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"The words that
I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life."-- Jesus
"The letter killeth, but the Spirit giveth life."-- Paul
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"LOVE CAN OPEN PRISON DOORS OF STEEL"
CHAPTER VIII
from the
book titled
Love Can Open Prison Doors (1)
by Starr Daily
Great men are they who see that spiritual is stronger
than any material force, that thoughts rule the world.
-Emerson.
All men accept the idea that love and thought are synonymous, that the
former is the first expression of the latter, and that the combination
of the intellectual and emotional form a unity inseparable one from the
other, and that this unity, acting upon creative principle,
constitutes the strongest creative force in the world.
All men admit that thought-force is capable of performing miracles, of
constantly changing the face of things, of brushing aside the impossible,
and out of the impossible of yesterday establishing the commonplace of
today. Men will agree to the truism that the possible accomplishments of
thought are limitless; but when you say that thought can open the doors
of a modern prison, unsupported by collusion or political influence, men
will shake their heads, thus indicating their Missourian disposition to
be shown.
On an evening in 1924 I sat in a cell alone on the receiving gallery of
the prison mentioned throughout this book. My outlook was as black
and hopeless as any man's outlook could possibly be. That morning I had
been up before the board of paroles, and the chairman of the board, who
had done the talking, had been in no mood to spare my sensibilities.
Only a very short while before I faced the same body of men, and
I had made them the usual run of glowing promises. "Yes, gentlemen," I
had said on that occasion, "when I go out this time I intend to make good.
I've learned my lesson. This jolt has taught me that crime doesn't pay.
I'm done with it forever. Me for the straight and narrow from now
on."
"Well, this has been your second offence in this prison, the chairman had
replied. "Yet your prison record has been fairly good. We've decided to
give you another chance. But if you fail, if you come back again you may
expect no consideration at our hands."
And I had gone out a few mornings later. The man who signed my parole and
who had worked for my release because of his friendship for my father,
received me in a spirit of paternal trust and confidence. And that very
night I took up again where I had left off when the prison door had cut
short my criminal career. I had no intention of trying to make good. I
had merely repeated my old meaningless promises in exchange for official
favors. So when I sat before the parole board on this morning I wore the
brand of an habitual criminal. The chairman said to me:
"You've betrayed the trust we reposed in you. You were told what to expect
if you did that. Now what have you to say for yourself ?"
I had nothing to say, of course. what could I say? I had reached the end
of my purring promises. I was at the end of my old reliable resources.
I could say nothing but face the music and pay the fiddler.
"You've made your own bed," the chairman went on ruthlessly, "and you've
made it out of sand-burrs. It's going to be pretty tough to lie in. But
you're going to lie in it this time. Your sentence calls for from one to
twenty years. I wish we had power to make it life. You've forfeited every
right to our sympathy. We cannot inflict more than the maximum sentence
upon you, but we can inflict that, and you shall be made to serve every
minute of that twenty years, which will amount to eleven years and three
months under the 'good time law,' without ever again having an opportunity
to appear before this board for consideration of parole matters."
My rating was not only that of an habitual criminal. My criminological
rating had me listed as abnormal, criminally insane, incurably
anti-social. I was hopelessly beyond the influence of reformation. The
warden told me no power on earth save a miracle could ever shorten my sentence
one minute.
And yet I sat before that same board five years later and listened to them
talk to me in the friendliest tones. And again, a year later, I appeared
before them again and received their assurance that I was deserving of
another chance. They gave me that chance and I went out five years in advance
of the time set for my release. Nor did I use any political or other influence
whatever. Indeed, I had only one or two letters of recommendation on file
in my behalf, and these were from persons who had no prestige or influential
power with the state administration.
****
In that night in 1924 as I sat in my cell on the receiving gallery, my
thoughts were fog-bound. I had been able to face short terms with a certain
degree of equipoise for I could see through to the end; but now there was
no end. Already dissipation had stamped me with premature old age. After
eleven years and three months I would be fit for nothing, save to join
the pathetic ranks of old broken-down prison lags who, after making their
weary rounds of the various prisons, usually wound up by appearing
voluntarily at some prison gate begging for admittance, pleading for the
privilege of entering and ending their miserable days in the only sort
of home they had ever known.
