Troward Essays

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EssaysBy

Thomas Troward

Contents1: The Principle of Guidance2: The "Eu Sou"3: Yourself 4: Desire as the Motive Power5: The Central Control6: Completeness7: Submission

8: Mind and Hand9: Entering into the Spirit of It10: Beauty 11: Touching Lightly 12: A Lesson from Browning13: Present Verdade14: Affirmative Power15: The Spirit of Opulence



1: The Principle of Guidance

SequênciaSe me perguntassem qual de todos os princípios espirituais

eu colocaria em primeiro lugar, sinto-me inclinado a dizer oPrincípio da Orientação, não no sentido que ele seja maisessencial do que outros, pois cada porção é igualmenteessencial à completude de um todo perfeito, mas nosentido de ser o primeiro numa ordem sequencial e paradar valor a nossos outros poderes colocando-os na devidarelação uns com os outros. "Dar valor a nossos outrospoderes", eu digo, porque este também é um de nossospoderes.

É aquele que, julgado do ponto de vista da auto-consciênciapessoal, está acima de nós; mas que, realizado do ponto devista da unidade de todo Espírito, é parte e parcela de nósmesmos, porque é aquela Mente Infinita necessariamenteidentificada com todas as suas manifestações.

A Mente Infinita é InternaOlhar para essa Mente Infinita como uma InteligênciaSuperior da qual podemos receber orientação não implicaportanto em olhar para uma fonte externa. Ao contrário, éolhar para a fonte mais recôndita de nosso ser, com umaconfiança em sua ação que nos permite proceder aexecução de nossos planos com uma firmeza e segurançaque são em si mesmas a própria garantia de nossossucesso.

CompreensãoA ação dos princípios espirituais em nós segue a ordem queimpomos a ele por nosso pensamento; portanto a ordem derealização irá produzir a ordem do desejo; e se ignorarmoseste primeiro princípio de correta ordem e orientação, nosencontraremos começando a demonstrar outros grandespoderes, que estão presentemente latentes dentro de nós,sem saber como encontrar um emprego adequado paraeles. Essa seria uma condição muito perigosa: pois semtermos perante nós objetos dignos dos poderes queacordamos, acabaremos desperdiçando-os em propósitosmesquinhos ditados apenas pelo estreito escopo de nossointelecto obscuro.



Portanto a sabedoria antiga diz, "Por tudo o que obtiveres,obtende entendimento”.O despertar à consciência dos nossos misteriosos poderesinteriores irá cedo ou tarde acontecer, e resultará em usá-

los quer entendamos ou não a lei de seu desenvolvimento.Os poderes interiores são poderes naturais tanto quanto osexteriores. Podemos dirigir seu uso pelo conhecimento desuas leis; e é portanto da mais alta importância termosalguns sadios princípios de orientação no uso dessasfaculdades superiores conforme começam a se manifestar.

VontadeSe, portanto, formos segura e proveitosamente entrar na

posse da grande herança de poder que se abre perantenós, devemos antes de tudo buscar realizar em nós aquelaInteligência Superior que se tornará um princípio infalívelde orientação bastando que o reconheçamos assim.

Tudo depende de nosso reconhecimento. Os pensamentossão coisas, e portanto quando queremos que nossospensamentos sejam, também queremos que as coisassejam. Se, então, queremos usar o Espírito Infinito comoespírito de orientação, descobriremos o fato de que oqueremos, e ao fazer isso ainda estamos fazendo uso denosso próprio princípio supremo.E este é o verdadeiro "entendimento" que, colocando todosos outros poderes em sua ordem correta, cria uma grandeunidade de poder direcionada a alvos claramente definidose dignos, no lugar da dispersão de nossos poderes, peloque apenas neutralizam-se uns aos outros e nada afetam.

