This Psychic Reading given by Edgar Cayce at the office of the Association, Arctic Crescent, Virginia Beach, Va., this 14th day of October, 1941, in accordance with request made by the self - Miss [954], Active Member of the Ass'n for Research & Enlightenment, Inc.

Present: Edgar Cayce; Gertrude Cayce, Conductor; Gladys Davis, Steno.

TEXT

1. GC: You will have before you the entity, [954], who is at present in Central Park at 5th Ave. & 60th St., N.Y.C., who seeks information, advice and guidance, which will enable her to fulfill the purpose for which she entered the earth plane; considering her Life Reading given July 18, 1935 [954-1], and the experiences through which she has passed since that time. You will answer the questions she submits, as I ask them:
2. EC: Yes, we have the body, the enquiring mind, [954]; together with the information indicated, and the experiences through which the entity has passed and is passing.
3. Ready for questions.
4. (Q) What general progress am I now making for soul growth?
   (A) This might be answered in many ways, and considered from many phases or angles.
   The very purposes indicate soul growth; the very desires latent and manifested, in attempting and in being that which is the conviction.
   As to soul growth, let this be fully understood:
   As indicated to mankind from the beginning, man is a free-willed, a free-purposed individual. Then, as to whether the soul growth is towards the purpose for each entity's experience in the earth must be answered from within self - according to what has been chosen as the ideal, the purposes and aims, and as to WHO and as to WHAT is that ideal.
   There are many interpretations of soul purpose, or of guiding and directing influences in the material plane, that are extenuations or activities that emerge from the unseen or the inter-between. Here we would give that the ideal should be, for each soul, that proclaimed by Him - who thought it not robbery to make Himself equal with God, and who came into the earth to fulfill that purpose from the beginning; that man through materiality might manifest physical, mental and spiritual influences. Hence through that manifestation as the Galilean, as the Son of man, as the son of Mary, as the Son of God, He fulfilled in the body the whole of the law which had been indicated by those to whom he pointed as being schoolmasters, teachers, interpreters. And He proclaimed that it was not of Himself, but as the spirit of truth might work in and through Him.
   So may the individual in the present plane of experience manifest those tenets, those truths that He presented as the way, the manner in which one might attain to soul growth, full awareness, life abundance as expressed and manifested by Him.
   THAT we would give as the ideal.
   For this then the entity only has to look within self, to see, to experience that which has been and is the soul growth. Hold fast to those tenets, those principles, if ye would know the way, the truth, the light.
5. (Q) Have I to some extent "made straight my paths"?
   (A) No influence outside of self has the right to judge or even to consider such, but rather point the way and let there be the answer within. For, the true law, the true principle ever is, "My spirit beareth witness with thy spirit, saith the Lord."
   Then, the answer must come in self, and not by judgments from other influences or forces.
   The way ye know, the manner ye must manifest.
6. (Q) Can you suggest a masterly teacher to help me?
   (A) Why seek only a master, or a teacher, when the promise is from Him that "If ye love me and keep my commandments, I and the Father will come and abide with thee"? There may be indicated to and for the entity those influences as may be directed to make, to bring the whole personality oft. But let not such hinder from the keeping of that promise within. Know that thy body is indeed the temple of the living God. There He hath promised to, and there He will meet thee. Hold to that.
7. (Q) Can the body be brought into full usefulness and throw off the confusions of shock I have suffered?
   (A) In Him is truth, light and understanding. In Him the shock, the sorrow, the confusion is put away.
   Let that ever be that as would prompt thee, "Be not afraid, it is I." And if He be with thee, no influence without - in heaven or hell - may make thee afraid, or cause thee to become confused. Only that which is temporal causes confusion. For that which is eternal is the straight way.
8. (Q) Is the weakness from the soul or in the body itself?
   (A) The answer is ever as He has indicated. The body is weak, the spirit is willing.
9. (Q) What best plans can be made for the future so that physical sustenance may be maintained with least physical effort?
   (A) As we find, continue in those activities that have been determined and as may be presented to thee from time to time. For, He knoweth what ye have need of. He will and does supply, if the whole trust is put in Him. For the earth IS the Lord's, and the fullness thereof. Know that without Him not anything was made that was made. It is then His. For He hath overcome the world. And confusion, Satan, sin, hath no part in Him. Thus as He becomes, as He is the guide, to the extent that we allow Him to be, He is the sureness of all that is necessary, - physically, mentally, spiritually. For He stands in thy stead.
