An Old Deception in a New Dress by C. M. S.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Oct 10, 1912

An Old Deception in a New Dress

By C. M. S.

MANY who criticize Adam for the part he played in the tragedy of the garden of Eden are falling to-day under the same temptation that was placed before him. Satan has dressed it in a new costume, but it is as old as his rebellion. This new manifestation of the old deception comes to us in the garb of New Thought. The editor of a New Thought magazine has produced a book whose title indicates that general opulence is standing before every man's door, begging to be taken in and made a member of the household. Money is represented as actually wanting the man. This book is supposed to explain just what mental attitude to maintain in order to draw the dollar. It is said that it will enable men to rise above the drudgery of enforced labor. The author seeks to teach the individual how he can so yield that he will be conducted into the pastures of abundance.

How striking is the similarity between this New Thought doctrine and the deception practised in Eden! The “god of this world” taught Adam and Eve how they could yield to him, and in so yielding gain all, and become gods themselves. Satan wanted the souls of the race, and promised them great things. They yielded to him, lost all, and were forced to labor as they had not done before. Now comes the champion of the New Thought, seeking the same thing, making the same offer, and in addition, holding out a remedy which “will enable you to rise above the drudgery of enforced labor.”

If the two propositions are not instigated by the same power, then the coincidence is a remarkable one; and the last deception holds out the promise of immunity from the results of the first one, that is, labor. Only yield to the invitations of the New Thought, and all you desire to have, you may have; all you desire to be, you may be, even if your desire, like that of Lucifer, be to be “like the Most High,” and to take the great title I AM.

Does the New Thought promise all this? The answer will be found in its own teaching, and this teaching incidentally classifies the New Thought, and indicates beyond question to what genus and specie it belongs. The author of the book above referred to says editorially in the journal Now:—

Man is conscious mind. Conscious mind is self-determined, is the personal God. To-day man is conscious of himself, says “I AM,” but has not awakened to his power as a conscious manifestation of God, of the One, so he can say what he is. He is coming to that consciousness. All power lies potentially in the human ego. Man, as an individual and a race, is limited only by his ignorance of his powers. As he thinks himself to be, that he is. To teach him to think of himself as potentially omnipotent, and to bring him into recognition of his possessions, is the object of Now.

If we were to italicize any of the above, it would be necessary to italicize all, so sweeping and all-including is the blasphemous assumption of human omnipotence. Man is made the “personal God,” the “I AM,” the “One,” the possessor of “all power,” “potentially omnipotent.” But this is not all. He continues:—

Man is that which he thinks he is, because thought is power; and by this power, which is creative, man creates himself. . . . Man is spirit; with all the

possibilities of divinity, and may manifest these possibilities here and now.

It would seem that nothing but an intellect crazed by self-admiration and self-worship could make such assumptions as these quoted; and we find that it was that very thing which turned the head of Satan, and brought discord and rebellion into heaven, and sin into this world. “I will destroy thee, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire. Thine heart was lifted up because of thy beauty, thou hast corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness: I will cast thee to the ground, I will lay thee before kings, that they may behold thee.” Eze. 28: 16, 17. God's rebuke to the king of Tyrus—symbol of Satan—can just as fittingly be applied to the proponents of New Thought. “Thus saith the Lord God: Because thine heart is lifted up, and thou hast said, I am a God, I sit in the seat of God, in the midst of the seas; yet thou art a man, and not God, though thou set thine heart as the heart of God.” Eze. 28: 2. One of the faults of that king was an inordinate desire for gold, treasure, and glory. The New Thought makes the road to opulence and the release from labor one of its aims. How striking is the similarity throughout!

We will note some of their affirmations, following each with a text of Scripture having a direct application to such affirmations:—

“As life, I am perfect.” Scripture: “Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God.” Rom. 3: 19. “They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one.” Verse 12.

“Through faith in myself as a manifestation of the infinite life, I am health and happiness.” Scripture: “I can of mine own self do nothing.” John 5: 30. “Without me ye can do nothing.” John 15: 5. “I can do all things in him that strengtheneth me.” Phil. 4: 13. The New Thought does all things through itself and in itself and for itself.

“I think of myself as the I AM, which is infinite.” Scripture: “And knowest not that thou art the wretched one and miserable and poor and blind and naked.” Rev. 3: 17. “Yet thou art a man, and not God, though thou set thine heart as the heart of God.”

“I live the eternal life, and partake of present immortality.” Scripture: “The King of kings, and Lord of lords; who only hath immortality.” 1 Tim. 6: 15, 16. “When this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality.” 1 Cor. 15: 54. That takes place at the resurrection of the just, and not till then.

We might give many more of these bold and audacious assumptions, which are just as plainly refuted by the Word of God, but it is not necessary. Those given show the animus of the whole teaching, and brand it as the wicked thing that it is. In the face of all this, shall we yield to the deception, and taste and fall, as did our first parents? The New Thought teaching is as contrary to the Word and truth of God as was Satan's contradiction in Eden. It is based upon and propagates the same falsehood, the immortality of the soul. It seeks the same object, the exaltation of the creature above the Creator. Knowing this fact, how can we hope for any other reward than the reward of the fallen cherub if we accept and propagate the doctrine which struck discord in heaven and brought sin, sorrow, and suffering to the earth? The deception of the pit is in its sophistries, its wicked assumptions, and its empty and impossible promises. Its glowing phrases are as empty as Dead Sea fruit. The propagation of these doctrines at this time is but another indication that the warfare which we wage now is not against men, but against the mighty workings of a deception that has been persistently practised upon the human race from its infancy, and is still insistently thrust forward to blind and dazzle now when God's last message is due the world.

C. M. S.