The first chaotic law is that the truth is different for everyone. Like all these principles, this one maintains that each is separate, and has a different set of thoughts which SETS HIM OFF from others. This principle evolves from the belief there is a hierarchy of illusions; some are MORE valuable, and THEREFORE true. And each establishes this FOR HIMSELF, and MAKES it true by his attack on what another values. This is justified BECAUSE the values differ. And those who hold them SEEM to be unlike, and THEREFORE enemies.

Think how this SEEMS to interfere with the first principle of miracles. For this establishes degrees of TRUTH among illusions, making it appear that some are HARDER to be overcome than others. If it were realized that they are all the same and EQUALLY untrue, it would be easy, then, to understand that miracles apply to ALL of them. Errors of ANY kind can be corrected, BECAUSE they are untrue. When brought to truth, instead of TO EACH OTHER, they merely disappear. No PART of nothing CAN be more resistant to the truth than can another.

The second law of chaos, dear indeed to every worshipper of sin, is that each one MUST sin, and therefore DESERVES attack and death. This principle, closely related to the first, is the demand that errors call for punishment, and NOT correction. For the DESTRUCTION of the one who makes the error places him BEYOND correction, and beyond forgiveness. What he has done is thus interpreted as an irrevocable sentence on himself, which God Himself is powerless to overlook. Sin cannot BE remitted, being the belief the Son of God can make mistakes for which his own destruction becomes inevitable.

Think what this SEEMS to do to the relationship between the Father and the Son. Now it appears that they can NEVER be One again. For One must ALWAYS be condemned, AND BY THE OTHER. Now are they different, and ENEMIES. And THEIR relationship is one of opposition, just as the separate aspects of the Son meet ONLY to conflict, but NOT to join. One becomes weak, the other strong BY HIS DEFEAT. And fear of God, and of each other, now appears as sensible, made real by what the Son of God has done, both to himself AND his Creator.

This leads directly to the third preposterous belief that seems to make chaos eternal. For, if God cannot BE mistaken, then He must accept His Son's belief in what he is, and HATE him for it. See how the fear of God is REINFORCED by this third principle. Now it becomes IMPOSSIBLE to turn to Him for help in misery. For now He has become the "enemy" Who "caused" it, and to Whom appeal is useless. Nor can salvation lie within the Son, whose every aspect seems to be at war with Him, and JUSTIFIED in its attack.

And now is conflict made inevitable, and beyond the help of God. And now salvation MUST remain impossible, because the Savior HAS become the enemy. There can be NO release and NO escape. Atonement thus becomes a myth, and vengeance, NOT forgiveness, is the Will of God. From where all this begins, there IS no sight of help that can succeed. ONLY destruction can BE the outcome. And God Himself SEEMS to be siding with it, to overcome His Son. Think not the ego will enable you to find ESCAPE from what it wants. THAT is the function of this course, which does NOT value what the ego cherishes.

All of the mechanisms of madness are seen emerging here. The "enemy," made strong by keeping hidden the valuable inheritance which should be yours; your JUSTIFIED possession, and attack for what has been withheld; and the inevitable loss the enemy MUST suffer, to save YOURSELF. Thus do the guilty ones protest their innocence. Were they not forced into this foul attack by the unscrupulous behavior of the enemy, they would respond with only kindness. But, in a savage world, the kind cannot survive. So they MUST take, or else be taken FROM.

And now there is a vague, unanswered question, not yet "explained." What IS this precious thing, this priceless pearl, this hidden secret treasure, to be wrested in righteous wrath from this most treacherous and cunning enemy? It must be what you want, and never found. And now you "understand" the reason WHY you found it not. For it was TAKEN from you by the enemy, and hidden where you would not think to look. He hid it in his BODY, making it the cover for his guilt; the hiding place for what belongs to YOU.

Now must his body be destroyed and sacrificed, that you may have that which BELONGS to you. His treachery DEMANDS his death, that YOU may live. And you attack only in self defense. But what is it you want, that NEEDS his death? Can you be sure your murderous attack IS justified, unless you know what it is FOR? And here a final principle of chaos comes to the "rescue." It holds there is a SUBSTITUTE for love. This is the "magic" that will cure all of your pain; the missing factor in your madness THAT MAKES IT SANE. THIS is the reason why you must attack. HERE is what makes your vengeance justified.

Behold, unveiled, the ego's secret gift, torn from your brother's body; hidden there in malice and in hatred for the one to whom the gift belongs. HE would deprive you of the secret ingredient which would give meaning to your life. The substitute for love, born of your enmity to one another, MUST be salvation. IT has no substitute, and there IS only one. And ALL relationships have but the purpose of seizing it, and making it your own. Never is your possession made complete. And never will your brother cease his own attack on YOU, for what you stole. Nor will God end His vengeance upon both, for, in His madness, HE must have this substitute for love, and kill you both.

How can some FORMS of murder NOT mean death? Can an attack in ANY form be love? What FORM of condemnation is a blessing? Who makes his Savior powerless, and FINDS salvation? Let not the FORM of the attack on him deceive you. You CANNOT seek to harm him, and be saved. Who can find SAFETY from attack by turning on himself? How can it matter what the FORM this madness takes? It is a judgment that defeats ITSELF, condemning what it says it wants to save. Be not deceived when madness takes a form you think is lovely. What is intent on your destruction, is NOT your friend.

There IS no life outside of Heaven. Where God created life, there life must be. In ANY state apart from Heaven, life is illusion. At best, it SEEMS like life; at worst, like death. Yet both are judgments on what is NOT life, equal in their inaccuracy and lack of meaning. Life not in Heaven is impossible, and what is NOT in Heaven is not ANYWHERE. Outside of Heaven, only the conflict of illusions stands; senseless, impossible, and beyond ALL reason, and yet perceived as an eternal BARRIER to Heaven. Illusions ARE but forms. Their content is NEVER true.

From the belief in sin, the faith in chaos MUST follow. It is BECAUSE it follows that it seems to be a logical conclusion; a valid step in ordered thought. The steps to chaos DO follow neatly from their starting-point. Each is a different form in the progression of truth's reversal, leading still deeper into terror, and AWAY from truth. Think not one step is smaller than another, nor that return from one is easier. The whole descent from Heaven lies in each one. And where your thinking starts, there must it end.

Brothers, take not one step in the descent to hell. For, HAVING taken one, you will NOT RECOGNIZE the rest for what they are. And they WILL follow. Attack in ANY form has placed your foot upon the twisted stairway that leads FROM Heaven. Yet, any instant, it is possible to have this all undone. How can you know whether you chose the stairs to Heaven or the way to hell? Quite easily. What do you feel? Is peace in your awareness? Are you CERTAIN which way you go? And are you sure the goal of Heaven CAN be reached? If not, you walk alone. Ask, then, your Friend to JOIN with you, and GIVE you certainty of where you go.

To heal, then, is to correct perception in your brother AND yourself by SHARING THE HOLY SPIRIT WITH HIM. This places you both WITHIN the Kingdom and restores ITS wholeness in your minds. This PARALLELS creation because it UNIFIES BY INCREASING, and INTEGRATES BY EXTENDING.

But the argument that underlies the DEFENSE of freedom is perfectly valid. Because it is true, it should not be FOUGHT for, but it SHOULD be sided WITH. Those who are AGAINST freedom believe that its outcome will hurt them, which CANNOT be true. But those who are FOR freedom, even if they are misguided in HOW they defend it, are siding with the one thing in this world which IS true. Whenever anyone can listen fairly to both sides of ANY issue, he WILL make the right decision. This is because he HAS the answer. Conflict can indeed be projected, but it MUST be intrapersonal first.

The term "intraPERSONAL" is an ego term, because "personal" implies of ONE person, and NOT of others. "Interpersonal" has a similar error, because it implies something that exists between DIFFERENT individuals. When we spoke before of the extremely PERSONAL nature of revelation, we followed this statement immediately with a description of the inevitable outcomes of the revelation in terms of SHARING. A PERSON conceives of himself as separate, largely because he perceives OF himself as bounded by a body. ONLY if he perceives as a MIND can he overcome this. THEN he is free to use terms like "intraMENTAL" and "interMENTAL" WITHOUT seeing them as different and conflicting, because minds CAN be in perfect accord.

OUTSIDE the Kingdom, the law which prevails INSIDE it is ADAPTED to "what you project you believe." This is its TEACHING form, because outside the Kingdom teaching is mandatory because learning is essential. This form of the law clearly implies that you will learn what YOU are from what you have projected onto others and therefore believe THEY are. IN the Kingdom, there is no teaching OR learning, because there is no BELIEF. There is only CERTAINTY. God and His Sons, in the surety of Being, KNOW that what you project you ARE.

God's Law of Creation, in perfect form, does NOT involve the USE of truth to convince His sons OF truth. The EXTENSION of truth, which IS the Law of the Kingdom, rests only on the knowledge of WHAT TRUTH IS. This is your INHERITANCE, and requires no learning at all. But when you DISinherited YOURSELVES, you BECAME learners. No-one questions the intimate connection of learning and memory. Learning is impossible WITHOUT memory, because it CANNOT be consistent UNLESS it is remembered.

That is why the Holy Spirit IS a lesson in remembering. We said before that He teaches remembering and FORGETTING, but the forgetting aspect is only TO MAKE THE REMEMBERING CONSISTENT. You forget to REMEMBER BETTER. You will NOT understand His translations while you listen to two ways of perceiving them. Therefore, you must forget or relinquish one to UNDERSTAND the other. This is the only way you can LEARN consistency, so that you can finally BE consistent. What can the perfect consistency of the Kingdom MEAN to the confused? It MUST be apparent that confusion INTERFERES with meaning, and therefore PREVENTS THE LEARNER FROM APPRECIATING IT.

There is NO confusion in the Kingdom, because there IS only one meaning. This Meaning comes from God and IS God. Because it is also YOU, you share it and EXTEND it AS YOUR CREATOR DID. This needs no translation, because it is perfectly understood, but it DOES need extension because it MEANS extension. Communication here is perfectly direct and perfectly united. It is totally without strain, because nothing discordant EVER enters. That is why it IS the Kingdom of God. It belongs to Him and is therefore LIKE Him. That IS its reality, and nothing CAN assail it.

Thus do you seek to prove salvation is where it is not. Today we will be glad you cannot prove it. For if you could, you would forever seek where it is not and never find it. The idea for today tells you once again how simple is salvation. Look for it where it waits for you, and there it will be found. Look nowhere else, for it is nowhere else.

All separation vanishes, as holiness is shared. For holiness is power, and by SHARING it, it GAINS in strength. If you seek for satisfaction in gratifying your needs as YOU perceive them, you MUST believe that strength comes from ANOTHER, and that WHAT YOU GAIN HE LOSES. Someone must ALWAYS lose, if you perceive yourself as weak. Yet there is another interpretation of relationships, that TRANSCENDS the concept of the LOSS of power completely.

You do NOT find it difficult to believe that, when ANOTHER calls on God for love, YOUR call remains as strong. Nor do you think that, by God's answer to HIM, YOUR hope of answer is diminished. On the contrary, you are far more inclined to regard HIS success, as witness to the possibility of YOURS. That is because you recognize, however dimly, that God is an IDEA, and so YOUR faith in Him is STRENGTHENED by sharing. What you find it difficult to accept is the fact that, LIKE your Father, YOU are an idea. And like Him, YOU can give yourself COMPLETELY, wholly without loss, and ONLY WITH GAIN.

Herein lies peace, for here there IS no conflict. In the world of scarcity, love HAS no meaning, and peace is impossible. For gain and loss are BOTH accepted, and so no-one is aware that perfect Love is IN him. In the holy instant, you recognize the IDEA of love in you, and UNITE this idea with the Mind that thought It, AND COULD NOT RELINQUISH IT. By HOLDING it within Itself, THERE WAS no loss. The holy instant thus becomes a lesson in how to hold ALL of your brothers in YOUR mind, experiencing not loss, but COMPLETION.

In the holy instant, nothing happens that has not always been. Only the veil, that has been drawn ACROSS reality, is lifted. Nothing has changed. But the AWARENESS of changelessness comes swiftly, as the veil of time is pushed aside. No-one who has not yet experienced the lifting of the veil, and felt himself drawn irresistibly into the Light behind it, can have faith in love WITHOUT fear. Yet the Holy Spirit GIVES you this faith, because He offered it to me and I ACCEPTED it.

Fear not the holy instant will be denied you, for I denied IT not. And, through me, the Holy Spirit GAVE it unto you, as YOU will give it. Let no need that YOU perceive, obscure your need of THIS. For, in the holy instant, you will recognize the ONLY need the aspects of the Son of God share equally, and, BY this recognition, you will join with me in OFFERING what is needed. It is through US that peace will come. Join me in the IDEA of peace, for, in ideas, minds CAN communicate.

If you would GIVE YOURSELF as your Father gives His Self, you will learn to understand Selfhood. And therein is love's meaning understood. But remember that understanding is OF THE MIND, and, ONLY of the mind. KNOWLEDGE is therefore of the mind, and its CONDITIONS are in the mind, WITH it. If you were not ONLY an idea, and NOTHING ELSE, you could not be in full communication with all that ever was. But, as long as you prefer to be something else, or would attempt to be NOTHING ELSE and SOMETHING ELSE together, the language of communication, WHICH YOU KNOW PERFECTLY, you will not remember.

In the holy instant, God is remembered, and the language of communication with ALL your brothers, is remembered WITH Him. For communication is remembered TOGETHER, as is truth. There is NO exclusion in the holy instant, because the past is gone, and, with it, goes the whole basis FOR exclusion. Without ITS source, exclusion vanishes. And this permits YOUR Source, and that of all your brothers, to REPLACE it in your awareness. God, and the power of God, will take their rightful place in you, and you will experience the full communication of ideas with ideas. Through your ability to do this, you will learn what you MUST be, because you will begin to understand what your Creator is, and what His creation is, along WITH Him.

Section 10 - Magic versus Miracles

All magic is a form of reconciling the irreconcilable. All religion is the recognition that the irreconcilable cannot BE reconciled.

Sickness and perfection ARE irreconcilable. If God created you perfect, you ARE perfect. If you believe you can be sick, you HAVE placed other gods before Him. GOD is not at war with the god of sickness which you made, but YOU are. He is the symbol of willing AGAINST God, and you are afraid of him BECAUSE he cannot be reconciled with God's will. If you ATTACK him, you will make him real to you. But if you refuse to worship him, in whatever form he may appear to you, and wherever you think you see him, he will disappear into the nothingness out of which he was made.

Reality can dawn only in an unclouded mind. It is always THERE, to BE accepted, but its acceptance depends on your WILLINGNESS TO HAVE IT. To know reality MUST involve the willingness to judge Unreality FOR WHAT IT IS. This is the RIGHT use of selective perception. To overlook nothingness is merely to judge it correctly, and because of your ability to evaluate it truly, to LET IT GO. Knowledge cannot dawn on a mind full of illusions, because truth and illusions are irreconcilable. Truth is whole, and CANNOT be known by PART of a mind.

The Sonship cannot be perceived as PARTLY sick, because to perceive it that way, is not to perceive it at all. If the Sonship is ONE, it is one in ALL respects. ONENESS CANNOT BE DIVIDED. If you perceive other gods, YOUR mind is split, and you will not be able to LIMIT the split, because the split IS the sign that you have removed part of your mind from God's Will, and this MEANS that it is out of control. To be out of control is to be out of REASON, and the mind DOES become unreasonable without reason. This is merely a matter of DEFINITION. By DEFINING the mind wrongly, you perceive it as FUNCTIONING wrongly.

The miracle is the act of a Son of God who has laid aside all false gods, and who calls on his brothers to do likewise. It is an act of faith, because it is the recognition that his brother CAN do it. It is a call to the Holy Spirit in his mind, a call to Him which is strengthened by this joining. Because the miracle-worker has heard Him, he strengthens His Voice in a sick brother by weakening his belief in sickness, which he does NOT share. The power of one mind CAN shine into another, because all the lamps of God were lit by the same spark. It is everywhere, and it is eternal.

In many, only the spark remains, for the great rays are obscured. But God has kept the spark alive, so the rays can never be completely forgotten. If you but see the little spark, you will learn of the greater light, for the rays are there unseen. Perceiving the spark will heal, but knowing the Light will create. Yet in the returning, the little light must be acknowledged first, for the separation was a descent from magnitude to littleness. But the spark is still as pure as the Great Light, because it is the remaining call of Creation. Put all your faith in it, and God Himself will answer you.

Lesson 88 Today we will review these ideas: (75-76)

75) "The light has come."

In choosing salvation rather than attack I merely choose to recognize what is already there. Salvation is a decision made already. Attack and grievances are not there to choose. That is why I always choose between truth and illusion; between what is there and what is not. The light has come. I can but choose the light, for it has no alternative. It has replaced the darkness, and the dark is gone.

These would prove useful forms for specific applications of this idea:

"This cannot show me darkness, for the light has come."

"The light in you is all that I would see, (name)"

"I would see in this only what is there."

Section 5 - The Recognition of Truth

God's MEANING waits in the Kingdom because that is where He placed it. It does NOT wait in time. It merely RESTS there (in the Kingdom) because it BELONGS there, as YOU do. How can you, who ARE God's meaning, perceive yourselves as absent FROM it? You can see yourselves as separated FROM your meaning only by EXPERIENCING YOURSELF AS UNREAL. This is WHY the ego is insane; it teaches that you are NOT what you ARE. This is so contradictory that it is clearly impossible. It is therefore a lesson which you CANNOT REALLY LEARN, and therefore CANNOT REALLY TEACH. But you ARE always teaching. You MUST, then, be teaching SOMETHING ELSE AS WELL, even though the ego DOES NOT KNOW WHAT IT IS.

The ego, then, IS always being undone, and DOES suspect your motives. Your mind CANNOT be unified in allegiance to the ego, because the mind does NOT BELONG to it. But what is "treacherous" to the ego IS faithful to peace. The ego's "enemy" is therefore YOUR friend. We said before that the ego's friend is not part of you but that is because the ego perceives itself as at war and therefore in need of allies. YOU, who are NOT at war, must look for brothers and RECOGNIZE all you see AS brothers, because ONLY EQUALS ARE AT PEACE.

Because God's equal Sons have everything, they CANNOT compete. But if they perceive ANY of their brothers as anything OTHER than their perfect equals, the IDEA of competition HAS entered their minds. Do not underestimate your need to be vigilant AGAINST this idea, because ALL your conflicts come FROM it. It IS the belief that conflicting interests are possible, and therefore means that you have accepted the IMpossible as true. How is that different from saying that you are perceiving YOURSELF as unreal?

To be IN the Kingdom is merely to focus your full attention ON it. As long as you believe that you can ATTEND to what is NOT true, you are accepting conflict as your CHOICE. IS IT REALLY A CHOICE? It SEEMS to be, but seeming and reality are hardly the same. You who ARE the Kingdom are not concerned with seeming. Reality is yours because you ARE reality. This is how having and being are ultimately reconciled, NOT in the Kingdom, but IN YOUR MINDS. The altar there is the ONLY reality. It is PERFECTLY clear in its thought, because it is a reflection of PERFECT Thought. It SEES only brothers because it sees ONLY in its own Light.

God has lit your minds Himself, and keeps your mind lit BY His light because His light is WHAT YOUR MINDS ARE. This is TOTALLY beyond question. And when YOU questioned it, you WERE answered. The answer merely UNDOES the question by establishing the fact that to QUESTION reality is to question MEANINGLESSLY. That is why the Holy Spirit NEVER questions. Its sole function is to UNdo the questionable, and thus LEAD TO CERTAINTY. The certain are perfectly calm, because they are not in doubt. They do NOT raise questions because NOTHING QUESTIONABLE ENTERS THEIR MINDS. This holds them in perfect serenity because this is what they SHARE, KNOWING what they are.

Healing is both an art and a science, as has so often been said. It is an art because it depends on inspiration in the sense that we have already used the term. Inspiration is the opposite of dis-spiriting, and therefore means to make joyful. The dis-spirited are depressed because they believe that they are literally "without the Spirit," which is an illusion. You do not PUT the Spirit in them by inspiring them, because that would be "magic," and therefore would not be real healing. But you DO recognize the Spirit that is ALREADY THERE, and thereby REAWAKEN IT. This is why the healer is part of the Resurrection and the LIFE. The SPIRIT is not asleep in the minds of the sick, but the part of the mind that can perceive it and be glad IS.

ALL abilities, then should be given over to the Holy Spirit, WHO KNOWS HOW TO USE THEM PROPERLY. He can use them ONLY for healing, because He knows you ONLY as whole. BY healing you learn of wholeness, and by learning of wholeness you learn to remember God. You HAVE forgotten Him, but the Holy Spirit still knows that YOUR forgetting MUST be translated into a way of remembering, and NOT perceived as a SEPARATE ability which OPPOSES AN OPPOSITE. This is the way in which the ego tries to use ALL abilities, because its goal is ALWAYS to make YOU believe that YOU are in opposition.

Lesson 346 "Today the peace of God envelops me, and I forget all things except His Love."

And when the evening comes today, we will remember nothing but the peace of God. For we will learn today what peace is ours when we forget all things except God's Love.

Lesson 89 These are our review ideas for today: (77-78)

77) "I am entitled to miracles."

You might use these suggestions for specific applications of this idea:

"Behind this is a miracle to which I am entitled."

"Let me not hold a grievance against you (name), but offer you the miracle that belongs to you instead."

"Seen truly, this offers me a miracle."

78) "Let miracles replace all grievances."

By this idea do I unite my will with the Holy Spirit's, and perceive them as one. By this idea do I accept my release from hell. By this idea do I express my willingness to have all my illusions be replaced with truth, according to God's plan for my salvation. I would make no exceptions and no substitutes. I want all of Heaven and only Heaven, as God wills me to have.

Useful specific forms for applying this idea would be:

"I would not hold this grievance apart from my salvation."

"Let our grievances be replaced by miracles, (name)"

"Beyond this is the miracle by which all my grievances are replaced."

Section 5 - Entering the Ark

Being without illusion of what you are, the Holy Spirit merely gives EVERYTHING to God, Who has already given AND RECEIVED all that is true. The UNtrue He has neither received NOR given. Sin has no place in Heaven, where its results are alien, and can no more enter than can their source. And therein lies your need to see your brother sinless. In him is Heaven. See sin in him INSTEAD, and Heaven is lost to YOU. But see him as he IS, and what is yours shines from him to you.

Nothing but this can touch them, for they see ONLY this, sharing their power according to the Will of God. And thus their freedom is established AND MAINTAINED. It is upheld through ALL temptations to imprison and to BE imprisoned. It is THEM, who learned of freedom, that you should ask what freedom IS. Ask not the sparrow how the eagle soars, for those with little wings have not accepted for THEMSELVES the power to share with you. The sinless give as they received. See, then, the power of sinlessness within your brother, and share with him the power of the RELEASE from sin you offered HIM.

To each who walks this earth in seeming solitude is a Savior given, whose special function here is to release him, and so to free himself. In the world of separation, each is appointed separately, though they are all the same. But those who KNOW that they are all the same, need not salvation. And each one FINDS his Savior, when he is ready to look upon the face of Christ, and see Him sinless. The plan is not of you, nor need you be concerned with anything except the part that has been given YOU to learn. For He Who knows the rest will see to it WITHOUT your help. But think not that He does not need your part, to help Him with the rest. For in your part lies ALL of it, without which is no part complete, nor is the whole completed WITHOUT your part. The ark of peace is entered two by two, yet the beginning of another world goes with them. Each holy relationship must enter here, to learn its special function in the Holy Spirit's plan, now that it SHARES His purpose. And, as this purpose is fulfilled, a new world rises, in which sin can enter not, and where the Son of God can enter WITHOUT fear. And where he rests a while, to forget imprisonment, and to remember freedom.

Think you, when this has been achieved, that you will rest WITHOUT them? You could no more leave one of them outside than I could leave you, and forget part of myself. You may wonder how you can BE at peace when, while you are in time, there is so much that must be done BEFORE the way to peace is open. Perhaps this seems impossible to YOU. But ask yourself if it is possible that GOD would have a plan for your salvation that does NOT work. Once you accept HIS plan as the ONE function that you would fulfill, there WILL be nothing else the Holy Spirit will not ARRANGE for you, WITHOUT your effort.

He will go before you, making straight your path, and leaving in your way no stones to trip on, and no obstacles to bar your way. NOTHING you need will be denied you. Not one seeming difficulty but will melt away BEFORE you reach it. You need take thought for nothing, careless of everything except the only purpose that you would fulfill. As THAT was given you, so will its fulfillment be. God's guarantee will hold against ALL obstacles, for it rests on certainty, and NOT contingency. IT RESTS ON YOU. And what can be more certain than the Son of God?

Section 7 - The Purpose of Pain

Pain demonstrates the body must be real. It is a loud, obscuring voice, whose shrieks would silence what the Holy Spirit says, and keep His words from your awareness. Pain compels attention, drawing it away from Him, and focusing upon itself. Its purpose is the same as pleasure, for they both are means TO MAKE THE BODY REAL. What shares a common function IS the same. This is the law of purpose, which unites all those who share in it within itself. Pleasure and pain are EQUALLY unreal, because their purpose CANNOT be achieved. Thus are they means for nothing, for they have a goal without a meaning. And they share the lack of meaning that their PURPOSE has.

Sin shifts from pain to pleasure, and again to pain. For EITHER witness is the same, and carries but one message, "You are here, WITHIN this body, and you CAN be hurt. You can have pleasure, too, but ONLY at the cost of pain." These witnesses are joined by many more. Each one SEEMS different, because it has a different NAME, and so it seems to answer to a different SOUND. Except for this, the witnesses of sin are all alike. Call pleasure "pain," and it will hurt. Call pain pleasure, and the pain BEHIND the pleasure will be felt no more. Sin's witnesses but shift from name to name, as one steps forward, and another, back. Yet which is foremost makes NO difference. Sin's witnesses hear but the call of death.

This body, purposeless within itself, holds all your memories and all your hopes. You use its eyes to see, its ears to hear, and let it TELL you what it is it feels. IT DOES NOT KNOW. It tells you but the NAMES you gave it to use, when YOU call forth the witnesses to its reality. You cannot choose AMONG them which are real, for any one you choose is like the rest. This name or that, but nothing more, you choose. You do not MAKE a witness true, because you called him by truth's NAME. The truth is found in him IF IT IS TRUTH HE REPRESENTS. And otherwise he lies, if you should call him by the Holy Name of God Himself.

God's Witness sees no witnesses AGAINST the body. Neither does He harken to the witnesses by OTHER names, which speak in OTHER ways for its reality. He KNOWS it is not real. For NOTHING could contain what you believe it holds within. Nor COULD it tell a Part of God Himself what It should feel, and what Its Function is. Yet must He love whatever YOU hold dear. And for each witness to the body's death, He sends a witness to your Life in Him Who knows no death. Each miracle He brings is witness that the body is NOT real. Its pains and pleasures does He heal alike, for ALL sin's witnesses do His replace.

The miracle makes NO distinctions in the names by which sin's witnesses are called. It merely proves that what they REPRESENT has no effects. And this it proves BECAUSE its own effects have come to take their place. It matters not the name by which you called your suffering. IT IS NO LONGER THERE. The One Who brings the miracle perceived them all as one, and called by name of "fear." As fear is witness unto death, so is the miracle the witness unto Life. It is a witness no-one can deny, for it is the EFFECTS of life it brings. The dying live, the dead arise, and pain has vanished. Yet a miracle speaks not but for itself, but what it REPRESENTS. Love, too, has symbols in a world of sin. The miracle forgives BECAUSE it stands for what is PAST forgiveness, and is TRUE.

Lesson 77 "I am entitled to miracles."

You are entitled to miracles because of what you are. You will receive miracles because of what God is. And you will offer miracles because you are one with God. Again, how simple is salvation! It is merely a statement of your true identity. It is this that we will celebrate today.

Today we will claim the miracles which are your right, since they belong to you. You have been promised full release from the world you made. You have been assured that the Kingdom of God is within you, and can never be lost. We ask no more than what belongs to us in truth. Today, however, we will also make sure that we will not content ourselves with less.

After this brief introductory phase, wait quietly for the assurance that your request is granted. You have asked for the salvation of the world and for your own. You have requested that you be given the means by which this is accomplished. You cannot fail to be assured in this. You are but asking that the Will of God be done.

In doing this, you do not really ask for anything. You state a fact that cannot be denied. The Holy Spirit cannot but assure you that your request is granted. The fact that you accepted must be so. There is no room for doubt and uncertainty today. We are asking a real question at last. The answer is a simple statement of a simple fact. You will receive the assurance that you seek.

Our shorter practice periods will be frequent, and will also be devoted to a reminder of a simple fact. Tell yourself often today:

"I am entitled to miracles."

Ask for them whenever a situation arises in which they are called for. You will recognize these situations, you are not relying on yourself to find them, and you are therefore fully entitled to receive them whenever you ask. Remember, too, not to be satisfied with less than the perfect answer. Be quick to tell yourself, should you be tempted:

"I will not trade miracles for grievances.

I want only what belongs to me.

God has established miracles as my right."

Section 8 - The Inclusiveness of Creation

God created nothing beside you, and nothing beside you exists, for you are part of Him. What except Him CAN exist? Nothing BEYOND Him can happen, because nothing EXCEPT Him is real. YOUR creations add to Him, as YOU do. But nothing is added that is different, because everything has always BEEN. What can upset you except the ephemeral, and how can the ephemeral be real, if you are God's ONLY creation, and He created you eternal?

Your holy will establishes EVERYTHING that happens to you. Every response you make, to everything you perceive, is up to you, because your will DETERMINES your perception of it. God does not change His Mind about YOU, for He is not uncertain of HIMSELF. And what He knows CAN be known, because He does not know only for Himself. He CREATED you for Himself, but He gave you the power to create for YOUR self, so you would be LIKE Him. That is why your will is holy.

Can anything EXCEED the love of God? Can anything, then, exceed YOUR will? Nothing can reach you from BEYOND it, because being in God, YOU encompass everything. Believe this, and you will realize how much IS up to you. When ANYTHING threatens your peace of mind, ask yourself "Has God changed His Mind about me?" Then ACCEPT His decision, for it is indeed changeless, and refuse to change your mind about YOURSELF.- God will never decide AGAINST you, or He would be deciding against Himself.

Is it not possible that you merely shifted from one dream to another without really wakening? Would you bother to reconcile what happened in conflicting DREAMS, or would you dismiss BOTH TOGETHER, if you discovered that REALITY is in accord with neither? You do not remember being awake. When you hear the Holy Spirit, you merely feel BETTER, because loving seems POSSIBLE to you. But you do NOT remember yet that it once was so, and it is in this remembering that you will know it can be so again.

What is possible has not yet been accomplished. But what has once been is so now, if it is eternal. When you remember, you will know what you remember IS eternal, and therefore is NOW.

You will remember everything the instant you DESIRE IT WHOLLY, for if to desire wholly is to create, you will have willed away the separation, returning your mind simultaneously to your Creator and your creations. Knowing them, you will have no wish to sleep, but only the will to waken and be glad. Dreams will be impossible, because you will WANT only truth, and being at last your will, it will be yours.

Lesson 204 "I am not a body. I am free. For I am still as God created me."

Lesson 329 "I have already chosen what You will."

Today we will accept our union with each other and our Source. We have no will apart from His, and all of us are one because His Will is shared by all of us. Through It we recognize that we are one. Through It we find our way at last to God.

Section 6 - Heralds of Eternity

Each herald of eternity sings of the end of sin and fear. Each speaks in time of what is far BEYOND it. Two voices, raised together, call to the hearts of everyone, and let them beat as one. And in that single heart beat is the unity of love proclaimed and given welcome. Peace to your holy relationship, which has the power to hold the unity of the Son of God together. You give to one another for EVERYONE. And in your gift is everyone made glad. Forget not Who has given YOU the gifts you give. And through your NOT forgetting this, will you remember Who gave the gifts to Him to give to you.

It is impossible to over-estimate your brother's value. Only the ego does this, but all it means is that it WANTS the other for ITSELF, and therefore values him too little. What is inestimable clearly cannot BE evaluated. Do you recognize the fear that rises from the meaningless attempt to judge what lies so far BEYOND your judgment you cannot even SEE it? Judge not what is invisible to you, or you will NEVER see it. But wait in patience for its coming. It will be GIVEN you to see your brother's worth, when all you WANT for him is peace. And what you want for HIM, you will receive.

How can you estimate the worth of him who offers peace to you? What would you want EXCEPT his offering? His worth has been established by his Father, and you will RECOGNIZE it as you receive his Father's gift through him. What is in him will shine so brightly in your grateful vision, that you will merely love him, and be glad. You will not think to judge him. Who would SEE the face of Christ, and yet insist that judgment still has meaning? For this insistence is of those who do NOT see. Vision OR judgment is your choice, but never BOTH of these.

Your brother's body is as little use to you as it is to him. When it is used ONLY as the Holy Spirit teaches, it has no function. For minds NEED not the body to communicate. The sight that SEES the body, has no use which serves the purpose of a holy relationship. And while you look upon each other thus, the means and end have NOT been brought in line. Why should it take so many holy instants to let this be accomplished, when one would do? There IS but one. The little breath of eternity that runs through time like golden light is all the same. Nothing before it; nothing afterwards.

You look upon each holy instant as a DIFFERENT point in time. IT NEVER CHANGES. All that it ever held or will ever hold is here right now. The past takes nothing FROM it, and the future will ADD no more. Here, then, is EVERYTHING. Here is the loveliness of your relationship, with means and ends in perfect harmony ALREADY. Here is the perfect faith that you will one day offer to each other, ALREADY offered you. And here the limitless forgiveness you will give each other is ALREADY given; the face of Christ you yet will look upon ALREADY seen.

Be comforted, and feel the Holy Spirit watching over you, in love and perfect confidence in what He sees. He knows the Son of God. And shares his Father's certainty the universe rests in his gentle hands in safety and in peace. Let us consider now what he must learn, to SHARE his Father's confidence in him. What IS he, that the Creator of the universe should offer it to him, and KNOW it rests in safety? He looks upon himself not as his Father knows him. And yet it is impossible the confidence of God should be misplaced.

Lesson 137 "When I am healed, I am not healed alone."

Today's idea remains the central thought on which salvation rests. For healing is the opposite of all the world's ideas which dwell on sickness and on separate states. Sickness is a retreat from others, and a shutting off of joining. It becomes a door that closes on a separate self, and keeps it isolated and alone.

It is impossible that anyone be healed alone. In sickness must he be apart and separate. But healing is his own decision to be one again, and to accept his Self with all its parts intact and unassailed. In sickness does his Self appear to be dismembered and without the unity which gives It life. But healing is accomplished as he sees the body has no power to attack the universal Oneness of God's Son. Sickness would prove that lies must be the truth. But healing demonstrates that truth is true.

The separation sickness would impose has never really happened. To be healed is merely to accept what always was the simple truth, and always will remain exactly as it has forever been. Yet eyes accustomed to illusions must be shown that what they look upon is false. So healing, never needed by the truth, must demonstrate that sickness is not real.

Healing might thus be called a counter-dream which cancels out the dream of sickness in the name of truth, but not in truth itself. Just as forgiveness overlooks all sins that never were accomplished, healing but removes illusions that have not occurred. Just as the real world will arise to take the place of what has never been at all, healing offers restitution for imagined states and false ideas which dreams embroider into pictures of the truth.

Yet think not healing is unworthy of your function here. For anti-Christ becomes more powerful than Christ to those who dream the world is real. The body seems to be more solid and more stable than the mind. And love becomes a dream, while fear remains the one reality which can be seen and justified and fully understood.

And as you let yourself be healed, you see all those around you, or who cross your mind, or whom you touch, or those who seem to have no contact with you, healed along with you. Perhaps you will not recognize them all, nor realize how great your offering to all the world, when you let healing come to you. But you are never healed alone. And legions upon legions will receive the gift which you receive when you are healed.

Those who are healed become the instruments of healing. Nor does time elapse between the instant they are healed and all the grace of healing it is given them to give. What is opposed to God does not exist, and who accepts it not within his mind becomes a haven where the weary can remain to rest. For here is truth bestowed, and here are all illusions brought to truth.

Would you not offer shelter to God's will? You but invite your Self to be at home, and can this invitation be refused? Ask the inevitable to occur and you will never fail. The other choice is but to ask what cannot be to be, and this cannot succeed. Today we ask that only truth will occupy our minds; that thoughts of healing will this day go forth from what is healed to what must yet be healed, aware that they will both occur as one.

We will remember, as the hour strikes, our function is to let our minds be healed that we may carry healing to the world, exchanging curse for blessing, pain for joy, and separation for the peace of God. Is not a minute of the hour worth the giving to receive a gift like this? Is not a little time a small expense to offer for the gift of everything?

Yet must we be prepared for such a gift. And so we will begin the day with this, and give ten minutes to these thoughts with which we will conclude today at night as well:

"When I am healed I am not healed alone.

And I would share my healing with the world,

That sickness may be banished from the mind

Of God's One Son, Who is my only Self."

Let healing be through you this very day. And as you rest in quiet be prepared to give as you receive, to hold but what you give, and to receive the Word of God to take the place of all the foolish thoughts that ever were imagined. Now we come together to make well all that was sick, and offer blessing where there was attack. Nor will we let this function be forgot as every hour of the day slips by, remembering our function with this thought:

"When I am healed I am not healed alone.

And I would bless my brothers, for I would

Be healed with them as they are healed with me."

Section 5 - The Truth Behind Illusions

You WILL attack what does not satisfy, and thus you will not see you made it up. You ALWAYS fight illusions. For the truth behind them is so lovely and so still in loving gentleness, were you AWARE of it, you would forget defensiveness entirely, and rush to its embrace. The truth could never BE attacked. And this you knew when you made idols. They were made that this might be forgotten. You attack but FALSE ideas, and NEVER truthful ones. All idols ARE the false ideas you made to fill the gap you think arose between yourself and what is true. And you attack them for the things you think they REPRESENT. What lies BEYOND them cannot BE attacked.

The wearying, dissatisfying gods you made are blown-up children's toys. A child IS frightened when a wooden head springs up as a closed box is opened suddenly. Or when a soft and silent wooly bear begins to squeak as he takes hold of it. The rules he made for boxes and for bears have failed him, and have broken his control of what surrounds him. And he is afraid because he thought the rules PROTECTED him. Now must he learn the boxes and the bears did NOT deceive him, broke no rules, nor mean his world is made chaotic and unsafe. HE WAS MISTAKEN. He misunderstood what MADE him safe, and thought that it had left.

The gap that is not there is filled with toys in countless forms. And each one seems to break the rules you set for it. It never WAS the thing you thought. It MUST appear to break your rules for safety, since the RULES are wrong. But YOU are not endangered. You can laugh at popping heads and squeaking toys, as does the child who learns they are no threat to him. But while he likes to play with them, he still perceives them as obeying rules he made for his enjoyment. So there still are rules which they can seem to break, and frighten him. Yet IS he at the mercy of his toys? And CAN they represent a threat to him?

Appearances deceive BECAUSE they are appearances, and not reality. Dwell not on them in ANY form. They but OBSCURE reality. And they bring fear BECAUSE they hide the truth. Do not attack what you have made to LET you be deceived. For thus you prove that you HAVE BEEN deceived. Attack HAS power to make illusions real. Yet what it makes is nothing. Who could be made fearful by a power that can have no REAL effects at all? What could it BE but an illusion, making things appear like to itself? Look calmly at its toys, and understand that they are idols which but dance to vain desires. Give them not your worship, for they are not there. But this is EQUALLY forgotten in attack.

God's Son needs NO defense against his dreams. His idols do not threaten him at all. His ONE mistake is that he thinks them real. What can the power of illusions DO? Appearances can but deceive the mind that WANTS to be deceived. And you can make a simple choice that will forever place you far BEYOND deception. You need not concern yourself with HOW this will be done, for this you CANNOT understand. But you WILL understand that mighty changes have been quickly brought about, when you decide one very simple thing; you do not WANT whatever you believe an idol gives. For thus the Son of God declares that he is free of idols. And thus IS he free.

Salvation is a paradox indeed! What could it be EXCEPT a happy dream? For you are asked but to forgive all things that no-one ever did; to overlook what is not there; and not to look upon the unreal as reality. You are but asked to let your will be done, and seek no longer for the things you do not want. And you are asked to let yourself be free of all the dreams of what you never were, and seek no more to substitute the strength of idle wishes for the Will of God. Here does the dream of separation start to fade and disappear. For here the gap that is not there begins to be perceived without the toys of terror that you made.

No more than this is asked. Be glad indeed salvation asks so little, NOT so much. It asks for NOTHING in reality. And even in illusions it but asks forgiveness be the substitute for fear. Such is the ONLY rule for happy dreams. The gap is emptied of the toys of fear, and then its unreality is plain. Dreams are for nothing. And the Son of God CAN have no need of them. They offer him no single thing that he could ever want. He is DELIVERED from illusions by his will, and but restored to what he IS. What could God's plan for his salvation BE, except a means to give him to Himself?

Section 7 - Salvation from Fear

Before your brother's holiness the world is still, and peace descends on it in gentleness and blessing so complete, that not one trace of conflict still remains to haunt you in the darkness of the night. He is your Savior from the dreams of terror. He is the healing of your sense of sacrifice, and fear that what you have will scatter with the wind, and turn to dust. In him is your assurance God is here, and with you now. While he is what he is, you can be sure that God is knowable, and WILL be known to you. For He could never leave His own creation. And the sign that this is so lies in your brother, offered you that all your doubts about yourself may disappear before his holiness.

See in him God's creation. For in him his Father waits for your acknowledgment that He created YOU as part of Him. Without you, there would be a lack in God, a Heaven incomplete, a Son without a Father. There could be no universe, and no reality. For what God wills is whole, and part of Him BECAUSE His Will is One. Nothing alive that is not part of Him, and nothing is but IS alive in Him. Your brother's holiness shows you that God is One with him AND you; that what he has is yours BECAUSE you are not separate from him OR from his Father.

Nothing is lost to you in all the universe. Nothing that God created has He failed to lay before you lovingly, as yours forever. And no thought within His Mind is absent from your own. It is His Will you SHARE His love for you, and look upon yourself as lovingly as He conceived of you before the world began, and as He knows you still. God changes not His Mind about His Son with passing circumstance which has no meaning in eternity where He abides, and you with Him. Your brother IS as He created him. And it is this that saves YOU from a world that He created not.

It is HIS sinlessness that eyes that see can look upon. It is HIS loveliness they see in everything. And it is HE they look for everywhere, and find no sight or place or time where He is NOT. Within your brother's holiness, the perfect frame for YOUR salvation and the world's, is set the shining memory of Him in Whom your brother lives, and you along with him. Let not your eyes be blinded by the veil of specialness that hides the face of Christ from him, and you as well. And let the fear of God no longer hold the vision you were MEANT to see from you. Your brother's BODY shows not Christ to you. He IS set forth within his holiness.

Choose, then, his body OR his holiness as what you WANT to see, and which you choose is yours to look upon. Yet will you choose in countless situations, and through time which seems to have no end, until the truth be your decision. For eternity is NOT regained by still one more denial of the Christ in him. And where is YOUR salvation, if he is but a body? Where is YOUR peace, but in his holiness? And where is God Himself but in that part of Him He set forever in your brother's holiness, that YOU might see the truth about yourself set forth at last in terms you recognized and understood?

Your brother's holiness is sacrament and benediction unto YOU. His errors can NOT withhold God's blessing from himself, nor you who see him truly. His mistakes can cause delay, which it is given YOU to take from him, that both may end a journey that has never been begun, and NEEDS no end. What never was is NOT a part of you. Yet will you think it is, until you realize that it is not a part of him who stands beside you. He is the mirror of yourself, wherein you see the judgment you have laid on BOTH of you. The Christ in you beholds his holiness. Your specialness looks on his body, and beholds him not.

Specialness is the function that you gave yourself. It stands for you alone, as self-created, self-maintained, in need of nothing, and unjoined with anything beyond the body. In its eyes, you are a separate universe, with all the power to hold itself complete within itself, with every entry shut against intrusion, and every window barred against the light. Always attacked and always furious, with anger always fully justified, you have pursued this goal with vigilance you never thought to yield, and effort that you never thought to cease. And all this grim determination was for this: YOU WANTED SPECIALNESS TO BE THE TRUTH.

Now you are merely asked that you pursue another goal with far LESS vigilance, with little effort and with little time, and with the power of God maintaining it, and promising success. Yet, of the two, it is THIS one you find more difficult. The SACRIFICE of self you understand, nor do you deem THIS cost too heavy. But a tiny willingness, a nod to God, a greeting to the Christ in you, you find a burden wearisome and tedious, too heavy to be borne. Yet, to the dedication to the truth as GOD established it, NO sacrifice is asked, NO strain called forth, and all the power of Heaven and the might of truth itself is given to provide the means, and GUARANTEE the goal's accomplishment.

You who believe it easier to see your brother's body than his holiness, be sure you understand what made this judgment. Here is the voice of specialness heard clearly, judging AGAINST the Christ, and setting forth, for YOU, the purpose that you CAN attain, and what you can NOT do. Forget not that this judgment MUST apply to what you do with IT as your ally. For what you do through Christ it does not know. To Him, this judgment makes no sense at all, for ONLY what His Father wills is possible, and there IS no alternative for Him to see. Out of His LACK of conflict comes your peace. And from His purpose come the means for effortless accomplishment and rest.

Section 2 - Healing as Joining

Healing is an act of thought by which two minds perceive their oneness, and become glad. This gladness calls to every part of the Sonship to rejoice with them, and let God Himself go out into them and through them. Only the healed mind can experience revelation with lasting effect, because revelation is an experience of pure joy. If you do not will to be wholly joyous, your mind cannot HAVE what it does not will to BE.

If you think about it, you will see that, while this kind of thinking is totally alien to having THINGS, even to the lower mind it is quite comprehensible in connection with IDEAS. If you share a physical possession, you DO divide its ownership. But if you share an IDEA, you do NOT lessen it. ALL of it is still yours, although all of it has been given away. Further, if the person to whom you give it accepts it as HIS, he reinforces it in YOUR mind, and thus INCREASES it.

If you can accept the concept that the world IS one of ideas, the whole belief in the false association which the ego has made between giving and LOSING is gone. Let us start our process of re-awakening with just a few simple concepts:

Thoughts INCREASE by being given away.

The more who BELIEVE in them, the STRONGER they become.

EVERYTHING is an idea.

How, then, is it possible that giving and losing can be meaningfully associated?

This is the invitation to the Holy Spirit. I told you that I could reach up and bring the Holy Spirit down to you. But I can bring Him to you only at your own invitation. The Holy Spirit is nothing more than your own right mind. He was also mine. The Bible says, "May the mind be in you that was also in Christ Jesus," and uses this as a BLESSING. It is the blessing of miracle-mindedness. It asks that you may think as I thought, joining with me in Christ-thinking.

The Holy Spirit is the only part of the Holy Trinity which is symbolic. He is referred to in the Bible as the Healer, the Comforter, and the Guide. He is also described as something separate, apart from the Father and from the Son. I myself said, "and if I go I will send you ANOTHER comforter, and he will abide with you."

The Holy Spirit is a difficult concept to grasp, precisely because it IS symbolic, and therefore open to many different interpretations. As a man and as one of God's creations, my right thinking, which came from the Universal Inspiration which IS the Holy Spirit, taught me first and foremost that this Inspiration is for ALL. I could not have it myself without knowing that.

The word "know" is proper here, because the Holy Inspiration is so close to knowledge that it calls forth, or better, allows it to come. We have spoken before of the higher or true perception, which is so close to truth that God Himself can flow across the little gap. Knowledge is always ready to flow everywhere, but it cannot oppose. Therefore you can obstruct it, although you can never lose it.

The Holy Spirit is the Christ mind that senses the knowledge that lies beyond perception. It came into being with the separation as a protection, and inspired the beginning of the Atonement at the same time. Before that, there was no need for healing and no-one was comfortless.

