Mental Therapeutics
The new psychology and the science of mental and spiritual healing
teach us that the lower principles in Man stand or should stand
under the dominion of the higher. The physical body, with its
material elements, is dominated and guided by the mind. The mind is
inspired through the inner consciousness, which is an attribute of
the soul. The soul of man is in communion with the Oversoul, which
is the Source of all life and all intelligence animating the
universe.
Wherever this natural order is reversed, there is discord or
disease. Too many people think and act as though the physical body
is all in all, as though it is the only thing worth caring for and
thinking about. They exaggerate the importance of the physical and
become its abject slaves.
The physical body is the lowest and least intelligent of the
different principles making up the human entity. Yet people allow
their minds and their souls to become dominated and terrified by the
sensations of the physical body.
When the servants in the house control and terrify the master, when
the master becomes their slave and they can do with him as they
please, there cannot be order and harmony in that house.
We must expect the same results when the lower principles in Man
lord it over the higher. When physical weakness, illness and pain
fill the mind with fear and dismay, reason becomes clouded, the will
atrophied and self-control is lost.
Every thought and every emotion has its direct effect upon the
physical constituents of the body. The mental and emotional
vibrations become physical vibrations and structures. Discord in the
mind is translated into physical disease in the body, while the
harmonies of hope, faith, cheerfulness, happiness, love and altruism
create in the organism the corresponding health vibrations.
Have you ever noticed how the written or printed notes of a tone
piece or the perforations on the paper music roll of an automatic
player are arranged in symmetrical and geometrical figures and
groups? Dry sand strewn on the top of a piano on which harmonious
tone combinations are produced shows a tendency to arrange itself in
symmetrical patterns.
In this you have a visual illustration of the translation of
harmonious sound vibrations, which express the harmonics of the
soul's emotions, into correspondingly harmonious arrangements and
configurations in the physical material of the paper roll.
A jumble of discords of sound, if reproduced on a music roll, would
present a chaotic jumble of perforations.
Thus the purely mental and emotional is translated into its
corresponding discords or harmonies in the physical.
As the perforations on the paper music roll arrange themselves
either symmetrically or without symmetry and order, in strict
accordance with the harmonies or discords of the composition, so the
atoms, molecules and cells in the physical body group themselves in
normal or abnormal structures of health or of disease in exact
correspondence with the harmonious or the discordant vibrations
conveyed to them from the mental and emotional planes.
Another Illustration: Two violins, as they leave the shop of the
maker, are exactly alike in material, structure and quality of tone.
One of the two instruments is constantly used by beginners and
persons incapable of producing pure notes. The other passes into the
hands of an artist who understands how to use the instrument to the
best advantage and who draws from it only musical tones that are
true in pitch and quality.
After a few years, compare the two violins again. You will find that
the one used by the tyros in music has deteriorated in its musical
qualities, while the one in the hands of the artist has greatly
improved in quality and purity of tone. What is the reason? The
atoms and molecules in the wood of the two instruments have grouped
themselves according to the discords or the harmonies that have been
produced from them.
If this rearrangement of atoms is possible in dead wood, how much
easier must be this adjustment of atoms, molecules and cells to
discordant or harmonious vibratory influence in the living, plastic
and fluidic human organism!
What harmony is to music, hope, faith, cheerfulness, happiness,
sympathy, love and altruism are to the vibratory conditions of the
human entity. These emotions are in alignment with the constructive
principle in Nature. They harmonize the physical vibrations, relax
the tissues and open them wide to the inflow of the life force.
Swedenborg truly says: "The warmth of life is the heat of the divine
love permeating and animating the universe." The more we possess of
hope, faith, love and their kindred emotions, the more we open
ourselves to the inflow and action of the vital energies. The
good-natured, cheerful, sympathetic person is more alive than the
crabbed, morose or selfish individual.
It has been proved over and over again by everyday experience that
mental and emotional conditions positively affect the chemical
composition of the tissues and secretions of the body. The
destructive emotions of fear, worry, anger, jealousy,
revengefulness, envy, etc., actually poison the fluids and tissues
of the body. The bite of an angry man may cause blood-poisoning and
prove as fatal as the bite of a mad dog. Sudden fear, anger or any
other destructive emotion in the nursing mother may cause illness or
even death of the infant.
