The Science of Mind

by Ernest Holmes

  MENTAL TREATMENT IS REAL

  Never forget that the Conscious Mind is the only Actor in the Universe and in man; that the unconscious or subjective mind is compelled, by reason of its nature, to accept; and that it can never reject; that the body is an effect, with no intelligence of its own. We can now see that a mental treatment is a real, tangible, specific operation, working in perfect accord with scientific Law.

  When a practitioner treats any one, he does not just hope that his patient will get well; he does not ask that he may be healed; he does not simply desire that he may be healed; he is busy doing a definite piece of mental work, bringing out in his own consciousness (in his own self-contemplative, conscious mind) an understanding that the patient is healed and is perfect.

  Treatment is the act, the art and the science of inducing thought within the mentality of the one treating, which thought shall perceive that the body of the patient is a Divine, Spiritual and Perfect Idea. Treatment does not necessarily treat every organ of the body specifically, but it does declare the body to be harmonious and that every specific idea within it is harmonious. It then pays especial attention to what appears to be the physical disorder.

  As the result of this treatment which the practitioner gives, Subjective Mind (which is Universal and Omnipresent) accepts the images of his thinking and reflects them in the direction that he specifies.

  He is not trying to send out a thought, hold a thought, or suggest a thought. Be sure that you differentiate between suggestion (which is all right, so far as it goes, but is limited) and real metaphysical healing. In metaphysical healing we are conscious that we are dealing with a Universal Principle, Law, which takes the impress of our thought and acts upon it. Nothing can stop It. Some day we shall know that not even the thought of the patient can stop It, and then that argument will be ended! We are dealing with Something that cannot and does not answer back nor argue. We are directing It for definite purposes, telling It to do certain things which It does. This is what happens when we give a treatment.

  Since the Law is Infinite, there is no incurable disease, as opposed to a curable one. The Law knows nothing about disease. It only acts. The practitioner says: "My word is the presence, power and activity of the Truth which is within me, which is Almighty, which is God. There is none other." This word then is the law of the thing whereunto it is spoken and has within itself the ability, the power, and the intelligence to execute itself through the great Law of all Life. This word, being the spontaneous recognition of Living Spirit—Infinite, Ever-Present, and Active—is now completely manifested in and through this person, or thing, about which the practitioner is thinking.

  MAN COMES THROUGH SUBJECTIVITY

  When man is born, he is born from pure subjectivity into objectivity. He is born from a subjective state of consciousness into an objective state, and he gradually grows into intelligent, self-conscious, objective understanding.

  When a baby is born into this world, it is purely subjective; it does not know enough to feed itself; it has no objective faculties, no judgment, no thought processes. But the minute it is born it begins to develop an objectivity through observation; however, it takes a baby longer than it does any other animal, as it is more helpless. A child does not always gain its objective faculties quickly—sometimes it never does during this lifetime. Irresponsible people never become completely objectified on this plane; they are still instinctively subjective.

  BORN PERFECT

  Since babies are born from subjectivity, they are born, generally speaking, from a perfect condition. You will find that practically everything, when it comes into the world, is perfect; it then takes on objectivity; but it brings with it, subjectively, certain tendencies. Very seldom does it bring disease. Very few diseases are inherited, in spite of all the claims that people make that they inherit heart trouble, tuberculosis, etc. They do not! What they do, however, is to inherit a subjective receptivity toward, and a belief in, those things.

  At first, children are happy, free, spontaneous. That is why we like them; they live instinctively. As they grow older and their emotions become more complex and they hear people talk about death, trouble, divorce, love and marriage, and everything else that is good, bad or indifferent, they begin to react to these emotions subjectively.

  Everything that opposes harmony and Spontaneous Unity will prove disastrous to the child's health, sooner or later. The inherited part is simply an inherited subjective tendency.

  RACE-SUGGESTION

  Another prolific source of disease is race-suggestion. RACE-SUGGESTION MEANS THE ACCUMULATED SUBJECTIVE TENDENCIES OF THE HUMAN RACE; these tendencies are operative through any person who is receptive to them.

  These, then, are the sources from which most diseases come—conscious observations, suppressed emotions, subjective inherited tendencies, and, perhaps three-fourths of them, from race-suggestion.

  DISEASE IS IMPERSONAL

  Disease is an impersonal thought force operating through people, which does not belong to them at all. Recognize that it is neither person, place, nor thing; that there is no law to support it; that it is a coward, fleeing before the Truth; that there is nothing but the Truth. There is no limitation imposed upon man anywhere. You must know that the Power you are using is definite, scientific, dynamic, Spiritual, Absolute and complete, and that It will work. Let no fear come into your thought.

  Remember that nothing can come through consciousness into objectivity but such thoughts as you claim. The person who has clearly and subjectively realized the Unity of Mind, the Unity of Good, the Presence of God, the Absoluteness of his own Being, the totality of things existing at the point of his own personality, is immune from mental suggestion. He can surround himself with an armor of protection so that false suggestion cannot enter.

