All's right with the world

Front matter

Cliap.. ...„._. Copyright No.

Shell

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

Preface

In passing over a mountain trail one's point of observation is often changed. Sometimes the traveler finds himself upon the edge of a precipice, looking down into dark and narrow valleys. Sometimes he climbs the heights and looks abroad over a superb and varied panorama of grand peaks and broad horizons. In our experiences of life we find that everything related to our happiness depends upon our point of view. We may lift up our eyes unto the hills even when walking in the valley of the shadow. We have wings ; like the dove we can fly away and be at rest. We can dwell in the confines of personal suffering, or gain the higher table-lands from which we can see the glory that excelleth in the universal life spread out before us.

The world is wearied with complaints of "hard times," "financial depression," and "social discontent." We are always looking to the future for remedies that never come. Let us open our eyes awhile to the possibilities of the present, and lay aside the smoked glasses of prejudice and ignorance through which we have looked at life. Let us identify God and man as inseparably united, — learn to unfold our latent powers and study the higher gospel of true worldliness. We will perceive that the Banquet of Life is always spread. Nature herself goes out into the highways and hedges to compel us to come in. None is really shut out from the feast except the self-exiled. All cause of suffering is in the individual himself. Life in very truth is opulence and equity.

Charles B. Newcomb.

Boston^ Nov. i, i8gy.

" The Bacon, the Spinoza, the Hume, Schelling, Kant, or whosoever propounds to you a philosophy of the mind is only a more or less awkward translator of things in your consciousness which you have also your way of seeing, perhaps of denominating. Say, then, instead of too timidly poring into his obscure sense, that he has not succeeded in rendering back to you your consciousness. He has not succeeded, now let another try. If Plato cannot, perhaps Spinoza will. If Spinoza cannot, then perhaps Kant. Anyhow, when at last it is done, you will find it is no recondite but a simple, natural, common state which the writer restores to you." — Emerson'' s " Intellect.^''

Contents

I. The Horizon of Natural Law .... 9

II. From Dan to Beersheba 11

III. Morbid Tenacity 16

I. The Horizon Of Natural Law

When we have new perception we shall gladly disburthen the memory of its hoarded treasures as old rubbish. — Emerson.

What is '^nature's law.'*" Is it not simply the horizon that limits our knowledge of today.''

Tomorrow we will have climbed higher — we will have a more elevated view — we will restate the law.

Yesterday we discovered gravitation. Today we are discovering magnetism. Yesterday the bit of metal fell to the ground. Today it rises to the magnet in obedience to an occult law of levitation which has apparently transcended for the moment that of gravitation.

We must not be too arbitrary in our definitions. We need not hurry to reach conclusions.

In the end we shall doubtless find that spirit governs every element and is absolutely free of limitation.

This seems to be a good working hypothesis today, and we find every encouragement in its application.

So let us not overvalue what we have called ** conservatism," or cling too tenaciously to the lO

conclusions of past thinkers. Every human being must breathe and eat for himself. We must not lean too much on one another in things intellectual or spiritual, or be afraid to move forward confidently.

We do not hold to yesterday's breath or yesterday's dinner. We may safely let go, perhaps, of yesterday's opinions.

Let us remember the manna in the desert. It was fresh every morning. He who gathered much had nothing over. True wealth is not mere accumulation, either mental or material.

Men and women often work like pointer dogs. They make wide ranges in the fields of philosophy, science, and religion — then stop rigidly on some small game, and cannot be induced to move till it is ''flushed."

We are too often magnetized by petty theories. They are like small game on the ground. We can never be free till we learn that our true horizon has no bounds and the soul no limitations.

II. From Dan To Beersheba

MILESTONES IN A PSYCHIC PILGRIMAGE.

Look within. Within is the fountain of good, and it will ever bubble up if thou wilt ever dig. — Marcus Aurelius.

In the usual reaction which follows a new and radical discovery of truth, the first impulse of the student is to distrust all that he has previously accepted, and commit himself ardently to the school which claims him as a disciple. In the end he too often finds that he has simply changed his label or intrenched himself in a new position which he is pledged to defend.

The truth-seeker should be a traveller, carrying very little baggage, trusting for his supplies to the resources of the country through which he journeys. If he become merely the disciple of a "cause " and the champion of a ''theory," he will inevitably find himself so engrossed with personalities that he cannot make much progress in the field of discovery.

Let us trace the usual course of the "investigator" of psychic forces.

Our pilgrim starts perhaps from the church. There he has been taught the theories of special creation, human limitations, and the '* scheme of redemption," in which his chief responsibihty is an act of faith.

