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Story of
Progress Speaking
generally, the thinking of man has run riot; it has been uncontrolled.
Man has not known that he needed a fixed basis for his thinking.
Usually he has based his thinking upon appearances and circumstances.
When circumstances are made the basis for conclusions, and these
conclusions are in turn the basis for further ones, then the whole
structure is in danger because the foundation is unreliable. This
method which ignores Truth, whether indulged in ignorantly or
otherwise, bears bitter fruit; a sense of lack, ungratified desires
accompanied by fear and doubt, and much confusion and turmoil in the
affairs of man. The
truth is that the perfect Mind is implanted within each individual and
can always be trusted to think true to the purpose of the Whole. When
we, as individuals, trust the inner guidance of God-Mind which thinks
perfect thoughts, we shall produce results in harmony with
God’s plan for creations. The
acknowledgment of but one Mind, one thought, one word, all divine, is
making it possible for man to say as Jesus did, "The words that I speak
unto you, I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he
doeth the works." John 14:10 After practicing until the right habit of
thought is established, man will, like Jesus, think as God thinks,
speak as God speaks, work as God works. This leads to success. In this
consciousness he will say as Jesus did, "He that hath seen me hath seen
the Father." John 10:30 Divine
Science predicates everything on Perfect Being and shows the true
relation of all things to their Source. The true and full use of our
spiritual and mental faculties is the means through which this
relationship is enjoyed. Keep
in remembrance the truth that God is All in all. Chapter Five The Work of Thought Commit thy
words unto the Lord, and thy thought shall be established. Prov. 16:3 Questions to
Alert Your Thinking
To
reason aright we must find cause. To understand creation, we must study
its source. To know what is possible to man, we must search his origin
and therein know his nature. To understand the work of thought, we must
discover its function in the God-Mind and realize that the same laws
apply on the plane of the individual. Divine
Science is based upon the principle that God is All in all. This One is
God, the Creator; God, the creative action; and God, the creation
– a trinity in unity. The value of Divine Science lies in its
unfailing principle, its never-changing basis, its exactness,
certainty, and universal applicability. Divine Science teaches that
creation is Spirit expressing; that creation is Spirit-Substance in
manifestation. It explains the law and order of perfect Mind in this
work of self-manifestation; it reveals the method by which invisible
Life, invisible Source, and invisible Spirit-Substance are made
visible. It teaches the method by which the Creator reveals Himself in
creation, known as the law of expression, the law of the trinity
expressing as unity. This is the law of the one perfect Mind and it
manifests throughout all creation for it is one law. Man then must
necessarily know Truth and understand the principle of unity in order
to experience the fulfillment of law within himself. An
infinite Source and Cause must be one which contains perfect
intelligence and limitless idea. Everything in existence is contained
within the infinite Source as idea. Idea is the natural product of
Mind, and consciousness is the knowledge of its power to carry that
idea into visible form. Without idea Mind would have naught of which to
think; and without consciousness it would not know anything of which to
think. Therefore they trinity of divine Mind combines these three which
work as one – Mind, Idea, and Consciousness. These three
compose one perfect intelligence ready for expression. The Creator as
infinite Mind, the Source, is God the Father. The perfect idea inherent
in God-Mind, which is to be created or pressed forth, is God the Son.