  As a matter of fact, practically all the world is hypnotized through race concept, and what we need to do is to de-hypnotize it.

  HOW TO HEAL

  Disease is mentally contagious through suggestion; so we must surround our patients with an aura, or atmosphere, of protection. This is nothing less than the realization of the presence and the power of God, or Spirit, as their Life, as the only Life there Is, as Complete and Perfect in them.

  First recognize your own perfection; then build up the same recognition for your patient; then directly attack the thought that binds him, recognizing that your word destroys it, stating that it does, taking into account and specifically mentioning everything that needs to be changed, every so-called broken law or false thought. Then finish your treatment with a great realization of peace, sitting there a few moments in silent recognition that it is done, complete and perfect.

  The work must not be thought of as hard; and when we know that there is but One Mind, we shall realize that it could not be hard. Mental treatment is a direct statement in Mind of what we wish to have done and a complete realization that it is done.

  MIND IS THE ACTOR

  We recognize that everything is in Mind and that nothing moves but Mind; that Intelligence is back of everything, acting through a thought force which is concrete, definite and real. The reason people do not realize that mental healing is possible is that they do not understand the meaning of Causation; they do not realize that Intelligence is back of all things; that there is but One Fundamental Intelligence in the Universe, One Common Mind or One Mind, Common to all people. That which we appear to be is simply the point where this Mind manifests through us. (Man is an Individualized Center of God-Consciousness. Remember, all Law is Mind in Action.)

  Every disease that we have must come through Mind in order to operate through us. There is but One Subjective Mind in the Universe. Upon this understanding alone is mental treatment possible (whether it be present or absent); if there were more than One, it would be impossible, for then there would be no Common Medium through which to work, think or act.

  There is but One, and we are always thinking into It; so whether a patient is present or absent makes
no difference. The only advantage in having him present is that you may talk to him and teach him, and, by analyzing his thought, remove any mental complex or conflict.

  The question is often asked: "Is this Subjective Mind, or Law, all that there is to the Divine Nature?" No, of course not. There is the Spirit and the Soul of the Universe, a dual aspect of that which is One; but when you are practicing mental healing, you are dealing with Law, just as definitely as a physicist deals with law.

  DISEASE IS NOT ALWAYS DUE TO CONSCIOUS THOUGHT

  Any disease, in order to operate through the body, must first be a mental picture in the inner mentality; it must first be subjective, if it is to become objectified. "Disease is an image of thought held in Mind until it appears in the body." This is all there is to it. While every disease is an effect and must first have a subjective cause, the subjective cause, nine times out of ten, is not conscious in the thought of the person who has it; but is, perhaps, largely the result of certain combinations of thinking, which, gathering together around and through the individual who thought and received them, becomes operative through him. Certain combinations of thought, coalescing, produce a definite manifestation.

  So, while it is true that every disease has a direct prototype in subjective mind, it is also true that the individual who suffers from the disease, nine times out of ten, never thought he was going to have that particular kind of trouble.

  WE DEAL WITH IDEAS

  You are dealing with ideas only. Let the physicians deal with bodies, if necessary. There is nothing wrong with medicine or manipulation, provided it relieves suffering, but lest the suffering come again, the mental cause must be removed. Never say to patients: "Don't take medicine, because if you do, the treatments will do you no good"; for this is untrue. Say, instead, "If you feel like taking medicine or going to the doctor, do so." If you follow this method, the time will generally come when your patient will realize that he no longer needs the medicine; he will have unfolded out of the disease, rather than have broken away from it.

  Actually speaking, no one needs to be healed; that is, health is an omnipresent reality, and when the obstructions that hinder healing are removed, it will be found that health was there all the time. So, in your work, do not feel that you must heal any one. In fact, assume no responsibility for any one's recovery.

  HAVE NO DOUBTS

  Suppose, when you treat a patient, you begin to feel a terrible sense of responsibility—what should you do? You should begin at once to treat yourself against that thought, for as long as you have it there is a barrier to healing. Why? Because when you sift that sense of responsibility down to its last analysis, it is a belief that you cannot heal. Do not give in to that belief, because it is nothing but a thought which says that you cannot heal. Nothing but a thought is saying, or could be saying, it. A chair could not say it, and since it is only a thought that says it, it is only a thought that can unsay it. Declare: "My word has the power to heal," and you will find that doubt has gone.

  THINKING IN TREATMENT

  When you are giving a treatment, you are thinking; you are meeting, opposing, neutralizing, erasing and obliterating all suppression, fear, doubt, failure, morbid emotion and sense of loss—whatever the trouble may be. Every time your thought hits fairly and squarely, it erases just as definitely as one would erase a chalk line. Such is the mystery of appearance and disappearance.

