1. We have already discussed the Last Judgment, but in insufficient detail. 2After the Last Judgment there will be no more. 3Judgment is symbolic because beyond perception there is no judgment. 4When the Bible says “Judge not that ye be not judged,” it means that if you judge the reality of others you will be unable to avoid judging your own.
2. The choice to judge rather than to know is the cause of the loss of peace. 2Judgment is the process on which perception but not knowledge rests. 3I have discussed this before in terms of the selectivity of perception, pointing out that evaluation is its obvious prerequisite. 4Judgment always involves rejection. 5It never emphasizes only the positive aspects of what is judged, whether in you or in others. 6What has been perceived and rejected, or judged and found wanting, remains in your mind because it has been perceived. 7One of the illusions from which you suffer is the belief that what you judged against has no effect. 8This cannot be true unless you also believe that what you judged against does not exist. 9You evidently do not believe this, or you would not have judged against it. 10In the end it does not matter whether your judgment is right or wrong. 11Either way you are placing your belief in the unreal. 12This cannot be avoided in any type of judgment, because it implies the belief that reality is yours to select from.
3. You have no idea of the tremendous release and deep peace that comes from meeting yourself and your brothers totally without judgment. 2When you recognize what you are and what your brothers are, you will realize that judging them in any way is without meaning. 3In fact, their meaning is lost to you precisely because you are judging them. 4All uncertainty comes from the belief that you are under the coercion of judgment. 5You do not need judgment to organize your life, and you certainly do not need it to organize yourself. 6In the presence of knowledge all judgment is automatically suspended, and this is the process that enables recognition to replace perception.
4. You are very fearful of everything you have perceived but have refused to accept. 2You believe that, because you have refused to accept it, you have lost control over it. 3This is why you see it in nightmares, or in pleasant disguises in what seem to be your happier dreams. 4Nothing that you have refused to accept can be brought into awareness. 5It is not dangerous in itself, but you have made it seem dangerous to you.
5. When you feel tired, it is because you have judged yourself as capable of being tired. 2When you laugh at someone, it is because you have judged him as unworthy. 3When you laugh at yourself you must laugh at others, if only because you cannot tolerate the idea of being more unworthy than they are. 4All this makes you feel tired because it is essentially disheartening. 5You are not really capable of being tired, but you are very capable of wearying yourself. 6The strain of constant judgment is virtually intolerable. 7It is curious that an ability so debilitating would be so deeply cherished. 8Yet if you wish to be the author of reality, you will insist on holding on to judgment. 9You will also regard judgment with fear, believing that it will someday be used against you. 10This belief can exist only to the extent that you believe in the efficacy of judgment as a weapon of defense for your own authority.
6. God offers only mercy. 2Your words should reflect only mercy, because that is what you have received and that is what you should give. 3Justice is a temporary expedient, or an attempt to teach you the meaning of mercy. 4It is judgmental only because you are capable of injustice.
7. I have spoken of different symptoms, and at that level there is almost endless variation. 2There is, however, only one cause for all of them: the authority problem. 3This is “the root of all evil.” 4Every symptom the ego makes involves a contradiction in terms, because the mind is split between the ego and the Holy Spirit, so that whatever the ego makes is incomplete and contradictory. 5This untenable position is the result of the authority problem which, because it accepts the one inconceivable thought as its premise, can produce only ideas that are inconceivable.
8. The issue of authority is really a question of authorship. 2When you have an authority problem, it is always because you believe you are the author of yourself and project your delusion onto others. 3You then perceive the situation as one in which others are literally fighting you for your authorship. 4This is the fundamental error of all those who believe they have usurped the power of God. 5This belief is very frightening to them, but hardly troubles God. 6He is, however, eager to undo it, not to punish His children, but only because He knows that it makes them unhappy. 7God’s creations are given their true Authorship, but you prefer to be anonymous when you choose to separate yourself from your Author. 8Being uncertain of your true Authorship, you believe that your creation was anonymous. 9This leaves you in a position where it sounds meaningful to believe that you created yourself. 10The dispute over authorship has left such uncertainty in your mind that it may even doubt whether you really exist at all.
9. Only those who give over all desire to reject can know that their own rejection is impossible. 2You have not usurped the power of God, but you have lost it. 3Fortunately, to lose something does not mean that it has gone. 4It merely means that you do not remember where it is. 5Its existence does not depend on your ability to identify it, or even to place it. 6It is possible to look on reality without judgment and merely know that it is there.
10. Peace is a natural heritage of spirit. 2Everyone is free to refuse to accept his inheritance, but he is not free to establish what his inheritance is. 3The problem everyone must decide is the fundamental question of authorship. 4All fear comes ultimately, and sometimes by way of very devious routes, from the denial of Authorship. 5The offense is never to God, but only to those who deny Him. 6To deny His Authorship is to deny yourself the reason for your peace, so that you see yourself only in segments. 7This strange perception is the authority problem.
11. There is no one who does not feel that he is imprisoned in some way. 2If this is the result of his own free will he must regard his will as not free, or the circular reasoning in this position would be quite apparent. 3Free will must lead to freedom. 4Judgment always imprisons because it separates segments of reality by the unstable scales of desire. 5Wishes are not facts. 6To wish is to imply that willing is not sufficient. 7Yet no one in his right mind believes that what is wished is as real as what is willed. 8Instead of “Seek ye first the Kingdom of Heaven” say, “Will ye first the Kingdom of Heaven,” and you have said, “I know what I am and I accept my own inheritance.”