The physical side of this research was aided by hints from homoeopathy,
sustaining my final conclusion that mortal belief, instead of the drug,
governed the action of material medicine.

I wandered through the dim mazes of _materia medica_, till I was weary of
"scientific guessing," as it has been well called. I sought knowledge from
the different schools,--allopathy, homoeopathy, hydropathy, electricity,
and from various humbugs,--but without receiving satisfaction.

I found, in the two hundred and sixty-two remedies enumerated by Jahr, one
pervading secret; namely, that the less material medicine we have, and the
more Mind, the better the work is done; a fact which seems to prove the
Principle of Mind-healing. One drop of the thirtieth attenuation of _Natrum
muriaticum_, in a tumbler-full of water, and one teaspoonful of the water
mixed with the faith of ages, would cure patients not affected by a larger
dose. The drug disappears in the higher attenuations of homoeopathy, and
matter is thereby rarefied to its fatal essence, mortal mind; but immortal
Mind, the curative Principle, remains, and is found to be even more active.

The mental virtues of the material methods of medicine, when understood,
were insufficient to satisfy my doubts as to the honesty or utility of
using a material curative. I must know more of the unmixed, unerring
source, in order to gain the Science of Mind, the All-in-all of Spirit, in
which matter is obsolete. Nothing less could solve the mental problem. If I
sought an answer from the medical schools, the reply was dark and
contradictory. Neither ancient nor modern philosophy could clear the
clouds, or give me one distinct statement of the spiritual Science of
Mind-healing. Human reason was not equal to it.