Have you ever asked yourself the question: What is God like? We are told to pray by turning away from the problem and thinking about God; but how are we to think about God? What is His nature? What is His character? Where is He? Can we really contact Him, and if so, how?

The first and most fundamental thing to realize is that God is not just a superior kind of man. Most people would say, “Of course not”; but my experience shows me that even today the majority of people, in their hearts, do think of God as just a magnified man—that and nothing more—a very good man, an extraordinarily wise man, a man of infinite power, but still a man. Now such an idea is really but a projection of their own personalities, and it requires very little thought to show that such an idea cannot be true. In philosophy, such a being is called an anthropomorphic God (from anthropos—man, and morphe—form—see Webster’s). And no such finite person could possibly have created the boundless universe that we see through our telescopes, or the infinite variety of minute forms that we contact through the microscope; to say nothing of the infinite creation of which we are still altogether unaware.

It is natural for a thoughtless person to think of God as being just a bigger edition of himself, just as we may suppose that if an insect could think of God, he would think of Him as an enormous insect of unlimited power. We, however, are beings possessing the twin faculties of reason and intuition, and so we must get beyond this infantile stage to the truth.

God is infinite which is infinite or unlimited. Reflect upon this every day of your life and a lifetime will not be long enough to grasp all that it means. For instance, you could not go into a room or a building to meet God because if God could be located in a particular room He would not be infinite. What usually happens is that while we are still very young, small children, we form ideas (childish ones naturally) about all sorts of things. We think a three-story house is a skyscraper. We think the road near which we live is so wide that crossing it is quite a journey. We think our parents know everything and could do anything. At that stage we think of God as being like our grandfather, or perhaps like the clergyman at the local church. Then we begin to grow up, and, as maturity comes, we gradually revise our ideas upon all subjects except one. We revise our ideas about our family, our city, and our country; about business, and sport, and politics; but in most cases people never revise their early idea of God; and so they continue in years of maturity to try to get along with the idea of God that they formed in infancy, and naturally the result is very limiting. It is really as though the grown man tried to wear the shoes of the infant. He could not walk at all.

A great practical difficulty in discussing God is the fact that we have no suitable pronoun to employ. We have to use the words “he” and “him.” We have no alternative, but these words are very misleading because they inevitably suggest a man or male animal. To say “she” and “her” would be equally absurd, and the word “it,” besides seeming to lack in reverence, suggests an inanimate and unintelligent object. The reader is therefore asked to bear in mind that the use of “He” and “Him” is an unavoidable makeshift, and to correct his thought accordingly.

The Bible says that God is spirit1 and that they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth. To worship Him in spirit means to get a spiritual understanding of His nature, and we shall now endeavor to do this. We shall not attempt to define God because that would be to limit Him, but we can get what is for all practical purposes an excellent working knowledge of God. We shall do this by considering different aspects of His nature, one by one.

Suppose you wanted to see a great building like the Capitol in Washington. You know that you cannot possibly see it all at once, but that does not mean that you cannot become very well acquainted with it. What you must do is to walk around the building, viewing it from different angles until you have seen it all. You would look at it, let us say, from the north, and then from the east, and then from the south, and then from the west; and then you would know exactly what the building looked like. We shall do the same with the idea of God.

The only way to approach God is by thinking of Him. There are no material steps that will bring you to God. Only by thinking of Him can you approach Him. In the East, certain foolish people have tried to get close to God by maiming their bodies or by assuming unnatural and uncomfortable postures, or training themselves to difficult feats of acrobatics—but such things are a waste of time. There is no way to find God except by prayer, and prayer is thinking about God.

There are three degrees of intensity in prayer. The first and easiest way is to pray aloud, what is often called an audible treatment. The second degree, which is a little more difficult for most people but is also much more powerful, is to think systematically about God, recognizing His presence where the trouble seems to be. This is meditation, and a good way to meditate is to read a verse of the Bible, or a paragraph from a spiritual book and then let your mind work on it. The third degree is reached when the thought and thinker become one and there is a vivid realization of Truth. This is called contemplation, but it is not possible for most people to attain to it yet, and one should never try to do so. At the right time it will come spontaneously, and before the right time you cannot compel it. Most practical problems can be solved by sufficient audible prayer or meditation.

God is infinite, but we, as human beings, while we cannot of course grasp the Infinite, can yet acquaint ourselves with many different aspects or attributes of His nature. Of these there are Seven Main Aspects that are more important than any of the others. These are seven fundamental truths about God, and all the others are built up of combinations of some of these seven. These truths never change. They were the same a billion years ago and they will be the same a billion years hence. So naturally it behooves us to get as clear an understanding and as strong a realization as possible of these Seven Main Aspects. This can be done by thinking about them a good deal, comparing one with another, and identifying them in the experiences of everyday life. This is prayer, and very powerful prayer too. The quickest way to solve a particular problem is to meditate on whichever aspect is the most appropriate in that particular case. Thinking of any Aspect of God will solve a problem, but if you select the right Aspect you will get your result more quickly and more easily.

