California, 1922
M. Emile Coue's Gospel of Auto-Suggestion will be the subject of the sermon at the First Unitarian church tomorrow morning by Rev. Clarence Reed, the pastor. In speaking of the reasons of selecting this sermon topic, Rev. Reed stated: "The Living Age, in commenting upon the interest in the addresses and clinic of M. Coue during his recent visit to England, says he is the most talked of man in London. Lord Curzon, the foreign minister of Great Britain, states that he was recently cured of a serious ailment in ten days by the methods of M. Coue, after all other treatments had failed.
"During the past two months, edition after edition has been exhausted of M. Coue's little book, 'Self Mastery Through Conscious Auto-Suggestion,' in which he explains in simple and clear language his theory and method of auto-suggestion.
"This great French psychologist has had a clinic at Nancy, France, for twenty years, and during that time many persons have been restored to health through the use of conscious auto-suggestion. There is nothing mysterious, supernatural and occult in his method. He does not claim to have cured a single person. They cure themselves."
Rev. Reed states that he will speak of the value of the method of M. Coue, not only in the treatment of physical diseases, but also in the development of moral character.
Unusual interest is being manifested in the course of addresses that Rev. Reed is giving in Wendte hall of the church. The subject tomorrow evening at 8 will be "The Historical Jesus and the Mythical Christ." His purpose in these addresses, according to Rev. Reed, is to state the authentic facts in regard to the life and teachings of Jesus. At the close of his address, within the limit of the time, he will answer any written question on the Bible in the light of modern Biblical research.
—Oakland Tribune, Oakland, CA, Oct. 7, 1922, p. 2 last section.
Coue System Old, Says Pastor
The ideas emphasized by Emile Coue, the French apostle of auto-suggestion are not new, according to Rev. Clarence Reed, pastor of the First Unitarian church, who pointed out in his sermon yesterday on "Emile Coue's Gospel of Self Mastery Through Auto-Suggestion," that the idea was thousands of years old.
"His great contribution," declared Rev. Reed, "is that he has given to the world in language easy to understand a helpful philosophy of life and placed within the reach of every person a method which will tend to keep people healthy and help them recover their health when they become sick.
"The fame of Coue is rapidly spreading throughout the world. In every land people are discussing the remarkable cures resulting from the clinic in his garden in Nancy, France, where he treats about 40,000 patients a year. Day by day the people come to Coue's home in great pain and mental distress. Many of them go away cured in body and happy in mind without the use of drugs, operations, physical exercises or special system of diet.
"Although he is a man of very moderate means Coue does not make any charge for imparting his method to others, nor does he accept money from those who consult him. He has not only used his own money in making experiments to ascertain the value of auto-suggestion but he has also freely given his life to the service of mankind. He often works fifteen hours a day in his clinic, although he is seventy years of age."
—Oakland Tribune, Oakland, CA, Oct. 9, 1922, p. 11.
Showing posts with label psychology. Show all posts
Showing posts with label psychology. Show all posts
Wednesday, June 6, 2007
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
The Modern Point of View in Religion
California, 1914
Short Sermons for Busy Readers
"The Modern Point of View in Religion!"
Acts 14:15 — "That ye should turn from these vain things unto a living God."
Are we medievalists or modernists? The medieval point of view has passed in science. It was characterized by the deductive method — the method of taking a formula or a Bible text and, by a series of logical deductions, seeking to arrive at the facts. The modern scientific point of view is characterized by the inductive method — the method of carefully gathering the facts and then patiently sitting down before them to try to understand what they really say.
The medieval point of view in society was represented by arbitrary government from above. Its typical expression was feudalism and monarchy. Men were to give unquestioning obedience to the authority of emperor, king and overlord. This is rapidly passing away. The modern spirit in society is democratic. "Taxation without representation is tyranny." "That government of the people, for the people and by the people shall not pass away from the earth" — these are watchwords of modernism in the social order.
How about religion? Is there a modern viewpoint here as well?
ARE FOUR CHARACTERISTICS
It seems to me there is a distinctly modern point of view in religion and it is marked by these four characteristics:
(1) — It appeals not to dogma so much as to present experience. It believes as the text says in "a living God." It finds God right here in His world, "closer to us than breathing and nearer than hands or feet." It sees in the great processes of nature the power and wisdom and indwelling presence of God. He is not far away. He did not create the world and leave it. He is an ever-present reality. He is the soul of the universe.
(2) — It finds reinforcement in modern psychology. It believes that "the descent into the soul is the ascent to God." The new understanding of the greatness of the subconscious mind, for example, gives to prayer a new depth of meaning. Our lives are vitally in touch with and a part of the life of God. We are not entirely isolated, but our little lives are related to God somewhat as the bay is related to the great ocean beyond. Prayer becomes as inevitable as the movement of the tides. Such a faith calls men "from these vain things to a living God."
REINFORCEMENT FROM BIBLE
(3) — It finds reinforcement from the Bible. Religion from the modern viewpoint does not originate from the Bible. It could exist without the Bible. But it finds in the Bible its finest examples and purest spiritual food. And the greatest thing to be gained from the Bible is the inspiration to find God in our world as the Bible men and women found Him in theirs — to believe that God is as ready to speak to us as He was to Moses, Elijah or St. Paul.
(4) — Finally the modern point of view in religion is characterized by a larger and profounder conception of salvation. Salvation is no mere escape from hell. It is the achievement of Christian character, "unto the fullness of the stature of Christ." Nor is salvation merely individual. No really modern man could rest content in heaven while a single soul remained outside. Salvation must be social and unselfish to meet the rigorous tests modern thought.
—REV. A. W. PALMER.
Rev. Albert W. Palmer is pastor of the Plymouth Congregational church of this city.
—Oakland Tribune, Oakland, California, March 1, 1914, editorial page.
Short Sermons for Busy Readers
"The Modern Point of View in Religion!"
