HENRY WARD BEECHER.

167

Perhaps some of my readers were visitors at Mr. Beecher's church some twenty-five or thirty years ago. Well do I remember the great audience-room, filled to repletion, with all the space clear to the speaker's stand occupied by seats, which surrounded it, for there were nearly as many persons behind it as in front. Thus encompassed, and re-inforced as it were, was the great orator of humanity. His powerful and generous physique, his great brain, his inspired glance, were all magnetized, and he held the vast throng without an effort. Blue, ministerial, New England blood was in his veins; but a bluer blood, that of generic man, filled them, showing the "heart within blood-tinctured, of a veined humanity." He spoke to man as he was in reality, not as falsely pictured by a mistaken theology. His giant shoulder gave a mighty push to the car of human ad

vancement.

Beecher helped his audience and his audience helped him. He spoke with them, and not to them. His magnetic and spiritual spheres blended with theirs, and the resulting harmony was a power that was felt to the ends of the nation, and far beyond. His free soul seldom knew hesitation or fear, and he easily heads the long line of American pulpit orators.

One easily recalls the names of those men who have greatly influenced others by powers that were made effective by their magnetism. Moses, Jesus, Demosthenes, Cæsar, Mohammed, Luther, Napoleon, Lincoln, were largely endowed with this easily conducting vehicle of the force within, and show how much can be done with its aid; and how little men are personally influenced by those who repel them, like Justinian, Calvin, and

168

FIFTH PHYSICAL STEP.

Erasmus. Other things being equal, it is the magnetic men that are followed, listened to, and that get the

votes.

By the third step, our personal magnetism was harmoniously blended with that of the earth; and by the fourth, it is gathered together and is fully under our own sway. The more frequently that this occurs, the longer does this effective state continue; but, until complete development be attained, our labors in the outside world and the influence of the inharmonious streams from persons we meet, cause it to dwindle away, and to be replaced by an inharmony that needs a repetition of the entire process. To defer this necessity as long as possible, to lock up our sphere as it were, we now pass to the fifth physical step, which should follow up the fourth without any delay.

In this we lock up the centralized power that we have attained, by passing the fingers of one hand across the palm of the other hand, without touching it. We then reverse the reciprocal action of the two hands, and repeat this alternative action two or three times. The hands being the poles of our personal horse-shoe magnet, these motions tend to hold the physical system in a polarized condition, somewhat as the soft iron armature placed across the ends of a steel magnet causes it to retain its polarity.

In this connection, if we find ourselves in presence of a person who is inharmonious, or who seeks to influence us unduly for self-interested motives, we may concentrate our own magnetic forces, and thus protect ourselves, by quietly putting our feet together, and placing one hand over the other. These motions actually con

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169

centrate our magnetic currents, and the act also brings our mind into a more positive state.

In the fifth step, it is better to first pass the fingers of the positive hand across the palm of the negative hand; but this is not essential, if the alternative motions of the hands be repeated two or three times.

Some per

sons find it difficult to decide which hand or which side of the body is positive. The right is generally the positive; but as there are exceptions to this statement, we may say that the hand, the cheek, the wrist that is habitually warmer than the other, indicate that that side is positive, and the cooler, the negative. One may test one's own cheeks, always with the same hand; or have another person test one's hands, with his same hand, of course, as his own hands differ in temperature from each other.

We have thus described the five physical steps of the process, leaving it to Chapter XVIII to show how to combine them with the mental steps given in previous chapters of the book.

"Conscious Law is king of kings

From world to world the Godhead changes,

Thou meetest him by centuries,

And lo! he passes like the breeze:

Thou seek'st in globe and galaxy,

He hides in pure transparency;

He is the axis of the star,

He is the sparkle of the spar;

He is the heart of every creature,

He is the meaning of each feature;

And his mind is the sky,

Than all it holds more deep, more high."

FMERSON.

CHAPTER XVII.

SOME PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS.

It is well to ascertain which side of the body is positive and which is negative, not so much to begin with the proper hand in the fifth step, as to know which side of the body is more liable to disease by being negative, and which hand to use in correcting our own ailments and those of other people, as it is generally better to make use of the positive hand.

While we shall not look for symptoms of liver trouble or appendicitis on our left side, nor for inflammation of the cardiac orifice on the right, yet where the opposite parts are similar, the negative side is more prone to disease. The left being usually negative, ovarian tumors and the like are apt to come on that side. One who is developing into a magnetized condition will find that he can easily avert an ailment in himself or in another by the simple application of his positive hand, if he do it just as soon as the slightest pain begins. This is especially the case when it is a slight inflammation; but when the liver is gorged with bile by a long course of improper food, or the spine has begun to curve, or a tumor has formed in the ear, it will take something more than the "laying on of a hand" to remove the trouble. The powerful magnetic healer and perhaps skillful mechanical appliances will then be necessary.

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171

But such things need never come to our posterity if all the rules of health described before are attentively followed.

A grown person can often remove serious trouble from the small body of a child by laying the positive hand on the affected stomach or abdomen, or aching tooth or ear. Where a part of the head or body reached by any one of the twelve pairs of cranial nerves is in pain, it is well to place the positive hand at the base of the sufferer's brain, and the other hand on the part that pains, and then wait quietly until your stronger magnetism begins to run from his brain to the part affected, when relief will be sure to follow. But as the mind re-acts on the body, do not attempt these normal methods unless the sufferer, child or grown, likes you, and has confidence in you. Even Jesus had to be sure that the sick man "believed" that he could heal him.

But as the writer has not much experience as a healer, she will not continue these suggestions. She will content herself by pointing out the process by which each one can become magnetic and in better physical health, leaving the application of magnetic currents to those whose work lies in that direction. Her own health has been remarkably improved by following the directions laid down in this book, and she is happy in communicating them to others.

One side of the body is positive and the other negative, and it is also true that the front of the body is always positive, and the back negative. The back having less resistant power, a draught on the exposed back of the neck will cause one to catch cold, when the same draught in front would be harmless. Disembodied