The “laws” of chaos can be brought to light, though never
understood. Chaotic laws are hardly meaningful, and therefore out of
reason’s sphere. Yet they appear to constitute an obstacle to reason and
to truth. Let us, then, look upon them calmly, that we may look beyond
them, understanding what they are, not what they would maintain. It is
essential it be understood what they are for, because it is their
purpose to make meaningless, and to attack the truth. Here are the laws
that rule the world you made. And yet they govern nothing, and need not
be broken; merely looked upon and gone beyond.

The first chaotic law is that the truth is different for everyone. Like
all these principles, this one maintains that each is separate, and has
a different set of thoughts which set him off from others. This
principle evolves from the belief there is a hierarchy of illusions;
some are more valuable, and therefore true. Each one establishes this
for himself, and MAKES it true by his attack on what another values. And
this is justified because the values differ, and those who hold them
seem to be unlike, and therefore enemies.

Think how this seems to interfere with the first principle of miracles.
For this establishes degrees of truth among illusions, making it appear
that some of them are harder to overcome than others. If it were
realized that they are all the same and equally untrue, it would be
easy, then, to understand that miracles apply to ALL of them. Errors of
any kind can be corrected BECAUSE they are untrue. When brought to truth
instead of to EACH OTHER, they merely disappear. No part of nothing can
be more resistant to the truth than can another.

The second law of chaos, dear indeed to every worshipper of sin, is that
each one must sin, and therefore deserves attack and death. This
principle, closely related to the first, is the demand that errors call
for punishment, and not correction. For the destruction of the one who
makes the error places him beyond correction, and beyond forgiveness.
What he has done is thus interpreted as an irrevocable sentence upon
himself, which God Himself is powerless to overcome. Sin cannot be
remitted, being the belief the Son of God can make mistakes for which
his own destruction becomes inevitable.

Think what this seems to do to the relationship between the Father and
the Son. Now it appears that they can never be one again. For ONE must
always be condemned, and by the OTHER. Now are
they different, and ENEMIES. And their relationship is one of
opposition, just as the separate aspects of the Son meet only to
conflict, but not to join. One becomes weak, the other strong by his
defeat. And fear of God and of each other now appears as sensible, made
real by what the Son of God has done both to himself and his Creator.
The arrogance on which the laws of chaos stand could not be more
apparent than emerges here.

Here is a principle which would define what the Creator of reality must
be; what He must think and what He must believe; and how He must
respond, believing it. It is not seen as even necessary that He be asked
about the truth of what has been established for His belief. His Son can
tell Him this, and He has but the choice whether to take his word for it
or be mistaken. This leads directly to the third preposterous belief
that seems to make chaos eternal. For if God cannot BE mistaken, then He
MUST accept his Son’s belief in what he is, and hate him for it.

See how the fear of God is reinforced by this third principle. Now it
becomes impossible to turn to Him for help in misery. For now He has
become the “enemy” Who CAUSED it, and to Whom appeal is useless. Nor can
salvation lie within the Son, whose every aspect seems to be at war with
Him, and justified in its attack. And now is conflict made inevitable,
and beyond the help of God. And now salvation must remain impossible,
because the Savior has become the enemy.

There can be no release and no escape. Atonement thus becomes a myth,
and vengeance, not forgiveness, is the Will of God. From where all this
begins, there is no sight of help that can succeed. Only destruction can
BE the outcome. And God Himself seems to be siding with it, to overcome
His Son. Think not the ego will enable you to find escape from what it
WANTS. That is the function of this course, which does not value what
the ego cherishes.

The ego values only what it TAKES. This leads to the fourth law of chaos,
which, if the others are accepted, must be true. This seeming law is the
belief you HAVE what you have taken. By this, another’s loss becomes
your gain, and thus it fails to recognize that you can never take away
save from YOURSELF. Yet all the other laws must lead to this. For enemies
do not give willingly to one another,
nor would they seek to share the things they value. And what your
enemies would keep from you must be worth having, just because they keep
it hidden from your sight.

All of the mechanisms of madness are seen emerging here: The “enemy,”
made strong by keeping hidden the valuable inheritance which should be
yours; your justified position, and attack for what has been withheld;
and the inevitable loss the enemy must suffer, to save yourself. Thus do
the guilty ones protest their “innocence.”Were they not forced into this
foul attack by the unscrupulous behaviour of the enemy, they would
respond with only kindness. But in a savage world the kind cannot
survive, so they must take or else be taken from.

And now there is a vague unanswered question, not yet “explained.” What
is this precious thing, this priceless pearl, this hidden secret
treasure, to be wrested in righteous wrath from this most treacherous
and cunning enemy? It must be what you want but never found. And now you
“understand” the reason why you found it not. For it was taken from you
by this enemy, and hidden where you would not think to look. He hid it
in his body, making it the cover for his guilt, the hiding place for
what belongs to you. Now must his body be destroyed and sacrificed, that
you may HAVE that which belongs to you. His treachery demands his death,
that YOU may live. And you attack only in self defense.

But what is it you want that NEEDS his death? Can you be sure your
murderous attack is justified unless you know what it is FOR? And here a
final principle of chaos comes to the rescue. It holds there is a
SUBSTITUTE for love. This is the “magic” that will cure all of your
pain; the missing factor in your madness that makes it “sane.” This is
the reason why you must attack. Here is what makes your vengeance
justified. Behold, unveiled, the ego’s secret gift, torn from your
brother’s body, hidden there in malice and in hatred for the one to whom
the gift belongs. He would deprive you of the secret ingredient which
would give meaning to your life. The substitute for love, born of your
enmity to one another, must be salvation. It has no substitute, and
there is only one. And all your relationships have but the purpose of
seizing it, and making it your own.