VerdadeEste é aquele Espírito de Verdade que nos guiará a todaVerdade. É o sincero Desejo em nós de sair em busca daVerdade. Verdade primeiro e Poder depois é a ordemrazoável, que não podemos inverter sem prejuízo a nósmesmos e outros; mas se seguirmos essa ordem sempreencontraremos escopo para nossos poderes desenvolveremem realidades presentes a continuamente crescente glóriade nossa visão do ideal.

Do Ideal ao Real



O ideal é o verdadeiro real, mas deve ser trazido àmanifestação antes que possa se mostrar assim, e é nissoque a natureza prática de nossos estudos mentais consiste.É o místico prático que é o homem de poder: o homem que,

realizando os poderes místicos internos, ajusta sua açãoexterna a esse conhecimento, e assim mostrar sua féatravés de suas obras; e certamente o primeiro passo éfazer uso daquele poder de infalível orientação que elepode chamar para seu auxílio simplesmente desejando serguiado por ele.



2: O "Eu Sou "Dois em UmFrequentemente não reconhecemos o suficiente a verdadedo enérgico ditado de Walt Whitman, "Não estou inteiro

contido entre meu chapéu e minhas botas”. Esquecemos anatureza dupla do "Eu Sou", que é ao mesmo tempo omanifesto e o não-manifesto, o Universal e o individual. Aoperder de vista essa verdade nos cercamos com limitações;vemos apenas parte do eu, e então nos supreendemos quea parte falha em fazer o trabalho do todo. Fatores seacumulam onde não havíamos percebido, ficamos nosperguntando de onde vieram, e não entendemos que elesnecessariamente surgem da grande Unidade em que todos

estamos incluídos.É a grande inteligência e vivacidade do Espírito Universalcontinuamente pressionando na direção da manifestaçãode si mesmo em uma humanidade gloriosa.Isso deve se efetivar pelo reconhecimento de cadaindivíduo acerca de seu poder de cooperar com o PrincípioSupremo através de uma concepção inteligente de seupropósito e das leis naturais pelas quais esse princípio érealizado. Um reconhecimento que somente pode procederda realização de que ele próprio é nada menos que omesmo Princípio em particular manifestação.Quando ele ve isso, ve que o ditado de Walt Whitman éverdadeiro e que sua fonte de inteligência, poder epropósito é aquele Eu Universal, que é dele assim como deoutro apenas porque é Universal, e que é portanto tãocompleta e inteiramente identificado consigo mesmo quenão poderia haver outra expressão dele no mundo.

Entendimento

O entendimento que sozinho dá valor ao conhecimento é oentendimento de que, ao empregarmos a fórmula "Eu sou,portanto eu posso, portanto eu quero”, o "EU SOU" com oqual a oração começa é um Ser que, por assim dizer, temSua cabeça o céu e Seus pés sobre a Terra, uma perfeitaUnidade, e com uma variedade de idéias muitotranscendente às pequenas ideias que são limitadas pelasexigências do dia e da hora.Por outro lado, as exigências do dia e da hora são reaisenquanto duram, e uma vez que a vida manifesta somente



pode ser vivida no momento que é agora, seja hoje ou dezmil anos daí, nossa necessidade é harmonizar a vida daexpressão com a vida do propósito e, realizando em nós afonte dos propósitos mais altos, realizar também a vida em

sua mais abundante expressão.OraçãoEsse é o significado da oração. A oração não é uma buscatola por mudar a Mente da Sabedoria Suprema. Ao invés, éuma busca inteligente de incorporar aquela sabedoria emnossos pensamentos para mais e mais perfeitamenteexpressá-la, ao expressar-nos a nós mesmos. Assim,conforme gradualmente crescemos no hábito de encontraressa inspiradora Presença dentro de nós, e em realizar seu

movimento adiante como o principal fator determinante detoda verdadeira ação mental sadia, ela se tornará segundanatureza para nós ao termos todos os nossos planos, desdeo mais aparentemente trivial, flutuando tanto sobre asubcorrente dessa Inteligência Universal que uma grandeharmonia chegará a nossas vidas, toda manifestaçãodiscordante desaparecerá, e nos encontraremos mais emais controlando todas as coisas da forma que desejamos.Por que? Por que atingimos o comando do Espírito e ofazemos obedecer-nos? Certamente não, pois "se o cegoguia o cego, ambos caem na vala”; mas porque somoscompanheiros do Espírito, e por uma contínua e crescenteintimidade mudamos, não "a Mente do Espírito”, mas nossaprópria. Aprendemos a pensar de um ponto de vista maisalto, de onde vemos que o antigo ditado “Conhece-te a timesmo”, inclui o conhecimento de tudo que queremos dizerquando falamos de Deus.