The FIRST MAIN ASPECT I am going to consider is Life. God is Life. God is not just living, nor does God give life, but God is Life. Where God is, there Life is. God is your life. Life is existence or being.

When you are sick you are only partly alive. When you are tired or depressed or discouraged, you are only partly alive. To be truly alive means to be well and full of interest in the day’s work. Few people as yet express God in an adequate way because they lack the sense of life. What usually happens is that people grow up to a maximum sense of life, what we call the “prime” of life, and then gradually deterioration sets in, a process which we call “middle age,” and finally come old age and death. This process is common to the whole race, and is not, of course, the fault of the individual. But we have to overcome it some time by realizing that it is only a false belief, and by knowing (not merely believing) that God is our Life and that He never changes.

Joy is one of the highest expressions of God as Life. Actually it is a mixture of Life and Love, and the Bible says that “the sons of God shout for joy.” This means that when we realize our divine sonship, we must experience joy, and that sorrow is a loss of the sense of the fatherhood of God. Joy and happiness always have an expansive effect, just as fear has a contracting and paralyzing effect. You know how a little child, when it meets someone whom it loves and trusts, expands like an opening flower and goes out to meet him, but when it is afraid, shrinks back into itself. That is what happens to the human soul too. Again, when a person says “I can,” you always notice an expansive and forward movement, but when he says “I can’t,” there is a retraction. You could not imagine a person saying “Yes, I can,” with a shrinking gesture, or “No, I can’t,” in an optimistic or forthright way. The body always expresses the thought; and the thought of Life heals and inspires, whereas thoughts of fear and death contract and destroy.

You should realize the Aspect of God as Life for healing sickness, for the “getting older” belief, and for any kind of depression or discouragement.

Realizing Divine Life heals a sick person, and, of course, you can heal animals and plants too. Animals usually respond quickly to this treatment, and plants very quickly indeed; but one should not try to keep an old animal alive by treatment after it has reached the normal span for its species. Animals and plants yield quickly because they do not have that strong sense of personal egotism that most human beings do. They never make up their minds that they cannot get well or that “sickness is sent for a good purpose.” Neither do they give way to discouragement because they have not been healed faster.

An excellent experiment is to select two plants or two flower beds and start them off together. Then treat one of them every day, but not the other, and before long you will be surprised to find how much difference there is in the progress made by them. Realize the presence of Divine Life in the flower bed or plant and give it thoughts of Love—drench it with Love. Everyone knows that some gardeners are far more successful than others, even though their technical qualifications may be the same, and the reason is that one loves his plants and the other has only a business interest in them.

If a person seems to lack ambition treat him for life by realizing the presence of Divine Life in him. A man came to me whose grown-up son seemed to be quite without ambition. On my advice the father treated him by realizing Divine Life, and very soon things began to change. The patient lost his listlessness, began to take an interest in life, and was soon doing well at his work. The doctors told the father that the patient’s glands were working better, and no doubt the treatment did improve them, but, of course, this was only the channel or means by which the prayer acted.

Here is another interesting experiment that you can make. Some evening when you find yourself in a crowded streetcar or subway train, and most of the people around you are looking tired and worried and obviously wishing they were at their journey’s end, just start declaring the Presence of God as Life in all those present; and keep it up. You will be surprised and gratified at what will happen. First one person will brighten up and smile, and then another will obviously relax, and before long the whole crowd in that car will be feeling and looking differently. Do not say that this is fantastic nonsense, but try it.

The SECOND MAIN ASPECT of God is Truth. God is Truth. God is not truthful but Truth itself, and wherever there is Truth, there is God. God is absolute Truth and does not change. There are many things which are relatively true at certain times and places only; but God is absolute Truth at all times and in all circumstances. As soon as we touch God who is the Absolute, relative things disappear.

To know the Truth about any condition heals it. Jesus said, “Know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”2 Truth is the great healer.

You should realize God as Truth when you want information on any subject, or if you suspect that you have to deal with deceit or falsehood. If you have reason to believe that someone is trying to deceive you, think of God as Truth and claim that Divine Truth dwells in the person concerned, and is expressed through him. If you realize this clearly enough he will then speak the truth. When you have to transact any important business such as signing a lease or a contract, spend a few minutes realizing Divine Truth and if there is anything you should know it will come out. Of course, people may have no desire to deceive you and yet for some reason you may not be given the whole story. I know of several cases where serious misunderstandings were prevented because somebody realized God as Truth and so all the facts were brought out. I know also of several cases where intentional dishonesty was frustrated in the same way.