Never is your possession made complete. And never will your
brother cease his attack on you for what you stole. Nor will God end His
vengeance upon both, for in His madness He must have this substitute for
love, and kill you both. You who believe you walk in sanity, with feet
on solid ground, and through a world where meaning can be found,
consider this: These ARE the principles which make the ground beneath
your feet seem solid. And it IS here you look for meaning. These are the
laws you made for your salvation. They hold in place the substitute for
Heaven which you prefer. This is their purpose; they were made for this.
There is no point in asking what they mean. That is apparent. The means
of madness must be insane. Are you as certain that you realize the GOAL
is madness?

No-one WANTS madness, nor does anyone cling to his madness if he sees
that this is what it IS. What protects madness is the belief that it is
TRUE. It is the function of insanity to take the PLACE of truth. It must
be seen as truth to be believed. And if it is the truth, then must its
opposite, which was the truth before, be madness now. Such a reversal,
completely turned around, with madness sanity, illusions true, attack a
kindness, hatred love and murder benediction, is the goal the laws of
chaos serve. These are the means by which the laws of God appear to be
reversed. Here do the laws of sin appear to hold love captive, and let
sin go free.

These do not SEEM to be the goals of chaos, for by the great reversal,
they appear to be the laws of ORDER. How could it not be so? Chaos is
lawlessness, and HAS no laws. To be believed, its seeming laws must be
perceived as real. Their goal of madness must be seen as sanity. And
fear, with ashen lips and sightless eyes, blinded and terrible to look
upon, is lifted to the throne of love, its dying conqueror, its
substitute, the savior from salvation. How lovely do the laws of fear
make death appear! Give thanks unto the hero on love’s throne, who saved
the Son of God for fear and death!

And yet, how can it be that laws like these can be believed? There is a
strange device that makes it possible. Nor is it unfamiliar; we have
seen how it appears to function many times before. In truth it does NOT
function, yet in dreams, where only shadows play the major roles, it
seems most powerful. No law of chaos could compel belief but for the
emphasis on FORM and disregard of CONTENT. No-one who thinks that one
of them is true SEES what it says. Some forms it takes seem to have
meaning, and that is all.

How can some forms of murder NOT mean death? Can an attack in ANY form
be love? What FORM of condemnation is a blessing? Who makes his Savior
powerless and FINDS salvation? Let not the form of the attack on him
deceive you. You CANNOT seek to harm him and be saved. Who can find
safety from attack by turning on himself? How can it matter WHAT the
form this madness takes? It is a judgement that defeats itself,
condemning what it says it wants to save. Be not deceived when madness
takes a form you think is lovely. What is intent on your destruction is
NOT your friend.

You would maintain, and think it true, that you do not believe these
senseless laws, nor act upon them. And when you look at what they SAY,
they cannot BE believed. Brothers, you DO believe them. For how else
could you perceive the form they take, with content such as this? Can
ANY form of this be tenable? Yet you believe them FOR the form they
take, and do not RECOGNIZE the content. It never changes. Can you paint
rosy lips upon a skeleton, dress it in loveliness, pet it and pamper it,
and make it LIVE? And can you be content with an ILLUSION that you are
living?

There IS not life outside of Heaven. Where God created life, there life
must be. In any state apart from Heaven, life is illusion. At best, it
seems like life; at worst, like death. Yet both are judgements on what is
not life, equal in their inaccuracy and lack of meaning. Life not in
Heaven is impossible, and what is not in Heaven is not anywhere. Outside
of Heaven, only the conflict of illusions stands; senseless, impossible
and beyond all reason, and yet perceived as an eternal barrier to
Heaven. Illusions ARE but forms. Their content is NEVER true.

The laws of chaos govern all illusions. Their forms conflict, making it
seem quite possible to value some above the others. Yet each one rests
as surely on the belief the laws of chaos are the laws of order as do
the others. Each one upholds these laws completely, offering a certain
witness that these laws are true. The seeming gentler forms of the
attack are no less certain in their witnessing, or their results.
Certain it is illusions will bring fear because of the beliefs that they
imply, not for their form. And lack of faith in love, in
ANY form, attests to chaos as reality.

From the belief in sin, the faith in chaos MUST follow. It is because it
follows that it seems to be a logical conclusion; a valid step in
ordered thought. The steps to chaos DO follow neatly from their starting
point. Each is a different form in the progression of truth’s reversal,
leading still deeper into terror, and away from truth. Think not one
step is smaller than another, nor that return from one is easier. The
whole descent from Heaven lies in each one. And where your thinking
starts, there must it end.

Brothers, take not one step in the descent to hell. For having taken
one, you will not recognize the rest for what they are. And they WILL
follow. Attack in any form has placed your foot upon the twisted
stairway that leads from Heaven. Yet any instant it is possible to have
all this undone. How can you know whether you chose the stairs to Heaven
or the way to hell? Quite easily. How do you feel? Is peace in your
awareness? Are you certain which way you go? And are you sure the goal
of Heaven CAN be reached? If not, you walk alone. Ask, then, your Friend
to join with you, and GIVE you certainty of where you go.