Neville Goddard
EVERY NATURAL EFFECT
Class Lecture by Neville
Every natural effect has a spiritual cause and not a natural. A natural cause only seems. It is a delusion of the
perishing, vegetable memory. We do not remember these moments in time when we imagined certain states.
So when that imaginal state takes form so we can see it with the outer eye, we do not recognize our own
harvest and deny that we had anything to do with these natural effects that are taking place in our world.
Because our memory is faulty, we do not remember. “There is a moment in every day,” said Blake, “that
Satan cannot find, nor can his watch fiends find it. But the industrious find this moment and it multiply and
when it once is found, it renovates every moment of the day if rightly placed.” Now, by the word “Satan,” he
simply means doubt. Doubt cannot find it. I desire a certain state in this world. Reason tells me it’s difficult;
my friends tell me it’s impossible; and so if I doubt that I could ever realize it, that’s the voice of Satan
speaking to me. He’s always challenging God. God is my own wonderful human imagination. That’s God. So
the protagonists are God and Satan — simply faith and doubt. Can I imagine that I am the one that I would
like to be and remain faithful to that assumption as though it were true. If I can and remember that assumption
and when I did it, then I will see when it happens in my world the relationship between the natural effect and
its spiritual cause. The spiritual cause was that moment of assumption.
Now let me share with you what was given to me this past week in the form of a letter. He’s here tonight. His
barber was the low man on the totem pole when he first encountered him. There were four in the shop. Well
he was the fourthman. If you’re familiar with the barbershop, and maybe you ladies do not know, and so the
boss always has the first chair; and so if it’s a slow day, he gets the man. By the time he’s through, he gets the
second one. He doesn’t share it. If three should come in, then they go to the different chairs. Well, four
chairs, the fourth one waits for his customer. Well, this friend of mine one day happened to sit in his chair.
And he liked the way he cut his hair and gathered from what he said that he liked cutting hair. He was proud
of his profession as a barber, proud of it — not making excuses as so many barbers do. He was proud to be
a barber and wanted to be the very best barber and win competitions. So having heard this man express this
desire, my friend imagined that he was tops. Well, in a little while he bought out the boss barber and then
dismissed him and rearranged his staff and then from then on began to proceed to the top. Well, three weeks
ago, while sitting in his chair, which is his now — the boss barber is his barber for he was the low man but
now he’s the top man. He said to him, and in a very exciting way, that there was a contest to be held in San
Francisco. And he would like to enter this contest for hair styling and cutting of hair. Well, my friend said
when “I discovered that he really wanted it, and no one goes into a contest unless he wants to win, I saw on
the wall the trophy that would be his. And I heard him tell me how he won.”Well, there were four men in the
shop. One was committed for that weekend and so, this past weekend, he took two with him. So there were
three from that shop of four men. There were only nine trophies given in the State in this competition and that
one little shop won four. The boss barber won first prize and a second prize, and his two men that went with
him each won a second. So they came back from San Francisco bearing four out of nine. Now he said to
me, you’ve often said from the platform, “I will tell you before it takes place that when it does take place you
may believe.”Well now, I’m going to tell you, Neville, before it takes place. There’s going to be a contest in
Southern California and I have seen his trophy as the first one on that wall. And so, I will tell you before it
takes place that when it does take place, you will know that I am putting this into practice. I know he lives by
it. “Then there will be another contest,” said, he, “in Miami and one must win in Miami to be eligible for that
which will be held in Brussels which will be international. I am putting him there in Brussels as first among all
contestants.”Well I know that he will win. For every natural effect has a spiritual cause and not a natural. A
natural cause only seems. It’s a delusion of man’s perishing, vegetable memory. He doesn’t remember. Well
now, he will remember what he did. And I have his record at home in his letter.