Realizing God as Truth will save you hours of work in research in any field. You will be led to the right book or the right place or the right person without loss of time, or the necessary information will come to you in some other way.

The THIRD MAIN ASPECT of God is Love. God is Love. God is not loving but Love itself, and it would probably be true to say that of all the Seven Main Aspects this is the most important one for us in practice. There is no condition that enough Love will not heal,3 and where there is good will it is not difficult to develop a sufficient sense of Love for the purpose of healing. The whole Bible deals with the nature of God, and as the Scripture develops, the idea of God becomes clearer and clearer until toward the end it says, “God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him,”4 and higher than this we cannot go. Jesus himself said, “By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.”5

Where there is fear there cannot be love. The best way to rid yourself of fear is to realize Divine Love. When you love God more than you love your problem, you will be healed. Does that seem strange to you? It is true. If you love God more than you love your microbe, your sickness, your grievance, your lack, or your fear, you will be healed. If you could feel a sense of Divine Impersonal Love toward everyone, no one could hurt you. If someone came to rob you or kill you he would not be able to carry out his intention. We have all heard many stories of exceptional people who were able to go among wild beasts in the jungle without being hurt, and there are many other histories on record of people who passed through extraordinary dangers of other kinds quite unscathed.

Divine Love never fails, but the important thing to realize is that Divine Love must be in your own heart and cannot operate from outside, so to speak. If you had sufficient Divine Love for everyone in your heart, you could heal others by speaking the Word once; and in many cases your mere presence would bring about healing without your having made any special effort at all. Of course, by the time you reached this stage you would have gotten rid of all criticism and condemnation. You would never for an instant want to see someone punished or think “It serves him right.” This does not mean you would condone wrong doing in any way, but you would condemn the wrong and not the wrong doer. If a small baby is troublesome or perhaps breaks a valuable object, you regret the act, but you do not hate the baby. So, in dealing with criminals and other delinquents, we should take whatever steps are wise concerning them, such as locking them up in humane prisons for their own good as well as that of society, but without hatred. A burglar must be restrained for instance not only to prevent his victims from being robbed but for his own sake, to prevent his criminal career developing and perhaps ultimately culminating in murder. Of course, his prison term should be reformatory and not just punitive.

In like manner you must not permit other people to cheat you or otherwise impose upon you. That would be to help them to be dishonest or selfish. Protect your own rights, but always in a spirit of Divine Love.

You probably know the old story of a stranger who settled in a town and asked his neighbor, “What are the people round here like?”

The neighbor, a Quaker, replied quietly with a question, “What were the people like where thee came from?”

The newcomer answered, “I have come from—The people there were very mean and dishonest.”

The Quaker answered, “I’m afraid thee will find them all here.”

A third person who had overheard the conversation, joined in by remarking, “This surprises me because I have come from the same town, and I found them a very kind and friendly lot of people.”

And the old Quaker, turning to him, said, “Thee will find them all here too.”

To realize God as Love is the remedy for fear—and the only real one. Of late a great many books have been published on the subject of fear, but on examining them I find that in nearly all cases they only get as far as analyzing fear, saying what a bad thing it is and how much harm it does, and how important it is for us to get rid of it; but without offering any practical way of doing so. The truth is that there is only one remedy for fear, and that is to get some sense of Divine Love, by thinking about it, analyzing it, claiming it, and expressing it in practice toward all human beings without any exception.

If your prayers are not being answered, there must be something wrong. The universe is governed by law, and there is no such thing as a broken law. Jesus himself did not break the Law of Being when he performed his miracles; he could not, and he would not have wished to. He fulfilled the law when he prayed. When your prayers are not answered it must be because you have not fulfilled the conditions of the law, and, ninety-nine times in a hundred, it is because you are lacking in a sense of love for all. It is a cosmic law that Love heals and that fear and condemnation damage and destroy. Treat yourself for Love every day6 and watch your thoughts, and watch your tongue, and watch your deeds, that nothing contrary to Love finds expression there.

Scientific Prayer consists in seeing God where the trouble seems to be. When a person seems to be behaving badly, see the Presence of God in him. When a part of the body is sick or damaged, see the Presence of God there. Where there seems to be lack, see the Presence of God and claim Divine Love too, and when you feel the sense of Divine Love, your demonstration is made and what you need will come. You do not need to have a thrilling experience. That might be only psychic. A strong conviction of the Truth, with a sense of Divine Love, is what will demonstrate under all circumstances. You have a strong conviction that two and two make four, that Chicago is in Illinois, that the Statue of Liberty is in New York. You do not argue about these things, you just know them to be true. Have the same quiet, firm conviction about your statements of Truth, and you will demonstrate. Sometimes you get a beautiful sense of peace concerning the problem—the dove alights—but this does not have to happen in order to make your demonstration. As a rule you will get it without that. If the dove alights, stop working.