Section 3 - The Shadow of Guilt

Release from guilt is the ego's whole undoing. MAKE NO-ONE FEARFUL, for his guilt is yours, and, by obeying the ego's harsh commandments, you bring its condemnation on yourself, and you will not escape the punishment it offers those who obey it. The ego rewards fidelity to it with pain, for faith in it IS pain. And faith can be rewarded only in terms of the belief in which the faith was placed. Faith MAKES the power of belief, and WHERE it is invested, determines its reward. For faith is ALWAYS given what is treasured, and what is treasured IS returned to you.

The world can give you ONLY what you gave it, for being nothing but your own projection, it HAS no meaning apart from what you found in it, and placed your faith in. Be faithful unto darkness, and you will NOT see, because your faith WILL be rewarded as you GAVE it. You WILL accept your treasure, and if you place your faith in the past, the future WILL be like it. Whate'er you hold as dear YOU THINK IS YOURS. The power of your VALUING will make it so.

Atonement brings a re-evaluation of EVERYTHING you cherish, for it is the means by which the Holy Spirit can SEPARATE the false and true, which you have accepted into your minds WITHOUT DISTINCTION. Therefore, you cannot value one without the other, and guilt has become AS TRUE FOR YOU AS INNOCENCE. You do NOT believe the Son of God is guiltless, because you see the past, and see HIM not. When you condemn a brother, you are saying, "I who WAS guilty choose to REMAIN so." You have denied HIS freedom, and by so doing, you have denied the witness unto YOURS. You could as easily have FREED him from the past, and lifted from his mind the cloud of guilt that binds him TO it. And in HIS freedom would have been your OWN.

Lay not his guilt upon him, for HIS guilt lies in his secret that HE thinks that HE has done this unto YOU. Would you then teach him that he is RIGHT in his delusion? The idea that the guiltless Son of God can attack himself, and MAKE him guilty, IS insane. In ANY form, in ANYONE, BELIEVE THIS NOT. For sin and condemnation are the same, and the belief in one is faith in the other, calling for punishment INSTEAD of love. NOTHING can justify insanity, and to call for punishment UPON YOURSELF, MUST be insane.

See no-one, then, as guilty, and you will affirm the truth of guiltlessness UNTO YOURSELF. In every condemnation that you offer the Son of God, lies the conviction of your OWN guilt. If you would have the Holy Spirit make YOU free of it, accept His offer of Atonement for ALL your brothers. For so you learn that IT IS TRUE FOR YOU. Remember always that it is impossible to condemn the Son of God IN PART. Those whom you see as guilty, become the witnesses to guilt IN YOU, and you WILL see it there, for it IS there, until it is undone. Guilt is ALWAYS in your OWN mind, WHICH HAS CONDEMNED ITSELF. Project it not, for while you do, it cannot BE undone. With everyone whom you release from guilt, great is the joy in Heaven, where the witnesses to your fatherhood rejoice.

GUILT MAKES YOU BLIND. For while you see one spot of guilt within you, YOU WILL NOT SEE THE LIGHT. And by projecting it, the WORLD seems dark, and shrouded in your guilt. You throw a dark veil over it, and cannot see it, BECAUSE YOU CANNOT LOOK WITHIN. You are afraid of what you would see there, but it is NOT there. THE THING YOU FEAR IS GONE. If you would look within, you would see only the Atonement, shining in quiet and in peace, upon the altar to your Father. Do not be afraid to look within. The ego tells you all is black with guilt within you, and bids you NOT TO LOOK. Instead, it bids you look upon your brothers, AND SEE THE GUILT IN THEM.

Yet this you cannot do, WITHOUT REMAINING BLIND. For those who see their brothers dark, and guilty in the dark in which they shroud them, are too afraid to look upon the light within. Within you is NOT what you believe is there, and what YOU put your faith in. Within you is the holy sign of perfect faith YOUR FATHER has in you. HE does not value you as you do. He knows Himself, and knows the truth IN YOU. He knows THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE, for He knows not of differences. Can YOU see guilt where God KNOWS there is perfect innocence? You can DENY His knowledge, but you CANNOT change it. Look, then, upon the light He placed within you, and learn that what you feared was there HAS BEEN replaced with love.

Lesson 278 "If I am bound, my Father is not free."

"Father, I ask for nothing but the truth. I have had many foolish thoughts about myself and my creation, and have brought a dream of fear into my mind. Today I would not dream. I choose the way to You instead of madness and instead of fear. For truth is safe and only love is sure."

Section 9 - The Vision of Sinlessness

Vision will come to you at first in glimpses, but they will be enough to show you what is given YOU who see your brother sinless.

Truth is restored to you through your desire, as it was lost to you through your desire for something ELSE. Open the holy place which you closed off by VALUING the something else, and what was never lost will quietly return. It HAS been saved for you. Vision would not be necessary, had judgment not been made. Desire now its whole undoing, and it is done FOR you. Do you not WANT to know your own identity? Would you not happily exchange your doubts for certainty? Would you not willingly be FREE of misery, and learn again of joy? Your holy relationship offers all this to you. As IT was given you, so will be its EFFECTS.

And as its holy purpose was not made by you, the means by which its happy end is yours is also not of you. Rejoice in what is yours but for the asking. And think not that you need make either means OR end. All this is GIVEN you, who would but SEE your brother sinless. All this is GIVEN, waiting on your desire but to RECEIVE it. Vision is freely given to those who ask to see. Your brother's sinlessness is given you in shining light, to look on with the Holy Spirit's vision, and to rejoice in, along with Him. For peace will come to all who ask for it with real desire and sincerity of purpose, SHARED with the Holy Spirit, and at one with Him on what salvation IS.

Be willing, then, to see your brother sinless, that Christ may rise before your vision, and give you joy. And place NO value on your brother's body, which held him to illusions of what he is. It is HIS desire to see his sinlessness, as it is YOURS. And bless the Son of God in your relationship, nor see in him what you have MADE of him. The Holy Spirit GUARANTEES that what God has willed and given shall be yours. This is YOUR purpose now, and the vision that makes it yours is ready to be given. You have the vision that enables you to see the body not. And as you look upon each other, you will see an altar to your Father, holy as Heaven, glowing with radiant purity, and sparkling with the shining lilies you laid upon it.

What can you value more than this? Why do you think the body is a better home, a safer shelter for God's Son? Why would you rather look on IT, than on the truth? How can the engine of destruction be PREFERRED, and chosen to REPLACE the holy home the Holy Spirit offers, where HE will dwell WITH you? The body is the sign of weakness, vulnerability, and LOSS of power. Can such a Savior HELP you? Would you turn, in your distress and need for help, unto the HELPLESS? Is the pitifully LITTLE the perfect choice to call upon for strength? Judgment WILL seem to make your Savior weak. But it is YOU who need his strength.

What if you recognized this world is a hallucination? What if you REALLY understood you made it up? What if you realized that those who SEEM to walk about in it, to sin and die, attack and murder and destroy themselves, are WHOLLY unreal? Could you have FAITH in what you see, if you ACCEPTED this? AND WOULD YOU SEE IT? Hallucinations disappear when they are RECOGNIZED for what they are. This IS the healing and the remedy. Believe them not, and they ARE gone. And all YOU need to do is recognize YOU DID THIS. Once you ACCEPT this simple fact, and take unto YOURSELF the power you GAVE them, YOU are released from them.

One thing is sure; hallucinations serve a purpose, and when that PURPOSE is no longer held, THEY disappear. Therefore, the question never is whether you want THEM, but ALWAYS do you want the purpose that they serve? This world SEEMS to hold out many purposes, each different, and with different values. Yet they are all the same. Again, there is no order, but a SEEMING hierarchy of values. Only two purposes are possible. And one is sin; the other holiness. Nothing is in between, and which you choose determines what you see. For what you see is merely HOW you elect to meet your goal.

Hallucinations serve to meet the goal of madness. They are the means by which the OUTSIDE world, projected from within, ADJUSTS to sin, and SEEMS to witness to its reality. It still is true that nothing IS without. Yet, upon nothing, are ALL projections made. For it is the PROJECTION which gives the "nothing" ALL the meaning that it holds. What has NO meaning, cannot BE perceived. And meaning ALWAYS looks within, to find itself. And THEN looks out. ALL meaning that you give the world outside, must thus reflect the sight you saw WITHIN. Or better, IF you saw at all, or merely judged AGAINST.

Vision is the means by which the Holy Spirit translates your nightmares into happy dreams; your wild hallucinations, that show you all fearful outcomes of imagined sin, into the calm and reassuring sights with which He would replace them. These gentle sights and sounds are looked on happily, and heard with joy. They are HIS substitutes for all the terrifying sights and screaming sounds the ego's purpose brought to your horrified awareness. They step AWAY from sin, reminding you that it is NOT reality that frightens you, and that the errors which you made CAN be corrected.

When you have looked on what seemed terrifying, and SEEN it change to sights of loveliness and peace; when you have looked on scenes of violence and death, and WATCHED them change to quiet views of gardens under open skies, with clear life-giving water running happily beside them in dancing brooks that never waste away; who need PERSUADE you to accept the gift of vision? And AFTER vision, who is there who COULD refuse what MUST come after? Think but an instant just on this. YOU can behold the holiness God gave His Son. And NEVER need you think that there IS something else for you to see.

Section 8 - Review of Principles

What relevance has preference to the truth? Illusions are illusions, and are false. Your preference gives them NO reality. Not one is true in ANY way, and all must yield with equal ease to what God gave as Answer to them all. God's Will is One. And ANY wish that SEEMS to go AGAINST His Will has NO foundation in the truth. Sin is not error, for it goes BEYOND correction to impossibility. Yet the belief that it is real has made some errors seem forever PAST the hope of healing, and the lasting grounds for hell. If this were so, would Heaven be opposed by its own opposite, as real as it.

Forgiveness is the only function here, and serves to bring the joy this world denies to every aspect of God's Son where sin was thought to rule. Perhaps you do not see the role forgiveness plays in ending death, and ALL beliefs that rise from mists of guilt. Sins are beliefs which you impose between your brother and yourself. They limit you to time and place, and give a little space to you; ANOTHER little space to him. This separating off is symbolized, in your perception, by a body which is clearly separate and a thing apart. Yet what this symbol REPRESENTS is but your wish to BE apart and separate.

Forgiveness TAKES AWAY what stands between your brother and yourself. It is the wish that you be JOINED with him, and NOT alone. We call it "wish" because it still conceives of other choices, and has not yet reached beyond the world of choice entirely. Yet is this wish in line with Heaven's state, and not in OPPOSITION to God's Will. Although it falls far short of giving you your full inheritance, it DOES remove the obstacles which YOU have placed between the Heaven where you are, and RECOGNITION of where and what you are. Facts are unchanged. But facts can be denied and thus unknown, though they were known BEFORE they were denied.

Salvation, perfect and complete, asks but a LITTLE wish that what is true be true. A LITTLE willingness to overlook what is not there. A LITTLE sigh that speaks for Heaven as a preference to this world which death and desolation seem to rule. In joyous answer will creation rise within you, to REPLACE the world you see with Heaven, wholly perfect and complete. What is forgiveness, but a willingness that truth be true? What can remain unhealed and broken from a Unity Which holds all things within Itself? There is NO sin. And EVERY miracle is possible the INSTANT that the Son of God perceives his wishes and the Will of God are One.

What is the Will of God? He wills His Son have everything. And this He guaranteed when He created him AS everything. It is impossible that anything be lost, if what you HAVE is what you ARE. This is the miracle by which creation became YOUR function, sharing it with God. It is not understood APART from Him, and therefore has no meaning in this world. Here does the Son of God ask NOT too much, but FAR too little. He would sacrifice his own identity WITH everything, to find a LITTLE treasure of his own. And this he cannot do, without a sense of isolation, loss, and loneliness. This IS the treasure he has sought to find. And he COULD only be afraid of it.

Is fear a treasure? Can uncertainty be what you WANT? Or is it a mistake about your will, and what you REALLY are? Let us consider what the error IS, so it can be corrected, NOT protected. Sin is belief attack can be projected OUTSIDE the mind where the belief arose. Here is the firm conviction that ideas CAN leave their source made real and meaningful. And FROM this error does the world of sin and sacrifice arise. This world is an attempt to prove your innocence, while cherishing attack. Its failure lies in that you STILL FEEL guilty, though without understanding WHY. Effects are SEPARATED from their source. They SEEM to be BEYOND you to control or to prevent.

What has been KEPT apart can never join. Cause and effect are one, NOT separate. God wills you learn what always has been true. That he created you as part of Him, and this must still be true BECAUSE ideas leave not their source. Such is creation's law; that each idea the mind conceives but ADDS to its abundance, NEVER takes away. This is as true of what is idly wished as what is truly willed, because the mind can wish to be deceived, but CANNOT make it be what it is not. And to believe ideas can leave their source is to invite illusions to be true, WITHOUT SUCCESS. Nor never will success BE possible in trying to deceive the Son of God.

The miracle is possible when cause and consequence are brought together, NOT kept separate. The healing of effect WITHOUT the cause can merely shift effects to other forms. And this is NOT release. God's Son could never be content with LESS than full salvation, and ESCAPE from guilt. For otherwise he still demands that he must make SOME sacrifice, and thus denies that EVERYTHING is his, unlimited by loss of any kind. A tiny sacrifice is just the same in its EFFECTS as is the WHOLE idea of sacrifice. If loss in ANY form is possible, then is God's Son made incomplete and not himself. Nor will he know himself, nor recognize his will. He has foresworn his Father AND himself, and made them both his enemy in hate.

Illusions serve the purpose they were MADE to serve. And FROM their purpose, they derive whatever meaning that they seem to have. God gave to ALL illusions that were made ANOTHER purpose that would justify a miracle, WHATEVER form they took. In every miracle ALL healing lies, for God gave Answer to them all as one. And what is one to Him must BE the same. If you believe what is the same is different, you but deceive yourself. What God calls one will be forever one, NOT separate. His Kingdom IS united; thus it was created, and thus will it ever be. The miracle but calls your ancient name, which you WILL recognize because the truth is in your memory. And to this name your brother calls for his release and yours. Heaven is shining on the Son of God. Deny him not, that YOU may be released.

Each instant is the Son of God reborn, until he chooses NOT to die again. In every wish to hurt he chooses death, instead of what his Father wills for him. Yet every instant offers life to him, because his Father wills that he should live. In crucifixion is redemption laid, for healing is not needed where there is no pain or suffering. Forgiveness is the ANSWER to attack of any kind. So is attack DEPRIVED of its effects, and hate is answered in the Name of Love. To you to whom it has been given to save the Son of God from crucifixion and from hell and death, all glory be forever. For you HAVE power to save the Son of God, because his Father willed that it be so. And in your hand does ALL salvation lie, to be both offered and received as one.

To use the power God has given you as He would have it used is natural. It is NOT arrogant to be as He created you, or to make use of what He gave to answer ALL His Son's mistakes, and set him free. But it IS arrogant to LAY ASIDE the power that He gave, and choose a little, senseless wish instead of what He wills. The gift of God to you is limitless. There is NO circumstance it cannot answer, and NO problem which is not resolved within its gracious light. Abide in peace, where God would have you be. And be the means whereby your brother finds the peace in which YOUR wishes are fulfilled. Let us unite in bringing blessing to the world of sin and death. For what can save each one of us, can save us all. There is no difference among the Sons of God.

The Unity that specialness denies will save them all, for what is One can HAVE no specialness. And EVERYTHING belongs to each of them. No wishes lie between a brother and his own. To get from one is to deprive them all. And yet to bless but one gives blessing to them all as one. Your ancient name belongs to everyone, as theirs to you. Call on your brother's name, and God will answer, for on Him you call. Could He refuse to answer, when He has ALREADY answered all who call on Him? A miracle can make no change at all. But it CAN make what always has been true be RECOGNIZED by those who know it not. And by this little gift of truth but let to be itself; the Son of God allowed to be himself, and all creation freed to call upon the Name of God as one.

Section 4 - The Fundamental Law of Perception

To the extent to which you value guilt, to that extent will you perceive a world in which attack is justified. To the extent to which you recognize that guilt is meaningless, to that extent will you perceive attack cannot BE justified. This is in strict accord with vision's FUNDAMENTAL law: You see what you believe is there, and you believe it there because you WANT it there. Perception HAS no other law than this. The rest but stem from this, to hold it up and offer it support. This is perception's form, adapted to this world, of God's more basic law; that Love creates Itself, and nothing BUT Itself.

Perception rests on choosing; knowledge does not. Knowledge has but one law BECAUSE it has but One Creator. But this world has two who made it, and they do NOT see it as the same. To each it has a DIFFERENT purpose, and to each it is a perfect means to serve the goal for which it is perceived. For specialness it is the perfect frame to set it off; the perfect battleground to wage its wars, the perfect shelter for the illusions which it would make real. Not one but it upholds in its perception; not one but can be fully justified.

In His perception of the world, nothing is seen but justifies forgiveness and the sight of perfect sinlessness. Nothing arises but is met with instant and complete forgiveness. Nothing remains an instant, to obscure the sinlessness that shines unchanged, beyond the pitiful attempts of specialness to put it out of mind, where it MUST be, and light the BODY up INSTEAD of it. The lamps of Heaven are NOT for it to choose to see them where it will. If it elects to see them elsewhere from their home, as if they lit a place where they could never be, AND YOU AGREE, then must the Maker of the world correct your error, lest you still remain in darkness, where the lamps are NOT.

Everyone here has entered darkness, yet no-one has entered it alone. Nor need he stay more than an instant. For he has come with Heaven's help within him, ready to lead him OUT of darkness into light at ANY time. The time he chooses can be ANY time, for help is there, awaiting but his choice. And when he chooses to AVAIL himself of what is given him, then will he see each situation that he thought before was means to justify his anger, turned to an event which justifies his love.

He will hear plainly that the calls to war he heard before are really calls to peace. He will perceive that where he gave attack is but another altar where he can, with equal ease and FAR more happiness, bestow forgiveness. And he will re-interpret ALL temptation as just another chance to bring him joy. How CAN a misperception be a sin? Let ALL your brother's errors be to you nothing except a chance for YOU to see the workings of the Helper given YOU to see the world HE made, instead of yours.

What, then, is justified? WHAT DO YOU WANT? For these two questions ARE the same, and, when you see them AS the same, your choice is made. For it is SEEING them as one that brings release from the belief there are two ways to see. This world has much to offer to your peace, and many chances to extend your own forgiveness. Such its PURPOSE is, to those who WANT to see peace and forgiveness descend on THEM, and offer THEM the light. The Maker of the world of gentleness has perfect power to offset the world of violence and hate that SEEMS to stand BETWEEN you and His gentleness. It is not there in His forgiving eyes. And THEREFORE it need not be there in yours.

Sin is the fixed belief perception CANNOT change. What has been damned IS damned, and damned forever, BEING FOREVER UNFORGIVABLE. If, then, it IS forgiven, sin's perception MUST have been wrong. And thus is change made possible. The Holy Spirit, too, sees what HE sees as far beyond the chance of change. But on His Vision sin can NOT encroach. For sin HAS BEEN corrected by His sight. And thus IT MUST HAVE BEEN AN ERROR, NOT a sin. For what it claimed could never be, HAS BEEN. Sin is ATTACKED by punishment, and so PRESERVED. But to FORGIVE it is to change its state from error into truth.

The Son of God could NEVER sin, but he CAN wish for what would hurt him. And he HAS the power to think he CAN BE hurt. What could this be EXCEPT a misperception of himself? Is this a sin or a mistake; forgivable or not? Does he need help or condemnation? Is it YOUR purpose that he be saved or damned? Forgetting not that what he is to YOU will make this choice YOUR future. For you MAKE IT NOW, the instant when ALL time becomes a means to reach a goal. Make, then, your choice, but recognize that, in this choice, the purpose of the world you see is chosen, and WILL be justified.

Section 9 - The Defense of Conflict

We once said that without projection there can be no anger, but it is also true that without projection there can be no love. Projection is a fundamental law of the mind, and therefore one which ALWAYS operates. It is the law by which you create and were created. It is the law which unifies the Kingdom and keeps it in the mind of God. To the ego, the law is perceived as a way of getting RID of something it does NOT want. To the Holy Spirit, it is the fundamental law of sharing, by which you give what you value in order to keep it in your OWN minds.

Projection to the Holy Spirit is the law of extension. To the ego, it is the law of deprivation. It therefore produces abundance or scarcity, depending on how you choose to apply it. This choice IS up to you, but it is NOT up to you to decide whether or not you will UTILIZE projection. Every mind MUST project, because that is how it lives, and every mind IS life. The ego's use of projection must be fully understood before the INEVITABLE association between projection and anger can be finally UNmade.

Strictly speaking, conflict cannot BE projected, precisely BECAUSE it cannot be fully shared. Any attempt to keep PART of it and get rid of ANOTHER part does not really mean ANYTHING. Remember that a conflicted teacher is a poor teacher AND A POOR LEARNER. His lessons are confused, and their transfer value severely limited BY his confusion.

A second fallacy is the idea that you can GET RID of something you do not want BY giving it away. GIVING it is how you KEEP it. The belief that by giving it OUT you have excluded it from WITHIN is a complete distortion of the power of EXTENSION.

That is why those who project from the ego are vigilant for their OWN safety. THEY ARE AFRAID THAT THEIR PROJECTIONS WILL RETURN AND HURT THEM. They DO believe they have blotted them out of their OWN minds, but they also believe they are trying to creep back INTO them. This is because their projections have NOT left their minds, and this, in turn, forces them to engage in compulsive activity in order NOT to recognize this.

DO NOT BE AFRAID OF THE EGO. It DOES depend on your mind, and as you made it by believing in it, so you can dispel it by withdrawing belief FROM it. Do NOT project the responsibility for your belief in it onto ANYONE else, or you will PRESERVE the belief. When you are willing to accept sole responsibility for the ego's existence YOURSELF, you will have laid aside all anger and all attack, because they COME from an attempt to PROJECT RESPONSIBILITY FOR YOUR OWN ERRORS. But having ACCEPTED the error as yours, DO NOT KEEP THEM. Give them over quickly to the Holy Spirit to be undone completely, so that ALL their effects will vanish from your minds and from the Sonship AS A WHOLE. He will teach you to perceive BEYOND belief, because truth IS beyond belief and His perception IS true.

The ego can be completely forgotten at ANY time, because it was always a belief that is totally incredible. No-one can KEEP a belief he has judged to be unbelievable. The more you learn ABOUT the ego, the more you realize that it cannot BE believed. The incredible cannot BE understood because it IS unbelievable. The utter meaninglessness of ALL perception which comes from the unbelievable MUST be apparent, but it is NOT beyond belief because it was made BY belief.

The whole purpose of this course is to teach you that the ego is unbelievable and will forever BE unbelievable. You who made the ego by BELIEVING the unbelievable CANNOT make this judgment alone. By accepting the Atonement for YOURSELF, you are deciding AGAINST the belief that you can BE alone, thus dispelling the idea of separation and affirming your true identification with the whole Kingdom as literally PART OF YOU. This identification is as beyond doubt as it is beyond belief. Your wholeness HAS no limits, because its being is in Infinity.

Section 5 - The Only Answer

Remember that the Holy Spirit is the ANSWER, not the question. The ego always speaks first, because it is capricious and does NOT mean its maker well. This is because it believes, and correctly, that its maker may withdraw his support from it at any moment. If it meant you well, it would be glad, as the Holy Spirit will be glad when He has brought you home and you no longer need His guidance. The ego does NOT regard itself as part of you. Herein lies its primary perceptual error, the foundation of its whole thought system.

When God created you, He made you part of Him. That is why attack WITHIN the Kingdom is impossible. But YOU made the ego without love, and so it does not love YOU. You could not remain WITHIN the Kingdom without love, and since the Kingdom IS love, you believe you are WITHOUT it. This enables the ego to regard itself as SEPARATE AND OUTSIDE ITS MAKER, thus speaking for the part of your mind that believes YOU are separate and outside the Mind of God.

The ego, then, raised the first question that was ever asked, but it can never answer it. That question, which was "What are you?" was the beginning of doubt. The ego has never answered ANY questions since, though it has raised a great many. The most inventive activities of the ego have never done more than OBSCURE THE QUESTION, because you HAVE the answer, and THE EGO IS AFRAID OF YOU. You cannot really understand conflict until YOU fully understand one basic fact that the ego does not know. The Holy Spirit does not speak first, but He ALWAYS answers. EVERYONE has called upon Him for help at one time or another, and in one way or another, AND HAS BEEN ANSWERED. Since the Holy Spirit answers truly, He answers FOR ALL TIME, and that means that EVERYONE HAS THE ANSWER NOW.

The ego cannot hear the Holy Spirit, but it DOES feel that part of the same mind that made it is AGAINST it. It interprets this wholly as a justification for ATTACKING its maker. The ego believes that the best defense is attack, and WANTS YOU TO BELIEVE THIS. Unless you DO believe it, you will not side with it. And the ego feels badly in need of allies, though not of brothers.

Perceiving something alien to itself in your MIND, the ego turns to the body, NOT the mind as its ally BECAUSE the body is not part of you. This makes the body the ego's friend. But it is an alliance frankly based on separation. If you side with this alliance, you WILL be afraid, because you are siding with an alliance OF fear. The ego and the body conspire AGAINST your minds, and because they realize that their "enemy" CAN end them both merely by knowing they are not part of him, they join in the attack together. This is perhaps the strangest perception of all, if you consider what it really involves. The ego, which is not real, attempts to persuade the mind, which IS real, that it IS its own learning device, and that the learning device is more real than IT is. No-one in his right mind could POSSIBLY believe this, and no-one in his right mind DOES believe it.

Hear, then, the one answer of the Holy Spirit to ALL the questions which the ego raises. You are a Child of God, a priceless part of His Kingdom, which He created as part of Him. Nothing else exists, and ONLY this is real. You have chosen a sleep in which you have had bad dreams, but the sleep is not real, and God calls you to awake. There will be nothing left of your dream when you hear Him, because you WILL be awake. Your dreams have contained many of the ego's symbols, and they have confused you. But that was only because you were asleep and DID NOT KNOW.

When you awake, you will see the Truth around you and in you, and you will no longer believe in dreams, because they will have no reality for you. But the Kingdom and all that you have created there will have great reality for you, because they are beautiful and true. In the Kingdom, where you are and what you are is perfectly certain. There is no doubt there, because the first question was never asked. Having finally been wholly answered, IT HAS NEVER BEEN. BEING alone lives in the Kingdom, where everything lives in God without question. The time that was spent on questioning in the dream has given way to the Creation and to its Eternity.

YOU are as certain as God, because you are as true as He is. But what was once quite certain in your minds has become only the ABILITY for certainty. The introduction of abilities into being was the beginning of UNcertainty, because abilities are POTENTIALS, not accomplishments. Your abilities are totally useless in the presence of God's accomplishments and also of yours. Accomplishments are RESULTS which HAVE BEEN achieved. When they are perfect, abilities are meaningless.

It is curious that the perfect must now be perfected. In fact, it is impossible. But you must remember that when you put yourselves in an impossible situation, you believed that the impossible WAS possible.

Abilities must be DEVELOPED, or you cannot use them. This is not true of anything that God created, but it is the kindest solution possible to what YOU have made. In an impossible situation, you can develop your abilities to the point where they CAN GET YOU OUT OF IT. You have a guide to how to develop them, but you have no commander EXCEPT YOURSELF. This leaves YOU in charge of the Kingdom, with both a guide to FIND it and a MEANS to keep it. You have a model to follow who will strengthen YOUR command, and never detract from it in any way. You therefore retain the central place in your perceived enslavement, a fact which ITSELF demonstrates that you are NOT enslaved.

You are in an impossible situation only because you thought it was possible to be in one. You WOULD be in an impossible situation if God showed you your perfection, and PROVED to you that you were wrong. This would demonstrate that the perfect were inadequate to bring THEMSELVES to the awareness of their perfection, and thus side with the belief that those who have everything need help, and are therefore helpless.

What would be gained if God proved to you that you have thought insanely? Can God lose His own certainty? We have frequently stated that what you teach you ARE. Would you have God teach you that you have sinned? If He confronted the self you have made with the Truth He created FOR you, what could you be but afraid? You would doubt your sanity, which is the one thing in which you can FIND the sanity He gave you. God does not teach. To teach is to imply a lack which God KNOWS is not there. God is not conflicted. Teaching aims at change, but God created ONLY the changeless.

The separation was not a loss of perfection, but a failure in COMMUNICATION. A harsh and strident form of communication arose as the ego's voice. It could not shatter the peace of God, but it COULD shatter YOURS. God did not blot it out, because to eradicate it would be to attack it. Being questioned, He did not question. He merely gave the Answer.

God's answer IS your teacher.

Section 7 - The Special Function

The grace of God rests gently on forgiving eyes, and everything they look on speaks of Him to the beholder. He can see no evil; nothing in the world to fear, and no-one who is different from himself. And, as he loves them, so he looks upon HIMSELF with love and gentleness. He would no more condemn himself for HIS mistakes than damn another. He is not an arbiter of vengeance, nor a punisher of sin. The kindness of his sight rests on himself with all the tenderness it offers others. For he would ONLY heal and ONLY bless. And, being IN ACCORD with what God wills, he HAS the power to heal and bless all those he looks on with the grace of God upon his sight.

Eyes become used to darkness, and the light of brilliant day seems painful to the eyes grown long accustomed to the dim effects perceived at twilight. And they turn away from sunlight, and the clarity it brings to what they look upon. Dimness seems better; easier to see, and better recognized. Somehow, the vague and more obscure seems EASIER to look upon; LESS painful to the eyes than what is wholly clear and unambiguous. Yet this is NOT what eyes are FOR. And who can say that he PREFERS the darkness, and maintain he WANTS to see?

The WISH to see calls down the grace of God upon your eyes, and brings the gift of light that makes sight possible. Will you behold your brother? God is glad to have you look on him. He does not will your Savior be unrecognized by you. Nor does He will that he remain without the function that He gave to him. Let him no more be lonely, for the lonely ones are those who see no function in the world for them to fill; no place where they are needed, and no aim which ONLY they can perfectly fulfill.

Forgiveness is the ONLY function meaningful in time. It is the means the Holy Spirit uses to TRANSLATE specialness from sin into salvation. Forgiveness is for all. But, when it RESTS on all, it is complete, and every function of this world completed with it. Then is time no more. But WHILE in time, there is still much to do. And each must do what is allotted him, for, on HIS part, does ALL the plan depend. He HAS a special part in time, for so he chose, and choosing it, made it for himself. His wish was not denied, but changed in form, to let it serve his brother AND himself, and thus become a means to save INSTEAD of lose.

The Holy Spirit needs YOUR special function, that HIS may be fulfilled. Think not you lack a special value here. You wanted it, and it IS given you. ALL that you made can serve salvation easily and well. The Son of God can make NO choice the Holy Spirit can not employ on his BEHALF, and NOT against himself. Only in darkness does your specialness APPEAR to be attack. In light, you see it is your SPECIAL FUNCTION in the plan to save the Son of God from ALL attack, and let him understand that he is safe, as he has ALWAYS been, and will remain in time and in eternity alike. This is the function given each of you for one another. Take it gently, then, from one another's hand, and let salvation be perfectly fulfilled in BOTH of you. Do this ONE thing, that EVERYTHING be given you.

Lesson 127 "There is no love but God's."

Perhaps you think that different kinds of love are possible. Perhaps you think there is a kind of love for this, a kind for that; a way of loving one, another way of loving still another. Love is one. It has no separate parts and no degrees; no kinds nor levels, no divergences and no distinctions. It is like itself, unchanged throughout. It never alters with a person or a circumstance. It is the heart of God and also of His Son.

Love's meaning is obscure to anyone who thinks that love can change. He does not see that changing love must be impossible. And thus he thinks that he can love at times and hate at other times. He also thinks that love can be bestowed on one and yet remain itself although it is withheld from others. To believe these things of love is not to understand it. If it could make such distinctions it would have to judge between the righteous and the sinner, and perceive the Son of God in separate parts.

Love cannot judge. As it is one itself, it looks on all as one. Its meaning lies in oneness. And it must elude the mind that thinks of it as partial or in part. There is no love but God's, and all of love is His. There is no principle which rules where love is not. Love is a law without an opposite. Its wholeness is the power holding everything as one, the link between the Father and the Son which holds them both forever as the same.

No course whose purpose is to teach you what you really are could fail to emphasize there is no difference in what you are and what love is. Love's meaning is your own, and shared by God Himself. For what you are is what He is. There is no love but His, and what He is is everything there is. There is no limit placed upon Himself, and so are you unlimited as well.

Let us together, then, be glad to give some time to God today, and understand there is no better use for time than this. For fifteen minutes twice today escape from every law in which you now believe. Open your mind and rest. The world which seems to hold you prisoner can be escaped by anyone who does not hold it dear. Withdraw all value you have placed upon its meagre offerings and senseless gifts, and let the Gift of God replace them all.

Call to your Father, certain that His Voice will answer. He Himself has promised this. And He Himself will place a spark of truth within your mind wherever you give up a false belief, a dark illusion of your own reality and what love means. He will shine through your idle thoughts today, and help you understand the truth of love. In loving gentleness He will abide with you, as you allow His Voice to teach love's meaning to your clean and open mind. And He will bless the lesson with His Love.

Today the legion of the future years of waiting for salvation disappears before the timelessness of what you learn. Let us give thanks today that we are spared a future like the past. Today we leave the past behind us, never more to be remembered. And we raise our eyes upon a different present, where a future shines unlike the past in every attribute.

The world in infancy is newly born. And we will watch it grow in strength and health to shed its blessing upon all who come to learn to cast aside the world they thought was made in hate to be love's enemy. Now are they all made free along with us. Now are they all our brothers in God's Love.

We will remember them throughout the day because we cannot leave a part of us outside our love, if we would know our Self. At least three times an hour think of one who makes the journey with you, and who came to learn what you must learn. And as he comes to mind, give him this message from your Self:

"I bless you, brother, with the Love of God

Which I would share with you. For I would learn

The joyous lesson that there is no love

But God's and yours and mine and everyone's."

Question 12 - What is the Ego?

The ego is idolatry; the sign of limited and separated self, born in a body, doomed to suffer and to end its life in death. It is the will that sees the Will of God as enemy, and takes a form in which It is denied. The ego is the "proof" that strength is weak and love is fearful, life is really death, and what opposes God alone is true.

The ego is insane. In fear it stands beyond the Everywhere, apart from All, in separation from the Infinite. In its insanity it thinks it has become a victor over God Himself, and in its terrible autonomy it "sees" the Will of God has been destroyed. It dreams of punishment, and trembles at the figures in its dreams, its enemies who seek to murder it before it can ensure its safety by attacking them.

The Son of God is egoless. What can he know of madness and the death of God, when he abides in Him? What can he know of sorrow and of suffering, when he lives in eternal joy? What can he know of fear and punishment, of sin and guilt, of hatred and attack, when all there is surrounding him is everlasting peace, forever conflict-free and undisturbed, in deepest silence and tranquility?

Yet will one lily of forgiveness change the darkness into light; the altar to illusions to the shrine of Life Itself. And peace will be restored forever to the holy minds which God created as His Son, His dwelling-place, His joy, His love, completely His, completely one with Him.

Chapter 8 - The Journey Back

Section 1 - Introduction

You are hampered in your progress by your demands to know what you do not know. This is actually a way of hanging on to deprivation. You cannot reasonably object to following instructions in a course FOR knowing, on the grounds that you do not know. The need for the course is implicit in your objection. Knowledge is not the motivation for learning this course. PEACE is. As the PREREQUISITE for knowledge, peace MUST be learned. This is ONLY because those who are in conflict are not peaceful, and peace is the CONDITION of knowledge because it is the condition of the Kingdom.

The distraction of the ego SEEMS to interfere with your learning, but it HAS no power to distract unless you GIVE it the power. The ego's voice is an hallucination. You cannot expect the EGO to say "I am not real." Hallucinations ARE inaccurate perceptions of reality. But you are NOT asked to dispel them alone. You are merely asked to evaluate them in terms of their results TO YOU. If you DO NOT WANT THEM on the basis of LOSS OF PEACE, they will be removed from your mind FOR you. Every response to the ego is a call to war, and war DOES deprive you of peace.

Yet in this war THERE IS NO OPPONENT. THIS is the re-interpretation of reality which you must make to secure peace, and the ONLY one you need ever make.

Section 6 - The Healing Example

The ONLY way to heal is to be healed. The miracle extends WITHOUT your help. But you ARE needed that it can BEGIN. ACCEPT the miracle of healing, and it WILL go forth, because of what it IS. It is its NATURE to extend itself the instant it is born. And it is born the instant it is offered and RECEIVED. No-one can ask ANOTHER to be healed. But he can let HIMSELF be healed, and thus offer the other what he has received. Who can bestow upon another what he does not HAVE? And who can SHARE what he denies HIMSELF? The Holy Spirit speaks to YOU. He does not speak to someone ELSE. Yet BY your listening, His Voice extends, BECAUSE you have accepted what He says.

Health is the witness unto health. As long as it is unattested, it remains without conviction. Only when DEMONSTRATED has it BEEN proved, and MUST compel belief. No-one is healed through double messages. If you wish ONLY to be healed, you heal. Your single PURPOSE makes this possible. But if you are AFRAID of healing, then it cannot come through you. The ONLY thing that is required for a healing is a lack of fear. The fearful are NOT healed, and cannot heal. This does NOT mean the conflict must be gone forever from your mind. For if it were, there were no NEED for healing any more. But it DOES mean, if only for an instant, you love without attack. An instant is sufficient. Miracles wait not on time.

The holy instant is the miracle's abiding-place. From there, each one is born into this world, as witness to a state of mind which has TRANSCENDED conflict, and has reached to peace. It carries comfort from the place of peace into the battleground, and DEMONSTRATES that war has no effects. For all the hurt that war has sought to bring; the broken bodies and the shattered limbs, the screaming dying and the silent dead, are gently lifted up and comforted. There IS no sadness, where a miracle has come to heal. And nothing more than just ONE instant of your love WITHOUT attack is necessary, that all this occur.

In that ONE instant are YOU healed, and in that single instant is ALL healing done. What stands APART from you, when you accept the blessing that the holy instant brings? Be not afraid of blessing for the One Who blesses you loves all the world, and leaves nothing within the world that COULD be feared. But if you SHRINK from blessing, will the world indeed seem fearful, for you have WITHHELD its peace and comfort, leaving it to die. Would not a world so bitterly bereft be looked on as a condemnation by the one who COULD have saved it, but stepped back, because he was AFRAID of being healed? The eyes of all the dying bring reproach, and suffering whispers, "What is there to fear?"

Consider well its question. It is asked of you on YOUR behalf. A dying world asks only that you rest an instant from attack upon YOURSELF, that it be healed. Come to the holy instant and be healed, for nothing that is there received is left behind, on your returning to the world. And BEING blessed, you will bring blessing. Life is given you, to give the dying world. And suffering eyes no longer will accuse, but shine in thanks to you who blessing gave. The holy instant's radiance will light YOUR eyes, and give them sight to see beyond ALL suffering, and see Christ's Face INSTEAD. Healing REPLACES suffering. Who looks on one cannot PERCEIVE the other, for they CANNOT both be there. And what YOU see the world will witness, and will witness TO.

Thus is YOUR healing everything the world requires, that it may be healed. It needs ONE lesson that has perfectly been learned. And then, when YOU forget it, will the world remind you gently of what you have taught. No reinforcement will its thanks withhold from you who let yourselves be healed, that it might live. It will call forth its witnesses to show the Face of Christ to you who brought the sight to THEM, by which THEY witnessed it. The world of accusation is replaced by one in which all eyes look lovingly upon the friend who brought them their release. And happily your brother will perceive the many friends he thought were enemies.

Problems are not specific, but they take specific forms, and these specific shapes make up the world. And no-one understands the nature of his problem. If he DID, it would be there no more for him to see. Its very NATURE is that it is NOT. And thus, WHILE he perceives it, he can NOT perceive it as it is. But HEALING is apparent in specific instances, and generalizes to include them all. This is because they really ARE the same, DESPITE their different forms. All learning aims at transfer, which becomes complete within two situations which are seen as one. For ONLY common elements are there. But this can only be attained by One Who does not see the DIFFERENCES you see.

Peace be to you whom is healing offered. And you will learn that peace is given you, when you accept the healing for yourself. Its TOTAL value need not be appraised by YOU, to let you understand that you have benefited from it. What occurred within the instant which love entered in WITHOUT attack, will stay with you forever. YOUR healing will be ONE of its effects, as will your brother's. Everywhere you go, will you behold its multiplied effects. Yet all the witnesses that you behold will be FAR less than all there really ARE. Infinity cannot be understood by merely counting up the separate parts. God thanks you for your healing, for He knows it is a gift of love unto His Son, and therefore is it given unto Him.

Lesson 57 Today let us review these ideas: (31-35)

31) "I am not the victim of the world I see."

How can I be the victim of a world which can be completely undone if I so choose? My chains are loosened. I can drop them off merely by desiring to do so. The prison door is open. I can leave it simply by walking out. Nothing holds me in this world. Only my wish to stay keeps me a prisoner. I would give up insane wishes, and walk into the sunlight at last.

32) "I have invented the world I see."

I made up the prison in which I see myself. All I need do is recognize this, and I am free. I have deluded myself into believing it is possible to imprison the Son of God. I was bitterly mistaken in this belief, which I no longer want. The Son of God must be forever free. He is as God created him, and not what I would make of him. He is where God would have him be, and not where I thought to hold him prisoner.

33) "There is another way of looking at the world."

Since the purpose of the world is not the one I ascribed to it, there must be another way of looking at it. I see everything upside-down, and my thoughts are the opposite of truth. I see the world as a prison for God's Son. It must be, then, that the world is really a place where he can be set free. I would look upon the world as it is, and see it as a place where the Son of God finds his freedom.

35) "My mind is part of God's. I am very holy."

As I share the peace of the world with my brothers, I begin to understand that this peace comes from deep within myself. The world I look upon has taken on the light of my forgiveness, and shines forgiveness back at me. In this light, I begin to see what my illusions about myself had kept hidden. I begin to understand the holiness of all living things including myself, and their oneness with me.

Lesson 49 "God's Voice speaks to me all through the day."

The part that is listening to the Voice of God is calm, always at rest and wholly certain. It is really the only part there is. The other part is a wild illusion, frantic and distraught, but without reality of any kind. Try today not to listen to it. Try to identify with the part of your mind where stillness and peace reign forever. Try to hear God's Voice call to you lovingly, reminding you that your Creator has not forgotten His Son.

We will need at least four five-minute practice periods today, and more if possible. We will try actually to hear the Voice reminding you of God and of your Self. We will approach this happiest and holiest of thoughts with confidence, knowing that in doing so we are joining our will with the Will of God. He wants you to hear His Voice. He gave It to you to be heard.

Listen in deep silence. Be very still and open your mind. Go past all the raucous shrieks and sick imaginings that cover your real thoughts and obscure your eternal link with God. Sink deep into the peace that waits for you beyond the frantic, riotous thoughts and sounds and sights of this insane world. You do not live there. We are trying to reach your real home. We are trying to reach the place where you are truly welcome. We are trying to reach God.

Do not forget to repeat today's idea very frequently. Do so with your eyes open when necessary, but closed when possible. And be sure that you sit quietly and repeat the idea for today slowly whenever you can, closing your eyes on the world, and realizing that you are inviting God's Voice to speak to you.

Lesson 136 "Sickness is a defense against the truth."

No one can heal unless he understands what purpose sickness seems to serve. For then he understands as well its purpose has no meaning. Being causeless and without a meaningful intent of any kind, it cannot be at all. When this is seen, healing is automatic. It dispels this meaningless illusion by the same approach which carries all of them to truth, and merely leaves them there to disappear.

Sickness is not an accident. Like all defenses, it is an insane device for self deception. And like all the rest its purpose is to hide reality, attack it, change it, render it inept, distort it, twist it, or reduce it to a little pile of unassembled parts. The aim of all defenses is to keep the truth from being whole. The parts are seen as if each one were whole within itself.

Defenses are not unintentional, nor are they made without awareness. They are secret magic wands you wave when truth appears to threaten what you would believe. They seem to be unconscious but because of the rapidity with which you choose to use them. In that second, even less, in which the choice is made, you recognize exactly what you would attempt to do, and then proceed to think that it is done.

Who but yourself evaluates a threat, decides escape is necessary, and sets up a series of defenses to reduce the threat that has been judged as real? All this cannot be done unconsciously. But afterwards your plan requires that you must forget you made it, so it seems to be external to your own intent; a happening beyond your state of mind, an outcome with a real effect on you, instead of one effected by your self.

It is this quick forgetting of the part you play in making your "reality" which makes defenses seem to be beyond your own control. But what you have forgot can be remembered, given willingness to reconsider the decision which is doubly shielded by oblivion. Your not remembering is but the sign that this decision still remains in force, as far as your desires are concerned. Mistake this not for fact. Defenses must make facts unrecognizable. They aim at doing this, and this they seem to do.

Every defense takes fragments of the whole, assembles them without regard to all their true relationships, and thus constructs illusions of a whole which is not there. It is this process which imposes threat, and not whatever outcome may result. When parts are wrested from the whole and seen as separate and as wholes within themselves, they become symbols standing for attack upon the whole, successful in effect, and never to be seen as whole again. And yet you have forgotten that they stand but for your own decision of what should be real, to take the place of what is real.

Sickness is a decision. It is not a thing that happens to you quite unsought, which makes you weak and brings you suffering. It is a choice you make, a plan you lay when, for an instant, truth arises in your own deluded mind, and all your world appears to totter and prepare to fall. Now are you sick, that truth may go away, and threaten your establishments no more. How do you think that sickness can succeed in shielding you from truth? Because it proves the body is not separate from you, and so you must be separate from the truth.

You suffer pain because the body does, and in this pain are you made one with it. Thus is your "true" identity preserved, and the strange, haunting thought that you might be something beyond this little pile of dust silenced and stilled. For see, this dust can make you suffer, twist your limbs and stop your heart, commanding you to die and cease to be.

Thus is the body stronger than the truth, which asks you live but cannot overcome your choice to die. And so the body is more powerful than Everlasting Life, Heaven more frail than hell, and God's design for the salvation of His Son opposed by a decision stronger than His Will. His Son is dust, the Father incomplete, and chaos sits in triumph on His throne.

Such is the simple truth. It does not make appeal to might nor triumph. It does not command obedience, nor seek to prove how pitiful and futile your attempts to plan defenses which would alter it. It merely wants to give you happiness, for such its purpose is. Perhaps it sighs a little when you throw away its gifts, and yet it knows with perfect certainty that what God wills for you must be received.

It is this fact which demonstrates that time is an illusion. For it lets you think what God has given you is not the truth right now, as it must be. The Thoughts of God are quite apart from time. For time is but another meaningless defense you made against the truth. Yet what God wills is here, and you remain as He created you.

Truth has a power far beyond defense, for no illusions can remain where it has been allowed to enter. And it comes to any mind that would lay down its arms and cease to play with folly. It is found at any time; today, if you will choose to practice giving welcome to the truth.

This is our aim today. And we will give a quarter of an hour twice to ask the truth to come to us and set us free. And truth will come, for it has never been apart from us. It merely waits for just this invitation which we give today. We introduce it with a healing prayer to help us rise above defensiveness, and let the truth be as it has always been:

"Sickness is a defense against the truth.

I will accept the truth of what I am,

And let my mind be wholly healed today."

Healing will flash across your open mind as peace and truth arise to take the place of war and vain imaginings. There will be no dark corners sickness can conceal and keep defended from the light of truth. There will be no dim figures from your dreams, nor their obscure and meaningless pursuits with double purposes insanely sought, remaining in your mind. It will be healed of all the sickly wishes that it tried to authorize the body to obey.

Now is the body healed because the source of sickness has been opened to relief. And you will recognize you practiced well by this; the body should not feel at all. If you have been successful, there will be no sense of feeling ill or feeling well, of pain or pleasure. No response at all is in the mind to what the body does. Its usefulness remains, and nothing more.

Yet this protection needs to be preserved by careful watching. If you let your mind harbor attack thoughts, yield to judgment or make plans against uncertainties to come, you have again misplaced yourself, and made a bodily identity which will attack the body, for the mind is sick. Give instant remedy, should this occur, by not allowing your defensiveness to hurt you longer. Do not be confused about what must be healed, but tell yourself:

"I have forgotten what I really am,

For I mistook my body for myself.