Now he said to me in this letter, “I had a dream. I repeated the dream and then I had a third dream, all in the
same night.” So, the first and second was simply the same dream, repeated. “I do not bring back the details,”
said he, “of the dream but it was all about, in detail, strangely enough, about my birthday. But I cannot recall
all the things that happened. I only know, here stood a man in a white robe with a book in his hand, opened
in the middle, it was gilt-edged, and he had a quill in his hand (or it could have been a scythe). He looked
almost like a cartoonist’s concept of Father Time. And he was insistent that my birthday was a certain day
and I was equally forceful in stating that it was not because I knew my birthday to be the 19th of September,
1927, and he was insisting, over my protests, pointing all the things out in the book. And then I woke. In spite
of his insistence and my protest, for I knew my birthday, at least that was my physical birthday.” I’ll call his
attention to the 87th Psalm, “And the Lord records as he registers the peoples. And he said this one was
born there.” It’s all about birth. There are only seven verses in it. It’s a small, short psalm. But this is the birth,
not of a physical birth, this is a spiritual birth, “and this one was born there.” I can say to him, you did the
perfect job as I knew you would in challenging the Lord’s angel, the recording one. For to sin by silence
when we should protest, makes cowards of us all. And no coward can be used in his stable of studs. I can
say from the way you worded your letter that you have been born; but the perishing, vegetable memory has
not brought it back. You have been born from above. You have had other experiences which would imply an
adumbration. But from this letter, I would say you have been. But memory has not brought it back. I am
convinced of that from your letter. For it’s all in the past; it’s not present and it certainly is not future the way
you worded the letter. For you know your birth date which is physical, and you said the 19th of September,
1927, and he denied that was the day of your birth. To deny that was the day of your birth would imply you
were born in the spirit world because he represents not the physical world but the spiritual world. So I would
say of you, you have been born from above.
So, here, take these moments, every moment in time. It’s a special moment, a precious moment, a moment
where you can actually use it to plant what you want planted in this world and, remembering that moment,
well then, it has to come out. For every natural effect has a spiritual cause and not a natural. Well, that
spiritual cause is that moment when you dare to assume that you are the man or the woman that you would
like to be or that another man, in his case the barber, that he is the top as he desired to be. So, you can do it
not only for yourself, do it for another or do it for many as he did. And these are these precious moments in
this wonderful world of ours, but our memory fades and we do not remember. So when the whole thing rises
in our world, we do not relate it to our own harvest. We can’t remember when we ever did it. But not a thing
could happen in my world that comes by accident. It couldn’t. All things come because I planted it, either
wittingly or unwittingly. I either did it knowing what I’m doing or I did it not knowing because I was lost in
some emotional state, and I felt intensely about a state. It might have been a lovely state or an unlovely state,
but the seed was planted and I will reap it. And the whole thing will come into my world whether I recognize
my harvest or not. So, if I know this to be the law of life, it is entirely up to me now to select and plant only
what I want to reap in my world.
So, everyone in this world is here for a purpose, and the purpose is to fulfill scripture. There is no other
purpose. And the fulfillment of scripture brings me out of this world where I must remain until I awaken. Well,
I can’t awaken until I fulfill scripture, for scripture is the plan. Now, another lady wrote this one. She said, “I
found myself in this glorious mansion, high, high up. And they had the most beautiful gardens and perfectly
kept. And a man and a woman left in a white car and someone said to me, ‘give me two names and they’re
names of two relatives of mine.’ But I knew that it was you who had left and I also knew that you would
return. Now, I have no memory whatsoever of what transpired between knowing that it was you who left and
that you would return. But I awoke saying, ‘now I know that I have experienced what Neville said that I
would.’ Then my throat was parched as though aflame and I went and got myself a nice cold drink of water,
went back to bed and had this dream. I’m in a department store and there I am with all these Bibles for
brides, Bibles given out for weddings. And, in a strange way, all the brides were dressed in their bridal white
gowns and the department store supplied the grooms. They were all being married by proxy. And the
department store supplied all the grooms that they may have a wedding picture taken with the groom supplied
by the department store. Then I turned to one and, speaking to her, she said she’s going to Paris. And then I
said to her, ‘I’m getting married next month.’”Well, this vision that you had, my dear, is a beautiful vision
because, as you’re told in scripture – the Book of Isaiah – “Your maker is your husband, and the lord of
Hosts is His name.” So that what you saw is the perfect symbol of what the depth of our own being revealed
to you, that you will have union with the Lord and union with the Lord means that that which is in you, like an
egg, will be fertilized and then it will erupt within you. And the whole thing said of Jesus Christ will unfold
within you, and you will be He. So I can say, you had the perfect vision.