He becomes interested in the discovery of spiritual forces and intelligences, which revolutionize his philosophy of life with all his former views of earth and heaven. His first step forward brings him into the mysteries of hypnotism. Here he receives a lesson in the possibilities of mind control through a subtle force which dominates heart and conscience, and like electricity sets at defiance time and distance, those two most important factors on the lower planes of life.

From the study of hypnotism he passes quickly to that of spiritualism.

He now obtains evidence of continued existence which science and theology have failed to reveal to him. He discovers at the same time that the conditions of that existence differ widely from all the ideas in which he has been instructed. In place of fixed states of happiness or misery, he learns that life means progress, and that every thought and every word and act has its legitimate and inevitable consequence which is neither ''reward" nor "punishment," and which is itself capable of being changed by bringing new causes into operation.

He discovers also the possibility of supplementing his human intelligence with that of better informed and sympathetic friends in the unseea

Here he encounters a real danger. In hypnotism he has been tempted by the power of dominating other minds at the sacrifice of their individual freedom. In spiritualism he endangers his own liberty by an unreasonable submission to minds that have dropped their mortal bodies. He has entered the realm of psychism. For a personal God he has substituted personal Will and the inexorable ''Law." The belief in a personal Devil has given place to a fear of obsessing spirits, malicious magnetism, and elementaries. It is only a few days' journey beyond materialism. In the prayer meetings of the church he has been taught to throw his responsibilities upon Jesus as a Saviour. He now exchanges the prayer meeting for the seance room, and is in danger of throwing his responsibilities upon the ''spirits." He learns that Jesus was a "medium," and he himself, perhaps, sits for development as a "sensitive."

After an experience of negative suffering, he seeks for higher thought in Occult Science and Theosophy. He discovers that the secret of spiritual power lies in the development of his own soul forces and in the realm of the positive.

From the seance room he passes into the occult circle. The "spirits" he now exchanges for the "masters" who also dwell in the unseen, though the Himalayas do not seem so remote to him as the spiritual spheres. Again he learns a new alphabet and new shibboleths, and is taught that Jesus was a "Hierophant."

Our pilgrim has travelled a long journey to discover at last that "the kingdom of heaven is within." Here he finds his true spiritual centre and reaches the place of wells — "Beersheba." He has successively passed the milestones of ecclesiasticism, materialism, and psychism, and arrived at last at the borderland of higher spiritualism. He has come from the colder north to the sunnier south of his Holy Land, to find in himself at last the "well of water springing up unto everlasting life." He has discovered the meaning of the words : "He that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the Light of Life."

Henceforth that Light is the glad star of his spiritual pilgrimage. "The Star which they saw in the East."

A spirit of controversy is not favorable to spiritual progress. We must at least accept a proposition as a working hypothesis, assuming it to be true, pending its demonstration or disproval. An unreasonable denial is as illogical as baseless assertion. An unfriendly attitude is not possible to the truly scientific mind. Such is not the attitude of the student in chemistry working in his laboratory, or of the mechanic in his workshop. Starting from a point of indifference, without prejudice, each of them seeks only to discover the law which governs in chemistry or mechanics. In mental science a principle begins to demonstrate itself at the very moment it is recognized, for then the student has committed himself to its action. Recognition is acceptance, and the harmonies of truth inevitably follow.

III. Morbid Tenacity

He in whom the love of truth predominates will keep himself aloof from all moorings and afloat. — Emerson.

Life is inspiration and expression. If we fail in one, we fail in both. We often close ourselves to fresh thought by our tenacity of the old. The attempt to harmonize the old and the new thought is as if a tree were to cling to its dead leaves and expect at the same time to renew its foliage. When good reason is shown for doing so, we must be willing to let go favorite ideas and prejudices. As long as we hold on we -cannot move forward.

We have been taught to '^hold fast that which is good." It is of equal importance to let go of whatever has served its purpose. Having gained a higher thought, why still cling to the lower.-* Life is not accumulation; it is circulation. Must existence, therefore, necessarily include unrest and disease, disappointment and loss .<* We fall easily into the habit of believing life to be chiefly discipline and trial. Is this the whole truth .-* Is not perfect peace possible here and now.-* Must work be always anxious, and rest without repose } Must we continue to hasten through our occupations without any real enjoyment, but only a feeling of dissatisfaction because of deficiencies .-*

We dwell too often in the negative conditions of life. We labor day after day, with no hope except the chance of attaining an indefinite goal called ^'heaven." *' Such is life/' we say to one another, as we limp along with heavy hearts, dimming eyes, and wrinkled faces. In our ignorance we pride ourselves that we can say, "Thy wilLbe done." We imagine sorrow and trouble are sent by God, and we moan with one another in "sympathy." Truly, Emerson might say that men are "like gods playing the fool." Let our eyes be opened and this nightmare be dispelled. We are but in the morning, and the long day stretches out in a glorious perspective.

