can be outlawed if there is evidence of fraud or abuse.
Surrounded in legend for centuries, Bugarach and its rocky outcrop, the Pic de Bugarach, have attracted an influx of New Age visitors in recent months, pushing up property prices but also raising the threat of financial scams and psychological manipulation, Miviludes said in its report.
Among the groups are the American Ramtha School of Enlightenment and the the Raelians.
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/french-village-seen-threat-apocalypse-sects-082758601.html
http://pvrguymale.blogspot.com/2011/03/2012-and-mayan-long-count-calendar.html
http://pvrguymale.blogspot.com/2011/03/2012-doomsday-theories-spring-from.html
http://pvrguymale.blogspot.com/2011/05/1000-1910-1919-1988-1997-2012-and-other.html
http://pvrguymale.blogspot.com/2010/05/2012-myths-dispelled.html

do nothing for 2 minutes

http://www.donothingfor2minutes.com/

“It is not your opinion about the world that is of consequence, but the actual truth of your existence in the world which Wisdom has created.”

IT is plain that to take the theory of spiritual healing seriously one must first apply it in actual practice, either with the sick or in self-help. It is not a doctrine to be theoretically accepted or rejected. It contains tenets which can only be tested experimentally. The experiences of no two people are alike. Hence in the end each man develops his own methods and states the doctrine according to the considerations which his own work has emphasized.

Fully one-half of Mr. Quimby's manuscripts abound in references to religious problems and to the Bible. The reason is not far to seek. Mr. Quimby found that the fears, emotions, and beliefs which were factors in producing the patient's disease were intimately connected with religious creeds and experiences. He sometimes traced a nervous disorder to the emotional excitement attendant upon religious conversion. To explain the genesis of the disease also meant to explain the effect of religious emotion upon health, and to indicate a wiser way of becoming religious. The close connection between health and religion in such cases led Mr. Quimby to investigate the subject more and more. The result was, for Mr. Quimby and for many of his patients, new light upon the cures wrought by Jesus, and hence new conclusions in regard to the mission of Jesus, the nature of sin, and the significance of the atonement.
Relation to Psychology. — Obviously, this theory of mental life is in sharp contrast with present-day physiological psychology.
Relation to Hypnotism. — Hypnotism is the inducing of sleep for purposes of scientific experiment, medical practice, or suggestive therapeutics. The principle of hypnotic after-effects is suggestion. In this respect there is a slight connection with the phenomena, but not with the methods, of mental healing.
Relation to Faith Cure. — Cures by faith are usually wrought by naive religious belief, or through superstitious credulity in a sacred relic or something of the sort.
Relation to “ Christian Science." — The term "Christian Science" was used, in an entirely different connection, in a poem by Abram Cowles, published about 1840. Mr. Quimby used the term to signify the exact principles implied in the life and teachings of Jesus, and also exemplified in his own work among the sick.
Relation to “Mental Science." — This term was used, for a time after 1880, to designate all mind-cure doctrines other than "Christian Science." … Later, the term was revived by a different type of mind-cure people, hence it became identified with a radically individualistic, commercial doctrine, in the South and West, and is no longer applicable to the Quimby theory. Relation to “Metaphysical Healing." — This term, which for a time took the place of "Mental Science," has usually been employed to designate any mind-cure theory founded on mental principles, and sometimes with reference to belief in " mental pictures" as the "causes" of disease. The term "metaphysics" is always used in a practical sense. The theory of "mental pictures" is a late development of a principle which Mr. Quimby very early recognised. Relation to the “New Thought'' — This is the latest of mind-cure terms and at present the most popular. It came into vogue in 1895, and was used as the title of a little magazine published for a time in Melrose, Massachusetts. The term was apparently a convenient designation, inasmuch as for its devotees it was literally a "new thought" about life. But critics soon assailed it on the ground that the doctrine was not new, and in England the term "Higher Thought" was substituted. Like "Mental Science," the term once had a nobler significance, but has often been identified with the most commercial, extravagant, and individualistic tendencies in the mind-cure world. It now means any kind of mind cure theory, from the most mystical pantheism to the sort of individualism that can not even be harmoniously organised for purposes of a general convention.

The "New Thought" at its best developed directly out of the teachings we have been considering, notably from the works of Dr. Evans, to whom Henry Wood and other recent writers have been greatly indebted. Of late there have been admixtures of "Christian Science" and other elements, differing more radically from the parent teaching in respects where that teaching had the advantage.

To all those who "build their own world from within" Mr. Quimby would have said : “It is not your opinion about the world that is of consequence, but the actual truth of your existence in the world which Wisdom has created.”

HEALTH AND THE INNER LIFE An Analytical and Historical Study of Spiritual Healing Theories, with an Account of the Life and Teachings of P. P. Quimby BY HORATIO W. DRESSER 1906


A History of The New Thought Movement by Horatio. W. Dresser – 1919
Gave a much more elaborate history and discussed the creation of the various churches.