Then another lady wrote. “So, I took my son into the backyard and here was the fish pond that I had. It
wasn’t yet stocked with fish, but with clear water and about twelve inches deep. And in it was a little shaggy
white dog lying in the water with its little black nose right above the water. I took the dog out and dried it off
and took it into the house. And it romped and played all over the place and then I missed it and, searching for
it, I went back into the yard and here was the dog in the pool again. But this time, when I walked by, it
wagged its tail as though, ‘leave me here, I like being here.’ And it was quite satisfied to be submerged in the
water minus the nose above. But the tail wagged as though it was happy to be in that water.”Well, may I say
to you, in the Bible, we speak of stone, the water, and the wine. The stone is the literal story, the allegory.
And man must discover the fictitious nature and character of a story. And when he discovers the fictitious
character of the story in scripture and then learns its meaning, he has found water. He has struck that rock
like a Moses and water flowed out of it. Now, the first miracle or sign in the Book of John is the turning of
water into wine. And so, you’re told, “Fill the stone jars with water and when they draw it out of the stone
jars, that water that was in the stone jar, it was wine, perfect wine, lovely wine. So, first we have a story and
man takes the story and accepts the story literally and so he goes through life with the literal meaning or the
stone. When he discovers the fictitious character of the story and then it reveals itself to him, the true meaning,
he has the psychological water. Now the little dog is the symbol of faith. Your faith is now in the
psychological meaning of these great truths. If you apply what you know, you will convert it into wine. If you
apply it. If you will take what you now know, that imagining creates reality, and dare to imagine that you are
now what you would like to be, then you are turning this water into wine.
As told us in the Book of Genesis when Jacob brought the flock into the field, the well was covered with a
stone. And he rolled the stone away and watered his flock and then he put the stone back again. He didn’t
turn it into wine but he did withdraw water. But a stone covered it and hid the view of the water. So the story
is told to man, because it’s a parable, the whole thing is a parable, the whole thing is an allegory, and if you
take it as factual and not as what it really is, the most wonderful parable in the world, well then you’ll never
use your imagination to extract from that stone, the water. Therefore, you cannot feed the flock. But if you
can actually get from any story in scripture, its psychological meaning and tell it to the world as when Isaac
brings his son, and Isaac is blind and can’t see, and he has two sons. One is called Esau and one is called
Jacob. And Jacob covers himself in the skins of a goat to give himself the feeling of hair. For the first one was
Esau and Esau was hairy all over. And so when Jacob deceived his father into believing that he was Esau,
Isaac gave him his blessing. So you take the story, and as I stand here now, reason tells me that I am not
where I would like to be, that I am not the man that I really desire to be. So I shut out what reason is
suggesting. I deny everything that reason dictates. I close my eyes to the facts of life, the obvious things, and I
clothe myself mentally in all that I would like to be. I imagine that people see me as they would see me if I
were the man that I want to be. I imagine that I am actually standing where I would stand if I were that, and
that I’m actually doing all the things I would do, normally and naturally, if what I am assuming were really true
– if it were a fact. Well now, when I do this, I am clothing myself in the outer garments of naturalness of the
facts. Now when I open my eyes on the facts of life, it denies everything that I’ve done. But I remember what
I did. I caught that precious moment. For there is that moment in each day that doubt cannot find, and his
helpmates cannot find it. But the industrious find this moment, and so become the industrious. You find this
moment and you clothe yourself in all the lovely things that you want to be in this world and, having done it,
you can break the spell. Open your eyes upon the facts of the world and the facts will deny everything that
you did. But you’re told in scripture that Isaac, having done it, having given the blessing to that moment, he
couldn’t take it back. He could not retract it. And so when Esau comes into the world and tells his father,
“but you’ve been deceived; first of all, he took from me my birthright. Now he’s taking from me my blessing.”
He’s rightly named. You named him Jacob which means “he supplants.” He’s a supplanter. But the father
Isaac said, “even though he came through deceit and deceived me into believing that he was Esau, I’ve given
him your blessing and I cannot take it back.” So that moment cannot be called back. It’s on its way and it will
move towards what? The fulfillment of itself. And when it appears in this world, suddenness is only the
emergence of that hidden continuity. So it was moving, unseen by the world and suddenly it erupts in the
world. But having remembered what I did, I can relate now that spiritual cause, the thing I did, unseen by
others, to the thing seen now, that the whole vast world will share with me.
