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O Wicked Wit and Gifts that Have the Power So to Seduce!
I have always noticed a prevalent want of courage, even among persons of superior intelligence and culture, as to imparting their own psychological experiences when those have been of a strange story. Almost all humans are afraid that what they could relate in such wise would find no parallel or response in a lister’s internal life, and might be suspected or laughed at. A truthful traveller who should have seen some extraordinary creature in the likeness of a devil, would have no fear mentioning it; but the same traveller having had some singular presentiment, impulse, vagary of thought, vision (so-called), dream, or other remarkable mental impression, would hesitate considerably before one would own to it. To this reticence I attribute much of the obscurity in which subjects are involved. We do not habitually communicate our experiences of these subjective things, as we do our experiences of objective creation. The consequences is, that the general stock of experiences in this regard appears exceptional, and really is so, in respect of being miserably imperfect. The Devil had been raised among us, and his rage was vehement and terrible; and, when he shall be silenced, the Lord only knows. It does not signify how many years ago, or how few, a certain Murder was committed in Boston in 1688, which attracted great attention. We hear more than enough of Murders as they rise in succession to their atrocious eminence, and if I could, I would bury the memory this this atrocious eminence, as hi body was buried, in the Witch House’s basement. When the murder was first discovered, no suspicion fell—or I ought rather to say, for I cannot be too precise in my facts, it was nowhere publicly hinted that any suspicious fell—on the man who was afterwards brought to trial. #RandolphHarris 1 of 13
As no reference was at the time made to him in the newspapers, it is obviously impossible that any description of him at that time have been given in the newspapers. It is essential that this fact be remembered. Unfolding at breakfast my morning paper, containing the account of that first discovery, I found it to be deeply interesting, and I read it with close attention. I read it twice, if not three times. The discovery had been made in a bedroom, and, when I laid down the paper, I was aware of a flash—rush—flow—I do not know what to call it—no word I can find is satisfactorily descriptive—in which I seemed to see that bedroom passing through my room, like a picture impossibly painted on a running river. Though almost instantaneous in its passing, it was perfectly clear; so clear that I distinctly, and with a sense of relief observed the absence of the dead body from the bed. As the circumstances of the Murder, gradually unravelling, took stronger and stronger posses of the public mind, I kept them away from mine, by knowing as little about them as was possible in the midst of the universal excitement. John Hathorne asked most of the questions and established the judicial attitude that was to prevail throughout most of the examinations and the trials. Many people suspected that the devil killed this man and he had been summoned by Sarah Good because she had also been accused of bewitching a few girls in the town. Mr. Hathorne asked the children to look at Sarah God and say whether she was one who afflicted them. #RandolphHarris 2 of 13
They accused her to her face, “upon which they were all dreadfully tortured and tormented for a short space of time.” When they recovered from their fits, they charged her with causing them, saying that her specter had come and tormented them although her body remained “at a considerable distance from them.” This was spectral evidence, that is, evidence concerning a specter or apparition of the accused, rather than her bodily person. It was eventually to become the central legal issue of the trials, but at the moment we need only see why it seemed initially so convincing to the examining magistrates. Here were girls afflicted with violent physical symptoms which had no known physical cause, but which a physician had attributed to witchcraft. There was a malicious old woman accused of causing them. When the sufferers accused her they were immediately thrown into convulsions. What could be more plausible than that the convulsions were inflicted as revenge for the accusation? Yet such behaviour was still unfamiliar enough in Salem so that one of the recorders noted that “none here see the [specters of the] witches but the afflicted and themselves.” However, the change was so startling that I fully believed the girls derived their impression in some occult manner. For instance, we knew there was something occult going on because the throat of the murdered man had been cut straight across. In the opening speech for the defense, it was suggested that the deceased might have cut his own throat in the dreadful condition referred to. Yet, it would have been impossible for such a wound to be self-inflicted by either hand. #RandolphHarris 3 of 13
Certainly, Mr. Hathorne was convinced; when the children had recovered and repeated their accusation he turned to the accused woman. “Sarah Good, do you not see now what you have done? Why do you not tell us the truth? Why do you this torment these people children?” Certainly many of her neighbours though her malicious, since they attributed to her a number of inexplicable events, including the death of a cow which perished in a “sudden, terrible and strange unusual manner.” Such testimony was common in witchcraft cases, and it has caused much unseemly hilarity among the modern historians. It is likely, they have asked, that His Satanic Majesty the Devil or any of his minions would stop to concern themselves with the fate of a New England cow? The answer is that nothing is more likely. What else would a fertility god concern himself with but the health or sickness of crops, of animals, and of humans? From the standpoint of a society that still remembered who the Devil was, no testimony could be more relevant. As a matter of fact, the village witches who still exist in rural England are often expert in folk medicines, human and animal, as well as charms, and until recently many of them were midwives. Sarah Osburn also denied that she had hurt anyone, but the girls feel again into fits. Mr. Hathorne asked her how this happened. Perhaps, she said, the Devil went about in her likeness doing harm, but she knew nothing about it. Sarah Osburn was the first at Salem to assert the principle that the Devil can impersonate an innocent person. #RandolphHarris 4 of 13
Whether the devil could or not was a matter of debate in the seventeenth century, but most Protestant authorities agreed with Goodwife Obsurn that, as Hamlet put it, “The Devil hath power/ to assume a pleasing shape.” However, the principle was not discussed at this hearing, since Sarah Osburn was a likely a suspect as Sarah Good, if for no other reason than her lying. Lying was still considered a serious sin in the seventeenth century, and a crime as well, legally punishable by the courts. Nine of us had not the smallest doubt about those passages, neither, I believed, had any one in Court. When Mr. Hathorne tried to find out how well Sarah Osburn knew Sarah Good she said she did not know her by name. Mr. Hathorne asked if Sarah Osburn had been tempted by the devil, and she said no. Why then, he asked, had not she been at church? She had been sick, she said, and unable to go. However, her husband and others contradicted her. “She had not been at meeting,” they said, “this year and two months.” To understand why the matter of church attendance was considered so significant one must remember that the seventeenth century saw witchcraft as literal Devil worship, and therefore as a rival religion to Christianity. This is why the magistrates sometimes asked accused persons, as they asked Sarah Good, what God they served. And if the accused person avoided speaking the name of God (as Sarah Good did), they had reason to think it a suspicious circumstance. The murdered man at that time stood directly opposite the judge, on the other side of the court. He slowly shook a great grey veil, which he carried on his arm for the first time, over his head and whole form. Then he collapsed, all was gone, and his place was empty. #RandolphHarris 5 of 13
The examinations of Sarah Good and Sarah Osburn afford grounds for suspicion and for further examination. However, the major event of that first day of March was the examination of Tituba. It began like the others, but it changed very quickly: “Tituba, what evil spirit have you familiarity with?” “None.” “Why do you hurt these children?” “I do not hurt them.” “Who is it then?” “The Devil, for aught I know.” “Did you never see the Devil?” “The Devil,” said Tituba, “came to me and bid me serve him.” She went on, with a minimum of judicia prodding, to provide a detailed confession of witchcraft, the first of approximately fifty that were made during the Salem trials. On March first and second, in her examination, Tituba said that the Devil had come to her in the shape of a man—a tall man in black, with white hair. Other times he had come in the shape of an animal. He had told her he was God, that she must believe him and serve him six years, and he would give her many fine things. He had shown her a book and she had made a mark in it, a mark that was “red like blood.” Many people thought this to be a revelation. “Then I saw another beast, coming out of the Earth. He had two horns like a lamb, but he spoke like a dragon. He exercised all authority of the first beast on his behalf, and made the earth and its inhabitants worship the first beast, whose fatal wound had been healed. And he performed great and miraculous signs, even causing fire to comedown from Heaven to Earth in full view of men. Because of the signs he was given power to do on behalf of the first beast, he deceived the inhabitants of the Earth. #RandolphHarris 6 of 13
“He ordered them to set up an image in honour of the beast who was wounded by the sword and yet lived. He was given power to give breath to the image of the first beast, so that it could speak and cause all who refused to worship the image to be killed. He also forced everyone, small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on his right hand or on his forehead, so that no one could buy or sell unless one had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of his name,” reports Revelation 13.11-17. Sarah Osburn was to die there on the tenth of May. Tituba, like later confessors, was never brought to trial. She lay in jail until she was sold to pay the jailer’s fees, her master refusing to pay them. Sarah Good was brought to trial. Another reaction to Tituba’s confession was to confirm the community in its fear of witchcraft, and particularly its fear of the three accused women. The night of March First William Allen and John Hughes heard a strange noise; it continued frightening them, but the approached and “saw a strange and unusual beast lying on the ground. Going up to it, the said beast vanished away and in the said place started up two or three women fled, not after the manner of other women but swiftly vanished out of sight, which women we took to be Sarah Good, Sarah Osburn, and Tituba.” #RandolphHarris 7 of 13
The next night William Allen again had hallucinations: “Sarah Good visibly appeared to him in his chamber, said Allen being in bed, and brought an unusual light with her. The said Sarah came and sat upon his foot. The said Allen went to kick at her, upon which she vanished and the light with her.” Notice that in this hallucination as in many others the hallucination stops as soon as the subject is able to move or speak. A curse is any expressed wish that some form of adversity or misfortune will befall or attach to one or more persons, a place, or an object. In particular, “curse” may refer to such a wish or pronouncement made effective by a supernatural or spiritual power, such as a god, or gods, a spirit, or natural force, or else as a kind of spell by magic or witchcraft. The Winchester rifle is a handsome gun that legend has it was forged in Hell. Whoever possesses the cursed rife either suffers disaster or fortune. Oliver Fisher Winchester was an American businessman and politician, best known as being the founder of the Winchester Repeating Arms Company. Oliver Winchester was born November 30, 1810 and dead December 10, 1880. Oliver Winchester was known for manufacturing and marketing the Winchester repeating rifle, which was a much re-designed descendant of the Volcanic rifle of some years earlier. Mr. Winchester was more learned than his kind in the mysteries of a deep and thrilling lore of peculiar fascination. He was a man highly honoured for his natural gifts and knowledge of learned books which nobody else could read, that was when he took his second orders the bishop gave him a mantle of scarlet silk to wear upon his shoulders in which, and his lordship had put such power into it that, when the parson has it rightly on, he could govern any ghost or evil spirit, and even stop an Earthquake. #RandolphHarris 8 of 13
Such a powerful man, in combat with supernatural visitations discovered that a division of Smith & Wesson firearms was failing financially with one of their newly patented arms. Having an eye for opportunity, Mr. Winchester assembled venture capital together with other stockholders and acquired the Smith & Wesson division, better known as the Volcanic Repeating Arms Company, in 1855. By 1857, Mr. Winchester had positioned himself as the principle stockholder in the company and relocated to New Haven, Connecticut, and changed the name to New Haven Arms Company. After experiencing a slow start, and then a booming success with the Henry rifle, the company reorganized once again and the first Winchester rifle was the Model 1866, which had been nicknamed the Yellow Boy. The gun was called Yellow Boy because it should be remembered that, howsoever strange and singular it may sound to us that a mere lad should formally solicit such a performance at his own hands. Gradually Mr. Winchester amassed a considerable fortune. When Mr. Oliver Winchester died on December 10, 1880, his ownership in the company passed to his son, William Wirt Winchester (who married Sarah Lockwood Pardee in 1862), and died March 7 1881 at the young age of 43. The couple has also had a child, Annie Pardee Winchester, born June 15, 1866, and died 6 weeks later on July 25, 1866. Mrs. Winchester was deeply troubled by the loss of her daughter. In the course of her daily walk, she had to pass a certain heath or down where the road wound along through tall blocks of granite with open spaces of grassy sward between them. #RandpolphHarris 9 of 13
There in a certain spot, and always in the same place, she declared that she encountered, every day, a baby with a pale and troubled face, clothed in a little dress of white pique, made with two skirts. The pique was cut slightly Gabriele, and rounded off in the front with scallops, bound with white braid, with a button in each scallop, and ribbon-sash, tied at the left side, with one hand always stretched forth, and the other pressed against her side. “She is my baby,” Mrs. Winchester would say, and she often used to come to her parents house in New Haven; but that which troubled her was, that she had now been dead three years, and she had seen her body laid in the grave at her burial, this that she saw every day must needs be her soul or ghost. The hair of the appearance, sayth Mrs. Winchester, is not like anything alive, but it is so soft and light that it seemth to melt away while you look; but her eyes are set, and never blink—no, not when the sun shineth full upon her face. She maketh no steps, but seemth to swim along the top of the grass; and her hand, which is stretched out alway, seemth to point to something far away, out of sight. It is her continual coming; for she never failth to meet Mrs. Winchester, and to pass on, that hath quenched her spirits; and although she never seeth her by night, yet cannot she get her natural rest. Mrs. Winchester went to see a doctor who told her, “The case is strange but by no means impossible. It is one that I will study, and fear not to handle, if you will be free with me, and fulfill all that I desire.” Mrs. Winchester was overjoyed, but she perceived that the doctor turned pale, and was downcast with some thought which, however, he did not express. #RandolphHarris 10 of 13
The doctor knew that this might be a doemonium meridianum, the most stubborn spirit to govern and guide that any human can meet, and the most perilous withal. He made an appointment to go with Mrs. Winchester to the spot where she had these encounters. They had hardly reached the accustomed spot, when they both saw her at once gliding towards them; punctually as the ancient writers describe their “lemures, which swoon along the ground, neither marking the sand nor bending the herbage.” The aspect of the baby girl was exactly that which had been related by Mrs. Winchester. There was a pale and stony face, the strange misty hair, the eyes firm and fixed, that gazed, yet not on them, but on something that they saw far, far away; one hand and arm stretched out, and the other grasping the girdle of her waist. She floated along the field like upon a stream, and glided past the spot where they stood, pausingly. But so deep was the awe that came over the doctor, as he stood there in the light of day, face to face with a human soul separate from her bones and flesh, that his heart and purpose both failed him. He had resolved to speak to the spectre in the appointed form of words, but he did not. He stood like one amazed and speechless, until she had passed clean of out sight. When they returned to the house, and after he had said all he could to pacify Mrs. Winchester, he took leave for that time, with a promise that when he had fulfilled certain business elsewhere, when then he alleged, he would return and take orders to assuage these disturbances and their cause. #RandolphHarris 11 of 13
The doctor later told Mrs. Winchester that he thought it was best that they try an exorcism, but his Church, as is well known, hath abjured certain branches of her ancient powers, on grounds of perversion and abuse. So he referred her to a medium. The medium told Mrs. Winchesters, “There is a danger from the demons, but so there is in the surrounding air every day.” There was a kind of trouble in the air, a soft rippling sound, and all at once the shape appeared, and came towards the medium gradually. She opened her parchment scroll, and read aloud the command. The spirit paused, and seemed to waver and doubt; stood still; then she rehearsed the sentence again, sounding out every syllable like a chant. The spirit then swam into the midst of the circle, and there stood still, suddenly. Her knees shook under her, and the drops of sweat ran down her flesh like rain. But, although face to face with the spirit, the medium’s heart grew calm, and her mind was composed. The spirit then commanded Mrs. Winchester to move West and build a mansion in honour of the spirit killed by the Winchester rifle and “as long as the hammer keep pounding, her heart would continue to beat.” The medium dismissed the troubled ghost, until she peacefully withdrew, gliding towards the west. Mrs. Winchester moved to San Jose, which was near her family Member, Enoch Pardee, an occultist, prominent physician, free mason, and Mayor of Oakland, California USA, had built his family’s mansion in 1868, which is now known as the Pardee House Museum. Masonry has influenced more the modern witchcraft; it has influenced dozens of occult orders. Mrs. Winchester bought a farm house and built a massive mansion. There was something very painful and peculiar in the position of the Winchester mansion through the nineteenth century. The estate in those days was in a transitory state, and Mrs. Winchester, like her formularies, embodied a strange mixture of the old belief with the new interpretation. #RandolphHarris 12 of 13
However, the mansion is now flanked by a pleasantness, a beautiful garden and lawn, and it is surrounded by a sole grove of palm trees. It has also the aspect of age and of solitude, and looks the very scene of harmony and supernatural events. A legend might well belong to every beautiful glade of grass around, and there must surely be a haunted room somewhere within its walls. The incredible mansion, scenery of the legend still survives, and, like the field of the forty footsteps in another history, the place is still visited by those who take interests in the supernatural tales of old and new. Freemasons supposedly conducted a séance in the mansion in August of 2019. A phantom made an answer willingly. It stated, “before the next Yule-tide, a fearful pestilence will lay waste the land, and myriads of souls will be loosened from the flesh, until our valleys will be full.” The general facts stated in this diary are to these matters of belief accounted a strong proof of the veracity of the Ghost that the plague, fatal to so many millions, did break out in the global village at the close of the year. How sorely must the infidels and heretics of this generation be dismayed when they know that this Black Death, which is now swallowing its thousands in the streets of the great city, was foretold several months before the outbreak, under the séance of a freemason, by a visible and suppliant ghost! And what pleasure and improvements do such deny themselves who scorn and avoid all opportunity of intercourse with souls separate, and the spirits, glad and sorrowful, which inhabit the unseen World! May they who observe the Sabbath and call it a delight, rejoice in Thy Kingdom. May the people who sanctify the seventh day be sated and delighted with Thy bounty. For Thou didst find pleasure in the seventh day, and didst sanctify it, calling it the most desirable of the days, in remembrance of creation. #RandolphHarris 13 of 13
Winchester Mystery House
Today is the return of our guided Mansion Tour! The tour guide-led experience allows guests to access areas of the mansion that have been closed since March 2020. Click the link in our bio for more information. winchestermysteryhouse.com/recent-links
The Source of those Accusations Was a Committee of Demons Who Had Infested Her!
