Page:Science and Health.djvu/443

Rh We admit man is immortal,—our only evidence of this, however, we gain from his harmony; discord, sickness or death never begat this conclusion. Immortality was never demonstrated to personal sense; but apprehending in the least, Soul and science, no man doubts his eternal existence. Physical effects proceed from mental causes; the belief we can move our hand moves it, and the belief we cannot do this renders it impossible during this state of mind. Palsy is a belief that attacks mind, and holds a limb inactive independent of the mind's consent, but the fact that a limb is moved only with mind proves the opposite, namely, that mind renders it also immovable. Medical works fill the mind with images of disease that are liable sooner or later to be re-produced on the body. The consent of mind must first be given that palsy is practical, then the circumstance said to produce it, and the result follows you have it developed.

Ossification, or any abnormal formation of bone, is produced by mind alone; for a bone never grew independent of mind, and the cause producing this can remove it. What the physician and others determine is fatal in a case, and above all what the patient believes regarding this, is the only obstacle in the way of the recovery. A condition of matter must first have been a condition of mind; hence to destroy the former we must begin with the latter, and when the cause is removed its effects disappear. We will suppose two parallel cases of bone disease, both produced similarly and attended by the same symptoms; for one we employ a surgeon, and for the other a scientist. The surgeon, believing matter forms its own conditions, entertains doubts or fears in