Unicidade

EU SOU É UMIsso pode parecer uma proposição bastante elementar, masé uma que não podemos perder de vista. O que elasignifica? Significa tudo; mas estamos mais interessados noque ela significa com relação a nós, e para cada umpessoalmente ela significa isto. Que não há dois Espíritos,um que sou eu e um que é o outro. Significa que não existealgum grande poder desconhecido externo a mim mesmoque pode ser atuado por motivos perfeitamente diferentesdo meu e que irá, portanto, se opor a mim com sua força



irresistível e passar sobre mim, deixando-me esmagado equebrado como o devoto sobre o qual o Carro de Jagannathpassou. Significa que há apenas uma Mente, um motivo,um poder - não dois se opondo mutuamente – e que minha

mente consciente em todos os seus movimentos é apenas aMente Única expressando-se como (não meramente atravésde) minha individualidade particular.Não há dois Eu Sou, mas um EU SOU. O que quer que,portanto, eu possa conceber como sendo o Grande Princípioda Vida Universal, isso eu sou.Eu Sobre Processo

Tentemos realizar completamente o que isso significa. Vocêconsegue conceber o Grande Originário e Sustentador

Princípio Vital de todo o Universo como sendo pobre, fraco,sórdido, miserável, ciumento, raivoso, ansioso, incerto, oude qualquer outra maneira limitado? Sabemos que isso éimpossível.Então porque o EU SOU é Um, tudo isso é igualmenteinverdade sobre nós também. Aprenda primeiro a distinguiro verdadeiro eu que você é dos processos mentais e físicosque ele lança como instrumentos de sua expressão, e entãoaprende que esse eu controla esses instrumentos, e nãovice versa. Conforme avançamos nesse conhecimentosabemos que somos ilimitados. Percebemos que, no mundoem miniatura cuja centro somos nós, nós mesmos somos oexato mesmo transbordar de alegre vitalidade que oGrande Espírito da Vida é no Grande Todo.O Eu Sou é Um.



3: Auto CrescimentoQuero falar sobre a vitalidade que há em ser você mesmo.

Tem no mínimo o mérito da simplicidade, pois devecertamente ser mais fácil ser a si mesmo do que fingir ser

algo ou alguém diferente. Ainda assim, é isso que muitosconstantemente tentam fazer; o eu que é o seu próprio nãoé bom o suficiente para eles, e assim estão sempretentando ser melhores do que Deus os fez, comintermináveis esforço e luta como consequencia.È claro que estão certos em colocar perante si mesmos umideal infinitamente maior que qualquer coisa que jáatingiram. O único meio possível de progresso é seguir umideal que está sempre um grau à nossa frente. Mas o erro é

em não ver que esse atingimento é uma questão decrescimento, e que o crescimento deve ser expansão dealgo que já existe em nós, e portanto implica em sermos oque somos como seu ponto de partida.Esse crescimento é um processo continuo, e não podemosfazer o crescimento do próximo mês sem primeiro fazer odo mês atual; mas estamos sempre querendo pular paraalgum ideal do futuro, não vendo que podemos atingi-losomente partindo de onde estamos agora.