The infinite power of God to create is far beyond what we can grasp or understand. If the Almighty devoted so much of His Word to prophecy, it certainly benefits every believer to study it. The study of the prophetic scriptures and their fulfillment attests to the authority of the Word of God. Every soul has cost an infinite price, and how terrible is the sin of turning one soul away from Christ, so that for Him the Saviour’s love and humiliation and agony shall have been in vain. Contrary to popular opinion, New England’s record in regard to witchcraft is surprisingly good, as Governor Thomas Hutchinson pointed out in 1750: “more having been put to death in a single country in England from the first settlement until the present time.” Through most of the seventeenth century the record is really astonishing. While Europe hanged and burned literally thousands, executions in New England were few and far between. (Witches were burned on the Continent and in Scotland, where witchcraft was a heresy, but hanged in England and in New England, where it was a felony. Burning a witch seems not to have been motivated by the wish to inflict a particularly painful death; Scottish witches, for instance, were first garroted by the executioner, who then proceeded to burn the corpse and scatter its ashes. Most probably, burning was an attempt to prevent the resurrection of the body.) There are some fascinating accounts in New England that deal with cases of witchcraft before 1692, and we shall look at a few of these for they will illuminate some interesting aspects of the Salem witch trials. #RandolphHarris 1 of 21
The first is that of Mrs. Anne Hibbins. Her husband, who died in 1654, had been a man of importance: Boston merchant, a Colonial Agent, and for several years one of the Assistants. Tradition has it that she was a sister of Governor Bellingham. She was apparently quarrelsome—quarrelsome enough so that her church censured her for it—and one quarrel was her undoing. She seems to have come upon two of her neighbours talking, to have told them she knew they were talking about her, and then to have reconstructed their conversation with enough fidelity to convince the she was possessed of “preternatural” knowledge (something Mrs. Sarah Winchester used to also have the ability to do, and a reason she dismissed so many staff members for gossiping). Nonetheless, Mrs. Hibbins was brought to trail in 1655, and the jury brought her in guilty. However, the presiding magistrates refused to accept the verdict, apparently believing her innocent, and their refusal automatically threw the case into the General Court. There again she was found guilty; the governor pronounced the required sentence of death; and in 1656 she was executed. We have seen that some of the magistrates were not satisfied of her guilt, and apparently the same were true of some of the clergy. To masses of people, death was a dread mystery; beyond was uncertainty and gloom. These people were seeking for truth, and to learn them the Spirit of Inspiration was imparted. #RandolphHarris 2 of 21
A surviving letter tells us that the Reverend John Norton “once said at his own table” before the Reverend John Wilson and others that Mistress Hibbins “was hanged for a witch only for having more with than her neighbours. It was his very expression; she having, as he explained it, unhappily guessed that two of her persecutors, whom she saw talking in the street, were talking of her—which cost her her life, not withstanding all he could do to the contrary, as he himself told us.” The Hibbins case shows how slender and how circumstantial were the grounds necessary to bring an accusation of witchcraft against anyone with a reputation for malice. It also shows that the popular elements in society (the jury, and the people’s representatives in the General Court) were far more ready to believe in witchcraft than the leaders of society (the magistrates and ministers.) This latter conclusion is reinforced by the fact that before 1692 there were far more acquittals than convictions in New England; there were more people willing to charge their neighbours with witchcraft than magistrates willing to convict them. A case which took place in Hartford, Connecticut, in 1662 is known in rather more detail than that of Mrs. Hibbins. Anne Cole, “a person esteemed pious,” was taken with “strange fits.” As with the Salem girls, the fits were both violent and public. Extremely violent bodily motions she many times had, even to the hazard of her life in the apprehensions of those that saw them. #RandolphHarris 3 of 21
And very often great disturbances was given in the public worship of God by her and two other women who had also strange fits. Once in especial, on a day of prayer kept on that account, the motion and noised of the afflicted was so terrible that a godly person fainted under the appearance of it. In some of her fits strange voices came from her, voices that were clearly not her own. Such voices are now known to be a consequence of multiple personality, which is the extreme form of the hysterical fugue. However, the seventeenth-century observers of Anne Cole judged them to be the voices of demons who had entered into her, and that judgment was sensible enough in view of the fact that the voices seemed to be plotting ways in which Anne Cole might be further afflicted. Eventually, seeming to realize that they were being overheard, one of the voices announced, “‘Let us confound her language, [that] she may tell no more tales.’” For some time nothing came from her but “unintelligible mutterings”; then the conversation resumed in a Dutch accent, and this time names were mentioned, names of the witches who were responsible for these afflictions. When Anne Cole was out of her fits, she “knew nothing of those things that were spoken by her” during them, but she was understandably distressed to find she had been speaking things which, to the best of her knowledge, had never been in her mind; it was a “matter of great affliction to her.” #RandolphHarris 4 of 21
It must have been afflicting to the local magistrates as well; they now had accusations of witchcraft against several persons, but the source of these accusations was not Anne Cole; it was a committee of demons who had infested her. The magistrates investigated further, and imprisoned some (and perhaps all) of the accused on suspicion of witchcraft One of these, a “lewd, ignorant, considerably aged woman” named Rebecca Greensmith sent for the two clergymen who has taken down in writing the demonic conversation issuing from the mouth of Anne Cole. She had the transcript read to er, and then “forthwith and freely confessed those things to be true,” confirming the statement of the voiced “that she (and other persons named in the discourse) had familiarity with the Devil.” She confessed to a number of other things as well, including “that the Devil has frequent use of her body with much seeming (but indeed horrible, hellish) delight to her.” Reports of copulation with demons (including the unpleasantness of the experience) are common in the literature of Continental witchcraft, but this is one of the few known cases in New England. What is involved is apparently an erotic fit in which the woman actually goes through the motions of copulation and achieves a climax; similar fits have been observed in mental patients in the twenty-first century. Thus it appears that in the case of Anne Cole the confessor as well as the afflicted person was an hysteric. This pattern we shall see again at Salem. #RandolphHarris 5 of 21
Rebecca Greensmith was hanged in 1663. So was her husband Nathaniel, although we do not know the grounds for his conviction; according to Increase Mather he did not confess. “Most” of the other persons accused by the demonic voices “made their escape into another part of the country.” What happened to the others we do not know, but they were apparently not executed. And since at least one of those who made her escape had at first been imprisoned in suspicion of witchcraft (Judith Varlet, a relative of Governor Peter Stuyvesant of New York), it can be assumed that the authorities were reluctant to press the matter further. The evidence they had was, after all, highly suspect, coming from demonic voices on the one hand and a confessed witch on the other. (Confessors are a group of women with the power to make anyone they touch love them. This love, however, is more aptly described as a soul-destroying obsession whose objective is pleasing the Confessor in any way possible. Confessors were created by warlocks to travel Medieval lands and act as law enforcers. The Confessors could possess anyone and make them tell the truth in great detail. There were also a few male Confessors, but they became megalomanics and plunged the entire World into a dark age. As a result, after all the male Confessors were defeated and wiped out, the warlocks and female Confessors took up the tradition of killing all male Confessors shortly after birth.) In any event, after the “execution of some and escape of others” Anne Cole’s fits ceased, and did not return. #RandolphHarris 6 of 21
Twenty years later, in 1682, the Reverend John Whiting reported that “she yet remains maintaining her integrity.” This together with what the voices said, suggests that Anne Cole’s fits probably were caused by her fear of witchcraft and cured by the removal of the fear. A few other cases are remarkable for a number of reasons, one of them being the exemplary thoroughness with which the symptoms of the affiliated persons are described, which makes it possible to say without question that these were pathological cases of hysteria. The first took place in Groton, Massachusetts, in 1671-1671 and was recorded by the Reverend Samuel Willard, then minister of Groton (during the Salem trials he was a member of the Boston Clergy). On 30 October 1671, Elizabeth Knapp began to behave strangely: “In the evening, a little before she went to bed, sitting by the fire she cried out, ‘Oh! My legs!’ and clapped her hands on them; immediately, ‘Oh! My breast!’ and removed her hands thither; and forthwith, ‘Oh! I am strangled’ and put her hands on her throat.” The similarity to Janet’s twentieth-century description of the onset of a typical hysterical fit is unmistakable; it starts, he writes “with a pain or a strange sensation situated at such or such a point of the body…[It] often begins in the lower part of the abdomen [and] seems to ascend and to spread to other organs. For instance, it very often spreads to the epigastrium, to the breast, then to the throat. There it assumes rather an interesting form, which was for a very long time considered as quite characteristic of hysteria. The patient has the sensation of too big an object, as it were, a ball, rising in her throat and choking her.” #RandolphHarris 7 of 21
The chocking sensation we shall find over and over again; it is the bolus hystericus and is related to the “lump in the throat” felt by normal people in moments of extreme stress. The normal person, like the hysteric, tries to relieve it by swallowing; this is why the comic-strip artist has one’s characters say “Gulp” when they are in trouble. The choking sensations in the throat was followed by “fits in which she was violent in bodily motions, leapings, strainings and strange agitations, scarce to be held in bound by the strength of three or four; violent also in roarings and screamings.” The fits continued until 15 January 1692, the date of Willard’s writings. Several of the details he recorded are worth noting. On 15 November, “her tongue was for many hours together drawn into a semicircle up to the roof of her mouth, and not to be removed, for some tried with the fingers to do it.” On 17 December her tongue was drawn “out of her mouth most frightfully, to an extraordinary length and greatness.” Devils appeared to her, and witches; “Oh,” she cried to one of them, “you are a rouge.” On 29 November she had a particularly grotesque hallucination, when she believed a witch in the shape of a dog with a woman’s head was strangling her. The hallucinations and the woman’s sufferings were terrifyingly convincing; Willard noted that when she thought the witch was strangling her, “she did often times seem to our apprehension as of she would forthwith be strangled.” #RandolphHarris 8 of 21
Elizabeth Knapp’s case is strikingly similar to that of Ler—one of the best-known cases of J.-M. Charcot, the nineteenth-century psychologist. Her fits, he wrote, “are characterized in the first stage by epileptiform and tetaniform convulsions; after this come great gesticulations of a voluntary character, in which the patient, assuming the most frightful postures, reminds one of the attitudes which history assigns to the demoniacs…At this stage of the attack, se is a prey to delirium, and raves evidently of the events which seem to have determined her first seizures. She hurls furious invectives against imaginary individuals, crying out, “villains! robbers! brigands! fire! fire! O, the dogs! I’m bitten!”—Reminiscences, doubtless, of the emotions experienced in her youth.” When the convulsive portion of Ler—’s attack was over other symptoms usually followed, including “hallucination of vision: the patient beholds horrible animals, skeletons, and specters” and “lastly, a more or less marked permanent contracture of the tongue.” Charcot drew this contracture of the tongue; it is quite appalling. Willard was not exaggerating in calling it frightful. Elizabeth Knapp displayed still other symptoms are identifiably hysterical, including loss of speech on some occasions, and on others speaking in voices other than her own; once “she barked like a dog, and bleated like a calf.” Willard noted that her fits did not seem to do her any permanent physical damage: “She hath no ways in body or strength by all these fits, though so dreadful, but gathered flesh exceedingly, and hath her natural strength when her fits are off, for the most part.” #RandolphHarris 9 of 21
This is typical; as Janet remarks, the “hysteric patient, after howling for several hours, feels rather comfortable; she experiences, as it were, a relaxation, and declares she is out of her fits has often raised the question of whether they are genuine. Willard thought they must be, if only for their violence: “such a strength is beyond the force of dissimulation.” (It should be noted that hysterics are not always well in the intervals between their fits. Some, for instance, lose their appetites and starve themselves. It is probably such cases who are referred to in the statue of James I against witchcraft as being “wasted, consumed, pined.) On 1 November, Elizabeth Knapp named one of her neighbour as the probable cause of her afflictions. The accused woman was sent for, and entered the house while the afflicted girl was in a fit. Her eyes were closed, as they usually were in her fits, yet she could distinguish this neighbour’s touch from all others, “though no voice was uttered.” That would have been quite enough to convict the neighbour in many witchcraft cases. However, fortunately she was permitted to pray with the afflicted girl, and at the conclusions Miss Knapp “confessed that she believed Satan had deluded her.” Willian was happy that “God was pleased to vindicate the case and justify the innocent,” and reported that Miss Knapp never again complained of any “apparition or disturbance from this neighbour.” Instead, she turned to accusing the Devil, who had, she said, been offering her a covenant for several years, a covenant she had frequently been tempted to sign. #RandolphHarris 10 of 21
The dark shadow that Satan has cast over the World grew deeper and deeper. About a month later Miss Knapp accused another person of witchcraft, this time during a period of hallucinations. Her father brought the woman to the house, and Willard, who had been asked to be present, noted that her fit became particularly violent when this woman entered. However, Willard, wrote, “we made nothing of it” since her fits had been as violent on other occasions. Instead they inquired carefully into the mater and found “two evident and clear mistakes” in the accusation. This was enough to exonerate the second accused woman. Satan had implanted this principle. Wherever it was held, people had no barrier against sin. Elizabeth Knapp was still having fits when Willard wrote about her, and all he could be certain of was that “she is an object of pity.” He did not think she was bewitched, but he did believe she was possessed (that is, that Devils has entered into her). This remained his opinion (and that of most others) when the case was remembered in 1692. He also believed that the girl’s terrible afflictions provided an occasion for the community to examine its collective conscience. Therefore he admonished his congregation in a sermon, “Let us all examine by this Providence [id est, this event] what sins they have been, that have given Satan so much footing in this poor place.” Satan was seeking to shut out from humans a knowledge of God, to turn their attention from the temple of God, and to establish His own kingdom. His strife for supremacy had seemed to be almost wholly successful. #RandolphHarris 11 of 21
They robbed God of His glory, and defrauded the World by a counterfeit of the gospel. They had refused to surrender themselves to God for the salvation of the World, and they became agents of Satan for its destruction. They were doing the work Satan designed them to do, taking a course to misrepresent the character of God, and cause the World to look upon Him as a tyrant. The convulsive fits which played so prominent a part in most witchcraft cases, and continued to be one of the most common symptoms of hysteria through the earl years of the twentieth century, have no become relatively rare in Western civilization. D.W. Abse reports fits occurred in only six out of one hundred and sixty-one cases of hysteria treated at a British military hospital during World War II, but that they were the most common symptom among Indian Army hysterics treated at Delhi during the same period. There are a number of possible explanations for this curious fact. Hysterics are notoriously suggestible, so the change may be ascribable to nothing more than the refusal of our culture to give the hysterical fit the respectful and awed attention it used to command. In any case, it seems clear that abnormal behaviour varies with time and place just as normal behaviour does. However, since this particular variation occurred so recently, after the classic studies of hysteria had been completed, it is possible to identify the seventeenth-century Massachusetts fits for what they were. #RandolphHarris 12 of 21
Mr. William Wirt Winchester, while we were attending lectures, purchased three or four old houses in California, one of which was unoccupied. He resided in the country, and he proposed that he wanted his wife and myself to take up our abode in the untenanted house, so long as it should continue unlet; a move which we would accomplish the double end of settling us nearer alike to our lecture-rooms and to our amusements, and of relieving us from the weekly charge of rent for our lodgings. Our furniture was very scant—our whole equipage remarkably modest and primitive; and in short, our arrangements pretty nearly as simple as those of a bivouac. Mrs. Sarah Winchester’s new plan was, therefore, executed almost as soon as conceived. The front drawing-room was our sitting-room. I had the bedroom over it, and Mrs. Winchester had the back bedroom on the same floor, which nothing could have induced me to occupy. The house to begin with was an incomplete, three-story farm house with a basement. It was very old. Dated back to the sixteenth century, I believe. It had nothing modern about it. The agent who looked into the property titles for Mrs. Winchester told her it was originally sold, along with much other forfeited property in 1702; and it had belonged to John Conduit, whose wife was the niece of Sir Isaac Newton, a father of modern science, although keenly interested in the occult. How old it was then, I cannot say; but, at all events, in had seen years and changes enough to have contracted all the mysterious and saddened air, at once exciting and depressing, which belongs to most old mansions. #RandolphHarris 13 of 21
There had been very little done in the way of modernizing details and, perhaps, it was better so; for there was something queer and by-gone in the very walls and ceilings—in the shape of doors and windows—in the odd diagonal site of the chimney-pieces—in the beams and ponderous cornices—not to mention the singular solidity of all the woodwork, from the bannisters to the window-frames, which hopelessly defined disguise, and would have emphatically proclaimed their antiquity through any conceivable amount of modern finery and varnish. An effort had, indeed, been made, to the extent of papering the drawing-rooms; but somehow, the paper looked raw and out of keeping. This woman said, old Judge Sir James Hales (who, having earned the reputation of a particularly ‘hanging judge’, ended by hanging himself, as the corner’s jury found, under an impulse of ‘temporary insanity’, with a child’s skipping-rope, over the massive old bannisters) resided there, entertaining good company, with fine venison and rare old port. In those halcyon days, the drawing-rooms were hung with gilded leather, and, I dare say, cut a good figure, for they were really spacious rooms. The bedrooms were wainscoted, but the front one was not gloomy; and in it the cosiness of antiquity quite overcame its somber associations. However, the back bedrooms, with its two queerly-placed melancholy windows, staring vacantly at the foot of the bed, and with the shadowy recess to be found in most old houses in Dublin, like a large ghostly closet, which, from congeniality of temperament, had amalgamated with the bedchamber, and dissolved the partition. #RandolphHarris 14 of 21
At the night-time, this “alcove”—as our “maid” was wont to call it—had, in my eyes, a specially sinister and suggestive character. Mrs. Winchester’s distant and solitary candle glimmered vainly into its darkness. There it was always overlooking her—always itself impenetrable. However, this was only part of the effect. The whole room was, I cannot tell, how repulsive to me. There was, I supposed, in its proportions and features, a latent discord—a certain mysterious and indiscernible relation, which jarred indistinctly upon some secret sense of the fitting and the safe, and raised indefinable suspicious and apprehensions of the imagination. On the whole, as I began saying, nothing could have induced me to pass a night alone in it. We have not been very long in occupation of our respective chambers, when I began to complain of uneasy nights and disturbed sleep. I was, I suppose, the more impatient under this annoyance, as I was usually a sound sleeper, and by no means prone to nightmares. It was not, however, my destiny, instead of enjoying my customary repose, every night to “sup full of horrors.” After a preliminary course of disagreeable and frightful dreams, my troubles took a definite form, and the same vision, without an appreciable variation in a single detail, visited me at least (on average) every second night of the week. Now, this dream, nightmare, or infernal illusion—which you please—of which I was the miserable port, was on this wise: I saw, or thought I saw, with the most abominable distinctness although at the time in profound darkness, every article of furniture and accidental arrangement of the chamber in which I lay. This, as you know, is incidental to ordinary nightmare. #RandolphHarris 15 of 21
Well, while in this clairvoyant condition, which seemed but the lighting up of the theatre in which was to be exhibited the monotonous tableau of horror, which made my nights insupportable, my attention invariably became, I know not why, fixed upon the windows opposite the foot of my bed; and, uniformly with the same effect, a sense of dreadful anticipation always took slow but sure possession of me. I became somehow conscious of a sort of horrid but undefined preparation going forward in some unknown quarter, and by some unknown agency, for my torment; and, after an interval, which always seemed to me of the same length, a picture suddenly flew up the window, where it remained fixed, as if by an electrical attraction, and my discipline of horror then commenced, to last perhaps for hours. The picture this mysteriously glued to the window-panes, was the portrait of an old man, in crimson flowered silk dressing-gown, the folds of which I could now describe, with countenance embodying a strange mixture of intellect, sensuality, and power, but withal sinister and full of malignant omen. His nose was hooked, like the beak of a vulture; his eyes large, grey, and prominent and lighted up with a more than mortal cruelty and coldness. The features were surmounted by a crimson velvet cap, the hair that peeped from under which was white with age, while the eyebrows retained their original blackness. Well I remember every line, hue, and shadow of that stony countenance, and well I may! The gaze of this hellish visage was fixed upon me, and mine returned it with the inexplicable fascination of nightmare, for what appeared to me to be hours of agony. #RandolphHarris 16 of 21
At last—the cock he crew, away then flew, the fiend who had enslaved me through the awful watches of the night and, harassed and nervous, I rose to the duties of the day. I had—I cannot say exactly why, but it may have been from the exquisite anguish and profound impressions of unearthly horror, with which this strange phantasmagoria was associated—an insurmountable antipathy to describing the exact nature of my nightly troubles to Mrs. Winchester. Generally, however, I told her I was haunted by abominable dreams; and, true to the imputed materialism of medicine, we put our heads together to dispel my horrors, not by exorcism, but by a tonic Vin Mariani. However, the evil spirit, who enthralled my senses in the shape of that portrait, may have been just as near me, just as energetic, just as malignant, though I saw him not. Everybody knows how contagious is fear of all sort, but more especially that particular kind of fear under which poor Mrs. Winchester was at that moment labouring. I would not have heard, nor I believe would she have recapitulated, just at that moment, for half the World, the details of the hideous vision which had so unmanned her. “I was sitting in my room,” said Mrs. Winchester “by my fireplace, the door locked when I heard a step on the flight of stairs descending from the attics. It was two o’ clock, and the streets were as silent as a churchyard—the sounds were, therefore, perfectly distinct. There was slow, heavy tread, characterized by the emphasis and deliberation of age, descending by the narrow staircase from above; and, what made the sound more singular, it was plain that the feet which produced it were perfectly bare measuring a descent with something between a pound and a flop, very ugly to hear. #RandolphHarris 17 of 21
“I knew quite well that you and my attendant had gone away many hours before, and that nobody but myself has any business in the house. It was quite plain also that the person who was coming down stairs had no intention whatever of concealing his movements; but, on the contrary, appeared disposed to make even more noise, and proceed more deliberately, than was at all necessary. When the step reached the foot of the stairs outside my room, it seemed to stop; and I expected every moment to see my door open spontaneously, and give admission to soul killed by the Winchester rifle. I was, however, relieved in a few second by hearing the descent renewed, just in the same manner, upon the stair case leading down to the drawing-rooms, and thence, after another pause, down the next flight, and so on to the hall, whence I heard no more. Now, by the time the sound had ceased, I was wound up, as they say, to a very unpleasant pitch of excitement. I listened, but there was not a stir. I screw up my courage to a decisive experiment—opened my door, and in a stentorian voice bawled over the banisters, ‘Who’s there?’ There was no answer but the ringing of my own voice through the empty old house—no renewal of the movement; nothing short, to give my unpleasant sensations a definite direction. There is, I think, something most disagreeably disenchanting in the sound of one’s own voice under such circumstances, exerted in solitude, and in vain. It redoubled my sense of isolation, and my misgivings increased on perceiving that the door, which I certainly thought I had left open, was closed behind me. #RandolphHarris 18 of 21
“In a vague alarm, lest my retreat should be cut off, I got again into my room as quickly as I could, where I remained in a state of imaginary blockade, and very uncomfortable indeed, till morning. Next night brought no return of my barefooted fellow-lodger; but the night following, being in my bed, and in the dark—somewhere, I supposed, about the same hour as before, I distinctly heard the old fellow again descending from the garrets. This time I jumped out of bed, clutched the poker as I passed the expiring fire, and in a moment was upon the lobby. The sound had ceased by this time—the dark and chill were discouraging; and, guess my horror, when I saw, or thought I saw, a monster, whether in the shape of a man or a bear I could not say, standing, with its back to the wall, on the lobby, facing me, with a pair of great greenish eyes shinning dimly out. Now, I must be frank, and confess that the cupboard which displayed our plates and cups stood just there, though at that moment I did not recollect it. At the same time I must never could satisfy myself that I was made the dupe of my own fancy in this matter; for this apparition, after one or two shiftings of shape, as if in the act of incipient transformation, began, as it seemed on second thoughts, to advance upon me in its original form. From an instinct of terror rather than of courage, I hurled the poker, with all my force, at its head; and to the music of a horrid crash made my way into my room, and double-locked the door. Then, in a minute more, I heard the horrid bare feet walk down the stairs, till the sound ceased in the halls, as on the former occasion. #RandolphHarris 19 of 21
“In a vague alarm, lest my retreat should be cut off, I got again into my room as quickly as I could, where I remained in a state of imaginary blockade, and very uncomfortable indeed, till morning. Next night brought no return of my barefooted fellow-lodger; but the night following, being in my bed, and in the dark—somewhere, I supposed, about the same hour as before, I distinctly heard the old fellow again descending from the garrets. This time I jumped out of bed, clutched the poker as I passed the expiring fire, and in a moment was upon the lobby. The sound had ceased by this time—the dark and chill were discouraging; and, guess my horror, when I saw, or thought I saw, a monster, whether in the shape of a man or a bear I could not say, standing, with its back to the wall, on the lobby, facing me, with a pair of great greenish eyes shinning dimly out. Now, I must be frank, and confess that the cupboard which displayed our plates and cups stood just there, though at that moment I did not recollect it. At the same time I must never could satisfy myself that I was made the dupe of my own fancy in this matter; for this apparition, after one or two shiftings of shape, as if in the act of incipient transformation, began, as it seemed on second thoughts, to advance upon me in its original form. From an instinct of terror rather than of courage, I hurled the poker, with all my force, at its head; and to the music of a horrid crash made my way into my room, and double-locked the door. Then, in a minute more, I heard the horrid bare feet walk down the stairs, till the sound ceased in the halls, as on the former occasion. #RandolphHarris 19 of 21
“If the apparition of the night before was an ocular delusion of my fancy sporting with the dark outlines of our cupboard, and if tis horrid eyes were nothing but a pair of inverted teacups, I had, at all events, the satisfaction of having launched the poker with admirable effect, and in true ‘fancy’ phrase, ‘knocked its two daylights into one,’ as the commingled fragments of my tea-service testified. I did my best to gather comfort and courage from these evidences; but it would not do. And then what could I say of those horrid bare feet, and the regular tramp, tramp, tramp, which measured the distance of the entire staircase through the solitude of my haunted dwelling, and at an hour when no good influence was stirring? Confound it!—the whole affair was abominable. I was out of spirits, and dreaded the approach of night. It came, ushered ominously in with a thunderstorm and dull torrents of depressing rain. Earlier than usual the streets grew silent; and by twelve o’clock nothing but the comfortless patterning of the rain was to be heard. I made myself as snug as I could. I lighted two candles instead of one. I forswore bed, and held myself in readiness for a sally, candle in hand; for, coute qui coute, I was resolved to see the being, if visible at all, who troubled the nightly stillness of my mansion. I was fidgety and nervous and, tried in vain to interest myself with my books. I walked up and down my room, whistling in turn martial and hilarious music, and listening ever and anon for the dreaded noise.” #RandolphHarris 20 of 21
Do not Grieve. Anything you lose comes around in another form. The child weaned from mother’s milk now drinks cranberry juice. God’s joy moves from unmarked box to unmarked box, from cell to cell. As rainwater, down into flowerbed. As roses, up from ground. Now it looks like a plate of rice and fish, now a cliff covered with vines, now a horse being saddled. It hides within these, till one day it cracks them open. There is the light gold of wheat in the sun, and the gold of bread made from wheat. I have neither, I am only talking about them as a town in the desert looks up to stars on a clear night. The Son of God, looking upon the World, beheld suffering and misery. With pity He saw how humans had become victims of satanic cruelty. He looked with compassion upon those who were being corrupted, murdered, and lost. They had chosen a ruler who chained them to his carriage as captives. God’s glory pervades the Universe; His ministering Angels inquire of one another: Where is the place of His glory? In response they give praise: Praised be the glory of the Lord from His Heavenly abode. From His Heavenly abode may He turn in mercy and bestow grace unto the people who, reciting the Shema evening and morning, twice daily, proclaim in love the unity of His name, saying: Hear, O America: the Lord our God, the Lord is One. He is our God; He is our Father, our sovereign and our Deliverer. In His mercy He will make known in presence of all the living that He will be your God. “I am the Lord your God.” As it is written in holy Scripture: The Lord shall reign forever; Thy God, O America, shall be Sovereign unto all generations. Hallelujah. #RandolphHarris 21 of 21
Winchester Mystery House
Ghostly tales are bountiful at Sarah Winchester’s Mystery House. What have you experienced? Photos are encouraged!