Sickness is a defense against the truth,

But I am not a body. And my mind

Cannot attack. So I can not be sick."

Section 4 - The Unhealed Healer

The ego's plan for forgiveness is far more widely used than God's. This is because it is undertaken by unhealed healers, and IS therefore of the ego. Let us consider the unhealed healer more carefully now. By definition, he is trying to GIVE what he has NOT received. If he is a theologian, he may begin with the premise, "I am a miserable sinner, and so are you." If he is a psychotherapist, he is more likely to start with the equally incredible idea that HE really believes in attack, and so does the patient, but it does not matter in EITHER case.

We have repeatedly stated that beliefs of the ego CANNOT be shared, and THIS IS WHY THEY ARE NOT REAL. How, then, can UNCOVERING them MAKE them real? Every healer who searches fantasies for truth MUST be unhealed, because he DOES NOT KNOW WHERE TO LOOK FOR TRUTH, and therefore does not have the answer to the problem of healing. There IS an advantage to bringing nightmares into awareness, but ONLY to teach that they are NOT real, and that ANYTHING they contain is meaningless. The unhealed healer cannot DO this, because he does not BELIEVE it.

All unhealed healers follow the ego's plan for forgiveness, in one form or another. If they are theologians, they are likely to condemn THEMSELVES, TEACH condemnation, and advocate a very fearful solution. Projecting condemnation onto God, they make Him retaliative, and FEAR HIS RETRIBUTION. What they have done is merely to IDENTIFY with the ego, and by perceiving clearly what IT does, condemn THEMSELVES because of this profound confusion.

It is understandable that there has been a revolt against this concept, but to revolt AGAINST it, is still to BELIEVE in it. The FORM of the revolt, then, is different, but NOT the content. The new form of the ego's plan is as unhelpful as the older one, because form does not matter to the Holy Spirit, and therefore DOES NOT MATTER AT ALL. According to the newer forms of the plan, the therapist interprets the ego's symbols IN the nightmare, and uses them to PROVE THE NIGHTMARE IS REAL. Having MADE it real, he then attempts to dispel its EFFECTS by DEPRECIATING THE IMPORTANCE OF THE DREAMER.

This WOULD be a healing approach, IF THE DREAMER were properly identified AS UNREAL. But if the dreamer is equated WITH the mind, the mind's corrective power, through the Holy Spirit, is DENIED. It is noteworthy that this is a contradiction even in the ego's own terms, and one which it usually DOES note, even in its confusion. If the way to counteract fear is to reduce the importance of the FEARER, how can this build up ego STRENGTH? These perfectly self-evident inconsistencies account for why, except for certain stylized verbal accounts, NOBODY can EXPLAIN what happens in psychotherapy. Nothing real DOES.

Nothing REAL has happened to the unhealed healer, and HE LEARNS FROM HIS OWN TEACHING. BECAUSE his ego is involved, it ALWAYS attempts to gain some support from the situation. Seeking to GET something for HIMSELF, the healer does NOT know how to give, and consequently CANNOT SHARE. He CANNOT correct, because he is not working CORRECTIVELY. He believes that it is up to him to teach the patient what is REAL, but he does not know it HIMSELF.

What, then, SHOULD happen? When God said: "Let there be Light," there WAS light. Can you find light by ANALYZING darkness as the psychotherapist does, or like the theologian, by ACKNOWLEDGING it in yourself, and looking for a distant light to remove it, while emphasizing the distance?

Healing is NOT mysterious. Nothing occurs UNLESS you understand it, since light IS understanding. A "miserable sinner" cannot be healed without magic, nor can an "unimportant mind" esteem itself without magic. Both forms of the ego's approach, then, MUST arrive at an impasse, the characteristic "impossible situation" to which the ego ALWAYS leads.

It CAN be helpful to point out to a patient WHERE HE IS HEADING, but the point is LOST unless he can change his direction. The therapist cannot do this for him, but he also CANNOT DO THIS FOR HIMSELF. His only MEANINGFUL contribution is to present an example of one whose direction has been changed FOR him, and who NO LONGER BELIEVES IN NIGHTMARES OF ANY KIND. The light in HIS mind will therefore ANSWER the questioner, who MUST decide with God that there IS light BECAUSE HE SEES IT. And by HIS acknowledgment, THE THERAPIST KNOWS IT IS THERE.

That is how perception ultimately is translated into knowledge. The miracle-worker begins by PERCEIVING light, and translates HIS perception into sureness by continually extending it, and ACCEPTING ITS ACKNOWLEDGMENT. Its EFFECTS assure him IT IS THERE. The therapist does not heal; he LETS HEALING BE. HE can point to darkness, but he CANNOT bring light OF HIMSELF, for light is NOT of him. But being FOR him, it MUST be for his patient.

The Holy Spirit is the ONLY therapist. He makes healing PERFECTLY clear in ANY situation in which He is the guide. The human therapist can only LET HIM FULFILL HIS FUNCTION. He needs no help for this. He WILL tell you EXACTLY what to do, to help ANYONE He sends to you FOR help, and will speak to him through you, IF YOU DO NOT INTERFERE. Remember that you ARE choosing a guide for helping, and the wrong choice will NOT help. But remember also that THE RIGHT ONE WILL. Trust Him, for help is His function, and He is of God.

By following the right Guide, you will learn the simplest of all lessons: "By their fruits ye shall know them, and THEY shall know THEMSELVES."

Section 2 - Principles of Miracles

Miracle Principle 1

The first thing to remember about miracles is that there is no order of difficulty among them. One is not harder or bigger than another. They are all the same.

Miracle Principle 2

Miracles do not matter. They are quite unimportant.

Miracle Principle 3

They occur naturally as an expression of love. The real miracle is the love that inspires them. In this sense, everything that comes from love is a miracle.

This explains the first point related to the lack of order. ALL expressions of love are maximal.

This is why the "thing in itself" does not matter. The only thing that matters is the Source, and this is far beyond human evaluation.

(Q and A re: first 3 points.) Q (Helen Schucman) Would you regard this communication as a kind of miracle? A. There is nothing special or surprising about this at all. The ONE thing that happened was the Universal Miracle which was the experience of intense love that you have felt. (Don't get embarrassed by the idea of love. Embarrassment is only a form of fear, and actually a particularly dangerous form because it reflects egocentricity.

Do not feel guilty about the fact that you are doubting this. Just re-read them and their truth will come to you. I love you, and I am not afraid or embarrassed or doubtful. MY strength will support you, so don't worry and leave the rest to me. But when you see Bill, be SURE you tell him how much he helped you through by giving you the right message, and don't bother with worrying about how you received it. That doesn't matter either. You were just afraid.)

(Helen Schucman fearful in taxi about a communication which related Dave's healing and Jonathan's hernia. She thought it would be safer to dissociate the two. Instructions were: refer to point 1 and re-read NOW.)

Miracle Principle 4

ALL miracles mean Life, and God is the giver of Life. He will direct you VERY specifically.

(Plan ahead is good advice in this world, where you should and must control and direct where you have accepted responsibility. But the Universal Plan is in more appropriate hands. You will know all you need to know. Make NO attempts to plan ahead in this respect.)

Miracle Principle 5

Miracles are habits, and should be involuntary. They should not be under conscious control. Consciously selected miracles are usually misguided, and this will make the talent useless.

Miracle Principle 6

Miracles are natural. When they do NOT occur something has gone wrong.

Miracle Principle 7

Miracles are everyone's right, but purification is necessary first.

Miracle Principle 8

Miracles are a form of healing. They supply a lack, and are performed by those who have more for those who have less.

Miracle Principle 9

Miracle Principle 10

A miracle is a reversal of the physical order because it brings more love to the giver AND the receiver. (A miracle is misunderstood when it is regarded as a spectacle.)

Section 10 - The Acceptance of Reality

Fear of the Will of God is one of the strangest beliefs that the human mind has ever made. This could not possibly have occurred unless the mind was already profoundly split, making it possible for IT to be afraid of what it really is. It is apparent that reality CANNOT "threaten" anything except illusions, because reality can only UPHOLD truth. The very fact that the will of God, which IS what you are, is perceived as fearful TO you demonstrates that you ARE afraid of what you are. It is not, then, the will of God of which you are afraid, but YOURS. Your will is NOT the ego's, and that is why the ego is against you. What seems to be the fear of God is really only the fear of YOUR OWN REALITY.

It is impossible to learn anything consistently in a state of panic. If the purpose of this course is to learn what you are, and if you have ALREADY DECIDED that what you are is FEARFUL, then it MUST follow that you will NOT LEARN THIS COURSE. But you might remember that the reason FOR the course is that you do NOT know who you are. If you do not know your reality, how would you know whether it is fearful or not? The association of truth and fear, which would be highly artificial at best, is particularly inappropriate in the minds of those who do not know what truth IS. All that this kind of association means is that you are arbitrarily endowing something quite beyond your awareness with something YOU DO NOT WANT.

It is evident, then, that you are judging something of which you are totally unaware. You have set this strange situation up so that it is COMPLETELY IMPOSSIBLE to escape from it WITHOUT a guide who DOES know what your reality is. The purpose of this Guide is merely to remind you of what YOU want. He is not attempting to force an alien will UPON you. He is merely making every possible effort, within the limits YOU impose upon Him, to RE-ESTABLISH your OWN will in your consciousness. You have IMPRISONED it in your UNconscious, where it remains available, but cannot help you. When we said that the Holy Spirit's function is to sort out the true from the false in your unconscious, we meant that He has the power to look into what YOU have hidden, and perceive the Will of God there.

His perception of this will can make it real to YOU, because HE is in your mind, and therefore He IS your reality. If, then, His perception OF your mind brings its reality TO you, He IS teaching you what you are. The only source of fear in this whole process can ONLY be WHAT YOU THINK YOU LOSE. But it is only what the Holy Spirit sees that you can possibly HAVE. We have emphasized many times that the Holy Spirit will never call upon you to sacrifice anything. But if you ask the sacrifice of reality OF YOURSELVES, the Holy Spirit MUST remind you that this is not God's will BECAUSE it is not yours.

There is NO DIFFERENCE between your will and God's. If you did not have divided wills, you would recognize that willing is salvation because it IS communication. It is impossible to communicate in alien tongues. You and your Creator can communicate through creation, because that, and only that, IS your joint will. Divided wills do not communicate because they speak for different things TO THE SAME MIND. This loses the ability to communicate, simply because confused communication DOES NOT MEAN ANYTHING. A message cannot be said to be communicated UNLESS it makes sense.

How sensible can your messages be, when they ask for WHAT YOU DON'T WANT? Yet as long as you are afraid of your will, this is precisely what you WILL ask for. You may insist that the Holy Spirit does not answer you, but it might be wiser to consider the kind of asker you are. YOU DO NOT ASK ONLY FOR WHAT YOU WANT. This is SOLELY because you are afraid you might receive it, AND YOU WOULD. THIS is really why you persist in asking the teacher who could not possibly teach you your will. Of him, you can never learn it, and this gives you the illusion of safety. But you cannot be safe FROM truth, but only IN it. Reality is the ONLY safety.

Your will is your salvation BECAUSE IT IS THE SAME AS GOD's. The separation is nothing more than the belief that it is DIFFERENT. NO mind can believe that its will is STRONGER than God's. If, then, a mind believes that ITS will is different FROM His, it can only decide either that there IS no God, or that GOD'S WILL IS FEARFUL. The former accounts for the atheist, and the latter for the martyr. Martyrdom takes many forms, the category including ALL doctrines which hold that God demands sacrifices of ANY kind.

Either basic type of insane decision will induce panic, because the atheist believes he is alone and the martyr believes that God is crucifying him. Both really fear both abandonment AND retaliation, but the former is more reactive against abandonment and the latter against retaliation. The atheist maintains that God has left him, but he does not care. He will, however, become very fearful, and hence very ANGRY, if anyone suggests that God has NOT left him. The martyr, on the other hand, is more aware of guilt, and believing that punishment is inevitable, attempts to teach himself to LIKE it.

The truth is, very simply, that NO-ONE WANTS EITHER ABANDONMENT OR RETALIATION. Many people SEEK both, but it is still true that they do NOT want it. Can you ask the Holy Spirit for "gifts" such as these, and actually expect to RECEIVE them? The Holy Spirit is totally incapable of giving YOU anything that does NOT come from God. His task is NOT to make anything FOR you. He CANNOT make you want something you DON'T want. When you ask the Universal Giver for what you do not want, YOU are asking for what CANNOT be given, BECAUSE IT WAS NEVER CREATED. It was never created because it was never your will for YOU.

Ultimately everyone must learn the will of God, because ultimately everyone must recognize HIMSELF. This recognition IS the recognition that HIS WILL AND GOD'S ARE ONE. In the presence of Truth, there are no unbelievers and no sacrifices. In the security of Reality fear is totally meaningless. To deny what IS can only SEEM to be fearful. Fear cannot be real without a cause, and GOD is the only Cause. God is Love, and you DO want Him. This IS your will. Ask for THIS and you WILL be answered, because you will be asking only for what BELONGS to you.

When you ask the Holy Spirit for what would hurt you, He CANNOT answer, because NOTHING can hurt you and SO YOU ARE ASKING FOR NOTHING. ANY desire which stems from the ego IS a desire for nothing, and to ask for it IS NOT A REQUEST. It is merely a denial in the FORM of a request. The Holy Spirit is not concerned with form at all, being aware only of MEANING. The ego cannot ask the Holy Spirit for ANYTHING, because there is COMPLETE COMMUNICATION FAILURE between them. But YOU can ask for EVERYTHING of the Holy Spirit, because YOUR requests are real, being of your will. Would the Holy Spirit deny the Will of God? And could He fail to recognize it in God's Sons?

The energy which you withdraw from Creation you expend on fear. This is not because your ENERGY is limited, but because YOU HAVE LIMITED IT. You do not recognize the ENORMOUS waste of energy which you expend in denying truth. What would YOU say of someone who PERSISTED in attempting the impossible, and believed that to ACHIEVE it is SUCCESS? The belief that you MUST HAVE THE IMPOSSIBLE in order to be happy is totally at variance with the principle of Creation. God COULD not will that happiness DEPENDED on what you could never have.

Attempts of any kind to deny what IS are fearful, and if they are strong they WILL induce panic. WILLING AGAINST reality, though impossible, can be MADE into a very persistent goal, EVEN THOUGH YOU DO NOT WANT IT. But consider the result of this strange decision. You are DEVOTING your mind to what you DO NOT WANT. How real can this devotion be? If you do not want it, it was never created. If it was never created, it is nothing. Can you REALLY devote yourself to nothing?

God, in His devotion to YOU, created you devoted to EVERYTHING, and GAVE you what you are devoted TO. Otherwise, you would not have been created perfect. Reality IS everything, and you therefore have everything BECAUSE you are real. You cannot make the UNreal because the ABSENCE of reality is fearful, and fear cannot BE created. As long as you believe that fear is possible, YOU WILL NOT CREATE. Opposing orders of reality MAKE REALITY MEANINGLESS, and reality is MEANING.

Remember, then, that God's Will is ALREADY possible, and nothing else will EVER be. This is the simple acceptance of Reality because only this is real. You cannot DISTORT reality and KNOW WHAT IT IS. And if you DO distort reality you will experience anxiety, depression, and ultimately panic, because you are trying to MAKE YOURSELF UNREAL. When you feel these things do not try to look BEYOND yourself for truth, for truth can only be WITHIN you. Say, therefore, :

"Christ is in me, and where He is God MUST be, for Christ is PART of Him."

Lesson 133 "I will not value what is valueless."

Sometimes in teaching there is benefit, particularly after you have gone through what seems theoretical and quite remote from what the student has already learned, to bring him back to practical concerns. This we will do today. We will not speak of lofty, world-encompassing ideas, but dwell instead on benefits to you.

You do not ask too much of life, but far too little. When you let your mind be drawn to bodily concerns, to things you buy, to eminence as valued by the world, you ask for sorrow, not for happiness. This course does not attempt to take from you the little that you have. It does not try to substitute utopian ideas for satisfactions which the world contains. There are no satisfactions in the world.

We have already stressed there are but two, however many there appear to be. The range is set, and this we cannot change. It would be most ungenerous to you to let alternatives be limitless, and thus delay your final choice until you had considered all of them in time, and not been brought so clearly to the place where there is but one choice which must be made.

Another kindly and related law is that there is no compromise in what your choice must bring. It cannot give you just a little, for there is no in between. Each choice you make brings everything to you or nothing. Therefore, if you learn the tests by which you can distinguish everything from nothing, you will make the better choice.

First, if you choose a thing that will not last forever, what you chose is valueless. A temporary value is without all value. Time can never take away a value that is real. What fades and dies was never there, and makes no offering to him who chooses it. He is deceived by nothing in a form he thinks he likes.

Next, if you choose to take a thing away from someone else, you will have nothing left. This is because when you deny his right to everything, you have denied your own. You therefore will not recognize the things you really have, denying they are there. Who seeks to take away has been deceived by the belief that loss can offer gain. Yet loss must offer loss and nothing more.

Your next consideration is the one on which the others rest. Why is the choice you make of value to you? What attracts your mind to it? What purpose does it serve? Here it is easiest of all to be deceived, for what the ego wants it fails to recognize. It does not even tell the truth as it perceives it, for it needs to keep the halo which it uses to protect its goals from tarnish and from rust, that you may see how "innocent" it is.

Yet is its camouflage a thin veneer which could deceive but those who are content to be deceived. Its goals are obvious to anyone who cares to look for them. Here is deception doubled, for the one who is deceived will not perceive that he has merely failed to gain. He will believe that he has served the ego's hidden goals.

And though he tries to keep its halo clear within his vision, yet must he perceive its tarnished edges and its rusted core. His ineffectual mistakes appear as sins to him because he looks upon the tarnish as his own, the rust a sign of deep unworthiness within himself. He who would still preserve the ego's goals and serve them as his own makes no mistakes according to the dictates of his guide. This guidance teaches it is error to believe that sins are but mistakes, for who would suffer for his sins if this were so?

And so we come to the criterion for choice which is the hardest to believe, because its obviousness is overlaid with many levels of obscurity. If you feel any guilt about your choice, you have allowed the ego's goals to come between the real alternatives, and thus you do not realize there are but two. And the alternative you think you chose seems fearful and too dangerous to be the nothingness it actually is.

All things are valuable or valueless, worthy or not of being sought at all, entirely desirable or not worth the slightest effort to obtain. Choosing is easy just because of this. Complexity is nothing but a screen of smoke which hides the very simple fact that no decision can be difficult. What is the gain to you in learning this? It is far more than merely letting you make choices easily and without pain.

Heaven Itself is reached by empty hands and open minds, which come with nothing to find everything and claim it as their own. We will attempt to reach this state today, with self-deception laid aside, and with an honest willingness to value but the truly valuable and the real.

Our two extended practice periods of fifteen minutes will begin with this:

"I will not value what is valueless,

And only what has value do I seek,

For only that do I desire to find."

And then receive what waits for everyone who reaches, unencumbered, to the gate of Heaven, which swings open as he comes. Should you begin to let yourself collect some needless burdens, or believe you see some difficult decisions facing you, be quick to answer with this simple thought:

"I will not value what is valueless,

For what is valuable belongs to me."

Lesson 53 Today we will review the following: (11-15)

11) "My meaningless thoughts are showing me a meaningless world."

Since the thoughts of which I am aware do not mean anything, the world which pictures them can have no meaning. What is producing this world is insane, and so is what it produces. Reality is not insane, and I have real thoughts as well as insane ones. I can therefore see a real world, if I look to my real thoughts as my guide for seeing.

13) "A meaningless world engenders fear."

The totally insane engenders fear because it is completely undependable, and offers no grounds for trust. Nothing in madness is dependable. It holds out no safety and no hope. But such a world is not real. I have given it the illusion of reality, and have suffered from my belief in it. Now I choose to withdraw this belief, and place my trust in reality. In choosing this, I will escape all the effects of the world of fear because I am acknowledging that it does not exist.

14) "God did not create a meaningless world."

How can a meaningless world exist if God did not create it? He is the Source of all meaning, and everything that is real is in His Mind. It is in my mind too, because He created it with me. Why should I continue to suffer from the effects of my own insane thoughts, when the perfection of creation is my home? Let me remember the power of my decision, and recognize where I really abide.

15) "My thoughts are images which I have made."

Whatever I see reflects my thoughts. It is my thoughts which tell me where I am and what I am. The fact that I see a world in which there is suffering and loss and death shows me that I am seeing only the representation of my insane thoughts, and am not allowing my real thoughts to cast their beneficent light on what I see. Yet God's way is sure. The images I have made can not prevail against Him because it is not my will that they do so. My will is His, and I will place no other gods before Him.

Lesson 38 "There is nothing my holiness cannot do."

Your holiness, then, can remove all pain, can end all sorrow, and can solve all problems. It can do so in connection with yourself and with anyone else. It is equal in its power to help anyone, because it is equal in its power to save anyone. If you are holy, so is everything God created. You are holy because all things He created are holy, and all things He created are holy because you are.

In today's exercises, we will apply the power of your holiness to all problems, difficulties, or suffering in any form that you happen to think of in yourself or someone else. We will make no distinctions because there are no distinctions.

In the four longer practice periods, each preferably to last a full five minutes, repeat the idea for today, close your eyes, and then search your mind for any sense of loss or unhappiness of any kind, as you see it. Try to make as little distinction as possible between a situation that is difficult for you and one that is difficult for someone else. Identify the situation specifically, and also name the person concerned. Use this form in applying the idea for today:

"In the situation involving ____ in which I see myself, there is nothing that my holiness cannot do."

"In the situation involving ____ in which ____ sees himself, there is nothing my holiness cannot do."

From time to time you may want to vary this procedure, and add some relevant thoughts of your own. You might like, for example, to include thoughts such as:

"There is nothing my holiness cannot do because the power of God lies in it."

Introduce whatever variations appeal to you, but keep the exercises focused on the theme

"There is nothing your holiness cannot do."

The purpose of today's exercises is to begin to instill in you a sense that you have dominion over all things because of what you are.

In the frequent shorter applications, apply the idea in its original form unless a specific problem concerning you or someone else arises, or comes to mind. In that event, use the more specific form of application.

Chapter 19 - How is Correction Made?

Correction of a lasting nature, - and only this is true correction, - cannot be made until the teacher of God has ceased to confuse interpretation with fact, or illusion with truth. If he argues with his pupil about a magic thought, attacks it, tries to establish its error or demonstrate its falsity, he is but witnessing to its reality. Depression is then inevitable, for he has "proved" both to his pupil and himself that it is their task to escape from what is real. And this can only be impossible. Reality is changeless. Magic thoughts are but illusions. Otherwise salvation would be only the same age old impossible dream in but another form. Yet the dream of salvation has new content. It is not the form alone in which the difference lies.

God's teachers' major lesson is to learn how to react to magic thoughts wholly without anger. Only in this way can they proclaim the truth about themselves. Through them, the Holy Spirit can now speak of the reality of the Son of God. Now He can remind the world of sinlessness, the one unchanged, unchangeable condition of all that God created. Now He can speak the Word of God to listening ears, and bring Christ's vision to eyes that see. Now is He free to teach all minds the truth of what they are, so they will gladly be returned to Him. And now is guilt forgiven, overlooked completely in His sight and in God's Word.

In order to heal, it thus becomes essential for the teacher of God to let all his own mistakes be corrected. If he senses even the faintest hint of irritation in himself as he responds to anyone, let him instantly realize that he has made an interpretation which is not true. Then let him turn within to his Eternal Guide, and let Him Judge what the response should be. So is he healed, and in his healing is his pupil healed with him. The sole responsibility of God's teacher is to accept the Atonement for himself. Atonement means correction, or the undoing of errors. When this has been accomplished, the teacher of God becomes a miracle worker by definition. His sins have been forgiven him, and he no longer condemns himself. How can he then condemn anyone? And who is there whom his forgiveness can fail to heal?"

Section 2 - Right Teaching and Right Learning

We have spoken of many different human symptoms, and at this level there IS almost endless variation. But there is only one cause for all of them. The authority problem IS "the root of all evil." Money is but one of its many reflections, and is a reasonably representative example of the kind of thinking which stems from it. The idea of buying and selling implies precisely the kind of exchange that the Souls cannot understand at all, because their own Supply is always abundant, and all their demands are fully met.

Every symptom which the ego has made involves a contradiction in terms. This is because the mind is split between the ego and the Soul, so that WHATEVER the ego makes is incomplete and contradictory. Consider what a "speechless professor" means as a concept. It literally means a "non-professing professor," or a "nonspeaking speaker."

Untenable positions such as this are the result of the authority problem, which, because it accepts the one inconceivable thought as its premise, can only produce ideas which are inconceivable. Bill may claim (and has certainly done so in the past) that the PROFESSORSHIP was thrust upon him. This is not true. He wanted it very much, and also worked hard to get it. He would not have had to work so hard either, if he had not misunderstood it.

The term "profess" is used quite frequently in the Bible, but in a somewhat different context. To profess is to identify with an idea and offer the idea to others to be THEIR own. The idea does NOT lessen; it becomes STRONGER. The teacher clarifies his own ideas and strengthens them BY teaching them.

Teacher and pupil, therapist and patient, are all alike in the learning process. They are in the SAME order of learning, and unless they SHARE their lessons they will lack conviction. If a salesman must believe in the product he sells, how much more must a teacher believe in the ideas which he professes. But he needs another condition; he must also believe in the students to whom he offers his ideas.

Bill could not be afraid to teach unless he still believes that interaction means loss, and that learning means separation. He stands guard over his own ideas, because he wants to protect his thought-system as it is, and learning MEANS change. Change is always fearful to the separated, because they cannot conceive of it as a change toward HEALING the separation. They ALWAYS perceive it as a change for further separation, because separation WAS their first experience of change.

Bill, your whole fear of teaching is nothing but an example of your own intense separation anxiety, which you have handled with the usual series of mixed defenses in the combined pattern of attack on truth and defense of error, which characterizes ALL ego-thinking.

You insist that if you allow no change to enter into your EGO, your SOUL will find peace. This profound confusion is possible only if one maintains that the SAME thought-system can stand on two foundations.

NOTHING can reach the Soul from the ego, and nothing FROM the Soul can strengthen the ego, or reduce the conflict within it. The ego IS a contradiction. Man's self and God's Self ARE in opposition. They are opposed in creation, in will, and in outcome. They are fundamentally irreconcilable because the Soul cannot perceive, and the ego cannot know. They are therefore NOT IN COMMUNICATION, and can never BE in communication.

Nevertheless the ego can learn, because its maker can be misguided, but CANNOT make the totally lifeless out of the life-given. The Soul need not be taught, but the ego MUST. The ultimate reason why learning or teaching is perceived as frightening is because true learning DOES lead to the relinquishment (NOT destruction) of the ego to the light of the Soul. This is the change the ego MUST fear, because it does not share my charity.

My lesson was like yours, and because I learned it I can teach it. I never attack your egos (in spite of H's strange beliefs to the contrary), but I DO try to teach them how their thought-systems have arisen. When I remind you of your TRUE Creation, your egos cannot BUT respond with fear.

Bill, teaching and learning are your greatest strengths now, because you MUST change your mind and help others change theirs. It is pointless to refuse to tolerate change or changing because you believe that you can demonstrate by doing so that the Separation never occurred. The dreamer who doubts the reality of his dream while he is still dreaming it is not really healing the level-split.

You HAVE dreamed of a separated ego, and you HAVE believed in a world which rested upon it. This is very real to you. You cannot undo this by doing nothing and not changing.

If you are willing to renounce the role of guardians of your thought-systems and open them to me, I will correct them very gently, and lead you home. Every good teacher hopes to give his students so much of his own thinking that they will one day no longer need him. This is the one real goal of the parent, teacher, and therapist. This goal will not be achieved by those who believe that they will LOSE their child or pupil or patient if they succeed.

The ego cannot make this choice because of the nature of its origin. But YOU can, because of the nature of YOURS. Egos can clash in any situation, but Souls cannot clash at all. If you perceive a teacher as merely a "larger ego," you WILL be afraid, because to ENLARGE an ego IS to increase separation anxiety. Do not engage in this foolishness, Bill. I will teach with you and live with you, if you will think with me.

But my goal will always be to absolve you finally from the need for a teacher. This is the OPPOSITE of the ego-oriented teacher's goal. He is concerned with the effect of HIS ego on OTHER egos, and he therefore interprets their interaction as a means of ego preservation. This is no less true if he is afraid to teach than if he is frankly out to dominate through teaching. The form of the symptom is only a reflection of his particular way of handling the separation anxiety.

ALL separation anxiety is a symptom of a continuing will to remain separated. This cannot be repeated too often because you have NOT learned it. Bill, you are afraid to teach ONLY because you are afraid of the impression your image of yourself will make ON OTHER IMAGES. You believe that their APPROVAL of your image will exalt it, but also that your separation anxiety will be increased. You also believe that their DISAPPROVAL of it will lessen the separation anxiety, but at the cost of depression.

I would not be able to devote myself to teaching if I believed either of these ideas, and YOU will not be a devoted teacher yourself as long as you maintain them. I am constantly being perceived as a teacher either to be exalted or rejected, but I do not accept either perception for myself.

Your own worth is NOT established by your teaching. Your worth was established by God. As long as you dispute this, EVERYTHING you do will be fearful, and particularly any situation which lends itself easily to the superior-inferior fallacy. Teachers must be patient, and repeat their lessons until they are learned. I am willing to do so, because I have no right to set your learning limits for you.

Once again, - NOTHING you do, or think, or will, or make is necessary to establish your worth. This point IS NOT DEBATABLE except in delusions. Your ego is NEVER at stake because God did not create it. Your Soul is never at stake because He DID. Any confusion on this point IS a delusion, and no form of devotion is possible as long as this delusion lasts.

Bill, if you will to be a devoted teacher rather than an egocentric one, you will not be afraid. The teaching situation IS fearful if it is misused as an ego involvement. If you become afraid, it is BECAUSE you are using it this way. But the devoted teacher perceives the situation AS IT IS, and NOT as HE wills it. He does not see it as dangerous because HE is not exploiting it.

The ego tries to exploit ALL situations into forms of praise for itself in order to overcome its doubts. It will be doubtful forever, or better, as long as you believe in it. You who made it CANNOT trust it, because you KNOW it is not real. The ONLY sane solution is not to try to change reality, which is indeed a fearful attempt, but to see it as it is. YOU are part of reality, which stands unchanged beyond the reach of your ego, but within easy reach of your Soul.

Bill, again I tell you that when you are afraid, be still and KNOW that God is real and YOU are His beloved son in whom he is well pleased. Do not let your ego dispute this, because the ego cannot know what is as far beyond its reach as you are. God is NOT the author of fear. YOU are. You have willed, therefore, to create unlike Him, and you have made fear for yourselves.

You are not at peace, because you are not fulfilling your function. God gave you a very lofty responsibility which you are not meeting. You KNOW this, and you are afraid. But your egos have chosen to be afraid INSTEAD of meeting it. When you awaken you will not be able to understand this, because it is literally incredible.

DO NOT BELIEVE THE INCREDIBLE NOW. Any attempt to increase its believableness is merely to postpone the inevitable. The word "inevitable" is fearful to the ego, but joyous to the Soul. God IS inevitable and you CANNOT avoid Him any more than He can avoid YOU.

The ego is afraid of the Soul's joy, because once you have experienced this, you will withdraw all protection from your ego and become totally without investment in fear. Your investment is great now, because fear is a witness to the Separation, and your ego rejoices when you witness to it.

Leave it behind. Do not listen to it, and do not preserve it. Listen only to God, who is as incapable of deception as are the Souls he created. As teachers and therapists, release yourselves and release others. Do not present a false and unworthy picture of yourselves TO others, or accept such a picture OF them yourselves.

The ego has built a shabby and unsheltering home for you, because it cannot build otherwise. Do not try to make this impoverished house stand. ITS weakness IS your strength. Only God could make a home that was worthy of His Creations, who have chosen to leave it empty by their own dispossession.

His Home will stand forever, and is ready for you when you choose to enter. Of this you can be wholly certain. God is as incapable of creating the perishable as your ego is of making the eternal.

Of your egos you can do nothing to save yourselves or others. But of your Souls you can do everything for the salvation of both. Humility is a lesson for the ego, not for the Soul. The Soul is beyond humility, because it recognizes its radiance, and gladly sheds its light everywhere.

The meek shall inherit the earth because their egos are humble, and this gives them better perception. The Kingdom of Heaven is the right of the Soul, whose beauty and dignity are beyond doubt, beyond perception, and stand forever as the mark of the love of God for His Creations, who are wholly worthy of Him and ONLY of Him. Nothing else is sufficiently worthy to be a gift for a creation of God Himself.

I will substitute for your ego if you will, but NEVER for your Soul. A father can safely leave a child with an elder brother who has shown himself responsible, but this involves no confusion about the child's origin. The brother can protect the child's body and his ego, which are very closely associated, but he does not confuse HIMSELF with the father because he does this, although the child may.

The reason why I can be entrusted with YOUR body and YOUR egos is simply because this enables YOU not to be concerned with them, and ME to teach you their unimportance. I could not understand their importance to YOU if I had not once been tempted to believe them myself. Let us undertake to learn this lesson together, so we can also be free of them together.

I need devoted teachers as much as I need devoted priestesses. They both heal the mind, and that is always my own aim. The Soul is far beyond the need of your protection OR mine.

The Biblical quotation should read "In this world you need NOT have tribulation BECAUSE I have overcome the world." THAT is why you should "be of good cheer."

B's course was very carefully chosen, because "abnormal psychology" IS ego psychology. This is precisely the kind of content which should never be taught FROM the ego whose abnormality should be lessened by teaching, not increased. You, Bill, are particularly well suited to perceive this difference, and can therefore teach this course as it should be taught. Most teachers have an unfortunate tendency to teach the COURSE abnormally, and many of the students are apt to suffer considerable perceptual distortion because of their own authority problem.

Your teaching assignment (and I assure you it IS an assignment) will be to present perceptual distortions without either engaging in them yourself, or encouraging your students to do so. This interpretation of your role and theirs is too charitable to induce fear. If you adhere to this role, you will both engender and experience hope, and you will inspire rather than dispirit the future teachers and therapists I am entrusting to you.

I promise to attend myself, and you should at least credit with me with some dependability in keeping my own promises. I never make them lightly, because I know the need my brothers have for trust.

Section 10 - The Forgiving Dream

The slave of idols is a WILLING slave. For willing he MUST be, to let himself bow down in worship to what has no life, and seek for power in the powerless. What happened to the holy Son of God, that this could BE his wish; to let himself fall lower than the stones upon the ground, and look to idols that they raise him up? Hear, then, your story in the dream you made, and ask yourself if it be not the truth that you believe that it is NOT a dream. A dream of judgment came into the mind that God created perfect as Himself. And in that dream was Heaven changed to hell, and God made enemy unto His Son.

How can His Son AWAKEN from the dream? It is a dream of judgment. So must he judge NOT, and he WILL waken. For the dream will seem to last while he is PART of it. Judge not, for he who judges WILL have need of idols, which will hold the judgment off from resting on himself. Nor CAN he know the Self he has condemned. Judge not, because you make yourself a PART of evil dreams, where idols are your "true" identity, and your salvation from the judgment laid, in terror and in guilt, upon yourself. All figures in the dream are idols, made to save you FROM the dream. Yet they are PART of what they have been made to save you FROM.

Thus does an idol KEEP the dream alive and terrible. For who would wish for one UNLESS he were in terror and despair? And this the idol REPRESENTS, and so its worship IS the worship of despair and terror, and the dream from which they come. Judgment is an INjustice to God's Son, and it IS justice that who judges HIM will not escape the penalty he laid upon HIMSELF within the dream he made. God knows of justice; NOT of penalty. But in the dream of judgment, you attack and ARE condemned. And WISH to be the slave of idols, who are interposed BETWEEN your judgment and the penalty it brings.

There CAN be no salvation in the dream, as YOU are dreaming it. For idols MUST be part of it, to save you from what you believe you have accomplished, and have done to make you sinful, and put out the Light within you. Little children, It is there. You do but dream, and idols are the toys you dream you play with. Who has need of toys but children? They pretend they rule the world, and give their toys the power to move about, and talk and think and feel, and speak for them. Yet everything their toys appear to do is in the minds of those who play with them. But they are eager to forget that they made up the dream in which their toys are real, and recognize their wishes are their own.

Nightmares are childish dreams. Their toys have turned against the child who thought he made them real. Yet CAN a dream attack? Or CAN a toy grow large and dangerous and fierce and wild? This does the child believe BECAUSE he fears his thoughts, and gives them to his toys instead. And their reality becomes his own, because they seem to SAVE him from his thoughts. Yet do they KEEP his thoughts alive and real, but seen OUTSIDE himself, where they can turn against him for his treachery to them. He thinks he NEEDS them that he may escape his thoughts, because he thinks the THOUGHTS are real. And so he makes of ANYTHING a toy, to make his world remain outside himself, and play that HE is but a part of it.

The real world still is but a dream. Except the figures have been changed. They are not seen as idols which betray. It is a dream in which no-one is used to substitute for something else, or interposed between the thoughts the mind conceives and what it sees. No-one is used for something he is not, for childish things have all been put away. And what was once a dream of judgment now has changed into a dream where all is joy, because that is the PURPOSE that it has. Only forgiving dreams can enter here, for time is almost over. And the forms which enter in the dreams are now perceived as brothers, not in judgment, but in love.

Forgiving dreams have little need to last. They are not made to separate the mind from what it thinks. They do not seek to prove the dream is being dreamed by someone ELSE. And in these dreams a melody is heard which everyone remembers, though he has not heard it since before all time began. Forgiveness, once complete, brings timelessness so close the song of Heaven can be heard, not with the ears, but with the holiness that never left the altar which abides forever deep within the Son of God. And when he hears this song again, he knows he NEVER heard it not. And where IS time, when dreams of judgment have been put away?

Whenever you feel fear in any form, - and you ARE fearful if you do not feel a deep content, a certainty of help, a calm assurance Heaven goes with you, - be sure you made an idol, and believe it will betray you. For, beneath your hope that it will save you, lie the guilt and pain of self-betrayal and uncertainty, so deep and bitter that the dream can not conceal completely all your sense of doom. Your self-betrayal MUST result in fear, and fear IS judgment, leading surely to the frantic search for idols and for death. Forgiving dreams remind you that you live in safety, and have NOT attacked yourself.

So do your childish terrors melt away, and dreams become a sign that you have made a new beginning, NOT another try to worship idols, and to KEEP attack. Forgiving dreams are kind to everyone who figures in the dream. And so they bring the dreamer full release from dreams of fear. He does not fear his judgment, for he has judged no-one, nor has sought to be released THROUGH judgment from what judgment MUST impose. And all the while he is remembering what he forgot when judgment seemed to be the way to SAVE him from its penalty.

Section 5 - The Guide to Salvation

The way to LEARN TO KNOW your brother is by perceiving the Holy Spirit in him. We have already said that the Holy Spirit is the bridge or thought-transfer of perception TO knowledge, so we CAN use the terms as if they were related, because in HIS mind they are. This relationship MUST be in His mind, because unless it were, the separation between the two ways of thinking would not be open to healing. He is part of the Holy Trinity, because His Mind is partly YOURS and also PARTLY GOD's. This needs clarification not in statement, since we have said this before, but in EXPERIENCE.

Since thoughts do not have to be conscious to exist, your brother does NOT have to be AWARE of the Holy Spirit, either in himself or in you for this miracle to occur. He may have dissociated the call for God, just as YOU have. But the dissociation is healed in BOTH of you as you see it in him, and thus acknowledge its BEING. Bill, who has made a number of vital contributions to our joint venture, made a major one a while ago, which he himself did not appreciate or even understand. If we recognize its value together, we will be able to use it together, because it is an idea, and must therefore be shared to be held.

When Bill said that he was determined "NOT to see you that way," he was speaking negatively. If he will state the same idea POSITIVELY, he will see the POWER of what he said. He had realized that there are two ways of seeing you, and also that they are diametrically opposed to one another. These two ways must be in HIS mind, because he was referring to HIMSELF as the perceiver. They must also be in YOURS, because he was perceiving YOU.

What he was really saying was that he would NOT look at you through HIS ego, or perceive YOUR ego in you. Stated positively, he would see you through the Holy Spirit in HIS mind, and perceive it in YOURS. What you acknowledge in your brother, you ARE acknowledging in yourself. What you share you STRENGTHEN. The voice of the Holy Spirit IS weak in you. That is why you MUST share it, because it must be INCREASED in strength before YOU can hear it. It is impossible to hear it in yourself while it is so weak in your OWN mind. It is NOT weak in itself; but it IS limited by your unwillingness to hear it.

Will itself is an idea, and is therefore strengthened by being shared. You have made the mistake of looking for the Holy Spirit in YOURSELVES, and that is why your meditations have frightened you. By adopting the ego's viewpoint, you undertook an ego-alien journey WITH THE EGO AS GUIDE. This was BOUND to produce fear. Bill's better idea needs to be strengthened in BOTH of you. Since it was HIS, HE can increase it by giving it to you.

Delay is of the ego, because time is ITS concept. Delay is obviously a TIME idea. Both time AND delay are meaningless in eternity. We have said before that the Holy Spirit is God's answer to the ego. Everything of which the Holy Spirit reminds you is in direct opposition to the ego's notions, because true and false perceptions are THEMSELVES opposed. The Holy Spirit has the task of UNDOING what the ego has made. It must undo it in the same realm of discourse in which the ego itself operates, or the mind would be unable to understand the change. We have repeatedly emphasized the fact that one level of the mind is not understandable to another. So it is with the ego and the soul, and with time and eternity.

Eternity is an idea of God, so the soul understands it perfectly. Time is a belief of the ego, so the lower mind, which IS the ego's domain, accepts it without question. The only aspect of time which is really eternal is NOW. That is what we REALLY mean when we say that now is the only time. The literal nature of this statement does not mean anything to the ego. It interprets it, at best, to mean "don't worry about the future." This is NOT what it really means at all.

It can thus perform the function of RE-INTERPRETING what the ego makes, not by destruction, but by understanding. Understanding is light, and light leads to knowledge. The Holy Spirit is IN light, because it is IN YOU who ARE light. But you yourselves do not know this. It is therefore the task of the Holy Spirit to re-interpret you on behalf of God.

You cannot understand yourselves alone. This is because you have no meaning apart from your rightful place in the Sonship, and the rightful place of the Sonship in God. This is your life, your eternity, and YOURSELF. It is of this that the Holy Spirit reminds you. It is this that the Holy Spirit SEES. This vision invariably frightens the ego, because it is so calm. Peace is the ego's greatest enemy, because according to ITS interpretation of reality, war is the guarantee of its survival. The ego becomes strong in strife because if you believe there is strife, you will react viciously because the idea of danger has entered your mind. This idea itself IS an appeal to the ego.

The Holy Spirit is as vigilant as the ego to the call of danger, opposing it with ITS strength just as the ego WELCOMES it with all its might. The Holy Spirit counters this welcome by welcoming peace. Peace and eternity are as closely related as are time and war. Perception as well as knowledge derive meaning from RELATIONSHIPS. Those which you accept are the foundations of your beliefs.

The Separation is merely another term for a split mind. It was not an act, but a thought. Therefore, the idea of Separation can be given away, just as the idea of unity can, and either way, it will be STRENGTHENED IN THE MIND OF THE GIVER. The ego is the symbol of the Separation, just as the Holy Spirit is the symbol of peace. What you perceive in others you are STRENGTHENING IN YOUR SELF. You let your mind misperceive, but the Holy Spirit lets your mind re-interpret its own misperceptions. The Holy Spirit is the perfect teacher. It uses only what your minds ALREADY understand, to teach you that you do not understand it.

The Holy Spirit can deal with an unwilling learner without going counter to his will, because part of his will IS still for God. Despite the ego's attempts to conceal this part, it is still much stronger than the ego, even though the ego does not recognize it. The Holy Spirit recognizes it perfectly, because it is its own dwelling place, or the place in the mind where it is at home. YOU are at home there, too, because it is a place of peace, and peace is of God.

You who are part of God are not at home EXCEPT in His peace. If peace is eternal, you are at home only in eternity. The ego made the world as IT perceives it, but the Holy Spirit, the RE-INTERPRETER of what the ego made, sees it only as a teaching device for bringing you home. The Holy Spirit must perceive time and re-interpret into the timeless. The mind must be led into eternity THROUGH time, because having made time it is capable of perceiving its opposite.

The Holy Spirit must work through opposites, because it must work with and for a mind that IS in opposition. Correct and learn, and be open to learning. You have NOT made truth, but truth can still set you free. Look as the Holy Spirit looks, and understand as He understands. His understanding looks back to God, in remembrance of Me. He is in Holy Communion always, and He is part of YOU. He is your guide to salvation, because he holds the remembrance of things past and to come. He holds this gladness gently in your minds, asking only that you INCREASE it in His name by sharing it to increase His joy in YOU.

Section 7 - Dreams and the Body

THERE IS NOTHING OUTSIDE YOU. That is what you must ultimately learn, for it is in that realization that the Kingdom of Heaven is restored to you. For God created only this, and He did not depart from it, nor leave it separate from Himself. The Kingdom of Heaven is the dwelling place of the Son of God, who left not his Father, and dwells not apart from Him. Heaven is not a place nor a condition. It is merely an awareness of perfect Oneness, and the knowledge that there is nothing else. Nothing OUTSIDE THIS Oneness, and NOTHING ELSE within.

What could God give, but knowledge of Himself? What else IS there to give? The belief that you could give AND GET something, else, something OUTSIDE yourself, has cost you the awareness of Heaven, and the loss of knowledge of your identity. And you have done a stranger thing than you yet realize. You have displaced your guilt to your bodies, FROM YOUR MINDS. Yet a body CANNOT be guilty, for it can do nothing of itself. You who think you hate your bodies, deceive yourselves. YOU HATE YOUR MINDS, for guilt has entered into them, and they would remain separate, which they CANNOT DO.

Minds ARE joined; bodies are not. Only by assigning to the mind the properties OF THE BODY, does separation SEEM to be possible. And it is MIND that seems to be fragmented and private and ALONE. Its guilt, which KEEPS it separate, is projected to the body, which suffers and dies, BECAUSE IT IS ATTACKED to hold the separation in the mind, and let it NOT KNOW its unity. Mind cannot attack, but it CAN make fantasies, and direct the body to act them out. But it is never what the BODY does that seems to satisfy. Unless the mind BELIEVES the body is ACTUALLY acting out ITS fantasies, it will attack the body by INCREASING the projection of its guilt upon it.

In this, the mind is CLEARLY delusional. It cannot attack, but maintains it CAN, and USES what it does to hurt the body, to PROVE it can. The mind can not attack, but it CAN deceive itself. And this is ALL it does, when it believes it has attacked the body, It CAN project its guilt, but it will NOT lose it through projection. And though it clearly can MISPERCEIVE the function of the body, it CANNOT change its function from what the Holy Spirit ESTABLISHES it to be. The body was NOT made by love. But love does not condemn it, and can use it lovingly, respecting what the Son of God has made, and using it to SAVE him from illusions.

Would you not have the instruments of separation RE-INTERPRETED as means for salvation, and USED for purposes of love? Would you not welcome AND SUPPORT the shift from fantasies of vengeance to RELEASE from them? Your PERCEPTION of the body can clearly be sick, but project this not upon the body. For your wish to make destructive what CANNOT destroy, can have no REAL effect at all. And what God created is only what He would have it be, being His Will.

You cannot make His Will destructive. You can make FANTASIES, in which your will CONFLICTS with His, but that is all. It is insane to use the body as the scapegoat for guilt; DIRECTING its attack, and BLAMING it for what you wished it to do. IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO ACT OUT FANTASIES. For it is still the FANTASIES you want, and they have nothing to do with what the body does. IT does not dream of them, and they but make IT a liability, where it COULD be an asset. For fantasies have made your body your "enemy," weak, vulnerable, and treacherous, "worthy" of the hate which you invest in it.