So, in your case, my dear, having seen the little dog which is the symbol of Caleb or the hound of faith, the
one that goes with him, goes with Jehoshua across the river into the promised land. No one else could go.
So, you walk in faith in this. And the day will come, you will turn it all into wine. In other words, you will find
yourself fulfilling scripture. The whole thing will unfold within you. Now we told you last Monday the story of
Moses and that he did not cross into the promised land, but Jehoshua went over. You may not be familiar
with scripture but Jehoshua’s original name was Oshea as told us in the Book of Numbers. You’ll find that in
the 13th Chapter, the 16th Verse of Numbers. And Moses called Oshea, the son of Nun, Jehoshua. So
when you take the prefix, “Je” and put it before Oshea, you turn Oshea which means saviour or salvation, into
He by Whom Jehovah Will Save. So it becomes that creative power that actually, I would say, fertilizes what
Moses represented. Moses represented the pattern man. See that you make everything according to the
pattern as it’s being shown you on the mountain. So here, you’re seeing everything clearly. That is a pattern.
Don’t alter one little thing. Make it just as it’s shown you on the mountain. But I can’t go in. That is the egg,
the perfect egg. That’s the ovum. But an egg remains just an egg until fertilized. It must be fertilized by the
sperm. So that sperm must penetrate the surface of the egg. It leaves no hole, either before or after
penetration. And no one understands how it happens. Because no one knows, it’s all imagination.
I do not need to go through any door to put myself in a closed room. Seal the room, and I can imagine that
I’m in it and I didn’t open a door to go through and I didn’t break down the wall to get through and when I
depart, I didn’t go through an open door and I didn’t go through by breaking down the wall. I entered
without leaving any hole and I departed without leaving any record of my entrance and departure. So, a little
sperm penetrates the surface of an egg and it leaves no hole, either before or after penetration. But unless it
penetrates, that egg remains just a perfect pattern of what ought to be or could be but could never by itself,
ever unfold. It takes the sperm to penetrate it to make it unfold. And so, it is Jehoshua, which is the Hebraic
name of Jesus – the word Jesus and the word Jehoshua are the same thing. So, He by Whom Jehovah Will
Save. And so, man awakened from the dream of life, if he is a powerful man, a man like the one I spoke of
earlier tonight, one who would defy the angel of the Lord and over his protests, he still is insisting that it’s not
the right date. And here he’s pointing to the book of God and showing him that it is. But in spite of that, he
didn’t sin by silence. And because he didn’t sin by silence, he can be used perfectly in the stable of the Lord.
To actually impregnate those who have accepted the word of God and have it within them as a pattern. The
perfect pattern that must one day, having been impregnated, erupt within that one and unfold within him.
So I congratulate him on his accomplishments. For everyone who is awakened if they are of that spirit, they
are members of the stable of the Lord, used for impregnation, to inseminate the brides of God. For he’s God.
Everyone in this world is God. But as the lady wrote, she said, “I wrote this letter. I don’t quite understand it
but I wrote and I was repeating, the thing is we are bifurcated, divided beings.” Well, who is the divided
being but the Lord Himself. The Lord and his emanation, a divided being. And out of Adam comes Eve, a
divided being. And that emanation of the first. Well, here we are emanations. But now these contain the
pattern of God’s plan of salvation. And it has to be, I would say fructified, fertilized. And, may I tell you, it
seems strange in this world to make these statements, but I know from experience that they’re true. I know
how we play these parts after we have been awakened from the dream of life. When man is twice born, and
he’s born from above, if he’s of that school, that spirit, that you re-enter like a serpent. If you go up in this
small little way like this, that’s not it. But when you go up as though you are a bolt of spiral lightening and you
vibrate the entire skull and you’re still vibrating it trying to get out, and finally you subside. That’s the power it
can use. And that’s the one He uses in the fertilization of his bride.
But tonight, you test it on this level and come down to this level and try it. There is a moment in each day and
not just a moment, every moment of time is such a moment if you have a desire. You could actually isolate
that moment and then clothe yourself with the feeling of the wish fulfilled whatever that wish is until you
actually feel all the tones of reality, all the things that you would normally feel were it true.
