Page:Science and Health.djvu/383

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HEALING THE SICK.
379

regarded when employing a manipulator of the head, that moulds mind and controls it, though less publicly and suddenly, not less surely than the mesmerist who comes more honestly before the foot-lights with his performance. Through his mesmeric control over minds, the mal-practitioner can hold his patients and practice, whether he heals the sick or not, and he moulds some of them into a belief they are healed, but others he must keep moulding, that is, continue to treat, or they will relapse. There are certain self-evident facts; this is one of them. A student of science, understanding its high requirements, cannot be unfamiliar with the fact that the teacher must have reached it worthily who has grown to its discovery, for this cannot be without pursuing faithfully the straight and narrow path that leads to Truth. Therefore, to know this and acknowledge it, is honesty and understanding on the part of a student, and not to know it, or acknowledge it, ignorance or dishonesty, and every true student will bear testimony to this statement. Paul said, “Live peaceably with all men inasmuch as in you lies.” This is wholesome counsel, and a most desirable thing; but could he live peaceably with all men, when “that which is perfect” had come to his understanding, and that which is imperfect was to be done away? Not the learning of a Roman student spared him when he girded on the armor of Truth and rushed to battle with the age. When he “fought the good fight” and kept the faith, he passed from the forum into toil and dishonor, and from a dungeon to a scaffold and a crown.

If virtue forgives vice, it cannot love it; if charity