How has this served you? You have IDENTIFIED with this thing you hate, the instrument of vengeance, and the perceived source of your guilt. YOU have done this to a thing that has no meaning, proclaiming it to be the dwelling place of the Son of God, and turning it AGAINST him. This is the host of God that YOU have made. And neither God nor His most holy Son can enter an abode which harbors hate, and where you have sown the seeds of vengeance, violence, and death.

This thing you made to serve your guilt, stands between you and other minds. The minds ARE joined, but you do not IDENTIFY with them. You SEE yourself as locked in a separate prison, remote and unreachable, incapable of reaching out as being reached. You HATE the prison that you made, and would destroy it. Yet you would NOT escape from it, leaving it unharmed, WITHOUT your guilt upon it. But only thus CAN you escape. The home of vengeance is not yours; The place you set aside to house your hatred is NOT a prison, but an ILLUSION OF YOURSELF.

The body is a limit imposed on the universal communication which is an eternal property of mind. But the communication is INTERNAL. Mind reaches to ITSELF. It is NOT made up of different PARTS, which reach each other. It does not go OUT. Within ITSELF, it HAS no limits, and there is nothing OUTSIDE it. It encompasses EVERYTHING. It encompasses you ENTIRELY; you within it, and it within you. There IS nothing else, anywhere or ever. The body is OUTSIDE you, and SEEMS to surround you, shutting you off from others, and keeping you APART from them, and them from you.

IT IS NOT THERE. There IS no barrier between God and His Son, nor can His Son be separated from himself, except in illusion. This is NOT his reality, though he believes it IS. Yet this could only BE, IF God were wrong. God would have had to create DIFFERENTLY, and to have separated HIMSELF from His Son, to make this possible. He would have had to create DIFFERENT things, and to establish different ORDERS of reality, only SOME of which were love. Yet love must be forever like itself, changeless forever, and forever WITHOUT alternative. And so it is.

YOU cannot put a barrier around yourself, because God placed none between HIMSELF and you. Your hand can stretch out, and reach to Heaven. You whose hands are joined have begun to reach BEYOND the body, but NOT outside yourselves. To reach your shared identity TOGETHER. Could this be OUTSIDE you? Where God is not? Is He a body, and did He create you as He is not, and where He CANNOT be? You are surrounded ONLY by Him. What limits CAN there be on you, whom HE encompasses?

Everyone has experienced what he would call a sense of being transported BEYOND himself. This feeling of liberation FAR exceeds the DREAM of freedom sometimes experienced in special relationships. It is a sense of actual ESCAPE from limitations. If you will consider what this "transportation" REALLY entails, you will realize that it is a sudden UNawareness of the body, and a joining of your self and SOMETHING ELSE, in which your mind ENLARGES to encompass it. It becomes PART of you, as you UNITE with it. And BOTH become whole, as NEITHER is perceived as separate.

What REALLY happens is that you have GIVEN UP the illusion of a LIMITED awareness, and lost your fear of union. The love that INSTANTLY replaces it EXTENDS to what has freed you, and UNITES you with it. And, while this lasts, you are NOT uncertain of your identity, and would not limit it. You have escaped from fear to peace, asking no questions of reality, but merely ACCEPTING it. You have accepted this INSTEAD of the body, and have LET yourself be ONE with something beyond it, simply by NOT letting your mind be limited BY it.

There is no violence at all in this escape. The body is NOT attacked, but merely PROPERLY PERCEIVED. It does not limit you, merely because YOU would not have it so. You are not really "lifted out" of it; it cannot CONTAIN you. You go where you would be; GAINING, NOT losing, a sense of self. In these instants of release from physical restrictions, you experience much of what happens in the holy instant; the lifting of the barriers of time and space, the sudden experience of peace and joy, and, above all, the LACK of awareness of the body, and of the questioning WHETHER OR NOT ALL THIS IS POSSIBLE. It IS possible, BECAUSE YOU WANT IT.

Section 3 - The Uses of Projection

Any split in will MUST involve a rejection of part of it, and this IS the belief in separation. The wholeness of God, which IS His peace, cannot be appreciated EXCEPT by a whole mind, which recognizes the wholeness of God's creation and BY this recognition knows its Creator.

Exclusion and separation are synonymous. So are separation and dissociation. We have said before that the separation was and IS dissociation, and also that once it had occurred, projection became its main defense, or the device which KEEPS IT GOING. The reason, however, may not be as clear to you as you think. What you project you disown, and therefore DO NOT BELIEVE IS YOURS. You are therefore EXCLUDING yourself from it, by the very statement you are making that you are DIFFERENT from someone else. Since you have also judged AGAINST what you project, you attack it because you have already attacked it BY rejecting it. By doing this UNCONSCIOUSLY, you try to keep the fact that you must have attacked yourself FIRST out of awareness, and thus imagine that you have made yourself safe.

Projection will ALWAYS hurt you. It reinforces your belief in your own split mind, and its ONLY purpose is to KEEP THE SEPARATION GOING. It is solely a device of the ego to make you feel DIFFERENT from your brothers and separated FROM them. The ego justifies this on the wholly spurious grounds that it makes you seem better than they are, thus obscuring equality WITH them still further.

Projection and attack are inevitably related, because projection is ALWAYS a means of JUSTIFYING attack. Anger without projection is impossible. The ego uses projection ONLY to distort your perception of both yourself AND your brothers. It begins by excluding something you think exists in you which you do not want, and leads directly to your excluding yourself from your brothers.

But we know that there is another use of projection. Every ability of the ego has a better counterpart, because its abilities are directed by the mind, which has a better voice. The Holy Spirit, as well as the ego, utilizes projection but since their goals are opposed, so is the result. The Holy Spirit begins by perceiving YOU as perfect. KNOWING this perfection is shared, it RECOGNIZES it in others, thus strengthening it in both. Instead of anger, this arouses love FOR both because IT ESTABLISHES INCLUSION. Perceiving equality, it perceives equal needs. This invites Atonement automatically, because Atonement IS the one need which is universal.

To perceive YOURSELF in this way is the ONLY way in which you can find happiness in this world. This is because it is the acknowledgement that you are NOT in this world, and the world IS unhappy. How else can you find joy in a joyless place EXCEPT by realizing that YOU ARE NOT THERE? You cannot be ANYWHERE that God did not put you, and God created you as part of HIM. That is both WHERE you are and WHAT you are. This is COMPLETELY unalterable. It is total inclusion. You cannot change this now or ever. It is forever true. It is NOT a belief, but a fact.

Anything that God creates is as true as He is. Its truth lies only in its perfect inclusion in Him Who alone IS perfect. To deny this in any way is to deny yourself AND Him, because it is impossible to accept one without the other. The perfect equality of the Holy Spirit's perception is the counterpart of the perfect equality of God's knowing. The ego's perception has no counterpart in God, but the Holy Spirit remains the bridge between perception and knowledge. By enabling you to use perception in a way that PARALLELS knowledge, you will ultimately meet it and KNOW it.

The ego prefers to believe that parallel lines do not meet, and conceives of their meeting as impossible. But you might remember that the human eye perceives them as if they DO meet in the distance, which is the same as IN THE FUTURE, if time and space are one dimension. The later mathematics support the interpretation of ultimate convergence of the parallel theoretically. EVERYTHING meets in God, because everything was created BY Him and IN Him. God created His Sons by extending His Thought and retaining the extensions of His Thought in His Mind. ALL His Thoughts are thus perfectly united within themselves and with each other because they, were created neither partially nor in part.

Although perception of any kind is unnecessary, YOU made it and the Holy Spirit can therefore use it well. He can INSPIRE perception and lead it toward God by making it PARALLEL to God's way of thinking, and thus guaranteeing their ultimate meeting. This convergence SEEMS to be far in the future ONLY because your mind is NOT in perfect alignment with the idea, and therefore DOES NOT WANT IT NOW. The Holy Spirit USES time, but does NOT believe in it. Coming from God, He uses EVERYTHING for good, but does not BELIEVE in what is not true.

Since the Holy Spirit IS in your minds, then your minds MUST be able to believe ONLY what is true. The Holy Spirit can speak only for this, because he speaks for God. He tells you to return your whole mind to God, BECAUSE IT HAS NEVER LEFT HIM. If it has never left Him, you need only perceive it AS IT IS to BE returned. The full awareness of the Atonement, then, is the recognition that the separation NEVER OCCURRED. The ego CANNOT prevail against this, because it is an explicit statement that the EGO never occurred.

The ego can accept the idea that RETURN is necessary, because it can so easily make the idea seem so difficult. But the Holy Spirit tells you that even RETURN is unnecessary, because what never happened CANNOT involve ANY problem. But it does NOT follow that YOU cannot make the idea of return both necessary AND difficult. God made nothing either necessary OR difficult. But YOU have perceived both AS IF they were part of His perfect creations. Yet it is surely clear that the perfect NEED nothing, and CANNOT experience perfection as a difficult accomplishment because that is what they ARE.

This is the way in which you MUST perceive God's Creations, bringing all of your perceptions into the one parallel line which the Holy Spirit sees. This line is the direct line of communication with God, and lets YOUR mind converge with HIS. There is NO CONFLICT ANYWHERE in this perception, because it means that ALL perception is guided by the Holy Spirit, whose mind is fixed on God. ONLY the Holy Spirit can resolve conflict, because ONLY the Holy Spirit is conflict-free. He perceives ONLY what is true in YOUR mind, and extends outward to ONLY what is true in other minds.

The difference between the ego's use of projection and projection as the Holy Spirit uses it is very simple. The ego projects to EXCLUDE and therefore to deceive. The Holy Spirit projects by RECOGNIZING HIMSELF in EVERY mind, and thus perceives them as ONE. Nothing conflicts in this perception, because what the Holy Spirit perceives IS the same. Wherever He looks He sees Himself, and because He is UNITED, He offers the whole Kingdom always. This is the one message which God gave TO Him, and for which He must speak because that is what He IS. The peace of God lies in that message, and so the peace of God lies in YOU.

The great peace of the Kingdom shines in your mind forever, but it must shine OUTWARD to make YOU aware of it. The Holy Spirit was given you with perfect impartiality, and only by perceiving Him impartially can you perceive Him at all. The ego is legion, but the Holy Spirit is one. No darkness abides ANYWHERE in the Kingdom, so your part is only to allow no darkness to abide in your OWN mind. This alignment with Light is unlimited, because it is in alignment with the Light of the world. Each of us IS the Light of the world, and by joining our minds IN this Light, we proclaim the Kingdom of God together and AS ONE.

Lesson 134 "Let me perceive forgiveness as it is."

Let us review the meaning of "forgive," for it is apt to be distorted and to be perceived as something which entails an unfair sacrifice of righteous wrath, a gift unjustified and undeserved, and a complete denial of the truth. In such a view, forgiveness must be seen as mere eccentric folly, and this course appears to rest salvation on a whim.

The major difficulty that you find in genuine forgiveness on your part is that you still believe you must forgive the truth and not illusions. You conceive of pardon as a vain attempt to look past what is there; to overlook the truth in an unfounded effort to deceive yourself by making an illusion true. This twisted viewpoint but reflects the hold that the idea of sin retains as yet upon your mind as you regard yourself.

Because you think your sins are real, you look on pardon as deception. For it is impossible to think of sin as true and not believe forgiveness is a lie. Thus is forgiveness really but a sin, like all the rest. It says the truth is false, and smiles on the corrupt as if they were as blameless as the grass; as white as snow. It is delusional in what it thinks it can accomplish. It would see as right the plainly wrong; the loathsome as the good.

Pardon is no escape in such a view. It merely is a further sign that sin is unforgivable, at best to be concealed, denied, or called another name, for pardon is a treachery to truth. Guilt can not be forgiven. If you sin, your guilt is everlasting. Those who are forgiven from the view their sins are real are pitifully mocked and twice condemned; first by themselves for what they think they did, and once again by those who pardon them.

It is sin's unreality which makes forgiveness natural and wholly sane, a deep relief to those who offer it; a quiet blessing where it is received. It does not countenance illusions, but collects them lightly, with a little laugh, and gently lays them at the feet of truth. And there they disappear entirely.

Forgiveness is the only thing that stands for truth in the illusions of the world. It sees their nothingness, and looks right through the thousand forms in which they may appear. It looks on lies but it is not deceived. It does not heed the self-accusing shrieks of sinners mad with guilt. It looks on them with quiet eyes, and merely says to them, "My brother, what you think is not the truth."

The strength of pardon is its honesty, which is so uncorrupted that it sees illusions as illusions, not as truth. It is because of this that it becomes the undeceiver in the face of lies, the great restorer of the simple truth. By its ability to overlook what is not there, it opens up the way to truth, which had been blocked by dreams of guilt. Now are you free to follow in the way your true forgiveness opens up to you. For if one brother has received this gift of you, the door is open to yourself.

There is a very simple way to find the door to true forgiveness, and perceive it open wide in welcome. When you feel that you are tempted to accuse someone of sin in any form, do not allow your mind to dwell on what you think he did, for this is self-deception. Ask instead, "Should I accuse myself of doing this?"

Thus will you see alternatives for choice in terms which render choosing meaningful, and keep your mind as free of guilt and pain as God Himself intended it to be, and as it is in truth. It is but lies which would condemn. In truth is innocence the only thing there is. Forgiveness stands between illusions and the truth, between the world you see and that which lies beyond, between the hell of guilt and Heaven's gate.

Across this bridge, as powerful as Love Which laid Its blessing on it, are all dreams of evil and of hatred and attack brought silently to truth. They are not kept to swell and bluster and to terrify the foolish dreamer who believes in them. He has been gently wakened from his dream by understanding what he thought he saw was never there. And now he cannot feel that all escape has been denied to him.

He does not have to fight to save himself. He does not have to kill the dragons which he thought pursued him. Nor need he erect the heavy walls of stone and iron doors he thought would make him safe. He can remove the ponderous and useless armor made to chain his mind to fear and misery. His step is light, and as he lifts his foot to stride ahead, a star is left behind to point the way to those who follow him.

Today we practice true forgiveness that the time of joining be no more delayed. For we would meet with our Reality in freedom and in peace. Our practicing becomes the footsteps lightening up the way for all our brothers, who will follow us to the Reality we share with them.

That this may be accomplished, let us give a quarter of an hour twice today, and spend it with the Guide Who understands the meaning of forgiveness, and was sent to us to teach it. Let us ask of Him:

"Let me perceive forgiveness as it is."

Then choose one brother as He will direct, and catalogue his "sins" as one by one they cross your mind. Be certain not to dwell on any one of them, but realize that you are using his "offenses" but to save the world from all ideas of sin. Briefly consider all the evil things you thought of him, and each time ask yourself "Would I condemn myself for doing this?"

Let him be freed from all the thoughts you had of sin in him. And now you are prepared for freedom. If you have been practicing thus far in willingness and honesty, you will begin to sense a lifting up, a lightening of weight across your chest, a deep and certain feeling of relief. The time remaining should be given to experiencing the escape from all the heavy chains you sought to lay upon your brother, which were laid upon yourself.

Forgiveness should be practiced through the day, for there will be so many times when you forget its meaning, and attack yourself. When this occurs, allow your mind to see through this illusion as you tell yourself:

"Let me perceive forgiveness as it is.

Would I accuse myself of doing this?

I will not lay this chain upon myself."

In everything you do remember this:

No one is crucified alone, and yet,

No one can enter Heaven by himself.

Lesson 199 "I am not a body. I am free."

Freedom must be impossible as long as you perceive a body as yourself. The body is a limit. Who would seek for freedom in a body looks for it where it can not be found. The mind can be made free when it no longer sees itself as in a body, firmly tied to it, and sheltered by its presence. If this were the truth, the mind were vulnerable indeed!

It is essential for your progress in this course that you accept today's idea, and hold it very dear. Be not concerned that to the ego it is quite insane. The ego holds the body dear because it dwells in it, and lives united with the home that it has made. It is a part of the illusion which has sheltered it from being found illusory itself.

Here does it hide, and here it can be seen as what it is. Declare your innocence, and you are free. The body disappears because you have no need of it except the need the Holy Spirit sees. For this, the body will appear as useful form for what the mind must do. It thus becomes a vehicle which helps forgiveness be extended to the all-inclusive goal that it must reach, according to God's plan.

Cherish today's idea, and practice it today and every day. Make it a part of every practice period you take. There is no thought that will not gain thereby in power to help the world, nor none which will not gain in added gifts to you as well. We sound the call of freedom 'round the world with this idea. And would you be exempt from the acceptance of the gifts you give?

The Holy Spirit is the home of minds that seek for freedom. In Him they find what they have sought. The body's purpose now is unambiguous. And it becomes perfect in the ability to serve an undivided goal. In conflict-free and unequivocal response to mind with but the thought of freedom as its goal, the body serves, and serves its purpose well. Without the power to enslave, it is a worthy servant of the freedom which the mind within the Holy Spirit seeks.

Be free today, and carry freedom as your gift to those who still believe they are enslaved within a body. Be you free, so that the Holy Spirit can make use of your escape from bondage to set free the many who perceive themselves as bound and helpless and afraid. Let love replace their fears through you. Accept salvation now, and give your mind to Him Who calls to you to make this gift to Him. For He would give you perfect freedom, perfect joy, and hope that finds its full accomplishment in God.

You are God's Son. In immortality you live forever. Would you not return your mind to this? Then practice well the thought the Holy Spirit gives you for today. Your brothers stand released with you in it; the world is blessed along with you, God's Son will weep no more, and Heaven offers thanks at the increase of joy your practice brings even to it. And God Himself extends His Love and happiness each time you say:

"I am not a body. I am free.

I hear the Voice that God has given me,

And it is only this my mind obeys."

Lesson 157 "Into His Presence would I enter now."

This is a day of silence and of trust. It is a special time of promise in your calendar of days. It is a time Heaven has set apart to shine upon, and cast a timeless light upon this day when echoes of eternity are heard. This day is holy, for it ushers in a new experience, a different kind of feeling and awareness. You have spent long days and nights in celebrating death. Today you learn to feel the joy of life.

This is another crucial turning point in the curriculum. We add a new dimension now; a fresh experience which sheds a light on all that we have learned already, and prepares us for what we have yet to learn. It brings us to the door where learning ceases, and we catch a glimpse of what lies past the highest reaches it can possibly attain. It leaves us there an instant and we go beyond it, sure of our direction and our only goal.

He will direct your practicing today, for what you ask for now is what He wills. And having joined your will with His this day, what you are asking must be given you. Nothing is needed but today's idea to light your mind, and let it rest in still anticipation and in quiet joy wherein you quickly leave the world behind.

From this day forth your ministry takes on a genuine devotion, and a glow that travels from your fingertips to those you touch, and blesses those you look upon. A vision reaches everyone you meet, and everyone you think of, or who thinks of you. For your experience today will so transform your mind that it becomes the touchstone for the holy Thoughts of God.

Your body will be sanctified today, its only purpose being now to bring the vision of what you experience this day to light the world. We cannot give experience like this directly. Yet it leaves a vision in our eyes which we can offer everyone, that he may come the sooner to the same experience in which the world is quietly forgot, and Heaven is remembered for a while.

As this experience increases and all goals but this become of little worth, the world to which you will return becomes a little closer to the end of time; a little more like Heaven in its ways; a little nearer its deliverance. And you who bring it light will come to see the light more sure; the vision more distinct. The time will come when you will not return in the same form in which you now appear, for you will have no need of it. Yet now it has a purpose, and will serve it well.

Today we will embark upon a course you have not dreamed of. But the Holy One, the Giver of the happy dreams of life, Translator of perception into truth, the holy Guide to Heaven given you, has dreamed for you this journey, which you make and start today, with the experience, this day holds out to you to be your own.

Into Christ's Presence will we enter now serenely unaware of everything except His shining Face and perfect Love. The vision of His Face will stay with you, but there will be an instant which transcends all vision, even this, the holiest. This you will never teach, for you attained it not through learning. Yet the vision speaks of your remembrance of what you knew that instant, and will surely know again.

Section 6 - The "Dynamics" of the Ego

No-one can escape from illusions unless he looks at them, for not looking is the way they are PROTECTED. There is no need to shrink from illusions, for they cannot be dangerous. We are ready to look more closely at the ego's thought system, because together we have the lamp that will dispel it, and since you realize you do not WANT it, you MUST be ready. Let us be very calm in doing this, for we are merely looking honestly for truth. The "dynamics" of the ego will be our lesson for a while, for we must look first at this to look beyond it, since you HAVE made it real. We will UNDO this error quietly together, and then look beyond it to truth.

What is healing, but the removal of all that STANDS IN THE WAY of knowledge? And how else can one dispel illusions EXCEPT by looking at them directly, WITHOUT protecting them? Be not afraid, therefore, for what you will be looking at IS the source of fear, but you have learned surely by now, that FEAR IS NOT REAL. We have accepted the fact already that its EFFECTS can be dispelled, merely by denying THEIR reality. The next step is obviously to recognize that WHAT HAS NO EFFECTS DOES NOT EXIST.

The ego is fearful BECAUSE you believe this. But the truth is very simple; ALL POWER IS OF GOD. What is NOT of Him has no power to do ANYTHING. When we look at the ego, then, we are NOT considering dynamics, but delusions. We can surely regard a delusional system without fear, for it cannot have any effects if its source is not true. Fear becomes more obviously inappropriate if one recognizes the ego's GOAL, which is so clearly senseless that any effort exerted on its behalf is NECESSARILY expended on nothing.

The ego's goal is quite explicitly EGO AUTONOMY. From the beginning, then, its PURPOSE is to be separate, sufficient unto itself, and independent of any power EXCEPT ITS OWN. This is WHY it is the symbol of separation. Every idea has a purpose, and its purpose is always the natural extension of what it IS. Everything that stems from the ego is the natural outcome of its central belief, and the way to undo its RESULTS, is merely to recognize that their SOURCE is NOT natural, being out of accord with your TRUE nature.

We once said that to will contrary to God is wishful thinking, and not real willing. His Will is One, because the extension of His Will CANNOT be unlike ITSELF. The real conflict you experience, then, is between the ego's idle wishes and the Will of God, WHICH YOU SHARE. Can this BE a real conflict? Yours is the independence of Creation, NOT of autonomy. Your whole creative function lies in your complete dependence on God, Whose function He shares WITH you. By HIS willingness to share it, He becomes as dependent on you, as you are on HIM. Do not ascribe the ego's arrogance to Him, Who wills NOT to be independent of YOU. He has included YOU in HIS Autonomy. Can YOU believe that autonomy is meaningful APART from Him?

The belief in EGO autonomy is costing you the knowledge of your dependence on God, IN WHICH YOUR FREEDOM LIES. The ego sees ALL dependency as threatening, and has twisted even your longing for God into a means of establishing ITSELF. But do not be deceived by ITS interpretation of your conflict. The ego ALWAYS attacks on behalf of separation. Believing it HAS the power to do this, it does nothing else, because its goal of autonomy IS nothing else. The ego is totally confused about reality, BUT IT DOES NOT LOSE SIGHT OF ITS GOAL. It is much more vigilant than YOU are, BECAUSE it is perfectly certain of its purpose. YOU are confused, because you do NOT know YOURS.

What you must learn to recognize is that the LAST thing the ego wishes you to realize, is THAT YOU ARE AFRAID OF IT. For if the ego gives rise to fear, it is DIMINISHING your independence, and WEAKENING your power. Yet its one claim to your allegiance is that it can GIVE power to you. Without THIS belief, you would not listen to it at all. How, then, can its existence continue, if you realize that by accepting it, you ARE belittling yourself, and DEPRIVING yourself of power?

The ego can and does allow you to regard yourself as supercilious, unbelieving, "light hearted -," distant, emotionally shallow, callous, uninvolved, and even desperate, BUT NOT REALLY AFRAID. MINIMIZING fear, but NOT its undoing, is the ego's constant effort, and is indeed the skill at which it is VERY ingenious. How can it preach separation WITHOUT upholding it through fear, and would you listen to it, if you recognized this IS what it is doing?

YOUR recognition that whatever seems to separate you from God is ONLY fear, regardless of the form it takes, and quite apart from HOW THE EGO WANTS YOU TO EXPERIENCE IT, is therefore the basic ego threat. Its dream of autonomy is shaken to its foundation by this awareness. For though you may countenance a false idea of independence, you will NOT accept the cost of fear, IF YOU RECOGNIZE IT. Yet this IS the cost, and the ego CANNOT minimize it. For if you overlook love, you are overlooking YOURSELF, and you MUST fear UNreality BECAUSE YOU HAVE DENIED YOURSELF. By believing that you have successfully attacked truth, YOU ARE BELIEVING THAT ATTACK HAS POWER. Very simply, then, YOU HAVE BECOME AFRAID OF YOURSELF. And no one wills to learn what he believes would DESTROY him.

If the ego's goal of autonomy COULD be accomplished GOD's purpose could be DEFEATED, and this IS impossible. Only by learning what fear IS, can you finally learn to distinguish the possible from the impossible, and the false from the true. According to the ego's teaching, ITS goal CAN be accomplished, and GOD's Purpose can NOT. According to the Holy Spirit's teaching, ONLY God's Purpose IS accomplishment, and it is ALREADY accomplished.

God is as dependent on you as you are on Him, because HIS autonomy ENCOMPASSES yours, and is therefore incomplete WITHOUT it. You can only ESTABLISH your autonomy by identifying WITH Him, and FULFILLING YOUR FUNCTION AS IT EXISTS IN TRUTH. The ego believes that to accomplish ITS goal IS happiness. But it is given YOU to know that GOD's function IS yours, and happiness CANNOT be found apart from your joint will. Recognize only that the ego's goal, which you have pursued quite diligently, has merely brought you FEAR, and it becomes difficult to maintain that FEAR is happiness.

UPHELD by fear, this IS what the ego would have you believe. Yet God's Son is not insane, and CANNOT believe it. Let him but RECOGNIZE it, and he will NOT accept it. For only the insane would choose fear IN PLACE of love, and only the insane could believe that love can be gained by ATTACK. But the sane KNOW that only attack COULD produce fear, from which the love of God COMPLETELY protects them.

The ego analyzes; the Holy Spirit ACCEPTS. The appreciation of wholeness comes ONLY through acceptance, for to analyze MEANS to separate out. The attempt to understand totality by BREAKING IT UP is clearly the characteristically contradictory approach of the ego to everything. Never forget that the ego believes that power, understanding AND TRUTH lie in separation. And to ESTABLISH this belief it MUST attack. Unaware that the belief cannot BE established, and obsessed with the conviction that separation IS salvation, the ego attacks everything it perceives, by breaking it up into small and disconnected parts, without meaningful relationships, and thus without meaning. The ego will ALWAYS substitute chaos for meaning, for if separation is salvation, harmony is threat.

The ego makes no attempt to UNDERSTAND this, and it is clearly not understandable. But the ego does make EVERY attempt to DEMONSTRATE it, and THIS it does constantly. Analyzing to ATTACK meaning, the ego DOES succeed in overlooking it, and is left with a series of fragmented perceptions WHICH IT UNIFIES ON BEHALF OF ITSELF. This, then, becomes the universe it perceives and it is this universe which, in turn, becomes its demonstration of its own reality.

Do not underestimate the appeal of the ego's demonstrations to those who would listen. Selective perception chooses its witnesses carefully, and its witnesses ARE consistent. The case for insanity IS strong to the insane. For reasoning ends at its beginning, and no thought system transcends its source. Yet reasoning without meaning CANNOT demonstrate anything, and those who are convinced by it, MUST be deluded. Can the ego teach truly, when it overlooks truth? Can it perceive what it has DENIED? Its witnesses DO attest to its DENIAL, but hardly to WHAT it has denied. The ego looks straight at the Father and does not see Him, for it has denied His Son.

Would YOU remember the Father? Accept His Son and you WILL remember Him. Nothing can demonstrate that His Son is unworthy, for nothing can prove that a lie is true. What you see of His Son through the eyes of the ego is a demonstration that His Son does not exist, yet where the Son is, the Father MUST be. Accept what God does NOT deny, and HE will demonstrate its truth. The witnesses for God stand in His Light and behold what HE created. Their silence is the sign that they have beheld God's Son, and in the Presence of Christ, THEY need demonstrate nothing, for Christ speaks to them of Himself and of His Father. They are silent because Christ speaks to them, and it is His words that THEY speak.

Every brother you meet becomes a witness for Christ or for the ego, depending on what you perceive in him. Everyone convinces you of WHAT YOU WANT TO PERCEIVE, and of the reality of the Kingdom you have chosen for your vigilance. Everything you perceive is a witness to the thought-system YOU WANT TO BE TRUE. Every brother has the power to release you, IF YOU WILL TO BE FREE. You cannot accept false witness of him, unless you have evoked false witnesses AGAINST him. If HE speaks not of Christ to YOU, YOU spoke not of Christ to him. You hear but your own voice, and if Christ speaks through you, YOU will hear Him.

Section 9 - The Decision to Forget

But to give up the dissociation of REALITY brings more than merely lack of fear. In THIS decision lie joy, and peace, and the glory of creation. Offer the Holy Spirit only your will to remember, for He retains the knowledge of God and of you FOR you, waiting for your acceptance. Give up gladly EVERYTHING that would stand in the way of your remembering, for God is in your memory, and His Voice will tell you that you are part of Him when you are willing to remember Him and know your own reality again. Let nothing in this world delay your remembering of Him, for in this remembering is the knowledge of YOURSELF.

To remember is merely to restore to your mind WHAT IS ALREADY THERE. You do not make what you remember; you merely accept again what has BEEN made AND REJECTED. The ability to ACCEPT truth in this world is the perceptual counterpart of creating in the Kingdom. God WILL do His part if you will do yours, and HIS return in exchange for yours IS the exchange of knowledge for perception. NOTHING is beyond His will for you. But signify your will to remember Him, and behold! He will give you everything but for your asking.

Whenever you attack, you are denying YOURSELF. You are specifically teaching yourself that you are NOT what you are. YOUR denial of reality precludes ACCEPTANCE of God's gift, BECAUSE YOU HAVE ACCEPTED SOMETHING ELSE IN ITS PLACE. If you understand that the misuse of defenses always constitutes an attack on truth, and truth is God, you will realize why this is ALWAYS fearful. If you further recognize that you are PART of God, you will also understand why it is that YOU ALWAYS ATTACK YOURSELF FIRST.

ALL attack is self attack. It cannot BE anything else. Arising from your OWN decision NOT to be what you ARE, IT IS AN ATTACK ON YOUR IDENTIFICATION. Attack is thus the way in which your identification is lost, because, when you attack, you MUST have forgotten what you are. And if your reality is God's, when YOU attack, you are not remembering HIM. This is not because He is gone, but because you are ACTIVELY WILLING NOT TO REMEMBER HIM.

If you realized the complete havoc this makes of your peace of mind, you COULD not make such an insane decision. You make it only because you still believe that it can GET YOU SOMETHING YOU WANT. It follows, then, that you want something OTHER than peace of mind, and you have not considered what it must be. Yet the logical outcome of your decision is perfectly clear, if you will LOOK at it. By deciding AGAINST your reality, you have made yourself vigilant AGAINST God and His Kingdom. And it is THIS vigilance that makes you afraid to remember Him.

You have NOT attacked God, and you DO love Him. Can you change your reality? No-one can will to destroy himself. When you think you are attacking your SELF, it is a sure sign that you hate what you think you are. And this, and ONLY this, can BE attacked by you. What you THINK you are CAN be hateful, and what this strange image makes you do can be very destructive. The destruction is no more real than the image, but those who make idols DO worship them. The idols are nothing, but their worshippers are the Sons of God in sickness.

God would have them released from their sickness, and returned to His Mind. He will not limit your power to help them, because He has given it TO you. Do not be afraid of it, because it is your salvation. What Comforter can there be for the sick children of God except His power through YOU? Remember that it does not matter where in the Sonship He is accepted. He is ALWAYS accepted for all, and when your mind receives Him, the remembrance of Him awakens throughout the Sonship.

Heal your brothers simply by accepting God FOR them. Your minds are not separate, and God has only one channel for healing, because He has but one Son. His remaining communication link with all His Children joins them together, and them to Him. To be aware of this is to heal them, because it is the awareness that no one is separate, and so no one is sick. To believe that a Son of God can be sick is to believe that PART OF GOD CAN SUFFER.

Love CANNOT suffer, because it cannot attack. The remembrance of love therefore brings invulnerability with it. Do not side with sickness in the presence of a Son of God, even if HE believes in it, for YOUR acceptance of God in him ACKNOWLEDGES the love of God which he has forgotten. Your recognition of him as PART OF GOD teaches him the truth about himself, WHICH HE IS DENYING. Would you STRENGTHEN his denial of God, and thus lose sight of YOURSELF? Or would you remind him of his wholeness, and remember your Creator WITH him?

To believe a Son of God is sick is to worship the same idol he does. God created love, NOT idolatry. ALL forms of idolatry are caricatures of creation, taught by sick minds, who are too divided to know that Creation SHARES power, and NEVER usurps it. Sickness is idolatry, because it is the belief that POWER CAN BE TAKEN FROM YOU. But this is impossible, because you are part of God, Who IS all power. A sick god MUST be an idol, made in the image of what its maker thinks HE is. And that is exactly what the ego DOES perceive in a Son of God; -- a sick god, self-created, self-sufficient, very vicious, and very vulnerable.

Is this the idol you would worship? Is this the image you would be vigilant to SAVE? Are you REALLY afraid of losing THIS? Look calmly at the logical conclusion of the ego's thought-system, and judge whether its offering is really what you want, for this IS what it offers you. To obtain THIS, you are willing to attack the Divinity of your brothers, and thus lose sight of YOURS. And you are willing to keep it hidden, to protect this idol, which you think will save you from dangers WHICH THE IDOL ITSELF STANDS FOR, but which do not exist.

There are no idolaters in the Kingdom, but there is great appreciation for every Soul which God created, because of the calm knowledge that each one is part of Him. God's Son knows no idols, but He DOES know His Father. Health in this world is the counterpart of value in Heaven. It is not my merit that I contribute to you, but my love, for you do not value yourselves. When you do not value yourself you become sick, but MY value of you can heal you, because the value of God's Son is one.

When I said, "my peace I give unto you," I meant it. Peace came from God through me to YOU. It was FOR you, but you did not ask. When a brother is sick, it is because HE IS NOT ASKING FOR PEACE, and therefore he does not know he HAS it. The ACCEPTANCE of peace is the denial of illusion, and sickness IS an illusion. Yet every Son of God has the power to deny illusions ANYWHERE in the Kingdom, merely by denying them completely in himself.

God is not jealous of the gods you make, but YOU are. You would save them and serve them, because you believe that THEY MADE YOU. You think they are your father, because you are projecting onto them the fearful fact that YOU MADE THEM TO REPLACE GOD. But when they seem to speak to you, remember that NOTHING can replace God, and whatever replacements you have attempted ARE nothing. Very simply, then, you may BELIEVE you are afraid of nothingNESS, but you are REALLY afraid of NOTHING. And in THAT awareness you ARE healed.

You WILL hear the god you listen to. You MADE the god of sickness, and BY making him, you made yourself ABLE to hear him. But you did NOT create him, because he is NOT the Will of the Father. He is therefore not eternal, and will be UNmade for you, the instant you signify your willingness to accept ONLY the eternal. If God has but one Son, there is but one God. You share reality with Him, BECAUSE reality is not divided. To accept other gods before Him, is to place other images before YOURSELF. You do not realize how much you listen to your gods, and how vigilant you are on their behalf. But they exist only because you honor them.

Place honor where it is due, and peace WILL be yours. It is your inheritance from your REAL Father. You cannot make your father, and the father you made did NOT make you. Honor is not due to illusions, for to honor them is to honor nothing. But fear is not due them either, for nothing cannot be fearful. You have chosen to fear love BECAUSE of its perfect harmlessness. And because of this fear, you have been willing to give up your own perfect helpfulness, and your own perfect Help. Only at the altar of God will you find peace, and this altar is in you, because God put it there. His Voice still calls you to return, and He will be heard, when you place no other gods before Him.

You can give up the god of sickness for your brothers; in fact, you would HAVE to do so, if you give him up for yourself. For if you see him anywhere, YOU are accepting him. And if you accept him, you WILL bow down and worship him, because HE WAS MADE AS GOD's REPLACEMENT. He is the belief that YOU CAN CHOOSE WHICH GOD IS REAL. Although it is perfectly clear that this has nothing to do with REALITY, it is equally clear that it has EVERYTHING to do with REALITY AS YOU PERCEIVE IT.

Section 6 - Finding the Present

To perceive truly is to be aware of ALL reality, through the awareness of your own. But for this, NO illusions can rise to meet your sight, for ALL reality leaves no room for ANY error. This means that you perceive a brother only AS YOU SEE HIM NOW. His past has NO reality in the present, and you CANNOT see it. Your past reactions TO him are also NOT THERE, and if it is to these that you react NOW, you see but an image of him that you made and cherish INSTEAD of him. In your questioning of delusions, ask yourself if it is REALLY sane to perceive WHAT WAS NOW. If you remember the PAST as you look upon him, you will be unable to perceive the reality that is NOW.

You consider it "natural" to use your PAST experience as the reference point from which to JUDGE the present. Yet this is UNnatural, because it is delusional. When you have learned to look upon everyone with NO REFERENCE AT ALL to the past, either his OR yours as you perceived it, you will be able to learn FROM WHAT YOU SEE NOW. For the past can cast no shadow to darken the present, UNLESS YOU ARE AFRAID OF LIGHT. And ONLY if you are, would you choose to bring this darkness WITH you, and by holding it in your minds, see it as a dark cloud that shrouds your brothers, and conceals their reality from your sight.

THIS DARKNESS IS IN YOU. The Christ revealed to you NOW has no past, for He is changeless. AND IN HIS CHANGELESSNESS LIES YOUR RELEASE. For if He is as He was created, there IS no guilt in Him. No cloud of guilt has risen to obscure Him, and He stands revealed in everyone you meet, because you see Him through HIMSELF. To be born again is to let the PAST go, and LOOK WITHOUT CONDEMNATION UPON THE PRESENT. For the cloud which obscures God's Son to you IS the past, and if you would have it past AND GONE, you must NOT SEE IT NOW. And if you see it now in your delusions, it has NOT gone from you, although it is not there.

Time can release as well as imprison, depending on whose interpretation of it you use. Past, present, and future are not continuous, UNLESS YOU FORCE CONTINUITY ON THEM. You can PERCEIVE them as continuous, and make them so FOR YOU. But do not be deceived, and then believe that this is how it IS, for to believe that reality is what you would HAVE it be, according to YOUR use for it, IS delusional. You would DESTROY time's continuity by breaking it into past, present, and future, FOR YOUR OWN PURPOSES. You would anticipate the future on the basis of your PAST experience and plan for it accordingly. And by so doing, you are ALIGNING past and future, and not allowing the miracles, which could intervene BETWEEN them, to free you to be born again.

The miracle enables you to see your brother WITHOUT his past, and so perceive him as born again. His errors ARE all past, and by perceiving him WITHOUT them, you are RELEASING him. And since his past is yours, you SHARE in this release. Let no dark cloud out of YOUR past obscure him from you, for truth lies ONLY in the present, and you WILL find it if you seek it there. You have looked for it where it is NOT, and therefore have not found it. Learn, then, to seek it where it IS, and it WILL dawn on eyes that see. Your past was made in anger, and if you use it to ATTACK the present you will NOT SEE the freedom that the present holds. Judgment and condemnation are BEHIND you, and unless you bring them WITH you, you WILL see that you are free of them.

Look lovingly upon the present, for it holds the ONLY things that are forever true. All healing lies within it, because ITS continuity is real. It extends to ALL aspects of consciousness AT THE SAME TIME, and thus enables them to REACH EACH OTHER. The present is before time WAS, and WILL BE when time is no more. In it is everything that is eternal, and they ARE one. THEIR continuity is timeless, and their communication is unbroken, for they are NOT SEPARATED by the past. Only the past CAN separate, and IT is nowhere.

The present offers you your brothers in the light that would unite you WITH them, and free YOU from the past. Would you, then, hold the past AGAINST them? For if you do, you are choosing to remain in the darkness THAT IS NOT THERE, and refusing to accept the light that is offered you. For the light of perfect vision is freely given, as it is freely received, and can be accepted only WITHOUT LIMIT. In this one, still dimension of time, which does not change, and where there is no sight of what you were, you look at Christ, and call His witnesses to shine on you, BECAUSE YOU CALLED THEM FORTH. And THEY will not deny the truth in you, because you looked for it in them, and FOUND it there.

Now is the time for salvation, for NOW is the release from time. Reach out to all your brothers, and touch them with the touch of Christ. In timeless union WITH them is YOUR continuity, unbroken because it is wholly shared. God's guiltless Son is ONLY light. There is no darkness in him ANYWHERE, for he is whole. Call all your brothers to witness to his wholeness, as I am calling you to join with me. Every voice has a part in the song of redemption, the hymn of gladness and thanksgiving for the light, to the Creator of Light. The holy light that shines forth from God's Son is the witness that his light is of his Father.

Shine on your brothers in remembrance of your Creator, and you WILL remember Him, as you call forth the witnesses to His creation. Those whom you heal bear witness to YOUR healing, for in THEIR wholeness you will see your own. And as your hymns of praise and gladness rise to your Creator, He will return your thanks, in His clear answer to your call. For it can never be that His Son called upon Him, and remained unanswered. His call to you is but your call to Him. And in Him you are answered by His peace.

Children of Light, you know not that the Light is in you. And you will find it through its witnesses. For having given light to them, THEY WILL RETURN IT. Everyone you see IN light brings YOUR light closer to your OWN awareness. Love always leads to love. The sick, who ASK for love, are grateful for it, and in their joy, they shine with holy thanks. And this they offer you, who GAVE them joy. They are your guides to joy, for having received it OF you, they would keep it. You have established them as guides to peace, for you have made it manifest in them. And SEEING it, its beauty calls you home.

There is a light which this world cannot give. Yet YOU can give it, as it was given YOU. And AS you give it, it shines forth to call you FROM the world, and follow it. For this light will attract you as nothing in this world can do. And you will lay aside the world and find another. This other world is bright with love WHICH YOU HAVE GIVEN IT. And here will everything remind you of your Father and his holy Son. Light is unlimited, and spreads across this world in quiet joy. All those you brought WITH you will shine on you, and you will shine on them in gratitude, because they brought you here. Your light will join with theirs, in power so compelling, that it will draw the others out of darkness as you look on them.

Section 10 - Guiltlessness and Invulnerability

If you did not feel guilty, you could not attack. For condemnation is the root of attack. It is the judgment of one mind by another as UNWORTHY of love, and DESERVING of punishment. But herein lies the split. For the mind that judges, perceives itself as SEPARATE from the mind being judged, believing that by punishing ANOTHER, IT will escape punishment. All this is but the delusional attempt of the mind to deny itself, and ESCAPE THE PENALTY OF DENIAL. It is NOT an attempt to RELINQUISH denial, but to HOLD ON TO IT. For it is guilt that has obscured the Father to you, and it is guilt that has driven you insane. The acceptance of guilt into the mind of God's Son was the beginning of the separation, as the acceptance of the Atonement is its end.

If this were the real world, God WOULD be cruel. For no father could subject his children to this as the price of salvation, and be loving. LOVE DOES NOT KILL TO SAVE. For if it did, attack WOULD be salvation, and this is the ego's interpretation, NOT God's. Only the world of guilt could demand this, for only the guilty could CONCEIVE of it. Adam's "sin" could have touched none of you, had you not believed that it was the FATHER Who drove him out of Paradise. For it is in THAT belief that knowledge of the Father was lost, for it is only those who do not understand Him that COULD believe it.

This world IS a picture of the crucifixion of God's Son. And until you realize that God's Son CANNOT be crucified, this is the world you will see. But you will NOT realize this, until you accept the eternal fact that GOD'S SON IS NOT GUILTY. He DESERVES only love, because he has GIVEN only love. He cannot be condemned, because he has never condemned. The Atonement is the final lesson he need learn, for it teaches him that, never having sinned, HE HAS NO NEED OF SALVATION.

Long ago we said that the Holy Spirit shares the goal of all good teachers, whose ultimate aim is to make themselves unnecessary, by teaching their pupils all they know. The Holy Spirit wills ONLY this, for sharing the Father's love for His Son, He wills to remove all guilt from his mind, that he may remember his Father in peace. For peace and guilt are antithetical, and the Father can BE remembered ONLY in peace. Love and guilt cannot coexist, and to accept one is to DENY the other.

Guilt hides Christ from your sight, for it is the denial of the blamelessness of God's Son. In this strange world which you have made, the Son of God HAS sinned. How could you SEE him, then? By making HIM invisible, the world of retribution rose in the black cloud of guilt which you accepted, and you hold it dear. For the blamelessness of Christ is the proof that the ego never was, and can never be. Without guilt the ego HAS no life, and God's Son IS without guilt.

As you look upon yourselves and judge what you do honestly, as you have been asked to do, you may be tempted to wonder how you can be guiltless. But consider this. You are NOT guiltless in time, but IN ETERNITY. You HAVE "sinned" IN THE PAST, but there IS no past. Always has no direction. Time seems to go in one direction, but when you reach its end, it will roll up like a long carpet that has spread along the past behind you, and will disappear. As long as you believe the Son of God is guilty, you will walk along this carpet, believing that it leads to death. And the journey will seem long and cruel and senseless, for so it is.

The journey which the Son of God has set HIMSELF is foolish indeed. But the journey on which his Father sets him is one of release and joy. The Father is not cruel, and His Son CANNOT hurt himself. The retaliation which he fears, AND WHICH HE SEES, will never touch him, for although he BELIEVES in it, the Holy Spirit KNOWS it is not true. He stands at the end of time, where YOU must be, because He is WITH you. He has ALWAYS undone everything unworthy of the Son of God, for such was His mission, given BY God. And what God gives HAS always been.

You will see me as you learn the Son of God is guiltless. He has always sought his guiltlessness, and he has FOUND it. For everyone is seeking to escape from the prison he has made, and the way to find release is not denied him. Being IN him, he has found it. WHEN he finds it is only a matter of time, and time is but an illusion. For the Son of God is guiltless NOW, and the brightness of his purity shines untouched forever in God's Mind. God's Son will ALWAYS be as he was created. Deny YOUR world, and judge him not. For his eternal guiltlessness is in the mind of his Father, and protects him forever.

When you have accepted the Atonement for yourselves, you will realize that THERE IS NO GUILT IN GOD'S SON. And ONLY as you look upon him as guiltless, can you understand his Oneness. For the IDEA of guilt brings a belief of condemnation of one by another, projecting separation in place of unity. You can condemn only yourself, and by doing so, you cannot know that you are God's Son. For you have denied the condition of his Being, which is his perfect blamelessness. Out of Love he was created, and in Love he abides. Goodness and mercy have always followed him, for he has always extended the Love of his Father.

As you perceive the holy companions who travel with you, you will realize that there IS no journey, but only an awakening. The Son of God, who sleepeth not, has kept faith with his Father FOR you. There is no road to travel ON, and no time to travel THROUGH. For God waits not for His Son in time, being forever unwilling to be without him. And so it has always been. Let the holiness of God's Son shine away the cloud of guilt that darkens your mind, and by accepting his purity AS yours, learn of him that it IS yours.

You are invulnerable BECAUSE you are guiltless. You can hold on to the past ONLY through guilt. For guilt establishes that you WILL BE punished for what you have done, and thus depends on one-dimensional time, proceeding from past to future. No-one who believes this, can understand what ALWAYS means. And therefore guilt MUST deprive you of the appreciation of eternity. You are immortal BECAUSE you are eternal, and always MUST be now. Guilt, then, is a way of holding past and future in your minds, to ensure the ego's continuity. For if what it HAS BEEN WILL BE punished, it's continuity WOULD be guaranteed.

But the guarantee of your continuity is God's, not the ego's. And immortality is the opposite of time, for time passes away, while immortality is constant. Accepting the Atonement teaches you WHAT IMMORTALITY IS, for by accepting your guiltlessness, you learn that the past has never been, and so the future is needless. The future IN TIME is ALWAYS associated with expiation, and ONLY guilt could induce a sense of NEED for expiation. Accepting the guiltlessness of the Son of God AS YOURS is therefore God's way of reminding you of His Son, and what he is in truth. For God has never condemned His Son, and being guiltless, he IS eternal.

