_BURTON’S ILLNESS AND ITS RESULTS._
For a period of two weeks after Edward Burton’s admission to the
hospital, a most intense fever scorched his body and fired his brain.
By spells, his temperature became almost furnace-like, his pulse a
confused flutter, and his mind a chaos of disordered fancies and morbid
emotions. His nervous system was strained to its utmost tension,
and his incoherent mutterings, his abnormal fears and terrors, his
bloodshot eyes and piteous wails, were appalling even to the hardened
and experienced hospital attendants. His mother remained with him as
much as Dr. Podram, the physician in charge, would permit, but most
of the time he was either unconscious of her presence, or fancied her
some unfriendly stranger who was seeking to injure him. Mrs. Burton
was dazed by the situation, and, like one in a dream, flitted backward
and forward between the hospital and her own quarters. She wrestled
night and day with the problem as to why God should so afflict her son,
who had planned to give his life to His service? Why should one so
conscientious, and alive to every duty, be subjected to such intense
suffering? The question would constantly force itself upon her mind,
How can a just God--my God--send such a trial upon us? The problem
was a dark, impenetrable mystery. Has He not promised to comfort and
sustain His children? Why has He hid His face from us? At times she
was almost overcome by doubt and despair. Not only was her motherly
heart wrung with anguish, but the promises, the consolations and the
supports, which she so long had rested upon, appeared to have been
removed. Not that she would renounce her God or her religion, but why
had they failed her in this supreme emergency?
The hospital authorities, and the casual acquaintances which she had
made, were very kind, but she sorely felt the need of some near friend
who could counsel and aid her. She thought of Mr. Johnson, but, as he
was feeble in health, the distance made it impracticable to send for
him. One day during one of Edward’s brief lucid intervals, Mrs. Burton
happened to be present, and, among other requests, he greatly desired
that Tapley should be informed of his condition. There had been kept
up a most cordial and intimate correspondence between the young men
while taking their respective courses of study. Though different in
training and temperament, and unlike as representatives of dissimilar
religious schools, their interest in and affection for each other was
unusual. Upon being made acquainted with the situation, Tapley at once
responded, and was untiring in his efforts to cheer, console, and
relieve both his stricken friend and the agonized mother. Living in
an immediate suburb, Tapley came in nearly every day and visited the
hospital; and no son could be more kind or attentive to a mother than
was he to Mrs. Burton.
At length the acute stage of Burton’s fever appeared to have run its
course, but upon its subsidence he was left almost a wreck. His medical
treatment had been of the “heroic” order, and, between the effects of
the disease and the influence of powerful drugs and opiates which had
been administered, his nervous system was shattered. He was too weak
to move himself, and his brain and spinal column were in a condition
of chronic irritation and congestion. About a year previous, while
taking exercise in a gymnasium, he met with a spinal injury from which
he had never fully recovered; and this old hurt became a very serious
complication. He was unable to obtain sleep or rest except by the use
of powerful narcotics, and his distress of mind was even a greater
trial than his physical pain. At the end of a month from the time of
his admission to the hospital, it was deemed advisable to remove him to
private quarters in a favorable locality, which Tapley had selected for
him.
Although the acute stage of his illness was passed, the indications
were that in consequence of his old spinal injury, a severe and chronic
state of invalidism would continue, and that in future he could never
be more than a wreck of his former self. Dr. Podram held firmly to
this view, and, after a thorough and searching investigation by a
brother practitioner, who was called in for a consultation, it was
mutually decided that no encouragement could be given as to any future
restoration to health. His daily allowance of opiates had constantly
to be increased, in order that any rest might be obtained; and his
gloom and depression often were so intense as to entirely overcome him.
Morbid fears and visions possessed his mind, and if left alone, even
for a moment, it produced a condition of great nervous excitement.
