Good and evil are thereby seen to be but relative terms indicating the result of our thoughts and actions. If we entertain constructive thoughts only, the result will benefit ourselves or others, this benefit we call good, if on the other hand we entertain destructive thought, this will result in inharmony for ourselves and others, this inharmony we call evil, but the power is the same in either event.

There is but one source of power and we can use the power for good or for evil, just as we can make use of electricity for light, heat or power by an understanding of the laws governing electricity, but if we are careless or ignorant of the laws governing electricity, the result may be disastrous. The power is not good in one case and evil in the other; the good or evil depend upon our understanding of the law.

Many will ask, “how does this thought agree with the scripture?” Many millions of Bibles are sold annually, and every discovery in chemistry, science or philosophy must be in agreement with the vital Truth of religious thought.

What then was the thought of the Master concerning the Creator? It will be remembered that the question was put to him by a lawyer: “Master what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” Did He evade the question? Did He quote some ancient authority? Did He recommend some creed or theological dogma? He did not. His answer was direct and to the point: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, will all thy soul, with all thy mind and with all thy strength, and they neighbor as thyself.”

Where is this God which the lawyer is told to love? Jesus refers to Him as the Father and when asked concerning Him says: “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father,” again “The Father and I are one,” again, “It is not I that doeth the work, but the Father that dwelleth in me, He doeth the work,” again He taught His disciples to pray: “Our Father who are in Heaven,” and when asked concerning the location of Heaven, He said: “Men shall not say Lo her or Lo there, for behold the Kingdom of Heaven is within you.” Here then is authority as to the immanence of the Creator, the Father from the Master Physician himself. Thus, we find that Science and Religion are not in conflict and that within the Church and without there is a setting aside of traditional creeds and a return to the things which the Great Teacher taught and the things for which He stood.

The Old Testament has much to say concerning the God of Jacob and of Moses, but this conception of an Anthropomorphic God is principally interesting as indicating the thought of a people who believed that the world was flat, that the sun moved, when science was but magic and religion the dogma of the scholastics.

This was the result of the deductive method of reasoning which originated with certain statements of fact which were universal and absolute, and which were incapable of verification, all other facts must be arrived at by a process of deduction from these original axioms. If facts were observed which seemed to contradict the deductions from which these original axioms were formulated, so much the worse for the facts, they could not be facts. Facts are nothing compared with “statements of Truth” as given by the scholastics. If there were those who persisted in seeing these unwelcome facts, there was the hemlock, or the stake or the cross.

But in the New Testament all of this is reversed, the doctrine of the immanence of God is taught, an objective God is converted into a subjective God, we are told that, “In Him we live and move and have our Being,” we are told that “The Kingdom of Heaven is within you,” and we are led to infer that God is always in the “Kingdom.”

In this connection it is interesting to note that the miscellaneous collection of manuscripts which have finally been put together and called the Bible were written by many different men, of many different locations, and at widely different times. At first these manuscripts were circulated separately, later they were collected into a single volume and for a long time there were serious disputes among the ancient Jews and the early Church Ecclesiastics as to what manuscripts should have a place in the sacred book. In fact until quite recently there were many of these manuscripts included which are not now to be found in the Bible as recognized by the Protestant Church of today.

The manuscripts comprising the old testament were written originally in Hebrew, those of the new testament in Greek, and not a single original manuscript of any book either of the old or the new testament is in existence today, nor have they been in existence for hundreds of years. We have then only copies of copies of copies many times removed from the original.

When we remember that those who undertook to translate these manuscripts into the English language for the purpose of giving them to the people met with violent opposition, frequently being driven from the country and excommunicated from the church, we see that there was little uniformity in the various translations of these manuscripts which are now called the Bible or the “Word of God.”

The King James edition which finally became popular with the people was the work of fifty-four churchmen who agreed with each other that all differences of opinion should be settled at special meetings to be held from time to time and that all marginal notes concerning the Greek or Hebrew text should be eliminated. The fact that this edition had the sanction of the King was probably the determining factor in favor of its general adoption, but aside from this the work came to be held in high esteem by the scholastics because of the smoothness and beauty of the diction, the churchmen who had the revision in charge evidently sacrificing accuracy for euphony and rhetoric.

And now we have a strictly “American” Bible, the word of the American Revision Committee in which the famous definition of Faith by St. Paul, “Now Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen” is changing to “Now Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, a conviction of things not seen,” from which it would appear that Paul did not begin to have the insight, the vision, the intuition with which he has been credited, the latter translation completely nullifying and destroying what has heretofore been the most wonderful definition of faith ever given to the world.

It will readily be seen that the Nazarene completely reversed the process of thought in vogue at that time, instead of using the deductive method of thinking he used the inductive. He accepted no authority, no dogma, no creed, instead of reasoning from the seen to the unseen, the visible to the invisible, from things temporal to things eternal, He reversed this process completely and as the idea of this immanent God took hold of man, as they began to understand that, “Closer is he than breathing, nearer than hands or feet,” then gradually came an awakening, which marks the birth of a splendor such as had never before been known.

If the inductive method of reasoning obtained in religion, we should find all religions co-operating for the purpose of bringing about “Peace on Earth and good will toward men.” We should find every school of theology co-operating with every other school for the purpose of spreading the “glad tidings of great joy,” telling of a Redeemer who has come “That we might have life and have it more abundantly,” and that this abundant life may be had by looking within instead of without.

That objective peace is the result of subjective peace, that harmony without is the natural consequence which follows harmony within, that “men do not gather figs from thistles, or grapes from thorns,” and that a man’s character is the evidence of the value of his religion: “For by their fruits shall they be known,” such a religion satisfies the brain as well as the heart, religion is to love justice, to long for the right, to love mercy, to forget wrongs and remember benefits, to love the truth, to be sincere, to love liberty, to cultivate the mind, to be familiar with the mighty thoughts that genius has expressed, the noble deeds of all the world, to cultivate courage and cheerfulness. To make others happy, to receive new truths with gladness, to cultivate hope, to see the calm beyond the storm, the dawn beyond the night. This is the religion of reason, the creed of science.

“For we know in part and we prophecy in part. But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away.”