You will remember that in the Garden of Eden, God created man and woman a them in the garden, which was an Earthly paradise. The River of Life flowed through the garden, watering it, and it contained every kind of fruit and plant necessary to human’s physical well-being. Adam and Eve were told to enjoy this garden, to live in it and be happy. However, they were warned that, while they could eat of all the fruits that grew in the garden, there was one tree from which they should not eat. This was called the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. At once we see the meaning of this. We can eat from the tree which bears fruit of love, and the more we eat from it the better off we shall be. However, if we begin to mix love with hate we come into confusion. The fruit does not digest because hate is contrary to the nature of love. It is natural that we should ask: Why did a God who is all wise, all-powerful, and loving and compassionate create a tree that could bear the fruit of hate? Because human beings have a self-choice or they would not be a person, and having choice implies there must be with which one is endowed makes it possible for one to use that freedom, at least temporarily, in a way that will restrict the individual; otherwise one would not be free. Therefore, human beings are given the right to choose, but with the right to choose must come the liability as well as the reward of one’s choice. #RandolphHarris 1 of 8

The great principles of nature exist to be used, and the laws of nature become our helpers when we use them rightly. However, these same laws, wrongly used, impose suffering upon us. We can use our minds to be happy or unhappy; we can think peace or confusion; we can be loving and kind, or disagreeable, because we are free. If we were so crated that we did not have this freedom, we should be eternally bound. Life would have no meaning. Everywhere we look in our own lives and the lives of others we see the use and abuse of this power. The power that can be used so destructively could be converted into an instrument that would help to bring freedom to everyone on Earth. The clue to whether we are dealing with the paranormal or the normal might lie not so much with what the soul does achieve as with what it does not achieve. We ought to examine the soul’s preferred style of working and the peculiar patterns it slips into. Suppose you have a theory that the reason someone says he is Lord Lucan, who mysteriously disappeared in 1974, is that he is Lord Lucan. However, in practice the only part of Lucan’s life he seems to be familiar with is the part serialized in the newspaper, and he gives a start whenever someone says, ‘Come off it, Jones.’ Whatever this is, it is not what you would expect of normal ‘human identity.’ #RandolphHarris 2 of 8

Or, to take a rather more puzzling example, suppose you have a theory that you are being shown an accurate drawing of a solid triangular object. However, when you ask to be shown other views of it, you are told this is the only angel from which the object likes to be photographed and that it goes to pieces if anyone doubts its word. Whatever this is, it is not what you would expect from an ordinary ‘solid object.’ Well, this is the meaning of the serpent and the savior and that great symbol which runs throughout the Bible, depicting the right and the wrong way to use the power which is within us, the power that is greater than we are. However, again, we must stop and ask ourselves a very important question, one we find to be in almost everyone’s mind: Is evil, then, equal to good? The answer is No, for we have already found out that, while we can love to any extent without being hurt, hate finally destroys itself and destroys us with it. Yet, love harms no one. Good protects itself because God is good. We are given the freedom to misuse the power of life, but only to a certain point. This is why the symbol goes on to show that, when Adam and Eve finally decided to eat from the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, and after they had done so, they were expelled from the Garden of Eden and compelled to earn their living by the sweat of their brow. #RandolphHarris 3 of 8

Sceptics have often got themselves into unnecessary difficulties by unwisely promising to explain how everything that has ever occurred in the paranormal realm is in reality achievable by normal means. Even supposing they are right about the underlying normality, such a promise must be wildly over-confident. With many of the cases on record there is in practice no prospect of knowing what really happened—perhaps because there is insufficient information about the circumstances at this distance in time and space, or because the investigation has been or is being blocked by interested parties, or simply because no one is clever enough to work it out. The sceptic’s position will be all the stronger if and when he or she can suggest how a particular effect was achieved, and stronger still if he or she can duplicate the phenomenon oneself. However, this challenge is not one that he or she should feel obliged to meet. Someday it is bound to happen that one will meet their match. And the danger is that when this happens, when one cannot say what normal explanation would make sense, this failure may be taken by the other side as absolute evidence in favour of the phenomenon being paranormal by default. “May God raise you from death by power of Resurrection and from everlasting death by power of Atonement,” reports 2 Nephi 10.25. #RandolphHarris 4 of 8