That knowledge which enables Mind to carry out its idea is perfect
consciousness, or God the Holy Ghost. Hence, the Universal or Absolute
Trinity is all pure Spirit, Absolute and Uncreate, Eternal and
Changeless, and is the basic urge underlying all life: Father,
Son, Holy Ghost Mind,
Idea, Consciousness The
process by which the Creator reveals or produces creation is called the
LAW OF EXPRESSION. By this law it is seen that like produces
like, or that which is born of Spirit is Spirit. This law
shows the relationship existing between Cause and effect, between God,
the Creator, and God, the creation. It works from the Invisible to the
visible, from Principle to example, from the Inner to the outer. This
is universally true and as we study we shall see that it works in the
same way on the plane of the individual. Infinite
Being, Spirit, is the state of perfection known as the Creator. Its
creation is the manifestation of itself and this manifestation must be
as perfect as is the Source. God is infinite Mind and manifests as
thought and word. God is infinite Spirit and manifests as living soul
and body. Thus by the law of expression we have these important
trinities: Mind,
thought, word Spirit,
living soul, body Since
by law like begets like, the living soul and body that comprise
individual man are image and likeness of Spirit. The image of God is
God expressed in individuality and as visible form; it is infinite Idea
expressed and expressing itself in mentality and visibility. The
likeness of God means that all inherencies and qualities of God, all
His ideas and potentialities, are implanted within Hi image. The nature
of the image is exactly like the nature of its source; that is, the
nature of man is exactly like the nature of God. God is Life, Love,
Truth; the image of God is life, love, truth. Infinite Source brings
forth after its kind that which is inherent within itself. God is
constantly expressing man in His image and likeness. Man then is not
something that has Spirit, but is Spirit. He is not something that has
body, but is body. The law of expression reveals the body to be Spirit
expressing; that is, substance, as vine, branch, and fruit are one and
the same substance. If the vine is grape, then the branch is grape and
the fruit is grape. There is but one Substance invisible and
visible. The substance of the vine is not changed by coming
forth into ranch and fruit; the Substance of infinite Source is not
changed by coming forth into the individualized expression of itself
– MAN. The
All is Good and the All is here. God is omnipresent and we are in His
presence from everlasting to everlasting. This proves the unity of God
and man, for man’s existence is right where God is, I in God
and God in me. Man could not exist as the reverse of God. This new
interpretation of life leads to a consciousness of what the Real is,
and of the true nature of all existence. If we rely upon the real
nature of what is, we have a fixed basis for peace, and a source of
faith. Let
us review in order to clarify our thinking and bring about the
realization that "I and the Father are one." It is well to study
carefully this law of expression, the divine order of creation, which
explains so exactly how it is possible and cannot be otherwise, that
man is made "in the image and after the likeness" of the Father GOD
IS THE ONE MIND, THE SOURCE OF EVERYTHING. ALL
THINGS HAVE THEIR ORIGIN IN THIS ONE MIND. MIND
HAS IDEA. MIND’S
ACTION IS THINKING. THINKING
BRINGS THE IDEA INTO THE VISIBLE, OR "THE WORD MADE VISIBLE." IT
IS LAW THAT LIKE PRODUCES LIKE. "In
the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was
God." John 1:1 Creation is the word of the Eternal made visible, or the
word become flesh. Spirit manifests as flesh, for though the form is
changed the Substance remains ever the same. This is the new
revelation, even the visible form is made of Spirit-Substance. We may
have a dim realization of this at the present time but the truth is
forever awaiting our recognition. Our divine nature can never be lost,
and sooner or later all shall awaken to its presence within them. Let
us study and contemplate the truth until full revelation (of the Truth)
dawns upon our minds. Although
Truth is omnipresent and changeless, thought "we live, and move, and
have our being" in God, the All_Good, yea, thought we dwell in the
Kingdom of Heaven but lacking many good things, and losing the
blessedness that is ours. Consciousness of Truth then is our great
need, not that more good may come to us, not that we may have more
strength or wisdom or life or health sent to us, but that our
comprehension may be opened to see that All is within our very nature
and that all God is, is forever ours. As
we reason from the order of this One in Self-expression, the conclusion
is that there is but One All. Since all things are produced by the
power of God’s creative action, the result is an exact image
of the idea of the Creator, and never is it otherwise. The Father is
the universal. The son is the individual. In and of universal
Substance, Life, Intelligence, and Power the individual is formed.
Hence, each individual is a center of Life’s activity, of
Mind’s intelligence and power, and is of the purity of
infinite Substance. And while each individual must acknowledge that "My
Father (the universal) is great than I," yet each may also say "I am
exactly what the Universal is. There is naught else to be, since man is
the individualized expression of God." The
purpose of creation is that the Creator may express, and the purpose of
individual creation is that the Creator may be expressed through and by
the individual. Man is created to carry on the work of the Creator and
he should know that he, too, is a triune being, that he is cause,
action, and result on his plane of existence, in his world of
experiences, conditions, and affairs. The law of expression works
through man as certainly as it does in God’s process of
creation. As
we study we understand that it is logical for man to be a triune being
for as we look at nature we discover many units which are made up of
three phases. All life on the planet is classified as mineral,
vegetable or animal; the very atoms into which so-called matter is
organized manifest in terms of three-ness, protons, neutron, and
electrons; the family comprises father, mother, and offspring; the
plant is composed of root, stalk, and fruit or flower; the functioning
process of any of man’s five senses consists of stimulus,
response, and reaction over nerves which are themselves made up of
neurons, axons, and dendrites. There are innumerable other
illustrations of such trinities, but these are sufficient to help us
understand the importance of the three-in-one principle upon which all
creation is based. Of
course we cannot in truth divide life, but to give clarity to our
thinking we may divide our concept of life into God and man, Invisible
and visible, Absolute and relative, Universal and individual. As we
have seen that God functions through the Absolute Trinity –
Father, Son, and Holy Ghost – or through the trinity of
divine Mind – Mind, Idea, Consciousness – we now
find that man on a lower level of awareness, the plane of the
individual, functions through a similar trinity – the
Super-conscious, conscious, and subconscious levels of mind. Each
individual, being an expression of the Father, possesses for his use
these three levels of mind: Superconscious,
or Christ Mind, the Father expressing on the plane of the individual. Conscious
level of mind, the son expressing on the plane of the individual. Subconscious
level of mind, the Holy Ghost manifesting on the plane of the
individual. This
truth of being gives man power to say "I am the thinker, the thought,
and the word." Every object that is made, every book that is written,
every picture that is painted began as idea in mind before being
expressed visibly. There is no visible thing but had its source, its
form, and its substance in the invisible. While man apparently
originates an idea, in reality he receives it from infinite
Intelligence because he sought it and was ready to receive it. He
brings it into expression by the inherent power of his consciousness.
