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THE SCIENCE OF BEING AND TWELVE LESSONS BY CHARLES FILLMORE. "NEW THOUGHT." A SECOND EXPLANATORY LESSON. N the July UNITY we had an Auxiliary Lesson explaining the difference between Practical Christianity and the various cults. Now we are asked to explain where we belong in the New Thought medley, also why there is such a diversity of teaching in that which passes under that name. New Thought is the common designation of a complex, and often contradictory, mass of metaphysical doctrines, which have sprung up in the past few years. No new truth has been presented by any of them; simply new ways of thinking about old truths. People who have been religiously educated from the Book of Common Prayer, where all the points of doctrine are clearly set forth, and nothing left to the imagination, are panic stricken when they meet this New Thougnt medley, and they either get right back into the church or gravitate to Christian Science. It is only the brave, fearless souls that boldly sally forth to meet and wrest the truth from this army of free thinkers. Truth includes all, and the broader the field the greater the crop of Truth. What seems contradiction is but the reports of those who see, like people climbing a mountain, from various levels, or points of view. New Thought people are striving to know the Truth as it is revealed direct from the fountain-head. The time is at hand when the promise shall be fulfilled: "And they shall not teach every man his fellow-citizen, From the least to the greatest of them." In medieval times the chiefs and barons assumed that they were divinely appointed to govern their fellowmen, and their word of authority was accepted by the less aggressive, who became their serfs. Similar conditions have existed in even a larger way in religion. Immersed in secular matters, the great majority of men have given no thought of an independent character to religion. What the priesthood has said about the few scraps of spiritual experiences left by the prophets, has been accepted as the whole of God's plan for man's religious salvation. But now a universal demand has sprung up for a better understanding of things spiritual, and the great running to and fro in the religious world today is the first awakening of this new impetus of the soul to know for itself whether or not the doctrines preached as authority are true. To attain this it is not safe for man to trust his information to others; he must know for himself. This, then, is really the foundation of the New Thought movement; that its adherents shall each and all be priest and prophet, and stand alone with the Inner Wisdom as sole guide in matters religious. But not all are living up to this free doctrine. There are leaders many, and schools separating their followers into limitations of various degrees. These are the natural divisions of the inner thought planes finding expression without, and are, in a measure, necessary in the present race development. There are those in New Thought who are seeking to carry into the Kingdom of Heaven their earthly possessions. They are trying to use the newly dis covered powers of the mind to build up humanity on the old foundations. They proclaim the universality of the One Life and Intelligence, and that all things necessarially resting upon God must be good. This logic is so plausible that a very large number of New Thoughters are not using spiritual discrimination, nor spiritual independence, but are following the way pointed out by some enthusiastic half-truth discoverer. Thus there are sharp divisions based upon different understandings of the expositions of the Divine Law in New Thought circles. What may be termed the Mental Science school holds that God is not a being of Love and Wisdom, but a force of attraction. They repudiate the Loving Father proclaimed by Jesus Christ, and hold that man is the highest form of self-consciousness in the universe. In their philosophy the human race is now at its highest point of understanding, and they see no evidence of there ever having been a "fall," or lapse in human evolution, thus repudiating a fundamental teaching of Christianity. If there has been no lapse in human evolution, there is no need of a mediator or mental mender of broken law; thus Jesus Christ, and the whole Christian plan of redemption, through him, is eliminated from their philosophy. There is another class of New Thought people who accept Christianity in its true sense, and try to live up to the teachings of Jesus Christ. They discern that there is a great truth hidden in the Christian religion, which its orthodox followers have not discovered. With a scientific understanding of the mind, and its laws of action, they have a key to the occult side of Christianity, and, in fact, all religions, that gives them an entirely new understanding of life and its object. With this key they unlock all the mysteries of religion and science, and place man where he belongs — master of all creation. There are a number of schools, passing under the general name of New Thought, that adhere to this Christian interpretation, yet even among them there are minor differences. Each teacher tinges with his mental bias the philosophy he promulgates. Not one seems yet to have attained that place where the revelation from the Spirit of Truth, promised by Jesus to his followers, is wholly transparent. For this reason disciples are never safe in accepting the teachings of any school as final, or as having the unadulterated truth. "Prove all things; hold fast to that which is good," is excellent advice. This diversity to which we refer is not in fundamental principles - they are universally the samebut in expressions thereof and man's relations thereto. For instance, there is diversity of opinion as to what is popularly known as the "fall of man." There are those that proclaim that man being spiritual could never have fallen, while others accept the Christian doctrine of the "fall," and the redemption through Jesus Christ. In strict logic, man being spiritual could never be anything less than perfect, yet we have the evidence on every side of the work of man that is not spiritual nor perfect. A close study of the Scriptures reveals a difference between the Son of God and the Son of Man. Comparing this with the constituent parts of man's being we discern that the Son of God is the spiritual Ego, or I AM, and the Son of Man the mentality which it inspires and creates. It is the mentality, or personal consciousness, that has departed from the observance of the perfect law, and brought about that state of ignorance, and its consequences in physical deterioration, so prevalent on every hand. This certainly is not a condition which should have existed under the wise use of the perfect potentialities inherent in Being, and given freely to man. The logic of cause and effect should show that there has been a very serious departure somewhere from spiritual perfection on the part of the human family. The Hebrew Scriptures teach this from beginning to end. The exclusion of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden; the call of the children of |