Acts 14:15 — "That ye should turn from these vain things unto a living God."
Are we medievalists or modernists? The medieval point of view has passed in science. It was characterized by the deductive method — the method of taking a formula or a Bible text and, by a series of logical deductions, seeking to arrive at the facts. The modern scientific point of view is characterized by the inductive method — the method of carefully gathering the facts and then patiently sitting down before them to try to understand what they really say.
The medieval point of view in society was represented by arbitrary government from above. Its typical expression was feudalism and monarchy. Men were to give unquestioning obedience to the authority of emperor, king and overlord. This is rapidly passing away. The modern spirit in society is democratic. "Taxation without representation is tyranny." "That government of the people, for the people and by the people shall not pass away from the earth" — these are watchwords of modernism in the social order.
How about religion? Is there a modern viewpoint here as well?
ARE FOUR CHARACTERISTICS
It seems to me there is a distinctly modern point of view in religion and it is marked by these four characteristics:
(1) — It appeals not to dogma so much as to present experience. It believes as the text says in "a living God." It finds God right here in His world, "closer to us than breathing and nearer than hands or feet." It sees in the great processes of nature the power and wisdom and indwelling presence of God. He is not far away. He did not create the world and leave it. He is an ever-present reality. He is the soul of the universe.
(2) — It finds reinforcement in modern psychology. It believes that "the descent into the soul is the ascent to God." The new understanding of the greatness of the subconscious mind, for example, gives to prayer a new depth of meaning. Our lives are vitally in touch with and a part of the life of God. We are not entirely isolated, but our little lives are related to God somewhat as the bay is related to the great ocean beyond. Prayer becomes as inevitable as the movement of the tides. Such a faith calls men "from these vain things to a living God."
REINFORCEMENT FROM BIBLE
(3) — It finds reinforcement from the Bible. Religion from the modern viewpoint does not originate from the Bible. It could exist without the Bible. But it finds in the Bible its finest examples and purest spiritual food. And the greatest thing to be gained from the Bible is the inspiration to find God in our world as the Bible men and women found Him in theirs — to believe that God is as ready to speak to us as He was to Moses, Elijah or St. Paul.
(4) — Finally the modern point of view in religion is characterized by a larger and profounder conception of salvation. Salvation is no mere escape from hell. It is the achievement of Christian character, "unto the fullness of the stature of Christ." Nor is salvation merely individual. No really modern man could rest content in heaven while a single soul remained outside. Salvation must be social and unselfish to meet the rigorous tests modern thought.
—REV. A. W. PALMER.
Rev. Albert W. Palmer is pastor of the Plymouth Congregational church of this city.
—Oakland Tribune, Oakland, California, March 1, 1914, editorial page.
Thursday, May 17, 2007
Can Human Nature Be Changed?
1910
Curiously enough, in every generation since Christ was born there have been large numbers of men, often followers of this very Christ, who have held as a sort of fundamental postulate their philosophy that you cannot change human nature. One who reads the literature of the ages carefully will see that often the great stumbling block in the way of human progress and emancipation has been this obsession of good people. So deep-rooted has it been that it has passed into proverbs: "Whatever has been must always be," "Whatever is, is right," "As is a boy so is the man," and, quoting an older cynic, "Can a leopard change his spots," "Temperament is a fixed quantity," "Human nature is the same in every age." These proverbs are generally coined by good people. It has been in the church that this philosophy has been prevalent, as well as among the scoffers.
And yet the fact of transformation of human nature is the very center and core of Christ's Gospel, and how his disciples could ever doubt it, and remain his disciples, is one of the mysteries and paradoxes of history. It is simply another of those strange misunderstandings of the Gospels that one witnessed among those Christians who could not see that slavery and Christianity had no part together. But this is not the strangest thing. Far stranger is the fact that fully half of the Christians of today are still under the spell of this delusion. Not long ago a great writer called the attention of the world to the fact that if reformers would only take human nature as it is, they would stop reforming. To his mind reforms originate in an idealizing of human nature it cannot stand. Many Christians share that view. On our way home from church one Sunday a good Christian mother, worried by some tendencies of her young boy, remarked that she supposed there was no hope of changing him because he was born so. You cannot change human nature, half of our Christians believe.
Now, the Christians of the early ages, and even of the middle ages, had only the promise of the Gospel to convict them of error — and, to be sure, that ought to have been enough — but the Christians of today have that and this fact, too, that history and most literature is nothing but the record of a gradual transformation of human nature. And not only in individuals, but in whole nations and communities. For civilization is nothing but the collective expression of the human nature of the time.
The passing of civilization from barbarism to the semi-Christian civilization of the middle ages is the history of the transformation of human nature. The passage from the cruelty and feudalism and vice of the middle ages to our more Christian civilization of today is further story of the alchemistic change in the human heart by the deeper and larger application and understanding of the Gospel. The promise of Christianity is the transformation of human nature into divine nature, the subduing of the animal in man by the rising, conquering, spiritual. This needs no proof. It is the whole asservation of the Gospel. If it fail, then Christianity is a failure. But perhaps it might be helpful to us, and deepen our faith in the power of Christianity to accomplish what it purposes to do. If we find that history, as we said, is the record of the fulfillment of this promise we think we can show it is by looking at two or three great spheres of human conduct where the change has been manifested.
There is a passage in Sienkiewicz's "Quo Vadis," where a wretch named Chilo, who has been plotting against the Christians — it is the time of the first Christians in Rome — falls into the hands of the Christians, and one of them, the giant slave Ursus, is ready to crush him to death, when the Apostle Peter rises from the table and speaks these words: "The Saviour said this to us: 'If thy brother has sinned against thee, chastise him; but if he is repentant, forgive him.' " Then Glaucus, against whose life Chilo had been especially plotting, turns to Chilo and says: "May God forgive thy offenses, as I forgive them in the name of Christ." The point is that Chilo cannot believe his own ears and eyes. When at last he finds himself free and tells the Romans they will not believe it.
