Chapter XIII
THE WISDOM OF EXPECTATION
W. John Murray
Mental
Medicine
Divine Science Publishing Assoc.
New York, 1923.
[186] We have
so often seen the words hope and expectation
used in prose and poetry as if they were synonymous, that we feel it
will not be time wasted if we venture to explain their difference. Hope
carries within itself the element of uncertainty, so that men hope
against hope itself. James Fenimore Cooper says that "Hope is the most
treacherous of all human fancies," but Henry Ward Beecher affirms that,
"The greatest architect and the one most needed is hope." Hope has been
defined as "the poor man's bread," meaning that when he has nothing
else he may still have hope though it lead to nothing but death and
"the hope of eternal life, of which he may have no
certitude."
Benjamin
Franklin says, "He that lives upon hopes will die fasting," and we have
[187] seen this come true literally. A strange fact that is not
commonly observed is that we seem to have the most hope when we have
the most fear. The approaching calamity is so appalling that we are
blinded by it, and all we have or can have under such circumstances is
that hope which if it is deferred too long, as it frequently is,
"maketh the heart sick."
True, it is
better to have hope than not to have it, but it is a poor substitute
for that attitude of mind which does the thing and expects
the results. An opiate may be a good thing when one is in intense pain,
but it is not a remedy for the pain-producing disease. Hope is
frequently an opiate which puts the mind to sleep when it should be
wide awake and "about the Father's business." To go through the world
hoping that something will "turn up" while doing nothing to turn it up,
is to have the world turn up its nose at us and blast our hopes by
disregarding them. The mechanic does not hope that his machine will
serve his purpose; all things properly attended to, he expects
it will; indeed [188] he would be surprised if it does not; but how
frequently the man who takes it out in hoping, is surprised when the
thing he hopes for actually comes to pass. The farmer does not merely
hope that his corn will come up and ripen; he expects it will and goes
about his other business. The commuter who takes the seven o'clock
train expects to get to his office on time. That both the farmer and
commuter are sometimes disappointed does not change the fact that
expectation is better than hope, for it carries within itself that
mental magnetism which attracts the thing expected. Not every piece of
steel attracts another piece of steel, but only that which is properly
magnetized. We need to be magnetized by a conscious contact with that
all-sufficing Supply if we would attract to ourselves the things we
hope for and which we so seldom receive because we do not expect
them. But to expect everything and prepare for nothing, is as foolish
as to hope for something and make no effort to bring it to pass. In the
same man expectation and [189] preparation are the chemical properties
of mind which always result in a third condition, namely, actualization.
When the
multitude which followed Jesus were hungry and hoped for food he bade
them sit down in groups. This created an expectant attitude of mind as
of body, for that which their mere hopes could never have obtained
their expectation made possible. For the loaves and fishes were
multiplied in accordance with the law, proving that which you expect
you get, whether it is poverty or prosperity, sickness or health.
Expectation
creates a neutral path in the brain into which tumbles the thing we
expect whether it is good or ill, and which then flows into our
experience as water flows into the ditch we prepare for it.
If Jesus
hoped for an increase of the loaves and fishes and expected no
increase, He would have been like the majority of mankind. The thing
that distinguished Him from other men was the thing that distinguishes
any successful man from the vast [190] majority. Expectation is that
state of mind which sees the thing expected
actually coming to pass despite all appearances. Sometimes this is
called visualization, but visualization in this sense is not idle
fancy; it is rather the intensification of thought on a specific
reality, in short, it is the method of making the ideal real.
When the
metaphysician sees or visualizes an abstract idea or mental picture and
predicts its appearance in visible form, it is only a question of time
when the mathematician will support the reality of this idea, whether
it is in the field of astronomy or electricity, and then it is only a
question of further time when the man in the street will be able to see
it by means provided mechanically, as when one sees through a telescope
what he could never see without it.
The New
Psychology is to the eye of the mind what the telescope is to the eye
of the body. It enlarges one's vision of mind, which will presently be
made manifest on the plane of matter, if one really expects
[191] it. Just as the plainsman whose eyes are trained to great
distances observes on the horizon what the ordinary person cannot
distinguish, and as the mariner sees objects at sea long before the
landsman sees them, so the illumined consciousness perceives changes in
circumstances and understands what the Bible means when it says, "The
night is far spent, the day is at hand," and this when there is no
visible evidence of it.
Just before
dawn one might say on the evidence of his senses, "It is getting darker
and darker," but the fact would be that "It is getting lighter and
lighter," and so Coue' is right when he instructs his followers to say,
"Day by day in every way I am getting better and better," though the
evidence of their senses does not bear immediate testimony to the truth
of the statement. Declaring the truth and expecting the verification of
it in improved health, improvement must come to pass.
Chapter
14