In psychological laboratories it has been found by scientifically
conducted experiments that under the influence of destructive mental
and emotional conditions, the secretions and excretions of the body
show an increase of morbid and poisonous elements.
Selfishness, fear and worry contract and congeal the blood vessels,
the nerve fibers, and the other channels through which the life
forces are conveyed from the innermost source of life to different
parts and organs of the physical body. The flow of the life currents
is impeded and diminished. Such are the actual physiological effects
of fear, anxiety and egotism on the physical organism.
A man under the influence of great fear and one exposed to freezing
present the same outward appearance. In both cases death may result
through the congealing of the tissues and the shutting out of the
life currents. The person afflicted with the worry habit may not die
suddenly like the one overcome by great and sudden fear.
Nevertheless, the fear and worry vibrations maintained constantly
will surely obstruct and diminish the inflow of the life force,
lower the vitality and therewith the resistance to the encroachment
of influences inimical to the health of the organism.
The cells in the body are negative, or, at least, they should be
negative to the positive mind. The relationship of the mind to the
cell should be like that of hypnotist to subject. If the mind could
not exert such absolute control over the cells and cell groups, it
would be impossible for us to walk, talk, write, dodge danger, etc.,
with almost automatic ease.
The cells are not able to reason upon the truth or untruth of the
suggestions conveyed to them from the mind. They accept its
promptings unqualifiedly and act accordingly.
Thus, if the mind constantly thinks of, say, the stomach as being in
a badly diseased condition, unable to do its work properly, the
mental images of weakness and disease with their accompanying fear
vibrations are telegraphed over the efferent nerves to the cells of
the stomach and these become more and more weakened and diseased
through the destructive vibrations sent to them from the mind.
I often advise my patients to procure a book on anatomy and
physiology and to study and keep constantly before their mind's eye
the normal structure and functions of a healthy stomach or liver or
whatever organ may be involved in any particular case.
Positive Affirmations
This explains why affirmations of health are justified in the face
of disease. The health conditions must be first established in the
mind before they can be conveyed to and impressed upon the cells.
The well-being of the human body as a whole depends upon the health
of the billions of minute cells which compose it. These cells are so
small that they have to be magnified several hundred times under a
powerful microscope before we can see them. Yet they are independent
living beings which grow, assimilate food, multiply and die like the
big cell, Man.
These little cells are congregated in communities which form the
organs and tissues of the body and in these communities they carry
on the complicated activities of citizens living in a large city.
Some are carriers, bringing food materials to the tissues and organs
or conveying waste and morbid matter to the excretory channels of
the body. Other cells manufacture chemical substances, such as
sugar, fats, ferments, hormones etc., for the production of which
man requires complicated factories. Still others act as policemen
and soldiers which protect the commonwealth against bacteria,
parasites and other hostile invaders.
The marvelous work performed by these little organisms, as well as
observations made in the dissecting room and under the microscope,
strongly indicate that these cells are endowed with some sort of
individual intelligence. They do their work without our aid or
conscious volition. But, nevertheless, they are greatly influenced
by the varying conditions of the mind. While their activities seem
to be controlled through the sympathetic nervous system, they stand
in direct telegraphic communication with headquarters in the brain
and every impulse of the mind is conveyed to them.
If there be dismay and confusion in the mind, this condition is
telegraphically conveyed over the nerve trunks and filaments to
every cell in the body, and as a result these little workers and
soldiers become panic-stricken and incapable of rightly performing
their manifold duties.
The cell system of the body resembles a vast army. The mind is the
general at the head of it. The cells are the soldiers, divided into
groups for special work.
Much of the work of an army is carried on through different
well-established departments, as the commissariat, the hospital
service, the scouts and pickets, etc. Though the life and the
activities of the army are so well regulated that they seem
automatic, nevertheless much depends upon the commander.