In every century, even within the church, men keep on saying that forgiveness of the enemy is impossible; revenge is the natural law of life, of man as well as of the animal; an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, is all humanity is capable of. Even today one meets Christians who cannot believe in this possibility of forgiveness as a law of life. And yet we find that every age in history has been full of exquisite instances of it. We find many a soul, like St. Francis, practicing it. Today there are millions of Christians practicing it, and thousands, from Tolstoy to the humblest apostle, preaching it. The church enjoins it upon every new member. We have seen thousands of unforgiving natures since Christ's day so transformed by the divine alchemy of Christ's Gospel that they have begun to practice it with ease. It has become the universal law of thousands, yet good men have said, and still say, you cannot change human nature.
As you go up and down Europe you find everywhere dungeons where slaves were kept. When Christ was born slavery was as common an institution and as much accepted as in the order of society as marriage. As the divine leaven of Christianity began to beget in men the worth and dignity of the human soul and the doctrine of brotherhood and human rights, the prophets began to see the evil of slavery and its inherent contradiction to the spirit of the new religion. But as they spoke they heard the same old story: Slavery has always been. It seems to have been a sort of divine institution. One cannot make over the human race. We did make over the human race and no one is now left, since 1860, to lift his voice for its existence. The owning of man by man is gone, and soon other indirect forms of industrial slavery will go with it.
Some time ago we were in Nuremberg. We climbed the hill to the old castle, and there we were shown through the great tower where all the torture machines are preserved. We saw the roasting pans, the racks for stretching and crushing bones, the other instruments too horrible to mention, along with the iron virgin, who once embraced hundreds of miserable creatures in her spiked arms. And the awful thing was not that men practiced this torture, but that they enjoyed it and flocked to see it. But one day a prophet arose in Nuremberg and said: "This torture is horrible, utterly inhuman, against all the sweet mercy and pity of Jesus Christ, unworthy of our civilization. It must stop." When he had spoken it was the good people who discouraged him. They said: "Yes, it is inhuman and un-Christian, but you cannot stop it. People have always tortured, therefore they always will. It is part of the order of civilization, because it has always been. You cannot change." Needless to say, it was stopped in all civilized countries in 100 years, and where once the whole city loved it, not one but who would shudder at it now. You can change human nature completely.
One of the last great barbarities, most inhuman of all, a pagan institution to linger on in our Christian civilization, is war. The prophetic souls know that it is doomed and must go, because it is an anachronism in Christianity, and because the forces are now at work before which it needs must fall. But the one thing that prevents its going in a generation is this obsession of good people, that you cannot change human nature. The church alone could stop wars tomorrow did it believe its own Gospel had power to do what it claims to do, and did it dare believe that human nature could be so changed as to see the reasonableness of Christian settlement of national disputes as already it settles individual differences. It has been changed to do that. Once all men settled personal disputes with fists. That passed, and the duel came. That has gone, and we have the courts. More and more private quarrels are now adjudicated before they even reach the courts, by diplomacy. This evolution has gone on side by side with all this absurd talk of not being able to change human nature. And the change from wars as the method of adjudication between groups of people to international courts is in this inevitable evolution; but it limps and halts because good people cling to this outgrown obsession: You cannot change human nature. Wars have always been, therefore they must always be.
We are writing this editorial to call the attention of these good people to the effect that this obsession will prove false here as it has everywhere. You can do away with war soon because you can change human nature. The earth is full of the signs that human nature is changing very fast in this regard. The calendar of 1909 printed in our last two issues is only a slight indication of what is going on in the mind of the world. Read it carefully, and remember that 50 years ago one could not have written one. World unity, international peace, world federation, Hague courts, arbitration treaties, brotherhood of man — these are the growing words everywhere. They betoken a change coming over human nature. Link yourself up to it and hasten the transformation with your Christian faith. The change of human nature is easy to a Christianity really believed. — The Christian Work and Evangelist.
--Reprinted in The Daily Press, Sheboygan, Wisconsin, Feb. 21, 1910, p. 7.
Note: OK, here, this has to be the classic article, if there ever was one, on the progress of humanity, the changing of human nature, because of religion. We've probably all heard it, that there was this sense before World War I, then great disillusionment for such a point of view, made much worse by the next war. And add to that the various things of psychiatry, Freud, Jung, and things were never so optimistic again, although of course their aim was reconciliation and adjustment for at least good coping.
Curiously enough, in every generation since Christ was born there have been large numbers of men, often followers of this very Christ, who have held as a sort of fundamental postulate their philosophy that you cannot change human nature. One who reads the literature of the ages carefully will see that often the great stumbling block in the way of human progress and emancipation has been this obsession of good people. So deep-rooted has it been that it has passed into proverbs: "Whatever has been must always be," "Whatever is, is right," "As is a boy so is the man," and, quoting an older cynic, "Can a leopard change his spots," "Temperament is a fixed quantity," "Human nature is the same in every age." These proverbs are generally coined by good people. It has been in the church that this philosophy has been prevalent, as well as among the scoffers.
And yet the fact of transformation of human nature is the very center and core of Christ's Gospel, and how his disciples could ever doubt it, and remain his disciples, is one of the mysteries and paradoxes of history. It is simply another of those strange misunderstandings of the Gospels that one witnessed among those Christians who could not see that slavery and Christianity had no part together. But this is not the strangest thing. Far stranger is the fact that fully half of the Christians of today are still under the spell of this delusion. Not long ago a great writer called the attention of the world to the fact that if reformers would only take human nature as it is, they would stop reforming. To his mind reforms originate in an idealizing of human nature it cannot stand. Many Christians share that view. On our way home from church one Sunday a good Christian mother, worried by some tendencies of her young boy, remarked that she supposed there was no hope of changing him because he was born so. You cannot change human nature, half of our Christians believe.