Espírito InteriorEssas considerações devem nos tornar mais confiantes emais confortáveis. Estamos empregando uma força que émuito maior do que acreditamos que somos, mas nãoseparada de nós ou precisando ser compelida ouconvencida a fazer o que queremos; é o substrato de nossoser que está continuamente passando para a manifestaçãono plano visível, e se tornando aquele eu pessoal no qualcostumamos limitar nossa atenção sem considerar de ondevem. Mas na verdade o eu externo é a superfície daquelaindividualidade que reside oculta bem nas profundezasabaixo, e que é nada menos que o Espírito da Vidasubjacente a todas as formas de manifestação.Endeavour to realise what this Spirit must be in itself .that is to say, apart from any of the conditions thatarise from the various relations which necessarilyestablish themselves between its various forms of individualisation. In its homogeneous Self what elsecan it be but pure Life Essence-. of-Life, if you like so



to call it? Then realise that as Essence-of-Life it existsin the innermost of every one of its forms of manifestation in as perfect simplicity as any we canattribute to it in our most abstract conceptions. In this

light we see it to be the eternally Self-generatingPower which, to express itself, flows into form.Natural Action

This Universal Essence-of-Life is a continualbecoming (into form), and since we are a part of Nature we do not need to go further than ourselves tofind the Life-giving Energy at work with all itspowers. Hence all we have to do is to allow it to riseto the surface. We do not have to make it rise any

more than the engineer who sinks the bore-pipe for anartesian well has to make the water rise in it; the waterdoes that by its own energy, springing as a fountain ahundred feet into the air. Just so we shall find afountain of Essence-of-Life ready to spring up inourselves, inexhaustible and continually increasing inits flow, as Jesus taught long ago to a woman at awayside well.

This up-springing of Life-Essence is not another's . itis our own. It does not require deep studies, hardlabours, weary journeys to attain it; it is not themonopoly of this teacher or that writer, whose lectureswe must attend or whose books we must read to get it.It is the innermost of ourselves, and a little commonsensethought as to how anything comes to beanything will soon convince us that the greatinexhaustible Life must be the very root and substanceof us, permeating every fibre of our being.Recognition

Surely to be this vast infinitude of Living Power mustbe enough to satisfy all our desires, and yet thiswonderful ideal is nothing else but what we alreadyare in principio it is . all there is in ourselves now, onlyawaiting our recognition for its manifestation. It is notthe Essence-of-Life which has to grow, for that iseternally present in itself; but it is our recognition of itthat has to grow, and this growth cannot be forced. Itmust come by a natural process, the first necessity of which is to abstain from all straining after being



something which at the present time we cannotnaturally be. The Law of our Evolution has put us inpossession of certain powers and opportunities, andour further development depends on our doing just

what these powers and opportunities make it possiblefor us to do, here and now.If we do what we are able to do today, it will open theway for us to do something better tomorrow, and inthis manner the growing process will proceedhealthily and happily in a rapidly increasing ratio.

This is so much easier than striving to compel thingsto be what they are not, and it is also so much morefruitful in good results. It is not sitting still doing

nothing, and there is plenty of room for the exercise of all our mental faculties, but these faculties arethemselves the outcome of the Essence-of-Life, andare not the creating power but only give direction to it.Now it is this moving power at the back of the variousfaculties that is the true innermost self; and if werealise the identity between the innermost and theoutermost, we shall see that we therefore have at ourpresent disposal all that is necessary for our unlimiteddevelopment in the future.Express Yourself!

Thus our liveliness consists simply in being ourselves,only more so, and in recognising this we get rid of agreat burden of unnecessary straining and striving,and the place of the old Sturm und Drang will betaken, not by inertia, but by a joyous activity whichknows that it always has the requisite power tomanifest itself in forms of good and beauty. Whatdoes it matter whither this leads us? If we arefollowing the line of the beautiful and good, then weshall produce the beautiful and good, and thus bringincreasing joy into the world, whatever particularform it may assume.We limit ourselves when we try to fix accuratelybeforehand the particular form of good that we shallproduce. We should aim not so much at having ormaking some particular thing as at expressing all thatwe are. The expressing will grow out of realising thetreasures that are ours already, and contemplating the



beauty, the affirmative side, of all that we are now,apart from the negative conceptions and detractionswhich veil this positive good from us. When we dothis we shall be astonished to see what possibilities

reside in ourselves as we are and with our presentsurroundings, all unlovely as we may deem them: andcommencing to work at once upon whatever we findaffirmative in these, and withdrawing our thoughtfrom what we have hitherto seen as negative in them,the right road will open up before us, leading us inwonderful ways to the development of powers that wenever suspected, and the enjoyment of happiness thatwe never anticipated.