Yes, by that time, my nerve would be completely gone. I would not have
enough left to commit another crime in order to break back into prison.
I would come doddering back, burned out and shriveled up, whining and begging
for a home and finally a hole in the prison grave-yard. I could
see that sort of end; I could see no other.
It was to be eleven years and three months on the calendar; in the terms
of emotion it would be a thousand years. I hated myself that evening as
no man has ever hated. One does not know hate who has only hated the conditions
in which he lives; the emotion of hate that reaches no farther than to
God, to decency, to fairness, to other men, is not hate in its blackest
and bitterest sense. One must hate one's self, wholly, completely, utterly,
really to know what hate means. And that is the way I hated on this dreary,
futureless evening. I could see but one way out. A safety razor blade would
twist me out of my misery. But a better way would be to die with the guns
of the guards roaring in my ears.
At least if I was rubbed out in an effort to escape I would have made that
one effort. The chances were one in a thousand perhaps, for success. But,
there was still that one chance. It would be better to gamble everything
on it, than to go out the cowardly way.
As I was trying to choose between these two extremes, I hadn't known that
self destruction actually was a cowardly way to avoid a bad situation.
The prisoner in charge of the gallery brought this fact home to me. I told
him in answer to his comment, "Looks kinda tough for you this trip," that
if it got too tough I knew how to remedy the situation.
He cackled mirthlessly, "You won't be the first weakling to take that way
out."
"It takes nerve to wind up your own ball of yarn," was my reply.
He cackled again. "No, you're wrong, it takes nerve to face the jolt you're
facing -- more nerve than you've got, old man. It's easier to hand in your
checks."
I hadn't thought of self destruction in that light. Obviously he was right.
Under the circumstances, it required little courage to face death; but
to face the lingering torment of this living death, eleven years and three
months of it -- to face it -- that took real courage.
It was courage, thank God, that challenged me to combat. I would not advertise
to the whole prison that I was too much of a weakling to pay the piper.
Nor would I knuckle down and become the docile, broken-spirited lamb. I
would face the music, but I would face it as a rebel, a firebrand, a prison
revolutionist.
Naturally, in this attitude of violence, I did nothing but injure myself.
It was the same attitude I carried with me into the dungeon some three
years later -- and left there, never again to be resurrected.
****
That I could use the love medium to gain my freedom never occurred
to me of my own accord. After I had discovered that medium and had began
to apply it to my life and the lives of those around me, I was so
thoroughly in harmony with my environment that time, place
and conditions meant nothing. The days and nights came and went with a
smoothness and velocity that was simply astounding. I seldom could tell
any one the day of the week, and the date of the month was a thing I rarely
ever knew. Once I was asked the day of the week. I didn't know. Then I
was asked the date of the month, and I didn't know that either.
"Well, do you know what year it is ?" asked my questioner. And studying
some time I was able to answer that one. But my questioner promptly informed
me that I was a year behind time.
So one day when a fellow, and he an official, asked why I didn't try to
get my case up and get out, I was forced to admit that it had been a long
time since I had thought of my freedom. I did think of it after that, however,
although not in a way to disturb my peace of mind. I had reached the point
where, like my old cell-mate, I didn't care where I was on earth, so long
as I could carry on my experiments for the improvement of myself
and others. The idea of gaining my freedom now held out its reward,
not in the freedom itself, but in the proof or demonstration that
it could be gained by the application of love and thought to creative
principle.
When I made up my mind to try it I bumped into a string of questioning
qualms. Always before I had used the principle for service to others or
for the purpose of furthering my own spiritual and mental interests. To
use it now merely to gain my freedom left a selfish tang in my soul that
I drew back from in a sort of moral recoil. Even though Dad assured me
that my qualms were unwarranted, the feeling continued to persist.
