in one of the most famous colleges of the East. At the suggestion of
the president of the club, Mr. Asa Marvin, F. T. S., the usual
programme was suspended on her return, and Miss Doctress Jones, D. N.
N. N. (for such indeed is the title she has now earned), told us of
her studies at the Massachusetts University of Mentiphysics, in
Boston, a noble institution, up to date in all respects, for it
received its charter from the General Assembly of Massachusetts in the
year 1881.
Miss Doctress Jones left her home in Alcalde on the 20th of July,
designing to visit certain relatives residing at Homer and Virgil,
Cortland County, N. Y., on the way. She reached Boston on the 5th day
of August, and at once proceeded to the university. An ignorant
hackman took her over to the suburban village of Cambridge, which is
the seat of Harvard College. Making inquiry of the professors there,
she found none who had ever heard of the University of Mentiphysics,
having eyes and ears for nothing but Harvard, which in some respects
is indeed a great institution, but on a material plane.
At last, after much inquiry, Doctress Jones was sent to the Neministic
Headquarters, a small building on the corner of Milk and
Transcendental Streets. Here she learned, from a little lady with a
withered face and a serene smile, that the University of Mentiphysics
was situated not in Boston, but in the neighboring town of Lynn, which
lies some miles to the north. "But in Massachusetts," she said, "we
call it all Boston."
"So I took the train for Lynn," Miss Doctress Jones continued, "and
drove at once to the street and number named on the card. The little
white house with green blinds, white columns on the veranda, and a few
weedy roses in the front yard did not fill my conception of a
university, for it did not look like our universities in California.
But the fault was with my conception, not with the fact.
"The maid who answered the bell assured me that this was indeed the
university, and ushered me at once into the office of the president.
The wall was covered with pictures and photographs, showing elderly
ladies with serene smiling faces. Under each one were the letters N.
N. N., and a card giving an account of how each one had been made
whole and happy through Neministic Science. The president was a
middle-aged, matronly lady, with a high forehead and brown hair,
streaked with gray, done in graceful frizzes over her brow. Above the
corners of her mouth, which were always drawn up in an engaging smile,
were three deep creases. Mr. Gridley, our schoolmaster, tells me that
these correspond to the grave accent in Greek, and that there being
three of them shows that the lady had been married three times. I do
not know as to this, but somehow her face seemed startlingly familiar
and at the same time strangely pleasant.
"I murmured something about having had the pleasure before. She said,
taking the words from my mouth: 'I know what you are going to say. We
are indeed very much alike, though she is on the material plane.
Still, my friends call me the "Lydia Pinkham of the soul," and I do
not resent it, for what dear Lydia tries to do, that I do.'
"I told the president," Doctress Jones continued, "that I wished to
learn the wisdom of Boston, and especially the science of Neministic
Healing, of which I had heard much in Alcalde. 'But perhaps I should
call at the university, and not trouble you in your rest at home.' At
this her eyes blazed, and she said, with a tragic air: 'Having eyes,
ye see not! I read the Soul and the Stars through a higher than mortal
sense. Has the Sun forgotten to shine and the Planets to revolve
around it? Who was it discovered, demonstrated, and teaches the marvel
of Neministic Healing? That one, whoever it be, does understand
something of what can not be lost.'
"I looked dazed. She quieted down and explained to me that she was
herself the university, because no one but herself could explain what
was revealed to her alone. The whole Neministic Science was taught in
twelve lessons, and I could begin then and there.
"I said something about preparatory work and the books I would need to
read. She placed in my hands a slip which read:
"'N. N. N. Persons contemplating a course in the Massachusetts
University of Mentiphysics can prepare for it through no books save
Neministic Science and Astral Health, with a Key to the Stars.
Man-made theories are narrow, else extravagant, and always
materialistic. _Nihil nemini nocet._' Then she added: 'I recommend
students not to read so-called scientific works antagonistic to
Neministic Healing, which advocate material systems, because such
works and words becloud the right sense of Mentiphysical Science. A
primary student richly imbued with the Neministic spirit is a better
healer and teacher than a normal-class student, who partakes less of
this power. Even an apt scholar who has dipped into my Neministic
Science and Astral Health, with a Key to the Stars (the last revised
edition), may enter this field of labor, without any personal
instruction, beneficially to himself and the race.'