The Winchester mansion is 160-room mansion built to appease the spirits who died at the hands of the Winchester Rifle 👻
🗝 winchestermysteryhouse.com
“Whoever shadows my every move will not lose me in the dark.” At least that is what Christ says, or what the Evangelist John heard Him say (8.12). He tells us to walk on, through the darkness, with Christ as our only torch. That way, when we mayn’t have gained a step, but we won’t have lost one either. And on into the day we must pursue with dogged tread the life of Jesus Christ. Is this the secret to Mrs. Winchester’s 7-11 staircase?
Success Means Never Having to Admit You are Unhappy!
As one went to Europe to see the living past, so one must visit Southern California to observe the future. They say in Hollywood if you want messages, you go to Western Union. The doctors thought you should really stay a few centuries more to be sure we have stabilized your condition. I really do not recommend you leaving us at this time. In Hollywood, success is relative. The closer the relative, the greater the success. Many people are recommending that California comes with a warning sign of the city limits: WARNING! PROCEED NO FURTHER! WARD O FOR BIPLOAR CONDITIONS. OCCUPANTS MAY BE VIOLENT. THEY NEED VRAYLAR However, I am telling you to ignore that and come on in. Look, buddy, it is dangerous to get out of bed in the morning. Are you a mortal in a desperate situation or are you not? Then come in here. This is your last resort, babe. However, of course it is up to you. The primary insight is a human’s awareness that one’s destiny is not synonymous with one’s daily experiences. You who have been through so much suffering, have tasted this inner freedom from outward events. You know there have been times when, according to the rules, you should have been smashed to the ground by what occurred. In such moments you were surprised by yourselves. You have the feeling you were being lifted up inwardly, as though the spiritual were triumphing over the material. You recognized a sort of happiness—if it can be called that—a happiness which would have been hidden by an unbroken succession of good days. #RandolphHarris 1 of 22
You began to understand what the apostle Paul meant when he said, “Though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day.” The peace of God begins when this fleeting experience can be preserved and turned into a permanent conviction. It is harder for us today to feel near God among the streets and houses of the city than it is for country folk. For them the harvested fields bathed in the autumn mists speak of God and His goodness far more vividly than any human lips. If we really want to labour in the true spirit, to hope, to keep silent, and to work alone—that is what we must learn to do. However, what exactly does it involve, this plowing? The plowman does not pull the plow. He does not push it. He only directs it. This is just how events move in our lives. We can do nothing but guide them straight in the direction which leads to our Lord Jesus Christ, striving toward him, and the furrow will plow itself. The paths into which God leads humankind are shrouded in darkness for us. There are only two ground rules. They go together, and each taken by itself is enigmatic. The first is that all sin requires atonement. The second is that all progress demands sacrifice, which has to be paid for by the lives of those chosen to be offered up. We sense this more than we understand. We do not subscribe to the belief that the divine soul has somehow gone astray and got enslaved by the terrestrial body. One’s higher self is not polluted by one’s own pollutions any more than sunlight is affected by the foul places in which it often shines. #RandolphHarris 2 of 22
The natural kiss is the kiss which will be given if moral or prudential considerations do not intervene. In all the examples of Natures means what happens “of itself” or “of its own accord”: what you do not need to labour for; what you will get if you take no measures to stop it. The Greek work for Nature (Physis) is connected with the Greek verb “to grow”; Latin Natura, which the verb “to be born.” The Natural is what springs up, or comes forth, or arrives, or goes on, of its own accord: the given, what is there already; the spontaneous, the unintended, the unsolicited. The higher self affects the ego but is not affected by it. Its existence goes on quite independently of the serialized Earth appearances of the ego, and persists when the other ceases. The insensitive can never know it, and may roundly deny it, but the others sometimes receive unforgettable glimpses for which they give thanks to God for years after. Just as space is unaffected equally by evil deeds or virtuous actions of humans, so the Overself is unaffected by the character or conduct of the ego. It is neither made worse by the ego’s wrong-doing nor better by its righteousness. “I am the way, the Truth,” announced Jesus Christ. Who is this I? In the narrow and shallower sense, it is the master. In the broader and deeper sense, it is the Christ-self within the spiritual consciousness. Why did Jesus Christ say, “I am my Father are one,” but yet a little later add, “The Father is greater than I?” The answer is that Jesus the man had attained complete harmony with His higher Self and felt himself one with it, but the universal Christ-principle will always be greater than the man himself; the Overself will always transcend the person. #RandolphHarris 3 of 22
Although I is still identified with one, since it is one’s own mind at its best level, it is immensely grander, wiser, and nobler than one. It is an entity greater, nobler, wiser, and stronger than oneself yet mysteriously and inseparably linked to oneself; it is indeed one’s super-self. Our bodies are born at some point of time and somewhere in space but their essence, the Overself, is birthless, timeless, and placeless. This is a human’s true individuality, not that mentally constructed “I” (which deludes one into acceptance as such). It is never anything else than its own perfect self, never contrary to its own unique and infinite nature. It is true that we are but poor and faulty, sadly limited, and miserably shrunken expressions of the divine spirit. Nevertheless, we are expression of it. Thus no thoroughgoing Naturalist believes in free will: for free will would mean that humans beings have the power of independent action, the power of doing something more or other than what was involved by the total series of events. And any such separate power of originating events is what the Naturalist denies. Spontaneity, originality, actions “on its own,” is a privilege reserved for “the whole show,” which one calls Nature. The Supernaturalist agrees with the Naturalist that there must be something which exists in its own right; some basic Fact whose existence it would be nonsensical to try to explain because this Fact is itself the ground or starting-point of all explanations. However, one does not identify this Fact with “the whole show.” #RandolphHarris 4 of 22
There is a tendency of Christian Science to enter a region of misunderstanding the moment it attempts to apply its true principles to things of this Earth. There is a time in the far past of the human race, a time now lost in the dim mists of antiquity, when the life of humans was stretched to a number of years far in excess of hat it is today. That time has been hinted at by horary legends of a Golden Age and by biblical stories of a pre-Flood race. Such a time will return in the cyclic course of our planet’s history, but naturally it is far-off in the future. Nature herself is in no hurry. She has plenty of time to accomplish her purposes. And in those days humans will again have a normal life-span of maybe one thousand years. There exists in the Old World a certain ancient knowledge—which promises its votaries astonishing benefits in longevity. This age-old art is similar to alchemy of medieval Europe, when humans sought rigorously in experiments for the elixir of life. It is of such antiquity that those who hand it down tell us it was born just after the time when the legendary gods had ceased to walk this Earth. The exponents have almost disappeared from the World, but the tradition is so widespread throughout the Old World that solitary individuals still practise it in remote and unfrequented places. So difficult are the exercises which belong to this system, so labourious are its practices, so ascetic the self-discipline which it involves, that one can understand why it has almost faded out of existence. #RandolphHarris 5 of 22
It performs strange feats such as reanimating dead bodies, stopping blood circulation and lung action, permitting knives and daggers to be run like skewers through living flesh without harming it and with an extremely rapid drying of blood (do NOT try this!), and even the burial alive of an enriched body beneath the ground and its safe resurrection several hours or some day later. The principal basis of these feats consists in making certain changes in the breath rhythm, changes which involve such risk to life and health that we are not prepared to assume the responsibility of describing here the exercises for the development of such powers. It is also necessary to live a celibate and chaste existence, to refrain from expending energy in Worldly work and business, and to reduce diet to an astonishing minimum. Because they demand a special and severely ascetic training which is the work of several years devoted wholly to this austere task, such feats are necessarily uncommon. The ordinary layperson could hardly be expected to find the time for such training, nor is there any necessity for one to do so. These displays are certainly spectacular but have primarily only scientific, medical, and theatrical values rather than a general one. Meanwhile, Nature has set her brief term to the human body, and those whose attachment to the body is not overweening will resignedly accept that terms while the others must do so unwillingly. However, this is a different matter—living in the flesh body for ever and ever, a notion which must seem insupportable to many who find the present brief term of human’s existence quite enough for them to cope with. #RandolphHarris 6 of 22
If Nature cared so much to preserve the physical body of humans, she would not introduce Earthquakes, eruptions, hurricanes, famines, pestilences, and floods into the scheme of things. The fact that she does do so indicates rather that she regards one’s body as being only a fragment of the human, not as the full human oneself. Some had the idea, of course, that in ancient times, sin and sickness would also have disappeared from the World, so that our existence would be a halcyon one. It is a pretty picture, but human’s true home is not in the tabernacle of flesh; it is elsewhere. The fleshly body is but a temporary abiding place at best, and when humans have arrived at a state of perfect spirituality one will abandon it and use a vehicle more consonant with one’s higher condition, an electromagnetic body that will more easily and more faithfully represent one. Yes, death will be conquered, but not in the way that Christian Scientists imagine. It will be conquered firstly, by extending the duration of human life to a constantly increasing period; and secondly, by completely abandoning the physical body for a subtler one. The clear real inner human—one’s spiritual being—is undying and immortal. When many began to consider that inner being in relation to its transient Earthly tenement, the body, they become confused and misunderstand the nature of that relationship. The hour of every human’s death is fixed by a higher will than one’s own, by that power which some call destiny but which itself takes its rise out of the Infinite Power, and no Christian Science practitioner or ordinary physician has ever “saved” the life of anyone. #RandolphHarris 7 of 22
A human’s own Overself fixes the dates of certain major events in one’s life prior to the moment when one utters one’s first cry as a babe, and the date of one’s death is but one of those appointed hours. Perhaps, if the choose, some people have the option to reschedule; others do not. At this point, not in the sky, nor in the depths of the ocean, nor by entering the caverns of the mountain, nowhere in the World can such a place be found where a human might dwell without being overpowered by death. However, “in those days humans will seek death and will not find it; they will desire to die, and death will flee from them,” Revelation 9.6. We are as birds on the wheel of the Universe. For all our loud tweeting, it still rolls along on its own path. And yet these people confidently imagine they set the great Laws of Destiny at naught, and interfere with the workings of the Cosmic Plan. In that sense there might be several “Natures.” This conception must be kept quite distinct from what is commonly called “plurality of Worlds”—id est, different solar systems or different galaxies, “island Universes” existing in widely separated parts of a single space and time. These, however remote, would be parts of the same Nature as our own sun: it and they would be interlocked by being in relations to one another, spatial and temporal relations and causal relations as well. Ans it is just this reciprocal interlocking within a system which makes it what we call a Nature. Other Natures might not be spatio-temporal at all: or, if any of them were, their space and time would have no spatial or temporal relation to ours. #RandolphHarris 8 of 22
It is just this discontinuity, this failure of interlocking, which would justify us in calling them different Natures. This does not mean that there would be absolutely no relation between them; they would be related by their common derivation from a single Supernatural source. They would, in this respect, be like different novels by a single author; the events in one story have no relation to the events in another except that they are invented by the same author. To find a relation to between them you must go right back to the author’s mind: there is no cutting across from anything. However, God might bring the two Natures into partial contact at some particular point: that is, He might allow selected events in the one to produce results in the other. There would thus be, at certain points, a partial interlocking; but this would not turn the two Natures into one, for the total reciprocity which makes a Nature would still be lacking, and the anomalous interlocking would arise not from what either system was in itself but from the Divine act which was brining them together. If this occurred each of the two Natures would be “supernatural” in relation to the other: but the fact of their contact would be supernatural in a more absolute sense—not as being beyond this or that Nature but beyond any and every Nature. It would be one kind of Miracle. The other kind would be Divine “interference” not by bringing together of two Natures, but simply. However, God may never interfere with the natural system He created. He may never cause His natural systems to impinge on one another. #RandolphHarris 9 of 22
If the movements of the individual units are events “on their own,” events which do not interlock with all other evens, then these movements are not part of Nature. It would be, indeed, too great a shock to our habits to describe them as super-natural. I think we should have to call them sub-natural. However, all our confidence that Nature has no doors, and no reality outside herself for doors to open on, would have disappeared. There is apparently something outside her, the Subnatural; it is indeed from this Subnatural that all events and all “bodies” are, as it were, fed into her. And clearly if she thus has a back door (door to nowhere) opening on the Subnatural, it is quite on the cards that she may also have a front door opening on the Supernatural—and events might be fed into her at that door, too. The movements of individual units are permanently incalculable to us, not that they are in themselves random and lawless. All possible knowledge, then, depends on the validity of reasoning. Unless human reasoning is valid, no science can be true. To be caused is not to be proved. Wishful thinkings, prejucides, and delusions of madness, are all caused, but they are ungrounded. Indeed to be caused is so different from being proved that we behave in disputation as if they were mutually exclusive. The mere existence of causes for a belief is popularly treated as raising a presumption that it is groundless, and the most popular way of discrediting person’s opinion is to explain them causally—“You say that because (Cause and Effect) you are a capitalist, or a hypochondriac, or a mere man, or a woman.” This implication is that is causes fully account for a belief, then, since causes work inevitably, the belief would have had to arise wither it had grounds or not. We need not, it is felt, consider grounds for something which can be fully explained without them. #RandolphHarris 10 of 22
The Universal and Infinite cannot be packed into the personal and finite, your demand, natural though it be, is unreasonable. God Himself knows not what He is, for He is not a “what.” So why ask a mere human? Just as there is a sun hidden behind the sun, the divinity which animates it, so in the human being there is a Mind within the mind—and that is one’s Overself. The personality is always limited and chained, the higher individuality always infinite and free. Each human is the expression of this infinite life-power. One’s awareness of life in the five senses will rest upon another and inner awareness. A second and hidden self will thus seem to support one’s outer one. The true I yields quite a different feeling, experience, and consciousness from the familiar physical ego. There is a deeper level of every human’s mind which is not subject to one’s passions, not moved by one’s desires, not affected by one’s sense. It is not possible for the timeless, spaceless, formless Overself to be degraded into activity by its time-bound, space-tied, form-limited offspring the person. The essence of human beings is not one’s Earthly body. Nor is it the ghostly duplicate of that body, as many spiritists and some religionists think. The Overself is the Higher mind in humans, one’s divine soul as distinguished from one’s human-terrestrial nature. It is the same as Plato’s “nous.” The true unchanging self is apart from any historical era and is not dependent on outer changes of custom and form. The aim of the mystic is to know what one is, apart from one’s physical body, one’s lower emotion, one’s personal ego; it is to know one’s inner-most self. #RandolphHarris 11 of 22
When this aim is successfully realized, one knows then with perfect certitude that one is a ray of the divine sun. How shall one know and understand that this very awareness, of which so small is the fragment that one experiences, is a limited and conditioned part of the Great Awareness itself, of God? The inhabitant of this fleshly body, including its accompanying invisible “ghost,” is a sacred one. There, within and yet behind one’s personal consciousness, is this other sphere of one’s own being into which one must one day be re-born as a Blue Jay from an egg. This is one’s best self; this is what one really is under all the defects. The relation between response and stimulus is utterly different from that between knowledge and truth known. Our physical vision is a far more useful response to light than that of the cruder organisms which have only a photo-sensitive spot. God is older than Nature, and from it the orderliness of Nature, which alone enables us to know her, is derived. The human mind in the acts of knowing is illuminated by Divine reason. It is set free, in the measure required, from the huge nexus of non-rational causation; free from this to be determined by the truth known. And, if there were any, the preliminary processes within Nature which led up to this liberation were designed to. At the frontier where the “outer World” ends and what I should ordinarily call “myself” begins, we find a great deal of traffic but it is all one-way traffic. It is a matter of daily experience that rational thoughts induce and enable us to alter the course of Nature—of physical nature when we use mathematic to build bridges, or of psychological nature when we apply arguments to alter our own emotions. #RandolphHarris 12 of 22
We succeed in modifying physical nature more often and more completely than we succeed in modifying psychological nature, but we do at least a little to both. On the other hand, Nature is quite powerless to produce rational thought: not that she never modifies our thinking but that the moment she does so, it ceases (for that very reason) to be rational. The problem is whether you or I can be such a self-existent Reason. This question almost answers itself the moment we remember what existence “on one’s own” means. It means that kind of existence which Naturalists attribute to “the whole show” and Supernatiralists to God. Human minds, then, are not only supernatural entities that exist. They do not come from nowhere. Each has come into Nature from Supernature: each has its tap-root in an eternal, self-existent, rational Being, whom we call God. Each offshoot, or spearhead, or incursion of that Supernatural reality into Nature. It seems that human thought is not God’s but God-kindled. I must hasten, however, that we are considering miracles, not about everything. I am attempting no full doctrine of man: and I am not in the least trying to smuggle in an argument for the “immortality of the soul.” The earliest Christian documents give a casual and unemphatic assent to the belief that the supernatural part of a human survives the death of the natural organism. However, they are very little interested in the matter. What they are intensely interested in is the restoration or “resurrection” of the whole composite creature by a miraculous divine act: and until we have come to some conclusion about miracles in general, we shall certainly not discuss that. #RandolphHarris 13 of 22
At this stage the supernatural element in humans concerns us solely as evidence that something beyond Nature exists. The dignity and destiny of humans has, at present, nothing to do with the argument. We are interested in humans only because their rationality is the little tell-tale rift in Nature which shows that there is something beyond or behind her. In a pond whose surface was completely covered with scum and floating vegetation, there might be a few waterlilies. And you might of course be interested in them for their beauty. However, you might also be interested in them because from their structure you could deduce that they had stalks underneath which went down to roots in the bottom. The Naturalist thinks that the pond (Nature—the great event in space and time) is of an indefinite depth—that there is nothing but water however far you go down. My claim is that some of the things on the surface (id est, in our experience) show the contrary. These things (rational minds) reveal, on inspection, that they at least are not floating but attached by stalks about the bottom. Therefore the pond has a bottom. It is not pond, pond for ever. Go deep enough and you will come to something that is not pond—to mud and Earth and then to rock and finally the whole bulk of Earth and the subterranean fire. God and Nature have come into a certain relation. They have, at the very least, a relation—almost, in one sense, a common frontier—in every human mind. #RandolphHarris 14 of 22
Reason saves and strengths my whole system, psychological and physical, whereas that whole system, by rebelling against Reason, destroys both Reason an itself. The military metaphor of a spearhead was apparently ill-chosen. The supernatural Reason enters my natural being not like a weapon—more like a beam of light which illuminates or a principle of organization which unifies and develops. Our whole picture of Nature being “invaded” (as if by a foreign enemy) was wrong. When we actually examine one of these invasions it looks much more like the arrival of a king among his own subjects or a mahout visiting his own elephant. The elephant may run amuck, Nature may be rebellious. However, from observing what happens when Nature obeys it is almost impossible not to conclude that it is her very “nature” to be a subject. All happens as if she had been designed for that very role. Not all help from the individual can, or necessarily should come from groups. In many cases, what the change-pressed person needs most is one-to-one counseling during the crisis of adaption. In psychiatric jargon a “crisis” is any significant transition It is roughly synonymous with “major life change.” Today, persons in traditional crisis turn to a variety of experts—doctors, marriage counselors, psychiatrists, the pastor, witches, warlocks, the spirits, God, Jesus Christ, vocational specialists and others—for individualized advice. Yet for many kinds of crisis there are no appropriate experts. Who helps the family or the individual faced with the need to move to a new city for the third time in five years? #RandolphHarris 15 of 22