A few days after his removal he was able to be propped up in bed each
day for an hour or two, and by turns Tapley and Mrs. Burton sat by and
strove to divert him with conversation or light reading. Tapley also
shared in the care of his friend with the regular attendant, often
remaining a part of the night, and cheerfully devoting much time and
strength to Burton’s welfare.
During the latter part of Tapley’s Andover life, he had become greatly
interested in a course of reading and investigation which was somewhat
outside of the regular curriculum. Although from the conservative
standpoint Andover had largely advanced from the old scholastic
literalism in its teaching, Tapley, as an individual, was in some
respects still in advance of Andover. He held to certain opinions which
not only were not taught there, but which, perhaps, might have been
interdicted, but for the prevailing large measure of individual liberty
and tolerance which characterized that institution.
Tapley’s nature was essentially deep, spiritual, and mystical. In his
late investigations, he had plunged deeply into metaphysics, spiritual
law, and the relation of spirit to matter. He had become interested in
delving among hidden and unseen forces, where, back of all external
manifestations, lies the realm of causation. He was gifted, not only
with a keen intellectual apprehension of truth, but his spiritual and
intuitive insight was even more remarkable. He looked upon all external
expressions as but the superficial register and manifestation of
preceding spiritual forces. To his idealistic vision, the materialism
and externalism of the present time were the great obstacles to moral
and religious progress. Spirit was intrinsic and realistic, and, in
contrast, matter was not only secondary, but, in the ultimate sense
of the term, unreal. His clear perception of spiritual verities
revealed to him the fact that logic, law, and sequence were as real
and unvarying in the immaterial as in the material realm. Science,
with him, did not abruptly stop at the boundary line of materiality.
Love was as much a mathematical and universal force as gravitation,
and no less well defined in its laws. His research and observation,
also, convinced him that physical disease and discord are but the
externalization of preceding inharmonious or false mental conditions.
One day, as soon as Burton had become able to collect his scattered
thoughts, and express himself in coherent terms, Tapley, in a simple
and kindly manner, tried to communicate some of the happiness and
brightness which he had gained from personal experience. Burton,
while appreciating the motive, rejected the proffered aid, and
received Tapley’s suggestions coldly. Although he held his friend
in great esteem and affection, he feared his opinions as dangerous
and heretical. “I love you,” he said to Tapley, “the best of any one
outside of my own family; yet my duty to God, to my mother, and myself
warns me not to listen to your liberal and, as I believe, unscriptural
ideas, even though they are attractive.”
During all Burton’s Princeton life, he had faithfully kept a diary;
recording in detail his experiences and observations. As soon as he
had gained sufficient strength to be propped up in bed, and hold a
pencil, he resumed the habit of keeping a daily journal. Perhaps no
truer impression of the experiences of this eventful period of Edward
Burton’s life can be conveyed than by giving a transcript of his
diary; beginning at the time when he was just able to make a legible
record--from day to day.
It ran as follows:
_Boston, June 15, 188-._--I am not dead, and therefore must be
alive! Can this trembling hand direct a pencil?--and have I
will-power enough to coherently express myself? Oh! my God! why am
I so afflicted? The doctor has just been in, and says no word of
encouragement. I cannot think any more now, but must take a quieting
potion and rest. I feel as if I never wanted to see myself again. Is
this shrunken, trembling soul myself? or is it a falsity?
_June 16._--What a terrible night I have passed! Oh, for a vale of
oblivion, to which I might retire and hide from myself! My brain
seems inverted, and terrible thoughts force themselves into my mind.
Oh! where is my Heavenly Father, and where is my peace? Shall I
entirely lose the helm? My volition seems to have slipped away.
_June 17._--Where is my manhood? Where is my Christian character?
I believe that God cannot fail me, yet His face is hid. Oh, that I
could find Him! My distress is doubled, in the distress of my mother.
Her prayers are importunate for me. Why are they not answered? Oh,
that doctor! how his drugs disgust me! My brain is confused, so that
I cannot think.