  Why doesn't God heal us? Because we are independent. We have made ourselves sick and we must heal ourselves. In the great world war ten or fifteen million people suffered agony, pain, sorrow and grief—it staggers the imagination to conceive of it. But water was just as wet and the birds sang just as sweetly through it all. Nothing happened, except in man's thought and act; he fought until he tired of fighting; then he stopped. We will be sick until we tire of it; then we will inquire into the cause, eliminate it and be healed.

  DO NOT TRY TO GO BEYOND YOUR UNDERSTANDING

  Our understanding is not sufficient to enable us to set bones, and, since we cannot walk on the water, we take a boat. We can go only as far as we know. Principle is Infinite, but we can demonstrate only at the level of our own concept.

  If a man struggles against a habit, he is building up a mental resistance, but if he does not resist it while you treat him, he will soon find himself liberated.

  People say: "I can't take off my glasses." Then wear them; but begin to make the declaration that there is One Perfect Vision seeing through you. This is the Truth. When this statement shall have become a subjective realization, you will be healed and will no longer need glasses.

  If a plaster will relieve, use it. If a pill does any good, take it; but gradually lead thought from where it is into the higher realms of consciousness where neither plasters nor pills are needed.

  WHAT A PRACTITIONER MUST KNOW

  A practitioner knows that disease is mental. He not only knows this; he knows that disease is simply an impersonal thought force, operating through whatever channel it may find. He knows that it is a direct thought force; that there is nothing but Mind in the Universe; nothing to move but Intelligence. He is not dealing with a physical body, nor trying to heal a physical condition.

  Right here, let me mention that many people think they must put their hands on their patients to heal them—that there is a certain magnetism, potent in healing. This has nothing to do with the power of which we are talking. Magnetic healing is the transmission of vital energy from one body to another and soon exhausts itself.

  We treat man, not as a patient, not as a physical body, not as a diseased condition; neither do we treat the disease as belonging to him, the reason being that if we do, we will fasten the disease to him. We must not think of the disease as being connected with him or as a part of him. The practitioner realizes that man is born of Spirit and not of matter. Spirit is Changeless, Perfect, Complete, and in every respect Pure, Undefiled and Uncontaminated. He realizes this until he sees his patient as a living embodiment of Perfection.

  A practitioner, then, is one who, recognizing that there is nothing but Mind to move, definitely, specifically, concretely and consciously speaks from his objective mind into subjectivity and gives direction to Law, which is the Actor.

  HEALING IS CLEAR THINKING

  Healing is the result of clear thinking and logical reasoning, which presents itself to consciousness and is acted upon by it. It is a systematic process of reasoning which unearths the mental cause or idea underlying disease, and presents the Truth about man's Being, thereby healing him.

  For instance, say to yourself: "God is All there is. There is only One Life." When you are treating, if there is any little point that is not clear, stop at once and go back to the last analysis of Ultimate Reality and Absoluteness and build your whole argument upon It, in order to get a clear consciousness.

  Repeat: "God is All. There is only One Power, Intelligence and Consciousness in the Universe, only One Presence. Now, that One Presence cannot change. There is nothing for It to change into but Itself. It is Changeless and It is My Life now. It is in me now." Claim that no form of race-suggestion, belief in limitation, subjective idea of limitation, thought of Karma, fatalism, theology or hell, horoscope, or any such beliefs have power. Accept none of them. If you have ever believed in them; if you have ever believed that the stars govern you, or that your environment governs you, or that your opportunities govern you, if you have ever been led to believe by any one that any of these things govern you, recognize that it is a hypnotic condition into which you have fallen, and deny every one of them, until there is no longer anything in you that believes in them.

  This is the way to get your consciousness clear. You see what it does; it induces a clear concept of Reality which must reproduce Itself. This process of clear thinking, if carried out every day, would heal any disease, because it would bring a complete recognition of Life.

  ONLY ONE LAW

  The thing that makes you sick can heal you. You do not need to look for a
law of health as opposed to a law of disease; for there is only One Law. This will give a great sense of relief, since it means that there is no power to oppose a correct mental treatment.

  People often say to a practitioner: "I want you to hold a strong thought for me." This is a misconception; for there are no strong and weak thoughts in this sense. The most powerful thought is the one that carries the greatest conviction with it. We do not hold thoughts; we simply think them and let Mind operate upon them.

  People often say: "It must be a drain to treat so many people; I should think that your will power would become exhausted." This also is a misconception; for will power has nothing whatever to do with real mental healing; its use would imply that the practitioner exercises a personal thought force over his patient. This is false suggestion, which is always some form of hypnotism.

  NO SENSATION IN TREATMENTS

  It is sometimes thought that in giving or receiving a treatment one must experience some physical sensation. A patient sometimes says, after having received a treatment: "I felt nothing during the treatment." It is not necessary that the patient should feel anything during the treatment, neither is it necessary that the practitioner should feel anything, other than the truth about the words that he speaks.