10. (Q) Should I continue to write?
    (A) Continue to write.
11. (Q) Please give a general plan of procedure.
    (A) As the spirit moveth thee to give that as will bring hope and help to others, in understanding and in finding their own relationships to that which is thy ideal, then write; whether this be in verse, in prose, in story, in confession - in whatever form it takes, write!
12. (Q) Should I continue in the ... Advertising job?
    (A) For the present, yes.
13. (Q) How can contacts be made for the furtherance of activity, whether writing or otherwise?
    (A) In the manner as has been indicated.
14. (Q) What is the most useful effort I can make for my fellowmen?
    (A) To bring hope to those discouraged, to give counsel to those that seek, to make the way clearer that Jesus of Nazareth passeth by today. And if ye will but invite Him, if ye will but entertain Him, He will come and sup with thee - NOW! He is the Lord of the way to understanding, He IS thy brother, thy mediator, thy strength, thy all. THAT is the greater contribution any soul may make to his fellow man.
15. (Q) Please suggest outlets consistent with my strength or fulfill my wish to serve.
    (A) It is not that any definite place or person may be indicated, or job, but even as He - who went about doing good, daily; wherever, whenever there was courage to be given, wherever there was love to be shown, wherever there was hate or jealousy to be dispersed, there was He to aid, to give that counsel.
    So may each soul, with Him as the guide, as the director daily.
    In every contact, - not as one harping upon such things but as one living same. For as there was indicated by the two as they entered into the temple, "Silver and gold have I not, but such as I have give I unto thee."
    So with each soul today; as ye meet, as ye pass, let thy life, thy personality, thy individuality so SHINE that others may know He walks and talks with thee oft!
16. (Q) Is the manuscript "No More Miracles" the book referred to in a previous Reading as a "book to be of good for others."?
    (A) We do not find it such. This may be turned, it may be put in order and in form as to make a manuscript worth considering.
17. (Q) Please suggest contacts for publishing this book.
    (A) Let's prepare it first in the proper forms, and then the Naylor (?) Press or Company would consider same.
18. (Q) Please suggest contacts for publishing the manuscript "Why Sugie Has a Birthday."
    (A) This as we find would necessarily be published by self for greater distribution among certain groups, as we find; than to a general publishing company.
19. (Q) Am I correct in my feeling that my knowledge of psychics is a special one and that it has come for a real purpose in this life?
    (A) This is to be answered only by self, and according to self's ideal.
20. (Q) Is the thought concerning psychic information for National Defense protection good?
    (A) Not at the present time. There are channels - that is, there are individuals in places or positions where such might be of a general help. As to which, or how - it may be determined from that which has been given, only according to the INDIVIDUAL, or by the individual or groups so living that the activities are such as to indicate the sources from which such has come. Not as a cult, schism or ism, but as CHRISTIAN living.
21. (Q) Can I maintain mental and physical balance enough to properly interpret and contact psychics for the purpose of national defense?
    (A) If that information is from the Lord of the way, yes. If it is individual, no.
22. We are through for the present.

    Copy to Self
    Copy to Ass'n file

BACKGROUND

1. See 954-5 on 7/26/38 & subsequent Reports.
2. 10/01/41 She submitted questions.

REPORTS

1. 10/17/41 EC's ltr. to [954]:
   Dear Miss [954]
   Am in hopes you have found your reading of interest and most helpful, will be anxious to know what you think of it.
   The wedding was a very beautiful home affair, only members of the families present. They left at once for a little trip by motor, heard from them this morning in New Orleans. Sally is a very lovely girl and am thinking she will be just the balance needed for H. L. They allowed the other boy to come to the wedding tho he was on maneuvers in S.C. He came home with us, so his mother and I took him back Sat., and drove home Sunday, very nice trip but a bit hard on Gertrude as she would do the driving, and with her eye as it is.
   Do hope you are feeling good and all is well, let us hear from you, for am thinking of you often.
   With love from all [signed] Edgar Cayce
2. 10/19/41 [954]'s ltr. to EC:
   New York, N.Y.
   My dear Teacher:
   I do want you to know that I received the reading and that I find parts of it most helpful.