You cannot dispel guilt by making it real, and THEN atoning for it. For this is the ego's plan, which it offers INSTEAD of dispelling it. The ego believes in ATONEMENT THROUGH ATTACK, being fully committed to the insane notion that attack IS salvation. And YOU who cherish guilt must ALSO believe it, for how else but by identifying WITH the ego, could you hold dear what you do not want?

The ego teaches you to attack yourself BECAUSE you are guilty, and this MUST INCREASE the guilt, for guilt is the RESULT of attack. In the ego's teaching, then, there IS no escape from guilt. For attack MAKES GUILT REAL, and if it is real there IS no way to overcome it. The Holy Spirit dispels it simply through the calm recognition that it has never been. As He looks upon the guiltless Son of God, he KNOWS this is true. And being true for you, you CANNOT attack yourself, for WITHOUT guilt, attack is impossible. You, then, ARE saved BECAUSE God's Son is guiltless. And being wholly pure, you ARE invulnerable.

Lesson 159 "I give the miracles I have received."

You understand that you are healed when you give healing. You accept forgiveness as accomplished in yourself when you forgive. You recognize your brother as yourself, and thus do you perceive that you are whole. There is no miracle you cannot give, for all are given you. Receive them now by opening the storehouse of your mind where they are laid, and giving them away.

Christ's vision is a miracle. It comes from far beyond itself, for it reflects Eternal Love and the rebirth of love which never dies, but has been kept obscure. Christ's vision pictures Heaven, for it sees a world so like to Heaven that what God created perfect can be mirrored there. The darkened glass the world presents can show but twisted images in broken parts. The real world pictures Heaven's innocence.

Christ's vision is the miracle in which all miracles are born. It is their source, remaining with each miracle you give, and yet remaining yours. It is the bond by which the giver and receiver are united in extension here on earth as they are one in Heaven. Christ beholds no sin in anyone, and in His sight the sinless are as one. Their holiness was given by His Father and Himself.

Christ's vision is the bridge between the worlds, and in its power can you safely trust to carry you from this world into one made holy by forgiveness. Things which seem quite solid here are merely shadows there, transparent, faintly seen, at times forgot, and never able to obscure the light that shines beyond them. Holiness has been restored to vision, and the blind can see.

This is the Holy Spirit's single gift; the treasure house to which you can appeal with perfect certainty for everything that can contribute to your happiness. All are laid here already. All can be received but for the asking. Here the door is never locked, and no one is denied his least request or his most urgent need. There is no sickness not already healed. No lack unsatisfied, no need unmet, within this golden treasury of Christ.

Here does the world remember what was lost when it was made. For here it is repaired, made new again but in a different light. What was to be the home of sin becomes the center of redemption and the hearth of mercy, where the suffering are healed and welcome. No one will be turned away from this new home, where his salvation waits. No one is stranger to him. No one asks for anything of him except the gift of his acceptance of his welcoming

Christ's vision is the holy ground in which the lilies of forgiveness set their roots. This is their home. They can be brought from here back to the world, but they can never grow in its unnourishing and shallow soil. They need the light and warmth and kindly care Christ's charity provides. They need the love with which He looks on them. And they become His messengers which give as they received.

Take from His storehouse, that its treasures may increase. His lilies do not leave their home when they are carried back into the world. Their roots remain. They do not leave their source, but carry its beneficence with them, and turn the world into a garden like the one they came from, and to which they go again with added fragrance. Now are they twice blessed. The messages they brought from Christ have been delivered and returned to them. And they return them gladly unto Him.

Behold the store of miracles set out for you to give. Are you not worth the gift, when God appointed it be given you? Judge not God's Son, but follow in the way He has established. Christ has dreamed the dream of a forgiven world. It is His gift whereby a sweet transition can be made from death to life, from hopelessness to hope. Let us an instant dream with Him. His dream awakens us to truth. His vision gives the means for a return to our unlost and everlasting sanctity in God.

Lesson 105 "God's peace and joy are mine."

God's peace and joy are yours. Today we will accept them, knowing they belong to us. And we will try to understand these gifts increase as we receive them. They are not like to the gifts the world can give, in which the giver loses as he gives the gift; the taker is the richer by his loss. These are not gifts, but bargains made with guilt. The truly given gift entails no loss. It is impossible that one can gain because another loses. This implies a limit and an insufficiency.

No gift is given thus. Such "gifts" are but a bid for a more valuable return; a loan with interest to be paid in full; a temporary lending, meant to be a pledge of debt to be repaid with more than was received by him who took the gift. This strange distortion of what giving means pervades all levels of the world you see. It strips all meaning from the gifts you give, and leaves you nothing in the ones you take.

A major learning goal this course has set is to reverse your view of giving, so you can receive. For giving has become a source of fear, and so you would avoid the only means by which you can receive. Accept God's peace and joy, and you will learn a different way of looking at a gift. God's gifts will never lessen when they are given away. They but increase thereby. As Heaven's peace and joy intensify when you accept them as God's gift to you, so does the joy of your Creator grow when you accept His joy and peace as yours.

True giving is creation. It extends the limitless to the unlimited, eternity to timelessness, and love unto itself. It adds to all that is complete already, not in simple terms of adding more, for that implies that it was less before. It adds by letting what cannot contain itself fulfill its aim of giving everything it has away, securing it forever for itself.

Today accept God's peace and joy as yours. Let Him complete Himself as He defines completion. You will understand that what completes Him must complete His Son as well. He cannot give through loss. No more can you. Receive His gift of joy and peace today, and He will thank you for your gift to Him.

Thus you prepare yourself to recognize God's gifts to you, and let your mind be free of all that would prevent success today. Now are you ready to accept the gift of peace and joy which God has given you. Now are you ready to experience the joy and peace you have denied yourself. Now you can say "God's peace and joy are mine," for you have given what you would receive.

You must succeed today if you prepare your mind as we suggest, for you have let all bars to peace and joy be lifted up, and what is yours can come to you at last. So tell yourself "God's peace and joy are mine," and close your eyes a while, and let His Voice assure you that the words you speak are true.

Spend your five minutes thus with Him each time you can today, but do not think that less is worthless when you cannot give Him more. At least remember hourly to say the words which call on Him to give you what He wills to give, and wills you to receive. Determine not to interfere today with what He wills. And if a brother seems to tempt you to deny God's gift to him, see it as but another chance to let yourself receive the gifts of God as yours. Then bless your brother thankfully, and say:

"My brother, peace and joy I offer you,

That I may have God's peace and joy as mine."

Section 5 - The Light of the World

I am come as a light into the world which DOES deny itself everything. It does this simply by dissociating itself FROM everything. It is therefore an illusion of isolation, MAINTAINED by fear of the same loneliness which IS its illusion. I have told you that I am with you always even to the end of the world. That is WHY I am the light of the world. If I am with you in the loneliness of the world, THE LONELINESS IS GONE. You CANNOT maintain the illusion of loneliness if you are NOT alone.

My purpose, then, IS to overcome the world. I do not attack it, but my light must dispel it because of WHAT IT IS. Light does not ATTACK darkness, but it DOES shine it away. If my light goes with you everywhere, YOU shine it away WITH ME. The light becomes OURS, and you CANNOT abide in darkness, any more than darkness can abide anywhere you go. The remembrance of me IS the remembrance of yourself and of Him Who sent me to you.

You WERE in darkness until God's Will was done completely by ANY part of the Sonship. When it was, it was perfectly accomplished by ALL. How else could it BE perfectly accomplished? My mission was simply to UNITE the Will of the Sonship WITH the Will of the Father by being aware of the Father's Will myself. This is the awareness I came to give YOU, and YOUR problem in accepting it IS the problem of this world. Dispelling it is salvation, and in this sense I AM the salvation of the world.

The world MUST despise and reject me, because the world IS the belief that love is impossible. YOUR reactions to me ARE the reactions of the world to God. If you will accept the fact that I am with you, you are DENYING the world and ACCEPTING GOD. My will IS His, and YOUR will to hear me IS the decision to hear His Voice and abide in His Will. As He sent me to you, so will I send you to others. But I will go to them WITH you, so we can teach them union and peace.

Do you not think the world needs peace as much as you do? Do you not want to give it to the world as much as you want to receive it? For unless you do, you will NOT receive it. If you will to have it of me, you MUST give it. Rehabilitation does not come from anyone ELSE. You can have GUIDANCE from without, but you must ACCEPT it from within. The guidance must become what YOU want, or else it will be meaningless to you. That is why rehabilitation is a collaborative venture. I can tell you what to DO, but this will not really help you unless you collaborate by believing that I KNOW what to do. Only then will your MIND will to follow me.

Without YOUR will, you cannot be rehabilitated. MOTIVATION TO BE HEALED is the crucial factor in rehabilitation. Without this, you are deciding AGAINST healing, and your veto of my will FOR you MAKES HEALING IMPOSSIBLE. If healing IS our joint will, unless our wills ARE joined you CANNOT be healed. This is obvious when you consider what healing is FOR.

Healing is the way in which the separation is overcome. Separation is overcome by UNION. It CANNOT be overcome by separating. The WILL to unite must be unequivocal, or the will ITSELF is separated or NOT WHOLE. Your will is the means by which you determine your own condition, because will is the MECHANISM OF DECISION. It is the power by which you separate or join, and experience pain or joy accordingly. My will cannot OVERCOME yours, because YOURS IS AS POWERFUL AS MINE. If it were not so, the Sons of God would be unequal.

All things BECOME possible through our joint will. But my will alone will not help you. Your will is as free as mine, and God Himself would not go against it. I cannot will what God does not will. I CAN offer you my will to make yours invincible by this sharing, but I CANNOT oppose yours without competing with it and thereby violating God's Will for you. Nothing God created can oppose your will, as nothing God created can oppose His. God GAVE your will its power, which I can only acknowledge in honor of His.

If you want to be LIKE me, I will help you, knowing that we ARE alike. If you want to be DIFFERENT, I will wait until you change your mind. I can TEACH you, but only you can choose to LISTEN to my teaching. How else can it be, if God's Kingdom IS freedom? Freedom cannot be learned by tyranny of ANY kind, and the perfect equality of ALL God's Sons cannot be recognized through the dominion of one will over another. God's Sons are equal in will, all being the Will of their Father. This is the ONLY lesson I can teach, knowing that it is true.

When your will is NOT mine, it is not Our Father's. This means that you have imprisoned YOURS, and have not LET it be free. Of yourselves you can do nothing, because of yourselves you ARE nothing. I am nothing without the Father, and YOU are nothing without me because by DENYING the Father you deny YOURSELF. I will ALWAYS remember you, and in MY remembrance OF you lies your remembrance of YOURSELF. In our remembrance of EACH OTHER lies our remembrance of God. And in this remembrance lies your freedom, because your freedom is in Him.

Join then with me in praise of Him AND you whom He created. This is our gift of gratitude to Him, which He will share with ALL His Creations, to whom He gives equally whatever is acceptable to Him. BECAUSE it is acceptable to Him, it is the gift of freedom, which IS His Will for all His Sons. By OFFERING freedom you will be free, because freedom is the only gift which you can offer to God's Sons, being an acknowledgment of what they are and what HE is.

Freedom is creation because it is love. What you seek to imprison you do NOT love. Therefore, when you seek to imprison ANYONE, including YOURSELF, you do not love him and you cannot identify with him. When you imprison yourself, you are losing sight of your true identification with me and with the Father. Your identification IS with the Father and with the Son. It CANNOT be with one and not the other. If you are part of one, you MUST be part of the other because they ARE One.

The Holy Trinity is holy BECAUSE It is One. If you exclude YOURSELF from this union, you are perceiving the Holy Trinity as separated. You MUST be included in It, because It IS everything. Unless you take your place in It and fulfill your function AS part of It, It is as bereft as YOU are. No part of It can be imprisoned if Its Truth is to be known.

Can you be separated from your identification and be at peace? Dissociation is NOT a solution; it is a DELUSION. The delusional believe that truth will ASSAIL them, and so they DO NOT SEE IT because they prefer the delusion. Judging truth as something they do NOT want, they perceive deception and block knowledge. Help them by offering them YOUR unified will on their behalf, as I am offering you mine on YOURS. Alone we can do nothing, but TOGETHER our wills fuse into something whose power is far beyond the power of its separate parts.

By NOT BEING SEPARATE, the Will of God is established IN ours and AS ours. This will is invincible BECAUSE it is undivided. The UNDIVIDED will of the Sonship is the perfect creator, being wholly in the likeness of God, Whose Will it IS. YOU cannot be exempt from it, if you are to understand what it is and what YOU are. By separating your will from mine, you ARE exempting yourself from the Will of God which IS yourself.

But to heal is still to make whole. Therefore to heal is to UNITE with those who are LIKE you, because perceiving this likeness IS to recognize the Father. If YOUR perfection is in Him and ONLY in Him, how can you KNOW it WITHOUT recognizing Him? The recognition of God is the recognition of yourself. There IS no separation of God and His Creation. You will learn this as you learn that there is no separation of YOUR will and mine.

Let the love of God shine upon you by your acceptance of me. MY reality is yours and His. By joining YOUR will with mine, you are signifying your awareness that the Will of God is One. His Oneness and ours are not separate, because His Oneness ENCOMPASSES ours. To join WITH me is to restore His power TO you BECAUSE we are sharing it. I offer you only the recognition of His power in you, but in that lies ALL truth. As WE unite, we unite with Him. Glory be to the union of God and His Holy Sons, because all glory lies IN them because they ARE united.

The miracles WE do bear witness to the Will of the Father for His Son, and to our joy in uniting WITH His Will FOR us. When you unite with me, you are uniting WITHOUT the ego, because I have renounced the ego in myself, and therefore CANNOT unite with yours. OUR union is therefore the way to renounce the ego in YOURSELVES. The truth in both of us is BEYOND the ego. By willing that, you HAVE gone beyond it toward truth.

Our success in transcending the ego is guaranteed by God, and I can share my perfect confidence IN His Promise because I know He gave me this confidence for both of us and ALL of us. I bring His Peace back to all His Children, because I received it of Him for us all. Nothing can prevail against our united wills, because nothing can prevail against God's. Would ye know the Will of God for YOU? Ask it of me, who knows it for you, and you will find it. I will deny YOU nothing, as God denies ME nothing.

Ours is simply the journey back to God Who is our home. Whenever fear intrudes anywhere along the road to peace, it is ALWAYS because the ego has attempted to JOIN the journey with us AND CANNOT DO SO. Sensing defeat and angered by it, it regards itself as rejected and becomes retaliative. You are invulnerable to its retaliation BECAUSE I AM WITH YOU. On this journey, you have chosen me as your companion INSTEAD of your ego. Do not try to hold on to both, or you will try to go in different directions and will lose the way.

The ego's way is not mine, but it is also NOT YOURS. The Holy Spirit has one direction for ALL minds, and the one He taught me IS yours. Let us not lose sight of His direction through illusions, for ONLY illusions of another direction can obscure the one for which God's Voice speaks in all of us. Never accord the ego the power to interfere with the journey, because it HAS none, and the journey is the way to what is TRUE. Leave ALL deception behind, and reach beyond all attempts of the ego to hold you back.

I DO go before you, because I AM beyond the ego. Reach therefore for my hand because you WANT to transcend the ego. My will will NEVER be wanting, and if you want to share it YOU WILL. I give it willingly and gladly, because I need YOU as much as you need ME.

Section 3 - The Ladder of Prayer

Prayer has no beginning and no end. It is a part of life. But it does change in form, and grows with learning until it reaches its formless state, and fuses into total communication with God. In its asking form it need not, and often does not, make appeal to God, or even involve belief in Him. At that level prayer is merely wanting, out of a sense of scarcity and lack.

The prayer, or asking-out-of-need, always involves feelings of weakness and inadequacy, and could never be made by a Son of God who knows Who he is. No-one, then, who is sure of his Identity could pray in this form. Yet it is also true that no-one who is uncertain of his Identity could avoid praying in this way. And prayer is as continual as life. Everyone prays without ceasing. Ask and you have received, for you have established what it is you want.

It is also possible to reach a higher form of asking-out-of-need, for in this world prayer must be used for reparation, and so it must entail levels of learning. Here, the asking may be addressed to God in honest belief, though not yet with understanding. A vague and usually unstable sense of identification has generally been reached, but it tends to be blurred by a deep-rooted sense of sin. It is possible at this level to continue to ask for things of this world in various forms, but it is also possible to ask for qualities such as honesty or goodness, and particularly for forgiveness for the many sources of guilt that inevitably underlie any prayer of need. Without guilt there is no scarcity. The sinless have no needs.

The prayer for enemies thus becomes a prayer for your own freedom. Now it is no longer a contradiction in terms. Rather it is a statement of the unity of Christ and a recognition of His sinlessness. And now it has become holy, for it acknowledges the Son of God as he was created.

Let it never be forgotten that prayer at any level is always for yourself. If you unite with anyone in prayer, you make him part of you. The enemy is you, as is the Christ. Before it can become holy, then, prayer becomes a choice. You do not choose for another. You can but choose for yourself. Pray truly for your enemies, then, for herein lies your own salvation. Forgive them for your sins, and you will be forgiven indeed.

Prayer is a ladder reaching up to Heaven. At the top there is a transformation much like your own, for prayer is part of you. The things of earth are left behind, all unremembered. There is no asking, for there is no lack. Identity in Christ is fully recognized as set forever, beyond all change and incorruptible. The light no longer flickers, and will never go out.

Now, without needs of any kind, and clad forever in the pure sinlessness which is the gift of God to you, His Son, prayer can again become what it was meant to be. For now it rises as a song of thanks to your Creator, sung without words, or thoughts, or vain desires, unneedful now of anything at all. So it extends, as it was meant to do. And for this giving God Himself gives thanks.

God is the goal of every prayer, giving it timelessness instead of end. Nor has it a beginning, because the goal has never changed. Prayer in its earlier forms is an illusion, because there is no need for a ladder to reach what one has never left. Yet prayer is part of forgiveness as long as forgiveness, itself an illusion, remains unattained. Prayer is tied up with learning until the goal of learning has been reached. And then all things will be transformed together, and returned unblemished into the Mind of God.

Being beyond learning, this state cannot be described. The stages necessary to its attainment, however, need to be understood, if peace is to be restored to the Son of God, who lives now with the illusion of death and the fear of God.

Section 7 - The Loss of Certainty

Dictated without notes.

We said before that the abilities which man possesses are only shadows of his true abilities. The Soul's true functions are knowing, loving, and creating. The intrusion of the ability to perceive, which is inherently judgmental, was introduced only after the Separation. No one has been sure of anything since then. You will also remember that I made it very clear that the Resurrection was the return to knowledge, which was accomplished by the union of my will with the Father's.

Since the Separation, the words "create" and "make" are inevitably confused. When you make something, you make it first out of a sense of lack or need, and second, out of a something that already exists. Anything that is made is made for a specific purpose. It has no true generalizability. When you make something to fill a perceived lack, which is obviously why you would make anything, you are tacitly implying that you believe in the Separation. Knowing does not lead to doing, as we have frequently observed already.

What appears to be contradictory about the difference between knowing and perceiving, and Revelation and miracles, is again the fallacy that is the root cause of all subsequent errors. The miracle was associated with perception, and not with knowing. However, we also noted that prayer is the medium of miracles, and also the natural communication of the Creator and the Created. Prayer is always an affirmation of knowledge, not of accurate perception. That is why unless perception has entered into it, it calls on Revelation.

The confusion between your own creation and what you create is so profound that it has literally become impossible to know anything, because knowledge is always stable. It is quite evident that human beings are not. Nevertheless, they are perfectly stable as God created them. In this sense, when their behavior is unstable, they are obviously disagreeing with God's idea of the Creation. This is a fundamental right of man, although not one he would care to exercise if he were in his Right Mind.

The problem that is bothering you most is the fundamental question which man continually asks of himself, but which cannot properly be directed to himself at all. He keeps on asking "himself" what he is. This implies that the answer is not only one which he knows, but one which is up to him. The first part of this statement is perfectly true, but the second part is not. We have frequently commented on the absolute necessity of correcting all fallacious thinking which associates man in any way with his own Creation. Man CANNOT perceive himself correctly. He has no image at all. The word "image" is always perception related, and is not a product of knowing. Images are symbolic, and stand for something else. The current emphasis on "changing your image" is a good description of the power of perception, but it implies that there is nothing to KNOW.

Prayer is the medium of miracles, not because God created perceptions, but because God created YOU. At the beginning of this course, we said that YOU are a miracle. Therefore, the miracle worker is a miracle NOT of his own creation. Unless perception rests on some knowing basis, it is so unstable that it doesn't mean anything. Knowing is not open to interpretation, because its meaning is its own. It is possible to interpret meaning, but this is always open to error because it involves the perception of meaning. All of these wholly needless complexities are the result of man's attempt to regard himself both as separated and unseparated at the same time. It is impossible to undertake a confusion as fundamental as this without engaging in further confusion.

Methodologically, man's mind has been very creative. But, as always occurs when method and content are separated, it has not been utilized for anything but an attempt to escape a fundamental and entirely inescapable impasse. This kind of thinking cannot result in a creative outcome, though it has resulted in considerable ingenuity. It is noteworthy, however, that this ingenuity has almost totally divorced him from knowledge.

Knowledge does not require ingenuity at all. When we say "the truth shall set you free," we mean that all this kind of thinking is a waste of time, but that you are free of the need of engaging in it.

Note again that the functions of the Soul were not referred to as abilities. This point requires clarification, because abilities are beliefs which are BASED on the scarcity fallacy, since they do not mean anything apart from within-group comparisons. As you yourself never fail to point out, "nobody has none of an ability, and nobody has all of it." That is, of course, why the curve never rests on the line. The clearest implications of relativity, which properly inheres in this statement, DEMONSTRATE that abilities are not functions of the Soul. The Soul's functions are NOT relative. They are ABSOLUTE. They are OF God and FROM God, and therefore God-like.

Prayer is a way of asking for something. When we said that prayer is the medium of miracles, we also said that the only meaningful prayer is for forgiveness, because those who have been forgiven HAVE everything. Once forgiveness has been accepted, prayer in the usual sense becomes utterly without meaning. Essentially, a prayer for forgiveness is nothing more than a request that we may be able to recognize something we already have.

In electing the ability to perceive instead of the will to know, man placed himself in a position where he could resemble his Father ONLY by perceiving miraculously. But he lost the knowledge that he HIMSELF is a miracle. MIRACULOUS CREATION was his own Source, and also his own real function. "God created man in his own image and likeness" is correct in meaning, but the words are open to considerable misinterpretation. This is avoided, however, if "image" is understood to mean "thought," and "likeness" is taken as "of a like quality." God DID create the Son in His own Thought, and of a quality like to His own. There IS nothing else.

Perception is impossible WITHOUT a belief in "more" and "less." Unless perception, at every level, involves selectivity, it is incapable of organization. In all types of perception, there is a continual process of accepting and rejecting, of organizing and reorganizing, and of shifting and changing focus. Evaluation is an essential aspect of perception, because judgment MUST be made for selection. "Lack of lack" is a concept which is meaningless to a perceiver, because the ability to perceive at all RESTS ON lack.

What happens to perceptions if there ARE no judgments, and there is nothing BUT perfect equality? Perception is automatically useless. Truth can only be KNOWN. All of it is equally true, and knowing any part of it IS to know all of it.

Forgiveness is the healing of the perception of separation. Correct perception of EACH OTHER is necessary ONLY because minds have willed to see themselves AS separate beings. Each Soul knows God completely. This IS the miraculous power of the Soul. The fact that each Soul has this power completely is a fact that is entirely alien to human thinking, in which if any ONE has everything, there is nothing LEFT.

God's miracles are as total as His Thought, because they ARE His thoughts. God shines in them all with perfect light. If they recognize this light anywhere, they know it universally. Revelation cannot be explained, because it IS knowledge. Revelation HAPPENS. It is the only REALLY natural happening, because it reflects the nature of God.

As long as perception lasts, prayer has a place. Since perception rests on lack, those who perceive have not totally accepted the Atonement and given over themselves to truth. Perception IS a separated state, and the perceiver DOES need healing. Communion, not prayer, is the natural state of those who know. God and HIS miracles are inseparable.

All words, at best, are preparatory. THE word is really a thought. No one WORD is universally meaningful, because a word is a symbol, but thought is not divisible by creation. The original name for "thought" and "word" was the same. The quotation should read "In the beginning was the thought, and the thought was with God, and the thought WAS God." How beautiful indeed are the thoughts of God, who live in His light. Your worth is beyond perception because it is beyond doubt.

Do not perceive yourself in different lights. KNOW yourself in the One Light, where the miracle which is you is perfectly clear.

The prerequisites for therapy must include the following conditions:

1. The procedure must involve the recognition rather than the denial of the importance of thought.

2. The exact equality of everyone who is involved. This must include Me.

3. No one is either therapist or patient. (Bill should add "teacher or pupil.")

4. Above all EVERYONE involved must want to give up everything that is NOT true. The reason for the negative emphasis here is that therapy implies something HAS gone wrong. Even though the purpose is to correct, those who are ill ARE negative.

6. The therapist (hopefully) does have the role of being the better perceiver. (This is also, again hopefully, true of the teacher.) It does not follow that he is the better knower. Temporarily, the therapist or teacher can help in straightening out twisted perceptions, which is also the only role that I would ever contribute myself. All therapy should do is try to place EVERYONE involved in the right frame of mind to help one another. It is essentially a process of true courtesy, including courtesy to Me.

Any form of mental illness can truthfully be described as an expression of viciousness. We said before that those who are afraid are apt to be vicious. If we were willing to forgive other people's misperceptions of us, they could not possibly affect us at all. There is little doubt that you can explain your present attitudes in terms of how people used to look at you, but there is no wisdom in doing so. In fact, the whole historical approach can justifiably be called doubtful.

As you have so often said, no one has adopted ALL of his parents' attitudes as his own. In every case, there has been a long process of choice, in which the individual has escaped from those he himself vetoed, while retaining those he voted FOR. Bill has not retained his parents political beliefs, in spite of the particular kind of newspapers that constituted their own reading matter in this area. The reason why he could do this was because he believed he was free in this area.

There must be some acute problem OF HIS OWN that would make him so eager to accept their misperception of his own worth. This tendency can ALWAYS be regarded as punitive. It cannot be justified by the inequality of the strengths of parents and children. This is never more than temporary, and is largely a matter of maturational and thus physical difference. It does not last unless it is held onto.

When B's father came to his new office and "destroyed" it, it is quite apparent that Bill MUST have been willing to let it be destroyed. The many times that he has commented on this event alone would suggest that the extreme importance of this misperception in his own distorted thinking. Why should anyone accord an obvious misperception so much power? There cannot be any real justification for it, because even Bill himself recognized the real problem by saying "How could he do this to me?" The answer is HE didn't.

Bill has a very serious question to ask himself in this connection. We said before that the purpose of the Resurrection was to "demonstrate that no amount of misperception has any influence at all on a Son of God." This demonstration EXONERATES those who misperceive, by establishing beyond doubt that they have NOT hurt anyone. B's question, which he must ask himself very honestly, is whether he is willing to demonstrate that his parents have NOT hurt him. Unless he is willing to do this, he has not forgiven them.

The essential goal of therapy is the same as that of knowledge. No one can survive independently as long as he is willing to see himself through the eyes of others. This will always put him in a position where he MUST see himself in different lights. Parents do not create the image of their children, though they may perceive images which they do create. However, as we have already said, you are not an image. If you SIDE WITH image-makers, you are merely being idolatrous.

Bill has no justification whatever for perpetuating ANY image of himself at all. He is NOT an image. Whatever is true of him is wholly benign. It is essential that he KNOW this about himself, but he cannot know it while he chooses to interpret himself as vulnerable enough to BE hurt. This is a peculiar kind of arrogance, whose narcissistic component is perfectly obvious. It endows the perceiver with sufficient unreal strength to make him over, and then acknowledges the perceiver's miscreation. There are times when this strange lack of real courtesy appears to be a form of humility. Actually, it is never more than simple spite.

Bill, your parents did misperceive you in many ways, but their ability to perceive was quite warped, and their misperceptions stood in the way of their own knowledge. There is no reason why it should stand in the way of yours. It is still true that you believe they DID something to you. This belief is extremely dangerous to your perception, and wholly destructive of your knowledge. This is not only true of your attitudes toward your parents, but also of your misuse of your friends. You still think that you MUST respond to their errors AS IF they were true. By reacting self-destructively, you are GIVING them approval for their misperceptions.

No one has the right to change himself according to different circumstances. Only his actions are capable of appropriate variation. His belief in himself is a constant, unless it rests on perceptual acuity rather than knowledge of what he is.

It is your DUTY to establish beyond doubt that you are totally unwilling to side with (identify with) anyone's misperceptions of you, including your own. If you become concerned with totally irrelevant factors, such as the physical condition of a classroom, the number of students, the hour of the course, and the many elements which you may choose to select for emphasis as a basis for misperception, you have lost the knowledge of what ANY interpersonal relationship is for. It is NOT true that the difference between pupil and teacher is lasting. They meet IN ORDER to abolish the difference. At the beginning, since we are still in time, they come together on the basis of inequality of ability and experience. The aim of the teacher is to give them more of what is temporarily his. This process has all of the miracle conditions we referred to at the beginning. The teacher (or miracle worker) gives more to those who have less, bringing them closer to equality with him, at the same time gaining for himself.

The confusion here is only because they do not gain the same things, because they do not NEED the same things. If they did, their respective, though temporary roles would not be conducive to mutual profit. Freedom from fear can be achieved by BOTH teacher and pupil ONLY if they do not compare either their needs or their positions in regard to each other in terms of higher and lower.

Presumably, children must learn from parents. What parents learn from children is merely of a different order. Ultimately, there is no difference in order, but this involves only knowledge. Neither parents nor children can be said to HAVE knowledge, or their relationships would not exist AS IF they were on different levels. The same is true of the teacher and the pupil. Children have an authority problem ONLY if they believe that their image is influenced BY the authority. This is an act of will on their part, because they are electing to misperceive the authority and GIVE him this power.

A TEACHER with an authority problem is merely a pupil who refuses to teach others. He wants to maintain HIMSELF in a position where he can be misused and misperceived. This makes him resentful of teaching, because of what he insists it has done to him.

The ONLY way out of this particular aspect of the desert is still to leave. The way this is left is to release EVERYONE involved, by ABSOLUTELY REFUSING to engage in any form of honoring error. Neither teacher nor pupil is imprisoned by learning unless he uses it as an attack. If he does this, he will be imprisoned whether he actually teaches or learns, or refuses to be engaged in the process at all.

The role of a teacher, properly conceived, is one of leading himself and others out of the desert. The value of this role can hardly be underestimated, if only because it was one to which I very gladly dedicated my own life. I have repeatedly asked MY pupils to follow me. This means that, to be effective teachers, they MUST interpret teaching as I do. I have made EVERY effort to teach you ENTIRELY without fear. If you do not listen, you will be unable to avoid the VERY obvious error of perceiving teaching as a threat.

It is hardly necessary to say that teaching is a process whose purpose is to produce learning. The ultimate purpose of ALL learning is to abolish fear. This is necessary so that knowledge can happen. The role of the teacher is NOT the role of God. This confusion is all too frequently made, by parents, teachers, therapists, and the clergy. It is a real misunderstanding of both God and His miracles. Any teacher who believes that teaching is fearful CANNOT learn because he is paralyzed. He also cannot really teach.

Bill was quite right in maintaining that this course is a prerequisite for his. However, he was really saying much more than that. The purpose of this course IS to prepare you for knowledge. So is the only real purpose of ANY legitimate course. All that is required of you as a teacher is to follow Me.

Descartes engaged in a very interesting teaching procedure, and one from which he himself learned a great deal. He began with doubting the existence of everything, except himself. He insisted that his own existence was not open to doubt, and rebuilt his entire thought system on the one premise "I think, therefore I am." It is noteworthy that he arrived at accepting the entire system he originally doubted, solely on the basis of this ONE piece of knowledge. There was, however, a distinct shift in his own perception. He no longer really questioned the reality of what he perceived, because he KNEW he was there.

We mentioned before that Bill is not too sure of this, and that is why we suggested that he concentrate on "Lord, here I am." A teacher is unlikely to be effective unless he begins with BEING THERE. B, this is not really open to question. You will lose all your fear of teaching and relating in any form once you know who you are. There is no point whatever in remaining in the prison of believing that this is up to you. You do NOT exist in different lights. It is this belief which has confused you about your own reality. Why would you want to remain so obscure to yourself?

Section 5 - The Inheritance of God's Son

Never forget that the Sonship is your salvation, for the Sonship is your Soul. As God's Creation it is yours, and belonging to you, it is His. Your Soul does not need salvation, but your mind needs to learn what salvation IS. You are not saved FROM anything, but you ARE saved FOR glory. Glory is your inheritance, given your Soul by its Creator, that you might EXTEND it. But if you hate part of your own Soul, ALL your understanding is lost, because you are looking on what God creates AS YOURSELF without love. And since what He created IS part of Him, you are denying Him His place in His own altar.

The peace of YOUR Soul lies in its limitlessness. Limit the peace you share, and your own Soul MUST be unknown to you. Every altar to God is part of your Soul, because the Light He created is One with Him. Would you cut a brother off from the Light that is yours? You could not do so, if you realized that YOU CAN ONLY DARKEN YOUR OWN MIND. As you bring HIM back, so will YOUR mind return. That is the law of God, for the protection of the wholeness of His Son.

ONLY YOU CAN DEPRIVE YOURSELF OF ANYTHING. Do not oppose this realization, for it is truly the beginning of the dawn of light. Remember also that the denial of this simple fact takes many forms, and these you must learn to recognize, and oppose steadfastly and WITHOUT EXCEPTION. This is a crucial step in the re-awakening. The beginning phases of this reversal are often quite painful, for as blame is withdrawn from without, there is a strong tendency to harbor it within.

It is difficult, at first, to realize that this is EXACTLY the same thing, for there IS no distinction between within and without. If your brothers are part of YOU, and you blame THEM for your deprivation, you ARE blaming yourself. And you cannot blame yourself WITHOUT blaming them.

That is why blame must be UNDONE, NOT re-allocated. Lay it to yourself, and you cannot KNOW yourself, for ONLY THE EGO BLAMES AT ALL. Self-blame is therefore ego identification, and as strong an ego defense as blaming others. YOU CANNOT ENTER GOD's PRESENCE IF YOU ATTACK HIS SON. When His Son lifts his voice in praise of his Creator, he WILL hear the Voice of his Father. But the Creator cannot be praised WITHOUT His Son, for their glory is shared, and they are glorified together. Christ is at God's altar, waiting to welcome His Son. But come wholly without condemnation, for otherwise you will believe that the door is barred, and you cannot enter.

The door is NOT barred, and it is impossible for you to be unable to enter the place where God would have you be. But love yourself with the love of Christ, for so does your Father love you. You CAN refuse to enter, but you CANNOT bar the door which Christ holds open. Come unto me who hold it open FOR you, for while I live, it cannot be shut, and I live forever. God is my Life and YOURS, and NOTHING is denied by God to His Son. At God's altar, Christ waits for the restoration of Himself in YOU.

God knows His Son as wholly blameless as Himself, and He is approached through the appreciation of His Son. Christ waits for your acceptance of Him as YOURSELF, and His Wholeness as YOURS. For Christ is the Son of God, who lives in his Creator, and shines with His glory. Christ is the extension of the love and the loveliness of God, as perfect as his Creator, and at peace with Him. Blessed is the Son of God, whose radiance is of His Father, and whose glory He wills to share as His Father shares it with Him.

There is no condemnation in the Son, for there is no condemnation in the Father. Sharing the perfect Love of the Father, the Son must share what belongs to Him, for otherwise He will not know the Father or the Son. Peace be unto you who rest in God, and in whom the whole Sonship rests.

Section 12 - The State of Grace

Grace is the natural state of every Son of God. When he is NOT in a state of grace he IS out of his natural environment, and does NOT function well. Everything he does becomes a strain, because he was not created for the environment which he has made. He therefore CANNOT adapt to it, nor can he adapt IT to HIM. There is no point in trying. A Son of God is happy ONLY when he knows he is WITH God. That is the only environment in which he will not experience strain, because that is where he belongs. It is also the only environment that is worthy of him, because his own worth is beyond ANYTHING that he can make.

Consider the Kingdom which YOU have made, and judge its worth fairly. Is it worthy to be a home for a Child of God? Does it protect his peace, and shine love upon him? Does it keep his heart untouched by fear, and allow him to give always without any sense of loss? Does it teach him that this giving IS his joy, and that God Himself thanks him for his giving?

That is the only environment in which you can be happy. You cannot make it, any more than you can make yourselves. But it has been created for you, as you were created for it. God watches over His children and denies them nothing. But when they deny Him they do NOT know this, because THEY deny themselves everything. You who could give the love of God to everything you see and touch and remember are literally denying Heaven to yourselves. I call upon you again to remember that I have chosen you to teach the Kingdom TO the Kingdom. There are no exceptions to this lesson because the lack of exceptions IS the lesson.

Every Son who returns to the Kingdom with this lesson in his heart has healed the Sonship and given thanks to God. Everyone who learns this lesson has become the perfect teacher, because he has learned it of the Holy Spirit, who wants to teach him everything He knows. When a mind has only light, it KNOWS only light. Its own radiance shines all around it, and extends out into the darkness of other minds, transforming them into majesty. The majesty of God is there, for YOU to recognize and appreciate and KNOW.

Perceiving the majesty of God AS your brother is to accept your OWN inheritance. God gives only equally. If you recognize His gift to anyone ELSE, you have acknowledged what He has given YOU. Nothing is as easy to perceive as truth. This is the perception which is immediate, clear, and natural. You have trained yourselves NOT to see it, and this HAS been very difficult for you. OUT of your natural environment you may well ask, "what is truth?" because truth IS the environment by which and for which you were created. You do not know yourselves because you do not know YOUR Creator. You do not know YOUR creations, because you do not know your brothers who created them WITH you.

We said before that only the whole Sonship is a worthy co-creator with God, because only the whole Sonship can create LIKE Him. Whenever you heal a brother by recognizing his worth, you are acknowledging HIS power to create and YOURS. HE cannot have lost what YOU recognize, and you MUST have the glory you see in HIM. He is a co-creator with God with YOU. Deny his creative power and you are denying yours AND THAT OF GOD WHO CREATED YOU. You cannot deny part of the truth. You do not know your creations because you do not know their creator. You do not know yourselves because you do not know YOURS.

Your creations cannot establish your reality, any more than YOU can establish God's. But you can KNOW both. Being is known by sharing. Because God shared His Being with you, you can know Him. But you must also know all He created to know what THEY have shared. Without your Father you will not know your fatherhood. The Kingdom of God includes all His Sons and their children, who are like the Sons as they are like the Father. Know then the Sons of God, and you will know ALL Creation.

Chapter 3 - The Ending of the Dream

Illusions are made as substitutes for truth, for which no substitutes are possible. Creator separate from creation was the first illusion, where all gifts of fear were born. For now creation could not be like its Creator, Who could never leave what He Himself created part of Him. Now must there be a substitute for love, which cannot have an opposite in truth and, being all, can have no substitute. So fear was made, and with it came the need for gifts to lend the substance to the dream in which there is no substance. Now the dream seems to have value, for its offerings appear as hope and strength and even love, if only for an instant. They content the frightened dreamer for a little while, and let him not remember the first dream which gifts of fear but offer him again.

The seeming solace of illusions' gifts are now his armor, and the sword he holds to save himself from waking. For before he could awaken, he would first be forced to call to mind the first dream once again. It is not God Who asks a price of him, but having drawn a veil across the truth, he now must let the veil be drawn away so that its lack of substance can be seen. No one would hesitate to leave a dream of shock and terror, merciless decay and sickening contortions, with despair always in sight and death not far behind, if he believed that it was but a dream. Yet if he thinks that he must first go through a greater terror still, he must see hope in what will now appear the "better" dream.

And now he seeks within his dream to find what gifts it may contain. What can you get within its shadows? Who can save you now by giving you the love you threw away? What can you learn to do to make yourself a master over others? What is there that is your special gift within the dream? Find these and do not waken from the dream, for it can give you what you think you lack. And if you waken all its gifts will go, your armor and your sword will disappear, and vultures, always circling overhead, will claim you as their lawful prey at last.

Oh children of the Father you forgot, you have not put your idols in His place, nor made Him give the gifts of fear you made. Let me be Savior from illusions. Truth may be concealed from you by evil dreams, but it is only from the dreams that you have need of saving. Truth is still untouched by your deceptions. But you cannot go past that first dream without a Savior's hand in yours. Each gift of fear would hold you back unless you let me lift it from your mind by showing you that it is but a dream within a larger dream of hopelessness in which there is no hope. Take not its gifts, for they condemn you to a lasting hell which will endure when all the seeming joy the gifts appeared to give has passed away.

Do not be tempted. Do not fall away into the shadows, and a deeper sleep in which the waking seems to be the dream. Help me give you salvation. Let us share the strength of Christ, and look upon the dream in which illusions started, and which serves to keep their birthplace secret and apart from the illumination of the truth. Come unto me. There is no need to dream of an escape from dreaming. It will fail. For if the dream were real, escape would be impossible, and there would be no hope except illusions. Do not yield to this. It is not so. For I am not a dream that comes in mockery. Salvation needs your help as well as mine. Do not forget you do not answer for yourself alone.

How joyful and how holy is our way when death has no dominion, and the dream of separation, agony and loss has been dispelled forever. Do not think that anything the gifts of fear hold out is worth an instant's hesitation, when the gate of Heaven stands before you and the Christ of God is waiting your return. Be still and hear Him, for His call to you could not be more insistent nor more dear, for it is but the call of Love Itself, Which will not cease to speak of God to you. You have forgot, but He is faithful still, because He is so like His Father He remembers Him forever in His Love. And He cannot forget creation is inseparable from Creator, so He understands that you are part of God and of the Son created like Himself.

How dear are you to Him, a part in which is every gift of God forever laid, without whom is Christ incomplete, Who is completion of His Father. Can a dream destroy a truth so holy and so pure that it encompasses all truth, and leaves nothing beyond Itself? Can you betray a love so perfect that its gifts become Itself in oneness, and this single gift is all there is to give and to receive? Oh come and let creation be again all that it always was and still will be forever and forever. Let the dream of time be given its appointed end, and let God's Son have mercy on himself.

There is a silence covering the world that was an ancient dream so long ago no one remembers now. Its time is done, and in the little space it seemed to have is nothingness. The dream has gone, and all its dreams of gifts have disappeared as well. The first dream has been seen and understood for merely an illusion of the fear on which the world was based. Behind the dream, reaching to everything, embracing all, creation and Creator still remain in perfect harmony and perfect love.

This is beyond the gate at which we stand. And shall we stay to wait upon a dream? Your holiness is mine, and mine is His. Here is His gift, complete and undefiled. It is Himself He gives, and it is this that is the truth in you. How beautiful are you who stand beside me at the gate, and call with me that everyone may come and step aside from time. Put out your hand to touch eternity and disappear into its perfect rest. Here is the peace that God intended for the Child He loves. Enter with me and let its quietness cover the earth forever. It is done. Father, your Voice has called us home at last: gone is the dream. Awake, My Child, in love.

Section 7 - The Two Decisions

Perhaps this will become clearer and more personally meaningful if the ego's use of guilt is clarified. The ego has a purpose, just as the Holy Spirit has. The ego's purpose is FEAR, because only the fearful can be egotistic. The ego's logic is as impeccable as that of the Holy Spirit, because your mind has all the means at its disposal to side with Heaven or earth, as it elects. But let us again remember that both are in you.

In Heaven there is no guilt, because the Kingdom is attained through the Atonement, which creates it in you. The word "create" is appropriate here, because once what YOU have made is undone by the Holy Spirit, the blessed residue IS restored, and therefore continues in creation. What is truly blessed is incapable of giving rise to guilt, and must give rise to joy. This makes it invulnerable to the ego, because its peace is unassailable. It is invulnerable to disruption BECAUSE it is whole.

Guilt is ALWAYS disruptive. Anything that engenders fear is divisive, because it obeys the law of division. If the ego is the symbol of the separation, it is also the symbol of guilt. Guilt is more than merely not of God. It is the symbol of the ATTACK on God. This is a totally meaningless concept EXCEPT to the ego, but do not underestimate the power of the ego's belief in it. This is the belief from which ALL guilt really stems.

The ego IS the part of the mind which believes in division. But how can part of God detach itself WITHOUT believing it is attacking Him? We spoke before of the authority problem as involving the concept of USURPING His power. The ego believes that this is what YOU did, because it believes it IS you. It follows, then, that if you identify WITH the ego, you MUST perceive yourself as guilty.

Whenever you respond to your ego, you WILL experience guilt, and you WILL fear punishment. The ego is quite literally a fearful thought. And however ridiculous the idea of attacking God may be to the sane mind, never forget that the ego is NOT SANE. It REPRESENTS a delusional system, and it speaks FOR it. Listening to the ego's voice MEANS that you believe it is possible to attack God. You believe that a part of Him has been torn away by YOU.

The classic picture of fear of retaliation from without then follows, because the severity of the guilt is so acute that it MUST be projected. Although Freud was wrong about the basic conflict itself, he was very accurate in describing its effects. Whatever you accept INTO your mind has reality for you. It is, however, only the ACCEPTANCE which makes it real.

As an extreme example of dissociation yourself, you should have little trouble in understanding that it is perfectly possible not to ACCEPT what IS in your minds. If you enthrone the ego in it, the fact that you have accepted it, or allowed it to enter, MAKES IT YOUR REALITY. This is because the mind as God created it IS capable of creating reality. We said before that you must learn to think WITH God. To think WITH Him is to think LIKE Him. This engenders joy, not guilt, because it is natural. Guilt is a sure sign that your thinking is UNnatural. Perverted thinking will ALWAYS be attended with guilt, because it IS the belief in sin.

The ego does not perceive sin as a lack of love. It perceives it as a POSITIVE ACT OF ASSAULT. This is an interpretation which is necessary to its survival, because as soon as YOU regard it as a LACK, you will automatically attempt to remedy the situation. And you will also succeed. The ego regards this as doom, but YOU must learn to regard it as freedom.

The guiltless mind cannot suffer. Being sane, it heals the body because IT has been healed. The sane mind cannot conceive of illness, because it cannot conceive of attacking anything or anyone. We said before that illness is a form of magic. It might be better to say it is a form of magical SOLUTION. The ego believes that by punishing ITSELF, it will mitigate the punishment of God. Yet even in this it is arrogant. It attributes to God a punishing attempt, and then takes over this intent as its OWN prerogative. It tries to usurp ALL the functions of God as it perceives them, because it recognizes that only total allegiance can be trusted.

But remember that the ALTERNATIVES are unalterable. The Holy Spirit, like the ego, is a decision. Together they constitute all the alternatives which your mind CAN accept and obey. The ego and the Holy Spirit are the ONLY choices which are open to you. God created one, and so you cannot eradicate it. YOU made the other, so you CAN. Only what God creates is irreversible and unchangeable. What YOU have made can always be changed, because when you do not think LIKE God, you have not really thought at all. Delusional ideas are NOT thought, but you CAN think that you believe in them.

But you are wrong. The function of thought comes FROM God and is IN God. As part of HIS thought, you cannot think APART from Him. Irrational thought is a thought DISORDER. God Himself orders your thought, because your thought was created BY Him. Guilt feelings are always a sign that you do not know this. They also show that you believe you CAN think apart from God, and WANT to.

Every thought disorder is attended by guilt at its inception, and MAINTAINED by guilt in its continuance. Guilt is inescapable for those who believe that they order their OWN thought, and must therefore obey its orders. This makes them feel RESPONSIBLE for their mind ERRORS, without recognizing that by ACCEPTING this responsibility they are really reacting IRresponsibly. If the sole responsibility of the miracle-worker is to accept the ATONEMENT, and I assure you that it is, then the responsibility for what is atoned FOR CANNOT be yours.