"Then she continued blandly: 'You must learn, my dear, to enter this
great field in a manner beneficial to yourself and the race. You must
teach others to render to Cæsar what is Cæsar's, and to do this you
must first render unto Cæsar yourself. Do you understand?' I looked
puzzled for a moment. Then she said: 'Twenty-five dollars, please,
dear, and be sure to come promptly at ten o'clock to-morrow. You are
now admitted to the Primary Plane, the first degree of Neministic
Healing.' As I gave her the California gold, she bowed me out of the
room with a tender and motherly smile, while she tested the unfamiliar
coins by ringing them softly on the table.
"At the second lesson she gave me the fundamental principles of
Neministic Healing. I received them eagerly, for I recognized in them
a close harmony with the teachings of our dear old Mr. Dean:
"'God is the principle of Mentiphysics. As there is but one God, there
can be but one Principle in this Science. As there are many stars,
there must be many fixed rules for the demonstration of this Divine
Principle.
"'The fundamental propositions among these rules are proved by
inversion, for this is the basis of all true mathematics. Two times
two is four, therefore four is two times two. As a star is the same
whether seen from the north, south, east, or west, so a precept of
Mentiphysics must be the same as seen from every side. To invert is
not to change its meaning, and must prove its truth.' Then she gave me
a printed card containing these words, over which I was to ponder
until the next lesson:
"'N. N. N. There is no Pain in Truth, therefore there is no Truth in
Pain. There is no Nerve in Mind, therefore there is no Mind in Nerve.
There is no Matter in Mind, therefore there is no Mind in Matter.
There is no Matter in Life, therefore there is no Life in Matter.
There is no Matter in Good, therefore there is no Good in Matter.
_Nihil nocet nemini; nihil nemini nocet._'
"'Twenty-five dollars, please,' and I returned to my hotel filled with
new thoughts, which I found later were very incomplete.
"The next day she said:
"'Man, my dear, is governed by Soul, not sense. Sense is the
reflection of matter, and matter does not exist. Thus sense is but the
shadow of a dream. In dreams the laws of health are valueless. There
is but one Law of Health, and that is the one precept of Neministic
Healing.
"'To the awakened mind the seasons will come and go, with changes of
time and tide, cold and heat, latitude and longitude. The
agriculturist finds that these changes can not affect his crops. The
mariner will have dominion over the atmosphere and the great deep,
over the fish of the sea and the fowls of the air. The astronomer will
no longer look up to the stars. He will look out from them upon the
universe, and the florist will find his flower before he beholds its
seed. Thus matter will be finally proved to be nothing but a mortal
belief, wholly inadequate to affect man through its supposed organic
action or existence.'
"Then she gave me another mystic card, which read:
"'N. N. N. We tread on forces. Withdraw them, and Creation must
collapse. _Nihil nocet nemini._' And this time I did not need to be
reminded of the final ceremony with which the lesson ended. Nor did
she need to clink the coins on the table.
"In the fourth lesson the president discoursed more fully on 'the
popular gods, Sin, Sorrow, and Sickness, the three S's of Satan; all
three illusions of the Sinful Soul. The very word Illusion proves
their nothingness. These are but troubled dreams of the darkened soul,
and to rise above them is to wake from a cataleptic nightmare to see
the stars shining on the hills.
"'When troubled by a horrible dream, my dear, one has only to say,
"This is a Dream; I will awaken." Then the stars will shine through
the open window and the hideous vision will disappear.
"'So in afflictions of disease and dread and death, one must say,
"This is a Dream." Then it becomes a dream, and we rise above it into
an atmosphere of Perfect Serenity.
"'To the material sense, dear,' continued the president, 'to cut the
jugular vein takes away life. But in Neministic Science Life goes on
unchanged, mounting ever and ever to higher reaches, because there is
no jugular vein, and Matter can not make its mark on Mind.
"'The Barometer, that little prophet of storm and sunshine, can not be
deceived by testimony of the senses. It points to fair weather in the
midst of the unreal apparition of murky clouds and threatening rain.
Thus does Neministic Science, the perfect culmination of Mentiphysics,
point to the changeless Health and Happiness of the Enlightened Man
whatever material science may have to say about the condition of his
members. Man is made in the image of perfection, therefore failure and
imperfection can never assail him. As well expect to gather peaches
from a pine tree as to gather discord from the Concord of Being.'
