Chapter III - Spirit and Matter
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mortal body, and thence to the immortal; this belief
mortal body, and thence to the immortal; this belief
is a relic of heathenism; we have no beliefs that are
not. Personality is not man, therefore the body mor-
tal is but a belief of man, and not the reality of him.
Life, Truth, and harmony are the reality of being,
and man is the idea of these; hence the body mortal
is but belief and error, discord and death. Shakes-
peare's description of age presents a picture of mortal
man; our bodies are not the repositories of us, else all
would go down to dust. I is Spirit and not matter,
and Spirit never for a moment entered or animated
matter. If happiness is personal sense, joy is a trem-
bler and builds on sand; or if materiality is man the
very worms do rob us.
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To understand Intelligence nor Life are in the body,
To understand Intelligence nor Life are in the body,
is to conquer age and hold being forever fresh and im-
mortal. The error of growing old is seen in the history
of an English lady, as narrated in the London Lancet.
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In early life she was disappointed in love, became
In early life she was disappointed in love, became
insane, in which she lost the calculation of time, and
lived only in the hour that parted the lovers, never
afterward recognizing the lapse of years, and speaking
only from that sad hour. The effect of this was, she
literally grew no older, and when seen by some of our
American travellers at seventy-four years of age, pre-
sented the entire appearance of youth, not a wrinkle
or gray hair marred the picture, but youth sat gently on
cheek and brow. Before being informed of her history
the visitors were asked to judge of her age, and each
placed her under twenty. This instance of preserved
youth suggests a point in science not to be overlooked,
and which a Franklin might have built upon, or a New-
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ton, with more certainty than the falling apple; years
ton, with more certainty than the falling apple; years
had not made her old, and wherefore? because she did
not believe she was growing old, but lived according to
another belief in the hour of youth, the result of which
was, time could not make her aged, for the body repre-
sented the belief. Mind must say she was growing old,
or the body would not present the aspect of age. She
was young because during all those years she had never
believed she was becoming old, therefore time fell pow-
erless at her feet. Impossibilities never occur, and one
such instance as the above, proves it not impossible to
be young at seventy-five years of age, but the Principle
of this proof is worth more than the bare fact; it ex-
plains the cause of decrepit age, and how to avoid it.
Never record years and keep time tables of births and
deaths, if you would preserve the full faculties of wom-
anhood and manhood. It is only because every hour
of our years, mind is admitting we are growing old,
that it is difficult to present three score years and ten
unmarred by age. It is not the years but the belief
that years make man infirm, that brings the infirmity of
age; "as a man thinketh so is he." A belief of acute
disease – and all disease is belief – is more readily
destroyed than the chronic, because mind has not set-
tled the question so decidedly, nor admitted the belief
as long; the mental force of habit is not as strong in
one case as in the other. The belief that man has
birth, maturity and decay, is simply saying he is a veg-
etable animal, the animal not fit to live, and the vege-
table incapable of Life. Soul is Spirit, and Spirit Life;
God, neither an infant, adult, nor decrepit; and man
is "the image and likeness of God," then what prece-