This contradiction cannot BE resolved except by accepting the solution of undoing. You WOULD be responsible for the effects of all your wrong thinking IF IT COULD NOT BE UNDONE. The purpose of the Atonement is to save the past in PURIFIED form only. If you accept the remedy FOR a thought-disorder, and a remedy whose efficacy is beyond doubt, how can its symptoms remain? You have reason to question the validity of symptom cure. But NO ONE believes that the symptoms can remain if the underlying CAUSE is removed.

Section 7 - The Vision of Christ

The ego is trying to teach you how to gain the whole world, and lose your own Soul. The Holy Spirit teaches that you CANNOT lose your Soul and there IS no gain in the world, for OF ITSELF, it profits nothing. To invest in something WITHOUT profit is surely to impoverish yourself, and the overhead is high. Not only is there no profit in the investment, but the cost TO YOU is enormous. For this investment costs you the world's reality, by DENYING YOURS, and gives you nothing in return. You CANNOT sell your Soul, but you CAN sell your AWARENESS of it.

You cannot perceive the soul, but you will not KNOW it while you perceive anything ELSE as more valuable. The Holy Spirit is your strength because He perceives nothing BUT your soul AS YOU. He is perfectly aware that you do NOT know yourselves, and perfectly aware of how to teach you what you are. BECAUSE He loves you, He will gladly teach you what He loves, for He wills to share it. Remembering you always, He cannot let you forget your worth. For the Father never ceases to remind Him of His Son, and He never ceases to remind His Son of the Father. God is in your memory BECAUSE of Him.

You CHOSE to forget your Father, but you did NOT will to do so. And THEREFORE, you CAN decide otherwise. As it was MY decision, so is it YOURS. YOU DO NOT WANT THE WORLD. The only thing of value in it is whatever part of it YOU look upon with love. This GIVES it the only reality it will ever have. ITS value is NOT in itself, but yours IS in you. As self value comes from self EXTENSION, so does the PERCEPTION of self value come from the projection of loving thoughts outward.

Make the world real unto YOURSELF, for the real world is the gift of the Holy Spirit, and so it BELONGS to you. Correction is for all who cannot see. To open the eyes of the blind is the Holy Spirit's mission, for He knows that they have not LOST their vision, but merely sleep. He would awaken them from the sleep of forgetting, to the remembering of God. Christ's eyes are open, and He will look upon whatever you see with love - if you accept His vision as yours.

The Holy Spirit keeps the vision of Christ for every Son of God who sleeps. In His sight, the Son of God is perfect, and He longs to share His vision WITH you. He will SHOW you the real world, because God GAVE you Heaven. Through Him, your Father calls His Son to remember. The awakening of His Son begins with his investment in the REAL world, and BY this, he will learn to REinvest in HIMSELF. For reality is one with the Father AND the Son, and the Holy Spirit blesses the real world in Their Name.

When you have seen this real world, as you will surely do, you WILL remember us. But you must learn the cost of sleeping, AND REFUSE TO PAY IT. Only then will you decide to awake. And then the real world will spring to your sight, for Christ has never slept. He is waiting to be seen, for He has never lost sight of YOU. He looks quietly on the real world, which He would SHARE with you, because He knows of the Father's love for Him. And knowing this, He would give you what is yours.

In perfect peace, He waits for you at His Father's altar, holding out the Father's love to you, in the quiet light of the Holy Spirit's blessing. For the Holy Spirit will lead everyone home to his Father, where Christ waits as his Self. Every Child of God is one in Christ, for his Being is in Christ, as Christ's is in God. Christ's love for you is His love for His Father, which He knows because He knows His Father's love for Him. When the Holy Spirit has at last led you to Christ, at the altar to His Father, perception fuses into knowledge, because perception has become so holy that its transfer to Holiness is merely its natural extension.

At the altar of God, the holy perception of God's Son becomes so enlightened that light streams into it, and the Spirit of God's Son shines in the Mind of the Father, and becomes one with it. Very gently does God shine upon Himself, loving the extension of Himself which is His Son. The world has no purpose, as it blends into the Purpose of God. For the real world has slipped quietly into Heaven, where everything eternal in it has always been. There, the Redeemer and the redeemed join in perfect love of God, and of each other. Heaven is your home, and being in God, it must ALSO be in you.

Section 2 - Is Psychotherapy a Profession

Strictly speaking the answer is no. How could a separate profession be one in which everyone is engaged? And how could any limits be laid on an interaction in which everyone is both patient and therapist in every relationship into which he enters? Yet practically speaking, it can still be said that there are those who devote themselves primarily to healing of one sort or another as their chief function. And it is to them that a large number of others turn for help. That, in effect, is the practice of therapy. These are therefore "officially" helpers. They are devoted to certain kinds of needs in their professional activities, although they may be far more able teachers outside of them. These people need no special rules, of course, but they may be called upon to use special applications of the general principles of healing.

First, the professional therapist is in an excellent position to demonstrate that there is no order of difficulty in healing. For this, however, he needs special training, because the curriculum by which he became a therapist probably taught him little or nothing about the real principles of healing. In fact, it probably tried to teach him how to make healing impossible. Most of the world's training follows a curriculum in judgment, with the aim of making the therapist a judge.

Even this the Holy Spirit can use, and will use, given the slightest invitation. The unhealed healer may be arrogant, selfish, unconcerned, and actually dishonest. He may be disinterested and unconcerned with healing as his major goal. Yet something happened to him, however slight it may have been, when he chose to be a healer, however misguided the direction he may have chosen. That "something" is enough. Sooner or later that something will rise in awareness and grow; a patient will touch his heart, and the therapist will silently ask him for help. He has himself found a therapist. He has asked the Holy Spirit to enter the relationship and heal it. He has accepted the Atonement for himself.

God is said to have looked on all He created and pronounced it good. No, He declared it perfect, and so it was. And since His creations do not change and last forever, so it is now. Yet neither a perfect therapist nor a perfect patient can possibly exist. Both must have denied their perfection, for their very need for each other implies a sense of lack. A one-to-one relationship is not one Relationship. Yet it is the means of return; the way God chose for the return of His Son. In that strange dream a strange correction must enter, for only that is the call to awake. And what else should therapy be? Awake and be glad, for all your sins have been forgiven you. This is the only message that any two should ever give each other.

Something good must come from every meeting of patient and therapist. And that good is saved for both, against the day when they can recognize that only that was real in their relationship. At that moment it is returned to them, blessed by the Holy Spirit as a gift from their Creator as a sign of His Love. For the therapeutic relationship must become like the relationship of the Father and the Son. There is no other, for there is nothing else. The therapists of this world do not expect this outcome, and many of their patients would not be able to accept help from them if they did. Yet no therapist really sets the goal for the relationships of which he is a part. His understanding begins with recognizing this, and then goes on from there.

It is in the instant that the therapist forgets to judge the patient that healing occurs. In some relationships this point is never reached, although both patient and therapist may arrive at different dreams in the process. Yet it will not be the same dream for both of them, and so it is not the dream of forgiveness in which both will someday wake. The good is saved; indeed is cherished. But only little time is saved and the new dreams will lose their temporary appeal and turn to dreams of fear, which is the content of all dreams. Yet no patient can accept more than he is ready to receive, and no therapist can offer more than he believes he has. And so there is a place for all relationships in this world, and they will bring as much good as each can accept and use.

Yet it is when judgment ceases that healing occurs, because only then it can be understood that there is no order of difficulty in healing. This is a necessary understanding for the healed healer. He has learned that it is no harder to wake a brother from one dream than from another. No professional therapist can hold this understanding consistently in his mind, offering it to all who come to him. There are some in this world who have come very close, but they have not accepted the gift entirely in order to stay and let their understanding remain on earth until the closing of time. They could hardly be called professional therapists. They are the Saints of God. They are the Saviors of the world. Their image remains, because they have chosen that it be so. They take the place of other images, and help with kindly dreams.

The professional therapist has one advantage that can save enormous time if it is properly used. He has chosen a road on which there is great temptation to misuse his role. This enables him to pass by many obstacles to peace quite quickly, if he escapes the temptation to assume a function that has not been given him. To understand there is no order of difficulty in healing, he must also recognize the equality of himself and the patient. There is no halfway point in this. Either they are equal or not. The attempts of therapists to compromise in this respect are strange indeed. Some utilize the relationship merely to collect bodies to worship at their shrine, and this they regard as healing. Many patients, too, consider this strange procedure as salvation. Yet at each meeting there is One Who says, "My brother, choose again."

Do not forget that any form of specialness must be defended, and will be. The defenseless therapist has the strength of God with him, but the defensive therapist has lost sight of the Source of his salvation. He does not see and he does not hear. How, then, can he teach? Because it is the Will of God that he take his place in the plan for salvation. Because it is the Will of God that his patients be helped to join with him there. Because his inability to see and hear does not limit the Holy Spirit in any way. Except in time. In time there can be a great lag between the offering and the acceptance of healing. This is the veil across the Face of Christ. Yet it can be but an illusion, because time does not exist and the Will of God has always been exactly as it is.

Section 6 - "To Have, Give All to All"

Like any good teacher, He DOES know more than you know NOW, but He teaches only to make you equals. This is because you had ALREADY taught wrong, having believed what was not true. YOU DID NOT BELIEVE IN YOUR OWN PERFECTION. Could God teach you that you had made a split mind when He knows your mind only as whole?

What God DOES know is that His communication channels are not open to Him, so that He cannot impart His joy and know that His Children are wholly joyous. This is an ongoing process, not in time, but in eternity. God's extending outward, though not His completeness, was blocked when the Sonship does not communicate with Him as one. So He thought, "My Children sleep, and must be awakened."

How can you wake children better and more kindly than with a gentle Voice that will not frighten them, but will merely remind them that the night is over and the Light has come? You do not inform them that the nightmares which frightened them so badly were not real, because children BELIEVE in magic. You merely reassure them that they are safe NOW. Then you train them to RECOGNIZE THE DIFFERENCE between sleeping and waking, so that THEY will understand they need not be afraid of dreams. Then when bad dreams come, they will call on the Light THEMSELVES to dispel them.

A wise teacher teaches through approach, NOT avoidance. He does not emphasize what you must avoid to escape from harm as much as what you need to learn to have joy. This is true even of the world's teachers. Consider the confusion that a child would experience if he were told, "Do not do THIS because it might hurt you and make you unsafe, but if you do THAT you will escape from harm and be safe, and then you will not be afraid." All of this could be included in only three words: "Do only that." That simple statement is perfectly clear, easily understood, and very easily remembered.

The Holy Spirit NEVER itemizes errors, because He does not frighten children, and those who lack wisdom ARE children. But He ALWAYS answers their call, and His dependability makes THEM more certain. Children DO confuse fantasy and reality, and they ARE frightened because they do not know the difference.

The Holy Spirit makes NO distinction among dreams. He merely shines them away. His light is ALWAYS the call to awake, WHATEVER you may have been dreaming. Nothing lasting lies in dreams, and the Holy Spirit, shining with the light from God Himself, speaks only for what lasts forever.

When your body and your ego and your dreams are gone, you will know that YOU will last forever. Many think that this is accomplished through death, but NOTHING is accomplished through death because death is nothing. EVERYTHING is accomplished through life, and life is of the mind and in the Mind. The body neither lives nor dies, because it cannot contain you who ARE life. If we share the same mind, YOU CAN OVERCOME DEATH BECAUSE I DID. Death is an attempt to resolve conflict by not willing at all. Like any other impossible solution which the ego attempts, IT WILL NOT WORK.

God did not make the body, because it is destructible, and therefore not of the Kingdom. The body is the symbol of WHAT YOU THINK YOU ARE. It is clearly a separation device, and therefore does not exist. The Holy Spirit, as always, takes what you have made and translates it into a learning device FOR you. Again, as always, it re-interprets what the ego uses as an argument FOR separation into an argument AGAINST it.

To the Holy Spirit THERE IS NO ORDER OF DIFFICULTY IN MIRACLES. This is FAMILIAR enough to you by now, but it has not yet become believable. Therefore, you do not understand it and cannot USE it. We have too much to accomplish on behalf of the Kingdom to let this crucial concept slip away. It is a real foundation stone of the thought system I teach and want YOU to teach. You cannot perform miracles without believing it, because it is a belief in perfect equality.

Only one equal gift CAN be offered to the equal Sons of God, and that is FULL APPRECIATION. Nothing more and nothing less. Without a range, order of difficulty IS meaningless, and there must BE no range in what you offer to each other. The Holy Spirit, which leads to God, translates communication into being, just as He ultimately translates perception into knowledge.

You DO NOT LOSE WHAT YOU COMMUNICATE. The ego uses the body for attack, for pleasure, and for pride. The insanity of this perception makes it a fearful one. The Holy Spirit sees it only as a means of COMMUNICATION. And because communicating IS sharing, it becomes communion. You might argue that fear as well as love can be communicated, and therefore can be shared. But this is not so real as it sounds. Those who communicate fear are promoting attack, and attack always BREAKS communication, and therefore makes communion impossible.

Egos DO join together in temporary allegiance, but always for WHAT EACH ONE CAN GET SEPARATELY. The Holy Spirit communicates only WHAT EACH ONE CAN GIVE TO ALL. He never takes ANYTHING back, because He wants YOU to keep it. Therefore, His teaching begins with the lesson: To HAVE, GIVE all TO all.

This is a very preliminary step, and THE ONLY ONE YOU MUST TAKE YOURSELF. It is not even necessary that you COMPLETE the step yourself, but it IS necessary that you turn in that direction. Having willed to go that way, you place YOURSELF in charge of the journey, where you and ONLY you must remain.

This step APPEARS to exacerbate conflict rather than resolve it, because it is the BEGINNING step in reversing your perception and turning it right side up. This conflicts with the upside down perception which you have not yet abandoned, or the change in direction would not have been necessary. Some people remain at this step for a very long time, experiencing VERY acute conflict. Many try to accept the CONFLICT, rather than to take the next step toward its resolution. But having taken the first step, they WILL be helped. Having willed what they CANNOT complete alone, THEY ARE NO LONGER ALONE.

You, Helen, had taken this step, and because you believed in it, you taught it to Bill, who still believed in the solution of sleep. You were not consistent in teaching it, but you did so often enough to enable him to learn it. Once HE learned it, he could teach YOU how to become more consistently awake, and thus begin to waken HIMSELF. This placed him, too, in command of the journey. His recognition of the direction it must take was perfectly stated when he INSISTED ON COLLABORATION.

You, H., had taken a giant step INTO conflict, but Bill turned you both forwards TOWARD THE WAY OUT. The more he teaches this, the more he will learn it.

Chapter 4 - Our Gift to God

There is no gift of faith that God does not accept with gratitude. He loves His Son. And as He gives His gifts to him, so is He grateful for the gifts His Son gives Him. Gratitude is the song of Heaven, the single harmony of all creation at one with its Creator. For gratitude is love expressed in joining; the necessary condition for extension and the prerequisite for peace. And who can be in conflict and love God?

We have discussed the gifts of God to you. Now we must also speak of those that you can give to Him. For it is these that render His giving, complete, as it is His to you that make you whole. Giving is joy and holiness and healing. Here is your answer to the world, and God's as well. For here it is you join with Him, His likeness being yours in this alone.

How can you give to Him Who has no lack, no need, no emptiness, no unlit place which needs a light that you can offer Him? He saves your gifts for you. He does not know of giving and receiving. What is love, or comes from love, or offers love a gift, is one to Him because it is of Him. To Him and from Him are not different to One Who has no opposite. For love is all there is and everything there is. A gift to love is given everyone, not lessening the giver, nor in truth adding to the receiver. More than love there cannot be. But this a gift becomes if it is truly given and received by both to both who know that they are one:

a key to silence and the peace of God,

a glad acknowledgement of love of Christ,

a greeting to the Holy Spirit's help,

an invitation that He enter in

and lift the Son of God unto Himself.

What more would God hold dearer, than this? These are His gifts as much as they are yours, for in them giver and receiver join. A gift is holy only when there is no sense of all of who will gain thereby, and not a shadow of a thought of loss. It is not easy in the world to know what giving means, and how to give a gift that God and all creation will accept as shining outward from a thankful heart and inward to the altar of its God.

God gives the grace to give as He must give, for He must give the only way He knows, and what He knows is everything He is. Christ gives as He does, being like Himself. And nothing stands outside the gifts They give, for every gift is all-encompassing and lifts the universe into Their arms.

Yet what of you who seem to be on earth, and do not understand what giving is because you have forgotten what love means? What gifts are there that you can give to God? My brother, there are many calls to you from those who lost their way and need your help in finding it again. It seems to you that you are helping them if you respond to what they ask and what you think they need. Yet it is always God Who calls to you, and he who asks your help is but yourself. Who is the giver and the receiver then? Who asks the gift and who is given it?

Count not the cost of giving. There is none. Your teachers have deceived. But do not think that their mistakes were not your own as well. To all who do not understand the gifts of God and Christ are one, be yours the voice that echoes what the Voice for God would say:

"Save Me, My brother, as you save yourself,

And let Me give to God your gifts for you

Because My altar waits for them in love,

And God is asking that We place them there."

There is no love but God's; no gifts but His. We but return his Own unto Himself. But as we do, He comes to call His Son from the far country where he threw away the memory of all his Father's gifts, and ask him to return again to Him.

Child of Eternal Love, what gift is there your Father wants of you except yourself? And what is there that you would rather give, for what is there that you would rather have? You have forgotten Who you really are. What but that memory is dear to you? What trifling gifts made out of sickly fear and evil dreams of suffering and death can be the substitute you really want for the remembrance of Christ in you? In the far country you were lost indeed, but you were not forgotten. Hear the call of love to love, by love, in love to you, and rise with love beside you to return the gift of love that He has given you, and you have given Him in gratitude.

Do not forget the Source of what you are, and do not think He has forgotten you. Love does not waver, and does not forget the gifts it gives that it would have you keep. Return them, then, for it is dark indeed in the far country, where God's memory has seemed to disappear. Yet Christ has come wherever you have gone. For you are His, and being His you are His Father's too. He brings with Him the gifts His Father gave, and giving them to you He teaches you how to return them in the way He gives. Light knows no limit; love no lessening. Return, My Child, to Me. For Christ is He Who is My Son and you are one with Him. You are My gift, for you are one with Me.

Lesson 154 "I am among the ministers of God."

Let us today be neither arrogant nor falsely humble. We have gone beyond such foolishness. We cannot judge ourselves, nor need we do so. These are but attempts to hold decision off, and to delay commitment to our function. It is not our part to judge our worth, nor can we know what role is best for us; what we can do within a larger plan we cannot see in its entirety. Our part is cast in Heaven, not in hell. And what we think is weakness can be strength; what we believe to be our strength is often arrogance.

Whatever your appointed role may be it was selected by the Voice for God, Whose function is to speak for you as well. Seeing your strengths exactly as they are, and equally aware of where they can be best applied, for what, to whom and when, He chooses and accepts your part for you. He does not work without your own consent, but He is not deceived in what you are, and listens only to His Voice in you.

It is through His ability to hear One Voice which is His Own that you become aware at last there is One Voice in you. And that One Voice appoints your function, and relays it to you, giving you the strength to understand it, do what it entails, and to succeed in everything you do that is related to it. God has joined His Son in this, and thus His Son becomes His messenger of unity with Him.

A messenger does not elect to make the message he delivers. Nor does he question the right of him who does, nor ask why he has chosen those who will receive the message that he brings. It is enough that he accept it, bring it to the ones for which it was appointed, and fulfill his role in its delivery. If he insists on judging what the messages should be, or what their purpose is, or where they should be carried, he is failing to perform his proper part as bringer of the Word.

There is one major difference in the role of Heaven's messengers, which sets them off from those the world appoints. The messages which they deliver are intended first for them. And it is only as they can accept them for themselves that they become able to bring them further, and to give them everywhere that they were meant to be. Like earthly messengers, they did not write the messages they bear, but they become their first receivers in the truest sense, receiving to prepare themselves to give.

An earthly messenger fulfills his role by giving all the messages away. The messengers of God perform their part by their acceptance of His messages as for themselves, and show they understand the messages by giving them away. They choose no roles that are not given them by His authority. And so they gain by every message which they give away.

Would you receive the messages of God? For thus do you become His messengers. You are appointed now, and yet you wait to give the messages you have received, and so you do not know that they are yours, and do not recognize them. No one can receive and understand he has received until he gives. For in the giving is his own acceptance of what he received.

You who are now the messengers of God receive His messages, for that is part of your appointed role. He has not failed to offer what you need, nor has it been left unaccepted. Yet another part of your appointed task is yet to be accomplished. He Who has received for you the messages of God would have them be received by you as well. For thus do you identify with Him and claim your own.

It is this joining that we undertake to recognize today. We will not seek to keep our minds apart from Him Who speaks for us, for it is but our voice we hear as we attend Him. He alone can speak to us and for us, joining in One Voice the getting and the giving of God's Word; the giving and receiving of His Will.

We practice giving Him what He would have, that we may recognize His gifts to us. He needs our voice that He may speak through us. He needs our hands to hold His messages, and carry them to those He appoints. He needs our feet to bring us where He wills, that those who wait in misery may be at last delivered. And He needs our will united with His Own, that we may be the true receivers of the gifts He gives.

Let us but learn this lesson for today: we will not recognize what we receive until we give it. You have heard this said a hundred ways, and yet belief is lacking still. But this is sure; until belief is given it, you will receive a thousand miracles and then receive a thousand more, but will not know that God Himself has left no gift beyond what you already have; nor has denied the tiniest of blessings to His Son. What can this mean to you, until you have identified with him and with his own?

Our lesson for today is stated thus:

"I am among the ministers of God,

And I am grateful that I have the means

By which to recognize that I am free."

The world recedes as we light up our minds, and realize these holy words are true. They are the message sent to us today from our Creator. Now we demonstrate how they have changed our minds about ourselves, and what our function is. For as we prove that we accept no will we do not share, our many gifts from our Creator will spring to our sight and leap into our hands, and we recognize what we received.

Section 5 - The Escape from Fear

If you cannot hear the voice of God, it is because you do not choose to listen. The fact that you DO listen to the voice of your ego is demonstrated by your attitudes, your feelings, and your behavior. Your attitudes are obviously conflicted; your feelings have a narrow range on the negative side, but are never purely joyous; and your behavior is either strained or unpredictable. Yet this IS what you want. This is what you are fighting to keep, and what you are vigilant to save. Your minds are filled with schemes to save the face of your egos, and you do not seek the Face of God.

The glass in which the ego seeks to see its face is dark indeed. How can it maintain the trick of its existence except with mirrors? But where you look to find yourself is up to you. We have said that you cannot change your mind by changing your behavior, but we have also said, and many times before, that you CAN change your mind.

When your mood tells you that you have willed wrongly, and this is so whenever you are not joyous, then KNOW this need not be.

In every case you have thought wrongly about some Soul that God created, and are perceiving images your ego makes in a darkened glass. Think honestly what you have thought that God would NOT have thought, and what you have NOT thought that God would have you think. Search sincerely for what you have done and left undone accordingly. And then change your minds to THINK WITH GOD's.

This may seem hard to you, but it is MUCH easier than trying to think AGAINST it. Your mind IS one with God's. Denying this and thinking otherwise has held your ego together, but has literally split your mind. As a loving brother, I am deeply concerned with your minds, and urge you to follow my example as you look at yourselves and at each other and see in both the glorious Creations of a glorious Father.

When you are sad, KNOW that this NEED NOT BE. Depression ALWAYS arises ultimately from a sense of being deprived of something you want and do not have. KNOW you are deprived of nothing, except by your own decisions, and then decide otherwise.

When you are anxious, KNOW that all anxiety comes from the capriciousness of the ego, and NEED NOT BE. You can be as vigilant AGAINST the ego's dictates as FOR them.

You, Helen, have been more honest that Bill in really trying to see whom your ego has hurt, and also in trying to change your mind about them. (Helen Schucman doubtful whether this is accurate - written at a time when she was very angry.) I am not unmindful of your efforts, but you still have much too much energy invested in your ego. THIS NEED NOT BE. Watch your minds for the temptations of the ego, and do not be deceived by it. KNOW it offers you nothing.

You, B, have not made consistent efforts to change your mind except through applying old habit patterns to new ideas. But you have learned, and learned it better than H., (Helen Schucman doubtful about accuracy here) that your mind gains control over ITSELF when you direct it genuinely toward perceiving someone ELSE truly. Your lack of vitality is due to your former marked effort at solving your needless depression and anxiety through disinterest. Because your ego WAS protected by this unfortunate negative attribute, you are afraid to abandon it.

When you have given up this voluntary dis-spiriting, you have already seen how your mind can focus, and rise above fatigue, and heal. But you are not sufficiently vigilant against the demands of your ego that you disengage yourself. THIS NEED NOT BE. The habit of engaging WITH God and His Creations is easily made if you refuse actively to let your minds slip away. Your problem is not concentration: it is a belief that nobody, including yourself, is WORTH consistent effort.

Side with me CONSISTENTLY against this deception, as we have sided against it briefly already. Do not permit this shabby belief to pull you back. The disheartened are useless to themselves and to me, but only the ego can be disheartened.

Have you REALLY considered how many opportunities you have to gladden yourselves, and how many of them you have refused? There is no limit to the power of a Son of God, but he himself can limit the expression of his power as much as he wills. Your mind and mine can unite in shining your ego away, and releasing the strength of God into everything you think and will and do. Do not settle for ANYTHING less than this, and refuse to accept anything BUT this as your goal.

Watch your minds carefully for any beliefs that hinder its accomplishment, and step away from them. Judge how well you have done this by your own feelings, for this is the one RIGHT use of judgment. Judgment, like any other defense, can be used to attack or protect, to hurt or to heal. The ego SHOULD be brought to your own judgment and found wanting there. Without your own allegiance, protection, and love it cannot exist.

Judge your ego truly, and you MUST withdraw allegiance, protection, and love from it. You are mirrors of truth in which God Himself shines in perfect light. To the ego's dark glass you need but say, "I will not look there because I KNOW these images are not true."

Then let me the Holy One shine upon you in peace, knowing that this and only this MUST be! His Mind shone on you in your creation, and brought YOUR mind into being. His Mind still shines on you and MUST shine THROUGH you. Your ego cannot prevent HIM from shining on you, but it CAN prevent you from letting Him shine THROUGH you.

The first coming of Christ is just another name for the Creation, for Christ is the Son of God. The SECOND coming of Christ means nothing more than the end of the ego's rule over part of the minds of men, and the healing of the mind. I was created like you in the First, and I am reminding you that I have called you to join with me in the Second.

If you will think over your lives, you will see how carefully the preparations were made. I am in charge of the Second Coming as I have already told you, and my judgment, which is used only for its protection, cannot be wrong because it NEVER attacks. YOURS is so distorted that you believe that I was mistaken in choosing you. I assure you this is a mistake of your own egos. Do NOT mistake it for humility.

Your egos are trying to convince you that THEY are real, and I am not, because if I AM real, I am no more real than YOU are. That knowledge, and I assure you that it IS knowledge, means that Christ must come into your minds and heal them.

While I am not attacking your egos, I AM working with your higher mind whether you are asleep or awake, (just as your ego does with your lower mind.) I am your vigilance in this, because you are too confused to recognize your own hope.

I was not mistaken. Your minds WILL elect to join with mine, and together we are invincible. You two will yet come together in my name and your sanity will be restored. I raised the dead by KNOWING that life is an eternal attribute of everything that the living God Created. Why do you believe that it is harder for me to inspire the dis-spirited or to stabilize the unstable? I do not believe that there is an order of difficulty in miracles: YOU do. I have called and you will answer. I KNOW that miracles are natural, because they are expressions of love. My calling you is as natural as your answer and as inevitable.

Section 6 - Reason and Perception

But on this choice depends far more than you may realize as yet. For, on the voice you choose to hear, and on the sights you choose to see, depends ENTIRELY your whole belief of what you ARE. Perception is a witness but to this, and never to reality. Yet it can show you the conditions in which AWARENESS of reality is possible, or those where it could NEVER be. Reality needs no cooperation from you, to be itself. But your awareness of it NEEDS your help, because it IS your choice.

Listen to what the ego says, and see what it DIRECTS you see, and it is sure that you will see YOURSELF as tiny, vulnerable, and afraid. You WILL experience depression, a sense of worthlessness, and feelings of impermanence and unreality. You WILL believe that you are helpless prey to forces far beyond your own control, and far more powerful than you. And you WILL think the world you made directs your destiny. For this will be your FAITH. But never believe, because it is your faith, it makes REALITY. There is ANOTHER vision and ANOTHER voice, in which your freedom lies, awaiting but your choice. And, if you place your faith in them, you will perceive ANOTHER Self in YOU.

This other self sees miracles as natural. They are as simple and as natural to it as breathing to the body. They are the OBVIOUS response to calls for help, the ONLY one it makes. Miracles seem unnatural to the ego, because it does not understand how SEPARATE minds can influence each other. Nor COULD they do so. But minds cannot BE separate. This other self is PERFECTLY aware of this. And thus it recognizes that miracles do NOT affect ANOTHER'S mind, only its OWN. They always change YOUR mind. There IS no other.

You do not realize the whole extent to which the idea of separation has INTERFERED with reason. Reason lies in the other self you have CUT OFF from your awareness. And nothing you have allowed to STAY in it is CAPABLE of reason. How can the segment of the mind DEVOID of reason understand what reason IS? Or grasp the information it would give? All sorts of QUESTIONS may arise in it, but, if the basic question stems from REASON, it will not ask it. Like ALL that stems from reason, the basic question is obvious, simple, and remains unasked. But think not reason could not ANSWER it.

God's plan for your salvation could not have been established WITHOUT your will and your consent. It MUST have been accepted by the Son of God, for what God wills for him, he MUST receive. For God wills not, apart from him. Nor does the Will of God wait upon time to be accomplished. Therefore, what JOINED the Will of God MUST be in you NOW, being eternal. You MUST have set aside a place in which the Holy Spirit can abide, and where He IS. He must HAVE BEEN there since the need for Him arose, and was fulfilled in the same instant.

Such would your REASON tell you, if you listened. Yet such is clearly NOT the ego's "reasoning." Its alien nature, TO THE EGO, is proof you will NOT find the answer there. Yet if it MUST be so, it must exist. And, if it exists FOR you, and has your freedom as the purpose GIVEN it, you MUST be free to FIND it. God's plan is simple; NEVER circular, and NEVER Self-defeating. He has no Thoughts except the Self-EXTENDING, and in this, YOUR will MUST be included. Thus there MUST be a part of you that KNOWS His Will and SHARES It.

It is NOT meaningful to ask if what MUST be is so. But it IS meaningful to ask why you are UNAWARE of what is so. For this MUST have an answer, if the plan of God for your salvation is complete. And it must BE complete, because its Source knows not of incompletion. Where would the answer BE, but in the Source? And where are YOU but there, where this same Answer is? Your identity, as much a true EFFECT of this same Source as is this Answer, must therefore be TOGETHER and the SAME.

Oh yes, you know this. And more than this alone. But any part of knowledge threatens dissociation as much as ALL of it. And all of it will COME with any part. Here is the part you CAN accept. What reason points to, you CAN see, because the witnesses on its behalf ARE clear. Only the TOTALLY insane can disregard them. And you HAVE gone past this. Reason is a means which serves the Holy Spirit's purpose in its OWN right. It is not RE-INTERPRETED and REDIRECTED from the goal of sin, as are the others. For reason is BEYOND the ego's range of means.

Faith and perception and belief can be misplaced, and serve the great deceiver's needs, as well as truth. But reason has no place at all in madness, nor can it be ADJUSTED to fit its ends. Faith and belief are STRONG in madness, guiding perception toward what the mind has valued. But reason enters NOT AT ALL in this. For the perception would fall away at once, if reason were applied. There IS no reason in insanity, for it depends ENTIRELY on reason's absence. The ego NEVER uses it, because it does not realize that it EXISTS.

The partially insane HAVE access to it. And only they have NEED of it. KNOWLEDGE does not depend on it, and madness keeps it OUT. The part of mind where reason lies was dedicated, by your will in union with your Father's, to the UNDOING of insanity. Here was the Holy Spirit's purpose accepted and accomplished, both at once. Reason is ALIEN to insanity, and those who use it have gained a means which cannot BE applied to sin. Knowledge is far beyond attainment of ANY kind. But reason CAN serve to open doors you closed AGAINST it.

You have come very close to this. Faith and belief have shifted, and you HAVE asked the question that the ego will NEVER ask. Does not your reason tell you now the question MUST have come from something that you do NOT know, but must BELONG to you? Faith and belief, upheld by reason, CANNOT fail to lead to changed perception. And, in THIS change, is room made way for vision. Vision extends BEYOND itself, as does the purpose which it serves, and ALL the means for its accomplishment.

Section 4 - The Investment in Reality

I once asked if you were willing to sell all you have, and give to the poor and follow me. This is what I meant: If you had no investment in anything in this world, you could teach the poor where THEIR treasure IS. The poor are merely those who have invested wrongly, and they are poor indeed! And because they are in need, it is given to you to help them, since you are among them. Consider how perfectly your lesson would be learned, IF YOU WERE UNWILLING TO SHARE THEIR POVERTY. For poverty is lack, and there is but one lack, since there is but one need.

Suppose a brother insists on having you do something you think you do not want to do. The very fact of his insistence should tell you that HE BELIEVES SALVATION LIES IN IT. If you insist on refusing, and experience a quick response of opposition, YOU are believing that YOUR salvation lies in NOT doing it. You, then, are making the same mistake that HE is, and are making his error real to both of you. Insistence means INVESTMENT, and what you invest in is ALWAYS related to your notion of salvation. The question is always two-fold; first, WHAT is to be saved, and second, how can it BE saved?

Whenever you become angry with a brother, for WHATEVER reason, you are believing that the EGO is to be saved, AND TO BE SAVED BY ATTACK. If HE attacks, you are agreeing with this belief, and if YOU attack, you are reinforcing it. REMEMBER THAT THOSE WHO ATTACK ARE POOR. Their poverty asks for gifts, NOT for further impoverishment. You who could help them are surely acting destructively, if you accept their poverty AS YOURS. If you had not invested AS THEY HAD, it would never occur to you to overlook their need.

RECOGNIZE WHAT DOES NOT MATTER, and if your brothers ask you for something "outrageous," do it BECAUSE it does not matter. Refuse, and your OPPOSITION establishes that it DOES matter to you. It is only you, therefore, who have MADE the request outrageous, for nothing can BE asked OF you, and EVERY request of a brother is FOR you. Why would you insist in DENYING him? For to do so is to deny yourself, and impoverish both. HE is asking for salvation, as YOU are. Poverty is of the ego, and never of God. No "outrageous" request CAN be made of one who recognizes what is valuable, and wants to accept nothing else.

Salvation is for the mind, and it is attained through peace. This is the only thing that CAN be saved, and the ONLY way to save it. Any response OTHER than love, arises from a confusion about the "what" and the "how" of salvation. And this is the ONLY answer. Never lose sight of this, and never allow yourself to believe, even for an instant, that there is another answer. For you will surely place yourself among the poor, who do not understand that they dwell in abundance and that salvation is come.

To identify with the ego is to attack yourself, and MAKE YOURSELF POOR. That is why everyone who identifies with the ego FEELS DEPRIVED. What he EXPERIENCES is then depression or anger, but what he DID is to exchange his self-love for self-hate, MAKING HIM AFRAID OF HIMSELF. He does NOT realize this. Even if he is fully aware of ANXIETY, he does NOT perceive its source AS HIS OWN EGO IDENTIFICATION, and he ALWAYS tries to handle it by making some sort of insane "arrangement" with the world. He ALWAYS perceives this world as OUTSIDE HIMSELF, for this is crucial to his adjustment. He does NOT realize that HE MAKES THIS WORLD, for there IS no world outside him.

If only the loving thoughts of God's Son ARE the world's reality, the real world MUST be IN HIS MIND. His insane thoughts, too, must be in his mind, but an INTERNAL conflict of this magnitude he cannot tolerate. For a split mind IS endangered, and the recognition that it encompasses COMPLETELY opposed thoughts within itself IS intolerable. Therefore, the mind projects the split, NOT the reality. EVERYTHING you perceive as the outside world, is merely your attempt to maintain your ego identification, for everyone believes that identification is salvation.

But consider what has happened, for thoughts have consequences to the thinker. You are AT ODDS with the world as you perceive it because you think IT is antagonistic to you. THIS IS A NECESSARY CONSEQUENCE OF WHAT YOU HAVE DONE. You have projected outward what IS antagonistic to what is inward, and therefore you would HAVE to perceive it this way. That is why you MUST realize that your hatred IS in your mind, and NOT OUTSIDE IT, before you can get rid of it. And why you MUST get rid of it, BEFORE you can perceive the world as it really is.

Long ago we said that God so loved the world that He gave it TO His only-begotten Son. (that whosoever believeth on him should never see death). God DOES love the real world, and those who perceive its reality CANNOT see the world of death. For death is not OF the real world, in which everything is eternal. God gave you the real world in exchange for the one you made, out of your split mind, and which IS the symbol of death. For if you could REALLY separate yourselves from the Mind of God, you WOULD die. And the world you perceive IS a world of separation.

Yet this world is ONLY in the mind of its maker, along with his REAL salvation. Do not believe it is outside of yourself, for only by recognizing WHERE it is, will you gain control over it. For you DO have control over your mind, for the mind is the mechanism of decision. If you will recognize that ALL attack which you perceive, is in your own mind, and NOWHERE ELSE, you will at last have placed its source, and where it began it must end. For in this place also lies salvation. The altar of God, where Christ abideth, is there.

You have defiled the altar, but NOT the world. But Christ has placed the Atonement on the altar FOR you. Bring your perceptions of the world to this altar, for it is the altar to truth. There you will see your vision changed, and there you will learn to see truly. From this place, where God and His Son dwell in peace, and where you are welcome, you will look out in peace, and behold the world truly. But to find the place, you must relinquish your investment in the world as YOU have projected it, allowing the Holy Spirit to project the real world TO you, from the altar of God. -

Miracle Principle 51

The miracle is a learning device which lessens the need for time. The sudden shift from horizontal to vertical perception which the miracle entails introduces an interval from which the doer and the receiver both emerge much farther along in time than they would otherwise have been.

A miracle has thus the unique property of abolishing time by rendering the space of time it occupies unnecessary. There is NO relation between the time a miracle TAKES and the time it COVERS. It substitutes FOR learning that might have taken thousands of years. It does this by the underlying recognition of perfect equality and holiness between doer and receiver on which the miracle rests.It is unstable, but perfectly consistent, i.e., it does not occur predictably across time, and it rarely occurs in comparable forms. But within ITSELF it is perfectly consistent. Since it contains NOTHING BUT an acknowledgment of equality and worth, all parts ARE equal. This establishes the prerequisite for validity.

We said before that the miracle abolishes time. It does this by a process of COLLAPSING it. It thus abolishes certain INTERVALS within it. It does this, however, WITHIN the larger temporal sequence.

Miracle Principle 52

The miracle is the only device which man has at his immediate disposal for controlling time. Only the Revelation TRANSCENDS it, having nothing to do with time at all. The miracle is much like the body, in that both are learning aids which aim at facilitating a state in which they are unnecessary. When the Soul is finally in the original state of direct communication, neither the body nor the miracle serves any purpose.

While he is IN the body, however, man can choose between loveless and miraculous channels of creativity. He can create an empty shell (see previous reference), but he DOES NOT create nothing at all. He can wait, delay, paralyze himself, reduce his creativity almost to nothing, and even introduce a real developmental arrest or regression. But he CANNOT abolish his creativity. He CAN destroy his medium of communication, but NOT his potential.

He was NOT created by his own free will. Only what HE creates is his to decide. The basic decision of the miracle-minded is NOT to wait on time any longer than is necessary. Time can waste, as well as be wasted. The miracle-worker, therefore, accepts the time-control factor of the miracle gladly, because he knows that every collapse of time brings all men closer to the ultimate RELEASE from time, in which the Son and the Father ARE one.

The real meaning of "are of one kind" is "of one mind or will." When the will of the Sonship and the Father are one, their perfect accord IS Heaven.

ASIDE Tell Bill he is right in providing you with the consistent strength you need to get, and he needs to offer. Your instability and his weakness have resulted from bad karmic choices, and your relationship NOW is crucial for the future. You must both exert every effort to restore it to what it once was. Both of you are correcting where you have failed before. This has already enabled you to fulfill a very unexpected role in your own joint salvation, and the salvation of many other children I will entrust increasingly to you. These are by no means chosen at random. Bill should know that his preparation is not only in terms of sharing in the results of your better application of some rather unusual talents. His own role, which he will understand after his preparation is complete, will be equally surprising. He will need your help then, as you need his strength now.

Note that you DO NOT need his help as a scribe, because you developed this ability by your own efforts, and finally placed them at MY disposal. By lending you his strength, he strengthens himself. When he gains this through his own efforts, he will need your help in a very unexpected way. But this is just another example of the reciprocal nature of miracles.

Equality does not imply homogeneity NOW. When EVERYONE has EVERYTHING, individual contributions to the Sonship will no longer be necessary. When the Atonement has been completed, ALL talents will be shared by ALL of the Sons of God. God is NOT partial. All of His children have His total love, and all of his gifts are given freely to everyone alike.

"Except you become as little children" means unless you fully recognize your complete dependence on God, you cannot know the real power of the Son in his true relationship with the Father.

You and Bill DO have special talents which are needed for the Celestial speedup at this time. But note that the term speed-up is not one which relates to the TRANSCENDING of time.

When time is abolished, and all of the Sons of God have come home, no special agents will be necessary. But do not underestimate the power of special agents now, or the great need there is for them. I do not claim to be more than that myself. No one in his Right Mind, (a term which should be specially noted) ever wants either more or less than that. Those who are called on to witness for me NOW are witnessing for all men, as I am.

The role of the Priestess was once to experience Revelations and to work miracles. The purpose was to bring those not yet available for direct Revelations into proper focus for them. Heightened perception was always the essential Priestess attribute.

(This is the first time that Helen Schucman ever said that she would be honored if there were any notes.)

(Neither Bill nor I is really clear about how sexual-impulses can be directly translated into miracle-impulses.) The fantasies that I mentioned yesterday (refers to discussion Helen Schucman and Bill had) provide an excellent example of how you switch. (Now switch the pronoun references, or it will be too confusing.)

Fantasies are distorted forms of thinking, because they always involve twisting perception into unreality. Fantasy is a debased form of vision. Visions and Revelations are closely related. Fantasies and projection are more closely associated, because both attempt to control external reality according to false internal needs. "Live and let live" happens to be a very meaningful injunction. Twist reality in any way, and you are perceiving destructively. Reality was lost through usurpation, which in turn produced tyranny. I told you you were now restored to your former role in the Plan of Atonement. But you must still choose freely to devote your heritage to the greater Restoration. As long as a single slave remains to walk the earth, your release is not complete. Complete restoration of the Sonship is the only true goal of the miracle-minded.

Sexual fantasies are distortions of perception by definition. They are a means of making false associations, and obtaining pleasure from them. Man can do this only because he IS creative. But although he can perceive false associations, he can never make them real except to himself. As was said before, man believes in what he creates. If he creates a miracle, he will be equally strong in his belief in that. The strength of his conviction will then sustain the belief of the miracle receiver.

NO fantasies, sexual or otherwise, are true. Fantasies become totally unnecessary as the Wholly satisfying nature of reality becomes apparent. The sex impulse IS a miracle impulse when it is in proper focus. One individual sees in another the right partner for "procreating the stock" (Wolff was not too far off here), and also for their joint establishment of a creative home. This does not involve fantasy at all. If I am asked to participate in the decision, the decision will be a Right one, too.

In a situation where you or another person, or both, experience inappropriate sex impulses, KNOW FIRST that this is an expression of fear. Your love toward each other is NOT perfect, and this is why the fear arose. Turn immediately to me by denying the power of the fear, and ask me to help you to replace it with love. This shifts the sexual impulse immediately to the miracle-impulse, and places it at MY disposal.

Then acknowledge the true creative worth of both yourself AND the other one. This places strength where it belongs. Note that sexual fantasies are ALWAYS destructive (or depleting), in that they perceive another in an inappropriate creative role. Both people are perceived essentially as "objects" fulfilling THEIR OWN pleasure drives. This dehumanized view is the source of the DEPLETING use of sex. Freud's description is purely NEGATIVE, i.e., as a release from the UNPLEASANT. He also observed that the tension from id impulses never completely abates.

What he should have said is that the shift from miracle-impulses to sexual impulses was debilitating in the first place, because of the level-confusion involved. This set up a state in which real release was impossible. Note also that Freud's notion of sex was as a device for inducing RELAXATION, which he confused with PEACE.

Inappropriate sex relaxes only in the sense that it may induce physical sleep. The miracle, on the other hand, is an ENERGIZER. It always strengthens, and never depletes. It DOES induce peace, and by establishing tranquility (not relaxation) it enables both giver and receiver to enter into a state of Grace. Here his miracle-mindedness, (not release from tension) is restored.

Tension is the result of a building-up of unexpressed miracle-impulses. This can be truly abated only by releasing the miracle-drive, which has been blocked. Converting it to sexual libido merely produces further blocking. Never foster this illusion in yourself, or encourage it in others. An "object" is incapable of release, because it is a concept which is deprived of creative power. The recognition of the real creative power in yourself AND others brings release because it brings peace.

The peace of God which passeth understanding CAN keep your hearts now and forever.

There are only two short additions needed here:

1. Your earlier acute problem in writing things down came from a MUCH earlier misuse of very great scribal abilities. These were turned to secret rather than shared advantage, depriving it (?) of its miraculous potential, and diverting it into possession. This is much like the confusion of sex impulses with possession-impulses. Some of the original material is still in the Temple. This is why you became so afraid about Atlantis. Bill has his own reasons.

2. Retain your miracle-minded attitude toward Rosie VERY carefully. She once hurt both of you, which is why she is now your servant. But she is blessed in that she sees service as a source of joy. Help her straighten out her past errors by contributing to your welfare now.

(special Revelation re Helen Schucman -OMISSION 1.)

Helen Schucman question re: past memories. ANSWER: As long as you remember ALWAYS that you never suffered anything because of anything that anyone ELSE did, this is not dangerous.

Remember that you who want peace can find it only by complete forgiveness. You never really WANTED peace before, so there was no point in knowing how to get it. This is an example of the "need to know" principle, which was established by the Plan of Atonement long before CIA.

No kind of knowledge is acquired by anyone unless he wants it, or believes in some way he NEEDS it. A psychologist does NOT need a lesson on the hierarchy of needs as such, but like everyone else, he DOES need to understand his own.

This particular set of notes will be the only one which deals with the concept of "lack", because while the concept does not exist in the Creation of God, it is VERY apparent in the creations of man. It is, in fact, the essential difference.

A need implies lack, by definition. It involves the recognition, conscious or unconscious, (and at times, fortunately, superconscious) that you would be better off in a state which is somehow different from the one you are in.

Until the Separation, which is a better term than the Fall, nothing was lacking. This meant that man had no needs at all. If he had not deprived himself, he would never have experienced them.

After the Separation, needs became the most powerful source of motivation for human action. All behavior is essentially motivated by needs, but behavior itself is not a Divine attribute. The body is the mechanism for behavior. (Ask any behaviorist, and he's RIGHT, too.)

You tell your own classes that nobody would bother even to get up and go from one place to another if he did not think he would somehow be better off. This is very true.

Believing that he COULD be "better off" is the reason why man has the mechanism for behavior at his disposal. This is why the Bible says "By their DEEDS ye shall know them."

A man acts according to the particular hierarchy of needs he establishes for himself. His hierarchy, in turn, depends on his perception of what he IS, i.e., what he LACKS. This establishes his own rules for what he needs to know.

Separation from God is the only lack he really needs to correct. But his Separation would never have occurred if he had not distorted his perception of truth, and thus perceived himself as lacking.

The concept of ANY sort of need HIERARCHY arose because, having made this fundamental error, he had already fragmented himself into levels with DIFFERENT needs. As he integrates, HE becomes one, and his ONE need becomes one accordingly. Only the fragmented can be confused about this.

Internal integration within the self will not (suffice to?) correct the lack fallacy, but it WILL correct the NEED fallacy. (Thank you for writing this as given.) Unified need produces unified action, because it produces lack of ambivalence.