In meditation I sought assurance which didn't come immediately. The reason:
I was shutting myself from the reservoir of intuitive knowledge by
squeezing the channel with strain. I learned that when you seek the super consciousness
for knowledge about a particular thing, you usually wind up disappointed
with knowledge about nothing. These are most unsatisfying meditations.
My meditations before had been all-embracing. I sought meditation for the
sheer joy of entering that far-flung realm of super joy. And consequently,
having no human desire to hinder bodily relaxation or to prevent the gradual
slowing down process of the heart and lungs to the state of pulse lessness
and breathlessness, I had been able to contact general wisdom almost at
a moment's notice. But with a particular desire in my mind, I could neither
relax nor receive, because the nature of the desire was always there, and
nothing else could get through or around it.
However, as it later panned out, these futile attempts did impress themselves
upon my subconscious mind, and the subconscious mind, in turn, took its
directions and passed them on to me.
These directions were specific, but not understandable as applying to my
problem. I got them in the form of a dream during subconscious meditation.
I did not at first act upon them, because they seemed to have no connection
with the one thing I wanted to know: "Would I now be justified in using
the creative principle against others in order to influence them to grant
me a favor I had come to consider purely selfish?"
Finally one evening, during a desire less meditation, I received the
information that there was no such thing as selfishness. There was a misuse
of supply and a right use of supply.
And with this, of course, I realized that my freedom rightly used would
conform to life's purpose of spiritual growth, just the same as my imprisonment
rightly used had done. We were punished not for our right uses of law,
but for our misuses of law.
*****
The directions I received had to do with the transmission of telepathic
thought over a distance of many miles. The object of this thought-transmission
was the chairman of the parole-board.
It entailed my having to learn something of this man's habits. Which I
did, working through a friend of mine in the prison record clerk's office,
and he in turn working through the private secretary of the chairman. I
learned a great deal about the home the chairman occupied, its location.
I learned that he usually retired at ten-thirty each night that business
or pleasure did not prevent. Also, that for about two hours before retiring
he sat alone in his library with his books. I learned many details about
this library, its general appointments, its shape and location in the house,
the reading lamp and the chair where he sat.
With all this information in my hands I was ready to begin the biggest
experiment I had yet undertaken, that of impressing my personality upon
the mind of a man across a vast distance of space. I had achieved the same
thing many times at close range, and I had no doubt but that the same thing
could be accomplished at long range. And I might add that this very faith
was a great aid to that end.
What I did therefore was to visualize the chairman in his favorite chair
in his library. I did this every night so as not to miss him on the nights
he actually occupied this place. I surrounded him with an imaginary atmosphere
of peace, contentment, comfort, receptiveness. I thought of him in terms
of love, of Christ likeness. I talked to him with my thoughts, wishing him
well. Night after night, in this imaginary manner, I hovered round. For
several months I kept faithfully and patiently at the experiment, not once
allowing myself to become discouraged in the face of the fact that nothing
seemed to happen. Indeed, as the effort was extended, it seemed to become
almost effortless. In time it grew into a pleasant endeavor. I grew to
feel an exuberant joy in paying this man my nightly visit, and I also came
to feel that he was finding his library period more and more pleasurable.
Eventually there was added to my directions another piece of business that
apparently had no connection whatever to the business at hand, but was
so urgent that I was forced to get in touch with Dad Trueblood, who of
course had been informed of my experiment from the first.
I was given an urge to write an essay on a certain topic and to submit
it to the editor of a certain welfare magazine. At this time the rules
of the prison had not yet been lowered to that place where prisoners were
allowed to write for publication. This restriction, however, was lifted
soon after the event just described.
Dad's advice was prompt and to the point.
"Write the essay and send it," he said.
"But the warden won't stand for that," I told him. "Besides, what do I
know about writing?"
"In this case you may find out you don't need to know an-thing about it
after you get started. If the urge is genuine, the thing will write itself.
Anyway it's up to you to go ahead."
"Well," I told him, "I don't know what it's all about, but I'm game to
try anything once."
