THE FOUNDATION STONE

by Neville Goddard

" Seek ye the Kingdom of Heaven and all things will be added unto you." Find the cause of things and you have found the secret of creation. You have heard it said, that "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth", that "all things were made by him; and without him was not anything made that was made." No one questions the truth of this statement, but what one does want to know is- "who is God and where is God located?" In answer to the who you are told, "I AM God, I AM the lord, I AM hath sent me (the man Moses) unto you." As to the location of God you are told, "The Kingdom of God is within you." These two answers identify God as your awareness of being and locates him where you are aware of being. To be conscious of being is to silently declare, "I AM." As you read this page you are aware of being. This awareness, this consciousness of being, is God the creator. Awareness is that formless deep in which all things live, move and have their being, and apart from which things have no reality. This is the secret of the statement, "Before Abraham was, I AM, before the world was, I AM and when all things shall cease to be, I AM."

Awareness of being precedes all conceptions of itself and remains its formless self when all of its conceptions cease to be. The creator must precede creation, as the conceiver precedes his conceptions. Creation begins and ends in the Creator. Consciousness is the secret of all manifestion. Every creation passes through three stages in its unfoldment, conception, crucifixion and resurrection. Ideas, desires, ambitions are all conceptions moving within the motionless being, I AM. Consciousness is Father and all conceptions of itself are children bearing witness of their Father. Therefore, "I and my Father are one, but my Father is greater than I" the conceiverand the conception are one, but the conceiver is greater than its conception.

Awareness is unconditioned. To be aware of being something or someone is conditioning the unconditioned. That which is defined is less than the definer. Awareness of being is the Almighty God, the Everlasting Father, upon whose shoulders is the government of the world. Awareness sustains and directs all things that it is aware of being. Consciousness of being is the eternal womb impregnating itself through the medium of desire. To be conscious of an urge or desire is to have conceived. To believe, by feeling yourself (The Formless) to be the thing desired, is to be crucified upon the form of the thing felt. To continue in the belief, feeling that you are now the thing desired until all doubts cease and a deep conviction is born that it is so is to be resurrected or visibly lifted into expressing the nature of the thing felt.

At this very moment you are resurrecting or expressing that which you are conscious of being. "I AM the resurrection and the life. "I AM now out-picturing in the world round about me, as a living reality, that which I am now aware that I AM- and I shall continue to do so until I change my conception of myself. So your answer in consciousness to the eternal question, WHO AM I, Will determine your world and its every expression. Begin now to realize that I AM is the Lord God Almighty and beside ME (your awareness) There is no other God. Not I, John Doe is God but I AM, the awareness of being, is God. John Doe is only its present limitation or conception of itself. I am the limitless expressing through the limited conception of myself. To change the expression change the conception of yourself but do so in truth, not in words. That is turn your attention completely away from your present limitation and place it upon the new conception, until the awareness, your true being, is lost in the belief or conviction that I AM that I AM.

This is the reclothing or rebirth of your formless, nameless self. Your true self is a self, who no man sees, and who sees not itself, but sees only its conception of itself. In the beginning, now this moment, the idea or desire is swimming around in your consciousness seeking embodiment. Before the desire can be realized or resurrected, it must first become a cross or fixed point upon which consciousness is nailed. Awareness is the only living reality, the only resurrecting power. So to give life to my desire, I must in consciousness become aware of being the thing desired. "Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters. "In the midst of the waters or formless awareness, let there be a firmness or conviction that I AM the thing desired. Continue to stand upon this conviction or cross, and in ways unknown to you as man, you will realize or resurrect your desire. Life or awareness has ways that man (the conception) Knows not of its ways are past finding out. Life's present conception of itself as man is a mask that it wears. Within this being that you think you are, is your nameless self I AM.

The foundation of all expression is consciousness and other foundations no man can lay. Try as man will he cannot find another cause of manifestation other than God his consciousness of being. Man thinks he has found the cause of disease in germs; the cause of war in conflicting political ideologies and greed. All such discoveries of man, catalogued as they are as the essence of wisdom, are foolishness in the eyes of God. There is only one power and this power is God (Consciousness). It kills, it makes alive, it wounds, it heals, it does all things good, bad or indifferent. 

A prisoner must have a jailer, a slave a master. A nation that feels itself to be imprisoned will automatically create a dictator. You could no more rub out a tyrant by destroying him, than you can your reflection by destroying the mirror. The consciousness of a nation produces its leaders. That which is true of a nation is true of an individual, for nations are made up of individuals. Man moves in a world that is nothing more nor less than his consciousness objectified. Not knowing this, he wars against his reflections while he keeps alive the light and the images which throw the reflections. "I AM the the light of the world." I AM (consciousness is the light.) That which I am conscious of being (my conception of myself) such as, I am rich, I am healthy, I am free-are the images. The world is the mirror magnifying all that I AM conscious of being. Stop trying to change the world, it is only a mirror telling you who you are.

The man who is conscious of being free or imprisoned is expressing that which he is conscious of being. I do not care what men have diagnosed your problem to be. A problem might have a history ages long, yet I know it will vanish in the twinkle of an eye, if you will faithfully follow this instruction.

Ask yourself this simple question. How would I feel if I were free? The very moment you sincerely ask this question the answer comes.

No man can tell another how that other would feel if his desire were suddenly realized. But everyone would know how he himself would feel, for such feeling would be automatic. The feeling or thrill that comes to one in response to his self-questioning is the Father state of consciousness or Foundation Stone, from which will come the thing felt. Just how this feeling will embody itself no one knows but it will for the Father (consciousness) has ways that no man knows of. Make the new feeling natural by wearing it. All things express their nature, so you must wear this feeling until it becomes your nature. It might take a moment or a year it is entirely up to you. The moment all doubts vanish and you feel I AM this, you begin to bear the fruit of the nature of the thing you are feeling yourself to be. When a person buys a new hat or pair of shoes he thinks everyone knows that they are new. He feels unnatural with them on until he wears them long enough to make them natural. The same applies to the wearing of the new state of consciousness.

When you ask yourself the question, "How would I feel if my desire were this moment realized?"-the automatic reply is so new that you Feel that it is not yours, that it is not true. Therefore, you instantly put this new state of consciousness off and immediately return to your problem because it is more natural. Not knowing that consciousness is ever out-picturing itself in conditions round about you- You, like Lot's wife, look back upon your problem and once again become hypnotized by its naturalness. Do you not hear the words of Jesus (salvation)? "Leave all and follow me- let the dead bury their dead." Your problem might have you so hypnotized by its seeming reality and naturalness, that you find it difficult to wear the new feeling, or consciousness of your saviour but wear it you must if you would have results. The stone (Consciousness) which the builders rejected (would not wear) is the chief corner Stone and other foundations no man can lay.