_June 18._--Why should an immortal soul be pent in such a disordered
body as mine? It makes the soul, also, seem disordered. How can a
spirit be ill? or, is it the diseased physical medium that makes
it seem so? I have tried to serve God, and live a righteous life.
Why should his displeasure be upon me; or was it so ordained? I can
almost say with Job: “Let the day perish in which I was born;” yet I
will not complain, even if I am chastised of the Lord.
_June 19._--The doctor still deals out his nauseating drugs. I wonder
if I shall become a victim of the opium habit. Yet, I cannot get
along without a narcotic. Will my brain ever get out of this tangle?
It seems as if my soul were dried up within me! My poor mother looks
pale and haggard. Her son will never be a missionary to the heathen!
Tapley tried to cheer me to-day. His doctrines are captivating but
dangerous. I am almost afraid that he may influence me to accept
some of his loose theories. I must now take my “hypodermic,” so, if
possible, to obtain a little rest.
_June 20._--What a night of restless tossings and turnings! I
dreamed of deaths and funerals. The whole world is draped in black.
Am I losing my mind? I try in vain to bar out horrible images! Why
should the soul be such a slave to the flesh? Is it ill because the
body is disordered? Must I--a child of God--be a victim of bodily
persecution?--a slave to my lower nature?
Mother has just been in to talk with me, and she quoted some
beautiful scriptural selections, but I cannot grasp them.
Tapley told me to-day that a conscious reliance upon God for
wholeness of body--as well as soul--actually has a healing influence.
I cannot believe such a doctrine, for the age of miracles has passed,
and, besides, illness and trouble are the common lot of man, and they
are my lot, and I must suffer. How singular that “hypodermics” seem
to affect the mind as well as the body. I wonder if God intended that
they should be used.
_June 21._--Another weary day! My strength seems slightly improved,
but the doctor informs me that the spinal difficulty is assuming
more and more a chronic character, and although he hopes to make me
comfortable, he cannot permanently benefit me. How can I get any
re-enforcement to my vitality from his drugs? Tapley observed to-day
that in order to get more life we should consciously rely upon the
Holy Spirit, or Divine Spirit of Wholeness, which is the fountain
of all life. That is a new idea to me. I have always reverenced the
Spirit as a very sacred influence, which visited us only on special
occasions; Tapley makes it a real, practical, every-day force.
Mother is quite fearful lest Tapley may impress me with some of his
peculiar views, but she loves him for his beautiful character, as I
cannot help doing. I know that mother and Mr. Johnson are constantly
praying that if it be God’s will He will yet raise me up for the
missionary work, but, if otherwise, that I may be resigned. Oh! this
soul bondage to bodily ills and drug influences! In the language of
Tapley, must the “image of God” be a slave to matter?
_June 22._--I have experienced a sense of resignation to-day to
an unusual degree. If it be God’s plan that I should be a chronic
invalid, I will submit. If it be His purpose, I am willing to suffer
physical pain, but why does He afflict me with such mental anguish? I
suppose that it would not be, were it not for my soul’s good. Perhaps
I have been self-righteous, and puffed up with spiritual pride, and
therefore must be purified in the furnace of affliction.
My spine is extremely painful, but I must have patience to bear it
without complaint.
_June 23._--A long, long weary day, after a dismal night! The world
seems like a desert. I formerly thought nature to be beautiful and
restful, but now it is sombre and funereal. A black cloud hangs
over me, and covers the entire horizon. Why has God thwarted all my
plans, which included a life-work in His service? I cannot dismiss my
faith, although it is barren. My spine distresses me more than ever
before, but that is nothing compared with this nightmare of morbid
consciousness. A feeling that I have committed “the unpardonable sin”
crowds itself unbidden into my mind, and sticks like the garment of
Nemesis. Why can I not cast it off? I know it to be false, yet I
quail before it. Even my prayers bring no relief.
Tapley said some beautiful things to me, but he is so visionary and
optimistic. It frightens me to see my poor mother look so helpless;
the doctor pronounces her really ill.