Do not talk about your prayers; keep your spiritual business to yourself. Do not tell people that you are praying for such and such a thing, or in such and such a way. Keep the affairs of your soul secret. When you get a demonstration do not run around and tell everyone about it immediately. Keep it to yourself until it has had time to crystallize, so to speak. When Jesus healed people, he said, “Go away and tell no one.”

Because God is Love, God never punishes or threatens anyone. The action of God takes place only to heal and comfort and inspire. The nearer we get to God, the happier, more peaceful, and healthier we are. In fact, trouble and sickness are really the way in which we become aware that we have lost the sense of His Presence. When we make mistakes or do wrong, the punishment which we bring upon ourselves is the natural consequence of the law we have broken, and we shall continue to suffer until we cease to break the law. This is a wise arrangement and a very merciful one, for in no other way could we learn. A red hot stove burns your hand if you touch it. That is a good thing because if it did not you would some day inadvertently put your hand in the fire and it would be burnt off before you knew about it. God is Love, and God is the only power.

The FOURTH MAIN ASPECT of God is Intelligence. God is not merely intelligent but God is Intelligence itself. When you clearly realize that this is an intelligent universe it will make a major difference in your life. It is obvious that in an intelligent universe there cannot be any disharmony because all ideas must work together for the common good. This means that there can be no clashing or overlapping anywhere, and neither can there be any lack. An engine which has been intelligently designed does not have any unnecessary parts and neither are any essential parts lacking. The machine is just right, complete and perfect, and so is the universe when we understand it.

It is especially important to realize that God is Intelligence, for the following reason: It sometimes happens that when people outgrow the childish idea that God is just a magnified man, they go to the opposite extreme and think of God as merely a blind force, like gravity or electricity. This means that they have lost all sense of the Love and Fatherhood of God, and such an idea is very little better than a subtle form of atheism. Indeed, this standpoint is not very far removed from the attitude of the materialist who is usually a great believer in what he calls the laws of Nature.

In an intelligent universe there can be neither cruelty nor waste, for these two things are infallible symptoms of a lack of intelligence in those who are guilty of them. And so we know that inharmony and stupidity of any kind are but illusions of the carnal mind, and in fact they always begin to disappear under the realization of God as Intelligence.

Is God a person? No, God is not a person in the usual sense of the word. God has every quality of personality except its limitation. It is true that the human mind cannot imagine any personality which is not limited, but this difficulty arises from the very limitations of the human mind itself, and, of course, this does not affect the nature of God. The Bible says, in effect, whatever you think I am, that will I be to you; and this means that if we attribute to God every quality of an infinite, intelligent, loving personality, having infinite power, God will be just that to us. So we may say that we believe in a personal God, but not in an anthropomorphic God. There is nothing that an anthropomorphic God could be to us that the true God is not, and He is infinitely more besides.

In acquiring these wider and better ideas of God you should not feel that you have, so to speak, left the God of your childhood for a new God—as one might leave one political party and join a different one—but that you are simply getting a better and more adequate idea of the same God that you always worshiped; because, of course, there is only one God.

You should treat yourself for Intelligence at least two or three times a week, by thinking about it, and claiming it for yourself. This practice will make every activity of your life more efficient. There are sure to be some things that you could do in a better way than you are doing them, and this treatment will bring such things to your notice. If you are wasting time in certain directions this treatment will make the fact clear to you and you will be shown a better way of working. Some people are a little hurt at being told to treat themselves for Intelligence, regarding such advice as a reflection upon their mentalities, but the more really intelligent a person is the more he realizes how much more of that quality he needs.

When things in your life seem to be going wrong, treat yourself for Intelligence. When business or other conditions appear to have reached a deadlock, treat yourself for Intelligence. When you seem to be up against a stone wall and apparently there is no way out, treat yourself for Intelligence. If you have to deal with someone who is seemingly very stupid or foolish, realize that Divine Intelligence works in him because he is a child of God, and if you get sufficient realization he will change for the better. It may sometimes happen, however, that you are the person who was at fault, although you did not in the least suspect it, and in that case you will come to see it, and you yourself will change.