   As I have sometimes felt before...I feel the reading very severe with me and making no allowances whatever for the tragedies and terrific difficulties of the experience. But that I can understand.
   Definitely I see that the psychic information part will be helpful...for not so long ago I was much obsessed with the idea that I might be able to prevent sabotage by utilizing psychic information. Yet I take it that the reading warns against that.
   Also the bit about the manuscript is good...for it is definitely in need of much work before it might be presented anywhere.
   I'll try to write more about this later as I digest the reading. One must live with a reading for sometime before it comes clearly to the consciousness...just what is intended.
   There's a beautiful phrase "He is the Lord of the way to understanding..." Certainly I accept that as entirely true, but I find much more to be learned than the mere school teacherish acceptance of His statements. Jesus had a system ...that I know...and by that system...that method of contact ...he could heal and do all the other things. That is why I asked for a Master...but I think that in the main I am being taught from outside and must still go on alone with the bits of information I have garnered. I have made much progress in bodily stability though the way has been hard indeed. Progress is presented to me in pictures from time to time... but alas the interpreter is absent.
   The clearest experiences come just as I am going to sleep. The other night I was quickly transported to a beauteous spot of the symbolic world...greenish in coloring...and Oriental in architecture and design. In the foreground were four mighty warriors...as of stone...immovable...their armor encrusted with myriad small figures of the Tibetan sort. Then one of the four forces moved...the horse carrying the figure (still of a piece)...Then I stopped, thinking I was directing the movement...rather than watching it.
   Now this has something to do with the War...but just what? Early in the War I was shown part of the Armies of Light... But how am I to interpret these things?
   So it goes.
   I shall try to digest the reading further and to obey its admonitions about the Master. And I shall let you hear from me soon about it.
   I was glad to hear the wedding was so lovely. I know you and Gertrude enjoyed having your other boy with you, too. Do hope Hugh Lynn and Sally have a successful and progressive life together.
   Love to all...[954]
   P.S. I am sitting barricaded among [1210]'s books. Have had the promise of a helper for weeks...but he does not arrive. It is a queer thing how difficult all these things have been...like millstones indeed...and unmovable even with direct intention and will to move.
3. 10/29/41 She expressed many of these books for the A.R.E. Library.
4. 2/08/43 [954]'s ltr. to EC:
   New York, N.Y.
   My dear Teacher: Just a short note to tell you of my first experience with the book [THERE IS A RIVER by Thomas Sugrue]. I opened it on Sunday morning (Yesterday). I had no great feeling of anticipation in regard to it...just a feeling of "Well they were kind to send it...I will open it."
   I dipped into the paper cover blurbs. Then into the preface. I am a dipper...and can get the whole gist of an article or book without reading words...although, of course, I have nothing like you have...this I have always been able to do...being called "a fast reader." The preface with its honesty and open heartedness seemed not to come from any Tom I had ever met...for Tom to me had always been a fish face. Psychologically I understood him...and personally I simply despised him. But here was an honest statement...A humble statement coming from one whose ego I recalled as being immensely over developed for his size. This is plain talk, my friend, you asked for it.
   "Ah," I thought, "Tom's illness has brought him of age. He's got a grip on reality." I remember the very poetic and beautiful writing of the original booklet "There Is A River" [See under 1800-26 Reports, GC's autographed copy.] and saw this was different indeed. This was an honest reporter's work.
   I started to read the first chapter...and got the nice human feeling of it.
   Then I began my dipping again. And in my half hour of dipping I was so overcome with a sense of tragedy...so stricken with sorrow...a sorrow that made me went to sob but that was beyond tears. I had to stop. My nerves are too delicate to stand shock of this kind.
   What caused this?
   It was NOT the facts involved...including the bride's sorrows ...including the possible separation of these different people through illness. Nor was it even the destroyed works of hospital and university. All human development calls for sorrow, and all human works are ultimately destroyed.
   I cannot actually tell you why this was. But I have this suspicion. THERE IS NO NEED FOR THIS BLINDNESS. We must undertake to be MASTERS...as it were. The pattern is so perfect...like those vast patterns of life which I used to see and which Doctor drew for you that summer. Why must we tiptoe? Why cannot we use the courage of the Bhgavid-Gita ...instead of our garbled Bible. Thought and Intelligence is what they are crying to us from outside. (I still have those gentlemen in white as occasional visitors.) LAW...all according to LAW. Ah...but who wants to follow the LAW...? even though as Jesus said, "MY yoke is easy and my burden is light."
