SPIRITUAL HEALTH AND HEALING (first published in 1922)

[Dover]

SPIRITUAL HEALTH AND HEALING
by
HORATIO W. DRESSER. Ph.D

Excerpt:

...There came as if heaven-sent a man whose work among the sick had no place among therepeutic systems commonly known as scientific. He did not give medicines or drugs. He had no system of physical treatment. Nor did he even diagnose disease by its symptoms, or inquire into verdicts pronounced by those competent to make a diagnosis. He received as patients those whose faith gave them impetus enough to visit his office or send for him. Without asking questions, he sat meditatively by his patients to gather whatever impressions might come intuitively by his own way of seeking such discernment. Having gained his impression and sought light on the problem before him, he put his mind through a realization akin to prayer as an act of worship, but more effective than such prayers as our young man was wont to hear on Friday evenings at church. He believed that God is directly accessible through prayer, yet with additional faith in the immediate response of the human spirit as potential master of the body. This definite and practical faith implied the utilizing of healing power to restore the body through the spirit. Proceeding by his own method, he ventured to seek help from within when all hope of a cure through conventional methods had passed. For in his practice with the sick he was not governed by outward appearances or even by signs which indicate the nearby presence of death. What signified was the state of a person's spirit and the possibility of leading a responsive person into the light out of the darkness of threatening miseries and fears.

Many people were restored to health by this true believer in the presence of God, some of whom became active workers when they grasped the principle. The world has since become familiar with the idea of mental healing, and is quick to arrive at the conclusion that this is what one means, namely, that by the influence of one mind on another through "suggestion" changes are wrought which physical means fail to accomplish. But here our account would end if this were an adequate explanation. Our reason for telling about the marvellous result accomplished in this young man's life is found in the fact that the change was more than victory over death and the successful staying of a disease presumably fatal. It will hardly be possible to see the meaning of this profound turning of a young life from one channel into another if we look at it as a mental cure. The change was the equivalent of a conversion and much more, if by a conversion we mean the adoption of a creed which makes of a worldly man a follower of Christ. For this young man had already given himself to Christ. Strange to relate, in adopting the teachings of the new therepeutist he renounced the church as an organization, together with all its observances, also his desire to become a minister. Yet on the other hand he became more faithfully a follower of Christ than before.


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Chapter VII - SPIRIT AND BODY

IN the endeavor to learn just how the spirit controls the body, it is important to note that man may either give assent to bodily tendencies or refrain from such desires. Thus he may be either slave or master, in the one case apparently without any control over his body at all, in the other with every evidence of such control. Whichever way he turns, and whether seeming to control his body or not, his assent or endeavor to control becomes an attitude which gathers its like and influences the body, an attitude which continues to be effective in that way until checked by a stronger activity than that of the tendency in question.

The body is adapted to receive the living forces which flow in from the spirit in such a way that man may act spontaneously, scarcely aware that his bodily organism conditions his spiritual life. But inasmuch as spirit and body act as one, whatever interferes at one point interferes more or less in all; for example, when a toothache or some other pain localized in a small region upsets the customary activities of daily life as a whole. Hence it comes about that the spirit feels the weight of bodily interference and seems to have no power to withstand the obstacles or enticements of the flesh. To learn that the spirit possesses entire control and impels the body to do whatever it does is to become aware of the activities by which the spirit has unwittingly permitted divine forces making for health and purity to be interfered with.

If the inner life is in a state of rebellion, distraught by anxieties and tensions, the spirit by yielding to these states and permitting them to increase thereby gives assent to their expression in the body, with all the consequences that may ensue. In a sense man still rules his flesh even when given over to the greatest lusts, for the flesh always obediently portrays man's feelings and carries out his desires. This subservience will continue as long as man so wills. The source of evil is not in the flesh, as the medieval Christians thought. There is no reason to mortify the flesh. We make no headway while we attribute either the trouble or the efficiency to the body. To do this is to be submissively a prisoner of the flesh. Nor do we make progress while we conciliate and indulge the body, on the ground that the flesh is strong and the spirit weak. One could not ask for more faithful servants than these remarkably responsive bodies of ours, adapted as they are to the slightest change of attitude on our part. There is plainly a great difference between a life of self-gratification and one of self-control. Yet, strange as it may seem, either condition reveals the supremacy of the spirit. Control at the centre means control all through, and sometimes mere assent to a bodily desire is the equivalent of control. The same power which weakly submits would suffice to give man a strong hold in the beginnings of self-mastery.

To adopt this deeper clue to the relationship of the spirit and body is not to advocate the short and easy road to health advertised by those who regard "wrong thoughts" as the only causes of disease. For a man might mend his thoughts in part and still give his will over to evil desires in other respects, or he might indulge in idealistic affirmations in one direction without endeavoring to change his bodily life in conformity thereto. Man is not essentially an assemblage of thoughts, despite the fact that in large measure he tends to make of himself what he thinks and by giving himself to directions of mind experiences the consequences of his own mental acts. He is more truly a will, a centre of desires and affection, with a prevailing love. It is this dominant desire which gives direction to his thoughts. He is influenced most by that which he steadily wills to be. If you can touch him at heart so that he is willing to turn from his old mode of life, opening his whole nature to receive the powers that make for goodness and health, then indeed his thoughts will conform, his mental imagery will be called into play, his emotions will correspond, and his external life will begin to show signs of change. So in the case of the nervous person, the creature of tensions and anxieties, there is no radical cure save through a spiritual process which readies the centre, induces a fundamental change through cultivation of the life which leads to nerve-control and moderate well-balanced outward deeds.

To attain health and freedom one may well bestow the usual care upon the body, attending to its nourishment according to the most approved ideas, giving it abundant exercise, observing the conditions which men in their prudence have discovered. Indeed, one who is seeking health by spiritual means would naturally go farther than this, noting in detail those physical conditions which most favor the spirit in the effort to regain full sanity and control. One would expect the spiritual idealist to undergo a change of tastes, steadily bringing the physical life up to the standard. Some of these results would came about spontaneously, and a man would find himself no longer caring for luxuries and means of gratification which formerly expressed his servitude.
Yet the involuntary consequences are not always enough. Some must work and co-operate from the outside as faithfully as possible to make the physical organism a more fitting vehicle of expression. Many of us are so external, so little aware of the inner life, that we can best adopt the appropriate inner attitude if we first make an external change, just as one feels stronger in mind by standing erect in a position which suggests and commands strength. To begin in this way is not necessarily to put emphasis upon external things, is not to yield one's powers of thought or will. One may begin at either end and work toward the other. In any event one makes such changes for the benefit of the spirit, that the whole life may correspond with the spiritual ideal. To co-operate from without by breathing deeply, taking exercises, and eating pure food, is to open the organism for receiving the inflow of spiritual life from within...cont'd

http://website.lineone.net/~newthought/shah7.htm