The Quimby Manuscripts by Phineas Parkhurst Quimby Edited by Horatio W. Dresser [1921]
For reasons known only to himself George Quimby refused to release the Quimby material prior to MEB’s death.

I believe that I can heal as you do.

As early as 1857, fairly intelligent accounts of Mr. Quimby's theory and practice began to appear in the newspapers of Maine. The first follower to publish a book on the subject was Rev. W. F. Evans (1817-1889), one of the four exponents of the original theory who have done most to spread the doctrine.

Mental Healing

To be told in one's youth about "the Christ within," to be taught to seek the guidances of the inner world in every moment of need, is an inestimable privilege in more senses than one. One then grows up not only with the thought of health rather than the fear of disease, the thought of life in place of the dread of death, but with an empirical religious basis free from the encumbrances of dogmatic theology. The philosophy of the immanent God then appeals to the mind, in later life, as a natural consequence of what has already been an experience.
HEALTH AND THE INNER LIFE
An Analytical and Historical Study of Spiritual Healing Theories, with an Account of the Life and Teachings of P. P. Quimby
BY HORATIO W. DRESSER
1906
Twenty-five years ago, when the mental-healing movement was first publicly discussed, it was lightly put aside as ''the Boston craze," and an early death was prophesied for it. Consequently no attempt was made to sift the wheat from the chaff, no record was kept of instances of cure. Since that time, the movement has attained large proportions, and has repeatedly divided and subdivided. At one time there were three so-called international societies holding independent conventions for the discussion of mental-healing theories. More them one hundred publications have been issued for brief periods, sixty of which were in existence at one time. The output of books has run into the hundreds, and while the majority contain repetitions of a few ideas many have had a large sale. Little "centres of truth," independent churches, and metaphysical clubs have been established here and there throughout the English speaking world. The practice of mental healing has grown steadily, and both physicians and clergymen have felt the results of widespread adherence to mind-cure doctrines. The tendency has been to make a religion of the cult, to substitute it both for current forms of worship and for medical practice. Entirely aside from the hold which its most radical form has had upon the community, many people have now come to the conclusion that the general doctrine has come to stay and must be reckoned with.
***
Mental-healing writers as a rule take little interest in facts. As opposed to this general tendency, the mind-cure theory of the future will be reared on facts. If dispassionate inquiry shall some time take the place of exaggerated assertion, the future history of the doctrine will be strikingly in harmony with its pioneer stages.
***
In India, where science has not been distinguished from superstition as we would discriminate, the age of belief in unusual powers has been practically continuous. The literature of Buddhism is particularly rich in doctrines which the mind-cure devotee of to-day has restated. In the Dhammapada, Buddha gives utterance to a sentence which might well stand for the modern theory oddly denominated the “New Thought. “ Buddha says : "All that we are is the result of what we have thought ; it is founded on our thoughts, it is made up of our thoughts."
Every student of the Vedas and Upanishads knows that these Hindu sacred books abound in statements which are almost identical with recent mind-cure sayings. In the Maitrayana Upanishad it is said that "thoughts cause the round of a new birth and a new death. . . . What a man thinks, that he is: this is the old secret."
In the least-known and speculatively less important Atharva-Veda there are suggestions and affirmations for the cure of disease which rival in minuteness and number any modern mind-cure scheme. There are special charms to cure fever, headache, cough, jaundice, colic, heart disease, paralysis, hereditary disease, leprosy, scrofula, ophthalmia, and dozens of other diseases. There are affirmations to overcome the effect of poison, to procure easy childbirth, to conquer jealousy, to control the kind of offspring, even to obtain a husband or secure a wife. The modern devotees of "claims" for success have been anticipated by the authors of this Veda, who also point out how one may “attract" prosperity. Even the charm for obtaining long life is given. Again, the principle is recognised that people who have little faith must eke out their faith by the use of material means.
***
Again, in the teachings of the Epicureans, the Stoics, and Sceptics, there are ideas and methods which remind one of current doctrines.
***
Through the middle ages there were outcroppings of doctrines and practices which still more closely resemble recent teachings. Instances of remarkable healing were more common than in earlier periods.
***
When all has been said, however, it is beyond dispute that it remained (or a man who knew almost nothing about the teachings of the past to make the investigations which in due course led to the development of what we now know as mental healing.
***
It is but fair, however, to acknowledge the work which really made the mind-cure movement possible, and, if any credit is given, assign it to the one who really deserves it. The movement sprang, directly or indirectly, from the work of half a dozen persons, all of whom were healed by the pioneer mental therapeutist of America. Many have enjoyed the after-benefits who have never heard of this pioneer. But that does not alter the fact that in a peculiar way their beliefs are bound up with the history of the movement.

Few men have begun and carried on an investigation in a more humble and quiet way than Phineas Parkhurst Quimby, who was born in Lebanon, New Hampshire, February 16, 1802, and died in Belfast, Maine, January 16, 1866.