Man’s thinking then is creative action and should have a
reliable base from which to operate. Unless that base is scientifically
true to principle, God’s law of good, man produces varied
conditions in his life. The one Thinker is God; the one God-Mind
produces ideas in man. Whether man thinks about ideas truly or falsely
the results will come forth according to his thinking and will manifest
scientifically by the law of expression in his experiences, conditions,
and affairs. Without
doubt the majority of people have proved to themselves the effect of
thought when learning to ride a bicycle or to steer an automobile. How
easily one steers directly into the very object he wishes to avoid if
he looks at that object and concentrates his thought upon it. Every
beginner learns by experience, or by the good advice of an experienced
"steerer," to look away from that which he wishes to avoid and to fix
his eye and his attention upon the place where he wishes to go in order
to reach it safely. The same law applies to our thinking: look away
from appearances of evil and keep "eye" or thought fixed upon the good
we wish, and we shall reach the goal. Hitherto we have not known that
the goodness, truth and love of God-Mind is set in action by our
thinking and speaking, but such is God’s law. All good is
ours of which to think and speak, so why waste opportunity by any
thinking or speaking which is contrary to Good? Not
until we acknowledge the infinite Source as the I that I am are we in a
condition to think and act divinely; for we shall always think and act
exactly in accordance with that which we believe ourselves to be and to
be related to. Not until we hold ourselves individually as divine Being
can we solve the problems of life satisfactorily, or enter the way that
leads to knowledge of Life Eternal which Jesus gave to the world. The
rue realization of oneness is knowing the true nature of the Creator
and creation, and conforming our ways to it. It is being lifted up to
know that all that really is, is Good. It enables us to act justly and
correctly in unity with the whole of power and correctly in unity with
the whole of power and the all of Good according to scientific law.
Many is one with God before or above all law, but the law of expression
shows the method by which man is to express himself in individual life,
through truthful thinking and speaking. It explains to him how he has
control over all conditions and how he may show forth his Perfect State
in all things. Man is one with God before he is born of God, and he can
never be outside of God. "I had planted thee a noble vine, wholly a
right seed." Jer. 2:21 Man is to cultivate this right seed by his
correct thinking and thus fulfill the purpose for which he was created,
to be a fixed center of action in the Infinite One. Thus man started
out, so to speak, with unlimited possibilities of Good. His Eternal
State is Perfection for God is his Being or Nature which is changeless. As
long as man does not realize that he is an individualized center of
God-activity and that he is to share in fulfilling the
Father’s purpose of bringing love, peace, harmony, and good
will to all, he is prone to use his thinking power for his own selfish
purposes. As long as man’s thinking is based upon anything
less than God’s idea of Good, he will experience confusion,
turmoil, and adverse circumstances in his world of affairs, for as
Emerson says, "Law obeyed or disobeyed brings opposite results." Man
has unknowingly made his own conditions of life and affairs. He is to
work out his state of perfection, and this is done by recognition of
his true Self through right thinking and right speaking. The same order
by which God is manifesting in existence must be maintained in
man’s thinking in solving the problems of life and in
demonstrating his true freedom. The law of expression fully understood
is of the greatest value to us. It is the way by which we have come
forth; and we need to apply it for the purpose of realizing our true
and harmonious relationship, not only with our source and Cause, but
with humanity. The Source of all idea being God, the omnipresent Mind,
then the true mental image of an idea will always bring realization of
that idea, and it will be actualized in the spoke word and in our
dealings with each other. When God-Idea is brought forth into form it
is the Real expressed and known. Fellow
student, by now your own thoughts have come to the place where they see
that if thinking turns aside and busies itself with outer "causes" it
fails in its work and gains nothing, for the outer cannot supply
anything to thought. It is the work of thought to look within, to
gather from within, to be illumined from within; then does it become
the outlet for Divine fullness, just as the branches of the tree draw
from the tree all the life and substance that is to make good fruit.