I don't know whether the essay was good or not. Dad said it was. The warden
said it was. The chairman of the board said it was. The point is, it was
because of it that I was called that second time before the parole-board,
five years after my first appearance before that body, at which time I
had been told I would never be called there again for consideration of
parole matters. As a matter of fact I wasn't called there for the consideration
of parole matters. But of that later.
After I had finished the essay I carried it to the warden and asked him
if I could send it to the magazine indicated. His answer was a flat
refusal. But he read the essay. When he had finished, he looked at me with
surprise.
"Did you write this?" he wanted to know.
I admitted the fact.
"Well, it's good," he said, "and I'm going to put it in the hands of the
chairman of the board."
As I rose to leave he added: "You've been making a mighty good record lately.
Keep it up."
When the parole board held its next session at the prison I was called
before it. My essay was lying on the table in front of the chairman when
I entered. I was greeted cordially and told to sit down. The chairman informed
me that I was not there because they had decided to reopen my case. He
picked up the essay and asked me if I had written it.
"Yes, sir," I replied. "Or rather it was written for me. My work was
merely stenographic."
He laughed. "Well, whoever wrote it," he said, "has expressed sentiments
that make for good citizenship."
There was more said, of course, and while I have not given the verbatim
account of the conversation, because I do not remember the precise words,
I have employed dialogue to express the general trend of the thought. So
it has been throughout the writing of this book wherever conversation has
been employed. Where I have been able to record conversation verbatim,
I've done so; where I haven't, due to a lack of memory, I've tried to copy
the actual as nearly as I could.
Following this incident, I no longer pursued my experimentation along
the telepathic line. I knew that the chairman of the board now had me in
mind and I knew that my prison conduct was being closely watched at the
chairman's request.
I conducted myself as before. I went ahead with my work and proceeded to
forget all about my freedom. When an opportunity arose whereby I could
use the creative principle constructively against the problems of my fellows,
I did so. A year thus passed. Then I was called before the board again.
This time to receive my freedom.
****
The subject of thought transference is today under the fire of controversy.
I have neither desire nor intention of presenting this experience as a
contribution to telepathic lore. The argument for or against has
no appeal for me whatever. There may not be such a possibility as transferring
thought although my belief is on the positive side. The weight of my evidence
is found in the results obtained through my experiments.
In this chapter I have described as nearly as I was able, the exact method
used to gain my freedom, to open the door of my prison. That this method
was responsible for the opening of that door, I sincerely believe to be
true. The reader may believe otherwise. That is a privilege I deny no one.
But I might say in addition, that apart from my description of what occurred,
there is some documentary evidence. The record of this prison will show
that I entered there in the year previously mentioned; that my sentence
was set at eleven years and three months; and that without political or
other influences of any kind, I was released from there five years in advance
of the time fixed by law.
My experience in the prison hospital was rich with evidence that thought
was easily transferred from one mind to another. In one of the many
cases of hysterically induced diseases, I used the telepathic method
exclusively.
The boy was a patient in the tubercular ward. A few months before he had
been in the best of health. Then one day he picked up a handkerchief near
the hospital, took it to his cell, washed it and began to use it. A day
or two later a friend seeing him with an outside store-bought handkerchief,
asked him where he got it, and the boy told him.
"Why you big fool," said the friend. "I'll bet one of them T.B.'s over
there threw it out of the window. They're always doing things like that.
They want other people to catch the T.B."
The boy became panicky and began to brood constantly on what his
friend had told him. His appetite began to fade away. He lost weight and
lived in daily and nightly dread of the terrifying disease. Then he caught
a slight cold and developed a cough. He was sure he had taken tuberculosis.
He came on the sick-call to the hospital and voiced his fears to the doctor.
He was put in a room while an examination was made. He carried no temperature;
a sputum test revealed the presence of no germs. But he could not be convinced,
and a few weeks later when another test was made, he was running
a temperature and the sputum revealed germs.
In the tuberculosis ward I tried every way I could think of to rid his
mind of this morbid disease-thought. But the thought was so deeply grooved
in his subconscious mind that no amount of conscious suggestion could counter-groove
it.
I decided to try telepathy on him while he slept. I knew of course that
these patients were supersensitive and super receptive to thought force
during their waking hours. But I had never tried to influence one of them
while he slept.