Children and young people respond very readily indeed to a treatment for Intelligence. If you are interested in a child at school or a young person at college, treat him several times a week for Intelligence and you will be surprised to find how his progress in his studies will increase. Remember also the wonderful fact that when you treat a person (or yourself) spiritually, the result of that treatment will be with the patient not only in the present time, but for the rest of his life. If you treat little Johnny for Intelligence today, his school work will improve immensely, but fifty years from now when he is a man of sixty he will be more intelligent and therefore happier and more successful because of today’s treatment.

If you are in business, treat yourself and your assistants for Intelligence several times a week. Some people make a practice of blessing the store or the office every morning soon after they arrive, and this brings splendid results.

The Intelligence Aspect of God is very important in its relation to the health of the body. It would not be an intelligent proceeding to make a body that can be easily hurt or damaged or one which would grow old after only seventy or eighty years’ use; nor would it be intelligent to give to man faculties like sight or hearing which could begin to fail long before he had finished with them. Yet the carnal mind believes just these things, and so men’s and women’s bodies experience decay in what is called old age. Their ears, their eyes, and their teeth fail them and ultimately death comes. When the human race realizes clearly enough that God is Intelligence, the “old age belief will be overcome.

We know that prayer is thinking about God, but in order to think about Him at all you must have a certain amount of knowledge of Him, and these Main Aspects furnish that. They enable us to think about God in an intelligent way. When you dwell upon one of these aspects you are developing that quality in yourself. When you think of that aspect as being in another person, you develop that quality in him. To think of God as Love makes you more loving, and gets rid of a certain amount of criticism, resentment, and condemnation. To think of God as Life improves your health and gives you more energy, and so forth. When some kind of trouble comes to you, try to realize the Main Aspect which represents the exact contrary. Thus you realize Love to overcome fear or anger, Life to heal sickness, Truth to uncover falsehood, and so forth.

The FIFTH MAIN ASPECT of God is Soul, and it is spelt with a capital S. Do not confuse this with the soul spelt with a small s, which is what modern psychology calls the psyche, and is another name for your human mind which consists of your intellect and your feelings.7

Soul is that Aspect of God by virtue of which He is able to individualize Himself. The word “individual” mans undivided (see Webster). Most people seem to think that it means the exact contrary. It suggests separateness to them, but they are mistaken. Individual means undivided, and God has the power of individualizing Himself without, so to speak, breaking Himself into parts.

God individualizes Himself as man, and so you are really an individualization of God. God can individualize Himself in an infinite number of distinct beings, or units of consciousness, and yet not be in any way separate. Only God can do this because He is spirit. Matter cannot be individualized. It can only be broken up. Thus, if you were to tear off half a page of this book, and then tear that into small pieces you would have divided up the page. The remnant of the page would be smaller by the amount of paper torn off; and the whole page would be the sum of all the fragments. This is division; it is not individualization. Spirit, however, can be individualized, and this possibility is the Aspect of God that we call Soul.

This will be quite a new idea to most people (our customary training prepares us to understand matter only), and you should therefore think it over a good many times until you are satisfied that you really understand it.

So your real self, the Christ within, the spiritual man, the I Am, or the divine spark, as it is variously called, is an individualization of God. You are the presence of God at the point where you are. This does not, of course, mean that you are an absurd little personal God. You are an individualization of the one and only God.8 Man may very well be compared to an electric light bulb.

The electric current is present in all parts of the circuit but it shines forth, or one might say, figuratively, becomes self-conscious, in the bulb.

So Divine Mind becomes self-conscious in you, and that is what you are. Jesus, who taught the people in a vine growing country, said, “I am the vine, ye are the branches.”9 Obviously the life in the branch is the common life of the whole vine expressed at that particular place, and if a branch is broken off from the parent vine it dies. Now, man cannot be separated from God in reality, but he can be separated in human belief, and when the belief in separation occurs, the belief in death follows in greater or lesser degree.10 The lesser degrees are what we call sickness, depression, discouragement, and old age. In the greater degree it becomes the death belief itself, when we lose the body altogether and disappear from this plane, leaving the body behind. The death thought is actually an extremely acute charge of fear.

I would warn the reader that this is not a subject to be quickly mastered. Much rereading of this subject, and prayer for enlightenment, will be necessary to understand it thoroughly, and one should be on one’s guard against jumping to rash conclusions.

To realize in some degree that you are an individualization of God could not possibly make you egotistic or vain. On the contrary, it would give you true humility and at the same time true self-confidence, and, indeed, it is the only pathway to the overcoming of fear.

Some of the ancient Egyptians spoke of man as a beam of the sun, and the same idea seems to have occurred to certain American aborigines. This is a wonderful idea and expresses the truth beautifully. If you will work regularly, realizing this oneness with God, you will change for the better out of all recognition. Your body and your mind will hardly be recognizable. People will say this cannot be you—it must be a younger brother, and how much finer he is than his senior! On the other hand, if you think negatively about yourself, if you believe that you are a miserable sinner and keep on saying so, that will be the best way to become one.

