Chapter 2 - DENIALS OF SCIENCE

If the statement of what is true from the very nature of our own mind is called to our attention, then we are able to see at once what is not true.

Is there a conviction of Good belonging to you now in your own mind? That is an omnipresent conviction. Everything and everybody believes the same way. You will notice that the instant you acknowledge that there is Good for you which you ought to have, the thought arises within your mind that you do not have the Good that belongs to you. You feel that your Good is absent from you. This is also a universal feeling. Every man, woman, child, stone, stick and snail feels that its Good is somewhere else than in it or with it. This is known as the conviction of absence. The conviction of presence is not uttered. That is, we feel the idea of the Good being for us, but we do not say so, and we feel the idea of the Good being absent and we keep saying so. We think that our Good is absent. We say aloud that our Good is absent.

Do you not see a possibility of entering upon your own beautiful inheritance of satisfying Good by looking this strong fact in the face? Does it not remind you that John, the wise disciple of Jesus Christ, said that without the Word nothing is made? How plain it is that you have been ready with the rest of the world to say that your Good is absent from you. How plain it is that you have been silent on the main idea that there is Good for you which you ought to have. Thus it seems that the silence of your mind with respect to Good is accountable for all the appearances of what is not good.

John, the Revelator, speaks of a white stone. Moses said the Spirit moved upon the face of the waters and commanded, "Let there be light." Moses and John were lovers of God. They felt great laws and principles moving through the universe and tried to express them. Moses did not always speak in symbols. He said to the people that the "I Am that I Am" spoke through him. He felt the Good within himself speak.

The moment that the idea which has always lain so silently in the mind is uttered it begins to tell great things with respect to itself. This is why it is called the Stone of Revelation — because it reveals. It brings a feeling of light and hope to the mind, and this is why Moses said, "Let there be light". He felt the strange darkness of the talk around him concerning the absence of Good, and instinctively understood the gloom of the silence as to Good. Good is the name of God. The Good that is for you is your God. Do you not move toward your Good? When you wish, is it not for your Good? Thus you are governed by your Good.

The metaphysical teaching calls attention to the law that if you tell the truth about your Good it will appear in your life. It is like speaking of the relation of numbers in arithmetic until you see exactly how they work. Repeat the multiplication tables, and sometime along the way, if you have taken the steps before multiplication, you will see that it is quick counting. If you simply repeat the tables at the dictation of another mind you may have to work a long time to find how to add by the tables of multiplication. But taking the adding and multiplication together it dawns upon you what the after process means.

The Science of Mind always runs by orderly steps in the same way. The first chapter of Genesis is the Science of Mind stated in the exact order of coming forth as power, as intelligence, as substance.

The idea of the absence of Good is plainly spoken enough.

The idea of where the Good must be, and is, we are not talking about as a race. It is to the race mind that Moses addresses himself. John also speaks to the universal conviction of absence. I will tell you that between you and your Good which belongs to you, and which you ought to have, is your idea of the absence of Good.

The second movement of your mind, after telling what truly is, you will find to be the putting away of your ideas that interfere with the substance of what you are seeking. You put away the idea of absence the first time you speak of your idea of Good. Tell the absolute truth about your idea of Good. Is there any absence of it? Is there any mixture of evil with your highest idea of Good? Where do you keep your idea of Good? Do you hide it in your mind and never express it? How do you know how much light might break over you and brighten your life if you would let it come up from the hidden place in your mind — your perfect idea of Good?

It is like every other mind's idea of Good. Thus we deal with the Universal Mind when we tell that in our highest idea of Good there is no evil. We say that in our idea of Good there is no absence. The Good that we are all seeking is our substance. It must be substantial to us. It must be present with us or it is illusion it deludes. Here then you see why metaphysicians of all ages have made two great denials:

First There is no evil.

Second — There is no matter.

This is because they looked so steadfastly at the word God, or Good, in their mind that its native action began in them. The Stone of Revealing makes you say that there is no evil and no matter.

St. Augustine said, "There is no evil." Jehosephat said, "There is no iniquity in God." Emerson said, "Evil is negation." They did not explain that it was their idea of Good that  should have no evil mixed with it. If every man, woman and child expressed his idea of Good it would be found to be like every other person's idea of Good.

Spinoza said, "I choose to know Spirit rather than to imagine matter." Channing says that since the beginning of time, in philosophical study, men have held that all is Spirit, and that matter is but an appearance, a delusion, having no reality. Thales, the Greek, thought so. Empedocles thought so. They did not explain that it was because their idea of Good was an enduring and substantial presence that could not fail and could not disappoint. They could not tell that matter is the result of thinking that Good is absent. Matter is that appearance which results from steady silence as to what and where our Good is; we might say as to where and what the Good is upon which subject all mankind are so silent. We may say "Our Good" or you may always say "My Good," for each one of you is the unit of his own life, and all his conditions swing around himself.

Demonstration of mental science means making visible our ideas. We must make it visible that there is no evil if the idea is true. The Truth makes free. All I am expected to do to manifest the Good that is for me is to tell the truth about what and where Good is. Good is God. Thus the making of good demonstrations will surely come out into our life if we tell the truth about God.

Jesus Christ said, "The truth shall make you free." Let us tell the truth. To say, "In my idea of Good there is no mixture of evil," is to tell the truth. It is a truth which will work freedom from evil. It will show that all evil is delusion. Here is where the denial of matter hurries in. Say that in your idea of Good there is no delusion. Very soon all matter will appear as delusion. You cannot say that in your idea of Good there is no mixture of evil without coming straight to the realization that all matter is delusion, built by belief in the absence of Good, which is evil.

Carlyle speaks of the everlasting NO of this world, whereby the world seemed to be a charnal house and demoniacal till he faced it with the stupendous "NO" of his soul, and said to all evil, "I am free." In the Book of the Dead we find how the soul talks after it is not afraid of the body any more. It, the soul, says, "I never committed adultery. I never stole from my neighbor. I never told a lie. I was never intoxicated." Every known sin is pronounced NOTHING. Formerly, it was not thought safe for men to speak these ideas while walking about on this plane of existence.

Jesus Christ said that if any man would come after him he must deny himself while dealing with the world. He knew the mystic relation of boldly spoken Truth to the redemption of man from the conditions of matter. "If a man eat of the bread which I will give him, he will never die." "The flesh profiteth nothing." "The words I speak unto you, they are life." The second lesson of His life was denial, exactly as the second lesson of Moses was denial, and exactly as all profound thinkers have given denials to all claims of mortality. It all comes of putting down the idea of Good in the mind and looking at it as to a white substance or "stone," with power of revealment in it. The highest word that we know how to express is "Good." It is certain that for a progressed realization there must be another word to express what we seek, but "Good" is found to bring us out the most safely thus far.

If we put down the idea "first cause" as...