March 23 ~ The Science of Mind in a Year

What Is the Body? ~ Ernest Holmes

"When man first awakened to self-consciousness, he had a body with a definite form, showing that Instinctive Life - which is God - had already clothed Itself with the form of flesh. Body or form is the necessary outcome of self-knowingness.  In order to know, there must be something to be known.  Some kind of a body (or expression) always was and always will be, if consciousness is to remain true to its own nature.

Body is a concrete manifestation, existing in time and space, for the purpose of furnishing a vehicle through which Life may express Itself.  The physical Universe is the Body of God; it is a manifestation in form of the Mind of God.  It is that Creation which - while It may have beginnings and ends - of Itself neither begins nor ends.  The manifestation of Spirit is necessary, if Spirit is to come into Self-Realization - hence, Body.

We say that body is composed of matter, but what is matter?  Science tells us that matter is an aggregation of small particles arranged in some kind of form.  We are also told that matter is in a continuous state of flow.  Strange as it may seem, we do not have the same physical bodies that we had a few months ago, they have completely changed.  New particles have taken the place of the old, and the only reason that they have taken the same form is that something within has provided the same mold.  Our bodies are like a river, forever flowing.  The Indwelling Spirit alone maintains the identity."

The Science of Mind in a Year ~ Ernest Holmes

Thoughts Are Things ~ Ernest Holmes

"Health and sickness are largely externalizations of our dominant mental and spiritual states.  An emotional shock, or a mind filled with thoughts of fear, has been known to cause the momentary stoppage or acceleration of the heart.  Physicians now testify that, under emotional stress, particularly anger, the blood leaves a chemical deposit around the joints in the body.  Worry, fear anger, jealousy, and other emotional conditions, are mental in their nature, and as such are being recognized as the hidden cause of a large part of all the physical suffering to which the flesh is heir.  A normal healthy mind reflects itself in a healthy body, and conversely, an abnormal mental state expresses its corresponding condition in some physical condition.  Thoughts are things!

Modern psychology affirms that all the thoughts and emotions we have experienced since we came into conscious existence are still present in Mind, where ceaselessly active they manifest themselves as subjective tendencies that mold the body in health or sickness; and determine, as well, our reactions to all life and experience.

We do not maintain that this or that specific disease is always the result of thinking about such a condition; but we do assert that a prolonged discordant mental state is certain to eventuate in some form of physical ailment.  People have died of great grief; of broken hearts; of outburst of temper; of deep and continued resentment; of excessive worry, and many other mental states, in which there was no specific thought of sickness at all.  The point to remember is, that all mind activity inevitably tends to create its physical correspondent, so that an unhealthful and morbid mental state projects itself into the physical body.

Thoughts are things, they have the power to objectify themselves; thought lays hold of Causation and forms real Substance.  The word of man is the law of his life, under the One Great Law of all Life.  Thoughts of sickness can make a man sick, and thoughts of health and perfection can heal him.  Thought is the conscious activity of the one thinking, and works as he directs, through Law; and this Law may be consciously set in motion.  This Law will work for him to the fullest extent of his belief in, and understanding of, It.  A realization of the Presence of God is the most powerful healing agency known to the mind of man.

One with God

Until we awake to the fact that we are One in nature with God, we shall not find the way of life. Until we realize that our own word has the power of life, we will not see clearly.  The Bible points out that man has the same power, in his own life and in his own world, that it claims for God.  "The Word was with God and the Word was God," is an oft-repeated but little understood statement.  The promise to man is equally positive:  "The word is nigh thee, even in thine own mouth that thou shouldst know it and do it."  If any word has power, it follows that all words have power.  It means that every word which we hear, speak or think, has some power."

February 2 ~ The Science of Mind in a Year

SOUL ~ Ernest Holmes, The Science of Mind

Creative Medium

"We have spoken of the threefold Nature of Reality or God- the Trinity of Being- as Spirit, Soul and Body:  Conscious Intelligence, Subjective Law, and Form.  This threefold unity of Reality has been taught by most of the great spiritual philosophies and religions that have been given to the world.

We are using the word "Soul" in the sense of a Universal Soul, or Medium, through which Spirit operates.  It is the Holy Ghost, or third Person of the Chistian Trinity.  Like the creative soil, in which seeds are planted and from which plant life comes, the Soul of the Universe is the Creative Medium into which the Word of Spirit falls and from which Creation arises.