The concept of need hierarchy, a corollary to the original error, requires correction at its OWN level, before the error of levels itself can be corrected. Man cannot operate (or behave) effectively while he operates at split levels. But as long as he does so, he must introduce correction from the bottom UP.

This is because he now operates in space, where "up" and "down" are meaningful terms. Ultimately, of course, space is as meaningless as time. The concept is really one of space-time BELIEF. The physical world exists only because man can use it to correct his UNBELIEF, which placed him in it originally. As long as man KNEW he did not need anything, the whole device was unnecessary.

The need to know is not safely under man's control at this time. It is MUCH better off under mine. Let's just leave it at that.

(Specific question raised by WT re sex under existing conditions) (Helen Schucman raised previous question about the past, which has just been answered.)

The other question, however, I am more than willing to answer, because it is appropriate for NOW. You and Bill both chose your present sex partners shamefully, and would have to atone for the lack of love which was involved in any case.

You selected them precisely BECAUSE they were NOT suited to gratify your fantasies. This was not because you wanted to abandon or give up the fantasies, but because you were AFRAID of them. You saw in your partners a means of protecting against the fear, but both of you continued to "look around" for chances to indulge the fantasies.

The dream of the "perfect partner" is an attempt to find EXTERNAL integration, while retaining conflicting needs in the self.

Bill was somewhat less guilty of this than you, but largely because he was more afraid. He had abandoned the hope (of finding a perfect partner) in a neurotic sense of despair of finding it. You, on the other hand, insisted that the hope was justified. Neither of you, therefore, was in your Right Mind.

As was said before, homosexuality is INHERENTLY more risky (or error prone) than heterosexuality, but both can be undertaken on an equally false basis. The falseness of the basis is clear in the accompanying fantasies. Homosexuality ALWAYS involves misperception of the self OR the partner, and generally both.

Penetration DOES NOT involve magic, nor DOES ANY form of sexual behavior. It IS a magic belief to engage in ANY form of body image activity at all. You neither created yourselves, nor controlled your creation. By introducing levels into your own perception, you opened the way for body-image distortions.

The lack of love (or faulty need-orientation) which led to your particular person (not OBJECT) choices CAN BE corrected within the existent framework, and would HAVE to be in the larger interest of overall progress. The situation is questionable largely because of its inherent vulnerability to fantasy-gratification. Doing the best you can WITHIN this limitation is probably the best corrective measure at present. Any relationship you have undertaken for whatever reasons becomes a responsibility.

If you shift your own needs, some amount of corresponding shift in the need-orientation of the other person MUST result, This will be beneficial, even if the partner was originally attracted to you BECAUSE of your disrespect. Teaching devices which are totally alien to a learner's perceptual system are usually merely disruptive. Transfer depends on SOME common elements in the new situation which are understandable in terms of the old.

Man can never control the effects of fear himself, because he has CREATED fear and believes in what he creates. In attitude, then, though not in content, he resembles his own Creator, who has perfect faith in His Creations because he Created them. All creation rests on belief, and the belief in the creation produces its existence. This is why it is possible for a man to believe what is not true for anyone else. It is true for him because it is made BY him.

Every aspect of fear proceeds from upside down perception. The TRULY creative devote their efforts to correcting this. The neurotic devotes his to compromise. The psychotic tries to escape by establishing the truth of his own errors. It is most difficult to free him by ordinary means, only because he is more stable in his denial of truth.

Miracle Principle 53

The miracle makes no distinction among degrees of misperception. It is a device for perception-correction which is effective quite apart from either the degree or the direction of the error. This is its TRUE indiscriminateness.

Both the power and the strength of man's creative will must be understood, before the real meaning of denial can be appreciated and abolished. Denial is NOT mere negation. It is a positive miscreation. While the miscreation is NECESSARILY believed in by its own creator, it does not exist at all at the level of true Creation.

Miracle Principle 54

The miracle compares the creations of man with the higher level of creation, accepting what is in ACCORD as true, and rejecting the DISCORDANT as false. This is why it is so closely associated with validity. Real validity is both true AND useful, or better, it is useful BECAUSE it is true.

All aspects of fear are untrue, because they DO NOT exist at the higher creative levels, and therefore do not exist at all. To whatever extent a man is willing to submit his beliefs to the real test of validity, to that extent are his perceptions healed (or corrected.)

In sorting out the false from the true, the miracle proceeds much along the lines suggested very correctly by Bill, i.e.:

If perfect love casts out fear,

And if fear exists,

Then there is NOT perfect love.

But

Only perfect love really exists.

Therefore, if there is fear, it creates a state which does not exist. Believe THIS and you WILL be free. Only God can establish this solution, for THIS faith IS His gift.

Section 11 - The Answer to Prayer

Everyone who has ever tried to use prayer to request something, has experienced what appears to be failure. This is not only true in connection with specific things which might be harmful, but also in connection with requests which are strictly in line with this course. The latter, in particular, might be incorrectly interpreted as "proof" that the course does not mean what it says. But you must remember that the course does state, and REPEATEDLY, that its purpose is the ESCAPE FROM FEAR.

Let us suppose, then, that what you request of the Holy Spirit IS what you really want, but that YOU ARE STILL AFRAID OF IT. Should this be the case, your ATTAINMENT of it would no longer BE what you want, even if IT is. This accounts for why CERTAIN SPECIFIC FORMS of healing are not achieved, even though the STATE of healing IS. It frequently happens that an individual asks for physical healing, because he is fearful OF BODILY HARM. However, at the same time, if he WERE healed physically, the threat to his thought-system would be considerably MORE fearful to him than its physical EXPRESSION. In this case, he is not really asking for RELEASE from fear, but for the removal of a symptom WHICH HE HAS SELECTED. This request is, therefore, NOT for healing at all.

The Bible emphasizes that ALL prayers are answered, and this must be true, if no effort is wasted. The very fact that one has asked the Holy Spirit for ANYTHING, will ensure a response. But it is equally certain that no response, given by the Holy Spirit, will EVER be one which would INCREASE fear. It is even possible that His answer will not be heard at all. It is IMpossible, however, that it will be lost. There are many answers which you have already received, but have NOT YET HEARD. I assure you that they are waiting for you. It is indeed true that no effort is wasted.

If you would know your prayers are answered, never doubt a Son of God. Do not question him, and do not confound him, for your faith in him is your faith in YOURSELF. If you would know God and His Answer, believe in me, whose faith in YOU cannot be shaken. Can you ask of the Holy Spirit truly, and doubt your brother? Believe his words are true, because of the truth which is in him. You will unite with the truth in him, and his words will BE true. As you hear him, you will hear me.

LISTENING to truth is the only way you can hear it now, and finally KNOW it. The message your brother gives you is UP TO YOU. What does he say to you? What would YOU have him say? Your decision ABOUT him determines the message YOU receive. Remember that the Holy Spirit is in him, and His Voice speaks to YOU through him. What can so holy a brother tell you EXCEPT truth? But are you LISTENING to it?

Your brother may not know who he is, but there is a Light in his mind which DOES know. This Light can shine into yours, making HIS words true, and you ABLE TO HEAR THEM. His words ARE the Holy Spirit's answer to YOU. Is your faith in him strong enough to LET you listen and hear? Salvation is of your brother. The Holy Spirit extends from your mind to his, and answers YOU. You cannot hear the Voice for God in yourself alone, because you are NOT alone. And His answer is only for what you ARE.

You will not know the trust I have in you, unless you EXTEND it. You will not trust the guidance of the Holy Spirit, or believe that it is for YOU, unless you hear it in others. It MUST be for your brother, BECAUSE it is for you. Would God have created a Voice for you alone? Could you hear His answer EXCEPT as He answers ALL of God's Sons? Hear of your brother what you would have me hear of YOU, for you would not want ME to be deceived.

I love you for the truth in you, as GOD does. Your deceptions may deceive YOU, but they CANNOT deceive ME. Knowing what you ARE, I CANNOT doubt you. I hear only the Holy Spirit in you, Who speaks to me through YOU. If you would hear ME, hear my brothers, in whom God's Voice speaks. The answer to ALL your prayers lies in them. You will be answered as you HEAR THE ANSWER IN EVERYONE. Do not listen to anything else, or you will not hear truth.

Believe in your brothers BECAUSE I believe in you, and you will learn that my belief in you is justified. Believe in me BY believing in them, for the sake of what God gave them. THEY WILL ANSWER YOU, if you learn to ask truth of them. Do not ask for blessings without blessing THEM, for only in this way can YOU learn how blessed YOU are. By following this way, you ARE looking for the truth in YOU. This is not going BEYOND yourself, but TOWARD yourself. Hear only God's answer in His Sons, and YOU are answered.

To disbelieve is to side AGAINST, or to ATTACK. To believe is to accept, and SIDE WITH. To believe is not to be credulous, but to accept and APPRECIATE. What you do NOT believe you do NOT APPRECIATE, and you CANNOT be grateful for what you do not VALUE. There is a price you will pay for judgment, because judgment IS the setting of price. And as you set it, you WILL pay it.

If paying is equated with GETTING, you will set the PRICE low, but demand a high RETURN. But you will have forgotten that to price is to VALUE, so that YOUR return is IN PROPORTION TO YOUR JUDGMENT OF WORTH. If paying is associated with giving, IT CANNOT BE PERCEIVED AS LOSS, and the RECIPROCAL relationship of giving and RECEIVING will be recognized. The price will then be set high, because of the value of the RETURN.

To price for GETTING is to LOSE SIGHT OF VALUE, making it inevitable that you will NOT value what you receive. Valuing it little, you will not appreciate it, and you will not WANT it. Never forget, then, that YOU have set the value on what you receive, and have priced it BY what you give. To believe that it is possible to get much FOR little, is to believe that you can bargain with God.

You can ASK of the Holy Spirit, then, ONLY by giving TO Him. And you can GIVE to Him only WHERE YOU SEE HIM. If you SEE Him in everyone, consider how much you will be asking OF Him, and HOW MUCH YOU WILL RECEIVE. He will deny you nothing, because you have denied Him nothing, and so you can SHARE EVERYTHING. This is the way, and the ONLY way, to have His answer, because His answer is all you can ask for and WANT. Say, then, to everyone,

"Because I will to know myself, I see you as God's Son and my brother."

Section 8 - The Total Commitment

Whenever you deny a blessing to a brother, YOU will feel deprived. This is because denial is as total as love. It is as impossible to deny part of the Sonship as it is to love it in part. Nor is it possible to love it totally AT TIMES. You CANNOT be totally committed SOMETIMES. Remember a very early lesson, -- "never underestimate the power of denial." It has no power in ITSELF, but YOU can give it the power of YOUR mind, whose power is without limit of ANY kind. If you use it to deny reality, reality is gone FOR YOU. REALITY CANNOT BE PARTLY APPRECIATED. That is why denying any part of it means you have lost awareness of ALL of it.

When a brother acts insanely, he is offering you an opportunity to bless him. His need is YOURS. YOU need the blessing you can offer him. There is no way for you to have it EXCEPT by giving it. This IS the law of God, and it HAS NO EXCEPTIONS. What you deny you LACK, not because it IS lacking, but because you have denied it in another, and therefore are not aware of it in YOU. Every response you make is determined by what you think you ARE. And what you WANT to be IS what you think you are. Therefore, what you WANT to be determines every response you make.

You do NOT need God's blessing, because that you have forever. But you DO need YOURS. The picture you see of yourselves is deprived, unloving, and very vulnerable. You CANNOT love this. But you can very easily escape FROM it, or better, leave it behind. You are NOT there, and that is not YOU. Do not see this picture in anyone, or you HAVE accepted it as you. ALL illusions about the Sonship are DISPELLED together, as they were MADE together. Teach no-one that HE is what YOU do not want to be. Your brother is the mirror in which you will see the image of yourself as long as perception lasts. And perception WILL last until the Sonship knows itself as whole.

You MADE perception, and it MUST last as long as you WANT it. Illusions are investments. They will last as long as you value them. Values are relative, but they are powerful because they are MENTAL JUDGMENTS. The only way to dispel illusions is to withdraw ALL investment from them, and they will HAVE no life for you because you have put them OUT OF YOUR MIND. While you include them IN it, you are GIVING them life. Except there is nothing there to receive your gift.

The gift of life IS yours to give, because it was given YOU. You are unaware of YOUR gift BECAUSE you do not give it. You CANNOT make nothing live, because it cannot BE enlivened. Therefore, you have NOT extended the gift you both have and are, and so you do NOT know your being. All confusion comes from not extending life, because this is NOT the will of your Creator. You CAN do nothing apart from Him, and you DO do nothing apart from him. Keep His Way to remember yourselves, and teach His Ways lest you forget yourself. Give only honor to the sons of the living God, and count yourself among them gladly.

ONLY honor is a fitting gift for those whom God Himself created worthy of honor and whom He honors. Give them the appreciation which God accords them always, because they are His Beloved Sons in whom He is well pleased. You CANNOT be apart from them, because you are not apart from Him. Rest in His love, and protect your rest by loving. But love EVERYTHING He created, of which YOU are part, or you cannot learn of His peace and accept His gift FOR yourself and AS yourself. You CANNOT know your own perfection until you have honored all those who were created LIKE you.

One Child of God is the only teacher sufficiently worthy to teach another. One Teacher is in all your minds, and He teaches the same lesson to all. He always teaches you the inestimable worth of EVERY Son of God, teaching it with infinite patience born of the Love of Him for whom He speaks. Every attack is a call for His patience, because ONLY His patience can translate attack into blessing. Those who attack DO NOT KNOW THEY ARE BLESSED. They attack BECAUSE THEY BELIEVE THEY ARE DEPRIVED. Give therefore of YOUR abundance, and teach them THEIRS. Do not share their delusions of scarcity, or you will perceive YOURSELF as lacking.

Attack could never PROMOTE attack unless you perceived it as a means of depriving you of SOMETHING YOU WANT. But you cannot lose ANYTHING unless YOU do not value it and therefore DO NOT WANT IT. This makes you feel DEPRIVED of it, and by projecting YOUR rejection, you believe that others are TAKING IT FROM YOU. One MUST be fearful if he believes that his brother is attacking him to tear the Kingdom of Heaven from him.

This is the ultimate basis for ALL of the ego's projection. Being the part of your mind which does NOT believe it is responsible for ITSELF, and being without allegiance to God, it is incapable of trust. Projecting its insane belief that YOU have been treacherous to YOUR Creator, it believes that your brothers, who are as incapable of this as you are, are out to TAKE GOD FROM YOU. Whenever a brother attacks another, THIS IS WHAT HE BELIEVES. Projection ALWAYS sees YOUR will in others. If you will to separate YOURSELF from God, that is what you will think others are doing TO you.

You ARE the will of God. Do not accept anything else AS YOUR will, or you ARE denying what you are. Deny THIS and you WILL attack, because you believe you have BEEN attacked. But see the love of God in you, and you will see it everywhere because it IS everywhere. See His abundance in everyone, and you will know that you are in Him WITH them. They are part of you as you are part of God. YOU are as lonely without understanding this as God Himself is lonely when His Sons do not know Him. The peace of God IS understanding this.

There is only one way out of the world's thinking, just as there was only one way INTO it. Understand totally by understanding TOTALITY. Perceive ANY part of the ego's thought system as wholly insane, wholly delusional, and wholly undesirable, and you have CORRECTLY EVALUATED ALL OF IT. This correction enables you to perceive ANY part of Creation as wholly real, wholly perfect, and WHOLLY DESIRABLE. Wanting this ONLY, you will HAVE this only, and giving this only, you will BE only this. The gifts you offer to the ego are ALWAYS experienced as sacrifices. But the gifts you offer to the Kingdom are gifts to YOU. They will always be treasured by God, because they belong to His Beloved Sons who belong to Him. All power and glory are yours because the Kingdom is His.

Section 8 - Time and Eternity

The CONTINUING will to remain separated is the only possible reason for continuing guilt feelings. We have said this before, but we did not emphasize the destructive results of this decision at that time. ANY decision of the mind will affect both behavior AND experience. And what you will you EXPECT. This is NOT delusional. Your mind DOES create your future, and CAN turn it back to full creation at any minute, IF IT ACCEPTS THE ATONEMENT FIRST. It will also turn back to full creation the instant it has done so. Having given up its thought DISORDER, the proper ordering of thought becomes quite apparent.

God in His knowledge is not waiting. But His Kingdom IS bereft while YOU wait. All the Sons of God are waiting for your return, just as YOU are waiting for THEIRS. Delay does not matter in eternity, but it IS tragic in time. You have elected to be in time rather than in eternity, and have therefore changed your belief in your status. But election is both free and alterable. You do NOT belong in time. Your place is ONLY in eternity, where God Himself placed you forever.

Guilt feelings are the PRESERVERS of time. They induce fears of FUTURE retaliation or abandonment, and thus ensure that the future will remain like the past. This IS the ego's continuity, and gives it a false sense of security through the belief that you cannot escape from it. But you can and MUST. God offers you the continuity of eternity in exchange. When you will to make this exchange, you will simultaneously exchange guilt for peace, viciousness for love, and pain for joy.

My role is only to unchain your will and make it free. Your egos cannot accept this freedom, and will oppose your free decision at every possible moment, and in every possible way. And as its maker, you KNOW what it can do, because you GAVE IT the ability to do it. The mind does indeed know its power, because the mind does indeed know God. Remember the Kingdom always, and remember that you who are part of it cannot BE lost. The mind that was in me IS in you, for God creates with perfect fairness. Let the Holy Spirit remind you always of His fairness, and let me teach you how to share it with your brothers. How else can the chance to claim it for yourself be given you?

The ego's decisions are ALWAYS wrong, because they are based on a complete fallacy which they are made to uphold. NOTHING it perceives is interpreted correctly. Not only does it cite scripture for its purpose, but it even interprets scripture as a witness for itself. The Bible is a fearful thing to the ego, because of its prejudiced judgment. Perceiving it as fearful, it interprets it fearfully. Having made YOU afraid, you do not appeal to the higher court, because you believe its judgment would be AGAINST you.

We need cite only a few examples to see how the ego's interpretations have mislead you. A favorite ego quotation is "As ye sow, so shall ye reap." Another is "Vengeance is mine sayeth the Lord." Still another is "I will visit the sins of the fathers unto the third and the fourth generation." And also, "The wicked shall perish." There are many others, but if you will let the Holy Spirit re-interpret these in its own light, they will suffice.

"As ye sow, so shall ye reap" merely means that what you believe to be worth cultivating you will cultivate in yourself. Your judgment of what is worthy DOES make it worthy for you.

"Vengeance is mine sayeth the Lord" is easily explained if you remember that ideas increase only by being shared. This quotation therefore emphasizes the fact that vengeance CANNOT be shared. Give it therefore to the Holy Spirit, who will undo it in you because it does not BELONG in your mind, which is part of God.

"I will visit the sins of the fathers unto the third and fourth generation," as interpreted by the ego, is particularly vicious. It is used, in fact, as an attempt to guarantee its survival beyond itself. Actually, all it really means is that the Holy Spirit in later generations retains the power to interpret CORRECTLY what former generations have thought, and thus release THEIR thoughts from the ability to produce fear ANYWHERE in the Sonship.

"The wicked shall perish" is merely a statement of fact, if the word "perish" is properly understood. Every loveless thought MUST be undone, and even the word "undone" is fearful to the ego, which interprets "I am undone" as "I am destroyed." The ego will NOT be destroyed, because it is part of YOUR thought. But because it is uncreative, and therefore unsharing, it WILL be re-interpreted entirely, to release you from fear.

The part of your thought which you have given TO the ego will merely return to the Kingdom, where your whole mind BELONGS. The ego is a form of ARREST, but arrest is merely delay. It does NOT involve the concept of police at all, although the ego welcomes that interpretation. You CAN delay the completion of the Kingdom, but you CANNOT introduce the concept of ASSAULT into it.

When I said "I am come as a light into the world," I surely came to share this light with you. Remember the symbolic reference we made before to the ego's dark glass, and remember also that we said "Do not look there." It is still true that "Where you look to find yourself is up to you." The Higher Court will not condemn you. It will merely dismiss the case against you. There can BE no case against a child of God, and every witness to guilt in God's creations is bearing false witness to God Himself.

Appeal everything you believe gladly to God's own Higher Court, because it speaks for Him, and therefore speaks truly. It WILL dismiss the case against you, however carefully YOU have built it. The case may be fool-proof, but it is NOT God-proof. The voice for God will not hear it at all, because it can only witness truly. Its verdict will always be "Thine is the Kingdom," because it was given you to remind you of what you ARE.

Your patience with each other is your patience with your selves. Is not a child of God worth patience? I have shown you infinite patience, because my will IS that of our Father, from whom I learned of infinite patience. His voice was in me, as it is in you, speaking for patience toward the Sonship, in the name of its Creator. What you need to learn now is that only infinite patience CAN produce immediate effects. This is the way in which time is exchanged for eternity. Infinite patience calls upon infinite Love, and by producing results NOW renders time unnecessary.

To say that time is temporary is merely redundant. We have repeatedly said that time is a learning device which will be abolished when it is no longer useful. The Holy Spirit, who speaks for God in time, also knows that time is meaningless. He reminds you of this in every passing moment of time, because it is His special function to return YOU to eternity and remain to bless YOUR creations there. He is the only blessing you can truly give, because He is so truly blessed. And because He has been given you so freely by God, you must give Him as you received Him.

Section 6 - The Shift to Miracles

When no perception stands between God and His Creation, or between His Children and their own, the knowledge of creation MUST continue forever. The reflections that you accept into the mirror of your minds in time, but bring eternity nearer or farther.

But eternity ITSELF is beyond ALL time. Reach out of time and touch it, with the help of its reflection IN you, and you will turn FROM time to holiness, as surely as the reflection of holiness calls everyone to lay all guilt aside. Reflect the peace of Heaven HERE, and bring this world to Heaven. For the REFLECTION of truth draws everyone TO truth. And as they enter INTO it, they leave ALL reflections behind. In Heaven, reality is SHARED, and not reflected. By sharing its reflection HERE, its truth becomes the only perception which the Son of God accepts. And thus, remembrance of His Father dawns on him, and he can no longer be satisfied with anything but his own reality.

What is more difficult to grasp is the lack of order of magnitude, which stamps the miracle as something that MUST come from elsewhere, NOT from here. From the world's viewpoint, this is quite impossible. You have experienced the lack of competition among your thoughts, which, even though they may conflict, can occur to you together, and in great numbers. You are so used to this, that it can cause you little surprise. Yet you are also used to classifying some of your thoughts as more important, larger, or better, wiser, or more productive and valuable, than others. And this is true about the thoughts that cross the mind of those who think they live apart. For some are reflections of Heaven, while others are motivated by the ego, which but SEEMS to think.

The result is a weaving, changing pattern that never rests, and is never still. It shifts unceasingly across the mirror of your mind, and the reflections of Heaven last but a moment, and grow dim, as darkness blots them out. Where there was light, darkness removes it in an instant, and alternating patterns of light and darkness, darkness and light, sweep constantly across your minds. The little sanity that still remains is held together by a sense of order which YOU establish. The very fact that you can DO this, and bring ANY order into chaos, shows you that you are NOT an ego, and that MORE than an ego MUST be in you. For the ego IS chaos, and if it were all of you, no order at all would be possible.

But, though the order which you impose upon your minds limits the ego, IT ALSO LIMITS YOU. To order is to judge, and to arrange BY judgment. Therefore, it is NOT your function, but the Holy Spirit's. It will seem very difficult for you to learn that YOU HAVE NO BASIS AT ALL for ordering your thoughts. This lesson the Holy Spirit teaches, by giving you shining examples, to show you that your way of ordering is wrong, but that a better way is OFFERED you. The miracle offers EXACTLY the same response to EVERY call for help. IT DOES NOT JUDGE THE CALL. It merely recognizes what it IS, and answers accordingly. It does NOT consider which call is louder, or greater, or more important.

You may wonder how you, who are still bound to judgment, can be asked to do that which requires no judgment of your own. The answer is very simple. The power of God, and NOT of you, engenders miracles. The miracle ITSELF is but the witness that you HAVE the power of God in you. That is the reason that the miracle gives EQUAL blessing to ALL who share in it, and that is also why EVERYONE shares in it. The power of God IS limitless. And, being always maximal, it offers EVERYTHING to EVERY call from ANYONE. There is no order here. A call for help is GIVEN help. The only judgment involved at all is in the Holy Spirit's one division into two categories; one of love, and the other, the call for love.

You cannot safely make this division, for you are much too confused, either to recognize love, or to believe that EVERYTHING else is nothing but a NEED for love. You are too bound to form, and NOT to content. What you CONSIDER content, is not content at all. It is merely form, and nothing else. For you do NOT respond to what a brother REALLY offers you, but only to the particular perception of his offering by which your EGO judges it. The ego is incapable of understanding content, and is totally unconcerned with it. To the ego, if the form is acceptable, the content MUST be. Otherwise, it will attack the form.

You who believe you understand something of the dynamics of the mind, let me assure you that you know NOTHING of it at all. For of yourselves, you COULD not know of it. The study of the ego is NOT the study of the mind. In fact, the ego enjoys the study of itself, and thoroughly approves the undertakings of the students who would analyze it, approving its importance. Yet they but study form, with meaningless content. For their teacher is senseless, though careful to conceal this fact behind a lot of words that sound impressive, but which lack ANY consistent sense when they are put together.

This is the characteristic of the ego's judgments. SEPARATELY, they seem to hold, but PUT THEM TOGETHER, and the system of thought which arises from JOINING them, is incoherent and utterly chaotic. For form is not enough for meaning, and the underlying LACK of content, makes a cohesive system impossible. SEPARATION therefore remains the ego's chosen condition. For no-one ALONE can judge the ego truly. But when two or more JOIN TOGETHER in searching for truth, the ego can no longer defend its lack of content. The fact of union tells them it is not true.

It is impossible to remember God in secret and alone. For remembering Him means you are NOT alone, and willing to remember it. Take no thought FOR YOURSELF, for no thought you hold IS for yourself. If you would remember your Father, let the Holy Spirit order your thoughts, and give only the answer with which He answers you. Everyone seeks for love, as you do, and knows it not, unless he joins WITH you in seeking it. If you undertake the search TOGETHER, you bring with you a light so powerful, that what you see is GIVEN meaning. The lonely journey fails, because it has EXCLUDED what it would FIND.

As God communicates to the Holy Spirit in you, so does the Holy Spirit TRANSLATE His communications THROUGH you, so YOU can understand them. God has no secret communications, for everything of Him is perfectly open, and freely accessible to all, being FOR all. Nothing lives in secret, and what you would hide from the Holy Spirit IS nothing. Every interpretation you would lay upon a brother is senseless. Let the Holy Spirit SHOW HIM TO YOU, and teach you both his love and NEED for love. Neither his mind, NOR YOURS, holds but these two orders of thought. The miracle is the recognition that this is true.

Where there is love, your brother MUST give it to you, because of what it IS. But where there is NEED for love, YOU must give it, because of what YOU are. Long ago we said this course will teach you what you are, restoring to you your identity. And we have already learned that this identity is shared. THE MIRACLE BECOMES THE MEANS OF SHARING IT. By SUPPLYING your identity, WHEREVER it is NOT recognized, YOU will recognize it. And God Himself, Who wills to be with His Son forever, will bless each recognition of His Son, with all the love He holds for him. Nor will the power of all His love be absent from any miracle you offer TO His Son. How, then, can there be ANY order of difficulty among them?

Section 2 - Projection versus Extension

You have made by projection, but God has created by extension. The cornerstone of God's creation is YOU, for HIS thought system is light. Remember the rays that are there unseen. The more you approach the center of HIS thought system, the clearer the light becomes. The closer you come to the foundation of the ego's thought system, the darker and more obscure becomes the way. But even the little spark in your mind is enough to lighten it. Bring this light fearlessly with you, and hold it up to the foundation of the ego's thought system bravely. Be willing to judge it with perfect honesty. Open the dark stone of terror on which it rests, and bring it out into the light. There you will see that it rests on meaninglessness, and that everything of which you have been afraid was based on nothing.

My brother, you are part of God and part of me. When you have at last looked at the ego's foundation without shrinking, you will also have looked upon ours. I come to you from our Father, to offer you everything again. Do not refuse it to keep a dark cornerstone hidden, for ITS protection will not save you. I GIVE you the lamp, and I will go with you. You will not take this journey alone. I will lead you to your true Father, Who hath need of you, as I have. Will you not answer the call of love with joy?

You HAVE learned your need of healing. Would you bring anything ELSE to the Sonship, KNOWING your need of it for yourself? For in this lies the beginning of knowledge; the foundation on which God will help you build again the thought system which you share WITH Him. Not one stone you place upon it but will be blessed by Him. For you will be restoring the holy dwelling place of His Son, where He wills His Son to be, and where he IS. In whatever part of the mind of God's Son you restore this reality, you restore it to YOURSELF. For you dwell in the Mind of God WITH your brother, for God Himself did not will to be alone.

To be alone is to be separated from Infinity, but how can this be, if Infinity has no end? No-one can BE beyond the limitless, because what has NO limits, must be everywhere. There are no beginnings and no endings in God, Whose Universe is Himself. Can you exclude yourself from the Universe, or from God, Who IS the Universe? I and my Father are one with YOU, for you are part of us. Do you REALLY believe that part of God can be missing or lost to Him?

If you were not part of God, His Will would not be unified. Is this conceivable? Can part of His Mind contain nothing? If your place in His Mind cannot be filled by anyone EXCEPT you, and your filling it WAS your creation, WITHOUT you, there would be an empty place in God's Mind. Extension cannot be blocked, and it has no voids. It continues forever, however much it is denied. Your DENIAL of its reality arrests it in time, but not in Eternity. That is why your creations have not ceased to be extended, and why so much is waiting for your return.

Infinity is meaningless WITHOUT you, and YOU are meaningless without God. There IS no end to God and His Son, for we ARE the universe. God is not incomplete, and He is not childless. Because He did not will to be alone, He created a Son like Himself. Do not deny Him His Son, for your unwillingness to accept His Fatherhood has denied you yours. See His creations as HIS Son, for yours were created in honor of Him.

The universe of love does not stop because you do not see it, and your closed eyes have not lost the ability to see. Look upon the glory of His creation, and you will learn what God has kept for YOU. God has given you a place in His Mind which is yours forever. But you could keep it only by Giving it, as it was given to you. Could YOU be alone there, if it was given you because GOD did not will to be alone? God's Mind cannot be lessened. It can ONLY be increased, and EVERYTHING He creates has the function of creating. LOVE DOES NOT LIMIT, and what it creates is not limited.

To give without limit is God's Will for you, because only this can bring you the joy which is His, and which He wills to share with YOU. Your love is as boundless as His because it IS His. Could any part of Him be WITHOUT His Love, and could any part of His Love be contained? God is your heritage, because His one gift is Himself. How can you give except LIKE Him, if you would know His gift to YOU? Give, then, without limit and without end, to learn how much HE has given YOU. Your ability to ACCEPT Him depends on your willingness to give as He gives. Your fatherhood and your Father are One.

God willed to create, and your will is His. It follows, then, that YOU will to create, since your will follows from His. And being the extension of His will, yours MUST be the same. Yet what you will, you do not know. This is not strange, when you realize that to deny IS to not know. God's Will was that you are His Son. By DENYING this, you denied your OWN will, and therefore DO NOT KNOW WHAT IT IS. The reason you must ask what God's Will is in everything, is merely because It IS yours. YOU do not know what it is, but the Holy Spirit REMEMBERS IT FOR YOU.

Ask him, therefore, what God's Will is for you, and He will tell you YOURS. It cannot be too often repeated that you do NOT KNOW it. Whenever what the Holy Spirit tells you appears to be coercive, it is ONLY because YOU DO NOT RECOGNIZE YOUR OWN WILL. The projection of the ego makes it appear as if God's Will is OUTSIDE yourself, and therefore NOT YOURS. In THIS interpretation, it IS possible for God's Will and yours to conflict. God, then, may seem to demand of you what you do NOT want to give, and thus DEPRIVE you of what you want. Would God, Who wants ONLY your will, be capable of this? Your will is His Life, which He has GIVEN to you. Even in time you cannot live apart from Him, for sleep is not death. What He created can sleep, but it CANNOT die. Immortality is His Will for His Son, and His Son's will for HIMSELF. Yet God's Son cannot will death for himself, because His Father is Life, and HIS SON IS LIKE HIM.

Creation is your will because it is His. You cannot be happy unless you do what you will truly, and you CHANGE this, because it is immutable. But it is immutable by God's Will AND YOURS, for otherwise His Will would not have been extended. You are afraid to know God's Will, because you believe it is NOT yours. This belief is your whole sickness, and your whole fear. Every symptom of sickness and fear arises here, because this is the belief that makes you want not to know. Believing this, you hide in darkness, denying that the Light is in YOU.

You are asked to trust the Holy Spirit only because He speaks for YOU. He is the Voice for God, but never forget that God did not will to be alone. He SHARES His Will with you; He does not thrust it UPON you. Always remember that what He gives He holds, so that nothing He gives CAN contradict Him. You who share His Life must share it to KNOW it, for sharing IS knowing. Blessed are you who learn that to hear the Will of your Father, is to know your own. For it is YOUR will to be LIKE Him, Whose Will it is that it be so.

God's Will is that His Son be One, and united with Him in His Oneness. That is why healing is the beginning of the recognition that YOUR WILL IS HIS.

Section 6 - The Little Hindrance

A little hindrance can seem large indeed to those who do not understand that miracles are all the same. But teaching that is what this course is FOR. That is its only purpose, for only that is all there is to learn. And you can learn it many different ways. All learning is a help or hindrance to the gate of Heaven. Nothing in between is possible. There are TWO teachers only, who point in different ways. And you will go along the way your chosen teacher leads. There are but TWO directions you can take, while time remains and choice is meaningful. For never will another road be made, except the way to Heaven. You but choose whether to go TOWARD Heaven, or away to nowhere. There is nothing else to choose.

Nothing is ever lost but time, which, in the end, IS nothing. It is but a little hindrance to eternity, quite meaningless to the real Teacher of the world. But since you DO believe in its reality, why should you waste it going nowhere, when it CAN be used to reach a goal as high as learning can achieve? Think not the way to Heaven's gate is difficult at all. Nothing you undertake with certain purpose and high resolve and happy confidence, holding each other's hand and keeping step to Heaven's song, is difficult to do. But it IS hard indeed to wander off, alone and miserable, down a road which leads to nothing, and which HAS no purpose.

God gave His Teacher to REPLACE the one you made, NOT to CONFLICT with it. And what He would replace HAS BEEN replaced. Time lasted but an instant in your mind, with NO effect upon eternity. And so is ALL time past, and everything EXACTLY as it was before the way to nothingness was made. The tiny tick of time, in which the first mistake was made, and ALL of them within that ONE mistake, held also the Correction for that one, and ALL of them that came within the first. And in that tiny instant time was gone, for that was all it ever was. What God gave Answer to IS answered, and IS gone.

To you who still believe you live in time, and know not it is gone, the Holy Spirit still guides you through the infinitely small and senseless maze you still perceive in time, though it has long since gone. You think you live in what is past. Each thing you look upon you saw but for an instant, long ago, before its unreality gave way to truth. Not one illusion still remains unanswered in your mind. Uncertainty was brought to Certainty so long ago that it is hard indeed to hold it to your heart, as if it were before you still. The tiny instant you would keep, and make eternal, passed away in Heaven too soon for anything to notice it had come.

What disappeared too quickly to affect the simple knowledge of the Son of God, can hardly still be there for you to choose to be your teacher. Only in the past, - an ancient past, too short to make a world in answer to creation, - did this world APPEAR to rise. So VERY long ago, for such a tiny interval of time that not one note in Heaven's song was missed. Yet, in each unforgiving act or thought, in every judgment, and in all belief in sin is that one instant still called back, as if it could be made again in time. You keep an ancient memory before your eyes. And he who lives in memories alone is unaware of where he IS.

Forgiveness is the great release from time. It is the key to learning that the past is over. Madness speaks no more. There IS no OTHER teacher and no OTHER way. For what has been undone no longer is. And who can stand upon a distant shore, and dream himself across an ocean, to a place and time that have long since gone by? How REAL a hindrance can this dream be to where he really IS? For this is fact, and does NOT change whatever dreams he has. Yet can he still IMAGINE he is elsewhere, and in another time. In the extreme, he can delude himself that this is true, and pass from mere imagining into belief and into madness, quite convinced that where he would prefer to be, he IS.

Is this a HINDRANCE to the place whereon he stands? Is any echo from the past that he may hear a fact in what is there to hear where he is now? And how much can his own delusions about time and place affect a change in where he REALLY is? The unforgiven is a voice that calls from out a past forever more gone by. And everything which points to it as real is but a wish that what is gone could be made real again, and seen as here and now, in place of what is REALLY now and here. Is this a HINDRANCE to the truth the past has gone, and CANNOT be returned to you? And do you WANT that fearful instant kept, when Heaven seemed to disappear, and God was feared and made a symbol of your hate?

Forget the time of terror that has been so long ago corrected and undone. Can sin withstand the Will of God? Can it be up to you to see the past, and put it in the present? You can NOT go back. And everything that points the way in the direction of the past but sets you on a mission whose accomplishment can ONLY be unreal. Such is the justice your ever loving Father has ensured MUST come to you. And from your own unfairness unto yourself has He protected you. You CANNOT lose your way, because there is no Way but His, and nowhere CAN you go, except to Him. Would He allow His Son to lose his way along a road long since a distant memory of a time gone by?

This course will teach you ONLY what is now. A dreadful instant in a distant past, now perfectly corrected, is of no concern or value. Let the dead and gone be peacefully forgotten. Resurrection has come to take its place. And now you are a part of Resurrection, NOT of death. No past illusions have the power to keep you in a place of death, a vault God's Son entered an instant, to be instantly restored unto His Father's Perfect Love. And how can he be kept in chains long since removed, and gone forever from his mind? The Son that God created is as free as God created him. He was reborn the instant that he chose to die, instead of live. And will you not forgive him now, because he made an error in the past that God remembers not, and is not there?

The real world is the second part of the hallucination time and death are real, and have existence which can be perceived. This terrible illusion was denied in but the time it took for God to give His Answer to illusion for ALL time and EVERY circumstance. And then it was no more, to be experienced as there. Each day, and every minute in each day, and every instant that each minute holds, you but relive the single instant when the time of terror was replaced by Love. And so you die each day to live again, until you cross the gap between the past and present, which is NOT a gap at all.

Such is each life; a seeming interval from birth to death, and on to life again, a repetition of an instant gone by long ago, which CANNOT be relived. And ALL of time is but the mad belief that what is over is still here and now. Forgive the past and let it go, for it IS gone. You stand no longer on the ground that lies between the worlds. You HAVE gone on, and reached the world that lies at Heaven's gate. There IS no hindrance to the Will of God, nor any need that you repeat again a journey that was over long ago. Look gently on each other, and behold the world in which perception of your hate has been transformed into a world of Love.

Section 6 - Healing and the Changelessness of Mind

The body is nothing more than a framework for developing abilities. It is therefore a means for developing potentials, which is quite apart from what the potential is used FOR. This IS a decision. The effects of the ego's decision in this matter are so apparent that they need no elaboration here. But the Holy Spirit's decision to use the body ONLY for communication has such direct connection with healing that it DOES need clarification. The unhealed healer OBVIOUSLY does not understand his own vocation.

ONLY minds communicate. Since the ego CANNOT obliterate the impulse to communicate because it is also the impulse to CREATE, it can only try to teach you that the BODY can both communicate AND create, and therefore DOES NOT NEED THE MIND. The ego, then, tries to teach you that the body can ACT like the mind, and therefore IS self-sufficient. But we have learned that behavior is NOT the level for either teaching OR learning. This MUST be so, because you CAN act in accordance with what you do NOT believe. But this will weaken you as teachers AND learners because, as has been repeatedly emphasized, you teach what you DO believe. An inconsistent lesson WILL be poorly taught and POORLY LEARNED. If you teach both sickness AND healing, you ARE both a poor teacher and a poor learner.

Healing is the one ability that everyone CAN develop, and MUST develop, if he is to BE healed. Healing IS the Holy Spirit's form of communication, and THE ONLY ONE HE KNOWS. He recognizes no other, because he does NOT accept the ego's confusion of mind and body. Minds CAN communicate, but they CANNOT hurt. The body in the service of the ego can hurt other BODIES, but this CANNOT occur UNLESS the body has ALREADY been confused WITH the mind. This fact, too, can be used either for healing or for magic, but you must realize that magic is ALWAYS the belief that healing is HARMFUL. This is its totally insane premise, and so it proceeds accordingly.

Healing ONLY STRENGTHENS. Magic always tries to weaken. Healing perceives NOTHING in the healer that everyone else does not share WITH him. Magic ALWAYS sees something special in the healer, which he believes he can offer as a gift to someone who does NOT have it. He may believe that this gift comes from God TO him, but it is quite evident that he does NOT understand God if he thinks HE has something that others DO NOT. You might well ask why SOME healing CAN result from this kind of thinking, and there is a real reason for this.

However misguided the "magical healer" may be, and however much he may be trying to strengthen his ego, HE IS ALSO TRYING TO HELP. He IS conflicted and unstable, but AT TIMES he is offering SOMETHING to the Sonship, and the ONLY thing the Sonship can ACCEPT IS healing. When the so-called healing "works," then, the impulse both to help and BE helped have coincided. This is co-incidental, because the healer may NOT be experiencing HIMSELF as truly helpful at the time, and the belief that he IS, in the mind of ANOTHER, HELPS HIM.

The Holy Spirit does NOT work by chance, and the healing that is of HIM ALWAYS works. And unless the healer ALWAYS heals BY Him, the results WILL vary. But healing itself IS consistence, because ONLY consistence is conflict-free, and only the conflict-free ARE whole. By accepting exceptions, and acknowledging that he can SOMETIMES heal and SOMETIMES not, the healer is OBVIOUSLY accepting INconsistency. He is therefore IN conflict and TEACHING conflict.

Can ANYTHING of God NOT be for all and always? Love is incapable of ANY exceptions. Only if there is fear does the whole IDEA of exceptions of any kind seem to be meaningful. Exceptions ARE fearful because they were made BY fear. The "fearful healer" is a contradiction in terms, and is therefore a concept that ONLY a conflicted mind could POSSIBLY perceive as meaningful. Fear does NOT gladden. Healing DOES. Fear ALWAYS makes exceptions. Healing NEVER does. Fear produces dissociation because it induces SEPARATION. Healing ALWAYS induces harmony because it proceeds from integration.

The unhealed healer wants gratitude FROM his brothers, but he is NOT grateful to them. This is because he thinks he is giving something TO them, and is NOT receiving something equally desirable in return. His TEACHING is limited because he is LEARNING so little. His HEALING lesson is limited by his own ingratitude, which is a lesson in sickness. Learning is constant and so vital in its power for change that a Son of God can recognize his power in an instant, and change the world in the next. That is because by changing HIS mind he has changed the most powerful device that was ever created FOR change.

This in no way contradicts the changelessness of mind as GOD created it. But YOU think that you HAVE changed it, as long as you learn through the ego. This DOES place you in a position of needing to learn a lesson which SEEMS contradictory: you must learn to change your mind ABOUT your mind. Only by this can you learn that it IS changeless.

When you heal, that is exactly what you ARE learning (doing). You are recognizing the changeless mind in your brother by perceiving (knowing) that he could NOT have changed his mind. That is how you perceive the Holy Spirit in him. It is ONLY the Holy Spirit in him that never changes His mind. He himself must think he CAN, or he would not perceive himself as sick. He therefore does not know what his self IS. If YOU see only the changeless in him, you have not really changed him at all. But by changing your mind about HIS FOR him, you help him undo the change his ego thinks it has made in him. As you can hear two voices, so you can see in two ways. One way shows you an image, or better, an idol which you may worship out of fear, but which you will never love. The other shows you only truth, which you will love because you will UNDERSTAND it. Understanding is APPRECIATION, because what you understand you can identify WITH, and by making it part of YOU you have accepted it with love. This is how God Himself created YOU, in understanding, in appreciation, and in love.

The ego is totally unable to understand this, because it does NOT understand what it makes. It does NOT appreciate it, and it does NOT love it. It incorporates to TAKE AWAY. It literally believes that every time it deprives someone of something IT has increased. We have spoken often of the INCREASE of the Kingdom by YOUR creations, which can only BE created as YOU were.

The whole glory and perfect joy that IS the Kingdom lies in you to give. Do you not WANT to give it? You CANNOT forget the Father because I am with you and I CANNOT forget Him. To forget ME is to forget yourself and Him who created you. Our brothers ARE forgetful. That is why they need your remembrance of Me and Him who created Me. Through this remembrance you can change THEIR minds about themselves, as I can change YOURS. Your minds are so powerful a light that you can look into theirs and enlighten them, as I can enlighten yours.

I do not want to share my BODY in communion because this is to share nothing. Would I try to share an illusion with the most holy children of a most Holy Father? But I do want to share my MIND with you because we ARE of one Mind, and that Mind IS ours. See ONLY this Mind everywhere, because only this IS everywhere and in everything. It IS everything, because it encompasses all things within ITSELF. Blessed are you who perceive only this, because you perceive only what is true. Come therefore unto me and learn of the truth in YOU.

The mind WE share IS shared by all our brothers, and as we see them truly, they WILL be healed. Let YOUR minds shine with mine upon their minds, and by our gratitude to them make THEM aware of the light in THEM. This light will shine back upon YOU and on the whole Sonship because this IS your proper gift to God. He will accept it and give it to the Sonship, because it is acceptable to Him, and therefore to His Sons. This is the true communion of the Spirit Who sees the altar of God in everyone, and by bringing it to YOUR appreciation calls upon you to love God and His Creation.

Miracle Principle 31

Miracles praise God through men. They praise God by honoring his Creations, affirming their perfection. They heal because they deny body-identification and affirm Soul-identification. By perceiving the Spirit, they adjust the levels and see them in proper alignment. This places the Spirit at the center, where Souls can communicate directly.

Miracles should inspire gratitude, not awe. Man should thank God for what he really is. The Children of God are very holy. The miracle honors their holiness.

God's Creations cannot lose their holiness, although it can be hidden. The miracle uncovers it, and brings it into the light where it belongs.

Holiness can never be really hidden in darkness, but man can deceive himself on this point. This illusion makes him fearful, because in his heart he KNOWS it is an illusion. Like all illusions, he exerts enormous efforts to establish their validity. The miracle sets validity where it belongs. Eternal validity belongs only to the Soul. The miracle acknowledges only the Truth. It thus dispels man's illusions about himself, and puts him into communion with himself and with God.

Miracle Principle 32

The Soul never loses its communion with God. Only the mind and body need Atonement. The miracle joins in the Atonement of Christ by placing the mind in the service of the Spirit. This establishes the proper function of mind, and abolishes its errors.

Miracle Principle 33

Miracles honor man, BECAUSE he is loveable. They dispel illusions about himself, and perceive the light in him. They thus atone for his errors by freeing him from his own nightmares. They release him from a prison in which he has imprisoned himself. By freeing his mind from illusions, they restore his sanity, and place him at the feet of Jesus.

(Biblical quotation re healing of devil possessed man, in which the sufferer was subsequently found healed in his right mind, and sitting at feet of Jesus. Helen Schucman note.)

(Tell Bill man's mind can be possessed by illusions, but his Spirit is eternally free. If a mind creates without love, it can create an empty shell. This CAN be possessed by evil. But the Atonement restores the Soul to its proper place. Unless there is emptiness there is no danger, and emptiness is a false creation. The mind that serves the Spirit is invulnerable.)

Miracle Principle 34

The miracle restores the Soul to its fullness. By atoning for lack, it establishes perfect protection. The strength of the Soul leaves no room for intrusions. The forgiven are filled with the Soul, and their Soul forgives in return. It is the duty of the released to release their brothers.

The forgiven ARE the means of Atonement. Those released by Christ must join in releasing their brothers, for this is the plan of Atonement.

Miracles are the way in which minds that serve the spirit unite with Christ for the salvation (or release) of all God's Creations.

