Unseating a Tyrant

This article is one of the Unity Classics written by legendary leaders of Unity. Some date back decades, even a century. That’s why the language may seem a bit formal, and the writers sometimes used masculine nouns and pronouns that were considered proper for their era. This is one of the many columns that Lowell Fillmore wrote for Weekly Unity, dated May 30,1936.

Remember that even the blackest darkness cannot stop a lamp that chooses to shine its rays of light into that dark darkness. Darkness has no power over light.

In many respects, blessings that shine out into evil conditions and heal them are like the rays of a lamp.

“What happens when we conscientiously bless one whom we believe is doing wrong? He is reminded by our silent thought of the good that is in him instead of the bad that is in him.”

When dreadful stories are brought to us by press and radio, we are filled with indignation and we feel that something must be done to remedy such evils. Perhaps a leader of men is grafting and betraying his trust. Perhaps a great genius is using his ability to train men to fight, kill, and destroy. Perhaps a powerful, wealthy man is crowding his competitors to the wall. Perhaps vandals are destroying beautiful properties, or communities are losing their regard for law and order. Perhaps religion is being denounced in the high places, kidnappers are harming the innocent, and robbers are holding up respectable citizens. These and many other disquieting stories seem to be increasing.

Our natural reaction is that physical force must be used to correct these deplorable conditions. But we average men and women do not have any workable plan that we are willing to help put into execution. Therefore, we boil away inside, ruining our digestion and making our life unhappy. We grumble and find fault with conditions, yet we are not willing to do anything to better them. This very attitude makes matters worse.

An Unpopular but Effective Antidote to Evil

We may not realize that evil conditions actually grow out of an accumulation of the negative mental attitudes of a number of individuals. Your careless thoughts and words of faultfinding may be doing their bit to stir up trouble in some fertile, receptive mind.

Often the best way to accomplish a reform is to find an entirely new way to tackle the fierce evil that needs reform. The first and usual method that comes to one’s mind is to do something in a physical way to destroy the evil. But we stop there, grumbling, threatening, but actually doing nothing.

There is another way, a way that is not very popular or very well understood. Yet it can be followed by everyone without fear of personal harm. It is a marvelous method, by which one can annihilate evil without hurting anyone. This is the simple method: Bless the person who seems to be the culprit. Sincerely ask God’s blessing on him. I know that this is contrary to popular feeling and good old popular common sense, so-called, but after all, what we sometimes need is popular uncommon sense.

What happens when we conscientiously bless one whom we believe is doing wrong? He is reminded by our silent thought of the good that is in him instead of the bad that is in him. When we condemn him, he is reminded of the bad only. Of course, we may have had a wrong report about him and he may not be as bad as he is painted, but whether he is right or wrong, our silent blessing will help him and strengthen him in doing the right thing. If he happens to be doing diabolical things, as reported, and we ask God to bless him and to give him more power, will he be aided by our prayer to do these awful things more easily? Absolutely not. God’s blessing can only help him to do good.

Shine Your Light in the World

What happens when you shine the ray of a lamp into the darkness? Does it make the darkness greater? No, the light overcomes the darkness. When you bless a man you appeal to the child of God in him. When the child of God in him feels this blessing, he becomes more alert and powerful. Blessing an enemy does not mean that you give him more power to harm you, but you help him to be more friendly.

The law is: Bless good and it increases. Bless what appears to be evil and the hidden good in it will be encouraged to assert itself. Curse good and your curses will return to you to torment you. Curse evil and the evil grows. You know the law. Are you willing to use it? Are you willing wholeheartedly to bless your enemies and bless those who are reported to be doing evil?

Kill evil by blessing the evildoer, and you will be making good use of your time and energy.

Read more from Lowell Fillmore.