We should not, however, think of Soul and Spirit as separate from each other.  They are really two parts or aspects of the same thing, each being Self-Existent and Co-Eternal with the other.  The term Subjective Mind is used in speaking of the Univeral Soul, rather than the term Subconscious Mind, to avoid the impression that subjective means unconscious.  MIND NEVER COULD BE UNCONSCIOUS!  The Soul is subjective to Spirit, receives impressions from Spirit.  The Subjective Mind which we call Soul, is not a knower in the sense that Spirit is, i.e., It is not Self-Conscious.  It knows only to do without knowing why It does.  It is a doer or executor of the will of the Spirit and has no choice of Its own.  It is the business of Soul to reflect the images that Spirit casts into It.

Subjective Intelligence

The Soul is immaterial as we think of matter, but It is the Substance of Spirit and perhaps we could use the expression, "the matter of Spirit."  As all matter in the physical world is supposed finally to resolve into the ether form which it came, we may think of the Substance of Soul as we think of the ether of science, and realize that all form finally becomes Soul-Stuff again.

Perhaps the simplest way would be to think of It as the last and final analysis of matter.  (We continue to use this word in the face of the knowledge that scientists, in theory, have already done away with matter.)  We know that matter comes from somewhere, and the teaching is that Soul-Stuff is the source from which it comes.  We must, however, distinguish Soul-Stuff from Soul.  Soul is Subjective Intelligence, the Principle just beneath Spirit; for, while Soul may not have the conscious Intelligence to choose, It certainly has the Intelligence to execute the desire of Spirit.  IT IS NEVER IN ANY SENSE UNCONSCIOUS.  The Soul of the Universe is next in Principle to Spirit and is the servant of Spirit.  The term "Soul-Stuff" refers to the primordial or undifferentiated Substance from which all things are made.

While the Soul may not choose, having no self-consciousness of Its own, yet It has an Intelligence which is infinite, compared to the intelligence which we exhibit.  For instance, the combined intelligence of the race could not create the life of a plant, yet the Intelligence in the creative soil of the earth will produce as many for us as we ask, when we plant the seed of that which we wish to have created.

The same principle holds good in that greater Creative Medium of the Spirit, which we call the Soul of the Universe.  It has the Intelligence and Power to produce, but no choice as to what It is to produce.  Having no conscious mind of Its own, It receives all ideas given It, and tends to create a form around them.  If It could choose, It could reject, and this is as impossible as for the soil to say, "You must not plant spinach this year, you must plant cauliflower."  We can imagine what consternation would prevail throughout the world if just once the soil failed to function according to the law of its nature.  We need not be disturbed by such a fear.  It is bound to accept and to act.  It does not argue but at once begins to create a likeness of the pattern given it.  If we say "petunias," right back to us it says "petunias," and begins immediately the business of producing them.  Being a neutral, creative medium which knows neither good nor bad, it is conscious only of its own ability to do.  This is why some of the earlier philosophers referred to the Universal Soul, or Creative Medium, as a "blind force, not knowing, only doing."  This we know to be true of the nature of all law.  We are not discussing the Nature of the Spirit.  We are talking about Law.

Law

It must be apparent by now that the Creative Medium of Spirit is the great Mental Law of the Universe.  It is the Law, obeying the Will of the Spirit; It is the Universal Law of Mind.  All law is Mind in action.  Soul is the Medium through which all Law and all Power operate.  Being subjective, It cannot analyze, dissect or deny.  Because of Its Nature, It must always accept.  The Karmic Law, which means the Law of Cause and Effect, works through the medium of the Universal Soul, which is the Creative Principle of Nature and the Law of Spirit.

Let us bear in mind that neither Spirit nor the Soul of the Universe were ever created.  Each is eternal. Because this impartial, impersonal Soul is the medium through which Spirit works, and because It is a "blind force not knowing, only doing," It was called by the ancients "Maya," from which arose the teachings of the illusions of the mind - the mirror of the mind.

What is termed Subjective Mind, as the average person comprehends it, has no existence.  In reality, there is no such thing as your subject mind and my subjective mind.  If our subjective minds were isolated and things of themselves, we would be so completely separated that there would be no means by which we could communicate with each other. The next great bridge that psychology must cross is a recognition that what is called your subjective mind and my subjective mind is merely the place where Universal Subjectivity, the Creative Medium Itself, reacts to our personal use of It.

Within us, then, there is a creative field which we call subjective mind, and around us there is a field which we call Universal subjectivity.  One is Universal, the other individual, but in reality they are one.  There is One mental Law in the Universe and where we use It, It becomes our law, because we have individualized It.  It is impossible to plumb the depths of the individual mind, because it is not really individual but individualized.

Behind or within the individualized point is the Universal, which has no limits.  In this concept alone lies the possibility of an endless and an eternal expansion.  Everyone is Universal on the subjective side of life and individual only at the point of conscious perception.  We use the power of the Universal Mind every time we think!"