The Aspect of God as Soul is the one to realize when you are called upon to perform some task or undertake some responsibility that seems too great for you. For instance, a clerk in a business house may suddenly be called upon to take the manager’s place, perhaps permanently, and he is frightened because he does not feel equal to it. Or on a ship at sea an inexperienced junior officer, owing to a chapter of accidents, may suddenly be called upon to take charge of the ship. In either case, the person concerned should work on the Aspect of God as Soul, realizing that he is an individualization of God and that therefore God works through him. If he gets this clear enough he will be amazed at how well everything will go, and he himself will have permanently entered a higher category of work.

When you realize that you are one with God, the task becomes “Our business” instead of “my business,” because God is your partner. Of course, when you enter upon this partnership it is an essential part of the contract that you practice the Golden Rule. Everyone you deal with must get a square deal, which means treating him exactly as you would wish him to treat you if the positions were reversed.

The fingers of the great pianist are not in business for themselves, so to speak. His fingers are not independent, they are part of himself. They express him on the keys, and they do not have to bother to think which note they ought to strike or wonder if they will be able to do it. They know that they will find themselves striking the right notes, because the master plays through them or by means of them. God is God, and someone aptly said, “Man is the by-means-of.”

The SIXTH MAIN ASPECT of God is Spirit. God is Spirit.11 We know that God is Spirit but what does that mean? Well, Spirit is that which cannot be destroyed or damaged or hurt, or degraded or soiled in any way. Spirit cannot deteriorate. It cannot grow old or tired. It cannot know sin, or condemnation, or resentment, or disappointment. It is the opposite of matter. Matter is always deteriorating. While you sit reading this page, the book is actually wearing out. The clothes on your back are wearing out. The building in which you are sitting is wearing out, and your body itself is wearing out—and some day all these things will be dust. True, it will take a long time according to our ideas for these things to happen but happen they will. There was a time when great cities filled with imposing buildings and splendid monuments flourished in Africa and in Asia, cities of which every trace has now disappeared, for they have become one with the desert sands. This is inevitable because matter is always wearing out. “Cometh forth like a flower, and is cut down: fleeth also as a shadow, and continueth not.”12

This is really a splendid thing because it means that the world is constantly being renewed. It is splendid that old things should disappear in order that newer, cleaner, and better things may take their place. If clothing did not wear out, many people would continue wearing it for many years until it became saturated with dirt, instead of which we get new clothes at frequent intervals. If automobiles did not wear out we might still be using the primitive models of thirty years ago. We should never try to hold on mentally to material objects, but be ever ready to renew and improve upon them. The chapter of Job quoted from above is an expression of the limited human view of these matters, the attitude of mind which was the real cause of Job’s troubles.

Matter wears out, but Spirit does not because Spirit is substance. Herbert Spencer defines substance as that which is not subject to discord or decay. Webster says, “that which underlies all outward manifestation … real, unchanging essence or nature … that in which qualities inhere … that which constitutes anything what it is.” All this can only apply to spiritual things.

You are Spirit. Your body is spiritual, but you are Spirit. Spirit cannot die and was never born. Your true self was never born and will never die. You are eternal, divine, unchanging Spirit, in your true nature. The whole universe is a spiritual creation but we see it in a limited way, and that limited way we know as matter. You have sometimes seen a window made of fluted glass, and you know that if you look at the street through this window everything will be distorted. The passers-by and the automobiles will appear to be warped and distorted in absurd and ugly ways. Nevertheless, you know that these things are really quite right in themselves, and that the distortion arises from your seeing them wrongly. So it is that damage, decay, sin, sickness, and death, and all of what we call “matter” arise from our false seeing. Our false vision causes us to know ourselves only from a seeming birth to a seeming death; but this is illusion too. This distorted vision of Spirit is really what we know as “matter.” The Bible refers to this distortion as the carnal mind. Eucken says, “Reality is an independent spiritual world, unconditioned by the apparent world of sense”—and this is substance.

Matter is unreal in the philosophical sense. It is not, of course, hallucination, but it is not the outer and separate thing that it seems to be. Life is a state of consciousness, and the world we see about us is part of our consciousness. We are conscious of certain objects and certain happenings, but these are mental experiences though we unwittingly give them objective existence.

Material objects often seem to be very beautiful. The beauty of nature and the beauty of art are familiar to all, but such beauty is really Spirit or Truth shining through and is not due to the matter. The thinner the veil of matter the more beauty do we see, and the thicker the veil of matter the less beauty do we see. In a beautiful landscape the veil of matter (the limitation in our thought) is comparatively thin, and in an ugly slum that veil is comparatively thick; but that is the only difference. All beauty, all good, all joy, are the Presence of God apprehended through the veil of matter.