We are all Adam and Eve, and when our intellects become coerced or misdirected they still find a subconscious reaction. When the subconscious reaction becomes powerful enough, it controls the intellect because of the unconscious thought patterns that are laid down in the mind. Finally, when these thought patterns become dominant, they control even the intellect. This is what produces most insanity and the psychosomatic relationships between the body and the mind. Our present knowledge of the mind tells us exactly how these Laws of Mind work, and we now know that our mental and emotional reactions to life decide what is going to happen to us. Because human’s misuse of power within them, they are led on the pathway which produces bondage and weakness. And so we come to the other side of this great story, which explains that God is within all of us and we all have the power to do what is right. “Atonement prepared that salvation might come to those who trust in the Lord,” reports Mosiah 4.6-8. If we want salvation, we are told to obey God. Of course, we all wish salvation. We all want to be happy; we should like to be well. We have never yet met anyone who did not wish to be successful. We want people to like us. We greatly desire to love and be loved. And above everything else, we want and need an inward sense of security and peace of mind. #RandolphHarris 5 of 8

It is true that we all long for the Kingdom of God on Earth, whether or not we know it. And the great struggle of humanity is toward freedom, emancipation from want and fear and infirmary, and from everything that can hurt. We all long to return to our lost paradise. “People assemble in sanctuary to worship,” reports Alma 15.17. Humans are put on this Earth to enjoy life and we are given the freedom to decide how we are to live; always there is placed before us the possibility of two things: to be, or not to be. All real power must rest on the side of good, and finally evil will be vanquished by good. This is the whole meaning of the story of the savior, the lifting up of the life principle on the Tree of Life—the coming to realize that we are one with God forever. God’s countenance smiles upon disciples. When in social situations we meet people for the first time, we notice if they do smile or not, and may form the impression that they are unfriendly or cold. In some cases we will recognize that a painfully shy person finds this situation unbearably difficult, and does not smile for that reason. However, if the person we have just met does smile, we tend to accept it as an expression of good manners and refrain from reading that smile in any particular way. This may or may not make the difference to whether we like this person, find him or her attractive, or else conclude that we have little in common. #RandolphHarris 6 of 8

A true person is strong enough to withstand the wiles of the adversary and humble enough to submit oneself to the redemptive powers of the Savior. A true person does not need the adversary to lead him or her down the easy path with the everlasting chains of destruction. Professional encounters can be complicated. When we front up to a job interview, we will perform the rituals of greeting and smile gamely. In that situation experienced employers may make allowances for the many stressors that our smile fails to conceal and, provided they are fair, will allow themselves to take notice only if our nerves continue to jangle long after removing the tension from the initial encounter. Others will adopt harsher tactics, which may better suit an industry where the people or businesses involved all want success and do not care if they harm each other in getting it in which the smile is a rarer commodity. That can also be a trend in some communities where a smile is considered a sign of weakness. Not everyone smiles and there are reasons why. Some people do not and cannot be seen as being nice, as it is not part of their repertoire. As other people are expected to smile and be polite. Likewise, circumstances will nudge the polite smile in one direction or another in business meetings depending on whether or not negotiations are going our way. If the other side obviously has us in a dire predicament, nobody will be surprised if at the end of the meeting we do not beam with unalloyed pleasure. #RandolphHarris 7 of 8

Wisdom, understanding, humbleness of heart are signs of maturity. However, the process of maturing is not as simple as acquiring wisdom. To mature is to retain or regain some innocent qualities we need to have to develop other qualities which youth may not have. Every spirit of human beings was innocent in the beginning; and God having redeemed humans from the fall, humans become again, in their infant state, innocent before God. Yes, the challenge to each one of us in these days of deceit and discord is to be innocent, to be guileless. We live in a wonderful World where people have largely turned away from righteousness and are self-seeking, gratifying their pride and vain ambition. We have the challenge to humble ourselves before God and to become patient, full of love, and willing to submit to all things which the Lord sees fit to inflict upon us. God intends good to come to everyone. What are we going to do with this greatest of all truths—the relationship that we as individuals have to the Divine Spirit which is already perfect, and which desires only our good? We have come to the crossroads of time, and the decision is ours. However, like everything else, this decision has to start with the individual life. If we are weary of our troubles there is something we can do about it. We can begin to exalt the life principle within us. Life should be beautifully simple. And then it will be simply beautiful. Learn to live. #RandolphHarris 8 of 8