Part 39 (1/2)

Immutable ident.i.ty of man

261:21 Detach sense from the body, or matter, which is only a form of human belief, and you may learn the meaning of G.o.d, or good, and the nature of the immu- 261:24 table and immortal. Breaking away from the mutations of time and sense, you will neither lose the solid objects and ends of life nor your own iden- 261:27 t.i.ty. Fixing your gaze on the realities supernal, you will rise to the spiritual consciousness of being, even as the bird which has burst from the egg and preens its wings for a 261:30 skyward flight.

Forgetfulness of self

We should forget our bodies in remembering good and the human race. Good demands of man every hour, in 262:1 which to work out the problem of being. Consecration to good does not lessen man's dependence on G.o.d, but 262:3 heightens it. Neither does consecration di- minish man's obligations to G.o.d, but shows the paramount necessity of meeting them. Christian 262:6 Science takes naught from the perfection of G.o.d, but it ascribes to Him the entire glory. By putting ”off the old man with his deeds,” mortals ”put on immortality.”

262:9 We cannot fathom the nature and quality of G.o.d's creation by diving into the shallows of mortal belief. We must reverse our feeble flutterings - our efforts to find 262:12 life and truth in matter - and rise above the testimony of the material senses, above the mortal to the immortal idea of G.o.d. These clearer, higher views inspire the G.o.d- 262:15 like man to reach the absolute centre and circ.u.mference of his being.

The true sense

Job said: ”I have heard of Thee by the hearing of the 262:18 ear: but now mine eye seeth Thee.” Mortals will echo Job's thought, when the supposed pain and pleasure of matter cease to predominate. They 262:21 will then drop the false estimate of life and happiness, of joy and sorrow, and attain the bliss of loving unselfishly, working patiently, and conquering all that is unlike G.o.d.

262:24 Starting from a higher standpoint, one rises spontane- ously, even as light emits light without effort; for ”where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”

Mind the only cause

262:27 The foundation of mortal discord is a false sense of man's origin. To begin rightly is to end rightly. Every concept which seems to begin with the brain 262:30 begins falsely. Divine Mind is the only cause or Principle of existence. Cause does not exist in matter, in mortal mind, or in physical forms.

Human egotism

263:1 Mortals are egotists. They believe themselves to be independent workers, personal authors, and even privi- 263:3 leged originators of something which Deity would not or could not create. The creations of mortal mind are material. Immortal spiritual man 263:6 alone represents the truth of creation.

Mortal man a mis-creator

When mortal man blends his thoughts of existence with the spiritual and works only as G.o.d works, 263:9 he will no longer grope in the dark and cling to earth because he has not tasted heaven.

Carnal beliefs defraud us. They make man an involun- 263:12 tary hypocrite, - producing evil when he would create good, forming deformity when he would outline grace and beauty, injuring those whom he would bless. He 263:15 becomes a general mis-creator, who believes he is a semi-G.o.d. His ”touch turns hope to dust, the dust we all have trod.” He might say in Bible language: ”The 263:18 good that I would, I do not: but the evil which I would not, _that I do._”

No new creation

There can be but one creator, who has created all.

263:21 Whatever seems to be a new creation, is but the discovery of some distant idea of Truth; else it is a new multiplication or self-division of mor- 263:24 tal thought, as when some finite sense peers from its cloister with amazement and attempts to pattern the infinite.

263:27 The multiplication of a human and mortal sense of per- sons and things is not creation. A sensual thought, like an atom of dust thrown into the face of spiritual im- 263:30 mensity, is dense blindness instead of a scientific eternal consciousness of creation.

Mind's true camera

The fading forms of matter, the mortal body and ma- 264:1 terial earth, are the fleeting concepts of the human mind.

They have their day before the permanent facts and their 264:3 perfection in Spirit appear. The crude crea- tions of mortal thought must finally give place to the glorious forms which we sometimes behold in the 264:6 camera of divine Mind, when the mental picture is spir- itual and eternal. Mortals must look beyond fading, finite forms, if they would gain the true sense of things.

264:9 Where shall the gaze rest but in the unsearchable realm of Mind? We must look where we would walk, and we must act as possessing all power from Him in whom we 264:12 have our being.

Self-completeness

As mortals gain more correct views of G.o.d and man, mult.i.tudinous objects of creation, which before were 264:15 invisible, will become visible. When we realize that Life is Spirit, never in nor of matter, this understanding will expand into self-com- 264:18 pleteness, finding all in G.o.d, good, and needing no other consciousness.

Spiritual proofs of existence

Spirit and its formations are the only realities of being.