The time to realize the Aspect of God as Spirit is when something seems to be damaged or soiled or in decay. If you can realize the presence of Spirit where the trouble seems to be the evil condition will begin to improve, and if your realization is sufficiently clear the condition will be completely healed.

When Jesus saw the man with the withered hand he realized that in Truth that hand was spiritual—and the hand was healed. When people said that Lazarus was dead, Jesus realized that true man is Spirit and dies not—and Lazarus came forth alive.

When you realize that any given thing is not in reality matter, but a spiritual idea seen in a limited way, that “thing” changes for the better. It matters not whether it be a living thing like a part of your body or an animal or a plant, or whether it is what we call an inanimate object, the law is the same. The so-called inanimate objects are really spiritual ideas. A table, a chair, your watch, your shoes, your house, the George Washington Bridge, are all spiritual ideas seen in the limited (clouded) way that we call matter. You are not a spiritual idea, you are an individualization of God, but things are spiritual ideas great or small. An animal is a wonderful grouping of God’s ideas in which Intelligence is a principal component, but it is not an individualization.

If you find the last couple of pages difficult to follow, ignore them for the time being and study the rest of this chapter. Sooner or later you will see these things clearly for yourself. Do not theorize too much about this subject but try a few practical experiments. When something is giving trouble, affirm and try to realize that in reality it is a spiritual idea—and watch what happens. If an automobile, or any other kind of mechanism is giving trouble, try treating it. I know that this will sound fantastic to people unacquainted with spiritual law, and so I say, do not be obstinate but try it.

The SEVENTH MAIN ASPECT of God is Principle, and this is probably the one that is least understood. People do not usually think of God as Principle, but such He is. What does the Word “principle” mean?

Well, consider a few generally accepted principles. “Water seeks its own level.” This is a principle. It is not a particular drop of water and it is not the course taken by a particular drop of water in a particular locality, say the passage of a drop of water from the Ashokan Reservoir to your faucet in New York City. It is a general principle that is true of all water everywhere on earth. It is not a particular thing or a particular action. It is a principle.

Consider another principle: “Matter expands when heated.” Because this is a principle it is true anywhere at any time under any circumstances. Heat a piece of steel and it will expand, no matter what country it is in, or who owns it, or for what purpose it is being used. This principle of expansion may help a piece of mechanism to run successfully, if the mechanism is well designed, or it may wreck it if it is not well designed, but the principle is unchanging. Again, this principle is not a thing or an action. It is not the steel nor is it the actual process of expansion; it is the fact that matter expands under heat.

Consider another principle: “The angles of any triangle always add up to 180°.” It makes no matter what kind of triangle one may consider, as long as it is a triangle, this principle exists. Size or material makes no difference. The area of the triangle may be a square inch or a million square miles, the principle is the same. The triangle may be arranged horizontally, vertically, or in any plane, and the principle remains.

These principles, I repeat, were true a billion years ago and they will be true a billion years hence. They cannot and do not change, for a principle changes not.

God is the Principle of perfect harmony and God does not change, so perfect harmony is the nature of his creation. Prayer is answered because God is principle, and when we pray rightly we bring ourselves into harmony with the Law of Being. Scientific Prayer does not try to change the Law. It does not try to bring about exceptions in our favor. It does not ask God to change the laws of nature for our temporary convenience, but it tunes us in, so to speak, with Divine Principle; and then we find things coming right.

If you have a radio and you want to get the program on WJZ, you tune in for WJZ. You do not expect to get that program on WABC. As long as you are tuned to the wrong station, you do not expect the right program, and you do not beg God to change the programs about to suit you; nor do you weep or tear your hair. You alter the tuning of your set, until you are in synchronism with the station you want. We have problems and troubles because we have tuned out mentally from God, or the Divine Principle of our being, and our only remedy is to tune back. If God were to make exceptions because we were in great difficulties (which, because of His nature, He could never do) we should never know where we stood. If the law of gravity did not work at certain times, say on Tuesdays, or if it were occasionally suspended without notice, say, because a very important man had fallen off a roof, you know what would happen to the world. Apart from anything else, we should be left in confusion because we should never know what to expect; but the law of gravity never does cease to operate, because it is a principle.

You may be inclined to think that this fact is limiting, or even depressing, but on the contrary it is extremely encouraging because, since principle cannot change, you know that you must always make your demonstration if only you can rise high enough in consciousness. If you should raise your consciousness and yet not get your healing or your freedom it could only mean that Principle had broken down—but you know that that cannot happen, and so it is only a question of enough prayer or treatment, and your difficulty, whatever it is, must yield.

