Page:Science and Health.djvu/414

410 what you are blotting out, and describe how badly her child was hurt; or how much disease she has, etc., little knowing the effect of this is like fire to a burn. We should inquire only into our fears and beliefs regarding sickness, and disregard all else.

Matter cannot give testimony, therefore we should not believe personal sense; mind alone reports physical conditions and produces them. The sick argue against themselves by saying, “I am sick”; the physical affirmative should be met with a mental negative; all discord is error, insomuch as harmony is the only Truth of being; we must take a mental position, the very oppositeof the physical one, to control the body to a change of action. We inform the muscles how to move, and they act in obedience to the mind, or there would be no action; so does the entire system. The sick are frightened, whether they do, or do not understand this, and the body, like a frightened man, runs too fast or too slow, partially palsied, or inflamed with fear, the action is naturally increased or diminished.

To advance in the understanding of Truth, we must live up to our present perceptions of it; and improving the present, we need take no thought for the morrow, for the morrow will take thought for us, and afford more light as we advance toward the light. When you know already, dishonesty is error, discipline yourself to meet consequences rather than do wrong or hide a wrong. Truth is nearly worthless to him who seldom uses it.

When physical action is inflammatory, mind is the cause; some fear has taken possession of you, although this fear is not recognized by the sick, yet the physical