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Christian Healing
Lesson 9
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[Christian Healing]
[Charles Fillmore's Works] [Unity on the Web Home Page]
Lesson Nine
Imagination
1. The teachings about the things of Spirit are said to be
mystical. We have thought them so because we have not come
into consciousness of the many faculties necessary to
comprehend Spirit. Victor Hugo said: "There are no occult
or hidden truths; everything is luminous with mind." So we
find in the study of Truth that what is called mysterious
and occult is simply a range of facts that man has not yet
explored. When he expands his mind and takes in a larger
horizon, he sees the interrelation of a multitude of
hitherto unknown laws which, from his former viewpoint,
seemed mysterious.
2. Mind manifests through faculties; if mind is to
comprehend increasingly, there must be an increase of these
avenues. That man has latent possibilities goes without
argument; that there is a limit to the ability of the mind
is unthinkable. What a man imagines he can do, that he can
do. The doing is a question of adopting the right way. To
allow the imagination to drift in daydreams never brings
anything to pass. Ideas must be worked up into living,
breathing, thinking things. Man can compress his vagrant
ideas into visibility as the chemist liquefies and makes
visible the invisible atmosphere; but to do this he must,
like the chemist, have the necessary machinery.
3. Physiology says that, in order to think, man
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must have brains. However, thinking is not limited to
material brain cells but, like everything else in the
universe, has a wide range of expression. There are brains
within brains, and cells within cells. All through the body
are brain centers, whose offices have not yet been
determined. Psychology shows that these nerve centers are
acted upon by invisible forces; it teaches that man has
what is called a subconscious mind, which transcends the
conscious mind in knowledge and in ability. Jesus gives us
this still higher teaching concerning our mental powers:
Man has a mind called the Lord, transcending both the
conscious and the subconscious minds. Yet the harmonious
working together of these three seemingly separate minds is
necessary to the bringing forth of the latent possibilities
of the man.
4. In truth there is but one Mind; in it all things exist.
Accurately speaking, man does not have three minds, nor
does he have even one mind; but he expresses the one Mind
in a multitude of ways. To believe in the possession of an
individual mind, and that it is necessary to store up
knowledge in it, makes living burdensome. This is why very
intellectual people are often impractical and unsuccessful;
they have accumulated more knowledge than they have wisdom
and power to apply. Like the miser who starves surrounded
by his gold, they perish for lack of real understanding.
Through thinking of their stored-up knowledge as a personal
possession, they have insulated it from the original fount
of
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wisdom and life, and it has consequently become stale and
forceless.
5. There is in man that which, when opened, will place him
in direct contact with universal knowledge and enable him
instantly and continuously to draw forth anything that he
may wish to know. God is our fount of wisdom, even as He is
our source of supply. The understanding of the Christ Mind
reveals that man of himself knows nothing. Jesus, who
developed this higher consciousness, claimed that all His
knowledge and power came direct from the Father: "I can of
myself do nothing." "The Father abiding in me doeth his
works."
6. All that man really needs is the quickening and rounding
out of the thinking centers in his consciousness; that
having been done, Divine Mind will think through him. This
supreme Mind holds man at its center, a perfect instrument
through which to express its possibilities. The writer of
the first chapter of Genesis says that man is formed in the
image and after the likeness of God. He is the I-am-age, or
the identical I AM of God-Mind in expression. God looks
into the mirror of the universe and sees Himself as man; He
gives Himself to man, and man in his highest is God
manifest. "He that hath seen me hath seen the Father." Thus
God gives to His image the power to express all that He is.
This not only includes man's ability to think, but also the
power to shape and form thought. This formative power of
thought requires a distinctive faculty,
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which is called the "imagination." The mind makes its forms
in a way similar to that in which cooks make biscuits.
First is the gathering of the materials, then the mixing,
then the biscuit cutting, which gives shape to the
substance. In thinking, man accumulates a mass of ideas
about substance and life, and with his imagination he makes
them into forms.