Who is available to counsel a leader who is up- or down-graded by a reorganization of one’s club or community organization? Who is there to help the secretary just bounced back to the typing pool? People like these are not sick. They neither need nor should receive psychiatric attention, yet there is, by large, no counseling machinery available to them. Not only are there many kinds of present-day life transitions for which no counseling help is provided, but the invasion of novelty will slam individuals up against wholly new kinds of personal crises in the future. And as the society races toward heterogeneity, the variety of problems will increase. In slowly changing societies the types of crises faced by individuals are more unfirm and the sources of specialized advice more easily identifiable. Sometimes you just need to turn to God, Allah, Buddha, or whoever your peaceful, confident, all-loving and powerful Overself is for healing. The crisis-caught person went to one’s priest, Paris Hilton, one’s witch doctor or one’s local chief. Today personalized counseling services in the high technology countries have become so specialized that we have developed, in effect, second-layer advice-givers who do nothing but counsel the individual about where to seek advice. These referral services interpose additional red tape and delay between the individual and the assistance one needs. By the time help reached one, one may have already made a crucial decision—and done so badly. #RandolphHarris 16 of 22
So long as we assume that advice is something that must come from evenmore specialized professionals, we can anticipate ever greater difficulty. Moreover, so long as we base specialties on what people “are” instead of what they are “becoming” we miss many of the real adaptive problems altogether. Conventional social service systems will never be able to keep up. The answer is a counterpart to the situational grouping system—a counseling set-up that not only draws on full-time professional advice givers, but on multitudes of lay experts as well. We must recognize that what makes a person an expert in one type of crisis is not necessarily formal education, but the very experience of having undergone a similar crisis oneself. To help tide billions of people over the difficult transitions they are likely to face, we shall be forced to “deputize” large numbers of non-professional people in the community—business people, students, teachers, workers, and others—to serve as “crisis counselors.” Tomorrow’s crisis counselor will be experts not in such conventional disciplines as psychology or health, but in specific transitions such as conventional disciplines as psychology or healthy, but in specific transitions such as relocation, job promotion, divorce, or subcult-hopping. Armed with their own recent experience, working on a volunteer basis or for minimal pay, they will set aside some small part of their time for listening to other people talk out their problems, apprehensions, and plans. In return, they will have access to others for similar assistance in the course of their own adaptive development. #RandolphHarris 17 of 22
Once again, there is nothing new about people seeking advice from one another. What is new is our ability, through the use of computerized systems, to assemble situational groups swiftly, to match up individuals with counselors, and to do both wit considerable respect for privacy and anonymity. We can already see evidence of a move in this direction in the spread of “listening” and “caring” services. In Davenport, Iowa, lonely people can dial a telephone number and be connected with a “listener”—one of a rotating staff of volunteers who control the telephone twenty-four hours a day. The program, initiated by a local commission on the aging, is similar to, but not the same as, the Care-Ring service in New York. Care-Ring charges its subscribers a fee, in return for which they receive two check-in calls each day at designated times. Subscribers provide the service with the names of their doctors, a neighbour, their building superintendent, and a close relative. In the even they fail to respond to a call, the service tries again half an hour later. If they still do not respond, the doctor is notified and a nurse is dispatched to the scene. Care-Ring services are now being franchised in other cities. In both these services we see forerunners of the crisis-counseling system of the future. Under that system, the giving and getting of advice becomes not a “social service” in the usual bureaucratic, impersonal sense, but a highly personalized process that not only helps cement the entire society together in a kind of “love network”—an integrative system based on the principle of “I need you as much as you need me.” #RandolphHarris 18 of 22
Situational grouping, and person-to-person crisis counseling are likely to become a significant part of everyone’s life as we all move together into the uncertainties of the future. There is a powerful, life-changing revelation God wants you to understand! The Principle of Stewardship. Good stewardship will lead to health, favour, and responsibility that God desires to put into your hands for the Kingdom of God! May each of us chose to love the Lord and follow His paths to happiness. More than anything else, Heavenly Father desires our true and lasting happiness. Our happiness is the design of all the blessings God gives us—gospel, teachings, commandments, priesthood ordinances, family relationships, prophets, temples, the beauties of creation, and even the opportunity to experience adversity. He sent His Beloved Son to carry out the Atonement so we can be happy in this life and receive a fulness of joy in the eternities. People everywhere are looking for something. In their own way, what they are really looking for is happiness. As with truth itself, however, many are kept from happiness “because they know not where to find it,” reports Doctrine and Covenants 123.12. Because they do not know where to find true and lasting happiness, they look for it in things that actually bring temporary pleasure only—buying things, seeking honour and praise from the World through inappropriate behaviour, or focusing on physical beauty and attractiveness. Pleasure is often confused with happiness. It seems that the more people seek temporary pleasure, the less happy they become. Usually, pleasure endures for only a short time. #RandolphHarris 19 of 22
You may get that transitory pleasure, yes, but you cannot find joy, you cannot find happiness. Happiness is found only along that well beaten track, narrow as it is, though straight, which leads to eternal life. Unfortunately for many, happiness is elusive. Scientists know that it is more than simply positive mode, happiness is a state of well-being that encompasses living a good life—that is, wit a sense of meaning and deep satisfaction. Research shows that happiness is not the result of bouncing from one experience to the next. Instead, achieving happiness typically involves a long-sustained effort for something more important in life. Happiness is determined by habits, behaviours, and thought patterns that we can directly address wit intentional actions. Much of our happiness is actually under personal control. God’s love speaks to us in our hearts and tries to work through us in the World. We must listen to it as to a pure and distant melody that comes across the noise of the World’s doings. Some say, “When we are grown up, we would rather think of other things.” However, the voice of love with which God speaks to us in the secret places of the heart, speaks to us when we are young so that our youth may be really youth, and that we may become the children of God. Happy are those who listen. Virtue, which is a pattern of thought and behaviour based on high moral standards. It encompasses chastity and moral purity, which qualify you to enter the Lord’s holy temples. #RandolphHarris 20 of 22
Virtuous people possess a quiet dignity and inner strength. They are confident because they are worthy to receive and be guided by the Holy Ghost. Virtue begins in the heart and mind, and it is the accumulation of thousands of small decisions and actions each day. “Let virtue garnish thy thoughts unceasingly; then shall thy confidence wax strong in the presence of God; and the doctrine of the priesthood shall distil upon thy soul as the dews from Heaven. The Holy Ghost shall be thy constant companion, and thy scepter an unchanging scepter of righteousness and truth; and they dominion shall be an everlasting dominion, and without compulsory means it shall flow unto thee forever and ever,” reports Doctrine and Covenants 121.45-46. If you listen, you will hear the sound of the Kingdom of God in the air as no generation ever could before. The ultimate questions of our life transcend knowledge. One riddle after another surrounds us. However, the final question of our being has but one concern, and it decides our fate. Again and again, we are thrown back to it. What will become of our will? How does it find itself in the will of God? The highest insight humans can attain is the yearning for peace, for the union of one’s will with an infinite will, one’s human will with God’s will. Such a will does not cut itself off and live in isolation like a puddle that is bound to dry up when the heart of summer comes. No, it is like a mountain stream, relentlessly splashing its way to the river, there to be swept on to the limitless ocean. #RandolphHarris 21 of 22
You know of the disease in Central Africa called sleeping sickness, there also exists a sleeping sickness of the soul. Its most dangerous aspect is that one is unaware of its coming. That is why you have to be careful. As soon as you notice the slightest sign of indifference, the moment you become aware of the loss of a certain seriousness, of longing, of enthusiasm and zest, take its as a warning. If you live superficially, you should realize that your soul suffers. People need times in which to concentrate, when they can search their inmost selves. It is tragic that most human have not achieved this feeling of self-awareness. And finally, when they hear the inner voice they do not want to listen anymore. They carry on as before so as not to be constantly reminded of what they have lost. However, as for you, resolve to keep a quiet time both in your homes and where within these peaceful walls when the bells ring on Sundays Then your souls can speak to you without being drowned out by the hustle and bustle of everyday life. Do not let your hearts grow numb. Stary alert. It is your soul which matters. O Lord our God, on this festive day we recall that on Sinai Thou didst reveal Thyself, and through Thine immortal words didst weld our people into a nation through Torah. Standing before the sacred scrolls of Thy law, we here renew the ancient covenant with our fathers, pronouncing again their memorable words: “All that the Lord hath spoken we will do.” Help us t discern the wisdom of Thy precepts so that we may heed Thy commandments. May Thy Torah ever inspire us, guiding and leading us in the paths of justice and peace. Amen. #RandolphHarris 22 of 22
Winchester Mystery House
Llanada Villa has changed quite a bit since Sarah Winchester began construction in 1884. Despite a tragedy-ridden life, her generosity, ingenuity, and passion left an endless mark on the Santa Clara Valley. How many times have you visited Mrs. Winchester’s creation?
Even after months of distancing, the air of bizarre energy still flows through the house after the sun sets.
We’re open for Self-Guided Mansion Tours!
Rubbing their Sleepy Eyes with Lazy Wrists–There is the Brute and the Angel in Almost Every Human!
Americans are trained from infancy for mutationhood. Western civilization is a human running with increased speed through an air-sealed tunnel in search of additional oxygen. In your prayers, pour out your heart to your Father in Heaven in thanks for the blessings you have received. Please be specific in thanking God for His goodness, for your family, for your friends, for your home, for your leaders and teachers, for the gospel, and for His Son, Jesus Christ. If we prayed for the small and simple blessings of if our prayers were only prayers of gratitude, what would our prayers be like? Recognizing our blessings and expressing gratitude increases our happiness. God gives us commandments to protect us and help us to be happy. The commandment to be grateful is no exception. Gratitude takes us outside of ourselves and focuses our attention on God and others. At this beautiful time of year, may our hearts be softened and changed as we increase our gratitude. May we always choose, no matter the season, to be grateful and qualify for God’s acknowledgement and promised blessings. “And one who recieveth all things with thankfulness shall be made glorious; and the things of this Earth shall be added unto one, even an hundred fold, yea, more,” reports Doctrine and Covenants 78.19. #RandolphHarris 1 of 23
When things get tough, perseverance is demonstrated by those who keep going, who do not give up even when others say it cannot be done. When we encounter challenged, success is usually earned by persevering and not becoming discouraged. Early warning signals are evident in many aspects of our lives. For example, a fever can be a first symptom of sickness of disease. Various financial and labour market indicator are used to forecast future trends in local and national economies. And depending upon the area of the World in which we live, we may receiver flood, Earthquake, avalanche, hurricane, tsunami, tornado, or winter storm warnings. We are also blessed by spiritual early warning signals as a source of protection and direction in our lives. Recall how Noah was alerted by God of things not yet seen, and he “prepared the ark to the saving of his house,” reports Hebrews 11.7. Consider the language of the Lord in the revelation known as the Word of Wisdom: “In consequence of evils and designs which do and will exist in the hearts of conspiring humans in the last days, I have warned you, and forewarn you, by giving unto you this word of wisdom by revelation,” reports Doctrine and Covenants 89.4. Spiritual warning should lead to increasingly vigilant watching. #RandolphHarris 2 of 23
You and I live in “a day of warning,” reports Doctrine and Covenants 63.58. And because we have been and will be warned, we need to be, as the Apostle Paul admonished, “watching with all perseverance,” reports Ephesians 6.19. I pray for the guidance of the Holy Ghost. The highest possibility which separates humans from beast is attainment of insight into truth, experience of one’s divine source. A tension holds all thins in equilibrium between coming together of their elements, temporary maintenance of their forms, and passing away int dissolution. This includes the mineral, the plant, the animal, and the human. However, when we look at the last-named, a new possibility opens up which could not have happened to Nature’s earlier kingdoms. All things dissolve in the end, but humans alone dissolve consciously into a higher Consciousness. We are not just higher animals and nothing more, but as human beings we possess a self-consciousness which can be developed until it matures into a thinking power as well as a totally superior kind of awareness—that of God. A human life presents only the opportunity for attaining the realization of God. #RandolphHarris 3 of 23
Developing the full potential of the human mind ought not to be taken away from any human, however evil one may be, and however remote from this goal, in punishment for one’s crimes. Our sole objective where the truths of salvation are concerned should be to find out what the Lord has revealed and then to believe and act accordingly. We testify that God is infinite and eternal and that He ordained the laws whereby His spirit children might have power to advance and progress and become like Him. We know the salvation is in Christ; that He was the Firstborn Son of the Eternal Father; that he was chosen and foreordained in the councils of Heaven to work out the infinite and eternal atonement; that Christ was born into the World as the Son of God; and that He has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. We believe with perfect surety that Christ came to ransom humans from the temporal and spiritual death brought into the World by the Fall of Adam and that Christ took upon Himself the sins of all humans on condition of repentance. We testify that the gospel of Jesus Christ is the plan of salvation; and that through the Lord’s atoning sacrifice all humans shall be raised in immortality to be judged by Jesus Christ according to the deeds done in the flesh. #RandolphHarris 4 of 23
Those that believe and obey the fullness of gospel shall be raised also unto eternal life in our Father’s kingdom. We believe it is by grace that we are saved after all that we can do, and that building upon the foundation of the atonement of Christ, all humans must work out their salvation with fear and trembling before the Lord. We proclaim that to gain salvation humans must believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, repent of their sins, receive the gift of the Holy Ghost by the laying on of hands, and then press forward with a steadfastness in Christ, keeping the commandments and enduring to the end. How can humans be so blind to the truth of their very being? Their quality of consciousness provides the clue, but it must be followed up. It is questionable whether the advantages of being a human creature are outweighed by the disadvantages. Why? Simply because humans may use their human faculties to transcend their present level and, as they call it, “realize oneself.” The choice between submitting or not submitting to one’s terrestrial genes and hormones belongs to humans, but the tendency to follow them belongs to the earlier stage; it is very, very ancient and is coming under their control very, very slowly. #RandolphHarris 5 of 23
When this transcendence of their ancestry is complete, humans fulfill themselves as truly human. If a human walks upright, it is because this upright poster is symbolic of their gradual progression into ruling their terrestrial body and human nature. The ordinary ego-driven unenlightened human is acted on by lower cosmic Nature, just as plants and animals are. However, in human animal, individuality and intellect are additionally present—whether slightly in the savage or markedly in the highly civilized person. The enlightened human is also acted on, but in one’s case it is by higher cosmic Nature. Instead of being guided by passion and desire, one is guided by intuition. The changeover from lower to higher requires one’s contribution, one’s effort to control nature, to discipline individuality, and to achieve self-mastery. It is not only in the possession of reason and the reception of intuition that the human form of life is superior to other beings, but also in the exercise of will. Humans are an individualized creature. They are aware of their own separate identity and special personality. If humans feel one feel they are not individually responsible for their actions, being entirely responsive to their instincts, they have the choice to learn how to modify their behaviour. #RandolphHarris 6 of 23
Human beings add a new urge, that of conscious development through intelligence to the Earth. The impersonal and eternal part of us is the God in us, symbolized by the upper half of the Sphinx’s head, as the lower half symbolizes the human part, and as the body itself symbolizes the terrestrial part. We cannot separate the importance of the body from the importance of the mind. We are animals in one part of our nature, human beings in the second part, and sometimes angelic in the third part. All make one creature. We learn what our bodies are through the physical senses. We learn a part of what the mind is through our thoughts. We learn still more about the mind’s deeper phases through our non-thoughts—that is, intuitions. Such is the triple nature of humans—a lower self of animal instincts, a middle self of human thoughts, a higher self of divine nature. We may well wonder how animal lust, human cunning, and angelic nobility can come to be mingled in a single entity. That indeed is the mystery of humans. When the whole cosmos shows its double-face of Eternal Consciousness, shadow and light, we must expect the individual creature to show the same. #RandolphHarris 7 of 23
Hence, humans are half animal and half god, with reason as their link; only when they establish an equilibrium between then do they fulfill themselves. Nature is what it is—bipolar—so existence involves struggle and conflict of all of us until the genius in a million finds the point of equilibrium between the two opposing pulls, between the savage and the saint in one. The animal nature is naturally selfish, the spiritual nature unselfish. Between those two poles, humans are brought more and more into conflict with oneself as one evolves. Because they are human animals bonded to a divine spirit, we see humans as erratic in their behaviour and irrelevant in their purposes. They bear the human form externally but are largely predatory animal internally. Mind—that is, character and consciousness—is the real essence of a human. There is the brute and the angel in almost every human. However, how much there is of the one and how little of the other, differs with every human. Returning for a moment to the metaphor of “islands,” it has to be acknowledged that the islands undergo some atypical developments in the course of time. As the infant encounters further experiences, we may think of the island both as disintegrating and as merging in new ways. #RandolphHarris 8 of 23
However, this transformation happens not on a geographical but on a multidimensional scale, and it is not easily visualized on a flat map. It is as though all the green on al the islands (green of leaves, of sea, of stones) merged to contribute to the more abstract concept of “green” without, however, bleaching the green objects on the island. It is as though the flying of the birds and of the leaves in the win were integrated to make the concept of flying. In short, each experience remains itself although generalized abstracted aspects may grow in relative importance as further experiences contribute to them. Differentiating, generalizing, and abstracting go together. Abstraction, differentiation, and generalization are names for different aspects of the same process which are in connection with learning to recognize triangles, oranges, and musical notation: the formation of concept. The concepts now under consideration are at a higher level, that is all. In order to conceptualize the colour puce, I have to perceive and recognize as puce a particular shade in a variety of contexts—generalizing. #RandolphHarris 9 of 23
I have to disentangle it from other features of the situation in which it is embedded—abstracting. And I have to distinguish it from other shades which are not puce—differentiating. Three main sets of abstractions, generalizations, and differentiations with which we are concerned just now are to do with the achievement of some sense of self, some sense of other people and things, and, thirdly, some ways in which self is experienced as related to other people and things. These will be considered one by one. However, perhaps yet another caution is needed before we do so. It is only for the sake of clarity we look at these three sets one by one and “abstract” them. Except in very rare circumstances, my experience of myself is not of me in some pure abstract sense. I am aware at this moment, not of “me,” but of me-getting-an-idea-across-to-you-the-reader and of you-the-reader-understanding-me, you-liking-this-point, you-put-off-by-my-style. In short, and to say it yet again, our experiences come in units of relationship. Gradually, if all goes well, a self, and a sense of self, is established, made up from all the bits of experience in which the persons has been involved. #RandolphHarris 10 of 23