At night time in the ward, after nine o'clock, all the lights were turned
off, except one red one in the middle of the room. Thus I could slip
in quietly, make my way through the semi-darkness, and thus reach his bed-side
without disturbing his slumber. Crouching directly behind the head of his
bed, I mentally called his name, concentrating the full force of my faculties
upon its clear deliberate and sonorous enunciation.
At first I got no visible response. Duties intervening, I was compelled
to conduct my experiment at short intervals throughout that first night.
The following night also evinced nothing
in the way of reward for my efforts. But
about three o'clock in the morning of the third night, he began to manifest
a sense of restlessness during the period I slowly pronounced his name.
When my thoughts of him were withdrawn, he would immediately become
quiet and begin again to breathe evenly.
Of course, I was elated. To me these incidents were not the accidental
disturbances of dream states. I was firmly convinced that he was being
influenced, not by internal forces, but by a force of thought exuded from
my own mind. However, before I accepted this conviction, I saw the
same thing demonstrated repeatedly in more than a hundred precise
experiments.
The last one of its kind conducted, that is, in which his response was
merely a nervous display, happened in the presence of the night-warder
of the hospital and the night-captain of the guard. More than a dozen times
they witnessed his disturbance while I called to him.. And then when I
would raise my hand, indicating to them that I was going to withdraw
my influence, they saw the tension leave him while he began his quiet even
process of breathing once more.
The next experiment brought forth in addition to his physical reaction,
a verbal response. Yet I refused to accept this as anything genuinely connected
with the experiment until he had repeated it numerous times during the
period of my operations. He at no time spoke over the one word while the
experiment was going on. That one word was mother. It was garbled somewhat,
as most words spoken in dreams. But the thing that was striking about it
was that the inflection was always the same. It was as though his mother
appeared to him in a dream and as though he had been expecting her to come.
Now the boy's mother was dead; but it was obvious the memory of her still
influenced his sub-conscious life.
At this point I made an assumption that, naturally, I had no way of proving
whether or not it was working out as I assumed it to be working out. But
when he would speak the word mother, I would assume that her personality
and influence were with him in a dream, and I endeavored to make her say
the things I wanted her to say. In other words, while her personality was
visible to him in his dream, I assumed that I was she and I spoke to him
with my thoughts in terms of his health, seeking always, through telepathic
suggestion, to counteract the effect of disease-thought held in his sub-consciousness,
and to replace the disease thought with the thought of health.
This treatment, together with a carefully planned tissue-building diet,
I am certain was responsible for this patient's final and complete recovery
from the disease that had taken him very close to death. I am aware that
this incident can prove nothing on behalf of the believers of thought-transference.
But then the motive for my experiment was not to seek proof for or against
a theory. My first interest was in the welfare of my patient, and my gratitude
came when I was able to witness his steady but certain progress toward
recovery. My big thrill of joy arrived on the day the doctor dismissed
him from the hospital with a high rating of health.
Love and the creative principle. These words mean absolutely nothing. But
to take what they symbolize and incorporate it into the daily livingness
of one's life, means that one has the key that will unlock all the doors
that limit one, in proportion as one's capacity increases for receiving
and using creative power through the medium of LOVE.
Jesus could use creative power greatly, because He LOVED greatly.
When one's sense of brotherly love is strong enough to die for the future
betterment of one's fellowmen, such a one becomes a magnificent user of
creative power and leaves a heritage the like of which has kept and will
continue to keep the human family in existence and growing toward its goal
of spiritual perfection.
What I have been able to achieve with creative power is small when compared
to what I should like to achieve. In the minds of my readers, my achievement
may not seem great; but to me it is monumental. I have no doubt, that without
this key, my prison door would still be locked against me, had I not died
long ago from the toxic poisons generated in my system by hate and
the philosophy of negation.
For this key I am humbly and enormously grateful.
THE END
________________________________
(1) Daily, Starr. Love Can Open Doors -
Paulton (Somerest) London, Purnell and Sons,LTD, England
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