How slowly the weary days drag themselves along.
_June 24._--Another night of agony, and such terrible dreams! I was
brought before the judgment-seat of God and condemned. I found myself
cast out with a great host on the left hand, and from every quarter
the word lost! lost! lost! was echoed in my ears. It was repeated
louder and louder, until its reverberations became like thunder,
when I awoke in a cold perspiration. My mind is a chaos of horrible
phantoms. Although so repulsive, I welcome the “hypodermic,” for it
rewards me with oblivion, glorious oblivion.
My poor, weak, trembling mother! who could be better than she? Yet
her prayers in my behalf avail nothing.
_June 25._--Tapley was here for a long time to-day, and his presence
was a benediction. While he was present I forgot all my pains and
distress. It seemed as if he were a channel through which soothing
influences flowed into me. It is a mystery that Tapley, with all
his loose and faulty theology, possesses such an influence. Mother
is apprehensive, but with his kindness she cannot give him any hint
which might hurt him or keep him away. Were it possible for him to
stay by me, I believe that I could dispense with opiates. Since he
departed, my bad feelings have again overwhelmed me, like a flood.
I am compelled to forge another link in the chain which binds me to
“the drug.”
_June 26._--There is almost a rift in the black cloud which so long
has covered my horizon; whatever there is of it came through Tapley.
Much of the time while here to-day, he sat with his head bowed
apparently in silent meditation, but there came from him a mysterious
stimulating influence, which I felt plainly. This influence was such
as might have resulted from the use of a powerful tonic. I cannot
understand it. There was a full hour of silence. Perhaps he was
engaged in prayer, but there was no movement of his lips. He advised
me to dispense with the “hypodermics,” and I shall make an effort to
break my chain to-night. Just after he left I felt much “stirred up,”
as if a conflict were going on within me, but this evening I am more
tranquil than at any time during my illness.
_June 27._--I slept four or five hours last night without the drug.
It was almost beyond belief, but some mysterious influence helped me.
It may be foolish to make note of a dream, but the one of last night
was so peculiar and real that I do not wish to forget it.
I was engaged in a most desperate conflict with malignant and
fiendish enemies. Mounted on a splendid white charger, I held in
my grasp a keen, glittering sword, which I could wield with great
ease and dexterity. My horse, though extremely fleet and agile,
was obedient to my every wish and inclination. My foes, also, were
well mounted and numerous, though when I first beheld them, they
were a little distance away. When they discovered me they rushed
impetuously forward to the attack. With leering, fiendish faces,
fiery breaths, and spears well poised to slay me, on they came. My
courage was unaccountable. I faced them with a calm disdain. As they
furiously charged upon me in quick succession, I found that the
lightest touch of my sword caused them to collapse, and, one by one,
they fell in a heap at my feet. They, who had looked so fierce and
formidable, turned out to be only--blown-up skins. After the last one
had dropped, I looked down to see the heap, but found that it had
dissolved to dust.
What can be the significance?
_June 28._--Tapley was here for two hours. His conversation soothes
me, which seems reasonable; but the strange thing is, that during
his periods of silent meditation, or prayer, or whatever it is, his
influence is vastly greater. It is so real that I cannot be mistaken.
After each visit I feel a distinct mental conflict. It is as if
two antagonists were crossing swords, and while it continues I am
very uncomfortable. It subsides in an hour or two, and tranquillity
ensues. It is now possible that I can emancipate myself from all
drugs and “hypodermics.” Mother looks a little brighter, but can
hardly credit my apparent improvement. Dr. Podram is also at a loss
to account for the change. I did not tell him that for three days
past I had pitched all his drugs out of the window.
_June 29._--The best day I have experienced since my illness began.
My mind has been strangely exercised. Intervals of great depression
and of happiness and exaltation have alternated.