The memory-traces of all these bits remain, but the structures which they form are profoundly affected by the context which the evolving structures provide for each new experience as it happened. Some experiences will have integrated with much that has gone before; some will have been left more or less isolated. Under the influences of a well integrated ego-identity, more central controls gain increasingly more dominance over new information coming in, and the map is no longer so easily modified by further experience. New information, although registered, then has relatively little effect on behaviour or indeed on consciousness. This is in reference to the process of selective perception, by which certain meanings come to predominate over others. Through these processes the sense of self differentiates from not self. Strong psychological structures are created in which the self is involved—self-structures. Self-structures are often strong enough to be functioning as “maps” to the working model of what is going on in and around the organism at a particular time. When this is so, they are strong enough to steer behaviour in a particular direction. When this has happenes, we recognize a stable identity. #RandolphHarris 11 of 23
Appetite and will are two different faculties, yet they have the same function: they impel humans to action. The two faculties are essential to action. Appetite is the efficient and effective cause of processes not having sense organs. It appears, for example, in the movements of nutrition and excretion. It seemed logical to postulate the same kind of originative power for all kinds of movement. That is why we admonish the mora philosophers who spend such an infinite quantity of debate touching good and the highest good to cast their eye abroad upon nature and behold the appetite that is in all things to receive and to give. With receiving and giving as the controlling ideas, there are appetitive motions more precise than that of philosopher in their long and wandering discourses of pleasure, virtue, duty, and religion. Furthermore, if one looks deeply into the experience of human desire one can detect movement, for every obtaining of a desire hath a shew of advancement, as motion though in a circle hath a shew of progression. #RandolphHarris 12 of 23
That is, a desire—say that of obtaining political office, or a mistress—directs one initially to a goal, and arriving at the goal is like retuning to one’s starting point. The will, too, seems to be the immediate impetus to any action that is the outcome of reasoning and judgment. Reason might work well and true, judgment might be sound, but unless the will were moved the intellect would have cerebrated in vain. One function of the imagination, described previously, is that of making reason appealing to the will; and the art of rhetoric discharged its office by applying the dictates of reason to imagination for “better’ moving of the will. As efficient causes, appetite and will allowed two different kinds of behaviour, the sensuous and the rational. In sensuous actions, three features were always present. First, they were immediate and nonreflective; there was no thinking about consequence. Desire, for example, was often touched off by some unlawful wish, and the wish rashly granted before it has been understood and weighed. Second, pleasure and pain attend sensuous actions, and hence were guides to desire. #RandolphHarris 13 of 23
These qualities of experience are shown most clearly in the passions, some emotional experience giving pleasure, as with joy, other experiences giving pain, as with anger. Pleasure and pain are to the particular affections, as light is to particular colours. That is, pleasure or pain is always a feature of emotional experience, just as light is always present in colour. As a quality of experience, pleasure is not most pure and satisfying when accompanying knowledge and learning. Delight always attends upon learning; there is no satiety for satisfaction and appetite are perpetually interchangeable. Many other kinds of behaviour give pleasure because of their novelty. Accordingly, some of life’s pleasures can be graded, the pleasures of knowing exceed those of affections, the affections those of the senses, achievement and victory those of a strong dinner. If the pleasure of learning be not insatiable, why do voluptuous men turn friars, and ambition men turn melancholy? The third feature of sensuous behaviour in some manner involves the affections of passions; that is, sensuous actions are emotional to some degree, great or small. The center of emotional experience is in the heart or its region. #RandolphHarris 14 of 23
Both affections and passions are linked to appetite rather than will. Their activity, strongly tinctured with pleasure and pain, powerfully affects the appetite. Their influence, however, need not be bad. In fact, in the scheme of things, if it does not conflict with reason and will, appetitive behaviour is coloured with good. The affections, indeed, can be properly enlisted by the imagination in efforts to move the will. Only when the affections of their perturbation rise up to disturb judgment and overpower the will are the issues of appetite are evil. As a general rule, behaviour controlled by will is preferable to actions controlled by appetite. “In the beginning God created the Heavens and the Earth. Now the Earth was a formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. And God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light. God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness. God called the light ‘day,’ and the darkness he called ‘night.’ And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day,” reports Genesis 1.1-3. Light is a species of quality. #RandolphHarris 15 of 23
Some writers have said that the light in the air has not a natural being such as the colour on a wall has, but only an intentional being, as a similitude of colour in their air. However, this cannot be the case for two reasons. First, because light gives a name to the air, since by it the air becomes actually luminous. However, colour does not do this, for we do not speak of the air as coloured. Secondly, because light produces natural effect, for by the rays of the sun bodies are warmed, and natural changes cannot be brought about by mere intentions. Others have said that light is the sun’s substantial form, but this also sems impossible for two reasons. First because substantial forms are not of themselves objects of the senses; for the object of the intellect is what a thing is. Whereas light is visible of itself. In the second place, because it is impossible that what is the substantial form of one thing should be accidental for of another; since substantial forms of their very nature constitute species: wherefore the substantial form always and everywhere accompanies the species. However, light is not the substantial for of air, for if it were, the air would be destroyed when light is withdrawn. Hence it cannot be the substantial form of the sun. #RandolphHarris 16 of 23
We must say, then, that as heat is an active quality consequent on the substantial form of fire, so light is an active quality consequent on the substantial form of the sun, or of another body that is of itself luminous, if there is any such body. A proof of this is that the rays of different stars produce different effects according to the diverse natures of bodies. Since quality is consequent upon substantial form, the mode in which the subject receives a quality differs ad the mode differs in which a subject receives a substantial form. For when matter receives its form perfectly, the qualities consequent upon the form are firm and enduring; as when, for instance, water is converted into fire. When, however, substantial form is received imperfectly, so as to be, as it were, in process of being received, rather than fully impressed, the consequent quality lasts for a time but is not permanent; as may be seen when water which has been heated returns in time to its natural state. However, light is not produced by the transmutation of matter, as though matter were in receipt of a substantial form, and light were a certain inception of substantial form. For this reason light disappears on the disappearance of its active cause. #RandolphHarris 17 of 23
It is accidental to light not to have a contrary, forasmuch as it is the natural quality of the first corporal cause of change, which is itself removed from contrariety. As heart acts towards perfecting the form of fire, as instrumental cause, by virtue of the substantial form, so does light act instrumentally, by virtue of the Heavenly bodies, towards producing substantial forms; and towards rendering colours actually visible, inasmuch as it is a quality of the first sensible body. God hath done all things, whatsoever He would. The will of God must needs always be fulfilled. In proof of which we must consider that since an effect is confirmed to the agent according to its form, the rule is the same with active causes as with formal causes. The rule in forms is this: that although a thing may fall short of any particular form, it cannot fall short of universal form. For though a thing may fail to be, for example, a man or a living being, yet it cannot fail to be a being. Hence the same must happen in active causes. Something may fall outside the order of any particular cause, but not outside the order of the universal cause; under which all particular causes are included: and if any particular cause fails of its effect, this is because of the hindrance of some other particular cause, which is included in the order of the universal cause. #RandolphHarris 18 of 23
Even in corporeal things this is clearly seen. For it may happen that a star is hindered from producing its effects; yet whatever effect does result, in corporeal things, from this hindrance of a corporal cause, must be referred though intermediate causes to the universal influence of Heaven first. Since, then, the will f God is the universal cause of all things, it is impossible that the divine will should not produce its effect. Hence that which seems to depart from the divine will in one order, returns into it in another order; as does the sinner, who by sin falls away from the divine will as much as lies in one, yet falls back into the order of that will, when it is punished. In the spiritually transformed social dimension is abandonment of all defensiveness. This of course could occur only in a social context where Christ dwells—that is, among his special people. However, it is natural it would occur in the absence of attack and withdrawal, wherever that may be, or where we have an impregnable defense against it. This abandonment includes a willingness to beknown in our most intimate relationships for who we really are. It would include abandonment of all practices of self-justification, evasiveness, and deceit, as well as manipulation. #RandolphHarris 19 of 23
That is not to say we should impose all the fact about ourselves upon those close to us, much less on others at large. Of course we should not. However, it does mean that we do not hide and we do not follow strategies for “looking good.” Jesus’ teachings about not performing for public approval, about letting our “yes” be a “yes” and nothing more, and about not being a hypocrite—having a face that differs from our reality—all find application here. “Be careful not to do your ‘acts of righteousness’ before humans, to be seen by them. If you do, you will have n reward from your Heavenly Father,” reports Matthew 6.1. (Important to read Matthew chapters 5 and 6 in the Christian Bible.) Frequently, death comes as an intruder. It is an enemy that suddenly appears in the midst of life’s feasts, putting out is lights and gaiety. It visits the aged as they walk on faltering feet. Its summons is heard by those who have scarcely reached midway in life’s journey, and often it hushes the laughter of little children. Death lays its heavy hand upon those dear to us and at times leaves us baffled and wondering. In certain situations, as in great suffering and illness, death comes as an Angel of mercy. However, for the most part, we think of it as the enemy of human happiness. #RandolphHarris 20 of 23
The darkness of death can ever be dispelled by the light of revealed truth. “I am the resurrection, and the life,” spoke the Master. “One that believeth in me, though one were dead, yet shall one live: And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die,” reports John 11.25-26. This reassurance, yes, even holy confirmation of life beyond the grace, could well be the peace promised by the Saviour when he assured his disciples: “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the World giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, nether let it be afraid,” reports John 14.27. So all those who walk with God in this Earthly pilgrimage will be blessed and know that God will not abandon his children who trust in Him. In the night of death God’s presence will be better than a light and safer than a known way. The door is starting to swing from hot to cold. Although it is not as cold as it should be, occasionally a cold day comes. The pokeberries are purple, the sassafras is starting to turn, and the gardens are heavy with tomatoes and mandarin oranges. #RandolphHarris 21 of 23
It is a time to stop and pay attention: the spirit of the land are very busy. I pray to them at this liminal time to open my eyes. Do not let me awake one day and ask where winter has gone. May I be aware of its heavy rain and feet and feet of deep snow, and artic chill. May I be aware of winter’s presence, may we experience rain and lightning and thunder storms, and be as thrilled with it as I will be with arrival of the spring. I set my face to the dark I will travel with the Sun through the dark. I will go with confidence in the deepest dark. Though about me the dark may grow, God is always at my side guiding me to light. This is what I know, God of the Universe. This is what you are telling me and this is what I tell you: the Earth prepares for a great change. Light and dark are equal today, but that will not last. I see the Heavens opened, and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God. The Earth makes its way around the Sun and takes u with it into the year’s dark half. We travel with it, not in calm resignation, but with wild anticipation of what dreams may be dreamt in the night of the World. May they be good dreams. For we saw Him, even on the right hand of God; and we heard the voice bearing record that he if the Only Begotten of the Father. #RandolphHarris 22 of 23
That by God, and through God, and of God, the World are and were created, and the inhabitants thereof are begotten sons and daughters of God. The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament shows His handiwork; day unto day expresses His greatness; night unto night makes Him known. There is no speech, there are no words, their voice is not heard. Yet their sway extends over all the Earth and their message to the ends of the World. In the Heavens, He hath set a tent for the Sun. For the Sun is as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber it rejoices as a strong human to run its course. Its going forth is from one end of the Heaven, and its circuit unto the other; nothing is hidden from its heat. The law of the Lord is perfect, restoring the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise simple. The precepts of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the Lord is clear, enlightening the eyes. The fear of the Lord is pure, enduring forever; the judgments of the Lord are true, they are righteous altogether; more to be desired are they than gold, yea, than must fine gold; sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb. More over by them is Thy servant warned; in keeping of the there is great reward. What can humans discern of their own errors? Please clear me of my hidden faults. #RandolphHarris 23 of 23
Winchester Mystery House
The Witches Cap – named for it’s conical resemblance of a witches hat. Many famous mediums claim this room was “important” to Sarah Winchester, all though we do not know what it may have been used for. How did you feel when you experienced the Witches Cap for the first time?
Winchester Mystery House
A 160-room mansion built to appease the spirits who died at the hands of the Winchester Rifle 👻 The original mansion still stands, but there were also other Victorian houses on the estate for employees. Be sure to show your support and help keep tours possible in the future by taking virtual tours and exploring items in the online gift shop.
🗝 winchestermysteryhouse.com
A Person that Does Not Have Any Tears Does Not Have Any Heart!
To have no friends at all is the worst state of humans. To have only one good friend is enough. You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you. Our personality develops in the course of our life from germs that are hard or impossible to discern, and it is only our deeds that reveal who we are. We are like the sun, which nourishes the life of the Earth and brings forth every kind of strange, wonderful, and evil thing; we are like the mothers who bear in their wombs untold happiness and suffering. At first we do not know what deeds or misdeeds, what destiny, what good and evil we have in us, and only the autumn can show what spring has engendered, only in the evening will it be seen what the morning began. Personality, as the complete realization of our whole being, is an unattainable ideal. However, unattainability is no argument against the ideal, for ideals are only signposts, never the goal. Just as the child must develop in order to be educated, so the personality must begin to sprout before it can be trained. And this is where the danger begins. For we are handling something unpredictable, we do not know how and in what direction the budding personality will develop, and we have learned enough of nature and the World to be somewhat chary of both. #RandolphHarris 1 of 24
On top of that, we were brought up in the Christian belief that human nature is intrinsically evil. However, even those who no longer adhere to the Christian teaching are by nature mistrustful and not a little frightened of the possibilities lurking in the subterranean chambers of their being. Even enlightened psychologists like Dr. Freud give us an extremely unpleasant picture of what lies slumbering in the depths of the human psyche. So it is rather a bold venture to put in a good word for the development of personality. Human nature, however, is fully of the strangest contradictions. We praise the “sanctity of motherhood,” yet would never dream of holding it responsible for all the human monsters, the homicidal maniacs, dangerous lunatics, epileptics, idiots, and physically disabled of every description who are born every day. At the same time, when it comes to allowing the free development of personality, we are tortured with doubts. “Anything might happen then,” people say. Or they dish up the old, feeble-minded objection to “individualism.” However, individualism is not and never has been a natural development; it is nothing but an unnatural usurpation, a freakish, impertinent pose that proves its hollowness by crumpling up before the least obstacle. What we have in mind is something very different. #RandolphHarris 2 of 24
Clearly no one develops one’s personality because somebody tells one that it would be useful or advisable to do so. Nature has never yet been taken in by well-meaning advice. The only thing that moves nature is causal necessity, and that goes for human nature, too. Without necessity nothing budges, the human personality least of all. It is tremendously conservative, not to say torpid. Only acute necessity is able to rouse it. The developing personality obeys no caprice, no command, no insight, only brute necessity; it needs the motivating force of inner or outer fatalities. Any other development would be no better than individualism. That is why when flung at the natural development of personality, the cry of “individualism” is a cheap insult. The words “many are called, but few are chosen” are singularly appropriate here, for the development of personality from the germ-state to full consciousness is at once a charisma and a curse, because its first fruit is the conscious and unavoidable segregation of the single individual from the undifferentiated and unconscious herd. This means isolation, and there is no more comforting word for it. Neither family nor society nor position can save one from this fate, nor yet the most successful adaptation to one’s environment, however smoothly one fits in. #RandolphHarris 3 of 24
The development of personality is a favour that must be paid for dearly. However, the people who talk most loudly about developing their personalities are the very ones who are lest mindful of the results, which are such as to frighten away all weaker spirits. Yet the development of personality means more than just the fear of hatching forth monsters, or of isolation. It also means fidelity to the law of one’s own being. For the word “fidelity” I should prefer, in this context, the Greek word used in the New Testament, which is erroneously translated “faith.” It really means “trust,” “trustful loyalty. Fidelity to the law of one’s own being is a trust in this law, a loyal perseverance and confident hope; in short, an attitude such as a religious human should have towards God. It can now be seen how portentous is the dilemma that emerges from behind our problem: personality can never develop unless the individual chooses one’s own way, consciously and with moral deliberation. Not only the causal motive—necessity—but conscious moral decision must lend its strength to the process of building personality. If the first is lacking, then the alleged development is a mere acrobatics of the will; if the second, it will get stuck in unconscious automatism. However, if one holds one’s own way to be the best, a human can make a moral decision to go that way. #RandolphHarris 4 of 24
The other ways are conventionalities of a moral, social, political, philosophical, or religious nature. The fact that the conventions always flourish in one form or another only proves that the vast majority of humankind do not choose their own way, but convention, and consequently develop no themselves but a method and a collective mode of life at the cost of their own wholeness. Just as the psychic and social life of humankind at the primitive level is exclusively a group life with a high degree of unconsciousness among the individuals composing it, so the historical process of development that comes afterwards is in the main collective and will doubtless remain so. That is why I believe convention to be a collective necessity. It is a stopgap and not an ideal, either in the moral or in the religious sense, for submission to it always means renouncing one’s wholeness and running away from the final consequences of one’s own being. To develop one’s own personality is indeed an unpopular undertaking, a deviation that is highly uncongenial to the herd, an eccentricity smelling of the cenobite, as it seems to the outsider. Small wonder, then, that from earliest times only the chosen few have embarked upon this strange adventure. Had they all been fools, we would safely dismiss them as mentally “private” persons who have no claim on interest. #RandolphHarris 5 of 24
