13. Every form and thing, whether in the ether or on the earth, represents some idea or mental attitude. The idea is first projected into mind substance, and afterward formed in consciousness. The mind of man sees all things through thought forms made by the imagination. The lover idealizes the object of his affection, and is often disappointed on close acquaintance. We are always creating ideals that have existence in our minds alone. A true story is told of a sailor who went on a long voyage and left his affianced behind. He thought of her continuously, and often saw her in his dreams. Finally he began to see and talk to her in his waking state, and she told him many remarkable things. She said that it was her soul that visited him; that her body was in her English home, awaiting his return. After some twenty years he arrived at home, expecting a welcome from his loved one. He was dumfounded to learn that she was married, had a family, and had forgotten him. Out of his own mind substance he had created the object of his affection, which had faithfully reflected all his thoughts about her.
14. Through the power of the imagination we impress upon the body the concepts of the mind. Here are stories of actual occurrences: a woman watched her little daughter pass through a heavy iron gate. The gate swung shut and the mother imagined that it had caught and crushed the little one's fingers. But the child had withdrawn her fingers before the gate struck. The mother felt pain in her own hand, and the next day she found a dark streak across her fingers, in the place where she had imagined that the child's had been crushed. In a secret-society initiation, the candidate was told that the word "coward" was to be branded upon his back with a red-hot iron. A piece of ice was used instead, but the promised brand arose in blistered letters.
15. We could cite cases without number to prove the power of the imagination in forming and transforming the body. Also, one mind can suggest to another and produce any desired condition, if there be mental receptivity. This can be done most effectively through the hypnotic state, but hypnosis is not always necessary. Experiments prove that we are constantly suggesting all sorts of things to one another, and getting results according to the intensity of the imagination. Thus disease is reflected into susceptible minds by people's merely talking about disease as an awful reality.
16. A man can imagine that he has some evil condition in body or affairs, and through the imaging law build it up until it becomes manifest. On the other hand, he can use the same power to make good appear on every side. The marks of old age can be erased from the body by one's mentally seeing the body as youthful. If you want to be healthy, do not imagine so vain a thing as decrepitude. Make your body perfect by seeing perfection in it. Transient patching up with lotions and external applications is foolish; the work must be an inner transformation. "Be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind."
17. The highest and best work of the imagination is the marvelous transformation that it works in character. Imagine that you are one with the Principle of good, and you will become truly good. To imagine oneself perfect fixes the idea of perfection in the invisible mindsubstance, and the mind forces at once begin the work of bringing forth perfection.
18. Paul saw this wonderful law at work in character-forming through imitating Christ: "But we all, with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are transformed into the same image from glory, to glory, even as from the Lord the Spirit."
Perfection In Form Established
(To be used in connection with Lesson Nine)
1. I see my countenance in its divine perfection.
2. "Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose imagination is stayed on thee."
3. I see perfection in all forms and shapes.
4. His Son is the brightness of His glory, and the express image of His person.
5. I see the light of the Christ consciousness always.
6. I am formed anew every day in my mind and my body.
7. Be renewed in the spirit of your mind.
8. My spirit is quickened in Christ.
9. "In a dream, in a vision of the night . . . he openeth the ears of men, and sealeth their instruction."
10. I know the reality back of the shadows.
Lesson Ten
Will and Understanding
1. "If any man willeth to do his will, he shall know of the teaching." Man manifests that which exists eternally in Being. We talk about the faculties of man's mind as if they belonged to the individual and had origin in him. Man exists in the one invisible Mind. He may assume to have a mind of his own, but his origin and destiny are in God-Mind.
2. Primal causes are complete, finished, absolute. All that man manifests has its origin in a cause that we name Divine Mind, Spirit, God. This being true in logic and intuition, it is not a difficult matter to arrive at the conclusion that the manifestation proves the character of the cause. In dealing with the faculties of man, the relation between them and the one Mind should not be lost sight of. There is but one Mind, and that Mind cannot be separated or divided, because, like the principle of mathematics, it is indivisible. All that we can say of the one Mind is that it is absolute and that all its manifestations are in essence like itself. This brings us to the true estimate of man, and when we speak of spiritual man, or Christ man, or the son of God, we refer to this original expression of Divine Mind.
3. In analyzing these faculties and in establishing their relation in the individual consciousness, we should clearly understand that they are never separated from their Principle, the Divine Mind. In the text quoted above, Jesus refers to two of the powers of man and brings out a certain phase of their relation. Will and know designate the faculties of mind that we term will and understanding. Through appropriation, through expansion and growth in consciousness, will and understanding would seem to have their source in individual man. But, however adapted by man, they can never be divorced from the mind of Being, in which they exist as essential members of its wholeness.
4. Individual consciousness is like an eddy in the ocean--all the elements that are found in the ocean are also found in the eddy, and every eddy may, in due course, receive and give forth all that is in the ocean. As the will of God, man represents I AM identity. This is individual consciousness, freedom to act without dictation of any kind, selfhood without consciousness of cause, the power to make or break without limitation, constructive and destructive ability with a universe of workable potentialities. The will is the man. Without absolute freedom of will, man would be an automaton. If his will were restricted in the least degree on any side, he would not be perfectly free. We know that God is the Great Unlimited, and man, His "image" and "likeness," must be of the same character; consequently man has the same freedom that God has to act in the fulfillment of desire. God does not dictate man's acts, although He may instruct and draw him through love away from error. The idea that God makes man do certain things cannot be true in a single instance, because, if it were, man would not be a free agent. If God interfered with man's will in some things, it would follow that He could interfere in any and all things. Logic and observation clearly reveal the freedom of man in everything.
5. Creative thought uses the will to build up individual consciousness. The Lord God, or Jehovah, of Genesis, is the original "I WILL BE THAT I WILL BE." In mind, both Jehovah and Jesus mean I AM. I AM is man's self-identity. I AM is the
