The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1895-08-23
GReENACRE CONGRESS.
Culture of Mind, Spirit and Body Discussed
at Eliot
Especial TO THE pREsS.1

space Will not permit OF review of all the
valuable lectures in the Greenacre course,
it is not always easy to know what ones to
mention and what to leave out. But GER
tainly the very practical one by Mrs Ur-
sula N. Gestefeld, president of the Exc
dus Club, of New York City, must claim
brief attention. Her subject was
Claiming our Birthrighu, 'that.t which
we are entitled by virtue of our being
and not by special favor. We have been
taught that we are childrn of common
Father and that being the case, we are
all equally entitled to all that our Father
has to bestow for He is not respecter
of persons, though generally so regarded.
We are clearly entitled to all those quail
ties which necessarily emanate from the
divine, subsistent source of our being, and
this makes us doubly rich, inasmuch as
these qualities are ours perpetually, not
temporarily. We are entitled to the full
and free use of every sense, faculty and
power pertaining to the ego, who is the
Son of God, and the results OF their full
and free use, which, synthesized, are per-
feet health, strength, power, happiness
of their possession through the recogni--
ton of our right and by the trained use OF
the imagining faculty. We feel what we
think, therefore we should think what
we wish to feel. The great secret of ap-
proximate realization of our higher being
and its possibilities is the use Of the pres
ent tense in our thinking, in our self-com-
muning, instead of the future tense. We
are really God-like in our being, though
human in our conception of it Our des-
tiny is fixed by our nature, not by fiat,
and we as souls, rule our destiny, or are
ruled by it. according as we recognize
and consciously use the inherent powers
and faculties of that nature, or are ruled
by them This view o our birthr1ght
spares us all envy for the possessions of
our neighbors. We recognize that the
greatest man OF woman who ever lived,
has become possessed of or accomplished,
no more than is possible for ourselves and
we may likewise claim our own, II we
will.
The address of Ralph Waldo Urine, Phi.
D., of Mt. Morris, ILL.,, was an inspira
ton to purer, nobler living, to all who
had the privilege of listening to it. The
theme was, Giving upon the Heights, :"
and in it, he traced the growth and devel-
opment of the race from the era of ply
steal prowess down to the present age of
intellectual supremacy, from which the
higher supremacy, that OF spirit, is begin
ming to evolve. Here and there all over
the world, rare souls have escaped from
the disease-laden valleys of materiality,
and assembled to the mountain tops of
spirituality, where joy, peace, freedom
and purity shine Respondent. What they
have proven possible of attainment is
equally possible for us all. We need but
higher self. TO do this, man must know
himself, not as material being, but as
a spiritual being, made in the image and
likeness of God, who is Spirit. Man nses
on this plane of existence, physical
house or body. in order to gain experience
in contact with the material world. Mr..
Urine said he heard one OF our most noted
writers and thinkers say recently, Men
talk of having soul I have no soul. l
am soul; have a body" and this repre-
sents the absolute truth. Because Of our
non recognition of this, our true selves
have been slaves to our physical selves
we have been giving our chief time and
attention to the body and called that liv-
ing. All the sin, the suffering, the ills
fears and forebodings, are on the side of
the physical, the transient; while al! the
peace, happiness, the hope and joy OF ex-
ultant life, lie on the side of the spiritual,
tie eternal. But as we come to realize
what we truly are, it brings US into rap
port with the universe. We feel the
bower and thrill of life universal. Great
laws and forces before unknown reveal
themselves to us. The lntu1tions become
keener and their guidance more unerr-
ing. Health takes the place of disease.
for all disease is merely the result OF the
violation of the laws under which we live.
Then comes also spiritual power, which,
as 1T is sent out, is adequate for the heal
ing of others, as in the days of old, and
power in other directions is ours also.
Why should we not have the powers OF the
foremost in former days The universe
is the same. its laws are identical, and
God, the Interchangeable, is in thew orld
Just the same. The fault has been that
we have taken ourselves out of harmony
with the higher laws of our being.
Probably no one person has done so
much as Henry Wood. Of Boston, to bring
the higher metaphysical thought within
the range of the masses, by his admirable
books and essays. His thought is always
lofty, vet his expression OF it so clear,
logical, comprehensive and simple. that it
alWays..Wins an attentive hearing. Having
been lifted by Mental Science, out of an in
dividualism extending over many. years,
what more natural than he should devote
his life to the PRONUNCIATION OF It's prncl-
pies? A large and attentive audience
listened to his address on 1.-THE Divinity
of NATURE He spoke of Nature as rev.
elator, and said that the attempt to turn
RELIGION away from Nature into an arbi-
trary and unrelated realm, has drained
it of its normal and aboundng vitality,
while the materialism ofScience has turned
it's gaze downward. Religion and Science
have both suffered by the divorce which
has been unnaturally forced upon them.
The forces of Nature are the opponents
and ministers of our Righteousness. The
man who violates the moral law ignores
the principles of his own being and sets
at naught the laws which are inscribed
in his inner constitution. But Infinite
forces work through us when we work
with them. Spirit is the reality and mat
ter it's servant and sensuous exPressor.
The revelation of God in Nature is not
less sacred than that through the Son or
the Book Man has effectively de-conse,
Grated Nature and even his own physical
organism, which is truly declared to be
the temple of the living God. But we can
lift everything toward the Divine by
transforming our own ideals. 1.-The pure
in heart shall see God. What wonder
full power and privilege, and yet it poten-
TALLY belongs to us all. We often speak
of the forces of Nature, but back OF all
forces there is one Force; back of all laws,
one Law; back of all causes, one Cause
one Spirit, one Life one Love.
Daniel Batchellor, director OF music in
the public schools of Philadelphia, deliv-
erd one of the most beautiful lectures of
,,ao,, tsTbo Rbutbr, Of