However, unfortunately, these personalities are as a rule the legendary heroes of humankind, the very ones who are looked up to, loved, and worshipped, the true sons of God whose names perish not. They are the flower and the fruit, the ever fertile seeds of the tree of humanity. This allusion to historical personalities makes it abundantly clear why the development of personality is an ideal, and why the cry of individualism is an insult. Their greatness has never lain in their abject submission to convention, but on the contrary, in their deliverance from convention. They towered up like mountain peaks above the mass that still clung to its collective fears, its beliefs, laws, and systems, and boldly chose their own way. To the man in the street it has always seemed miraculous that anyone should turn aside from the beaten track with its known destinations, and strike out on the steep and narrow path leading into the unknown. Hence, if not actually crazy, it was always believed that such a human was possessed by a daemon or a god; for the miracle of a human being able to act otherwise than as humanity has always acted could only be explained by the gift of daemonic power or a divine spirit. How could anyone but a god counterbalance the dead weight of humanity in the mass, with its everlasting convention and habit? #RandolphHarris 6 of 24
From the beginning, therefore, the heroes were endowed with godlike attributes. According to the Nordic view they had snake’s eyes, and there was something peculiar about their birth or descent; certain heroes of ancient Greece were snake-souled, others had a personal daemon, were magicians or the elect of God. All these attributes, which could be multiplied at will, show that for the ordinary human the outstanding personality is something supernatural, a phenomenon that can only be explained by the intervention of some daemonic factor. What is it, in the end, that induces a human to go one’s own way and to rise out of unconscious identity with the mass as out of a swathing mist? Not necessity, for necessity comes to many, and they all take refuge in convention. Not moral decision, for nine times out of ten we decide for convention likewise. What is it then, that inexorable tips the scales in favour of the extra-ordinary? It is what is commonly called vocation: an irrational factor that destines a human to emancipate oneself from the herd and from its well-worn paths. True personality is always a vocation and puts its trust in it as in God, despite its being, as the ordinary human would say, only a personal feeling. #RandolphHarris 7 of 24
However, vocation acts like a law of God from which there is no escape. The fact that many a human who goes one’s own way ends in ruin means nothing to one who has a vocation. One must obey one’s own law, as if it were a daemon whispering to one of new and wonderful paths. Anyone with a vocation hears that voice of the inner human: one is called. That is why the legend say that one possesses a private daemon who counsels one and whose mandates one must obey. The best known example of this is Faust, and an historical instance is provided by the daemon of Socrates. Primitive medicine-humans have their snake spirits, and Aesculapius, the tutelary patron of physicians, has for ones emblem the Serpent of Epidaurus. He also has, as his private daemon, the Cabir Telesphoros, who is said to have dictated or inspired his medical prescriptions. Nonetheless, always choose a vocation where you will be happy. You will spend at least eight hours a day or more at it through all the foreseeable future. Choose something that you enjoy doing. The original meaning of “to have a vocation” is to be addressed by a voice.” The clearest examples of this are to be found in the avowals of the Old Testament prophets. That it is not just a quaint old-fashioned way of speaking is proved by the confessions of historical personalities such as Goethe and Napoleon, to mention only two familiar examples, who made no secret of the feeling of vocation. #RandolphHarris 8 of 24
When it comes to a vocation, income is important, but you do not need to be a multimillionaire or a billionaire to be happy. In fact, if wealth becomes your only objective, you are more likely to be unhappy. You will become a slave t it. It will colour all your decisions. You need enough to get along on. You need enough to provide well for your family. Vocation, or the feeling of it, is not, however, the prerogative of great personalities; it is also appropriate to the small ones all the way down to humble personalities, but as the size decreases the voice become more and more muffled and unconscious. It is as if the voice of the daemon within were moving further and further off, and spoke more rarely and more indistinctly. The smaller the personality, the dimmer and more unconscious it becomes, until finally in merges indistinguishably with the surrounding society, thus surrendering its own wholeness and dissolving into the wholeness of the group. In the place of the inner voice there is the voice of the group with its conventions, and vocation is replaced by collective necessities. However, even in this unconscious social condition there are not a few who are called awake by the summons of the voice, whereupon they are at once set apart from the others, feelings themselves confronted with a problem about which the others know nothing. #RandolphHarris 9 of 24
In the most cases it is impossible to explain to others what has happened for any understanding is walled off by impenetrable prejudices. “You are no different from anybody else,” they will chorus, or, “there is no such thing,” and even if there is such a thing, it is immediately branded as “morbid” and “most unseemly.” For it is “a monstrous presumption to suppose anything of that sort could be of the slightest significance” –it is “purely psychological.” This last objection is extremely popular nowadays. It stems from a curious underestimation of anything psychic, which people apparently regard as personal, arbitrary, and therefore completely futile. And this, paradoxically enough, despite their enthusiasm for psychology. The unconscious, after all, is “nothing but fantasy.” We “merely imagined” so and so, et cetera. People think themselves magicians who can conjure the psyche hither and thither and fashion it to suit their moods. They deny what strikes them as inconvenient, sublimate anything nasty, explain away their phobias, correct their faults, and feel in the end that they have arranged everything beautifully. In the meantime they have forgotten the essential point, which is that only the tiniest fraction of the psyche is identical with the conscious mind and its box of magic tricks. #RandolphHarris 10 of 24
The much greater part of the mind is sheer unconscious fact, hard and immitigable as granite, immovable, inaccessible, yet ready at any time to come crashing down upon us at the behest of unseen powers. The gigantic catastrophes that threaten us today are not elemental happenings of a physical or biological order, but psychic events. To a quite terrifying degree we are threatened by wars and revolutions which are nothing other than psychic epidemics. At any moment several millions of human beings may be smitten with a new madness, and then we shall have another World war or devastating revolution. Instead of being at the mercy of wild beasts, earthquakes, landslides, and inundations, modern humans are battered by the elemental forces of one’s own psyche. This is the World Power that vastly exceeds all other powers on Earth. The Age of Enlightenment, which stripped nature and human institutions of gods, overlooked the God of Terror who dwells in the human soul. If anywhere, fear of God is justified in face of the overwhelming supremacy of the psychic. However, all this is so much abstraction. Everyone knows that the intellect, that clever jackanapes, can put it this way or any other way one pleases. #RandolphHarris 11 of 24
When the psyche, as an objective fact, hard as granite and heavy as lead, confronts a human as an inner experience and addresses one in an audible voice, saying, “This is what will and must be,” it is a very different thing. Then one feels oneself called, just as the group does when there is a war on, or a revolution, or any other madness. It is not for nothing that our age calls for the redeemer personality, for the one who can emancipate oneself from the inescapable grip of the collective and save at least one’s own soul, who lights a beacon of hope for others, proclaiming that here is at least one person who has succeeded in extricating oneself from that fatal identity with the group psyche. For the group, because of its unconsciousness, has no freedom of choice, and so psychic activity runs on it like an uncontrolled law of nature. There is thus set going a chain reaction that comes to a stop only in catastrophe. When they feel the danger of psychic forces, the people always long for a hero, a slayer of dragons; hence the cry for personality. We know that God is our ultimate Saviour. Sabbath fulfilled in human life is really celebration of God. Sabbath is inseparable from worship, and, indeed, genuine worship is Sabbath. #RandolphHarris 12 of 24
As the fourth commandment, Sabbath is the fulfillment in practice of the first three. When we come to the place where we can joyously “do no work” it will be because God is so exalted in our minds and bodies that we can trust him with our life and our World and can take our hands off of them. Now, for most of us Sabbath is first to be achieved in the practice of solitude and silence. Thee must be carefully sought, cultivated, and dwelt in. When they become established in our soul and our body, they can be practiced in company with others. However, the body must be weaned away from its tendencies to always take control, to run the World, to achieve and produce, to attain gratification. These are its habitual tendencies learned in a fallen World. Progress in the opposite direction can only be made in solitude and silence, for they “take our hands off our World” as nothing else does. And that is the meaning of Sabbath. Rest is one primary mark of the condition of sabbath in the body, as unrest is a primary mark of its absence. So if we really intend to submit our bodies as living sacrifices to God, our first step well might be to start getting enough sleep. Sleep is a good first use of solitude and silence. It is also a good indicator of how thoroughly we trust in God. #RandolphHarris 13 of 24
The psalmist, who knew danger and uncertainty well, also slept well: “I lay down and slept; I awoke, for the LORD sustains me” (3.5-6), he said, and “In peace I will both lie down and sleep, for Thou alone, O LORD, dost make me to dwell in safety,” (4.8). Of course we do not mean that we can just seep our way to sainthood. Sometimes people sleep because they are depressed, or are sad, or have a physical condition, or are just evading reality. Nor do we mean that really godly people—call them saints—do not work hard and are never exhausted. However, the saints who have separated their bodies to God have resources not at the disposal of the ordinary person running on fumes and promises, where so many of us find ourselves today. We have to learn how to get where those resources are and to take our bodies into the rest of God. If we are not rested, on the other hand, the body moves to the center of our focus and makes its presence more strongly felt, and the tendencies of its parts call out more strongly for gratification. He sensual desires and ego demands will have greater power over us through our desperate body and its parts. In addition, our awareness of what it is doing—it is very subtle—and what is happening around us will be less sharp and decisive. Confusion is the enemy of spiritual orientation. #RandolphHarris 14 of 24
Rest, properly taken, gives clarity to the mind. Weariness, by contrast can make us seek gratification and energy from food or drugs, or from various illicit relationships, or from egoistic postures that are, in Paul’s words, “upon the Earth.” They pull us away from reliance upon God and from living in his power. Much more could be said of the role of spiritual disciplines on behalf of the spiritual formation of the body. A full discussion of disciplines focused on the body would have to deal with how exercise and diet can contribute to easing the influence of the “sin that is in our members.” As finite, bodily creature we cannot ignore such things. In particular, specific disciplines go far in retraining particular parts of our body away from the specific tendencies to sin that are localized in them. They enable us to stop the practice and remove the tendency in question by entering special contrary practices and circumstances, and thereby breaking the force of habit that has us in bondage. God has made every provision for the body we actually have to serve us and him well for his purposes in putting us here on Earth. There may be severe problems with our bodies, at least from the human point of view. We do not mean to deny or disregard that. #RandolphHarris 15 of 24
However, as Peter said to women apprentices of his day (and of course it applies equally well to men), the real power of life lies in who we are as redeemed people and how our behaviour is caught up in that. So we should “not let [our] adornment be merely external—braiding the hair, and wearing gold jewelry, or putting on dresses; but let it be the hidden person of the heart, with the imperishable quality of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is precious in the sight of God,” reports 1 Peter 3.3-4. This is no legalistic ban on jewelry and so on—though such things can be wrongly used, and perhaps nearly always are. However, it is a clear indication of where genuine beauty, health, and strength of the body come from and what incredible grace lies in the spiritual transformation of the body. “And it came to pass that Sez, who was a descendant of Heth—for Heth had perished by the famine, and all his household save it were Shez—wherefore, Shez began to build up again a broken people. And it came to pass that Shez did remember the destruction of his fathers, and he did build up a righteous kingdom; for he remembered what the Lord had done in bringing Jared and his brother across the deep; and he did walk in the ways of the Lord; and he begat sons and daughters. #RandolphHarris 16 of 24
“And his eldest son, whose name was Shez, did rebel against him; nevertheless, Shez was smitten by the hand of a robber, because of his exceeding riches, which brought peace again unto his father. And it came to pass that his father did build up many cities upon the face f the land, and the people began again to spread over all the face of the land. And Shez did live to an exceedingly old age; and he begat Riplakish. And he died, and Riplakish reigned in his stead. And it came to pass that Riplakish did not do that which was right in the sight of the Lord, for he did have many wives and concubines, and did lay that upon most men’s shoulders which was grievous to be borne; yea, he did tax them with heavy taxes; and with the taxes he did build many spacious buildings. And he did erect him an exceedingly beautiful throne; and he did build many prisons, and whoso would not be subject unto taxes he did cast into prison; and whoso was not able to pay taxes did cast into prison; and he did cause that they should labour continually for their support; and whoso refused to labour he did cause to be put to death. Wherefore he did obtain all his fine work, yea, even his fine gold he did cause to be refined in prison; and all manner of fine workmanship he did cause to be wrought in prison. And it came to pass that the did afflict the people with his whoredoms and abominations. #RandolphHarris 17 of 24
“And when he had reigned for the space of forty and two years the people did rise up in rebellion against him; and there began to be war again in the land, insomuch that Riplakish was killed, and his descendants were driven out of the land. And it came to pass that after the space of many years, Morianton (he being a descendent of Riplakish) gathered together an army of outcasts, and went forth and gave battle unto the people; and he gained power over many cities; and the war became exceedingly sore, and did last for the space of many years; and he did gain power over all the land, and did establish himself king over the land. And after that he had established himself king he did ease the burden of the people, by which he did gain favour in the eyes of the people, and they did anoint him to be their king. And he did do justice unto the people, but not unto himself because of his many whoredoms; wherefore e was cut off from the presence of the Lord. And it came to pass that Morianton built up many cities, and the people became exceedingly rich under his reign, both in buildings, and in gold and silver, and in raising grain, and in flocks, and herds, and such things which has been restored unto them. And Morianton did live to an exceedingly great age, and then he begat Kim. #RandolphHarris 18 of 24
“And Kim did reign in the stead of his father; and he did reign eight years, and his father died And it came to pass that Kim did not reign in righteousness, wherefore he was not favoured of the Lord. And his brother did raise up in rebellion against him, by which he did bring him into captivity; and he did remain in captivity all his days; and he begat sons and daughters in captivity, and in his old age he begat Levi; and he died. And it came to pas that Levi did serve in captivity after the death of his father, for the space of forty and two years. And he did make war against the king of the land, by which he did obtain unto himself the kingdom. And after he had obtained unto himself the kingdom he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord; and the people did prosper in the land; and he did live to a good old age, and begat sons and daughters; and he also begat, Corom, whom he anointed king in his stead. And it came to pass that Corom did that which was good in the sight of the Lord all his days; and he begat many sons and daughters; and after he had seen many days he did pass away, even like unto the rest of the Earth; and Kish reigned in his stead. And it came to pass that Kish passed away also, and Lib reigned in his stead. #RandolphHarris 19 of 24
“And it came to pass that Lib also did that which was good in the sight of the Lord. And in the days of Lib the poisonous serpents were destroyed. Wherefore they did go into the land southward, to hunt food for the people of the land, for the land was covered with animals of the forest. And Lib also himself became a great hunter. And they built a great city by the narrow neck of the land, by the place where the sea divides the land. And they did preserve the land southward for a wilderness, to get game. And the whole face of the land northward was covered with inhabitants. And they were exceedingly industrious, and they did buy and sell and traffic one with another, that they might get gain. And they did work in all manner of ore, and they did make gold, and silver, and iron, and brass, and all manner of metals; and they did dig it out of the Earth; wherefore, they did cast up mighty heaps of Earth to get ore, of gold, and of silver, and of iron, and of copper. And they did work all manner of fine work. And they did have silks, and fine-twined linen; and they did work all manner of cloth, that they might clothe themselves from their nakedness. And they did make all manner of tools to till the Earth, both to plow and to sow, to reap and to hoe, and also to thrash. #RandolphHarris 20 of 24
“And they did make all manner of tools which they did work their beasts. And they did make all manner of weapons of war. And they did work all manner of work exceedingly curious workmanship. And never could be a people more blessed than were they, and more prospered by the and of the Lord. And they were in a land that was choice above all lands, for the Lord has spoken it. And it came to pass that Lib did live many years, and begat sons and daughters; and he also begat Hearthom. And it came to pass that Hearthom reigned in the stead of his father. And when Hearthom had reigned twenty and four years, behold, the kingdom was taken away from him. And he served many years in captivity, yea, even all the remainder of his days. And he begat Heth, and Heth lived in captivity all his days. And Heth begat Aaron, and Aaron dwelt in captivity all his days; and he begat Amnigaddah, and Amnigaddah also dwelt in captivity all his days; and he begat Coriantum, and Coriantum dwelt in captivity all his days; and he begat Com. And it came to pass that Com drew away the half of the kingdom. And he reigned over the half of the kingdom forty and two years; and he went to battle against the king, Amgid, and they fought for the space of many years, during which time Com gained power over Amgid, and obtained power over the remainder of the kingdom. #RandolphHarris 21 of 24
“And in the days of Com there began to be robbers in the land; and they adopted the old plans, and administered oaths after the manner of the ancients, and sought again to destroy the kingdom. Now Com did fight against them much; nevertheless, he did not prevail against them,” reports Ether 10.1-34. Dear Lord in Heaven, as we approach this New Year, may it be born from You; praise, blessings, and honours are due for this gift! Please hear my words, Lord, as you give birth to everything. A newly born year will take its place among your wonders, one more thing for which You might rightly be praised. Sweet hymns shall be my chant and women songs, for Thou art all for which my spirit longs—to be within the shadow of Thy hand, and all Thy mystery to understand. The while Thy glory is upon my tongue, my inmost heart with love is of Thee is wrung. So though Thy mighty marvels I proclaim, these songs of love wherewith I greet Thy name. I have not seen Thee, yet I tell Thy praise, nor known Thee, yet I imagine forth Thy ways. For by Thy seers’ and servants’ mystic speech Thou didst Thy sov’ran splendor darkly teach, and from the grandeur of Thy work they drew the measure of Thy inner greatness, too. They told of Thee, but not as Thou must be, since from Thy work they tried to body Thee. #RandolphHarris 22 of 24
To countless visions did their pictures run, behold through all the visions Thou art One. I glorify Him, for He joys in me, my crown of beauty He shall ever be! His head is like pure gold: His forehead’s flame is graven glory of His holy name. And with that lovely diadem this graced, the coronal His people there have placed. Like Nature, the World, I myself, all of existence is subject to change. It is inevitable. What can we do except accommodate ourselves to this inexorable law? If there is any law which governs human existence it is the law of change. We forget it at our peril. Most ancient societies forgot it and suffered. For they cannot escape change, nor the sorrow that change bring, nor the loss of individual existence which is also brings. Such is the universal law which dominates all things and all creatures. When we try to press a permanent happiness out of this World of impermanent things, we are deceiving ourselves. Whether one comes to this truth near the end of a lifetime after long and varied experience or early in it by intuition, the effect is salutary, if saddening: perfect and continual happiness would include perfect and continual functioning of the body, good health, oral hygiene, good vision, good digestion, and all of the rest. #RandolphHarris 23 of 24
How many of the saints and the wise in history’s records had excellent bodily condition until the end? Nothing remains; everything is subject to change. Whether you rebel against this stark fact or resignedly accept it, it stares you in the face unaffected by your personal attitude. Jesus said: “This World will pass away.” It is hard to bear the remembrance that whatever else may happen change is certain, in one way or another, at some time or another. This is the “eternal flow” of ancient Greek thinkers. Not only is everything subject to change but everything also exists in relation to something else. Thus change and relativity dominate the World scene. Even Nature, used to existences extending through millions of years, is itself subject to this ever-changing process. What chance is then is there for the creations of humans? How could they hope to endure? We may think of the Sphinx and the Pyramid as likely to outlast the hours—but stay! Look at their neighbour, Sahara: today a vast sea of sand, but formerly a vast sea of water. So we must conclude that all is perishable—yet, to complete the picture, we must admit also that all is renewable. The one feature of life and thus Universe which does not change is change itself! It is an inexorable law. #RandolphHarris 24 of 24
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The Best Humans Cannot Suspend their Fate: The Good Die Early, and the Bad Die Late!