Now, don’t forget that moment. That moment is productive. And in its own good time, that moment will
appear in this world properly clothed as an objective fact. If it takes the whole vast world to aid its birth, it
will take the whole vast world. If it takes an army of men to bring it to pass, an army of men. It doesn’t really
matter. You don’t have to guide it. All you have to do is simply do it. And then let it alone as you would put a
seed into the ground, confident that it will grow. Well, so you simply drop this, knowing what you did so that
you aren’t surprised when it happens in your world. So you want to be a man of wealth; all right assume that
you’re a man of wealth. Not that it has any purpose in this world other than that you desired it. Because the
man of wealth and the poor man are the same being. The poor state, the wealthy state are only states. The
man who occupies the poor state is an individual that never ceases to be that individual. But if he falls into the
state of poverty, well then you call him a poor man. But he doesn’t differ from the man who falls into the state
of wealth. For the man in the state of wealth; he’s not any better; he has money, lots of money if he’s a
fabulously wealthy person. But that doesn’ tput him in a spiritual sense beyond the man that is poor. But the
man that is poor doesn’t know he could get out of the state of poverty. All these are states, infinite states and
man blindly falls into states. If he knows they’re only states and he dislikes the state he’s in, he’ll get out of
that state by now planting one of these moments, these heavenly moments by assuming that I am now secure.
Security is a relative term. It may be that someone feels, well, insecure with a hundred thousand a year
income. I’ m quite sure that if you take any of the fabulously wealthy men of our world and say, “your income
as of now will be only a hundred thousand a year,” they would instantly have to sell their yachts, their homes,
all these things, and give up membership in certain clubs because they couldn’t even pay their servants. If they
had a full complement of servants in their many homes, and you said a hundred thousand a year, well, they’ll
feel poor. And the average person, if you said,” you have a hundred thousand,” he would feel fabulously
wealthy. So wealth is a relative term. It hasn’t a thing to do with the spiritual growth of a being. None.
Because all these are states. So, I can put myself into any kind of state in this world. And so if I don’t enjoy
poverty, well then, don’t get into the state. I, on the other hand, have no desire for fabulous wealth because I
do not wish the responsibility of fabulous wealth and thinking about it. I can’t see how anyone who is
fabulously wealthy has any time whatsoever for thinking about spiritual matters. He is so concerned about his
wealth, his portfolio, and he watches it morning, noon, and night. And the first thing he does in the morning
when he gets the morning paper, he turns to that section. And he reads it, as some ladies turn to the social
section and they read it, as though it really mattered. But they do it. There are some who only read the
obituaries and they make a living out of reading that and notifying all the people who are recorded as dead
that he knew them.
I know that when my father-in-law died, he was a very prominent man in New York City. And when he
died, why Mrs. Van Schmoose got unnumbered letters from people who claimed that they knew him and he
had promised them so much and that he died before he could execute his desire. Some even went so far as to
print up all kinds of things and said he ordered these before he died – and then misspelled his name. Printers
will send you all kinds of personal cards, saying that Mr. Van Schmoose ordered these before he died. And
when we saw them, why, the name was misspelled, and so her lawyer said, “just ignore it, just forget it. And
ignore all these requests because people make a living reading the obituary column.” You’d be surprised how
many fall for it because in that emotional moment, they are carried away, well, if my husband did this, I
wouldn’t want not to make good, and so they will send off the check for what he had ordered, which he
didn’t tell me. And so they send off a nice hundred dollar or two hundred dollar check for these stupid cards.
And her lawyer said, “Just simply forget them.” This happens every moment of time. Well, you can hardly
believe that people live that way, but they do. You can’t conceive of something in this world, that someone
isn’t doing it. And all these things are done in our world, so I ask you to try it.