"Then she gave me a card:
"'N. N. N. The Equipollence of the Stars above and of the Mind below
shows the awful unreality of Evil. _Nihil nemini nocet._'
"After the usual parting ceremony I returned to my room, well
convinced of the unreality of Boston, and doubting whether I should
ever again find my own Alcalde. I feared lest some further precept
might arise by which Alcalde could not exist.
"In the fifth lesson the president informed me that I was now in the
second degree, or Normal Plane. We were ready for the first glimpse
into the full, rounded perfection of Neministic Healing.
"'To cure men of all ills whatsoever, we have only to show them the
stars. When we waken in the night, only the sight of the stars can
tell us we are awake. When we are awake all dreams must vanish, and
all is dream which breaks the serenity of the mind or checks the
perfect perspicacity of being. We need not deal with the body, for the
body does not exist. It is dull, heavy, and aching, because it is the
dead Residuum of Dream. When we forget it, it is no longer there. Then
and not till then can you smile the serene smile of the
Neministically Healed and Mentiphysically Perfect Soul.'
"The little card read:
"'N. N. N. The body says, "I am ill." The reports of Sickness may form
a coalition with the reports of Sin and say, "I am Malice, Lust,
Appetite, Envy, Hate." Treat a belief in sickness as you would
sin--with sudden dismissal. If it were not for what the human mind
says of the body, the body would not be weary any more than an
inanimate wheel. _Nihil nemini nocet._'
"On the sixth day the president greeted me with her serenest smile.
"'We have now reached the point, my dear,' she said, 'when we must
abandon Pharmaceutics and take up Ontology, the science of Abstract
Being. In this we have many rivals who echo the cry, "Why art thou,
NEMINISM, come hither to torment us before our time?" Among the
systems that thus cry out are many whom this world deems successful.
Animal Magnetism, Atheism, Spiritualism, Theosophy, Agnosticism,
Pantheism, and Infidelity are antagonistic to Mentiphysics and fatal
to the demonstration thereof, and of Neminism, its noblest
culmination; and so,' she continued, 'are some other systems.'
"She warned me especially against Pantheism, 'the worship of the
sylvan god Pan,' a cult reputed to be especially rife among the
members of our club at Alcalde.
"I tried to explain to her the difference between Pantheism and
Sciosophy, but I did not succeed very well, for she grew impatient. In
her judgment, I discovered, Sciosophy was grossly impractical, and the
views of Mr. Abner Dean would take the bread from the mouths of better
men than he. 'I am told,' she said, 'that Mr. Dean actually signed
that wicked paper[15] of those Washington soreheads, who call
themselves the Reformed College of Neminism.' With this, she would not
listen to another word about Sciosophy.
[Footnote 15: In this document it is asserted that Neministic
Science and Astral Health with a Key to the Stars "and all of the
inspired writings shall be free--i. e., free from the love of the
lust of gain and that the charging of three dollars for Science
and Health, etc., when it can be printed and sold for less than
fifty cents per copy, is wrong in principle, and, in effect, shuts
the doors of this beautiful truth upon the poor by thus putting a
prohibitive price upon it....
"We hold that in the giving of class instruction the teacher is
entitled to a reasonable compensation, and give our opinion that
such compensation should be ten dollars, and we do condemn the
present practice when they charge one hundred dollars for a series
of twelve lessons. Take a class of thirty--which is not
unusual--the teacher receives about $258 per day for two hours'
work. This is unjust, and especially so, because many of these
teachers are unable and unfit for teaching.
"In the matter of healing, when the healer gives the proper time
to the work, one dollar per treatment ought not to be excessive,
but the practice of some of charging before the patient is
received into the room and then heavily charged for the treatment,
is an outrage, ... and should be prohibited."--_See full text,
Washington News Letter, September 6, 1899; Editor._]
"Then I regretted that I had said anything, for this pleasant lesson
came to an abrupt end, and left me without even the customary card to
ponder over. I still wondered what could be the secret meaning of N.
N. N., _nihil nemini nocet_.
"On the next day the storm had blown over, or rather, like all other
storms, it had no real existence, and the smile of the president at
the closing act of the lesson was the sweetest I had ever seen, the
most perfect witness to the truth of her teachings.
