interposition in answer to prayer. None of the
other systems accept anything as special, but believe in the
universality and continuity of orderly law.

There are many leaders, authors, and workers in this movement, who are
eminent; but as principles are more important than personality, their
names need not be enumerated.

Why did this movement originate among women, and why have so large a
proportion of its exponents belonged to the so-called weaker sex?
Because the intuitional and spiritual senses of women are keener than
those of men, and mental healing is not the result of profound
reasoning. It is the seeming "weak things of the world which confound
the strong." Men are largely immersed in intellectual and formulated
systems, and when the time was ripe for new light and attainment in
spiritual evolution to dawn upon humanity, it might have been expected
that its first delicate rays would be detected by woman.

The one great principle which underlies all mind healing is contained
in the assumption that all primary causation relating to the human
organism is mental or spiritual. The mind, which is the real man, is
the cause, and the body the result. The mind is the expressor, and the
body the expression. The inner life forces build the body, and not the
body the life forces. The thought forms the brain, and not the brain
the thought. The physical man is but the printed page, or external
manifestation, of the intrinsic man which is higher and back of him.

Materia medica deals with effects rather than primary causes. It seeks
to modify the expression, which can only be done through the
expressor. It is axiomatic that to change results we deal with causes.
This principle is so widely recognized that it is seen in an endless
variety of phases, even among barbarous and half-civilized races. The
charms and incantations used for healing among Indian tribes have this
significance. With all their barbarism they are near to nature and
keen in locating causation. With nothing more than a superstitious
basis, charms, incantations, dances, images, ceremonies, and shrines
have a wonderful influence for healing. They divert the mind from the
ailment, and stimulate a strong faith which awakens the recuperative
forces to action, and thus cause a rapid recovery.

A traveller in Algiers relates the following conversation he had with
a Moorish woman of high class: "When ill do you go to the doctor?" he
asked. "Oh, no; we go to th