   This is for your eyes only. I would not have this reasoning passed on. It was only an impression. But it shook me. You must watch your step after the publication of this book. BE YOUR OWN MASTER. OBEY THE LAW OF RESPONSIBILITY. BE the LAW GIVER...not any exhibit for fools to pull apart.
   My love to you and to all...[954]
   Be STRONG. As you are in unconscious talk.
5. 2/20/43 [954]'s ltr. to EC:
   Saturday,
   My dear Teacher:
   I have now finished the word by word reading of the book... with no recurrence of the first wave of despair. Again I would say Tom has done a wonderful job...more especially in the first part of the book, I believe. The latter part of the book bears much of Hugh Lynn's imprint, I would suspect. I missed the stories about the wondrous chemicals or minerals in the West and wish they had been included because of the war interest in need for this knowledge. I thought also that if the horse racing episodes had been included a more rounded "human" feeling would have resulted. But the writer must choose...and Tom probably cut again and again because of the wealth of material.
   Two things stand out to me which I feel I must pass on to you since my opinion seems to me so much to you.
   1. I was most happy to learn that you wish this power were conscious and that you hope that it may be conscious some day - some place. For it should be, of course. The highly trained psychics of the East do these things without recourse even to daylight trance of your type. This made me happy. There have been times when I have wished to see you stronger ...not that I am strong...but just that I want those I love to be strong. But, of course, we both know that the sacrifice of personality which you make this time for the good of so many is going to count mightily for you in the record.
   2. I think I put my finger on the mistake you made in dealing with Morton...and I only mention it because once again you will soon have to make a similar choice. You gave your time to individual readings for sicknesses rather than to the one who was supporting the much larger work of keeping the hospital going. Undoubtedly many other factors entered into Morton's backing out. He was not a steadfast character.
   But with a little shrewdness...a little CONSCIOUS reasoning that kept the eye on the larger ball of larger benefit for many...the hospital might have been kept running for a longer time...maybe even long enough to win other moneyed people to it. Do not take this harshly to yourself...but try to sense what I mean for the future. There is a small picture: it is comprised of Tommy Smith's toe ache and Molly Ames tumor. Both are sad. But not too sad. The larger horror is the multiplication of toe ache and tumor all through the land.
   Now the opportunity may soon come to you when you will have to choose between helping Molly or giving readings for some Foundation or Research Bureau on a general topic. Then you must forget Molly. You must give your time and effort to the larger cause. Do you get this reasoning? Do you agree with it?
   Lots of Mollys and Tommys and Sallys are going to be coming to your doorstep soon. but CHOOSE THOU. Individual love for individual suffering is fine...but the true servant of the law works in the larger circle of preventing suffering for many. The research man does not get the personal kick of personal gratitude from the world...but he is the law-giver by whose findings many are saved. Get me?
   If you want further argument in this direction let me refer you to Jesus. In his early ministry he healed them...but not in the later. In the later he tried to show them the LAW... the LAW by which they could heal. And of with what mighty rage he turned on those who kept the LAW of LIFE from the people when he said
   "Woe unto you, lawyers! for ye have taken away the key of knowledge: ye stored not in yourselves, and them that were entering in ye hindered."
   For the law of life, the law of healing had always been there ...if you recall the old Testament healings.
   So there are these two things.
   There is much more. I want you to know that the case of Arthritis [Case [951]] given in the book has been most enlightening to me personally...and I am thinking just of it. The diets outlined are based on the science of biochemistry...which is what I have worked with for over two years now...getting much benefit. I live without sugar, flour or salt. What is most interesting to me in connection with this muscular arthritis which I have in some degree (at times very bad) is that SILICON is also damned along with salt and calcium. This gives me a tip which I am thinking of following...although the elimination of silicon from the diet would take my breakfast of apples away from me.
   Funny thing...this progress. I read that case several years ago...but the diet meant nothing to me until these years of study of biochemistry. Doesn't it show we have to have some enlightenment before we can progress in any given direction? Well...I could go on and on. But as the book comes into the public eye...and you become swamped with letters...BE STRONG. Do not weary yourself for the larger task which we are hoping will be offered you. Bear in your conscious mind what you know of KARMA. As Besant says "You do not need to do ALL the work...there are other workers in the field...encourage them." O it is a hard thought for those of us who love man so well...but we much accept our limitations.