7. Whatever we mirror in our minds becomes a living, active
thing, and through it we are connected with the world about
us. Through the work of the imaging faculty, every thought
makes a form, and multitudes of thoughts make multitudes of
forms. These crowd in upon one another around the central
I-am-age, and appear in what is called the body. Physiology
says that all the organs of the body are made up of cells,
and that every cell contains the essential elements of its
particular organ. The liver is made of a multitude of liver
elements, the heart of heart elements, and so forth. The
starting point is an idea, and through the mechanism of the
mind (often erroneously called the mechanism of the body)
man forms his organism. With this key anyone can unlock the
door of his temple and in mind visit all its various rooms
and set the furniture in order.
8. The imagination has its center of action in the front
brain; it uses what phrenology calls the perceptive
faculties. It is really the author of these faculties;
size, weight, form, color, and the like are its children.
When it flashes its light into the cells that
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make up the organs, they at once respond to the thought,
and out of substance visible and invisible make forms that
correspond to the idea held in imagination. If the idea
originates in Spirit, the creation is harmonious and
according to law. The nerve centers are so sensitive and
receptive to thought that they take impressions from
without and make in the ether the forms that correspond to
the impressions received. This is an inversion of the
creative law, which is that all creations shall have their
patterns in the mind. When man allows his imagination to
run on in a lawless way, he brings about such discord in
mind and body that the flood of error thought submerges his
understanding and he is drowned in it. "And Jehovah saw
that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that
every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only
evil continually." "And I, behold, I do bring the flood of
waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesh."
9. All things, including the mind, work from center to
circumference. A knowledge of this fact puts man on his
guard and causes him to direct that his imagination shall
not create things in his mind that have been impressed upon
him from without. This does not imply that the outer world
is all error, or that all appearance is the creation of
finite mind; it means that the outer is not a safe pattern
from which to make the members of the body. When Moses was
instructed by the Lord to furnish the tabernacle, the
command was, "See . . . that thou
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make all things according to the pattern that was showed
thee in the mount." "The mount" is the place of high
understanding in mind, which Jesus called the kingdom of
God within us. The wise metaphysician resolves into ideas
each mental picture, each form and shape seen in visions,
dreams, and the like. The idea is the foundation, the real;
when understood and molded by the power of the word, it
creates or recreates the form at the direction of the
individual I AM. By working with this simple law, man may
become an adept or master. By handling the cause of things
he attains mastery over things, and instead of giving up to
his emotions and feelings, he controls them. Instead of
letting his imagination run riot, conjuring up all sorts of
situations, he holds it steadily to a certain set of ideas
that he wants brought forth. "Thou wilt keep him in perfect
peace, whose imagination is stayed on thee." (Is. 26:3,
margin.)
10. As man develops in understanding, his imagination is
the first of his latent faculties to quicken. Esau
represents the natural man. Jacob represents the
intellectual man supplanting Esau; hence Jacob is called
the "supplanter." Historically, he seems a trickster,
taking advantage of those of less wisdom, but this incident
merely shows how the higher principle appropriates the good
everywhere. Imagination was the leading faculty in Jacob's
mind. He dreamed of a ladder reaching from earth to heaven,
the angels of God ascending and descending upon it. This
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is prophecy of union between the ideal and its
manifestations, between Spirit and body; the union is made
by pure thoughts of the absolute--the angels of Jacob's
dream. Farther along in his development Jacob awakened all
his faculties, represented by his twelve sons. Joseph was a
dreamer and an interpreter of dreams. He was the favorite
son of Jacob, the I AM, who gave him a coat of many colors.
This is all representative of the imaging faculty, which
Joseph typifies.
11. The history of Joseph is the history of man's
imagination developed under the divine law. His dreams were
messages from God, and God interpreted them for him; his
life is one of the most interesting and fascinating
romances in the Bible. For a time the way of Joseph was
thorny, but through his obedience to Spirit he reached the
highest place in the king's domain. This shows that man
begins the development of the imagination in the darkness
of materiality and in the depths of ignorance, represented
by Joseph's being cast into the pit and sold into Egypt.
Through spiritual understanding, the "dreamer" becomes the
most practical son of the family; by following his dream
interpretations, multitudes are saved from starvation. The
individual application of this is: Having our attention
fixed on Spirit, we discern the ebb and flow of the forces
in the organism, and we know how to conserve and husband
our resources.