AsideHelen Schucman commented on awakening with the phrase "God is not Mocked," with anticipation of punishment.)

Interpretation: "God is not mocked" was intended as reassurance. You are afraid that what you wrote last night was contradictory, conflicting with some earlier points, especially because you were writing while you were all doped up. Remember, "God is not mocked" under any circumstances.

Contradictions in MY word mean lack of understanding, or scribal failures, which I make every effort to correct. But they are still NOT crucial. The Bible has the same problem, I assure you, and it's STILL being edited. Consider the power of MY WORD, in that it has withstood all the attacks of error, and is the Source of Truth.

(Tell Bill that there are certain advantages in being a Psychologist. A major one is the understanding of projection, and the extent of its results. Possession is very closely related to projection. "Lucifer" could be literally translated "Light Bearer." He literally PROJECTED himself from Heaven. Projection still has this "hurling" connotation, because it involves hurling something you DO NOT want, and regard as dangerous and frightening, to someone else. This is the opposite of the Golden Rule, and having placed this rule upside down, the reverse of miracles, or projection, follows automatically.)

The correction lies in accepting what is true in YOURSELF, by bringing ALL that you are into light. (Helen Schucman fearful of writing next part.) Cacey sic was wrong about Possession, and he was also wrong about hurting himself. One of the major problems with miracle workers is that they are so sure that what they are doing is right, because they KNOW it stems from love, that they do not pause to let ME establish MY limits.

While what he (Cacey sic) did came from Me, he could NOT be induced to ask me each time whether I wanted him to perform this PARTICULAR miracle. If he had, he would not have performed any miracles that could not get through constructively, and would thus have saved himself unnecessary strain. He burned himself out with indiscriminate miracles, and to this extent did not fulfill his own full purpose, and was also subject to the Scribal error I mentioned at the start. The Disciples were also prone to this.

Miracle Principle 35

The answer is NEVER perform a miracle without asking me IF you should. This spares you from exhaustion, and because you act under direct communication the trance becomes unnecessary. Because miracles are expressions of love, it does NOT follow that they will always be effective. I am the only one who can perform miracles indiscriminately, because I AM the Atonement. You have a ROLE in Atonement, which I will dictate TO you.

Remember, you already have a point about the involuntary nature of miracles. We also have established the fact that everything involuntary belongs under Christ-control, NOT under yours. Under Christ-control, Miracles REPLENISH the doer as well as the receiver.

Possession really means "Not under Christ-Control", thus making him (the mind?) vulnerable to projection. The references to the earth-bound entering bodies really refer to the "taking over" by their own earth-bound "thoughts." This IS Demon Possession. After all, Lucifer fell, but he was still an angel. He is thus the symbol for man. Atonement is the knowledge that the belief that angels can fall is false. It is true that mind can create projections as well as miracles, but it's NOT true that projections are REAL. Any psychologist should understand this. This is what is meant by "The Truth shall set you free."

Miracle Principle 36

Christ-controlled miracles are part of the Atonement, but Christ-guidance is personal, and leads to PERSONAL salvation. The impersonal nature of miracles is an essential ingredient, because this enables Me to control their distribution as I see fit.

Christ-guidance, on the other hand, leads to the highly PERSONAL experience of Revelation. This is why it involves PERSONAL choice. A guide does NOT control, by definition, but he does DIRECT, leaving the following up to you. "Lead us not into temptation" means "guide us out of our own errors." Note that the word is "lead", NOT order.

"Take up thy cross and follow me" should be interpreted to read "Recognize your errors and choose to abandon them by following My guidance."

(Tell Bill when he is afraid of Possession, he need only remember that error cannot really threaten Truth, which ALWAYS can withstand its assaults. ONLY the error is really vulnerable.) The "Princes of this World" are princes only because they are really angels. But they are free to establish their kingdom where they see fit.

If you will remember that ALL princes INHERIT their power from the Father, the right choice becomes inevitable.

The soul is in a state of grace forever.

Man's reality is ONLY his soul.

Therefore, man is in a state of Grace forever.

Atonement undoes all errors in this respect, and thus uproots the REAL source of fear. If you will check back at the reference to uprooting, you will understand it better in this context.

(Tell Bill that WHENEVER God's reassurances are experienced as threat, it is ALWAYS because man is defending his misplaced and misdirected love and loyalty. That is what projection always involves.)

"Casting spells" merely means "affirming error", and error is lack of love. When man projects this onto others, he DOES imprison them, but only to the extent that he reinforces errors they have already made. This distortion makes them vulnerable to the curse of others, since they have already cursed themselves. The miracle worker can only bless, and this undoes the curse and frees the soul from prison.

(Tell Bill that his slip about (rivet) should be noted. Some slips reach consciousness from the un-Christ-controlled subconscious, and betray a lack of love.)

But others (slips) come from the superconscious, which IS in communion with God, and which can also break into consciousness.

HIS slip (rivet) was an expression of a Soul gaining enough strength to request freedom from prison. It will ultimately DEMAND it.

Special Revelation for Helen Schucman

You are wholly lovely. A perfect shaft of pure light. Before your loveliness the stars stand transfixed, and bow to the power of your will.

What do children know of their creation, except what their Creator tells them?

You were created ABOVE the angels because your role involves creation as well as protection.

You who are in the image of the Father need bow only to HIM, before whom I kneel with you.

Note: This revelation was permitted because you did NOT project onto Bill the blame for your omission to ASK ME if you should transcribe the notes. The fact that HE should have done so does not exempt you from your own omission.

Thanks for blessing him with a miracle rather than cursing him with projection.

NOTE FURTHER: HE needn't feel concerned about it either; so he forgot? It happens all the time, until the habit of asking becomes involuntary.

(Helen Schucman meeting with Dr. Wise and Dr. Damrosch. Dr. D permitted an opportunity for questioning in his capacity as chairman of the flu board for asking re B's flu shot. This was an example of how miracles should work. You did not jump into the question yourself, and even though you DID rush for the phone on Red's advice, you exerted no pressure on B's reluctance.)

This gave ME a chance to let you leave it to the real expert, whom I sent to answer the question.

Miracle Principle 37

Miracles are examples of right thinking. Reality contact at all levels becomes strong and accurate, thus permitting correct delineation of intra- and interpersonal boundaries. As a result, the doer sees the truth as God created it. This is what is meant by the point on "perspective adjustment."

Miracle Principle 38

A miracle is a correction factor introduced into false thinking by ME.

It acts as a catalyst, shaking up erroneous perception and snapping it into place. This correction factor places man under the Atonement principle, where his perception is healed. Until this has occurred, perception of the Divine Order is impossible. True depth perception becomes possible only at the highest order of perceptual integration.

Miracle Principle 39

The Spiritual eye is the mechanism of miracles, because what the Spiritual eye perceives IS truth. The Spiritual eye perceives both the Creations of God AND the creations of man. Among the creations of man, it can also separate the true from the false by its ability to perceive totally rather than selectively. It thus becomes the proper instrument for reality testing, which always involves the necessary distinction between the true and the false.

Miracle Principle 40

The miracle dissolves error because the Spiritual eye identifies error as false or unreal. This is the same as saying that by seeing light, darkness automatically disappears.

Darkness is lack of light. It does not have unique properties of its own. It is an example of the scarcity fallacy, from which only error can proceed.

(Truth is always abundant... Those who perceive and acknowledge that they have everything have no need for driven behavior of any kind. Helen Schucman has other personal material related to this re pregnancy.)

Section 9 - The Principle of Salvation

The Holy Spirit can use ALL that you give to Him for your salvation. But He CANNOT use what you withhold. For He can NOT take it from you, WITHOUT your willingness. For, if He did, you would believe He wrested it from you AGAINST your will. And so you would not learn it IS your will to be without it. You need not give it to Him WHOLLY willingly, for if you could, you had no need for Him. But this He needs; that you PREFER He take it, than that you keep it for yourself alone, and recognize that what brings loss to no-one YOU WOULD NOT KNOW. This much is necessary to add to the idea no-one CAN lose for you to gain. And nothing more.

Here is the ONLY principle salvation needs. Nor is it necessary that your faith in it be strong, unswerving, and without attack from all beliefs opposed to it. You HAVE no fixed allegiance. But remember salvation is not needed by the saved. You are NOT called upon to do what one divided still against himself WOULD find impossible. Have little faith that wisdom COULD be found in such a state of mind. But be you thankful that only little faith is ASKED of you. What BUT a little faith remains to those who still believe in sin? What COULD they know of Heaven and the justice of the saved?

You who know not of justice still can ask, and learn the answer. Justice looks on all in the same way. It is NOT just that one should lack for what another has. For that is vengeance, in WHATEVER form it takes. Justice demands NO sacrifice, for ANY sacrifice is made that sin MAY BE PRESERVED and KEPT. It is a payment offered for the cost of sin, BUT NOT THE TOTAL COST. The rest is taken from another, to be laid beside your LITTLE payment, to "atone" for all that you would keep and NOT give up. So is the victim seen as PARTLY you, with someone ELSE by far the greater part. And in the TOTAL cost, the greater his, the less is yours. And justice, being blind, is satisfied by being paid, it matters not by whom.

Can this BE justice? God knows not of this. But justice DOES He know, and knows it well. For He is wholly fair to everyone. Vengeance is alien to His Mind BECAUSE He knows of justice. To be just is to be fair, AND NOT be vengeful. Fairness AND vengeance are impossible, for each one contradicts the other, and denies that it is real. It is impossible for you to SHARE the Holy Spirit's justice, with a mind that can conceive of specialness at all. Yet how could HE be just, if He condemns a sinner for the crimes he did not do, but THINKS he did? And where would justice be if He demanded of the ones obsessed with the idea of punishment that they lay it aside, unaided, and perceive it is not true?

It is extremely hard for those who still believe sin meaningful to understand the Holy Spirit's justice. They believe He shares their OWN confusion, and can NOT avoid the vengeance that their own belief in justice MUST entail. And so they fear the Holy Spirit, and perceive the wrath of God in Him. They are unjust indeed to Him. Nor can they trust Him NOT to strike them dead with lightening bolts torn from the fires of Heaven by God's Own angry hand. They DO believe that Heaven is hell, and ARE afraid of love. And deep suspicion and the chill of fear come over them when they are told that they have NEVER sinned. Their world DEPENDS on sin's stability. And they perceive the "threat" of what God KNOWS as justice to be more destructive to themselves and to their world than vengeance, which they understand and love.

So do they think the LOSS of sin a curse. And flee the blessing of the Holy Spirit as if He were a messenger from hell, sent from above in treachery and guile, to work God's vengeance on them in the guise of a deliverer and friend. What COULD He be to them except a devil dressed to deceive, within an angel's cloak? And what escape has He for them, except a door to hell that SEEMS to look like Heaven's gate? Yet justice cannot punish those who ask for punishment, but have a Judge Who knows that they are wholly innocent in truth. In justice He is BOUND to set them free, and GIVE them all the honor they deserve, and have denied themselves because they are NOT fair, and CANNOT understand that they ARE innocent.

Love is NOT understandable to sinners. BECAUSE they think that justice is SPLIT OFF from love, and stands for something else. And thus is love perceived as weak and vengeance strong. For love has LOST when judgment left its side, and is too weak to SAVE from punishment. But vengeance WITHOUT love has GAINED in strength by being separate and apart from love. And what BUT vengeance now can help and save, while love stands feebly by, with helpless hands, bereft of justice and vitality, and powerless to save? What can Love ask of you who think that all of this is true? Could He, in justice AND in love believe in your confusion you HAVE much to give?

You are NOT asked to trust Him far. No further than what you SEE He offers you, and what you recognize you COULD not give yourself. In God's Own justice does He recognize all you deserve, but understands as well that you can NOT accept it for yourself. It is His Special Function to hold out to you the gifts the innocent DESERVE. And every one that you accept brings joy to Him AS WELL as you. He knows that Heaven is richer made by each one you accept. And God rejoices as His Son receives what loving justice KNOWS to be his due. For love and justice are NOT different. BECAUSE they are the same, does mercy stand at God's right Hand, and GIVE the Son of God the power to forgive HIMSELF of sin.

To him who merits EVERYTHING, how can it be that ANYTHING is kept FROM him? For that would be injustice, and unfair indeed to all the holiness that IS in him, however much he recognize it not. God knows of NO injustice. He would not allow His Son be judged by those who seek his death, and COULD not see his worth at all. What honest witnesses could THEY call forth, to speak on his behalf? And who would come to plead FOR him, and not AGAINST his life? No justice would be given him by you. Yet God ensured that justice WOULD be done unto the Son He loves, and would protect from ALL unfairness you might seek to offer, believing vengeance IS his proper due.

As specialness cares not who pays the cost of sin, so it BE paid, the Holy Spirit heeds not who looks on innocence at last, provided it IS seen and recognized. For just ONE witness is enough, if he sees truly. Simple justice asks no more. Of each one does the Holy Spirit ask if he will be that one, so justice may return to love, and there be satisfied. Each special function He allots is but for this; that each one learn that love and justice are NOT separate. And both are strengthened by their union with each other. Without love is justice prejudiced and weak. And love WITHOUT justice is impossible. For love is fair, and cannot chasten without cause. What cause can BE to warrant an attack upon the innocent? In justice, then, does love correct mistakes, but NOT in vengeance. For that would be unjust to innocence.

You can be perfect witness to the power of love AND justice, if you understand it is impossible the Son of God COULD merit vengeance. You need NOT perceive, in every circumstance, that this is true. Nor need you look to your experience WITHIN the world, which is but shadows of all that is REALLY happening within yourself. The understanding that you need comes NOT of you, but from a larger Self, so great and holy that He COULD not doubt His innocence. Your special function is a call to Him, that He may smile on you whose sinlessness He shares. HIS understanding will be YOURS. And so the Holy Spirit's Special Function has been fulfilled. God's Son has found a witness unto his sinlessness, and NOT his sin. How LITTLE need you give the Holy Spirit, that simple justice may be given YOU.

Without impartiality there IS no justice. How CAN specialness be just? Judge not because you cannot, NOT because you are a miserable sinner too. How can the special REALLY understand that justice is the same for everyone? To take from one to give another MUST be an injustice to them both, since they are equal in the Holy Spirit's sight. Their Father gave the SAME inheritance to both. Who would have more OR less is not aware that he has everything. He is no judge of what MUST be another's due, because he thinks HE is deprived. And so MUST he be envious, and try to TAKE AWAY from whom he judges. He is NOT impartial, and CANNOT fairly see another's rights BECAUSE his own have been obscured to him.

You have the right to all the universe; to perfect peace, complete deliverance from ALL effects of sin, and to the life eternal, joyous, and complete in EVERY way, as God appointed for His holy Son. This is the ONLY justice Heaven knows, and all the Holy Spirit brings to earth. Your special function shows you nothing else BUT perfect justice CAN prevail for you. And you ARE safe from vengeance in ALL forms. The world deceives, but it can NOT replace God's justice with a version of its own. For only love IS just, and CAN perceive what justice must accord the Son of God. Let love decide, and never fear that you, in your unfairness, will deprive yourself of what GOD's justice has allotted you.

Section 5 - Self-Concept versus Self

The learning of the world is built upon a concept of the self adjusted to the world's reality. It fits it well. For this an image is that suits a world of shadows and illusions. Here it walks at home, where what it sees is one with it. The building of a concept of the self is what the learning of the world is FOR. This is its purpose; that you come WITHOUT a self, and MAKE one as you go along. And by the time you reach "maturity," you have perfected it to meet the world on equal terms, at one with its demands. A concept of the self is made by YOU. It bears NO likeness to yourself at all. It is an idol, made to take the place of your reality as Son of God.

The concept of the self the world would teach is not the thing that it appears to be. For it is made to serve two purposes, but one of which the mind can recognize. The first presents the face of innocence, the aspect acted ON. It is this face that smiles and charms and even seems to love. It searches for companions, and it looks at times with pity on the suffering, and sometimes offers solace. It believes that it is good, within an evil world. This aspect can grow angry, for the world is wicked, and unable to provide the love and shelter innocence deserves. And so this face is often wet with tears, at the injustices the world accords to those who would be generous and good.

This aspect NEVER makes the first attack. But every day a hundred little things make small assaults upon its innocence, provoking it to irritation, and at last to open insult and abuse. The face of innocence the concept of the self so proudly wears can tolerate attack in self-defense, for is it not a well-known fact the world deals harshly with defenseless innocence? No-one who makes a picture of himself omits this face, for he has need of it. The other side he does not want to see. But it is here the learning of the world has set its sights. For it is here the world's reality is set, to see to it the idol lasts.

Beneath the face of innocence there is a lesson that the concept of the self was made to teach. It is a lesson in a terrible displacement, and a fear so devastating that the face which smiles above it must forever look away, lest it perceive the treachery it hides. The lesson teaches this; "I am the thing you made of me, and as you look on me you stand condemned, because of what I am." On this conception of the self the world smiles with approval, for it guarantees the pathways of the world are safely kept, and those who walk on them will not escape.

Here is the central lesson that ensures your brother is condemned eternally. For what YOU are has now become his sin. For this is no forgiveness possible. No longer does it matter what he does, for your accusing finger points to him, unwavering and deadly in its aim. It points to you as well, but this is kept still deeper in the mists below the face of innocence. And in these shrouded vaults are all his sins and yours preserved, and kept in darkness, where they cannot be perceived as errors, which the light would surely show. You can be neither BLAMED for what you are, nor can you CHANGE the things it makes you do. And you are each the symbol of your sins to one another, silently, and yet with ceaseless urgency condemning still your brother for the hated thing you are.

Concepts are learned. They are not natural. Apart from learning they do not exist. They are not given, and they must be made. Not one of them is true, and many come from feverish imaginations, hot with hatred and distortions born of fear. What is a concept but a thought to which its maker gives a meaning of his own? Concepts maintain the world. But they can NOT be used to demonstrate the world is real. For all of them are made WITHIN the world, born in its shadow, growing in its ways, and finally "maturing" in its thought. They are ideas of idols painted with the brushes of the world, which cannot make a single picture representing truth.

Thus are the Holy Spirit's lesson plans arranged in easy steps, that, though there be some lack of ease at times, and some distress, there is no shattering of what was learned, but just a re-translation of what seems to be the evidence on its behalf. Let us consider, then, what proof there is that you are what your brother made of you. For even though you do not yet perceive that this is what you think, you surely learned by now that you BEHAVE as if it were. Does he REACT for you? And did he know exactly what would happen? Could he see your future, and ordain before it came what you should do in EVERY circumstance? He must have made the world as well as you, to have such prescience in the things to come.

That you are what your brother made of you seems most unlikely. Even if he did, who gave the face of innocence to you? Is this YOUR contribution? Who is, then, the "you" who made it? And who is deceived by all your goodness, and attacks it so? Let us forget the concept's foolishness, and merely think of this; there are two parts to what you think yourself to be. If one was generated by your brother, who was there to make the other? And from whom must something be kept hidden? If the world be evil, there is still no need to hide what YOU are made of. Who is there to see? And what but is attacked could NEED defense?

Perhaps the reason why this concept must be kept in darkness is that, in the light, the one who would not think it true is YOU. And what would happen to the world you know, if all its underpinnings were removed? Your concept of the world DEPENDS upon this concept of the self. And BOTH would go, if either one were ever raised to doubt. The Holy Spirit does not seek to throw you into panic. So He merely asks if just a LITTLE question might be raised. There ARE alternatives about the thing that you must be. You might, for instance, be the thing you chose to have your BROTHER be.

This shifts the concept of the self from what is wholly passive, and at least makes way for active choice, and some acknowledgment that interaction must have entered in. There is some understanding that you chose for BOTH of you, and what he represents has meaning that was given it by YOU. It also shows some glimmering of sight into perception's law that what you see reflects the state of the PERCEIVER's mind. Yet who was it that did the choosing first? If you are what you chose your brother be, alternatives were there to choose between, and someone must have first decided on the one to choose, and let the others go.

Although this step has gains, it does not yet approach a basic question. Something must have gone BEFORE these concepts of the self. And something must have done the learning which gave rise to them. Nor can this be explained by either view. The main advantage of the shifting to the second from the first is that you somehow entered in the choice by YOUR decision. But this gain is paid in almost equal loss, for now YOU stand accused of guilt for what your BROTHER is. And you must SHARE his guilt, because you chose it FOR him, in the image of your own. While ONLY he was treacherous before, now must YOU be condemned along with him.

The concept of the self has always been the great preoccupation of the world. And everyone believes that he must find the answer to the riddle of himself. Salvation can be seen as nothing more than the ESCAPE from concepts. It does not concern itself with content of the mind, but with the simple statement THAT IT THINKS. And what can think has choice, and CAN be shown that different thoughts have different consequence. And it can learn that EVERYTHING it thinks reflects the deep confusion that it feels about how it was made, and what it is. And vaguely does the concept of the self appear to answer what it does not know.

Seek not your Self in symbols. There can be no concept that can stand for what you are. What matters it which concept you accept, while you perceive a self which interacts with evil, and reacts to wicked things? Your concept of yourself will still remain quite meaningless. And you will not perceive that you can interact but with yourself. To see a guilty world is but the sign your learning has been guided by the world, and you behold it as you see yourself. The concept of the self embraces all you look upon, and NOTHING is outside of this perception. If you can be hurt by ANYTHING, you see a picture of your secret wishes. Nothing more than this. And in your suffering of ANY kind, you see your own concealed desire to kill.

You will make many concepts of the self as learning goes along. Each one will show the changes in your own relationships, as your perception of yourself is changed. There will be some confusion every time there is a shift, but be you thankful that the learning of the world is loosening its grasp upon your mind. And be you sure and happy in the confidence that it will go at last, and leave your mind at peace. The role of the accuser will appear in many places and in many forms, and each will seem to be accusing you. But have no fear it will not be undone. The world can teach no images of you unless you WANT to learn them. There will come a time when images have all gone by, and you will see you know not what you are.

It is to this unsealed and open mind that truth returns, unhindered and unbound. Where concepts of the self have been laid by is truth revealed exactly as it is. When every concept has been raised to doubt and question, and been recognized as made on NO assumptions that would stand the light, then is the truth left free to enter in its sanctuary clean and free of guilt. There is no statement that the world is more afraid to hear than this:

"I do not know the thing I am, and THEREFORE do not know what I am doing, where I am, or how to look upon the world and on myself." Yet in this learning is salvation born. And what you are will TELL you of Itself.

Chapter 5 - What are the Characteristics of God's Teachers?

Section 1 - Introduction

The surface traits of God's teachers are not at all alike. They do not look alike to the body's eyes, they come from vastly different backgrounds, their experiences of the world vary greatly, and their superficial "personalities" are quite distinct. Nor at the beginning stages of their functioning as teachers of God, have they yet acquired the deeper characteristics that will establish them as what they are. God gives special gifts to His teachers because they have a special role in His plan for Atonement. Their specialness is, of course, only temporary; set in time as a means of leading out of time. These special gifts, born in the holy relationship toward which the teaching-learning situation is geared, become characteristic of all teachers of God who have advanced in their own learning. In this respect they are all alike.

All differences among the Sons of God are temporary. Nevertheless, in time it can be said that the advanced teachers of God have the following characteristics:

Section 2 - Trust

When this Power has once been experienced, it is impossible to trust one's own petty strength again. Who would attempt to fly with the tiny wings of a sparrow when the mighty power of an eagle has been given him? And who would place his faith in the shabby offerings of the ego when the gifts of God are laid before him? What is it that induces them to make the shift?

First, they must go through what might be called "a period of undoing." This need not be painful, but it usually is so experienced. It seems as if things are being taken away, and it is rarely understood initially that their lack of value is merely being recognized. How can lack of value be perceived unless the perceiver is in a position where he must see things in a different light? He is not yet at a point at which he can make the shift entirely internally. And so the plan will sometimes call for changes in what seem to be external circumstances. These changes are always helpful. When the teacher of God has learned that much, he goes on to the second stage.

Next, the teacher of God must go through "a period of sorting-out." This is always somewhat difficult because, having learned that the changes in his life are always helpful, he must now decide all things on the basis of whether they increase the helpfulness or hamper it. He will find that many, if not most of the things he valued before will merely hinder his ability to transfer what he has learned to new situations as they arise. Because he has valued what is really valueless, he will not generalize the lesson for fear of loss and sacrifice. It takes great learning to understand that all things, events, encounters and circumstances are helpful. It is only to the extent to which they are helpful that any degree of reality should be accorded them in this world of illusion. The word "value" can apply to nothing else.

The third stage through which the teacher of God must go can be called a "period of relinquishment." If this is interpreted as giving up the desirable it will engender enormous conflict. Few teachers of God escape this distress entirely. There is, however, no point in sorting out the valuable from the valueless unless the next obvious step is taken. The third step is rarely if ever begun until the second is complete. Therefore, the period of overlap is apt to be one in which the teacher of God feels called upon to sacrifice his own best interests on behalf of truth. He has not realized as yet how wholly impossible such a demand would be. He can learn this only as he actually does give up the valueless. Through this, he learns that where he anticipated grief, he finds a happy light-heartedness instead; where he thought something was asked of him he finds a gift bestowed on him.

Now comes "a period of settling down." This is a quiet time, in which the teacher of God rests a while in reasonable peace. Now he consolidates his learning. Now he begins to see the transfer value of what he has learned. Its potential is literally staggering, and the teacher of God is now at the point in his progress at which he sees in it his whole way out. "Give up what you do not want, and keep what you do." How simple is the obvious. And how easy to do. The teacher of God needs this period of respite. He has not yet come as far as he thinks. Yet when he is ready to go on, he goes with mighty companions beside him. Now he rests a while, and gathers them before going on. He will not go on from here alone.

The next stage is indeed "a period of unsettling." Now must the teacher of God understand that he did not really know what was valuable and what was valueless. All that he really learned so far was that he did not want the valueless and that he did want the valuable. Yet his own sorting out was meaningless in teaching him the difference. The idea of sacrifice, so central to his own thought system, had made it impossible for him to judge. He thought he had learned willingness, but now he sees that he does not know what the willingness is for. And now he must attain a state that may remain impossible for a long, long time. He must learn to lay all judgment aside and ask only what he really wants in every circumstance. Were not each step in this direction so heavily reinforced, it would be hard indeed.

And finally, there is "a period of achievement." It is here that learning is consolidated. Now what was seen as merely shadows before become solid gains, to be counted on in all "emergencies" as well as tranquil times. Indeed, the tranquility is their result; the outcome of honest learning, consistency of thought and full transfer. This is the stage of real peace, for here is Heaven's state fully reflected. From here, the way to Heaven is open and easy. In fact, it is here. Who would "go" anywhere, if peace of mind is already complete? And who would seek to change tranquility for something more desirable? What could be more desirable than this?

Section 3 - Honesty

All other traits of God's teachers rest on trust. Once that has been achieved the others cannot fail to follow. Only the trusting can afford honesty, for only they can see its value. Honesty does not apply only to what you say. The term actually means consistency. There is nothing you say that contradicts what you think or do; no thought opposes any other thought; no act belies your word; and no word lacks agreement with another. Such are the truly honest. At no level are they in conflict with themselves. Therefore it is impossible for them to be in conflict with anyone or anything.

The peace of mind which the advanced teachers of God experience is largely due to their perfect honesty. It is only the wish to deceive that makes for war. No-one at one with himself can even conceive of conflict. Conflict is the inevitable result of self-deception, and self-deception is dishonesty. There is no challenge to a teacher of God. Challenge implies doubt, and the trust on which God's teachers rest secure makes doubt impossible. Therefore they can only succeed. In this as in all things they are honest. They can only succeed, because they never do their will alone. They choose for all mankind; for all the world and all things in it; for the unchanging and unchangeable beyond appearances; and for the Son of God and his Creator. How could they not succeed? They choose in perfect honesty, sure of their choice of themselves.

Section 4 - Tolerance

God's teachers do not judge. To judge is to be dishonest, for to judge is to assume a position you do not have. Judgment without self-deception is impossible. Judgment implies that you have been deceived in your brothers. How then could you not have been deceived in yourself? Judgment implies a lack of trust, and trust remains the bedrock of the teacher of God's whole thought system. Let this be lost and all his learning goes. Without judgment are all things equally acceptable, for who could judge otherwise? Without judgment are all men brothers, for who is there who stands apart? Judgment destroys honesty and shatters trust. No teacher of God can judge and hope to learn.

Section 5 - Gentleness

Harm is impossible for God's teachers. They can neither harm nor be harmed. Harm is the outcome of judgment. It is the dishonest act that follows a dishonest thought. It is a verdict of guilt upon a brother and therefore on oneself. It is the end of peace and the denial of learning. It demonstrates the absence of God's curriculum and its replacement by insanity. No teacher of God but must learn, - and fairly early in his training, - that harmfulness completely obliterates his function from his awareness. It will make him confused, fearful, angry and suspicious. It will make the Holy Spirit's lessons impossible to learn. Nor can God's Teacher be heard at all except by those who realize that harm can actually achieve nothing. No gain can come from it.

Therefore God's teachers are wholly gentle. They need the strength of gentleness, for it is in this that the function of salvation becomes easy. To those who would do harm it is impossible. To those to whom harm has no meaning it is merely natural. What choice but this has meaning to the sane? Who chooses hell when he perceives a way to Heaven? And who would choose the weakness that must come from harm in place of the unfailing, all-encompassing and limitless strength of gentleness? The might of God's teachers lies in their gentleness, for they have understood their evil thoughts came neither from God's Son nor his Creator. Thus did they join their thoughts with Him Who is their Source. And so their will, which always was His Own, is free to be itself.

Section 6 - Joy

Joy is the inevitable result of gentleness. Gentleness means that fear is now impossible, and what could come to interfere with joy? The open hands of gentleness are always filled. The gentle have no pain. They cannot suffer. Why would they not be joyous? They are sure they are beloved and must be safe. Joy goes with gentleness as surely as grief attends attack. God's teachers trust in Him. And they are sure His Teacher goes before them, making sure no harm can come to them. They hold His gifts and follow in His way, because God's Voice directs them in all things. Joy is their song of thanks. And Christ looks down on them in thanks as well. His need of them is just as great as theirs of Him. How joyous it is to share the purpose of salvation.

Section 7 - Defenselessness

God's teachers have learned how to be simple. They have no dreams that need defense against the truth. They do not try to make themselves. Their joy comes from their understanding Who created them. And does what God created need defense? No-one can become an advanced teacher of God until he fully understands that defenses are but the foolish guardians of mad illusions. The more grotesque the dream, the fiercer and more powerful its defenses seem to be. Yet when the teacher of God finally agrees to look past them, he finds nothing was there. Slowly at first he lets himself be undeceived. But he learns faster as his trust increases. It is not danger that comes when defenses are laid down. It is safety. It is peace. It is joy. And it is God.

Section 8 - Generosity

The term generosity has special meaning to the teacher of God. It is not the usual meaning of the word; in fact, it is a meaning that must be learned and learned very carefully. Like all the other attributes of God's teachers this one rests ultimately on trust, for without trust no-one can be generous in the true sense. To the world, generosity means "giving away" in the sense of "giving up." To the teachers of God, it means "giving away" in order to keep. This has been emphasized throughout the text and the workbook, but it is perhaps more alien to the thinking of the world than many other ideas in our curriculum. Its greater strangeness lies merely in the obviousness of its reversal of the world's thinking. In the clearest way possible and at the simplest of levels, the word means the exact opposite to the teachers of God and to the world.

The teacher of God is generous out of Self-interest. This does not refer, however, to the self the world speaks of. The teacher of God does not want anything he cannot give away, because he realizes it would be valueless to him by definition. What would he want it for? He could only lose because of it. He could not gain. Therefore he does not seek what only he could keep, because that is a guarantee of loss. He does not want to suffer. Why should he ensure himself pain? But he does want to keep for himself all things that are of God, and therefore for His Son. These are the things that belong to him. These he can give away in true generosity, protecting them forever for himself.

Section 9 - Patience

Those who are certain of the outcome can afford to wait, and wait without anxiety. Patience is natural to the teacher of God. All he sees is certain outcome, at a time perhaps unknown as yet, but not in doubt. The time will be as right as is the answer. And this is true for everything that happens now or in the future. The past as well held no mistakes; nothing that did not serve to benefit the world as well as him to whom it seemed to happen. Perhaps it was not understood at the time. Even so, the teacher of God is willing to reconsider all his past decisions, if they are causing pain to anyone. Patience is natural to those who trust. Sure of the ultimate interpretation of all things in time, no outcome already seen or yet to come can cause them fear.

Section 10 - Faithfulness

The extent of the teacher of God's faithfulness is the measure of his advancement in the curriculum. Does he still select some aspects of his life to bring to his learning, while keeping others apart? If so, his advancement is limited and his trust not yet firmly established. Faithfulness is the teacher of God's trust in the Word of God to set all things right; not some, but all. Generally, his faithfulness begins by resting on just some problems, remaining carefully limited for a time. To give up all problems to one Answer is to reverse the thinking of the world entirely. And that alone is faithfulness. Nothing but that really deserves the name. Yet each degree, however small, is worth achieving. Readiness, as the text notes, is not mastery.

True faithfulness, however, does not deviate. Being consistent it is wholly honest. Being unswerving it is full of trust. Being based on fearlessness it is gentle. Being certain it is joyous, and being confident it is tolerant. Defenselessness attends it naturally, and joy is its condition. Faithfulness, then, combines in itself the other attributes of God's teachers. It implies acceptance of the Word of God and His definition of His Son. It is to Them that faithfulness in the true sense is always directed. Toward Them it looks, seeking until it finds. And having found, it rests in quiet certainty on That alone to which all faithfulness is due.

Section 11 - Open-Mindedness

The centrality of open-mindedness, perhaps the last of the attributes the teacher of God acquires, is easily understood when its relation to forgiveness is recognized. Open-mindedness comes with lack of judgment. As judgment shuts the mind against God's Teacher, so open-mindedness invites Him to come in. As condemnation judges the Son of God as evil, so open-mindedness permits him to be judged by the Voice for God on His behalf. As the projection of guilt upon him would send him to hell, so open-mindedness lets Christ's image be projected on him. Only the open-minded can be at peace, for they alone see reason for it.

How do the open-minded forgive? They have let go all things that would prevent forgiveness. They have in truth abandoned the world, and let it be restored to them in newness and in joy so glorious they never could have conceived of such a change. Nothing is now as it was formerly. Nothing but sparkles now which seemed so dull and lifeless before. And above all are all things welcoming, for threat has gone. No clouds remain to hide the Face of Christ. Now is the goal achieved. Forgiveness is the final goal of the curriculum. It paves the way for what goes far beyond all learning. The curriculum makes no effort to exceed its legitimate goal. Forgiveness is its single aim, at which all learning ultimately converges. It is indeed enough.

You may have noticed that the list of attributes of God's teachers does not include those things which are the Son of God's inheritance. Terms like love, sinlessness, perfection, knowledge, and eternal truth do not appear in this context. They would be most inappropriate here. What God has given is so far beyond our curriculum that learning but disappears in its presence. Yet while its presence is obscured, the focus properly belongs on the curriculum. It is the function of God's teachers to bring true learning to the world. Properly speaking, it is unlearning that they bring, for that is "true learning" in the world. It is given to the teachers of God to bring the glad tidings of complete forgiveness to the world. Blessed indeed are they, for they are the Bringers of salvation.

Miracle Principle 21

Miracles are an industrial necessity. Industry depends on cooperation, and cooperation depends on miracles. (see page 8)

Miracle Principle 22

1 Miracles are cobwebs of iron. They unite human frailty to the strength of God. (see page 7)

(add for 21. Helen Schucman considered changing "iron" to "steel." Correction: No. Steel would NOT be a better word. Steel is very useful but it would have to be tempered by fire. Iron is the raw material. The point of miracles is that they replace fire, thus making it unnecessary.)

Miracle Principle 23

Miracles are natural expressions of total forgiveness. Through miracles, man accepts God's forgiveness by extending it to others. The second step is inherent in the first, because light cannot tolerate darkness. Light dispels darkness automatically, by definition.

EXPLANATORY INSTRUCTIONS: Miracles are associated with fear only because of the fallacy that darkness can hide. Man believes that what he cannot see does not exist, and his physical eyes cannot see in the dark. This is a very primitive solution, and has led to a denial of the spiritual eye, which always depends on light. Remember the Biblical injunction: "May I never forget that THINE eye is ever upon me, beholding the evil and the good."

There are two stages, one lower and one higher, which are involved in the escape from darkness: 1) the recognition that darkness CANNOT hide. This usually does entail fear.

2) The recognition that there is nothing you WANT to hide, even if you could. This brings escape from fear.

The raw material, or iron, is heavy but crude, and stands for the body, which is a crude creation. The cobweb concept is closer to how the body SHOULD be regarded, i.e., as an airy and temporary home, which can just be blown away with a slight breeze.

(21. 2) The point should read "A miracle reawakens the awareness that the spirit, and not the body, is the altar of Truth. This is the recognition that leads to the healing power of the miracle."

Miracle Principle 24

(22a) A miracle rearranges the order of perception, and places the levels in their true perspective. This heals at all levels, because all sickness comes from confusing the levels.

(Tell Bill about the idea (which is still dim to Helen Schucman) that the reason is not that you (plural) distantiate, doubt, or cannot believe. It is more of a reaction formation against a pull which you both recognize is so intense that you are afraid that you will be uprooted. But remember that a cobweb is really stronger than the iron, if you see it properly. This fear is also why you couldn't get the point straight.)

By the way, it is not true that you are both 'JUST SCRIBES'. You might remember that the Scribes were very wise and holy men and are even sometimes spelled with a capital S. If you want to go further, you might change the meaning of 'just' from 'merely' to 'honest', a term used in the Bible in association with 'might' or 'strength.' Tell Bill you couldn't make that pun if the original phrasing had been singular. (Helen Schucman aside about liking the first about assumption failure more.) Answer: It was cuter, but this one MEANS more. The REAL reason you don't like it is because it refers to you in a VERY lofty position. This makes you nervous.)

Correction: And don't lose sight of the emphasis on cooperation, or the NOT SINGULAR. That point about "industrial necessity" should read "corporate", referring to the body of Christ which is a way of referring to the Church. But the Church of God is only the sum of the souls he created, which IS the corporate body of Christ. Correct to read: "A Miracle makes souls one in God," and leave in the next part about cooperation.

Further correction: "God" should read "Christ." The Father and the Son are not identical, but you CAN say "Like Father, LIKE Son."

(Remind Bill to get another notebook. I don't give up as easily as HE does. If I could get YOU to listen, which was a miracle in itself, I can get him to register. He should appreciate this more than anyone else, having had some trouble with this problem himself.)

"Lord heal me" is the only legitimate prayer. This also means "Lord atone for me," because the only thing man should pray for is forgiveness. He HAS everything else.

Now take this personally, and listen to Divine logic: If, when you have been forgiven, you have everything else, and

If you have been forgiven

Then you HAVE everything else.

This happens to be the simplest of all propositions.

IF P then Q

P

Therefore, Q

The real question is, is P true. If you will review the evidence, I think you will find this inescapable. I went on very personal record to this effect, and I am the only completely True Witness for God. You have every right to examine MY credentials - in fact, I urge you to do so. You haven't read the Bible in years.

Special Explanatory Note: As soon as you (H and B) have entered the second phase, you will be not only willing to enter into communion, but will also understand peace and joy. Your commitment is not yet total. That is why you still have more to learn than to teach. When your equilibrium stabilizes, you can teach AS MUCH as you learn. This will give you the proper sense of balance. Meanwhile, remember that NO EFFORT IS WASTED. Unless you remember this, you cannot avail yourself of MY efforts, which are limitless.

(Have a good day.) Since only eternity is real, why not use the illusion of time constructively? You might remember that "underneath are the Everlasting Arms."

BIBLICAL QUOTATION: "If you are ashamed of me before men, I will be ashamed of you before God," (Helen Schucman ? of misquote.) is interpreted as a threat ONLY as long you remain in the first step. (see bottom of p. 6 for steps.)

What it REALLY means is that if you are ashamed of me (or embarrassed by love), you will project and therefore make it impossible for me to reach you. Make every effort you can NOT to do this. I will help you as much as you will let me.

Miracle Principle 25

Miracles make time and tide wait for all men. They can heal the sick and raise the dead because man himself made both death and taxes, and can abolish both. Note: Tax also means "strain." (One definition for miracles is: "That which, or one who, is of surpassing excellence or merit.") (from Dictionary, third definition)

YOU are a miracle. God creates only "that which, or one who, is of surpassing excellence or merit." Man is capable of this kind of creation, too, being in the image and likeness of his own Creator. Anything else is only his own nightmare, and does not exist. Only the Creations of Light are real.

Miracle Principle 26

Miracles are a part of an interlocking chain of forgiveness which, when completed, is the Atonement. This process works all the time and in all dimensions of time. (e.g. given of Helen Schucman report rewrite for Esther! Esther had hurt something you loved, by writing a report you regarded as very bad. You atoned for her by writing one in her name that was very good. Actually, it was not your responsibility professionally to do this, but because you DO love the Shield you recognized that in this case, you ARE your brother's keeper. While you did not cancel Esther's sin (later defined as "lack of love") you DID cancel out its EFFECTS.

Someday I want to tell Esther that not only is she forgiven but that the effects of all her sins are cancelled. This is what I have already told you. When I can tell her, she will be afraid for a long time, because she will remember many things, consciously or unconsciously, including the Shield report, a lack of love which you cancelled out in advance by a miracle of devotion.

I am in charge of the process of Atonement, which I undertook to begin. My Atonement was for the canceling out of all sins (i.e., lack of love) which human beings could not otherwise correct. That is what the Biblical statement "underneath are the Everlasting Arms" means. (Helen Schucman explanation: This means that He will backstop whenever human miracles will not suffice for atonement purposes. However, it is perfectly clear that when a person can atone by miracles, both giver and receiver are atoning. It is better to atone this way because of the mutual benefits involved.)"Inasmuch as you do it unto the least of these, my children" really ends with "you do it unto yourself and ME." The reason why YOU come before me is because I do not need miracles for my own Atonement, but I stand at the end in case YOU fail temporarily.

Miracle Principle 27

SPECIAL EXPLANATION: (In response to Helen Schucman request re possible corrections.) Change the word "sin" to "absence of love." Sin is a manmade word with threat connotations which he made up himself. No REAL threat is involved anywhere. Just because "nature abhors a vacuum," which is true enough, it does NOT follow that "a vacuum is filled with hellfire." Nothing is gained by frightening yourself, and it is very destructive. Miracles need freedom from fear. Part of their Atonement value involves just that. Note that the word "atone" really means "undo."

The purpose of the Atonement is to restore everything TO you. (That is, to restore the awareness. Later clarification.) You had everything when you were created, just as everyone did.

Having been restored to your original state, you naturally become part of the Atonement yourself. You now share MY inability to tolerate the lack of love in yourself and in everyone else, and MUST join the GREAT CRUSADE to correct it. The slogan for this Crusade is "Listen, Learn, and DO."

This means Listen to My Voice, Learn to undo the error, and DO something to correct it.

The first two are not enough. The real members of MY party are ACTIVE workers.

The power to work Miracles BELONGS to you. I will create the right opportunities for you to do them. But you must be ready and willing to do them, since you are already able to. Doing them will bring conviction in the ability. I repeat that you will see Miracles through your hands through MINE. Conviction really comes through accomplishment. Remember that ability is the potential, Achievement is its expression, and Atonement is the Purpose.

Miracle Principle 28

24 A miracle is a Universal Blessing from God through Me to all My Brothers. Explanation: You once said that souls cannot rest until everyone has found salvation. This happens to be true. It is the privilege of the forgiven to forgive. The Disciples were officially and specifically told to heal others, as Physicians of the Lord. They were also told to heal themselves, and were promised that I would never leave them or forsake them. Atonement is the natural profession of the Children of God, because they have professed Me.

(ASIDE. Tell B that that is what Professor really means. As an Assoc. Prof., he must become associated with My strength. As an Asst. Prof., you must assist both him and Me. The Children need both strength and help. You cannot help until you are strong. The Everlasting Arms are your strength, and the Wisdom of God is your help.)

"Heaven and Earth shall pass away" means that they will not always exist as separate states. My Word, which is the Resurrection and the Light, shall not pass away, because Life is Eternal. YOU are the work of God, and His Work is wholly loveable and wholly loving. This is how a man MUST think of himself in his heart, because this is what he IS.

Add: "As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he."

Miracle Principle 29

Remember the point about Miracles as a means of organizing different levels of consciousness. Miracles come from the (below conscious) (subconscious) level. Revelations come from the above conscious level. The conscious level is in between and reacts to either sub- or super-conscious impulses in varying ratios. Freud was right about the classification, but not the names. He was also right that the content of consciousness is fleeting. Consciousness is the level which engages in the world, and is capable of responding to both external and internal impulses. Having no impulses from itself, and being primarily a mechanism for inducing response, it can be very wrong.

For example, if the identification is with the body, consciousness may distort superconscious impulses by denying their Source, and seeking their impact in the orgasm. This is the result of the "mistaken identity" confusion.

If you will look back at the description of the EFFECTS of Revelation you will see that there ARE some similarities in the experiential results but hardly in the content.

(This and preceding paragraph go later)

Revelations induce complete but temporary suspension of doubt and fear. They represent the original form of communication between God and His Souls, before the intrusion of fire and ice made this impossible. It should be noted that they involve an extremely personal sense of closeness to Creation, which man tries to find in sexual relationships. This confusion is responsible for the depression and fear which are often associated with sex.

Sex is often associated with lack of love, but Revelation is PURELY a love experience. Physical closeness CANNOT achieve this. As was said before, the subconscious impulses properly induce Miracles, which ARE interpersonal, and result in closeness to others. This can be misunderstood by a personally willful consciousness as an impulse toward sexual gratification.

The Revelation unites Souls directly with God.

The Miracle unites Souls directly with each other. Neither emanates from consciousness, but both are EXPERIENCED there. This is essential, because consciousness is the state which PRODUCES action, though it DOES NOT Inspire it.

Man is free to believe what he chooses. What he DOES attests to what he believes.

The deeper levels of his subconscious always contain the impulse to Miracles, but he is free to fill its superficial levels, which are closer to consciousness, with the impulses of this world and to identify himself with them. This results in denying himself access to the miracle level underneath. In conscious actions, then, his interpersonal relationships also become superficial, and miracle-inspired relating becomes impossible.

Miracle Principle 30

Miracles are a way of EARNING release from fear.

Revelation induces a state in which fear has ALREADY BEEN abolished. Miracles are thus a means, and Revelations are an end. In this sense, they work together.

(Tell Bill that miracles DO NOT depend on Revelation. They INDUCE it. He is quite capable of miracles already, but he is still too fearful for Revelations.)

Note that YOUR (Helen Schucman) Revelation occurred specifically after you had engaged at the visionary level in a process of DENYING fear.

Revelation is intensely personal, and is actually not translatable into conscious content at all. That is why any attempt to describe it in words is usually incomprehensible, even to the writer himself at another time. This is why the Book of Revelations is essentially incomprehensible. Revelation induces ONLY experience. Miracles, on the other hand, induce interpersonal ACTION. In the end, these are more useful, because of their IMPERSONAL nature.

In this phase of learning, working miracles is more valuable because freedom from fear cannot be thrust upon you. The experience cannot last.

(Tell Bill that your propensity for Revelations, which is very great, is the result of a high level of past communion. Its transitory nature comes from the descent into fear, which has not yet been overcome. His own "suspended" state mitigates both extremes. This has been very apparent in the course of both of your recent developmental patterns.)

Miracles are the essential course of ACTION for both of you. They will strengthen him and stabilize you.

(NOTE that the much more personal than usual notes you are taking today reflect the Revelatory experience. This does NOT produce the more generalizeable quality which this course is aimed at. They may, nevertheless, be of great help to Bill personally, since you asked for something that WOULD help him personally. It depends on how he listens, and how well he understands the COOPERATIVE nature of your joint experience. You can help only by reading this note FIRST. Ask him later if this should be included in the written part of the course at all or whether you should keep these notes separately. He is in charge of these decisions.)

(Tell Bill he should try to understand the VERY important difference between Christ-control and Christ-guidance. This is what made him fearful yesterday.)