There is but one laws. It is omnipresent. The work of thought is to
recognize and carry from the inner to the outer all the good that
infinite Love holds for its offspring. Our
thought can be enlightened in truth only by turning to the Christ
within to unfold a consciousness of our oneness with the Father; a
realization that we are extensions of Him, functioning here to carry on
His work of love; a knowledge of truth that is based upon the Eternal;
an understanding of changeless Life and Being that reveals Spirit as
presence and power. These are to be the light of our thinking. We must
remain true to our basis, the omnipresence of God; know what we are and
fully believe in what we are, and with faith in the knowledge that like
produces like, trust what we are. Thought is to be diligent in
perceiving knowledge of one Presence and one Power; to hold to the
consciousness of ever-present fullness; to form the habit of thinking
of love, life, purity and perfection. Thought
is to recognize the unity of spirit and body and to declare fullness of
life and perfection for all things. True thoughts partake of the real
nature of the Source and give form to divine ideas and attitudes. "By
their fruits ye shall know them." Matt. 7:20 As
important as thought is, we must remember that that which represents
the nature of Being cannot control or guide Being; consequently neither
thought nor word can rightly control or guide. "I am the Way" should be
understood to mean that the right way is being the Way and expressing
what I am. I am before I think or speak. I precede by thought therefore
I cannot be the result of my thought. Thought has power to express the
Self but not to make it. What I am cannot change; it waits forever upon
recognition. Our divine nature – our real Self – is
the Christ our "hope of glory." Jesus declared this real Self when he
said, "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life." This divine nature is a
universal Presence saying "Lo, I am with you always." Matt. 28:20 As
soon as we recognize it, it is our glory, and then we shall have true
control, which is doing as the Father does, being the Way and
demonstrating the God-Self. We
are now accepting Omnipresence as our basis of thought, and the law of
expression as showing the exact place and work of thought. The power of
thought is derived from Mind; its substance also comes from Mind. We
assume the responsibility of controlling thought simply by thinking
correctly; of controlling words by speaking true to principle, and of
controlling deeds by acting in accord with the unity of the spirit.
When this is done we shall be able to perceive and read the silent and
invisible language or idea that lies back of all nature, the language
which is in the beginning, before thought, prior to expression. The
highest truths of the Unmanifest will reveal themselves to the
perception of one whose mental condition is purified by perfect thought. May
we rejoice in the beauty of this truth which is becoming more and more
clear to us. May the light of inspiration which glows in the words of
the founders of Divine Science be the spark which will set our hearts
aflame, bringing realization of harmony to ourselves and others. Listen
inwardly as Malinda Cramer instructs us in these forceful words: "Let
us cease to be prodigal in our conclusions and beliefs and awaken to
our Reality. Each of us, being the thinker of true thoughts, can change
his way of believing and know himself divine, a son or daughter of God,
and know that his life is God. Then, think of your life as perfect,
unlimited, and unending. There is but One Life. This is Truth, which to
know, makes free and brings peace that passeth understanding. What is
it to find the Kingdom of Heaven and dwell therein but to get
understanding and to become fully conscious that we live, move, and
have our Being in God? To thus know that the Kingdom of Heaven is a
hand is to think, speak, and act, that is, to live in the realization
of the power and glory of Being. "Our
work resolves itself into this: we are to make the thought, love, and
motive of Spirit our thought, love, and motive, and thus produce the
fruits of Spirit – effects which harmonize with the Supreme
All. Awaken to thine own inheritance of pure and perfect Being; lay
hold upon it, it is thine to use and to enjoy. Be true in thought, and
free from anxiety and fear; look steadfastly into the Unity of Being,
the perfect law of liberty, and thou shalt see that all that is, is
divine. ‘Be still and know that I am God.’ " Questions For Review and
Discussion
Divine
Science Its Principle and Practice
Copyright 1957 by Divine Science Church
and College Denver,
Colorado Made available
here by the ministry of Rev. Lawrence C.
Terry, M.Msc., D.Min. P. O. Box 68324 Indianapolis, IN
46268-0324 |
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