Love at eighteen is largely an attempt to find out who we are by listening to our echoes in the words of another, and it means always apologizing first, even when you think you did nothing wrong. The phenomena of the World-form tyrannously and completely masks its reality, so completely that only a dwindling number of people even suspect there is any reality behind it. Spiritual intuition has never been so dormant among the race as during the past hundred and fifty years. Form, which should have been a wicket-gate giving entry to its diviner significance, has become a prison in which they are held captive by their own obtuseness. There is great beauty in the silent Universe. There is an intrinsic principle in created things which is not expressed. The self-actualized looks back to the beauty of the Universe and penetrates into this principle. These seeming shadows of the spiritual domain are more real than the tangible things which are everywhere taken for reality. The question, “Are inanimate things included in the infinite life?” must answer itself, if you take one of the meanings of this term as being the Great, the All. #RandolphHarris 1 of 24
As a matter of fact, however, science now knows that there are no inanimate things. Its high-power microscopes reveal the presence of minute living cells in materials and substances and liquids which are seemingly dead, and its sensitive electrical instruments reveal the presence of energies in others, such as steel. In the end we have to come back to the basic idea that the Universal existence is like (but is not actually) a dream inasmuch as it is all a series of mental experiences projected from one’s own mind. And because even the inanimate things such as tables and houses which a dreamer sees are really one’s ideas—that is, reflections of one’s own mind and therefore of one’s own life-energy—consequently they are no really dead things. So too for the mountains and rivers in God’s dream. From this standpoint there is no such thing as death, only life. However, of course, when compared to the life of the divine World, the life of a limited World is poetically like death. There is a marked intelligence within every atom of the cosmos and within every living creature within the cosmos. So far as the human mind shows forth its own native intelligence it reveals, however faintly, the presence of that master-intelligence out of which it spends itself. #RandolphHarris 2 of 24
The circling Earth makes its way through space just as a human makes one’s way through city streets. It is an intelligent living entity. If there is life in the plant kingdom, there must be consciousness also. What, then, is this consciousness? It is like that of a deep sleep. Nay, we may even go back further and assert of the mineral kingdom that there is life in it, too. For the cells of plants are built up out of the molecules. It is impossible for the human mind to conceive of what the mineral consciousness is like, but the closet description would be that of the deepest trance. Whether in the fragile China Doll tree or the sturdy redwood three there is life, intelligence, and being. They are fellow dwellers on this curious planet just like all of us. American-Indian ceremonies emphasize the sacredness of the human personality. The Hupa Boat Dance ritual creates sacred space for a community mysticism that revitalized the community and makes the trial members feel special in the perceptions of the Creator. This is a spirituality in which the tribal members “know” they are recognized by the Creator. #RandolphHarris 3 of 24
The Boat Dance honours the dead and helps their spirits to make the crossing into the Great Mystery. It is also a ritual for reminding the living that they are sacred and that every individual is important in this communitarian Worldview. The archetypal sounds from the dance and the archetypal experiences of the observer/participants allow this serious ontological enactment of death to become an experience of beauty. In certain communities it is a cultural norm not to talk about the deceased for the death experience is supposed to be settled in ritual ceremony. However, the emotional trauma of a death can lead to substance abuse problems due to the emotional trauma surrounding a death; and the therapist unfamiliar with the culture will label the nondisclosing, nonverbal youth as untreatable. Often in such a case, the district attorney will recommend that the youth be placed in a residential treatment facility or in the state’s youth prison. These placements are usually far from the youth’s home, separating one from the healing, cultural matrix of family, tribe, landscape, and associates. This separation further aggravates the grief process, and for most youth, superimposes post-traumatic stress symptoms upon the death and grief trauma. #RandolphHarris 4 of 24
The psychology and Worldview of some American cultures, especially those connected to the Old World, holds that it is in the solitude of the mind and heart, along with the ceremonial way, that one understands one’s “limitations and freedoms.” When these youth are pressured by the dominant culture’s mental health professionals to speak about a death in the family, one becomes painfully caught in a clash of cultural values. The cultural conflict over how to process the experience of death brings about feelings of dread, despair, anxiety, isolation, and limitedness. Certain Old World cultures have norms he prescribe that one can only speak with respect for the dead; and it is better not to speak at all than to risk drawing the spirit of the deceased back into the World. The therapist’s unenlightened disposition of the silence, words, rituals, and ancestors disrupts the dialogical healing process in the meeting of client and therapist. The family tradition is a stronger determinant of what the youth will share with the psychotherapist than is the court’s intimidation. There are many highest principles both of life and of philosophy, and accordingly there are just as many different forms of compensation by opposition. #RandolphHarris 5 of 24
It has come to light that on closer investigation that different types of personalities have a predilection to marry its opposite, each being unconsciously complementary to the other. So, that is something to keep in mind with any kind of relationship one is trying to establish with an individual. Nonetheless, the reflective nature of the introvert causes one always to think and consider before acting. This naturally makes one slow to act. One’s shyness and distrust of things induces hesitation, and so one always has difficulty in adapting to the external World. Conversely the extravert has a positive relation to things. One is, so to speak attracted by them. New, unknown situations fascinate one. In order to make closer acquaintance with the unknown one will jump into it with both feet. As a rule one acts first and thinks afterwards. Thus one’s action is swift, subject to no misgivings and hesitations. The two types therefore seem created for a symbiosis. The ne takes care of reflection and the other sees to the initiative and practical action. When the two types marry, they may effect an ideal union. #RandolphHarris 6 of 24
So long as they are fully occupied with their adaptation to the manifold external needs of life they fit together admirably. However, when the dominant person in the relationship as made enough money, or if a fine legacy should drop from the skies and external necessity no longer presses, then they have time to occupy themselves with one another. Hitherto they stood back to back an defended themselves against necessity. However, now they turn face to face and look for understanding—only to discover that they have never understood one another. Each speaks a different language. Then the conflict between the two types begins. This struggle is envenomed, brutal, full of mutual depreciation, even when conducted quietly and in the greatest intimacy. For the value of the one is the negation of value for the other. It might reasonably be supposed that each, conscious of one’s own value, could peaceably recognize the other’s value, and that in this way any conflict would be superfluous. I have seen a good number of cases where this line of argument was adopted, without, however, arriving at a satisfactory goal. Where it is a question of normal people, such critical periods of transition will be overcome fairly smoothly. #RandolphHarris 7 of 24
By “normal” I mean a person who can somehow exist under all circumstances which afford one the minimum needs of life. However, many people cannot do this; therefore not so very many people are normal. What we commonly mean by a “normal person” is actually an ideal person whose happy blend of character is a rare occurrence. By far the greater number of more or less differentiated persons demand conditions of life which afford considerably more than the certainty of food and sleep. For these the ending of a symbiotic relationship comes as a severe shock. It is not easy to understand why this should be so. Yet if we consider that no human is simply introverted or simply extraverted, but has both attitudes potentially in one—although one has developed only one of them as a function of adaption—we shall immediately conjecture that with the introvert extraversion lies dormant and undeveloped somewhere in the background, and that introversion leads a similar shadowy existence in the extravert. And this is indeed the case. The introvert does possess an extraverted attitude, but it is unconscious, because one’s conscious gaze is always turned to the subject. #RandolphHarris 8 of 24
In the introvert the influence of the object produces an inferior extraversion, while in the extravert an inferior introversion takes the place of one’s social attitude. And so we come back to the proposition from which we stared: “The value of the one is the negation of value for the other.” Positive as well as negative occurrences can constellate the inferior counter-function. When this happens, sensitiveness appears. Sensitiveness is a sure sign of the presence of inferiority. This provides the psychological basis for discord and misunderstanding, not only as between two people, but also in ourselves. The essence of the inferior function is autonomy: it is independent, it attacks, it fascinates and so spins us about that we are no longer master of ourselves and can no longer rightly distinguish between ourselves and others. And yet it is necessary for the development of character that we should allow the other side, the inferior function, to find expression. We cannot in the long run allow one part of our personality to be care for symbiotically by another; for the moment when we have a need of the other function may come at any time and find us unprepared. #RandolphHarris 9 of 24
And the consequences maybe bad: the extravert loses one’s indispensable relation to the object, and the introvert loses one’s to the subject. Conversely, it is equally indispensable for the introvert to arrive at some form of action not constantly bedeviled by doubts and hesitations, and for the extravert to reflect upon oneself, yet without endangering one’s relationships. In extraversion and introversion it is clearly a matter of two antithetical, natural attitudes or trends, which Goethe once referred to as diastole and systole. They ought, in their harmonious alternation, to give life a rhythm, but it seems to require a high degree of art to achieve such a rhythm. Either one must do it quite unconsciously, so that the natural law is not disturbed by any conscious act, or one must be conscious in a much higher sense, to be capable of willing and carrying out the antithetical movements. Since we cannot develop backwards into animal unconsciousness, there remains only the more strenuous way forwards into higher consciousness. Certainly that consciousness, which would enable us to live the great Yea and Nay of our own free will and purpose, is an altogether superhuman ideal. #RandolphHarris 10 of 24
Still this superhuman ideal is the goal. Perhaps our present mentality only allows us consciously to will the Yea and to bear with the Nay. When that is the case, much is already achieved. The problem of opposites, as an inherent principle of human nature, forms a further stage in our process of realization. As a rule it is one of the problems of maturity. The practical treatment of a patient will hardly ever begin with this problem, especially not in the case of young people. The neuroses of the young generally come from a collision between the forces of reality and an inadequate, infantile attitude, which from the causal point of view is characterized by an abnormal dependence on the real or imaginary parents, and from the teleological point of view by unrealizable fictions, plans, and aspirations. Here the reductive methods of Dr. Freud and Dr. Adler are entirely in place. However, there are many neuroses which either appear only at maturity or else deteriorate to such a degree that the patients become incapable of work. Naturally one can point out in these cases that an unusual dependence on the parents existed even in youth, and that all kinds of illusions were present. #RandolphHarris 11 of 24
However, all that did not prevent them from taking up a profession, from practising it successfully, from keeping a marriage of sorts until that moment in riper years when the previous attitude suddenly failed. In such cases it is of little help to make them conscious of their childhood fantasies, dependence on the parents, et cetera, although this is a necessary part of the procedure and often has a not unfavourable result. However, the real therapy only begins when the patient sees that it is no longer father and mother who are standing in one’s way, but oneself—id est, an unconscious part of one’s personality which carries on the role of father and mother. Even this realization, helpful as it is, is still negative; it simply says, “I realize that it is not father and mother who are against me, but I myself.” However, who is it in one that is against one? What is this mysterious part of one’s personality that hides under the father- and mother-imagoes, making one believe for years that the cause of one’s trouble must somehow have got into one from outside? This part is the counterpart to one’s conscious attitude; and it will leave one no peace and will plague one until it has been accepted. #RandolphHarris 12 of 24
For young people a liberation from the past may be enough: a beckoning future lies ahead, rich in possibilities. It is sufficient to break a few bonds; the life-urge will do the rest. However, we are faced wit another task in the cause of people who have left a large part of their life behind them, for whom the future no longer beckons with marvelous possibilities, and nothing is to be expected but the endless round of familiar duties and the doubtful pleasures of old age. If ever we succeed in liberating young people from the past, we see that they always transfer the imagos of their parents to more suitable substitute figures. For instance, the feeling that clung to the mother now passes to the wife, and the father’s authority passes to respected teachers and superiors or to institutions. Although this is not a fundamental solution, it is yet a practical road which the normal human treads unconsciously and therefore with no notable inhibitions and resistances. The problem for the adult is very different. One has put this part of the road behind one with or without difficulty. One has cut loose from one’s parents, long since dead perhaps, and has sought and found the mother in the wife, or, in the case of a woman, the father in the husband. #RandolphHarris 13 of 24
One has duly honoured one’s fathers and their institutions, has oneself become a father, and, with all this in the past, has possibly come to realize that what originally meant advancement and satisfaction has now become a boring mistake, part of the illusion of youth, upon which one looks back with mingled regret and envy, because nothing now awaits one but old age and the end of illusions. Here there are no more fathers and mothers; all the illusions one projected upon the World and upon this gradually come home to one, jaded and way-worn. The energy streaming back from these manifold relationships falls into the unconscious and activates all the things one had neglected to develop. In a young man, the instinctual forces tied up in the neurosis give him, when released, buoyance and hope and the chance to extend the scope of one’s life. To the human in the second half of life the development of the function of opposites lying formant in the unconscious means a renewal; but this development no longer proceeds via the solution of infantile ties, the destruction of infantile illusions and the transference of old imagos to new figures: it proceeds via the problem of opposites. #RandolphHarris 14 of 24
There is no balance, no system of self-regulation, without opposition. The psyche is just such a self-regulating system. If the psyche is regarded as a self-regulating system, it follows that the attitude of consciousness is compensated by the attitude of the unconscious. In Jungian analysis, the principal, though not the only, way of discovering the attitude of the unconscious is through the study and interpretation of the patient’s dream. Neurotic symptoms, also, can be compensatory to a distorted, one-sided conscious attitude, and may this be valuable pointers toward a new adaptation rather than being simply disagreeable. I am not altogether pessimistic about neurosis. In many cases we have to say: “Thank Heaven he could make up his mind to be neurotic.” Neurosis is really an attempt at self-cure, just as any physical disease is in part an attempt at self-cure. We cannot understand a disease as an ens per se any more, as something detached which not so long ago it was believed to be. Modern medicine—internal medicine, for instance—conceives of disease as a system composed of a harmful factor and a healing factor. #RandolphHarris 15 of 24
It is exactly the same with neurosis. It is an attempt of the self-regulating psychic system to restore the balance, in no way different from the function of dreams—only rather more forceful and drastic. When we gaze observantly and reflectively around an object—whether it be a microscope—revealed cell or a telescope—revealed star—it inescapably imposes upon us the comprehension that an infinite intelligence rules this wonderful cosmos. The purposive way in which the Universe is organized betrays, if it be anything at all, the working of a Mind which understands. God’s immanence is reflected throughout the whole Universe. God’s reality is indicated by the very existence of the Universe. God’s intelligence is revealed by the intelligence of the creatures in the Universe. To recognize that the order of the cosmos is superbly intelligent beyond human invention, mysterious beyond human understanding, and even divinely holy is not to lapse into being sentimental. It is to accept the transcendence and self-sufficiency of THAT WHICH IS. Thought is the spirit of the Universe, thoughts are the forms of the Universe. #RandolphHarris 16 of 24
Everything in the Universe testifies to a super-intelligent power being behind it. We live in a Universe that is spun out of the divine intelligence and sustained by the divine energy. At the center of each human, each animal, each plant, each cell, and each atom, there is complete stillness. A seemingly empty stillness, yet it holds the divine energies and the divine Idea for that thing. For many of us today, our body is in a constant state of agitation and discomfort. That is the contemporary condition and explains our astonishing degree of dependence on prescription and drugs and vaccines. In some cases, of course, this may be due to strictly physical conditions. However, more often, it is not so, but is due to tendencies of the self that have settled into our body’s parts and put it at war with itself. Wounds, fears, unsatisfied desires, shames, losses, and unhealthy ambitions and images of the self sink beneath the horizon of our awareness. We may even deny them. However, they continue to disrupt our body and can even take over our life through the body’s “automatic” responses. #RandolphHarris 17 of 24
Frank Laubach—partly because, to be “noble,” he had voted for the other candidate—was denied a position as president of a college in the Philippines, where he had been serving as a missionary. He lost by one vote. He was frustrated and bitter, and for two years was almost continuously ill. A biographer writes, “He suffered from flu, appendicitis, paratyphoid, a strained leg muscle, an ulcerated eye, and shingles! In a sate of bitter self-pity, he hobbled around, work inefficiently, and wore a patch over one eye much of the time. His failure to accept the defeat was costing him his health. The fact that his desire to exercise Christian principles resulting in him hurting himself increased the inner tension and conflict These were years of despondency and aimlessness. He was fighting the battle of his soul. In fact, what we see in such a cast is soul disruption manifesting itself in disorders of the body, which in turn threaten to take over life as a while and could even lead to physical death. Thank God, Laubach in time found the spiritual key to turning all this around and bringing one’s body into the health of a person radiant with the presence of Christ. #RandolphHarris 18 of 24
The Void which humans find at the center—whether of one’s own being or of the Universe’s—is divine. It holds both godlike Mind and godlike Energy. It is still and silent, yet it is the source of all the dynamic energies, human and universal. “And it came to pass that Orihan did execute judgment upon the land in righteousness all one’s days, whose days were exceedingly many. And he begat sons and daughters; yea, he begat thirty and one, among whom were twenty and three sons. And it came to pass that ne also begat Kib in his old age. And it came to pass that Kib reigned in his stead; and Kib begat Corihor. And when Corihor as thirty and two years old he rebelled against his father, and went over and dwelt in the land of Nehor; and he begat sons and daughters, and they become exceedingly fair; wherefore Corihor drew away many people after him. And when he had gathered together an army he came up unto the land of Moron where the king dwelt, and took him captive, which brought to pass the saying of the brother of Jared that they would be brought into captivity. #RandolphHarris 19 of 24
“Now the land of Mormon, where the kind dwelt, was near the land which is called Desolation by the Nephites. And it came to pass that Kib dwelt in captivity, and his people under Corihor his son, until he became exceedingly old; nevertheless Kib begat Shule in his old age, while he was yet in captivity. And it came to pass that Shule was angry with his brother; and Shule waxed strong, and become mighty as to the strength of a human; and he was also mighty in judgment. Wherefore, he came to the hill Ephraim, and he did molten out of the hill, and made swords out of steel for those whom he had drawn away with him; and after he had armed them with swords he returned to the city Nehor, and gave battle unto his brother Corihor, by which means he obtained the kingdom and restored it unto his father Kid. And now because of the thing which Shule had done, his father bestowed upon him the kingdom; therefore he began to reign in the stead of his father Kib. And now because of the thing which Shule had done, his father bestowed upon him the kingdom; therefore he began to reign in the stead of his father. #RandolphHarris 20 of 24
“And it came to pass that he did execute judgment in righteousness; and he did spread his kingdom upon all the face of the land, for the people had become exceedingly numerous. And it came to pass that Shule also begat many sons and daughters. And Cori repented of the many evils which he had done; wherefore Shule have him power in his kingdom. And it came to pass that Corihor had many sons and daughters. And among the sons of Corihor there was one whose name was Noah. And it came to pass that Noah rebelled against Shule, the king, and also his father Corihor, and drew away Cohor his brother, and also all his brethren and many of the people. And he gave battle unto Shule, the kind, in which he did obtain the land of their first inheritance; and he became king over that part of the land. And it came to pass that he gave battle again unto Shule, the king; and he took Shule, the king, and carried him away captive into Moron. And it came to pass as he was about to put him to death, the sons of Shule crept into the house of Noah by night and slew him, and broke down the door of the prison and brought out their father, and placed him upon his throne in his own kingdom. #RandolpHarris 21 of 24
“Wherefore the son of Noah did build up his kingdom in his stead; nevertheless they did not gain power any more over Shule the king, and the people who were under the reign of Shule the king did prosper exceedingly and wax great. And the country was divided; and there were two kingdoms, the kingdom of Shule, and the kingdom of Cohor, the son of Noah. And Cohor, the son of Noah, caused that his people should give battle unto Shule, in which Shule did beat them and did slay Cohor. And now Cohor had a son who was called Nimrod; and Nimrod gave up the kingdom of Cohor unto Shule, and did gain favour in the eyes of Shule; wherefore Shule did bestow great favours upon him, and he did do in the kingdom of Shule according to his desires. And also the reign of Shule there came prophets among the people, who were sent from the Lord, prophesying that the wickedness and idolatry of the people was bring a curse upon the land, and they should be destroyed if they did not repent. #RandolphHarris 22 of 24
“And it came to pass that the people did revile against the prophets, and did mock them. And it came to pass that king Sule did execute judgment against all those who did revile against the prophets. And he did execute a law throughout all the land, which gave power unto the prophets that they should go whithersoever they would; and by this cause the people were brought unto repentance. And become the people did repent of their iniquities and idolatries the Lord did spare them, and they began to prosper again in the land. And it came to pass that Shule begat sons and daughters in his old age. And there were no more wars in the days of Shule; and he remembered the great things of the Lord had done for his fathers in brining them across the great deep into the promised land; wherefore he did execute judgment in righteousness all his days,” reports Ether 7.1-27. It will be a dark night indeed, for, even though the stars give what light they can, it comes from far away, and is scattered and spent when it falls on the Earth. Where is the light that comes from nearer, from our own World’s companion, our own World’s sister? She hides from us tonight. Tonight there will be no Moon. Tonight we will have no companion to guide us through the darkness. #RandolphHarris 23 of 24
However, though we cannot see you, you live in our hearts. Strengthen us in the darkness: is that not what darkness is for? Raised against the empty Winter sky, the barren limbs of trees and my hands reach out in prayer. I ask from the gods of Winter the strength I will need to endure until spring and the wisdom I require to learn from the dark and the cold the lessons they will teach. May I receive them without flinching. With silent steps you come, snow spirits, silently descending, silently landing. You who silence the World with your falling, silence it so I can hear from you: I hear silence. Please drop welcome tears upon the Earth, fertile sky. Awaken it to new life, please feed its thirsty mouth. The Lord reigneth; He is robed in majesty; the Lord is robed, He hath girded Himself with strength. Now is the Earth firmly established; it shall not be moved. Thy throne is established of old; thou art from everlasting. The waters lift up their voices, O Lord, the water lift up their roaring; yet above the voices of many waters, above the breakers of the sea, Thou, O Lord, art mighty. Thy law is true and unfailing; holiness is becoming to Thy house, O Lord, forevermore. #RandolphHarris 24 of 24
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With Every Morn their Love Grew Tender, with Every Eve Deeper and Tenderer Still!
