nd we cut away the root of all evil. For how can evil
proceed from an All-originating Source which is good altogether, and in
which, therefore, no germ for the development of evil is to be found?
Good cannot be the origin of evil; and since nothing can proceed except
from the one Originating Mind, which is only good, the true nature of
all things must be that which they have received from their
Source--namely, good.

Hence it follows that evil is not the true nature of anything, and that
evil must have its rise in something external to the true nature of
things. And since evil is not in the true nature of the things
themselves, nor yet in the Universal Mind which is the Originating
Principle, there remains only one place for it to spring from, and that
is our own personal thought. First we suppose evil to be as inherent in
the nature of things as good--a supposition which we could not make if
we stopped to consider the necessary nature of the Originating
Principle. Then, on this entirely gratuitous supposition, we proceed to
build up a fabric of fears, which, of course, follow logically from it;
and so we nourish and give substance to the Negative, or that which has
no substantial existence except such as we attribute to it, until we
come to regard it as having Affirmative power of its own, and so set up
a false idea of Being--the product of our own minds--to dispute the
claims of true Being to the sovereignty of the universe.

Once assume the existence of two rival powers--one good and the other
evil--in the direction of the universe, and any sense of harmony becomes
impossible; the whole course of Nature is thrown out of gear, and,
whether for ourselves or for the world at large, there remains no ground
of certainty anywhere. And this is precisely the condition in which the
majority of people live. They are surrounded by infinite uncertainty
about everything, and are consequently a prey to continual fears and
anxieties; and the only way of escape from this state of things is to
go to the root of the matter, and realise that the whole fabric of evil
originates in our own inverted conception of the nature of Being.

But if we once realise that the true conception of Being necessarily
excludes the very idea of evil, we shall see that, in giving way to
thoughts and fears of evil, we are giving substance to that which has no
real substance in itself, and are attributing to the Negative an
Affirmative force which it does