Now, the Christians of the early ages, and even of the middle ages, had only the promise of the Gospel to convict them of error — and, to be sure, that ought to have been enough — but the Christians of today have that and this fact, too, that history and most literature is nothing but the record of a gradual transformation of human nature. And not only in individuals, but in whole nations and communities. For civilization is nothing but the collective expression of the human nature of the time.
The passing of civilization from barbarism to the semi-Christian civilization of the middle ages is the history of the transformation of human nature. The passage from the cruelty and feudalism and vice of the middle ages to our more Christian civilization of today is further story of the alchemistic change in the human heart by the deeper and larger application and understanding of the Gospel. The promise of Christianity is the transformation of human nature into divine nature, the subduing of the animal in man by the rising, conquering, spiritual. This needs no proof. It is the whole asservation of the Gospel. If it fail, then Christianity is a failure. But perhaps it might be helpful to us, and deepen our faith in the power of Christianity to accomplish what it purposes to do. If we find that history, as we said, is the record of the fulfillment of this promise we think we can show it is by looking at two or three great spheres of human conduct where the change has been manifested.
There is a passage in Sienkiewicz's "Quo Vadis," where a wretch named Chilo, who has been plotting against the Christians — it is the time of the first Christians in Rome — falls into the hands of the Christians, and one of them, the giant slave Ursus, is ready to crush him to death, when the Apostle Peter rises from the table and speaks these words: "The Saviour said this to us: 'If thy brother has sinned against thee, chastise him; but if he is repentant, forgive him.' " Then Glaucus, against whose life Chilo had been especially plotting, turns to Chilo and says: "May God forgive thy offenses, as I forgive them in the name of Christ." The point is that Chilo cannot believe his own ears and eyes. When at last he finds himself free and tells the Romans they will not believe it.
In every century, even within the church, men keep on saying that forgiveness of the enemy is impossible; revenge is the natural law of life, of man as well as of the animal; an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, is all humanity is capable of. Even today one meets Christians who cannot believe in this possibility of forgiveness as a law of life. And yet we find that every age in history has been full of exquisite instances of it. We find many a soul, like St. Francis, practicing it. Today there are millions of Christians practicing it, and thousands, from Tolstoy to the humblest apostle, preaching it. The church enjoins it upon every new member. We have seen thousands of unforgiving natures since Christ's day so transformed by the divine alchemy of Christ's Gospel that they have begun to practice it with ease. It has become the universal law of thousands, yet good men have said, and still say, you cannot change human nature.
As you go up and down Europe you find everywhere dungeons where slaves were kept. When Christ was born slavery was as common an institution and as much accepted as in the order of society as marriage. As the divine leaven of Christianity began to beget in men the worth and dignity of the human soul and the doctrine of brotherhood and human rights, the prophets began to see the evil of slavery and its inherent contradiction to the spirit of the new religion. But as they spoke they heard the same old story: Slavery has always been. It seems to have been a sort of divine institution. One cannot make over the human race. We did make over the human race and no one is now left, since 1860, to lift his voice for its existence. The owning of man by man is gone, and soon other indirect forms of industrial slavery will go with it.
Some time ago we were in Nuremberg. We climbed the hill to the old castle, and there we were shown through the great tower where all the torture machines are preserved. We saw the roasting pans, the racks for stretching and crushing bones, the other instruments too horrible to mention, along with the iron virgin, who once embraced hundreds of miserable creatures in her spiked arms. And the awful thing was not that men practiced this torture, but that they enjoyed it and flocked to see it. But one day a prophet arose in Nuremberg and said: "This torture is horrible, utterly inhuman, against all the sweet mercy and pity of Jesus Christ, unworthy of our civilization. It must stop." When he had spoken it was the good people who discouraged him. They said: "Yes, it is inhuman and un-Christian, but you cannot stop it. People have always tortured, therefore they always will. It is part of the order of civilization, because it has always been. You cannot change." Needless to say, it was stopped in all civilized countries in 100 years, and where once the whole city loved it, not one but who would shudder at it now. You can change human nature completely.
One of the last great barbarities, most inhuman of all, a pagan institution to linger on in our Christian civilization, is war. The prophetic souls know that it is doomed and must go, because it is an anachronism in Christianity, and because the forces are now at work before which it needs must fall. But the one thing that prevents its going in a generation is this obsession of good people, that you cannot change human nature. The church alone could stop wars tomorrow did it believe its own Gospel had power to do what it claims to do, and did it dare believe that human nature could be so changed as to see the reasonableness of Christian settlement of national disputes as already it settles individual differences. It has been changed to do that. Once all men settled personal disputes with fists. That passed, and the duel came. That has gone, and we have the courts. More and more private quarrels are now adjudicated before they even reach the courts, by diplomacy. This evolution has gone on side by side with all this absurd talk of not being able to change human nature. And the change from wars as the method of adjudication between groups of people to international courts is in this inevitable evolution; but it limps and halts because good people cling to this outgrown obsession: You cannot change human nature. Wars have always been, therefore they must always be.
We are writing this editorial to call the attention of these good people to the effect that this obsession will prove false here as it has everywhere. You can do away with war soon because you can change human nature. The earth is full of the signs that human nature is changing very fast in this regard. The calendar of 1909 printed in our last two issues is only a slight indication of what is going on in the mind of the world. Read it carefully, and remember that 50 years ago one could not have written one. World unity, international peace, world federation, Hague courts, arbitration treaties, brotherhood of man — these are the growing words everywhere. They betoken a change coming over human nature. Link yourself up to it and hasten the transformation with your Christian faith. The change of human nature is easy to a Christianity really believed. — The Christian Work and Evangelist.
--Reprinted in The Daily Press, Sheboygan, Wisconsin, Feb. 21, 1910, p. 7.
