“To-day we first went over what we had said last week. The question arose as to which class of evil disease belongs. We came to the conclusion that it is the result or price of progress. We also spoke about the idea of a trinity. We had said at the last meeting that God is a divine self within us, and that when we know each other we will know God. Connecting each one of us to the other, there is a feeling of sympathy, a third element. That is to say, there is you, and myself, and, making the third part, that sympathetic understanding which brings us closer together.
“The chief topic to-day was that of Matter and Spirit. At first there was a little difference of opinion, but we finally agreed that in reality everything is spirit, and that which we call matter is only the expression of the spirit. As an example we took the sculptor, who, getting an idea through the mind, expresses this spirit in a statue, which we call matter. We speak of the body as matter, but it is spirit, in as much as it is the medium through which the spirit manifests itself.”
When I told the children I had decided to take up evolution before immortality, because evolution was the problem of creation, they were all satisfied and interested.
“On Sunday, October 25th, the Seekers held a regular meeting. We first reviewed our discussion of the last week, and then took up the subject of Matter and Spirit. Our discussion was long, and the conclusion we reached was that matter is an expression of spirit. In the first place, matter is that which has form or qualities. Every material thing is the expression of a thought. If a man makes a table, he does so because he wishes to, because it is his will to do so. If he writes a book, that book is an expression of his thought, but it is what is commonly called matter. Matter is, in short, a result of spirit, is an expression of spirit. Our bodies are the expression of our minds, and the way in which we express ourselves to each other. If our bodies are not perfect, if they are diseased, it is merely that our minds have not advanced far enough to express the perfect body. Our talk this week helped me a great deal. Although we did not cover much ground, we reached a conclusion on one of the most difficult subjects, and I think almost every one was convinced.”