   Do let me know if you agree with me...if there are thoughts here worthy of your consideration. I have thought much before writing you this letter.
   Ever...your devoted... [954]
6. 2/25/43 EC's ltr. to [954]:
   Dear Miss [954];-
   Appreciate more than can tell you your taking the time to write me as you have and agree with you in most every thing you say - not as just a YES-man, but to be sure have thought and thought many times of every thing as has gone on from time to time, can I but learn the lesson that should have gained. Well, then it hasn't been in vain - as for the Hospital, once begun, it might have been best had it been conducted as you suggested - yet with its closing now we have some several in various parts of the country that will and are co-operating with us, this we possible would never have done. But just what the status would have been, do not know. Possibly none of us know, can only do the best I know how at the time and leave the rest to HIM. Can I only keep that thought first and foremost.
   Am beginning to hear from people here and there who have read the book, may not be able to take care of one-10th of the requests, choosing and how to choose those who will be given the readings will not be easy. Just hope and pray will choose wisely. and May it all be to the Glory of God, and not to any one individual or person.
   The later part of the book is quotations from readings, and is not from any one other than those - Tom did a nice job of putting it together - but there the greater criticism will come from some Orthodox people. Have already seen that - yet more persons are thrilled with that - if that is a good expression than any of the rest of the book. Just hope it may be a source of good - and not bad in the affairs of people.
   Glad you found something good in the case reports - that too from some who are in the profession, healing profession - seems to be good; as many remark as you on the way it is put together.
   Don't forget me in your prayers-that I my be strong, and choose that as is good in HIS sight at all times.
   Appreciate your letter more than have words to tell you for know you have given the work here thought for many years now, and I appreciate your judgement.
   Thanks and do write us occasionally and offer any suggestions that may seem good to you.
   With love from all Edgar Cayce
7. 3/30/43 EC's ltr. to [954]:
   Dear Miss [954];-
   Thank you for remembering me in all the confusion as is going on about me. Wish you were feeling real good and well and wanted to be out of N.Y. for a year or so. Will have no Mgr. of the Ass'n after Friday; H. L. goes to war. Wish you could see this baby of his and Sally's - just a darling baby. Is getting his goat to have to leave him. Not that he is a slacker, for he has and is doing a bag up job here with the recreation work for young people as well as for Soldiers at the camps, but seems they must have him.
   Thanks for the enclosures. Yes, have seen them. Guess we are most fortunate that they even took notice of the book. Maybe am becoming hardened but they still hurt to be misunderstood so completely. Yes, Tom did a nice job. Can do as well. They call, they wire, they come. Am already three weeks ahead with appointments, so can't let them get further. Don't know what just to do for can only try so much.
   Letter today from my State Paper in Ky. asking for a feature story. I can't do it and don't know whether H. L. will have time or not.
   The radio reviews are the ones that make people write that know nothing. Yet haven't heard a single one, have you? Had two calls since been trying to write this letter, one from N.Y. other from some where in Md. Both heard on radio, so they say. Surely a test for me - pray for me that I make it for HIS sake, not mine. No - nothing definite. Something as may be a deciding factor will happen next month - Apr.-
   Thanks again and with love from all
   [signed] Edgar Cayce
8. 4/02/43 [954]'s ltr. to EC:
   My dear Teacher:
   You are naturally much in my mind today, for I know what Hugh Lynn's leaving means to you...particularly at this time. And your off hand suggestion that you'd like to have me at the Beach hits me between the eyes. You have no idea how much the thought of Springtime in Virginia draws me. I really believe if I were all alone today that I'd be coming down...hoping just to give you a lift for a while anyway. I feel your situation deeply. As to my physical condition ...some part of it is psychic - and I believe in a different atmosphere more to my liking I'd really get strong. To look at me, you know, you would think me wonderfully well.
   But at any rate here is something I can do. I can prepare the feature story for you and have already begun it. I enclose a carbon of the start of it. How many words does the editor want?