Heaven can never be found through death. Death of itself brings nothing. It is an error to believe that death in the mortal sense is "gain." Through death we will not find treasures or lamented friends unless they and we, through the harmonies of truth, are drawn into spiritual companionship. Upon the other shore we shall find what we take with us. Gain comes only through development.

Environment is not a fetter, though often proffered as an excuse for the poverty of our lives. Such thoughts act as opiates to personal dissatisfaction. In bondage we may be, but, if so, as willing captives — slaves to many masters who all serve under the one great potentate of selfishness. We desire power, and yet are ruled by self-appointed taskmasters. Toiling and sweating under heavy burdens, dare men submit their troubles to an honest spiritual analysis and be ready to let them go ? This is a searching question. Self-pity is carefully nursed and enjoyed with morbid satisfaction.

There was once a young man in Galilee who thought he desired eternal life till he was bidden to relinquish his accumulations. He went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions. This is the case with many who are attracted to the new thought of the day. They make but little progress, and the reason is not difficult to find. They are not willing to let go. They want to hold on to old ideas, old standards of living, and old habits. They are afraid of finding themselves cut loose from the old moorings of thought. Anchored so many years, their anchors are embedded in the mud, and their life-craft is covered with barnacles. It would take a serious effort to cut their cables — to put the ship in order and be ready to sail on a voyage of discovery. Pride and indolence forbid. What would people think of such unusual preparations } The ocean of Truth is very wide. How can they, with a new pilot, sail away from the haven where a fleet of friends lies idly swinging at anchor.'* At last a storm arises and breaks the cable chains. The conservative mariners are driven out to sea by some event of life — a death, or an illness, possibly a bankruptcy. Their seamanship is tested as never before. It is found, alas! very sadly at fault, and navigation must be studied anew. Ballast has not been stowed away, and, as for cargo, it must all be thrown overboard to right the ship.

Then begins the great lesson of letting go. Adrift and not well provisioned, men realize that their so-called "faith in God" was only faith in friends, in bank accounts, in church, or social position. Their "great possessions" prove to be like the "emigrant's gold" — the iron pyrites of the mining regions that are carefully hoarded by the tenderfoot until he learns that "fool's gold" can buy nothing.

These fancied riches may be the self-righteousness of the pietist, the intellectual treasures of the scholar, worldly friendships, or influence and business credit. All these would be sadly compromised by any association with new cults. So men prefer their bondage, and indulge their indolence rather than let go. For the future, they are consoled by the expectation of a paradise where all treasures will be found; for the present, they cling to the bric-a-brac of life — things and friends and reputation.

But what is highly esteemed among men is but lightly regarded in the kingdom of good. Humanity can only postpone the day when there will be petitioners in bankruptcy mournfully crying, "Who will show us any good?" Men must begin some time and somewhere as little children, before they can enter the kingdom of Truth.

We need not be either ^< tempest tossed" or "fog bound" upon any day of our human existence, for we are spiritually equipped for every possible emergency of life, and need only recognize the divine power and intelligence at our command, to give us soundings and bring us into port.

It is always we ourselves who raise the billows that threaten to engulf us, and the fogs that shut out our horizon, through our own mental agitations. In the severest storm, that ship rides easily that is encircled by the oil thrown out from its own cargo.

IV. Christian Transgressors — The Disease Of Conservatism

No truth is so sublime but it may be trivial tomorrow in the light of new thoughts.

People wish to be settled ; only as far as they are unsettled is there any hope for them. — Ejnerson.

Progress is from the Latin ''pro," meaning forward, and ''gradi," to step. Retrogress is from "retro" and ''gradi," meaning to step backward, and transgress is to step across.

"The way of the transgressor is hard."

This is true of all who abandon progress and undertake to swing across the tides and currents of fresh thought, preferring old beliefs and prejudices.

No matter how closely they are allied with religious creeds and organizations, they may be "transgressors," and, if such, must inevitably suffer for what, perhaps, they mistakenly imagine to be wise "conservatism."

Conservatism of error is never wise, and such suffering can in no sense be called "divinely appointed."

The only remedy is to recognize the harmonies of progressive thought, and accept the truth that "in good we are moved and have our being."

The modern transgressor usually prides himself upon his loyalty to thought that has really been outgrown by awakened minds. He enjoys the posing as a ''conservative," and very likely at the same time insists that he is ''liberal." The doctors and clergymen find their largest clientage among this class, for they are often chronic invalids, and their families are usually ailing and delicate.