12. Instead of treating the visions of the night as
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idle dreams, we should inquire into them, seeking to know
the cause and the meaning of every mental picture. Every
dream has origin in thought, and every thought makes a mind
picture. The study of dreams and visions is an important
one, because it is through these mental pictures that the
Lord communicates with man in a certain stage of his
unfoldment. Solomon was instructed in dreams. "In Gibeon
Jehovah appeared to Solomon in a dream by night; and God
said, Ask what I shall give thee." In Job 33:15, 16, we
read, "In a dream, in a vision of the night, when deep
sleep falleth upon men, in slumberings upon the bed; then
he openeth the ears of men, and sealeth their instruction."
"Then was the secret revealed unto Daniel in a vision of
the night." Joseph, the husband of Mary, was told in a
dream to take the young child Jesus and go down into Egypt.
Peter was shown his intolerance in a vision, and Paul was
obedient to the "heavenly vision." God has instructed all
the great and wise in every age in dreams and visions.
"Where there is no vision, the people cast off restraint."
13. Every form and thing, whether in the ether or on the
earth, represents some idea or mental attitude. The idea is
first projected into mind substance, and afterward formed
in consciousness. The mind of man sees all things through
thought forms made by the imagination. The lover idealizes
the object of his affection, and is often disappointed on
close acquaintance. We are always creating ideals
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that have existence in our minds alone. A true story is
told of a sailor who went on a long voyage and left his
affianced behind. He thought of her continuously, and often
saw her in his dreams. Finally he began to see and talk to
her in his waking state, and she told him many remarkable
things. She said that it was her soul that visited him;
that her body was in her English home, awaiting his return.
After some twenty years he arrived at home, expecting a
welcome from his loved one. He was dumfounded to learn that
she was married, had a family, and had forgotten him. Out
of his own mind substance he had created the object of his
affection, which had faithfully reflected all his thoughts
about her.
14. Through the power of the imagination we impress upon
the body the concepts of the mind. Here are stories of
actual occurrences: a woman watched her little daughter
pass through a heavy iron gate. The gate swung shut and the
mother imagined that it had caught and crushed the little
one's fingers. But the child had withdrawn her fingers
before the gate struck. The mother felt pain in her own
hand, and the next day she found a dark streak across her
fingers, in the place where she had imagined that the
child's had been crushed. In a secret-society initiation,
the candidate was told that the word "coward" was to be
branded upon his back with a red-hot iron. A piece of ice
was used instead, but the promised brand arose in blistered
letters.
15. We could cite cases without number to prove
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the power of the imagination in forming and transforming
the body. Also, one mind can suggest to another and produce
any desired condition, if there be mental receptivity. This
can be done most effectively through the hypnotic state,
but hypnosis is not always necessary. Experiments prove
that we are constantly suggesting all sorts of things to
one another, and getting results according to the intensity
of the imagination. Thus disease is reflected into
susceptible minds by people's merely talking about disease
as an awful reality.
16. A man can imagine that he has some evil condition in
body or affairs, and through the imaging law build it up
until it becomes manifest. On the other hand, he can use
the same power to make good appear on every side. The marks
of old age can be erased from the body by one's mentally
seeing the body as youthful. If you want to be healthy, do
not imagine so vain a thing as decrepitude. Make your body
perfect by seeing perfection in it. Transient patching up
with lotions and external applications is foolish; the work
must be an inner transformation. "Be ye transformed by the
renewing of your mind."
17. The highest and best work of the imagination is the
marvelous transformation that it works in character.
Imagine that you are one with the Principle of good, and
you will become truly good. To imagine oneself perfect
fixes the idea of perfection in the invisible mind
substance, and the mind forces at once
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begin the work of bringing forth perfection.
18. Paul saw this wonderful law at work in
character-forming through imitating Christ: "But we all,
with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of
the Lord, are transformed into the same image from glory,
to glory, even as from the Lord the Spirit."
Perfection In Form Established
(To be used in connection with Lesson Nine)
1. I see my countenance in its divine perfection.
2. "Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose imagination
is stayed on thee."
3. I see perfection in all forms and shapes.
4. His Son is the brightness of His glory, and the express
image of His person.
5. I see the light of the Christ consciousness always.
6. I am formed anew every day in my mind and my body.
7. Be renewed in the spirit of your mind.
8. My spirit is quickened in Christ.
9. "In a dream, in a vision of the night . . . he openeth
the ears of men, and sealeth their instruction."
10. I know the reality back of the shadows.
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