Chapter IV - Creation
250:1
knowledge. Truth's question to Adam, error, viz., "Is
knowledge. Truth's question to Adam, error, viz., "Is
Life and Intelligence in matter?" rebuked and exposed
this would-be material consciousness.
250:4
"The Lord formed man of the dust, and breathed into
"The Lord formed man of the dust, and breathed into
his nostrils the breath of Life, and he became a living
Soul,"
250:6
put Truth in error! Intelligence in matter! made
put Truth in error! Intelligence in matter! made
the body mortal embrace the Principle of being that
embraces man! Did the Infinite enter matter through
man's nostrils? did God, the Truth and Life, enter the
sick, sinning, and dying body? then Deity would be
man, or man Deity, and Life mortal! this absurd belief
is atheism. "When God, who is our Life, shall appear,
then shall we be like Him." Man will be perfect, sin-
less, and eternal, when Spirit permeates man. Principle
never entered its idea, nor Spirit matter. We have no
record in Genesis that God gave Adam, error, dominion
over the earth, and yet, to belief, error holds this sway.
Adam was a product of belief, and Eve, of Adam, and
both were beliefs of Life in matter; we say beliefs
because that is not the Truth of being. Principle, and
not person, Spirit and not matter, Truth and not error,
God and not man, made male and female.
250:23
"And the Lord said, behold, the man is become as
"And the Lord said, behold, the man is become as
one of us, to know good from evil, and now lest he put
forth his hand and take also of the tree of Life and live
forever, therefore the Lord sent him forth from the gar-
den of Eden, to till the ground whence he was taken."
250:28
No one can doubt this scripture is allegorical, pointing
No one can doubt this scripture is allegorical, pointing
out the results of a belief of God in man, or Intelligence
in matter; we cannot accept it in a literal sense with
out impugning the Love that made man, and gave him
earth for a possession, and blessed it for his sake. A
251:1
literal acceptation of this quotation implies malice,
literal acceptation of this quotation implies malice,
withholding from man the opportunity to reform, lest
he should become better; but this is not our God, and
so contrary to Love and Wisdom, we must accept it
only as the pagan opinions of those re-writing the in-
spired word. The true interpretation of this scripture
is its spiritual sense. Beginning in person instead of
Principle, to explain God, we express him after the
manner of man, the nature of personal sense and on the
basis of error instead of Truth, drawing all our conclu-
sions from a material, instead of a spiritual standpoint,
hence the discord, theoretically and practically, that fol-
lows the belief of intelligent matter. "Behold, the
man is become as one of us." Error and not the Truth
of being, said that; man is not God, therefore he did
not become as one of "Us." Intelligence is not in
matter, therefore it is not personal sense; Spirit in mat-
ter would make God mortal man, and Intelligence and
Life, person instead of Principle, and body instead of
Soul. That this error be not reckoned Truth, or as
one of "Us," and claim the prerogative of Intelligence,
God said, let all that produces sickness, sin, and death,
"till the ground;" i.e., be understood as proceeding
from a material, and not a spiritual basis, and therefore
an error that returns to dust, primitive nothingness.
Let material things be understood forever, as apart
from the spiritual; think not to blend matter and Spirit,
for this is not the science of being, and will result in
discord and death. From the sweat of the brow to de-
rive Life or happiness, started with Adam, error; it was
from the "tree of knowledge," so unlike the harmony
and immortality of man created by Spirit. Lay not up