Mental science finds no difficulty in the diagnosis of such cases.

The modern transgressor takes more counsel of his fears than of his confidence. He dwells upon his weakness rather than his strength. In politics and finance he is sure to consider every possibility of disaster and defeat that he can conjure up. These he exaggerates and magnifies to the greatest degree. The elements of success he considers last. He denies all recognition of his highest intelligence — the intuitional faculties. He prides himself on being "practical," and considers himself entitled to great credit for his "common sense."

And so with bat-like blindness he knocks himself against first one difficulty and then another, often losing everything except his egotism.

At last he leaves the body, wearied with what he imagines to be the necessary "conflict of life," and when his friends are saying he has "closed his eyes in death," those eyes are being opened for the first time to the meaning of real life, to which they have been always per^stently and obstinately blind.

There is a curious fiction in the line of that old hymn :

"When mine eyelids close in death."

As a matter of fact the eyes of the dead persistently open wide, and it is difficult to close them. It is as if nature herself intended to show that instead of the ''sleep of death," of which we hear so much, the change that has come is one of real awakening to a life of progress.

BRIC-A-BRAC BONDAGE.

The man or woman who would have remained a sunnygarden flower, with no room for its roots and too much sunshine for its head, by the falling of the walls and the neglect of the gardener is made the banian of the forest, yielding shade and fruit to wide neighborhoods of men. — Einerso?i.

An owner of ground sometimes sees his opportunities and clears away dilapidated buildings, replacing them with better ones.

Sometimes he is neglectful, and a conflagration sweeps his property clear and shows him plainly that it is for his interest to build larger, fairer, and more commodious structures, better adapted to the wants of the day.

The fire is often a spontaneous combustion from accumulated rubbish.

Can we not see how these experiences are typical of life }

How often do we find our fortunes swept away as by a conflagration, or ourselves prostrated by disease, or transferred by death to new activities.

Doubtless, we suffer just as much to be taken away from all we have cherished in life, as to have our possessions taken from us while remaining here.

There can be no doubt that the awakening after death is often to a sense of complete bankruptcy and irreparable loss of friends, property, and influence. What then remains to the spirit, whether here or there ?

Simply to build again upon more solid foundations — to construct a more stately home for the soul, either in mortal or immortal realms — to so change the thought of life that its vibrations will attract, as a magnet, a more opulent and imperishable environment.

We can never truly enjoy or possess till we have awakened to the truth that all we have springs from what we are, and that no plane of life has yet been discovered upon which this law does not govern.

Let us not be in bondage to our bric-a-brac — to the selfish routine of life — or the claims of mistaken friendship. Let us not be slaves to any rigid purpose or ambition which could cramp or hinder us in our soul's progress. Let us not be fettered by opinions.

If one has had a glimpse of the eternal equities, his brow can never again be clouded with anxiety and care ; his heart can never be heavy with a sense of fear or loss.

We are the rightful masters of the universe and make its laws.

When we become sensible of our limitations (which we have made ourselves), we call them natural law, and intrench ourselves behind what is but the phantom of our ignorance. This we hasten to embody in the text -books of our sciences.

No wonder that we are so continually obliged to revise and revolutionize our ^'scientific conclusions," so that yesterday's ''standard work" is valueless today.

Our horizon line recedes as we advance. The limits of our atmospheres are not so easily reached as we imagined, and their composition is not so simple as we thought. The laws of storms are not so readily defined as we supposed. The forces of nature are not limited to the few elements with which we have made acquaintance. The simple wild rose can be differentiated by our new botany into thousands of varieties.

The universal life is found to be a plastic force which we ourselves are learning to direct — to limit and expand at will in its relation to ourselves.

The latest revelation of these closing days of the century, is not only that man is his own creator, but that he is the creator of all subordinate forms of life, and that no element yet discovered wholly defies his control.

Principles are the only absolute laws.

Fixed opinions are dangerous, whether of persons or things, of ourselves or one another. They take no account of the laws of growth or of the fact, as Emerson says, that all nature is "fluidic."

Even the " everlasting hills " we know to be forever changing in disintegration and reconstruction. Periodic cataclysms remodel the entire face of the globe and bring forth new worlds of plain and mountain. So does man change. He needs continually to renew acquaintance with himself and his fellows.

The real science of life is ever fresh adjustment. We never truly know ourselves or one another.

We are never really the same in two successive days. Nature abhors fixity as much as she abhors a vacuum.

Conservatism is an impossibility ; it is a purely fictitious quality.

