[Sidenote: Sincerity and Truth.]
You"ve heard that, haven"t you? I never could understand how a sensible person could use such logic. Sincerity is no evidence of truth. The Hindu mother is sincere when she throws her babe to the crocodiles, but her sincerity is no proof that by this sacrifice she is sure of her salvation.
The Christian Scientist is sincere in the belief that medicines do not cure diseases. The doctor is equally sincere in his belief that medicines do cure disease.
The Theosophist is sincere, the Atheist, the Agnostic, the Christian, the Pagan, the Mohammedan, the Buddhist, the Sunworshipper, the Republican, the Democrat, the Progressive, the Prohibitionist, the Brewer, all these are sincere in their beliefs. And as these beliefs are different, it is common sense to say that no one creed, sect, belief, branch, dogma or system includes or embodies all truth.
[Sidenote: No Monopoly on Truth.]
It is true that every channel or avenue we meet in life"s travel has some truth, but it is not for you or me to a.s.sume that we are the sole possessors of wisdom and the real discoverers of all truth. We must not take the conclusions we arrive at and expect to force the world to accept without protest our rules for conduct, our methods for living, our practices for morals, or our beliefs for their guidance.
Converts to new doctrines, new issues, new cults, and to the old ones, too, are made largely because the amba.s.sadors or proselyters seem so fervid and sincere in expounding what they claim is the definite truth.
The believers in a cult or code of ethics are auto-hypnotized; their visions are narrowed.
By focusing their thought on their special belief, they bring together sophistry, argument, example and so-called proof that gives them facility in arguing the case or expounding their doctrine.
[Sidenote: Christian Science.]
You can make no gain in trying to argue with a Christian Scientist. You ask for concrete rules, definite answers and proofs other than their flat statements, and you are told you have not the understanding--you do not view the subject from the right plane, and that the truth cannot be shown you. You are told to have faith and belief, to eliminate antagonism, and to study "Science and Health," and you will receive the divine spirit and see the light.
The Scientist is sincere; he shows you "Science and Health" with a lot of testimonials in the back to prove that Christian Science cures disease. Every patent medicine, every science, every system of healing has testimonials by the hundreds.
Scientists say there is no disease, no material--that we are only spirit or soul or thought--that we are not matter but mind. Health, they tell us, is truth and disease is error. They deny disease, yet "Science and Health" and the midweek experience meetings have testimonials of disease cured by Christian Science.
There is much truth in Christian Science. People are helped by it; people are sincere in their belief in it, but that Christian Science is all truth, all-powerful, all-right, all-sufficient, cannot be proven.
What about the people who have gone hence before Christian Science was ever heard of?
The theological religion of to-day differs radically in practice and belief from what it was fifty years ago.
If the Protestant religion be all truth, what became of our religious ancestors who died before Martin Luther found the truth?
[Sidenote: The Spirit of Tolerance.]
I have no quarrel with the Christian Scientist, the Protestant, the Roman Catholic, the Buddhist or the Mohammedan. I must be generous and broad enough to admit that others have the right to think and be sincere. All sciences have truth, but no science, sect, cult, dogma or creed is ALL truth.
Sincerity is evidence of honest conviction, but that your sincerity in your belief must be accepted by me as proof that I should believe as you do, is, I believe, the place where I have the undoubted right to say: "I reserve the right to my own conclusions, and I would be unjust to myself if I should force myself to accept your viewpoint without fully satisfying myself that you were right."
So, because a person is sincere in a conviction that is contrary to your conscientious belief, do not be disturbed. There is no need to swerve from your own common sense a.n.a.lysis of the matter, or be convinced against your better judgment.
No one possesses all the truth. It is for you and me to do our plain duty as we see it--to do the best we can each day in act and thought and word.
We can pretty much agree on the simple essential truths which are proven. That is--being honest, truthful, kind, lovable, sympathetic, cheerful; doing good, helping one another, and doing things worth while.
[Sidenote: Unprofitable Speculation.]
If we agree on these things, and do useful work, and think helpful thoughts, we are doing our duty. Theories, arguments and studying too deeply on bootless systems, codes, beliefs, cults, isms and doctrines, is a waste of time. When we can, here and now, derive definite benefits from doing the simple and helpful things, and acting and thinking the simple, practical cheer thoughts, it is neither necessary nor helpful for us to waste time on spiritualism or theoretical beliefs that cannot be proven to our own satisfaction.
We are asked to believe these strange, impractical, unnatural beliefs because of the sincerity of others. It"s better to believe and to credit the things we can ourselves measure, understand and sincerely adopt.
There are hundreds of strange beliefs and spiritual systems, each claiming to be all-powerful, all-right. If any one is all truth, then all the others are all wrong.
The bigot who a.s.sumes he is the sole possessor of truth--the cult, sect, ism, or science that claims to possess all truth and presumes to lay down the exact rules for the world to obey--should be cla.s.sed with those misguided religions and inst.i.tutions of the dark past which burned human beings who dared to doubt their claim to the possession of all truth and knowledge.
G.o.d never gave his approval to any one man-made religious sect.
G.o.d is the universal good power. Man often tries to dwarf G.o.d"s idea to the narrow dimensions of his own small soul.
43.
[Sidenote: Whiskey and Fake Medicines.]
Whiskey must go. It is written on the pages of the record book of man"s progress. Likewise must the quack doctor and the fake medicine go. They have had their day. The quack doctor has already breathed his last in many parts of the country. The fake medicine schemes are still with us, but they are becoming increasingly difficult to put over. That they are doomed to extinction, there can be no doubt.
The side-whiskered advertising doctor who magnifies symptoms and proclaims them to be grave forerunners of awful, debilitating disease, is nothing short of a criminal. He is one of the worst of criminals, because he imposes upon the credulity of the ignorant, excites their fear by means of sensational scarehead advertising, and then when he has finally lured them into his spider-web, fleeces them unmercifully. These charlatans are really more contemptible than any thief, for the thief does not pretend to be anything else but what he is, while the quack doctor swindles and exploits you under the guise of being your benefactor.
As I have repeatedly explained, illness, feeling "out of sorts," local pains and sickness, unless of the contagious or infectious kind, are largely conditions of the mind.
Most of the temporary ailments are caused by constipation, wrong diet or lack of exercise. The doctor gives a laxative, nature re-a.s.serts herself, and the patient is cured.
Chronic ailments require long treatments--making long bills and many visits for the quack doctor.
[Sidenote: Your Family Physician.]
Your health and happiness are things largely in your own control.
However, when you feel you must have a doctor, go to your family physician and not to a strange doctor who advertises. His advertis.e.m.e.nt is merely a spiderweb to catch and hold you while he robs you.
It is a hopeful sign of the brighter future toward which man is progressing, that the respectable papers will not lend their aid to swindling doctors. The best papers will not carry these quack doctor or fake medicine ads.
Before long the government will pa.s.s laws abolishing this baneful, shameful, quack advertising. Quack doctoring, gambling, liquor selling--these are all swindling methods to get money, and in the getting, the ghouls and parasites who practise these "professions" are killing men, ruining homes, destroying happiness, holding back progress.
The one object of the quack doctor is to size you up and see what you "are good for." "Good for" means how much money can he get from you, and how long can he keep you as a patient to contribute to his coffers.
Let every reader of this book enroll as an opponent to quack doctors and quack medicines, and by word and influence help to hasten the day when such pernicious swindlers and swindling schemes are things of the past.
44.
No two minds can see the same picture in the same way, nor can two persons, armed and equipped with logic, come to the same definite conclusions on religion.
The old Scripture said: "An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth."