Page:Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures (1898).djvu/213

Rh Human belief is an autocrat, though not deserving its power. It says to mortals, “You are wretched!” and

they become so; and nothing can change this state, until the belief changes. Human belief says, “You are happy!” and mortals are so; and no circumstance can alter the situation, until the belief on this subject changes. Human belief says to mortals, “You are sick!” and this belief manifests itself as sickness. It is as necessary for a health-illusion, as for an illusion of sickness, to be instructed out of itself, into the understanding of what constitutes health; for a change in either belief affects the physical condition.

Erroneous belief is mental self-mesmerism. Change the belief, and that disappears which before seemed

to it real; and whatever is accepted, in place of the forsaken belief, now seems real. The only fact concerning any belief is, that it is neither Scientific nor eternal, but subject to change and dissolution.

Faith is higher and more spiritual than belief. It is a chrysalis state of human thought, wherein spiritual

evidence, contradicting the testimony of material senses, begins to appear, and Truth, the ever-present, is becoming understood. Belief has its degrees of comparison. Some beliefs are better than others. Beliefs in Truth are better than beliefs in error, but no human beliefs are founded on the divine rock. They can be shaken; and until belief becomes faith, and faith becomes understanding, thought has little relation to the actual.

A belief fulfils the illusive conditions of belief. Sickness, sin, and death are the realities of human belief.