1. We have said much about discrepancies of means and end, and how these must be brought in line before your holy relationship can bring you only joy. ²But we have also said the means to meet the Holy Spirit’s goal will come from the same Source as does His purpose. ³Being so simple and direct, this course has nothing in it that is not consistent. ⁴The seeming inconsistencies, or parts you find more difficult than others, are merely indications of areas where means and end are still discrepant. ⁵And this produces great discomfort. ⁶This need not be. ⁷This course requires almost nothing of you. ⁸It is impossible to imagine one that asks so little, or could offer more.

2. The period of discomfort that follows the sudden change in a relationship from sin to holiness may now be almost over. ²To the extent you still experience it, you are refusing to leave the means to Him Who changed the purpose. ³You recognize you want the goal. ⁴Are you not also willing to accept the means? ⁵If you are not, let us admit that you are inconsistent. ⁶A purpose is attained by means, and if you want a purpose you must be willing to want the means as well. ⁷How can one be sincere and say, “I want this above all else, and yet I do not want to learn the means to get it?”

3. To obtain the goal the Holy Spirit indeed asks little. ²He asks no more to give the means as well. ³The means are second to the goal. ⁴And when you hesitate, it is because the purpose frightens you, and not the means. ⁵Remember this, for otherwise you will make the error of believing the means are difficult. ⁶Yet how can they be difficult if they are merely given you? ⁷They guarantee the goal, and they are perfectly in line with it. ⁸Before we look at them a little closer, remember that if you think they are impossible, your wanting of the purpose has been shaken. ⁹For if a goal is possible to reach, the means to do so must be possible as well.

4. It is impossible to see your brother as sinless and yet to look upon him as a body. ²Is this not perfectly consistent with the goal of holiness? ³For holiness is merely the result of letting the effects of sin be lifted, so what was always true is recognized. ⁴To see a sinless body is impossible, for holiness is positive and the body is merely neutral. ⁵It is not sinful, but neither is it sinless. ⁶As nothing, which it is, the body cannot meaningfully be invested with attributes of Christ or of the ego. ⁷Either must be an error, for both would place the attributes where they cannot be. ⁸And both must be undone for purposes of truth.

5. The body is the means by which the ego tries to make the unholy relationship seem real. ²The unholy instant is the time of bodies. ³But the purpose here is sin. ⁴It cannot be attained but in illusion, and so the illusion of a brother as a body is quite in keeping with the purpose of unholiness. ⁵Because of this consistency, the means remain unquestioned while the end is cherished. ⁶Seeing adapts to wish, for sight is always secondary to desire. ⁷And if you see the body, you have chosen judgment and not vision. ⁸For vision, like relationships, has no order. ⁹You either see or not.

6. Who sees a brother’s body has laid a judgment on him, and sees him not. ²He does not really see him as sinful; he does not see him at all. ³In the darkness of sin he is invisible. ⁴He can but be imagined in the darkness, and it is here that the illusions you hold about him are not held up to his reality. ⁵Here are illusions and reality kept separated. ⁶Here are illusions never brought to truth, and always hidden from it. ⁷And here, in darkness, is your brother’s reality imagined as a body, in unholy relationships with other bodies, serving the cause of sin an instant before he dies.

7. There is indeed a difference between this vain imagining and vision. ²The difference lies not in them, but in their purpose. ³Both are but means, each one appropriate to the end for which it is employed. ⁴Neither can serve the purpose of the other, for each one is a choice of purpose, employed on its behalf. ⁵Either is meaningless without the end for which it was intended, nor is it valued as a separate thing apart from the intention. ⁶The means seem real because the goal is valued. ⁷And judgment has no value unless the goal is sin.

8. The body cannot be looked upon except through judgment. ²To see the body is the sign that you lack vision, and have denied the means the Holy Spirit offers you to serve His purpose. ³How can a holy relationship achieve its purpose through the means of sin? ⁴Judgment you taught yourself; vision is learned from Him Who would undo your teaching. ⁵His vision cannot see the body because it cannot look on sin. ⁶And thus it leads you to reality. ⁷Your holy brother, sight of whom is your release, is no illusion. ⁸Attempt to see him not in darkness, for your imaginings about him will seem real there. ⁹You closed your eyes to shut him out. ¹⁰Such was your purpose, and while this purpose seems to have a meaning, the means for its attainment will be evaluated as worth the seeing, and so you will not see.

9. Your question should not be, “How can I see my brother without the body?” ²Ask only, “Do I really wish to see him sinless?” ³And as you ask, forget not that his sinlessness is your escape from fear. ⁴Salvation is the Holy Spirit’s goal. ⁵The means is vision. ⁶For what the seeing look upon is sinless. ⁷No one who loves can judge, and what he sees is free of condemnation. ⁸And what he sees he did not make, for it was given him to see, as was the vision that made his seeing possible.