Even our conceptions of good are never quite the same at successive periods of our development.

They advance with our knowledge and experience of life.

No two mortals can possibly worship the same God or hold to exactly the same standards, for both are the results of different experience.

We begin by believing in the despotism of a personal God, whom we distort into a demon. We call this ''religion." As we progress we substitute for the tyranny of a God, the tyranny of a ''law."

We call this "science." This is only changing the name of our deity.

A step forward enlarges our horizon. We discover that the law of our being is all we need to recognize ; it reveals the universal and interprets all.

We must be polarized to principle and not to theories and dogmas.

When we are thus in equilibrium, we can take our compass into any waters, and it will always show us the true north.

When magnetized by ideas and prejudices, we cannot voyage beyond the length of our cable chain.

All our experiences serve as mirrors to reveal us to ourselves. We gain little from books, but the revelation of our own minds, and no real help from people but aids to self-discovery. No satisfaction from experience except as it results in self-development. Plato has said that all knowledge is reminiscence.

The mirror adds nothing to form or feature of the one who stands before it.

It takes away nothing except in appearance, if it be concave or convex. If it is a true reflector, it show? the man to himself and as he is.

Life brings the awakening to spiritual consciousness on the objective plane. Can there be any question that it is well worth living ?

"All that we are is built out of what we have thought." — Dhammapada.

It is well that life makes such demands upon us and will not be satisfied with an easy discipline, nor confer upon us her degrees of honor till we have thoroughly proved our right to hold them. It is well worth while to be a graduate in all her schools. Her courses are severe ; but she never fails to put her faithful pupils in possession of illimitable powers, through unfoldment, which is the only education.

A memory that etches anything too deeply into our brain-cells only cramps and hinders us. We should not fear to lose anything we really need to hold.

If we gave less attention to the holding we would find ourselves more free. A true spiritual poise is never possible where either memory or expectation is unduly indulged and becomes habitual.

Confident concentration at the point of personal indifference puts us in possession of the largest spiritual power. This is the inevitable result of knowledge.

VI. Postponement A Delusion

'"Tis life of which our nerves are scant — O life, not death, for which I pant, More life and fuller that I want."

I PREACH a gospel of true worldliness. Let us eat, drink, and be merry with the fruits of righteousness, and know that we shall not die tomorrow.

We err in thinking spiritual good can be purchased by self-denial. Life is not a matter of barter : a meal the less, a virtue the more ; a material indulgence sacrificed, a spiritual illumination gained ; this world denied, another world secured as a reward. Let us recognize the full value of the here and now.

Too long have we postponed our highest good to an uncertain future. We have thought life an illusion, and lived in a dream of ''heaven."

We have been reluctant to face our responsibilities of today.

Our piety has been largely indolence. Rather than reconstruct the world in which we find ourselves, we have been willing to postpone our good things to another, which we pictured as ready for our habitation and peopled with congenial spirits enjoying their reward. Yet we have no reason to think that death releases any soul from even the least of its responsibilities. Rather must it open its eyes to a larger recognition of them.

Can we not understand that the work we are postponing is not to be escaped by death, but that after death we shall demand infinitely more of ourselves than we do now, as a necessary condition of the peace that we desire ?

If we could realize this, would we not take up more gladly the life that now is, and work out its problems with greater satisfaction and cheerfulness .''

The religion that feeds itself on the emotions, and talks of the life that is to come rather than apply itself to the duties and privileges of the hour, must prove worthless at the last.

The wedding feast is open only to those who are equipped for its festivities.

Heaven is doubtless a very great disappointment to most people.

Many a saint whose body lies buried beneath a solemn monument sculptured with some text of promise and reward, whose friends imagine him to be among the very chosen ones around the throne, we have every reason to believe is groping sadly for the light of truth to which he denied recognition in this life, and seeking to undo, as far as possible, the work that was most loudly praised among his fellow men.

This is no fanciful speculation.

This world is our problem. If we focus upon it all our spiritual powers, we will discover that it is not the *' desert " we have named it.

It is a garden of delights, a veritable Eden to those who are not blind and deaf.

What right or reason have we to suppose a "Paradise Lost," or anticipate a "Paradise Regained ?"

It is a shuffling evasion of the truth.

The promise of a millenium in the infinite perspective is a moral anaesthetic, with which we hush the clamor of our souls, demanding better things of us in the present.

All responsibilities and possibilities are ours today.

Let us have done with this affectation of aversion to the world in which we live, this indefinite postponement of our happiness and powers. Let us cultivate worldliness, and learn truly what it is to enjoy the present.

There is no problem that belongs to our time which we cannot solve.