On this basis, imagining creates reality. That is my premise. And don’t think for one moment you can imagine
idly because the record is there. And so, as a man plants, so he’s going to reap. There isn’t a thing in this
world that comes into your world that comes by accident. But you don’t remember the moment in time when
you actually did it. And so you can’t relate it to the natural effect. But the natural effect always has a spiritual
cause and not a natural cause. The natural cause only seems. It is a delusion. So don’t let anyone tell you that
you can trace it to some physical cause. The physical cause, which is the natural cause, is not a cause. It’s
only an effect. All causes are spiritual and by spiritual I mean imaginal. For man is all imagination and God is
man and exists in us and we in Him. The eternal body of man is the imagination and that is God Himself. And
God is the only source. There is no other source. In that 87th Psalm that I quoted tonight, “when this one was
born there,” it ends in a very lovely note. “And the singers and the dancers alike said, you are our springs.”
There is no other spring, no other source, no other cause. Whether you be the dancer or the singer of the
world. You are our springs. We have no other source. So the only source of all causation is found in man as
man’s own wonderful human imagination. So you take it to heart and then you never can pass the buck. You
can’t blame anyone in this world for anything that happens to you. There isn’t one in the world you can turn
to and say, “well now, you are the cause of it.” Don’t let anyone turn to you and say that. If they do, just
ignore it. Because they’re bringing it into their own world by what they imagine morning, noon, and night. So,
one sits down to imagine unlovely things of another, unlovely things of a group, well then they’re going to
simply produce it. Not in the group, but in themselves.
So, you go home and live it. Live it as that lady, by her vision tells me she’s living it, because the little shaggy
dog was in the water. Her faith is in the psychological knowledge of these stories. I only ask her not to just
continue drinking water. As you’re told in the Book of Timothy, “Drink no longer water, but use a little wine
for your stomach’s sake and your many infirmities.” So, it’s good to know what to do but we are the operant
power. And, therefore, we must do it, not just know what to do but we must do it. So when I do it, I stop
drinking the water and I drink wine. Because the minute I begin to apply it, I’m using wine. But if I know
what to do but don’t do it, well, I have the water but I’m not turning it into wine. So, let everyone here,
practice it and put it into a daily practice. And, may I tell you it cannot fail you. It cannot fail you. Now let us
go into the silence.
Neville:Now are there any questions?
Question: …a physical upset? Upset when something goes wrong?
Neville:Well, as far as I am concerned, my body is an emotional filter and bears the marks of my prevalent
emotions. That’s what bodies are, they’re filters. Emotional filters. And so if you persist in a certain emotion,
one of despondency, one of this, one of that, eventually it will take its toll and you’ll find it leaving its mark on
these filters. For they are emotional filters. To know, first of all, to know that it is so. And then to stop or try
to change these prevalent emotions. You know you have friends who, whenever you meet them, they
complain, always complaining. Well, that is almost a permanent state with them. Now, discriminate between
the state that they occupy and the occupant. The occupant is not that. But if they remain in a state long
enough, they feel at home in that state. If you pull them out, they’ll feel ill at ease. They want to actually feel
that no one understands them, that they are this, they are that. And they delight in feeling that they’re
misunderstood. If you try to pull them out, they don’t want it. They revel in it. And there are people who live
that way. Well, don’t you follow suit. Tell them what to do, and if they do it, they’ll come out of it. There are
people who will call you on the phone and who will say, “Now look here, I want so and so.” Thank you,
that’s enough. Oh no, but wait, “I must tell you the facts.” And they’ll hold you there, if you let them, for one
solid half hour, giving you all the facts why it can’t be done. So they voiced what they wanted and then they
proceed to tell you why it’s impossible. And so they live that way. They go through life that way.
Question: (Inaudible)
Neville:Well, I wouldn’t say they should not be in the Bible. We have 66 and it’s good enough. The 27 of
the New and 39 of the Old, forming the 66 Books of the Bible, I find it quite complete. But the Gospel of
Thomas is a marvelous Gospel, perfectly marvelous. But nothing is lost in scripture by not including it in the
Cannon of Scripture. There are many glorious works that are not included in the Cannon. And you can buy
them under one copy called the Apocrypha. Thomas is only recently discovered, but you can buy that as a
single copy. But the Bible hasn’t lost anything by even the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls. They’re
beautiful, wonderful, dealing mostly with Isaiah, but it hasn’t changed anything in the Isaiah that we have, only
confirms it. At one time, the Book of Hebrews was not included in our Bible. But it’s a glorious Book, but
now it’s part of the Bible.
Neville Goddard, Summa Theologica, Manly P Hall, A Course In Miracles