I told Tapley that he appeared to be like an incarnation of the
spirit of Christ, but he denied all personal credit. In answer to my
earnest queries he disclaimed any power, in his own personality, to
help me. I suggested that perhaps he had learned to make a beneficial
use of mesmeric influence. He seemed hurt at such a suggestion, and
said that he regarded all hypnotic exercises as belonging only to the
lower or animal nature; that in their very essence they are opposed
to spirituality and to everything most divine in man. Tapley is so
full of love that it overflows like water from a fountain. How can
his theology bring forth such fruit if it be erroneous or dangerous?
_June 30._--Sweet, refreshing rest was mine last night; free from
troublesome fancies, except to a slight extent towards morning. How
good to enjoy natural sleep as contrasted with the false rest which
came from opiates! I do not blame the doctor; from his standpoint as
well as my own belief, anodynes were indispensable. But I have become
independent of such aid. I was up for two hours in an easy-chair. Dr.
Podram was nonplussed, and mother was happy. Tapley sat with me, and,
besides his long, silent, meditative spell, we had a most interesting
conversation. He is my “good angel;” I thank God for him!
He predicts that I shall be able to go out within a week or two. I,
the chronic, nerveless invalid! Can it be possible? Have I grasped
the helm? Am I no longer drifting?
_July 1._--Last evening by following Tapley’s suggestions I had
a peculiar experience. During the quiet of evening, while alone,
I barred the material world and all its belongings out of my
mentality, and, for the time being, tenaciously held the thought
in my consciousness that “in Him we live, and move, and have our
being.” I relaxed every nerve, and as far as possible made my whole
being passive and receptive. I invited spiritual influences, and they
flowed in and filled me as naturally as air inclines to a vacuum.
What a glorious exercise! I intently listened for the “still small
voice,” and it was audible to my spiritual hearing.
Can we have the “Holy Spirit” upon such easy terms every day? I have
always thought it necessary to beg for it, and expected its presence
only upon rare and special occasions. A tranquil and happy night.
_July 2._--Last evening my leading thought was “God is love.” By a
quiet, reverent effort, I abstracted myself from material things,
and unbarred the doors and windows of my spiritual nature; then the
divine sunshine illuminated every apartment. I was linked to the
living Christ--“He in me and I in Him,”--and such a tie was most
natural. I was “in God;” he was not “afar off.” There was communion
between us. I felt a Presence! The Divine touched the human!
Both mind and body are daily gaining strength. If the spinal
irritation continues, as Dr. Podram predicted, I am not conscious of
it except at occasional intervals. To-day we dismiss the doctor, and
to-morrow we shall dispense with the services of my attendant. Mother
has lost her distrust of Tapley, and loves him as much as I do.
_July 3._--“Ye are complete in Him.”
This profound expression of St. Paul has occupied my thought. How
concise and exact! Not “shall be,” but “are.” Completeness in God;
incompleteness apart from Him. We are apart when we do not hold Him
in our consciousness. When physically diseased man is not complete.
The body, being but the outward expression of the mind, reflects its
quality. To clarify the stream we must begin at the fountain. How
natural, and even scientific, these principles; yet I was blind to
them. I have almost had a sixth sense added: spiritual intuition.
Those who have only a material consciousness are “color-blind” to it.
I am inclined to give Tapley the credit for my cure, but he insists
that he was nothing more than a “finger-board.”
My spiritual perception was not sufficiently deep to recognize the
oneness of life.
_July 4._--The booming of guns signals the anniversary of our
national independence.
Have we freedom in reality? Political freedom exists, but spiritual
bondage is the rule. The human family are slaves to material things.
Why should the higher be in subjection to the lower? The reverse
condition is denominated “supernatural.” That term is superfluous:
for the spiritual to rule is normal, logical, and scientific.
As long as our mental abiding-place is in the pleasures and pains of
the body and its surroundings, we are prisoners.
“As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he.”
Whatever permanently occupies our subjectivity becomes the real and
ruling to us. To emancipate ourselves from material bondage we must
hold God in our consciousness, until materiality is dethroned and
displaced. Even matter when subordinated grows beautiful, because it
assumes its normal position as below and at the service of spirit.