Note: OK, here, this has to be the classic article, if there ever was one, on the progress of humanity, the changing of human nature, because of religion. We've probably all heard it, that there was this sense before World War I, then great disillusionment for such a point of view, made much worse by the next war. And add to that the various things of psychiatry, Freud, Jung, and things were never so optimistic again, although of course their aim was reconciliation and adjustment for at least good coping.
Friday, May 4, 2007
Rosicrucians' George Knox Dies, Sought Philosopher's Stone
December 1898
The Rosicrucians
Londoner Who Spent His Life Seeking the Philosopher's Stone and the Elixir of Life
The pre-Faraday school of chemistry, the chemistry of the elixir of life and the philosopher's stone, in whose strange nomenclature metals were known by such uncouth names us the "Red Lion," the "Green Serpent," the "Blue Dragon," and invested with mysterious, inexplicable properties, has recently lost one of its last, if not its very last genuine disciple.
His name was George Knox, and he died the other day in London at the age of somewhere about 90 years. For the last 30 years he had lived in the quarter of the city known as St. John's Wood, the last place where one would expect to find a philosopher. The old gentleman, however, knew nothing of the ways of his neighbors and they knew as little of his. Though a cheerful old man and exceedingly active for his years, he lived the life of a hermit, his whole energies being bent on the task of resolving the chemical problems of the middle ages. Mr. Knox used to call himself the "last of the Rosicrucians," and the chief objects of his pursuit were the elixir of life and the philosopher's stone. Three small fortunes he had had left to him at different periods of his life and the whole of two of them and the greater part of the third went into the crucible and the mortar. When a young man he had traveled all over the east, camping with Bedouins and hobnobbing with Brahmins and Tartars, seeking information concerning the recondite and occult.
The latter half of his life was spent in endeavoring to apply the information thus gained. One fortune went in the making of a few small rubies and a commercially valueless diamond. The elixir of life swallowed up the second. Among other processes this latter chimera involved the boiling of a liquid in a crucible for three yours. Up till the day of his death he believed that he had discovered if not the veritable elixir at least something approximating to it, and to the close he attributed his health and longevity to his concoction. The results of some of the experiments he made with the elixir before he perfected it were curious. It killed his favorite cat and took all the lubrication out of his own joints, so that for several days he went about creaking like a gate with rusty hinges. — N. Y. Sun.
The Rosicrucians
Londoner Who Spent His Life Seeking the Philosopher's Stone and the Elixir of Life
The pre-Faraday school of chemistry, the chemistry of the elixir of life and the philosopher's stone, in whose strange nomenclature metals were known by such uncouth names us the "Red Lion," the "Green Serpent," the "Blue Dragon," and invested with mysterious, inexplicable properties, has recently lost one of its last, if not its very last genuine disciple.
His name was George Knox, and he died the other day in London at the age of somewhere about 90 years. For the last 30 years he had lived in the quarter of the city known as St. John's Wood, the last place where one would expect to find a philosopher. The old gentleman, however, knew nothing of the ways of his neighbors and they knew as little of his. Though a cheerful old man and exceedingly active for his years, he lived the life of a hermit, his whole energies being bent on the task of resolving the chemical problems of the middle ages. Mr. Knox used to call himself the "last of the Rosicrucians," and the chief objects of his pursuit were the elixir of life and the philosopher's stone. Three small fortunes he had had left to him at different periods of his life and the whole of two of them and the greater part of the third went into the crucible and the mortar. When a young man he had traveled all over the east, camping with Bedouins and hobnobbing with Brahmins and Tartars, seeking information concerning the recondite and occult.
The latter half of his life was spent in endeavoring to apply the information thus gained. One fortune went in the making of a few small rubies and a commercially valueless diamond. The elixir of life swallowed up the second. Among other processes this latter chimera involved the boiling of a liquid in a crucible for three yours. Up till the day of his death he believed that he had discovered if not the veritable elixir at least something approximating to it, and to the close he attributed his health and longevity to his concoction. The results of some of the experiments he made with the elixir before he perfected it were curious. It killed his favorite cat and took all the lubrication out of his own joints, so that for several days he went about creaking like a gate with rusty hinges. — N. Y. Sun.
Saturday, April 14, 2007
Your Chance to Visit the Famous Nathoo, the Hindoo Seer
Iowa, 1914-1915
Click image for larger version
Nathoo, Hindu Seer, Now Free
Soothsayer Nathoo, the Hindu seer, perfumist, and alleged beguiler of maids, who "love not wisely but too well," as provided a bond of $500 and is free. Jerome F. Bartlett and John M. O'Brien, of Muscatine, both well-qualified to protect the state with their property, are the sureties. The bond is for $500. Nathoo left for Muscatine, after providing the bond, as Justice Ewing immediately ordered his release from the county jail.
His hearing is on July 10.
—Iowa City Daily Press, Iowa City, Iowa, July 3, 1914, page 8.
You Will Miss Your Chance to Visit The Famous Nathoo — The Hindoo Seer, Astrologist and Psychological Reader, UNLESS YOU COME SOON
Beginning under unusual difficulties he has given 300 readings and has won three hundred friends and supporters since he came here one month ago. He has advised and guided thousands of people to happiness, wealth and success, and is recognized in all the larger cities as the greatest of them all. You who are worried, in trouble and in doubt can be helped by this man. He can tell you of your past and see into your future. With his universal knowledge, and psychological power, he can advise you as to what you should do to get the most out of your life and make your desires become realities.
Readings every day and evening, except Sunday, by appointment. 210 East Washington Street. $5.00 Reading for 50c. This special price is given to build a reputation here.
MANY OF YOUR NEIGHBORS AND FRIENDS ARE TAKING ADVANTAGE OF THE OPPORTUNITY TO VISIT THIS MAN.
—Iowa City Daily Press, Iowa City, Iowa, September 3, 1914, page 4, advertisement.