God is Principle, the Principle of perfect harmony, and therefore perfect harmony is the LaW of Being. You should note that this sentence is in itself a very powerful treatment.

This Aspect of God, namely, Principle, may be used at any time, but it is especially helpful when you are feeling discouraged about your prayers, and in cases where there seems to be a great deal of ill feeling or prejudice involved. In other cases where there seems to be any sense of vindictiveness or spite, such things will melt away under the realization that Divine Principle is the only power that exists, and that there simply is no false personality to think evil of that kind.

These are the Seven Main Aspects of God and we have considered them separately, one at a time, but, of course, God has them all, all the time, and one cannot really draw a hard and fast line between them. To take an example, we know that the rose, for instance, has color—red. It has weight—so many grams. It has shape. It has fragrance—an odor. Here are four different things, color, weight, shape, and fragrance; and we determine them and talk about them separately, in order thoroughly to understand the rose; but the rose has them all at the same time and all the time. So these Seven Main Aspects are all true of God at all times. In practice it is often better to handle a particular problem by realizing two or more of them. In case of doubt, quietly claim that God is thinking through you. God thinks by means of man—God thinks through me, is one of the best affirmations you can use at any time.

Each of the Seven Main Aspects is a distinct quality like the elements in chemistry. A chemical element, as you know, is just itself and nothing else. Oxygen is an element because there is nothing in it but oxygen. Hydrogen is an element, for there is nothing in it but hydrogen. Water on the other hand is a compound, a combination of hydrogen and oxygen; and so are steel and sulphuric acid compounds, to take other examples. There are many attributes of God, such as wisdom, beauty, joy, and so forth, but they are compounds, made up of two or more of the Seven Main Aspects. Wisdom, for example, is the perfect balance of Intelligence and Love. It is not an element. If you had Intelligence without Love, you could, for a time at least, have cleverly organized wickedness. The traditional Satan is an example of such a case. He is always credited with being extremely intelligent in promoting his schemes. Again, when you have Love without Intelligence, you can have boundless folly. The spoilt child is the most obvious example of this danger. The parent is full of Love but is lacking in Intelligence, and so he spoils the child and makes him a nuisance to himself and all those around him.

Beauty is an attribute of God and is the perfect balance of Life, Truth, and Love. In any true work of art, be it a picture, a building, a musical composition, or what you please, you will find that these three Aspects are balanced. One often comes across a work of art which he admires, but he feels that it somehow misses being complete; and a careful analysis will show that one of these Aspects is missing, or is not sufficiently represented.

In a sense it may be said that the first three Aspects are the most fundamental, and they are represented by the three primary colors, yellow for Life, blue for Truth, and red for Love. This is not an arbitrary arrangement, but has a metaphysical basis, and if you are interested in this phase of the Truth you can follow it up by treating for inspiration on the subject.

When you realize that the whole universe is but a network of thoughts and that actually man can know nothing but his own states of mind, you will see that there must be all kinds of unsuspected relationships and interdependencies between seemingly unrelated things in the outer world—“Thou canst not pluck a flower without the trembling of a star.”

There are two synonyms for the word God—Mind and Cause. These are not “Aspects” of God but are synonyms. Each means exactly the same as the word God itself. God is the religious name for the Creator of all things. Mind is the metaphysical name, and Cause is the natural science name for God. Anything that has any real existence is an idea in the One Mind; and this is the metaphysical interpretation of the universe. From the natural science point of view we may say that all creation is the result or effect of One Cause (God), and that there are no secondary causes. Now a cause cannot be known directly. It can be known only by its effect, and so the universe is the manifestation or effect of Cause or God, and because God is good, it must be good too.

Think over these Main Aspects every day. If you are a quick thinker go over these several times. If you are a slow thinker go through them once or twice. There is no special advantage in being either a quick or a slow thinker, it is a matter of natural temperament and one can accomplish just as much work as the other. Claim that you understand each one of them and that you express it. An excellent practice is to use the Divine Love Card for each Aspect, changing the word “Love” to whichever Aspect you are working on at the moment.

1. John 4:24, Revised Version.

2. John 8:32.

3. See “Yoga of Love,” and “Golden Gate,” in Power Through Constructive Thinking

4. First Epistle of John 4:16.

5. John 13:35.

6. See “Divine Love,” in Power Through Constructive Thinking.

7. See “The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.”

8. John 10:34.

9. John 15:5.

10. See “The Good Shepherd,” in Power Through Constructive Thinking.

11. John 4:24.

12. Job 14:2.

EMMET FOX