How puny and unreal “the seen,” when compared with “the unseen;” yet
we fill ourselves with the former, and thus practically worship it.
Is not that idolatry?
The last must become first, and the material immaterial.
“The Spirit shall lead you into all truth,” and “the truth shall make
you free.”
I have been up all day, and quite free from pain. Independence Day,
indeed!
_July 5._--Tapley came with a carriage and took mother and myself
out for a drive. We went to one of the parks, and my sense of
enjoyment was very keen. Since my spiritual vision has become more
acute, added beauty manifests itself in all things. The change is
in my consciousness, and not in the things. I behold God in nature:
I see him in the unfolding of the leaves; in every tree and plant;
in the clouds, the sunshine, the air, the sea. All are gilded and
beautified. I am led to the One Great and Universal Life, which
comprehends all other life. This is not the Pantheistic god, but the
very opposite, the Spiritual God, of which material things are but a
faint external manifestation. Matter is beautiful only as it becomes
transparent, so that through it we may see the radiant effulgence of
Spirit.
Becoming centred in God, our standpoint is changed, and we no longer
revolve on our own axis. This change adjusts and rectifies things
which before were inverted.
My appetite is excellent, and my ride has occasioned no fatigue.
_July 6._--Mother will return home to-morrow, and I shall follow
in a few days. Tapley has pressed me to pay him a visit, and to go
with them on a cruise in his father’s yacht, and I shall do so after
spending a little time at home. I am delighted at the prospect of
again being with my dear brother and sisters, from whom I have so
long been separated. The dears! Mother says they have changed and
improved very much.
Some important problems will soon present themselves for solution.
How can I most benefit the world? How best aid in leading it out
from the bondage of materialism which now prevails? I find myself
somewhat out of harmony with the ruling “systems of truth,” and there
is even doubt whether or not my own church would tolerate me as a
religious teacher. I am conscious of a spiritual certitude that I
have lost nothing which is good that formerly was mine, and also
that I have gained much. I shall be obliged to choose my own ways and
methods of labor, for the reason that existing “institutions” would
misunderstand me. There will be abundant opportunity to confer with
Tapley in regard to these questions while I am his guest, a few weeks
later.
_July 7._--I took a long walk with Tapley, and, as opportunity
offered, I asked him to explain one or two points which were not
plain. I said: “Why is it that when restoration from disease is
possible by means of compliance with spiritual law, many most
exemplary and pure Christians remain chronic invalids for years, in
bondage to pain and discords of the flesh?” He replied: “Such persons
have been theologically taught that pain and suffering are normal
conditions; that they are directly sent by God, and therefore their
duty is to accept them. Such a radical misunderstanding of the nature
of God fastens those conditions upon them. Still farther: instead
of cultivating a consciousness of their wholeness in God, they show
their allegiance to matter by turning from the Source of all Life, to
drugs and other material means, which can add no vitality.”
I cited the cases of young children, and others who have no
opportunity nor capacity to form erroneous opinions. He replied: “The
aggregate race beliefs have given a terrible reality to disease,
because it has been viewed only from a material standpoint, and they
have bound us as in a strong net, which even few adults are able to
break. As we are all ‘bound in one bundle,’ such an aggregation is
doubly powerful in its effect upon the sensitive and impressionable
natures of children, and thus they suffer and die as a sacrifice to
surrounding and hereditary materiality.”
When the spiritual blossoming-out, of which already there are
indications, appears, deliverance from material bondage will come,
and the consciousness of disease, sin, and sorrow will fade out in
proportion as spiritual understanding brightens.
_July 8._--To-morrow I shall leave here, and go to my dear old New
Hampshire home. What an eventful experience during the last few
weeks! My terrible illness turned out to be a blessing in disguise.
