Chapter III - Spirit and Matter
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tions than the horoscope hung out upon empyrean, yet
tions than the horoscope hung out upon empyrean, yet
earth and heavens were bright, and bird and blossom
glad in the sunshine. So to-day we have Truth, Life
and Love to gladden man, but leaving him to the inter-
pretations of a belief or personal sense makes him as
the wandering comet and desolate star.
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"Man never is, but always to be blest."
"Man never is, but always to be blest."
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The Ptolemic system, or error regarding the heavenly
The Ptolemic system, or error regarding the heavenly
bodies, could not effect the vital interests of man, like
the error of belief, relating to our body, that reverses the
order of science and assigns to matter the prerogative
of Spirit; making man the most inharmonious phe-
nomenon of the universe. When we admit Spirit gov-
erns man, and demonstrate this, in our control over the
body, sickness, sin and death will disappear; for noth-
ing evil or mortal comes from Spirit; but if we would
divide Spirit into persons called "spirits," putting Soul
in body and Spirit in personality, we make an unac-
countable blunder, and lose the science of being. The
senses of Soul are without pain, and forever at peace;
nothing can hide from them the beauties of Truth; but
what a transient trust is the eye, when the power of
light and lens may all end with a prick of the retina.
To understand our being is to hold sight immortal.
The science of Soul preserves the sight, and there is no
physical science; the Principle of all phenomena is In-
telligence and Life, unconfined to matter; where the
altitude of the eye need not be perpendicular to the
geometrical plane; whatsoever is governed by Soul
instead of sense, is never deprived of the action or
blessing of Intelligence.
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We should never ask after the condition, structure,
We should never ask after the condition, structure,
or economy of the body, but take no thought about it;
– Soul governs man better than sense, and for the
body to be sensationless is science. The compound
minerals or aggregate substances that compose the
earth, the relations constituent masses bear to each
other, or the magnitudes, distances, revolutions, etc.,
of the celestial bodies, are of no real importance,
for all this must give place to the spiritualized under-
standing, that matter is not substance, and when we
admit this, man will be found harmonious and eternal,
even the idea of God, that expresses the harmony of
being.
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Material substance, geological calculations, etc., will
Material substance, geological calculations, etc., will
be swallowed up in the infinite Spirit that comprehends
and evolves all idea, structure, form, coloring, etc., that
we now suppose are produced by matter. The spir-
itual perception of man and of the universe constitutes
the true idea of both. While Columbus was putting
down one of the errors of personal sense, and giving
freer breath to the globe, the hands of ignorance and
superstition were chaining the honest limbs of the brave
old navigator; starvation and disgrace looked him in
the face, but sterner still had been the fate of him
whom history has since immortalized, had his discovery
embraced a Principle, undermining sensuality. Age
nor accident interferes with the senses of Soul; the
body has no sensation; it cannot see, hear or feel, not-
withstanding the belief to the contrary. Understanding
this truth, the Master knew no loss of our faculties can
occur except to belief; therefore he knew how to han-
dle personal sense, by putting it under his feet, which