Billeder på siden
PDF
ePub

99

or be destroyed; just as your reflection in a glass would disappear if you remove from the glass, your body being the Substance of that reflection. Soul, the reflection of the highest Thought or Idea of God, being the opposite of that Thought in quality, saw everything as the opposite or as spiritual instead of Spirit. This spiritual soul and also the life of the whole animal kingdom, saw itself and all things of the vegetable and mineral kingdoms as spiritual, but could not see Spirit its Creator, thus it was "concluded in unbelief" or left to its own perception. The life of the animal kingdom is the same in outline, and is composed of the same organs, as the material body which we see, but is spiritual. This spiritual life of the mineral, vegetable and animal kingdoms, including the soul of man, is, unconsciously to itself, perpetually sustained by God, thus God is indirectly the cause of the increase or product of this life. Spiritual life or God's creation was a reflection of God's compound Idea,

100

male and female, and was, therefore, male and female combined. The soul or life of man was created with an inward spiritual perception through which it can realize and understand God and his creation which is spiritual, and have dominion over it. This was the creation that the Lord God made in the day when he made the earth and the heavens, before there was a material man to till the ground. Thus the life was first, and must be the cause of matter. This spiritual life of the animal kingdom, which was male and female combined, saw with the outward spiritual sight, all spiritual life, including the life of the vegetable and mineral kingdoms, in their different forms and with limited outlines, through which this life received limited or material thoughts. These material thoughts or seeds, thus sown in the life or soil, were retained and fastened in the life by its natural conscious perception, and this perception is sustained by God who gives a perpetual increase or product according to the

seeds or thoughts sown.

These thoughts

being natural, limited, or material thoughts, the fruit or product thereof must be material, and after a period of time the life was covered or clothed upon with this fruit or product which we name matter. This matter was the first material transparent atomic covering of the life, and the breathing of air (matter) was necessary to sustain it. This transparent material covering of the life covered also the sight of the life, causing the life to see all spiritual things, including the vege table and mineral kingdoms as matter, or as the same quality as its covering. In this way the spiritual animal kingdom appeared to itself as material, and saw all other spiritual things as material also. The soul or life of man, through the inward spiritual perception with which it was created, realized its existence or became a living soul. This existence was material, separate or apart from Spirit, God, and was governed by its own material will, and material laws of its own

102

making. Through the continued contemplation of materiality, and through nourishing it with matter, this transparent covering of the life became grosser and grosser until it produced the opaque material protoplasm and established the solid matter body; and through this matter covering, all things appeared to the sight of the life as solid matter or as the same quality as its covering, and the life called them, as well as its own body, substance and real. It sees all things as matter and can change the form of the matter, but does not see nor change the form of the life which produces the matter, which is the real or spiritual part of it, or that part which is the reflection of the Thought of God.

If we cut a tree down we only cut the matter, we do not cut the life, for we have no power over that. The life of the sun, moon, stars, and of the animal, vegetable and mineral kingdoms, is the reflection of the Idea of God, and will continue as

long as God wills, and man has no power over it. How long or how short a time materiality will continue "No man knoweth, not the son, but the Father," the destruction of it, will be the end of the world or the last day. God is immortal and unchangeable, and his Thought is immortal and unchangeable also, but the reflection of that Thought, which is the life or soul of man, is the image of that Thought, in outline, and the likeness or opposite of it, in quality; it is, therefore, mortal and changeable. Life, soul, being mortal or changeable, produces a mortal or changeable thought which can be separated from that life, because we may forget a thought, or it may be wrong and utterly destroyed by another which is correct; but an immortal thought cannot be separated from God, because he forgets nothing, and, being perfect Spirit, neither adds to nor takes away from himself, but remains always the same. Thus it is impossible that man could be the Thought of God, because God's Thought

« ForrigeFortsæt »