"She took up the subject of Materia Medica. After reading from a
printed book the names of a host of poisons, from Abacus to Swamproot
and Sandalwood and _Zygadene_, she warned us against them all. All are
alike evil. All alike have no real existence. Therefore the student
will do well not to learn their names. It will only interfere with his
serenity of mind, and perfect serenity is the sole symptom of success.
"'Surely this is better,' she said, 'than to support the popular
systems of medicine, when the physician may be perchance an infidel
and lose ninety-and-nine patients where Neminism cures its hundred. Is
it because Osteopathy and Ostariopathy are more fashionable and less
spiritual? Even business men have found that Neministic Science
enhances their physical and mental powers, enlarges their perception
of character, gives them acuteness and comprehensiveness, and an
ability to exceed their ordinary business capacity.'
"Then she gave me this card:
"'N. N. N. In 1866 this discovery was made by me and by me alone: "The
erring Mortal misnamed Mind produces all the organism and action of
the mortal body." This led to the demonstration that Mind is All and
matter is naught, and being nothing, nothing hurts nobody. Nobody
hurts nothing, which proves it plainly by inversion. _Nihil nocet
nemini; nihil nemini nocet._'
"On the eighth day the president discoursed on Anatomy. Referring
briefly to the pernicious notions of the 'ancients,' as with a broad
sweep of her hand she designated the professors in Boston and
Cambridge, concerning the structure of the human body, she called it
the nightmare of undigested learning. 'Why should we care where the
jugular vein goes, when we know that there is no jugular vein? What of
bones and muscles, and teguments and integuments? "Toil fatigues me,"
you say; but what is this me? Is it muscle or Mind? Which is tired,
and so speaks? Without Mind could the muscles be tired? Do the
muscles talk, or do you talk for them? Science includes no rule of
discord, but governs harmoniously.'
"On the card were these words:
"'N. N. N. Flesh is an error of physical belief; a supposition that
life, substance, and intelligence are in matter; an illusion; a belief
that matter has sensations. _Nihil nocet nemini._'
"On the ninth day I was admitted to the third degree, or the
Introspective Plane. As the president entered, I noticed a touch of
camellia powder on her face, for the subject of the day was Beauty.
'Beauty,' she said, 'is internal before it is perceived outwardly. To
have perfect faith in the principle of Neminism is to regain the
charms of Eternal Youth.' She told me of patients of hers who had
become beautiful through faith. One good lady at ninety developed new
teeth through belief in Neminism--incisors, cuspids, bicuspids, and
one molar. A gentleman at sixty had retained his full set of upper and
lower teeth without a decaying cavity.
"On her card were these words:
"'N. N. N. The receipt for Beauty is to have less Illusion and more
Soul. _Nihil nemini nocet._'
"And, as the final ceremony was passed, the president looked almost
beautiful herself.
"On the tenth day the president gave some account of her early studies
and of the origin of Neministic Healing.
"'While from the human standpoint I inherited the refinement that goes
with culture of family and moral rectitude, as usual here in Boston,
yet there was a marked degree of spiritual Grace, Soulful Delicacy,
and Esoteric Elegance that comes not from human ancestry, neither from
communion with Nature. It was the exquisite coloring of the touch of
the astral hand which opens the petals of thought as it does the
opening rose. This ended in a soft glow of ineffable Joy, and out of
its perfect serenity Neministic Science was born.
"'The discovery was so new, the basis laid down for physical and moral
health so hopelessly original and men so unfamiliar with the subject,
that not until later did I venture to proclaim it to the world.'
"On the card was--
"'N. N. N.
"'My world has sprung from Spirit
In Everlasting Day;
Whereof I've much to glory,
Wherefor have much to pay.'
"Under this was a picture of the egg of a vulture, in which, through
his microscope, Agassiz once saw the sun, moon, stars, and the
gathering of clouds. '_Nihil nemini nocet._'
"At the eleventh lesson I was directed to go out for clinical
practice. In my hotel I found a dear little six-year-old boy who had
been invited, with the rest of a kindergarten class, to attend a
picnic.
"He did not feel that he wanted to go. He seemed dumpish, and,
according to mortal belief, was not well. At noon he said that he
wanted to go to sleep. I took him in my lap and began to read to him
from Neministic Science and Astral Health with a Key to the Stars.
Very soon he expressed a wish to go to the picnic, and did go. So I
gave him a little card, with the words '_Nihil nemini nocet_,' and all
day he said nothing more about being sick.