"Count" Nathoo in Trouble
Iowa City. — The Johnson county grand jury is busy investigating the case of "Count" Nathoo, the Hindoo, who is charged with a crime against Alice Cornish of London, England. Nathoo was bound over to the grand jury after a preliminary hearing in July.
—Marble Rock Journal, Marble Rock, Iowa, September 23, 1914.
FAKER'S VICTIM IS SAVED MORE GRIEF
DEPORTATION WAS ORDERED
Alice Cornish Spared Sorrow of Outcast in England by Iowa Humanitarians.
Special to The Gazette.
Iowa City, Iowa, Jan. 20 — Count Nathoo, fake oriental astrologer of Des Moines, who last fall lured Alice Cornish, 19-year old English girl from Burlington to Davenport, from Davenport to Iowa City and from here to the capital suffered her the humility of arrest at that place yesterday for the second time, her first detention being in company with him at Iowa City where both were acquitted. The result at Des Moines, however, was not so successful and Miss Cornish, was ordered deported by United States government officials.
Only the intervention of Secretary of Labor Wilson, Congressman Prouty and Senator Cummins averted an execution of the order.
After hearing her pitiful story and knowing that deportation to England now when every new arrival needs a reference and employment is hard to obtain, Deaconess Martha H. Wurtz of St. Monica's home in Des Moines intervened in her behalf with the result that she will remain for the time being an inmate of that institution.
Count Nathoo meanwhile is still at large.
The 19-year old girl was born in England, but two years ago came to Muscatine to live with her aunt. She found life there anything but desirable and secured employment in Burlington where Nathoo met her. He lured her to Davenport and then to Iowa City where they were arrested, but later permitted to get out of town.
The intervention of Iowa's congressmen at Washington in the girl's behalf was secured upon the protestation against her deportation by such men as Bishop Longley, Attorney-General Cosson, James A. Davis, Northwestern railroad attorney for Iowa, and Ex-Governor Garst.
At first the order from the government officials was apparently irrevocable, but Miss Wurtz, the deaconess, decided to make a desperate effort to prevent its execution. The girl was utterly crushed by the order. In the best of times, without friends and relatives, without that essential thing in England, references of past employment, her lot would have been difficult, with all Europe under martial law there would be absolutely no place for her to go but the work house or brothel. She will stay at St. Monica's home for a year or two as a result of Miss Wurtz' efforts in her behalf.
—The Evening Gazette, Cedar Rapids, Iowa, January 20, 1915, page 5.
"Count" Nelson, self advertised as the "agent of God" and "Hindu seer," was bound over the grand jury at Iowa City, charged with seducing Alice Cornish, aged 19 a little friendless English working girl
—The Nashua Reporter, Nashua, Iowa, July 30, 1914, page 7.
—The Oxford Mirror, Oxford Junction, Iowa, October 22, 1914, page 7. Exact same item.
Note the wide disparity in the dates of publication, and "Nelson." Maybe that was Nathoo's real name?
Tuesday, April 10, 2007
Episcopals Gather to Think About Thinking
1920
TO DISCUSS "HOW TO THINK"
Henry Hazlitt's "Thinking as a Science" will be the subject of a lecture by the Rev. Dr. A. L. Murray at St. Johns Episcopal church Sunday evening. Hazlitt's book is a popular one on thinking and Dr. Murray believes the church should concern itself not only with what people think but how they think.
-The Evening Gazette, Cedar Rapids, Iowa, December 18, 1920, page 13.
TO DISCUSS "HOW TO THINK"
Henry Hazlitt's "Thinking as a Science" will be the subject of a lecture by the Rev. Dr. A. L. Murray at St. Johns Episcopal church Sunday evening. Hazlitt's book is a popular one on thinking and Dr. Murray believes the church should concern itself not only with what people think but how they think.
-The Evening Gazette, Cedar Rapids, Iowa, December 18, 1920, page 13.
Interviews with Ouija
1920
By FREDERIC J. HASKIN,
Director Janesville Daily Gazette Information Bureau, Washington, D.C.
Washington, Feb. 20.—"Why don't you interview ouija?" asked a friend the other day.
We thought it over. Our relations with "weegee" have always been rather distant. We have met at parties and at the home of ouija janes. But always we have passed the time of day in a few trifling queries, and let it go at that. Certainly, we never expected to start interviewing spirit celebrities so long as the earthly supply held out.
Still, we reflected, there were advantages to this kind of interview. Ouija, once cornered, could not plead a previous engagement or a conference, and judging by his reputation he would have a lot to say.
So we decided to borrow a staid, serious minded old ouija and ask him about the Sims-Daniels scrap, and who ought to be the next president, and if there were any messages from cousin Lon, who is either dead or in Chicago. We knew the board to borrow. It belongs to an elderly woman who goes in for higher thought and concentration, and undoubtedly her ouija has never been asked a silly question in its life.
Borrowed Board and Book
The old woman promptly offered to get the board, and also a book on how to set the best results with ouija. We hauled ouija home, corralled a friend to act as accomplice, and with the setting arranged, settled down for the interview.
First we read the book carefully. We found out that "the solar plexus -- that never sleeping brain of the individual -- is the witch board or receiving station for the messages." We also discovered that "the great secret why some individuals can successfully use the board and some cannot is "that the successful person must have, so to speak, a diseasedly sensitive solar plexus." That worried us, as our solar plexus has always been pretty healthy, and was feared the message germs might not have any effect. For a while we held on to the hope that maybe the writer was mistaken about the solar plexus being the brain of the soul, but further on we found that ouija himself had told her, "The solar plexus is the spiritual brain." With his inside information and a warning that to get best results you must think high thoughts we invited "little weegee" to the interview.
For the property of a higher thought sort of person this ouija board certainly had a remarkable line of talk and interesting opinions. It told us that there would be a big message for us.