   You should provide pictures...most of these stories ARE pictures. Have you any of yourself in trance? (That should be done sometime; you might even get somebody else!) Snapshots of you fishing...gardening...a family group would be good. A print of the Ames and Brownly photo would be good - or any glossy print of a good close up (of E.C.). I will complete story & send from here if you wish:
   Have not heard any radio reviews. Try to relax on all requests. More and more I am convinced that readings are best taken and used if the need is continued...and if some one other than the patient is in power and is interested. If I had been in POWER when Doctor got that last one he'd probably be here today. How I pleaded that he have just one high colonic! But NO...
   Remember not all the healings are on your shoulders. GOD will show every soul the way...if not thru you...then through others. Besant gives a rule which is the most helpful thing to me (who am without activities almost at times...but was once over zealous). I quote her for you...this from her study of the Bhagavad-Gita:
   Besant:
   You may say: "There is so much to do, so many claims on me and on my time, so many actions that need to be performed, and so many things to be done." Quite true. But you are not the only person who can do things. You are not the solitary individual, endowed with all powers, all capacities and all time, that the whole world should depend upon your activity, and that nothing should be done to which you do not put your own small hand. That which we have not TIME to do is NOT our duty, and if we do it, we are keeping another man out of his duty, and forcing him into idleness. Over-activity is not the path of action, it is the path of the world.
   A difficult lesson I know, for an active man, because a part of his activity is a sense of capacity; he is able to do things, and he often forgets to measure the time as well as well as the power. But both are of the Lord, and both have to be considered. And this I know to be true from my own experience, for many things crowd round me crying out "Do me, attend to me". I used to try to do them all and failed. Then I realized that the Lord could do very well without me, and was not dependent on one particular body in which He, after all, was the Actor and not I, and that He had many bodies in which to act.
   Now isn't that grand...she, too, had the same struggle you see...that overcrowding...
   This has comforted me so much. Maybe you will like it. [954]
9. 4/02/43 Article written by [954]:
   STRANGE POWER OUT OF KENTUCKY by [954]
   The backroad that leads to the house of the man who does his best work by going to sleep is a pleasant one. In the late Spring sunshine you pass the butterfly bush where bees and white moths hover and hum, an isolated cottage, and come at at the turn of the road to the grey shingle house where Edgar Cayce lives in Virginia Beach, Va.
   You have heard that this transplanted Kentuckian goes to sleep and tells people what makes them sick and how they can get well. He has told thousands in his lifetime.
   And so you almost imagine that you are not alone as you go along the road to Edgar Cayce's house. With you goest the procession of the many who have preceded you. They are the memories of the little children, the mothers, the men, the the girls who have figuratively thrown aside crutches and come to walk through the treatments of which this man has told them as he lay "asleep."
   Beyond the grey shingled house you see the figure of Jesus ...at the nearby church...and somehow it seems appropriate enough.
   If you go as a skeptic as most people do, you wonder what manner of man you are to meet. He has been proclaimed to you as a miracle worker, and somehow our modern age has not prepared us for miracles...not anything less than mechanical marvels anyway.
   The way a Virginia neighbor had told me about him was like this:
   "The way I reason it out is this: Dr. Cayce...we call him Doctor, but he's not a doctor...well he goes into a sleep like and gives advice to sick people. He's got some peculiar power that none of us understand. So we don't criticize it. It's done so much good.
   "He's wrought some wondrous cures. Little girl was brought here years ago all crippled up. I saw her the other day... playing natural as you please. It seems Dr. Cayce feels his power leaves him when he uses it for material things. Seems like he made a vow he'd only use his power to cure - particularly little children. He seems a most sincere man to me - a most sincere man."
   After that build-up you wonder. But you are just as apt to pass over the man in the garden or the man coming into the house with a fish he's hooked...and not know that is Edgar Cayce.
   The clear and piercing glance that meets you out of the blue grey eyes seems to go right through you - but with kindliness. You have come to see Edgar Cayce...but Edgar Cayce is seeing you. You remember something of that same piercing look in the eyes of a world renowned surgeon you once knew. But this man is no doctor albeit he has been giving psychic medical diagnoses for forty-one years.
   The sun streams in at the windows of the large living room which the touch of Gertrude Evans Cayce (of Hopkinsville) has made truly "Homelike". Each morning and each afternoon, Edgar Cayce lies down of a couch in this sunlit room and under the guidance of his wife "goes to sleep." Canaries sing softly back in the study, while she gives him the order to read the bodily conditions of some person - perhaps present - but more probably in New York, Philadelphia, Detroit, or Louisville.