"Next morning the president gave me an account of various wonderful
cures in her experience. Among others, she showed me a letter from
John B. Higgins, of Little Egg Harbor, N. J. This I copied down as
follows:
"'I am glad to tell you how I was healed. Beliefs of consumption,
dyspepsia, neuralgia, ulcers, tobacco, and bad language....
Doctors that were consulted did nothing to relieve me, and I
constantly grew worse. Nearly two years ago you told me that if I
would read a book called Neministic Science and Astral Health
with a Key to the Stars, I would be healed. I told you I would go
into it for all it was worth, and I found that it is worth all. I
got the book and read day and night. I saw that it must be true,
and believed that what I could not then understand would be made
clear later. After some days' reading I was afflicted with
drowsiness, followed by vomiting. This lasted several hours, when
I fell into a sleep. I awoke healed.'
"The president assured me that if I would spend no time in
intellectual drifting, adhering to the impersonal and scientific
deductions of the one discoverer to whose clarified spiritual eye all
truth of the mind had been revealed, with all the loyalty of a
mathematician to the principles of mathematics, I would be sure of a
comfortable fortune. Although money had no real existence, the shadow
in its substance proved that there was after all substance in its
shadow. The Neministic Healer is at no expense for books or
instruments or medicine, providing always that the one perfect Key to
the Stars (including Neministic Science and Astral Health) lies open
before him. With that in sight he can not go wrong, and with perfect
faith in the unreality of all external things it matters not in
earthly affairs what he does or leaves undone.
"The card for this lesson was:
"'N. N. N. The population of our cities is ample to supply many
practitioners, teachers, and preachers with work. To enter this field
of labor beneficially to ourselves, it is necessary to demonstrate
that _the patient who is able to pay for being healed is more apt to
recover_ than he who withholds a slight equivalent for health! _Nihil
nemini nocet._'
"At the last lesson the president informed me that my course of
instruction was complete, and that I must now go forth and bless the
world. I must lean no longer on her personal leadership, but, trusting
in the spirit, I should rest solely on the pure Mentiphysical
principle at work. As a pioneer of Neministic Healing in the far
uncultured West, I must stand alone in the conflict, smiting error
with the falchion of Truth. The rare bequests of the spirit are
costly, and they have won fields of battle from which the dainty
borrower would have fled.'
"I spoke once or twice of my diploma, without which I could not
practice my profession under the laws of Fresno County. At first she
made as if she did not hear me, but at last she said:
"'The Massachusetts University of Mentiphysics draws its breath from
me, but I yearn for retirement. No one else can sustain this
institution amid the legislation aimed at its vital purpose. This has
given me conscientious scruples about diplomas, and, with the growing
conviction that every one should build on his own foundation, no more
diplomas shall be issued from this flourishing school.
"'But do not worry, dear,' she said. 'Your power is just the same with
or without diploma. You can make known the rare bequests of the Spirit
quite as well as a martyr as you could as a physician. The faithful
will stand by you. Those who believe will always pay. Take this
locket, and hang it about your neck. It will contain the quintessence
of all my teachings, and with this in your right hand and Neministic
Science and Astral Health with a Key to the Stars in your left, you
will drain the cup which I have drained to the dregs as the discoverer
and teacher of Neminism, and without tasting this cup its inspiration
can not be gained.'
"Then I took the little locket, and here it is. On one side are the
letters D. N. N. N., 'which,' she said, 'makes its holder a doctress.'
On the reverse is the face of Lydia Pinkham, while around the margin,
in fine gilt letters, is a scroll with the motto, '_Nihil nemini
nocet._' Mr. Gridley, the learned professor of our Alcalde school,
says this means 'nothing hurts nobody.' But I am sure that there is
more in it than that; besides, whatever it is we can prove it by
inversion: _Nihil nocet nemini; nihil nemini nocet_--one is true like
the other, and its symbolic significance is proved by its three N's,
for N is the symbol of eternity. At least, this is what the president
told me. But now that I am back in Alcalde, the whole thing seems like
a dream, while all the things I had learned to call dreams seem more
real than ever. Maybe I am still on the Material Plane after all, in
spite of all I have done and all the rest of us in Alcalde are doing
to try to rise above it."
DEVELOPMENT OF THE AMERICAN NEWSPAPER.