The vital processes of the human organism, digestion, assimilation,
elimination, respiration, the circulation of the blood, etc., are
going on without our volition, whether we be awake or asleep. These
involuntary activities are impelled by the sympathetic nervous
system, while the voluntary functions of the body are controlled
through the motor [voluntary] nervous system. This division,
however, is not a sharp one, and the two departments frequently
overlap one another.
The sympathetic nervous system resembles the commissarial department
of the army, which attends to the material welfare of the soldiers,
while the motor nervous system, with headquarters in the brain,
corresponds to the commander with his executive staff, the nerve
centers in the spinal cord and other parts of the body being the
subordinate officers in the field.
While the physical well-being of the army depends upon the almost
automatic work of its different departments, its mind and soul is
the man commanding it. He determines the spirit, the energy and the
efficiency of the vast organization.
If the commander-in-chief lacks insight, force and determination,
the discipline of the army will be lax and its efficiency greatly
impaired. If he is a craven, without faith in himself and in the
cause he represents, his lack of courage, his doubt and indecision
will communicate themselves to the whole army, resulting in
discouragement and defeat.
The most successful commanders have been those who were possessed of
absolute confidence in themselves and in the efficiency of their
army, who in the face of gravest danger and discouraging situations
pressed on to the predetermined goal with dogged courage and
resolution. Determination and pertinacity of this kind create the
magnetic power which imparts itself to every individual soldier in
the army and makes him a willing subject, even unto death, to the
will of his commander.
When the plague was invading Napoleon's army, that great general
entered the hospitals where the victims of the plague were lying,
took them by the hand and conversed with them. He did this to
overcome the fear in the hearts of his soldiers, and thus to protect
them against the dread disease. He said: "A man whose will can
conquer the world, can conquer the plague."
To my mind, this was one of the greatest deeds of the Corsican. At a
time when "New Thought" was practically unknown, the genius of this
man had grasped its principles and was making them factors in his
apparent success. "Apparent" because, while we admire his genius, we
deplore the ends to which he applied his wonderful powers.
At times when the battle seemed lost, Napoleon would go to the front
where the danger was greatest; and by the mere sight of him the
hard-pressed soldiers under his command were inspired to super-human
effort and final victory.
As long as the glamour of invincibility surrounded him, Napoleon was
invincible, because he infused into his soldiers a faith and courage
which nothing could withstand. But when the cunning of the Russian
broke his power and decimated his ranks on the ice-bound steppes,
the hypnotic spell was broken also. Friends and enemies alike
recognized that, after all, he was but a man, subject to chance and
circumstance; and from that time on he was vulnerable and suffered
defeat after defeat.
The power of the mind over the physical body and its involuntary
functions (the functions which are regulated and controlled through
the sympathetic nervous system) may be illustrated by the
demonstrated facts of hypnotism. Through the exertion of his own
imagination and his will-power, the hypnotist can so dominate the
brain and through the brain the physical body of his subject, as to
influence not only the sensory functions, but also heart action and
respiration. By the power of his will the hypnotist is able to
retard or accelerate pulse and respiration, and even to subdue the
heart beat so that it becomes hardly perceptible.
If it is possible thus to control by the power of will the vital
functions in the body of another person, it must be possible also to
control these functions in our own bodies. Many a Hindu fakir and
yogi have developed this power of the mind over the physical body to
a marvelous extent.
Here lies the true domain of mental therapeutics. We can learn to
dominate and regulate the vital activities and the life currents in
our bodies so that they will do their work intelligently and
serenely even under the stress of illness or of danger. We can, by
the power of will, direct the vital currents to those parts and
organs which need them most and we can relieve congested areas by
equalizing the circulation, by drawing from the surplus of blood and
nerve currents and distributing the vital fluids over other parts of
the body.
We must be careful, however, to use our higher powers in conformity
with Nature's intent; that is, we must not endeavor to suppress
Nature's cleansing and healing efforts. It is possible to do this by
the power of will as well as with ice bags and drugs.
Mentally and emotionally, as well as physically, we must work with
Nature, not against her. When we understand the fundamental laws of
disease and cure, we cannot well do otherwise.