   Slowly and clearly he tells of the body's condition and gives suggestions for its healing - he who never had a medical education, never even read through a medical library.
   Thomas Sugrue's new book, "There Is A River", just published by Henry Holt and Company of New York, is the story of Edgar Cayce's life with all of its early Kentucky years. Born on March 18, 1977, in Hopkinsville, it was there that he grew slowly into the knowledge that he possessed a strange power.
10. 4/05/43 EC's ltr. to [954]:
    Dear Miss [954];-
    Just to say thank you for yours of the 30th and 2nd is putting it mildly. Yours of the 30th, don't know why, but reminds me of Paul C. Bragg, tho may be all wrong. But think here you would have a diet that would be or could be ideal for you; tho may be all wrong, but the building blocks and all. Seems to me to be the body building needed, tho to take it in one stride might be too severe but if you haven't seen this, think it over.
    Possibly the letter was writing you - caused you to find me in your dreams.
    Just wish could have you here for a while any way - H. L. leaves Friday - is already inducted.
    As for the Article, think it thus far very lovely and am sure would be used any where, if you cared to have it done. Whether you could get it in time for the Ky paper that I doubt. As believe it will be on the press by the time you will get this, as it is to go in the Rotogravure sec of the Louisville Courier Journal. But many of the papers about the county are using the story and any of the Southern or western papers would be glad to have it and possibly some Magazines you would know better than I. As to its length depends on how far you follow the book, or your own experience with the work. But do finish it, and submit it some where.
    Thanks again a thousand thanks, do hope all is well. With love from all here.
    Sincerely, [signed] Edgar Cayce
    P.S. People have begun to come now, yet that of course, doesn't hurry one bit. Only makes disappointments for them when they come with out first having an appointment.
11. 1/16/45 [954]'s ltr. to GD:
    Dearest Gladys:
    You can guess how much I am thinking of you in these days when we face our great loss - particularly I think of you because you were so close to him and because all that he did and those who surrounded him were in a very large sense your life - your whole.
    I cannot help but wonder what is in your heart. I am trying not to rebel - not to inquire of God why this had to be. For is some ways I know why it was, and I tried so hard to warn him in the very beginning of the increased publicity which resulted from the book.
    My own experience in connection with his passing has been strange, too. For no warning of it came to me so far as I could trace a warning at all. Shortly after Christmas I was awakened one morning by a terrific pounding in the mattress and sheets of my bed - a phenomena I have not experienced for some time. But I did not get from it any sense of foreboding. The pounding was a definite knocking...in a series of six...that was all.
    You know better than anyone how deeply I cared for him - what an important influence he was in my life...a true turning point. Indeed I refuse to say "cared"...I say "care"...in the present sense. For one all important feeling is the feeling that though I do not contact him at all he is so tremendously ALIVE.
    You are busy, I know...and heavy laden, I know. But if you get a chance and can think of any thing I can do for YOU, please let me know. I wish my circumstances were such that I could say..."Come here for a while and stay with me". But you undoubtably have plans of your own either there or elsewhere. Your home is there, but I can sense how vast a difference our great one's passing will make in whatever you now do, for you will have to earn a living.
    Always remember that you have a PERMANENT place in my heart and that all my thought for you is that He, the Chiefest Eternal Good, will comfort and guide you all your days. The beauty of your soul is lovelier than you know.
    Ever yours in fond remembrance and continuing constant friendship,
12. 12/45 Xmas Card to HLC: "Hugh Lynn - It is good to know you are at home safe. I greet you in loving remembrance of those who made Christmas a real thing in my life."
13. 7/01/49 See [954]'s A.R.E. SEARCHLIGHT article, FOOD - OUR HELPER ON THE PATH TO ATTAINMENT.
14. 5/04/51 Miss [2160] wrote: "You see, I assist the Rev. [954] who is well known to HLC - and was also acquainted with the great Mr. Cayce. She has her class...nights in her studio at..."
15. 1/57 Miss [954] wrote: "How I rejoice in all the advancement made by the Assoc. [1058] and I always are glad to pass on news of the Assoc. to the many who speak of our dear one, Edgar Cayce."

Edgar Cayce Readings © 1971, 1993, 1994, 1995 by the Edgar Cayce Foundation