Aunt Harriet Is Happy
After a rest it condescended to tell us that Aunt Harriet, who died some years ago, "is happy, but when we asked for Dumas to come and tell us who was the man in the iron mask, it wouldn't write anything except, "They don't answer."
When we returned the board we commented on the rather flippant attitude that it seemed to have. "Well," said the old woman, "I never tried the board myself. It's the maid's board."
Having talked to "little weegee" we decided to find out something about his life history. The messenger at the patent office was frankly amused at our mission.
"Weejah?" he repeated with a huge grin. "Yessuh. Try de toy division, suh."
The toy division was also moved to laughter over the password, but soon recovered sufficiently for a pleasant young patent examiner to get a collection of the patents.
"There are now 30 or 40 patents along this line," he explained. "Some are ouija board type, worked by a moving index, and others are planchettes and have a pencil to write the message."
"The first ouija board, called 'little wonder,' was patented in 186S. Since then, the idea has been adapted and the board improved by numerous inventors, mostly toy makers. The ouija board and similar inventions can be patented in the United States only as a toy. The patent office does not inquire into any mystic properties, and it does not permit inventors to claim or describe such properties in their patent papers."
It's Different in England
In England inventors often go into detail to explain the supernatural power of such devices. Thus, one British patentee inserts the following on his patent:
"If the person or persons are of temperament suitable for the reception of spiritualistic or telepathic messages, sentences may be spent out obtained from such sources and possibly conveying information unknown to the operator; the largest number of messages are automatic, i.e., communications from the subliminal consciousness finding expression through muscular workings controlled in a method hitherto only imperfectly understood."
"What does ouija mean, anyway?" we asked the patent office, for we have heard all sorts of cabalistic meanings attached to the queer syllables. "Well," said an obliging clerk, "the name is trademarked just as a word, but we understand that it means 'yes, yes,' being derived from oui, which is French for yes, and ja, which is German."
This seems plausible, if we discount ouija's own statements that its name signifies "The Master Hand," or "The Unknown," or that it is Hawaiian for "Truth." If ouija had not told so many people such different names for itself it might be easier to believe that the name savors of the occult. As it is, we fear that some prosaic toymaker, French perhaps, or German, accidentally put these two syllables together and found the effect pleasing, so that he named the board which answered yes and no, ouija, a union of languages not offensive.
Inventor Doesn't Understand
The ouija board most used in the United States was patented by William Fuld, a Baltimore toy manufacturer. Mr. Fuld invented his board simply as a game of the puzzle or mystic variety. He is careful to say that he does not claim any remarkable powers for his invention, but on the other hand, he tells the public that he does not himself know exactly what makes the little table move in so uncanny a manner.
This Solomon-like verdict is the only safe one for the inventor, for to deny outspokenly that his little board held any kinship with spirits would greatly injure the trade in his best seller, while if he claimed mysterious powers in league with the bits of wood, then he might be held responsible for some of little ouija's playful jokes.
Take the recent case of the woman who was unable to account for the disappearance of a sum of money. Ouija told her that a certain neighbor had taken it, and this startling advice was accepted as a clue from heaven. The neighbor was dramatically accused of theft, and the case went to court, one woman claiming a charge of theft, and the other after a libel suit. In such an instance the inventor of ouija is safe from attack as the cause of it all, as he never claimed that his invention was infallible.
Comedy and Farce
Most of ouija's history has been comedy, so far, and a good deal has been farce, but in a few cases an unaccountable force is said to have guided the board. The outstanding example of this is the well known story of Patience Worth who sent messages to a St. Louis woman through a ouija board. The mystery of Patience was that she talked in the language of seventeenth century England, using words and figures of speech which the medium could not possibly know, but which were almost always found in dictionaries of archaic English. Patience is still a mystery -- a seventeenth century English spinster who came to St. Louis to give her poems to the twentieth century, and for social chats with the medium and her friends, all through the ouija board.
We had talked to the ouija board, and delved into its history, and there was one more thing we wanted to know about that ouija -- how does it work, anyway? We called up the bureau of standards, the government scientific laboratory. The chief clerk answered, after his secretary had gurgled our message to him between fits of giggles, easily heard over the phone. The chief clerk was amused too, but the third commandment of the government is to give a serious answer to inquiries.
"Of course," he said, "we have never made a study of this matter. Unofficially, I should say that there is a tendency for the eye to guide the table toward some letter. The influence of the eye is shown in that is almost impossible to get any results blindfolded.
"Yes," he continued, "it is probably the working of the sub-conscious mind."
Still, we wonder. Thousands of people play with the board every night when the supper table is cleared off, and weegee tells them what day Jim will come home, and who is playing at the Main street picture show. Sometimes weegee hits the answer, sometimes he fails. It is a game. But out of these thousands of ouija fans comes one who calls up a Patience Worth, to upset the common sense theories and keep us wondering.
--Janesville Daily Gazette, Janesville, Wisconsin, February 26, 1920, page 4.
By FREDERIC J. HASKIN,
Director Janesville Daily Gazette Information Bureau, Washington, D.C.
Washington, Feb. 20.—"Why don't you interview ouija?" asked a friend the other day.
We thought it over. Our relations with "weegee" have always been rather distant. We have met at parties and at the home of ouija janes. But always we have passed the time of day in a few trifling queries, and let it go at that. Certainly, we never expected to start interviewing spirit celebrities so long as the earthly supply held out.
Still, we reflected, there were advantages to this kind of interview. Ouija, once cornered, could not plead a previous engagement or a conference, and judging by his reputation he would have a lot to say.
So we decided to borrow a staid, serious minded old ouija and ask him about the Sims-Daniels scrap, and who ought to be the next president, and if there were any messages from cousin Lon, who is either dead or in Chicago. We knew the board to borrow. It belongs to an elderly woman who goes in for higher thought and concentration, and undoubtedly her ouija has never been asked a silly question in its life.
