1. The opposite of illusions is not disillusionment but truth. ²Only to the ego, to which truth is meaningless, do they appear to be the only alternatives, and different from each other. ³In truth they are the same. ⁴Both bring the same amount of misery, though each one seems to be the way to lose the misery the other brings. ⁵Every illusion carries pain and suffering in the dark folds of the heavy garments in which it hides its nothingness. ⁶Yet by these dark and heavy garments are those who seek illusions covered, and hidden from the joy of truth.

2. Truth is the opposite of illusions because it offers joy. ²What else but joy could be the opposite of misery? ³To leave one kind of misery and seek another is hardly an escape. ⁴To change illusions is to make no change. ⁵The search for joy in misery is senseless, for how could joy be found in misery? ⁶All that is possible in the dark world of misery is to select some aspects out of it, see them as different, and define the difference as joy. ⁷Yet to perceive a difference where none exists will surely fail to make a difference.

3. Illusions carry only guilt and suffering, sickness and death, to their believers. ²The form in which they are accepted is irrelevant. ³No form of misery in reason’s eyes can be confused with joy. ⁴Joy is eternal. ⁵You can be sure indeed that any seeming happiness that does not last is really fear. ⁶Joy does not turn to sorrow, for the eternal cannot change. ⁷But sorrow can be turned to joy, for time gives way to the eternal. ⁸Only the timeless must remain unchanged, but everything in time can change with time. ⁹Yet if the change be real and not imagined, illusions must give way to truth, and not to other dreams that are but equally unreal. ¹⁰This is no difference.

4. Reason will tell you that the only way to escape from misery is to recognize it and go the other way. ²Truth is the same and misery the same, but they are different from each other in every way, in every instance and without exception. ³To believe that one exception can exist is to confuse what is the same with what is different. ⁴One illusion cherished and defended against the truth makes all truth meaningless, and all illusions real. ⁵Such is the power of belief. ⁶It cannot compromise. ⁷And faith in innocence is faith in sin, if the belief excludes one living thing and holds it out, apart from its forgiveness.

5. Both reason and the ego will tell you this, but what they make of it is not the same. ²The ego will assure you now that it is impossible for you to see no guilt in anyone. ³And if this seeing is the only means by which escape from guilt can be attained, then the belief in sin must be eternal. ⁴Yet reason looks on this another way, for reason sees the source of an idea as what will make it either true or false. ⁵This must be so, if the idea is like its source. ⁶Therefore, says reason, if escape from guilt was given to the Holy Spirit as His purpose, and by One to Whom nothing He wills can be impossible, the means for its attainment are more than possible. ⁷They must be there, and you must have them.

6. This is a crucial period in this course, for here the separation of you and the ego must be made complete. ²For if you have the means to let the Holy Spirit’s purpose be accomplished, they can be used. ³And through their use will you gain faith in them. ⁴Yet to the ego this must be impossible, and no one undertakes to do what holds no hope of ever being done. ⁵You know what your Creator wills is possible, but what you made believes it is not so. ⁶Now must you choose between yourself and an illusion of yourself. ⁷Not both, but one. ⁸There is no point in trying to avoid this one decision. ⁹It must be made. ¹⁰Faith and belief can fall to either side, but reason tells you misery lies only on one side and joy upon the other.

7. Forsake not now your brother. ²For you who are the same will not decide alone nor differently. ³Either you give each other life or death; either you are each other’s savior or his judge, offering him sanctuary or condemnation. ⁴This course will be believed entirely or not at all. ⁵For it is wholly true or wholly false, and cannot be but partially believed. ⁶And you will either escape from misery entirely or not at all. ⁷Reason will tell you that there is no middle ground where you can pause uncertainly, waiting to choose between the joy of Heaven and the misery of hell. ⁸Until you choose Heaven, you are in hell and misery.

8. There is no part of Heaven you can take and weave into illusions. ²Nor is there one illusion you can enter Heaven with. ³A savior cannot be a judge, nor mercy condemnation. ⁴And vision cannot damn, but only bless. ⁵Whose function is to save, will save. ⁶How He will do it is beyond your understanding, but when must be your choice. ⁷For time you made, and time you can command. ⁸You are no more a slave to time than to the world you made.

9. Let us look closer at the whole illusion that what you made has power to enslave its maker. ²This is the same belief that caused the separation. ³It is the meaningless idea that thoughts can leave the thinker’s mind, be different from it and in opposition to it. ⁴If this were true, thoughts would not be the mind’s extensions, but its enemies. ⁵And here we see again another form of the same fundamental illusion we have seen many times before. ⁶Only if it were possible the Son of God could leave his Father’s Mind, make himself different and oppose His Will, would it be possible that the self he made, and all it made, should be his master.

10. Behold the great projection, but look on it with the decision that it must be healed, and not with fear. ²Nothing you made has any power over you unless you still would be apart from your Creator, and with a will opposed to His. ³For only if you would believe His Son could be His enemy does it seem possible that what you made is yours. ⁴You would condemn His joy to misery, and make Him different. ⁵And all the misery you made has been your own. ⁶Are you not glad to learn it is not true? ⁷Is it not welcome news to hear not one of the illusions that you made replaced the truth?

11. Only your thoughts have been impossible. ²Salvation cannot be. ³It is impossible to look upon your savior as your enemy and recognize him. ⁴Yet it is possible to recognize him for what he is, if God would have it so. ⁵What God has given to your holy relationship is there. ⁶For what He gave the Holy Spirit to give to you He gave. ⁷Would you not look upon the savior that has been given you? ⁸And would you not exchange, in gratitude, the function of an executioner you gave him for the one he has in truth? ⁹Receive of him what God has given him for you, not what you tried to give yourself.

12. Beyond the body that you interposed between you and your brother, and shining in the golden light that reaches it from the bright, endless circle that extends forever, is your holy relationship, beloved of God Himself. ²How still it rests, in time and yet beyond, immortal yet on earth. ³How great the power that lies in it. ⁴Time waits upon its will, and earth will be as it would have it be. ⁵Here is no separate will, nor the desire that anything be separate. ⁶Its will has no exceptions, and what it wills is true. ⁷Every illusion brought to its forgiveness is gently overlooked and disappears. ⁸For at its center Christ has been reborn, to light His home with vision that overlooks the world. ⁹Would you not have this holy home be yours as well? ¹⁰No misery is here, but only joy.

13. All you need do to dwell in quiet here with Christ is share His vision. ²Quickly and gladly is His vision given anyone who is but willing to see his brother sinless. ³And no one can remain beyond this willingness, if you would be released entirely from all effects of sin. ⁴Would you have partial forgiveness for yourself? ⁵Can you reach Heaven while a single sin still tempts you to remain in misery? ⁶Heaven is the home of perfect purity, and God created it for you. ⁷Look on your holy brother, sinless as yourself, and let him lead you there.