We take a handful of sand from the endless landscape of awareness around us and call that handful of sand the World. Time is not the fourth dimension, and should not be so identified. Time is only a relative observation. Existentialism of Personalism embraces interconnected attitudes of aesthetic, sacred consciousness with social, political awareness. Transpersonal and existential realities are captured in the sacred and profane events of life. The ecstasy and numinous awesomeness of an I-and-Thou encounter with the Supreme Personality can be experienced in any time and in any place and through any object, person, or event. It is not limited to an inner, individualistic mysticality, nor is it particular to community worship and ceremony. The personal relationship with Supreme Personality creates a “sense of being” and “becoming” that is spontaneous and goes on ceaselessly in a constant dialogue with self, other, and nature. It is contained in form and is experienced in existential, concrete, everyday life. Flora Jones, Wintu medicine woman, speaks about the spirits like they are living personalities in a partnership of existence with human beings. #RandolphHarris 1 of 27
Witness the following statement from Flora Jones: “This is what the spirit tells me—get my people together. Whoever has sacred places must wake them up, the same as I am doing here—to keep my old World within my heart and with the spiritual. For them to help me and for me to help my people.” The personalism expressed by Flora Jones is the basis of most Victorian, African-American and American-Indian traditions. All of these cultures have a dual theme of Being-in-the World and Being-beyond-the-World. The Supreme Personality is experienced as an integrated intelligence and love that is expressed through the archetypes of mythologies, rituals, worship, dreams, and visions. The archetypal spirituality of the meeting in the Between confirms that the Supreme Personality lies within the human personality and in the meeting as he Ground of Being. The Supreme Personality, as a living personality, offers love, knowledge, mystery, gift giving, and sharing in relationship with the human person. The I-and-Thou encounter bring to “awareness” constellations of fascination and fear, destiny and freedom, death and life, anxiety and joy, interest and surprise, love and shame, and guilt and excitement. #RandolphHarris 2 of 27
Existentialism of Personalism came out of my practice and theory in a circle of understanding and interpretation through dialogue with American Indians, Victorian people, and African-Americans. Alex Haley in his book Roots (1976) describes how the father of Kunta Kinte presented his infant son to the Universe. He writes, “Carrying little Kunta in his strong arms, he walked to the edge of the village, lifted his baby up with his face to the Heavens, and said softly….Behold—the only thing greater than yourself” (p.13). Haley is showing that the living Universe is the father/mother of Kunta Kinte and that the child’s personality is sacred. In the Navajo tradition, the man who holds his infant up to Father Sun and says, “Father Sun, this is your child,” is expressing that the Universe is personal and loving. The Navajo infant is a direct descendant of the living Universe, and, therefore, its personality is sacred. American-American, Victorian, and American Indian traditions demonstrate a continual dialogue between the human personality and the Supreme Personality that reveals the sacred and the profane as not separated but forming an interconnected metaphysical reality that is remythologized in every I-and-Thou meeting. #RandolphHarris 3 of 27
However, philosophy does not accept the Semitic belief in a World created for the first time by a personal creator, and this is as true of the highest Greek philosophy as expressed, for instance, in Aristotle’s work on metaphysics as in the highest Asiatic philosophy associated with Buddhism and Hinduism. The word “creation” is inadmissible here for it signifies producing something out of nothing. No one, not even God himself, can produce something out of nothing. Therefore, the orthodox Christian idea of a mysterious creation is completely untenable. That the existence of manufactured things indicates a manufacturer is sound logic, but to apply the same analogy to the World is not. For the World is something quite other than them; it is in a category not only altogether apart from them but altogether by itself. There was never a time when the Universe was created or fabricated by a Creator or Maker. This is a case of man making God in his own image. Through successive cycles of the Universe comes and goes, is born and dies, as the World-Mind rethinks the World-Idea or lets it lapse. #RandolphHarris 4 of 27
The Universe was never created for the first time for it has always and incessantly appeared and disappeared, activated and rested, come forth, evolved, and retreated into latency. There has never been a time when there was not a Universe, by which I do not mean our own. There is nothing arbitrary in this “creation.” It is really self-determined. Everything brings itself into existence under the necessity of its own being and the laws of its own possibilities. Where a circle begins it also ends; the Universe is like that: it has n real beginning or ending. It is not a creation in the Biblical sense but an intermittent continuation. Aristotle: “The Universe unfolds out of its own essence, not being made.” We could add that its pattern unfolds too out of the World-Idea. The Universe has never had a beginning, and cannot have an end, but its forms and states may change and therefore must have a beginning and end. It is more correct to speak of the Universe’s birth, not of its creation. The Universe was not made, in a workshop sense; it was emanated. It flowed out of the Original Source and it will flow back there at the appointed time. The cosmos is neither a phantom to be disdained nor an illusion to be dismissed. #RandolphHarris 5 of 27
The cosmos is more of a remote expression in time and space and individuality of that which is timeless, spaceless, and infinite. If it is not the it is not the Reality in its ultimate sense, it is an emanation of the Reality. Hence it shares in some way the life of its source. To find that point of sharing is the true object of incarnation for all creates within the cosmos. The World of external Nature, being eternal, is not brought into existence by an act of sudden creation out of nothing. Furthermore, this World is rooted in the divine substance and is consequently not an empty illusion but an indirect manifestation of divine reality. A thought exists in intimate relation with the World-Mind, God. The World is not bereft of reality although it does not possess ultimate reality. The World is neither a trap nor an illusion, neither a degradation of the divine essence nor an indication of the divine absence. What is the meaning of the World? If it is nothing more than an illusion, it can have no real meaning at all. However, if it is an expression of the infinite intelligence it must everywhere pervaded by immense meaning. #RandolphHarris 6 of 27
The truth is ever here, whether unwritten and bodiless or scripted and described. The image of it can be looked at by other generations long afterwards, but the reality of it remains always in the World-Idea and is never lost. If the World is sheer illusion, how could man—himself a part of this illusion—ever know the Real? Were humans merely an illusion man and woman could see only further illusions. Were one part of the Real one could see only further reality. Since our experience of illusion is itself in accordance with the World-idea, why should we be afraid of admitting its existence? What we should be afraid of is letting it blot out Reality. The whole Universe is a symbol, whose meaning can be read only when we have learned the alphabet of philosophic laws and experiences. Our World is but a fleeting symbol, yet we may not disdain it. For it is the arched entrance under which we must pass through to the infinite life. The World is a spectacle presented for our meditation in depth. It is a clue, a pointing sign, and even a mystery play. What is the Universe but a gigantic symbol of God? Its infinite variety hints at the infinite endless of the Absolute itself. #RandolphHarris 7 of 27
The World stands for something else: it is, first, a token that God exists, second, an image of God’s being. The Universe is a cipher which needs to be decoded. The scientist does this on one level of investigation, the metaphysician on a different level; the religionist does not attempt the effort but reveres the cipher’s Author. Was it not Goethe who wrote: “Everything which happens is only a symbol”? Is not the whole gigantic cosmic effect in the end only a symbolic expression indicating that paradoxically it is and is not? The more we learn about the Universe, the more mysterious it becomes. Once, in America, I was consulted by a business man about twenty-five, whose case is a good illustration of the sublimation of free energies. He was a typical American self-made man who had worked his way up from a novice to an expert. He had been very successful and had founded an immense business. He has also succeeded in organizing it in such a way that he was able to think of retiring. Two years before I saw him, he had in fact taken his farewell. #RandolphHarris 8 of 27
Until then he had lived entirely for his business and concentrated all his energies on it with the incredible intensity and one-sidedness peculiar to successful American business men. He had purchased a splendid estate where he thought of “living,” by which he meant horse, BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Rolls Royce, Bentley, Porsche, golf, tennis, parties and what not. However, he had reckoned without his host. The energy which should have been at his disposal would not enter into these alluring prospects, but went capering off in quite another direction. A few weeks after the initiation of the longed-for life of bliss, he began brooding over peculiar, vague sensations in his body, and a few weeks more sufficed to plunge him into a state of extreme hypochondria. He had a complete nervous collapse. From a healthy man, of uncommon physical strength and abounding energy, he became a peevish child. That was the end of all his glories. He fell from one state of anxiety to the next and worried himself almost to death with hypochondriacal mopings. He then consulted a famous specialist, who recognized at once that there was nothing wrong with the man but lack of work. The patient saw the sense of this, and returned to his former work. #RandolphHarris 9 of 27
However, to his immense disappointment, no interest in the business could be aroused. Neither patience nor resolution was of any use. His energy could not by any means be forced back into the business. His condition naturally became worse than before. All that had formerly been living, creative energy in him now turned against him with terrible destroying force. His creative genius rose up, as it were, in revolt against him; and just as before he had built up great organizations in the World, so now his daemon spun equally subtle systems of hypochondriacal delusion that completely annihilated him. When I saw him, he was already a hopeless moral ruin. Nevertheless I tried to make clear to him that though such a gigantic energy might be withdrawn from the business, the question remained, were should I go? The finest horses, Porches, Mercedes and farms, even the most amusing parties may very likely fail to allure the energy, although it would be rational enough to think that a man who had devoted his whole life to serious work had a sort of natural right to enjoy himself. Yes, if fate behaved in a humanly rational way, it would certainly be so: first work, then well-earned rest. #RandolphHarris 10 of 27
However, fate behaves irrationally, and the energy of life inconveniently demands a gradient agreeable to itself; otherwise it simply gets dammed up and turns destructive. It regresses to former situations—in the case of this man, to the memory of an internal inflammatory condition of the medical nature. Yet even this was only a stage on the way to the resuscitation of infantile reminiscences which had all but vanished in the meantime. It was the original relation to his mother that mapped the course of his symptoms: there were an “arrangement” whose purpose it was to compel the attention and interest of is long-dead mother. Nor was this stage the last; for the ultimate goal was to drive him back, as it were, into his own body, after he had lived since his youth only in his head. He had differentiated one side of his being; the other side remained in an inert physical state. He would have needed this other side in order to “live.” The hypochondriacal “depression” pushed him down into the body he had always overlooked. Had he been able to follow the direction indicated by his depression and hypochondriacal illusion, and make himself conscious of the fantasies which proceed from such a condition, that would have been the road to my salvation. #RandolphHarris 11 of 27
My argument naturally met with no response, as was to be expected. A case so far advanced can only be cared for until death; it can hardly be cured. This example clearly shows that it does not lie in our power to transfer “disposable” energy at will to a rationally chosen object. The same is true in general of the apparently disposable energy which is disengaged when we have destroyed its unserviceable forms through the corrosive of reductive analysis. This energy, as we have said, can at best be applied voluntarily for a short time. However, in most cases it refuses to seize hold, for any length of time, of the possibilities rationally presented to it. Psychic energy is a very fastidious thing which insists on fulfillment of its own conditions. However much energy may be present, we cannot make it serviceable until we have succeeded in finding the right gradient. The question of the gradient is an eminently practical problem which crops up in most analyses. For instance, when in a favourable case the disposable energy, the so-called libido (psychic energy, which is equivalent to the intensity with which psychic contents are charged), does seize hold of a rational object, we think we have brought about the transformation through conscious exertion of the will. #RandolphHarris 12 of 27
However, we are deluded, because even the most strenuous exertions would not have sufficed had there not been present at the same time a gradient in that direction. How important the gradient is can be seen in the cases when, despite the most desperate exertions, and despite the fact that the object chosen or the form desired impresses everybody with its reasonableness, then transformation still refuses to take place, and all that happens is a new repression. It has become abundantly clear to me that life can flow forward only along the path of the gradient. However, there is no energy unless there is tension of opposites; hence it is necessary to discover the opposite to the attitude of the conscious mind. It is interesting to see how this compensation by opposites also plays its part in the historical theories of neurosis: Dr. Freud’s theory espoused Eros, Dr. Adler’s the will to power. Logically, the opposite of love is hate, and of Eros, Phobos (fear); but psychologically it is the will to power. Where love reigns, there is no will to power; and where the will to power is paramount, love is lacking. The one is but the shadow of the other: the human who adopts the standpoint of Eros finds one’s compensator opposite in the will to power, and that of the human who puts the accent on power is Eros. #RandolphHarris 13 of 27
Seen from the one-sided point of view the conscious attitude, the shadow is an inferior component of the personality and is consequently repressed through intensive resistance. However, the repressed content must be made conscious so as to produce a tension of opposites, without which no forward moment is possible. The conscious mind is on top, the shadow underneath, and just as high always longs for low and hot for cold, so all consciousness, perhaps without being aware of it, seeks its unconscious opposite, lacking which it is domed to stagnation, congestion, and ossification. Life is born only of the spark of opposites. It was a concession to intellectual logic on the one had and to psychological prejudice on the other that impelled Dr. Freud to name the opposite of Eros the destructive or death instinct. For in the first place, Eros is not equivalent to life; but for anyone who thinks it is, the opposite of Eros will naturally appear to be death. And in the second place, we all feel that the opposite of our own highest principle must be purely destructive, deadly, and evil. We refuse to endow it with any beneficial life-force; hence we avoid and fear it. #RandolphHarris 14 of 27
Before there are any outward disciplines of giving, there must be a disciplined understanding of giving. First, you must bear in mind that giving is not a meritorious work which will enhance your position before God. Similarly, giving will not make you better than other Christians. Second, you need to understand that while giving will not gain favour with God, giving does bring blessing! Jesus said: “Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you,” reports Luke 6.38. Correspondingly, Paul wrote: “Remember this: Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously,” reports 2 Corinthians 9.6. Admittedly these blessings are essentially spiritual. However, which would you rather have—a spiritual blessing or a bigger bank and bigger Benz (The bigger the bank, the bigger the Benz, the better the chance I have to get close to his rich friends, bank accounts in the Philippines, blank note to take everything! )—inner contentment or a new yacht? Third, you must keep in mind that giving which pleases God is generous and sacrificial. As we have seen, the Macedonians gave out of their deep poverty. #RandolphHarris 15 of 27
We can also profitably reflect on what Jesus said about the poor widow who humbly gave only a fraction of a penny: “I tell you the truth, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others,” reports Mark 12.43. Fourth, you must understand that what you give is to be determined between you and God. Giving should never be decided casually or flippantly, but through serious prayer—asking God what He wants you to give. With the mental disciplines of giving firmly in mind, the way is ready for the act of giving. To begin with, the act of giving should be accompanied by offering oneself to the Lord, just as did the Macedonians who “gave themselves first to the Lord,” reports 2 Corinthians 8.5. This should be done silently, not so someone will see out pious act of worship. And giving oneself to God is need worship. “Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship,” reports Romans 12.1. Second, it is strongly recommended, in light of the great giving requirements imposed on God’s ancient people Israel, that everyone should at least consider the first 10 percent as a starting point in giving—a minimum. #RandolphHarris 16 of 27
And in the case of the Macedonians’ grace giving, the amount must have been way over 10 percent because a tenth of their “extreme poverty” (1 Corinthians 8.2) would not have helped anyone. Third, your giving ought to be regular. Paul advised this same Corinthians church on another occasion, “On the first day of every week, each one of your should set aside a sum of money in keeping with one’s income, saving it up, so that when I come no collections will have to be made,” report 1 Corinthians 16.2. The apostle knew that regular, systematic giving would help the people meet their regular obligations and most emergencies. Fourth, you must begin giving now. The natural tendency is to put giving off until you feel able to give. Such thinking keeps many from ever giving. A preacher came to see a farmer and asked him, “If you had $2,00.00, would you give $1,000.00 or it to the Lord?” “I would.” “If you have two Ultimate Driving Machines, would you give one of them to the Lord?” “Sure.” “If you had two Cresleigh Homes, would you give one of them to the Lord?” The farmer said, “Now that is not fair! You know I have two Cresleigh Homes.” #RandolphHarris 17 of 27
Giving should not only be regular, but responsive to need, spontaneous, like that of the Macedonians and Mary of Bethany who in anointing Jesus so lavishly poured out her resources. High Heaven rejects the lore of nicely calculated les and more. Finally, your giving should be joyous—“for God loves a cheerful giver,” reports 2 Corinthians 9.7. As we have been so often reminded, “cheerful” can be translated “hilarious,” suggesting a joy which leaps over all restraints. The act of giving is a blessed state. We do well to remember that our Lord Jesus Himself said, “It is more blessed to give then to receive,” reports Acts 20.35. May we be faithful and disciplined in giving ourselves and all we have to God! What does the phrase “grace giving” mean to you? What does grace have to do with giving? When you give to the church or various Christian ministries, do you generally do so out of obligation or willingness? How much of your income do you believe God wants you to give to Him? Support your answers with Scripture; then ask God in prayer whether He agrees. “Will a human rob god? Yet you rob me. But you ask, ‘How do we rob you?’ In tithes and offerings. You are under a curse—the whole nation of you—because you are robbing me. #RandolphHarris 18 of 27
“Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this,” says the LORD Almighty, “and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of Heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it. I will present pests from devouring your crops, and the vines in your fields will not cause their fruit,” says the LORD Almighty. “Then all the nations will call you blessed, for yours will be a delightful land,” says the LORD Almighty,” reports Malachi 3.8-12. What did God speak to you about most specifically, most powerfully in this essay? Talk to Him about it right now! The World-idea has been represented by Churches and statues, and stained-glass windows. They are seen as places and refuge and the images tell a story. There are pictorial stories because people could not always read and also because they wanted the stories to pass on for generations. The statues also serve a purpose. The World-Mind has been embodied in images and idols. These things can be and are used in religious worship and mystic meditation. The idols act as reminders to its devotees; one is not a fool to confuse a piece of stone with the power of God. #RandolphHarris 19 of 27
We live in what appears as a multiverse, a timed and spaced existence—in a short, a finite one. However, those who can pierce through to its secret—and some have done so—find that it is actually the Unconditioned revealing itself as if it were the Conditioned. This Universe appearing in time and space under innumerable forms, its particles and planets ever in motion, hides as its supreme secret THAT which is timeless and placeless, without shape, intangible and immobile. Is this not the greatest paradox, this solid something whose essence is Nothing? Few humans know God even when they see Him, as they are unrealizingly do when they look around at the World or even when they merely look at it. “And now I, Moroni, proceed to give the record of Jared and his brother. For it came to pass after the Lord had prepared the stones which the brother of Jared had carried up into the mount, the brother of Jared came down out of the mount, and e did put forth the stones into the vessels which were prepared, one in each end thereof; and behold, they did give light unto the vessels. And thus the Lord caused stones to shine in darkness, to give light unto men, women, and children, that they might not cross the great waters in darkness. #RandolphHarris 20 of 27
“And it came to pass that when they had prepared all manner of food, that thereby they might subsist upon the water, and also food for their flocks and herds, and whatsoever beast or animal or fowl that they should carry with them—and it came to pass that when they had done all these things they got aboard of their vessels or barges, and set forth into the sea, commending themselves unto the Lord their God. And it came to pass that the Lord God caused that there should be a furious wind blow upon the face of the waters, towards the promised land; and this they were tossed upon the waves of the seas before the wind. And it came to pass that they were many times buried in the depths of the sea, because of the mountain waves which broke upon them, and also the great and terrible tempests which were caused by the fierceness of the wind. And it came to pass that when they were buried in the deep there was no water that could hurt them, their vessels being tight like unto a dish, and also they were tight like unto the ask of Noah; therefore when they were encompassed about by many waters they did cry unto the Lord, and he did bring them forth again upon the top of the waters. #RandolphHarris 21 of 27
“And it came to pass that the wind did never cease to blow towards the promised land while they were upon the waters; and thus they were driven forth before the wind. And they did sing praises unto the Lord; yea, the brother of Jared did sing praises unto the Lord, and he did thank and praise the Lord all the day long; and when the night came, they did not cease to praise the Lord. And thus they were driven forth; and no monster of the sea could break them, neither whale that could mar them; and they did have light continually, whether it was above the water or under the water. And thus they were driven forth, three hundred and forty and four days upon the water. And they did land upon the shore of the promised land. And when they had set their feet upon the shores of the promised land they bowed themselves down upon the face of the land, and did humble themselves before the Lord, and did shed tears of joy before the Lord, because of the multitude of his tender mercies over them. And it came to pass that they went forth upon the face of the land, and began to till the Earth. #RandolphHarris 22 of 27
“And Jared had four sons; and they were called Jacom, and Gilgah, and Maha, and Orihah. And the brother of Jared also begat sons and daughters. And the friends of Jared and his brothers were in number about twenty and two souls; and they also begat sons and daughters before they came to the promised land; and therefore they began to be many. And they were taught to walk humbly before the Lord; and they were also taught from on high. And it came to pass that they began to spread upon the face of the land, and to multiply and to till the Earth; and they did wax strong in the land. And the brother of Jared began to be old, and saw that he must soon go down to the grave; wherefore he said unto Jared: Let us gather together our people that we may number them, that we may know of them what they will desire of us before we go down to our graves. And accordingly the people were gathered together. Now the number of the sons and daughters of the brothers of Jared were twenty and two souls; and the number of sons and daughters of Jared were twelve, he having four sons. And it came to pass that they did number their people; and after that they had numbered them, they did desire of them the things which they would that they should do before they went down to their graves. #RandolphHarris 23 of 27
“And it came to pass that the people desired of them that they should anoint one of their sons to be a king over them. And now behold, this was grievous unto them. And the brother of Jared said unto them: Surely this thing leadeth into captivity. However, Jared said unto his brother: Suffer them that they may have a king. And therefore he said unto them: Choose ye out from among our sons a king, even whom ye will. And it came to pass that they chose even the firstborn of the brother of Jared; and has name was Pagag. And it came to pass that he refused and would not be their kind. And the people would that his father should constrain him, but his father would not; and he commanded them that they should constrain no human to be their king. And it came to pass that they chose all the brothers of Pagag, and they would not. And it came to pass that neither would the sons of Jared, even all save it were one; and Orihah was anointed to be king over the people. And he began to reign, and the people began to prosper; and they became exceedingly rich. And it came to pass that Jared died, and his brother also. #RandolphHarris 24 of 27
“And it came to pass that Orihah did walk humbly before the Lord, and did remember how great things the Lord had done for his father, and also taught his own people how great things the Lord had done for their fathers,” reports Ether 6.1-30. Winter is not just a single day. It takes time. Pay attention to its different stages, and adjust your prayers accordingly. As the cold time begins, I turn toward it with courage, knowing I do not face it alone. All the Holy Ones are with me; we will face it together. The leaves may fall, the grass may die, but the Land Spirits live, and to them I pray. Though some may sleep, others awake to face the cold, to bless the Earth with the gifts only they can give. Spirit of rock and tree, Spirits of running and still water, Spirits of Earth and sky: to the ones who now go to sleep, farewell until the warm time. To those who now awake, once again I greet you, as the Earth once again enters Winter. Cry the Winter rains to prepare the way, to mourn the darkness now enfolding. Cry the Winter rains to prepare the way, to wash pure the World as it lies here waiting. Cry the Winter rains, sky overarching, but soon the sorrows’ tears will turn to joy. Light will return to the covered Earth. #RandolphHarris 25 of 27
Cry, rain spirits, as this time demands. The sickle of reaping is low in the sky in the period just before down. The Sun’s halo soon will hide it, but it will be there, at the back of my mind, at the bottom my heart, poised to perform its acts of loving mercy. Waning Moon, passes over me, and pass on by. Please grant me your wisdom, but withhold your power. Sing joyously unto God our strength; sing along unto the God of Jacob. Take up the melody, and sound the timbrel, the sweet harp with the psaltery. Blow the Shofar at the New Moon, at the full Moon for our festival. For it is a statute for Israel, an ordinance of the God of Jacob, when God made a testimony for Joseph, when Her went forth against the land of Egypt. I hear a mysterious voice: “I, the Lord, removed the burden from your shoulder; your hands were freed from the heavy hod. O Israel, you called, and I delivered you; I answered you in the thunder; I tested you are the waters of Meribah, saying: ‘Hear, O My people, and I will admonish you; O America, if you would only Hearken unto Me! There shall be no strange god in your midst; nor shall you worship any foreign god. I am the Lord your God, Who brought you up out of the land of Egypt; open you mouth, and I will grant you of My bounty.’ #RandolphHarris 26 of 27
“But my people hearkened not to My Voice; and American would not obey. So I let them go after the stubbornness of their heart. Let them walk in their own evil counsels! Oh that My people would hearken unto Me, that America would walk in My ways! I would soon subdue their enemies, and place My hand upon their adversaries. The enemies of the Lord would cringe before Him, and their doom would be everlasting. However, you would I feed with the fat of wheat; and with the honey out of the rock would I satisfy you.” So the two brothers and their murdered man rode past fair Florence, to where Arno’s stream gurgles through straitened banks, and still doth fan itself with dancing bulrush, and the bream keeps head against the freshest. Sick and wan the brothers’ faces in the ford did seem, Lorenzo’s flush with love. They passed the water into a forest quiet for the slaughter. There was Lorenzo slain and buried in, there in that forest did his great love cease; ah! when a soul doth thus its freedom win, it aches in loneliness—is ill at peace as the break-covert blood-hounds od such sin: They dipped their swords in the water, and did tease their horses homeward, with convulsed spur, each richer by his being a murderer. #RandolphHarris 27 of 27
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Well, if I Called the Wrong Number, Why Did You Answer the Phone?
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The Former Allies Had Blundered in the Past by Offering Germany too Little, and Offering Even that too Late!
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How Long is it Since You were Really Bothered? About Something Important, About Something Real?
Cans. Beer cans. Glinting on the verges of a million miles of roadways, lying in scrub, grass, dirt, leaves, sand, mud, but never hidden. Piel’s, Rheingold, Ballantine, Schaefer, Schlitz, shinning in the Sun, or picked by Moon or the beam of headlights at night; washed by rain or flattened by wheels, but never dulled, never buried, never destroyed. Here is the mark of savages, the testament of wasters, the stain of prosperity. These wise souls contemplated their past lives in a long wrathless reverie, and sought to answer prayers from below as I have said. They watched over their kindred, their clansmen, their own nations; they watched over those who attracted their attention with accomplished and spectacular displays of religiosity; they watched with sadness the suffering of humans and wished they could help and tried to help by thought when they could. However, who are these beings who defile the grassy borders of our roads and lanes, who pollute our ponds, who spoil the purity of our ocean beaches with the empty vessels of their thirst? Who are the beings who make these vessels in millions and then say, “Drink—and discard”? What society is this that can afford to cast away a million tons of metal and to make of wild and fruitful land a garbage heap? #RandolphHarris 1 of 14
Randolph Harris II International 