Borrowed Board and Book
The old woman promptly offered to get the board, and also a book on how to set the best results with ouija. We hauled ouija home, corralled a friend to act as accomplice, and with the setting arranged, settled down for the interview.
First we read the book carefully. We found out that "the solar plexus -- that never sleeping brain of the individual -- is the witch board or receiving station for the messages." We also discovered that "the great secret why some individuals can successfully use the board and some cannot is "that the successful person must have, so to speak, a diseasedly sensitive solar plexus." That worried us, as our solar plexus has always been pretty healthy, and was feared the message germs might not have any effect. For a while we held on to the hope that maybe the writer was mistaken about the solar plexus being the brain of the soul, but further on we found that ouija himself had told her, "The solar plexus is the spiritual brain." With his inside information and a warning that to get best results you must think high thoughts we invited "little weegee" to the interview.
For the property of a higher thought sort of person this ouija board certainly had a remarkable line of talk and interesting opinions. It told us that there would be a big message for us.
Aunt Harriet Is Happy
After a rest it condescended to tell us that Aunt Harriet, who died some years ago, "is happy, but when we asked for Dumas to come and tell us who was the man in the iron mask, it wouldn't write anything except, "They don't answer."
When we returned the board we commented on the rather flippant attitude that it seemed to have. "Well," said the old woman, "I never tried the board myself. It's the maid's board."
Having talked to "little weegee" we decided to find out something about his life history. The messenger at the patent office was frankly amused at our mission.
"Weejah?" he repeated with a huge grin. "Yessuh. Try de toy division, suh."
The toy division was also moved to laughter over the password, but soon recovered sufficiently for a pleasant young patent examiner to get a collection of the patents.
"There are now 30 or 40 patents along this line," he explained. "Some are ouija board type, worked by a moving index, and others are planchettes and have a pencil to write the message."
"The first ouija board, called 'little wonder,' was patented in 186S. Since then, the idea has been adapted and the board improved by numerous inventors, mostly toy makers. The ouija board and similar inventions can be patented in the United States only as a toy. The patent office does not inquire into any mystic properties, and it does not permit inventors to claim or describe such properties in their patent papers."
It's Different in England
In England inventors often go into detail to explain the supernatural power of such devices. Thus, one British patentee inserts the following on his patent:
"If the person or persons are of temperament suitable for the reception of spiritualistic or telepathic messages, sentences may be spent out obtained from such sources and possibly conveying information unknown to the operator; the largest number of messages are automatic, i.e., communications from the subliminal consciousness finding expression through muscular workings controlled in a method hitherto only imperfectly understood."
"What does ouija mean, anyway?" we asked the patent office, for we have heard all sorts of cabalistic meanings attached to the queer syllables. "Well," said an obliging clerk, "the name is trademarked just as a word, but we understand that it means 'yes, yes,' being derived from oui, which is French for yes, and ja, which is German."
This seems plausible, if we discount ouija's own statements that its name signifies "The Master Hand," or "The Unknown," or that it is Hawaiian for "Truth." If ouija had not told so many people such different names for itself it might be easier to believe that the name savors of the occult. As it is, we fear that some prosaic toymaker, French perhaps, or German, accidentally put these two syllables together and found the effect pleasing, so that he named the board which answered yes and no, ouija, a union of languages not offensive.
Inventor Doesn't Understand
The ouija board most used in the United States was patented by William Fuld, a Baltimore toy manufacturer. Mr. Fuld invented his board simply as a game of the puzzle or mystic variety. He is careful to say that he does not claim any remarkable powers for his invention, but on the other hand, he tells the public that he does not himself know exactly what makes the little table move in so uncanny a manner.
This Solomon-like verdict is the only safe one for the inventor, for to deny outspokenly that his little board held any kinship with spirits would greatly injure the trade in his best seller, while if he claimed mysterious powers in league with the bits of wood, then he might be held responsible for some of little ouija's playful jokes.
Take the recent case of the woman who was unable to account for the disappearance of a sum of money. Ouija told her that a certain neighbor had taken it, and this startling advice was accepted as a clue from heaven. The neighbor was dramatically accused of theft, and the case went to court, one woman claiming a charge of theft, and the other after a libel suit. In such an instance the inventor of ouija is safe from attack as the cause of it all, as he never claimed that his invention was infallible.
Comedy and Farce
Most of ouija's history has been comedy, so far, and a good deal has been farce, but in a few cases an unaccountable force is said to have guided the board. The outstanding example of this is the well known story of Patience Worth who sent messages to a St. Louis woman through a ouija board. The mystery of Patience was that she talked in the language of seventeenth century England, using words and figures of speech which the medium could not possibly know, but which were almost always found in dictionaries of archaic English. Patience is still a mystery -- a seventeenth century English spinster who came to St. Louis to give her poems to the twentieth century, and for social chats with the medium and her friends, all through the ouija board.
We had talked to the ouija board, and delved into its history, and there was one more thing we wanted to know about that ouija -- how does it work, anyway? We called up the bureau of standards, the government scientific laboratory. The chief clerk answered, after his secretary had gurgled our message to him between fits of giggles, easily heard over the phone. The chief clerk was amused too, but the third commandment of the government is to give a serious answer to inquiries.
"Of course," he said, "we have never made a study of this matter. Unofficially, I should say that there is a tendency for the eye to guide the table toward some letter. The influence of the eye is shown in that is almost impossible to get any results blindfolded.
"Yes," he continued, "it is probably the working of the sub-conscious mind."
Still, we wonder. Thousands of people play with the board every night when the supper table is cleared off, and weegee tells them what day Jim will come home, and who is playing at the Main street picture show. Sometimes weegee hits the answer, sometimes he fails. It is a game. But out of these thousands of ouija fans comes one who calls up a Patience Worth, to upset the common sense theories and keep us wondering.
--Janesville Daily Gazette, Janesville, Wisconsin, February 26, 1920, page 4.
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