Dr Jackson is well known for three books: Understanding Prayer, Understanding Loneliness and The Many Faces of Grief. Here, he ranges even wider by considering the whole relationship between the individual, with his or her specific attitudes, and illness.

Perhaps more than we realize, he argues, stress weakens our resistance to disease and wears down our ability to cope with illness.

Modern disillusionment can easily lead to suspicion, depression and anxiety, which manifest themselves in forms of illness or hinder people from regaining full health.

People become ill because of their internal and external environment, and each person needs to realize that they are part of that environment. For healing, they therefore need ways of shielding themselves from the destructive forces within themselves and outside, which at the same time help them to realize their full physical and spiritual potential.

How this may happen is explained by a counsellor of wide knowledge and long experience, in terms which may be easily understood and hopefully acted upon.

Edgar N. Jackson is Adjunct Professor at Union Graduate School and Visiting Lecturer and Consultant in Crisis Psychology at Walter Reed Hospital and Medical School. Although now officially retired. he still spends much of his time travelling and lecturing both at home in America and abroad.