I am thankful for the experience, and now realize that Pain, rightly
considered, is an “Angel of Mercy,” to turn us back from our lower,
false, sensuous selves, to our real heritage; from the “strange land”
of external phantoms to the “Father’s house,” which is “the secret
place of the Most High.” The mud of materiality is washed off, as
from an excavated antique marble statue, and lineaments, white,
sharp, and beautiful, are disclosed. Pain, rightly interpreted, is
a beneficent teacher. Such a view does away with it _as_ pain, for
it is transformed into blessing. A different standpoint changes
everything. The tempest is no tempest to us unless we so view it. The
beauty of the sunset is in our consciousness: not in the declining
orb.
_July 9._--After certain intervals, the merchant takes an account
of stock. In view of recent events an inventory seems proper before
leaving this place. What have I gained? Has anything been lost?
Truth never changes, but our recognition of it may become fuller.
My former theology was scholastic, dogmatic, historic; I reverently
trust that it is now more definitely spiritual.
God was an anthropomorphous God, infinite in power, but in some
sense possessed of human characteristics; changeableness, passions,
emotions, and having a local habitation: now, He is “All in All,”
the only Real--the only Life; in the language of Scripture: “He is
Love,” not merely lovely. “He is Spirit.”
Christ: is more than the personal, historic Jesus: He is the
ever-living Divine manifestation of love to man; “the Way, the Truth,
and the Life.”
Heaven: is not a place, but a condition. It is, harmony with God.
It “cometh not with observation.” “Behold, the Kingdom of Heaven is
within you.”
The Church: is not an end, but a means; it is useful in just the
degree that it awakens in man spiritual consciousness, which is “the
mind of Christ.”
Faith: is the practical exercise of the spiritual eyes.
Spirit: is the only true substance. The spiritual body is the real
man. The material man, except as an external expression, is false,
and in a deep sense unreal.
The Bible: is not a fetich, but a progressive revelation of God to
man. Truth is eternal, but our understanding of it is progressive,
which was also true of the Bible writers. Revelation was not closed
with them, but is continuous: “Howbeit when He, the Spirit of Truth,
is come, He shall guide you into all the truth.”
Miracles: are real, that is, the occurrences so denominated are
true; the miraculous quality, however, belongs to the material
standpoint. They are in full accord with unvarying spiritual law,
which is superior to material law. They are peculiar to no age, for
God does not withdraw any blessing, once conferred. “He is without
variableness or shadow of turning.”
Inspiration: is spiritual, not verbal. “The letter killeth, but the
Spirit giveth life.”
Prayer: is more than verbal petition; it is communion, oneness of
Spirit. “Pray without ceasing.”
Scholastic Theology: is a burden to the church so far as it
substitutes rituals, dogmas, systems, and their intellectual
acceptance, for spiritual Christianity, which is, Christ incarnated.
Religion: is normal, manly, attractive, joyful; not an unpleasant
necessity, but a glorious possession. Its essence is spiritual
harmony with God.
The Fall: is the descent from spiritual consciousness, and the
acceptance of material conditions as the real and ruling.
Sin: consists in various forms of idolatry; a worship of material
things as real forces, instead of God. Turning our faces towards Him,
sin disappears, because its seat is in the carnal nature which is put
off. “That which is born of God cannot sin.”
Love: is the law of the spiritual, as gravitation is of the material
universe. The opposite of this law, selfishness in its thousand
forms, controls the material man.
Physical Disease: is a deviation from spiritual harmony externalized.
When the centre is brought back to God, the circumference adjusts
itself. Knowledge is subjective. The mental quality and tone
gradually find corresponding expression in the physical man.
Supernaturalism: nothing is supernatural, for natural law pervades
the spiritual as fully as it does the material realm.
The New Birth: is the human incarnation of the Christ, a substitution
of His mind for the mind of the flesh.
Retribution: is inherent; what we make for ourselves, not vindictive.
I close the inventory, for it is time to go to the train. My two
months in Boston have been an epoch.