Go Forward!We have never been out of our right path, only wehave been walking in it backwards instead of forwards. Now that we have begun to follow the pathin the right direction, we find that it is none other thanthe way of peace, the path of joy, and the road toeternal life. These things we may attain by simplyliving naturally with ourselves. It is because we aretrying to be or do something which is not natural to usthat we experience weariness and labour where weshould find all our activities joyously concentrated onobjects which lead to their own accomplishment bythe force of the love that we have for them.When we make the grand discovery of how to livenaturally, we shall find it to be all, and more than all,that we had ever desired; our daily life will become aperpetual joy to ourselves, and we shall radiate lightand life wherever we go.



4: Desire as the Motive PowerMisapprehensionHá certas escolas orientais de pensamento, junto comvárias ramificações ocidentais das mesmas, que são

inteiramente fundadas no princípio de aniquilar todo desejo."Atinja o ponto em que não tens desejo por nada e teencontrarás livre", é a soma e substância de seuensinamento; e em apoio a isso eles colocam um monte deargumentos muito sagazes que muito provavelmenteenredarão o desavisado, porque contem umreconhecimento de muitas das mais profundas verdades daNatureza.Mas devemos ter em mente que é possível ter um

conhecimento muito profundo de fatos psicológicos, e aomesmo tempo viciar os resultados de nosso conhecimentopor uma pressuposição totalmente errônea com relação àlei que une esses fatos juntos no sistema Universal; e osresultados prejudiciais dessa incompreensão sobre pontostão vitais são tão radicais e abrangentes que não podemosressaltar o suficiente a necessidade de entenderclaramente a verdadeira natureza do ponto em questão.Extirpada de todos os acessórios e adornos, a questão seresume nisto: O que devemos escolher: Vida ou Morte? Nãohá acomodações entre as duas; e qualquer queselecionemos como nosso princípio guia deve produzirresultados próprios a si mesma.O todo dessa questão momentosa se volta para o lugar queassinalamos para o desejo em nosso sistema depensamento. É a Árvore da Vida no meio do Jardim daAlma? Ou é a Árvore Upas criando uma desolação de morteao redor? É sobre essa questão que devemos formar um

julgamento, e esse julgamento deve colorir toda nossapercepção da vida e determinar o inteiro conjunto depossibilidades.A Living DeathLet us, then, try to picture to ourselves the idealproposed by the systems to which I have alluded . aman who has succeeded in entirely eliminating alldesire. To him all things must be alike. The good andthe evil must be as one, for nothing has any longer thepower to raise any desire in him; he has no longer anyfeeling which will prompt him to say, "This is good,



therefore I choose it; that is evil, therefore I reject it";for all choice implies the perception of somethingmore desirable in what is chosen than in what isrejected, and consequently the existence of that

feeling of desire which has been entirely eliminatedfrom the ideal we are contemplating. Then, if the perception of all that makes one thingpreferable to another has been obliterated, there canbe no motive for any sort of action whatever. Endue abeing who has thus extinguished his faculty of desirewith the power to create a Universe, and he has nomotive for employing it. Endue him with allknowledge, and it will be useless to him; for, since

desire has no place in him, he is without any purposefor which to turn his knowledge to account. And withLove we cannot endue him, for that is desire in itssupreme degree.But if all this be excluded, what is left of the man?Nothing, except the mere outward form. If he hasactually obtained this ideal, he has practically ceasedto be. Nothing can by any means interest him, forthere is nothing to attract or repel in one thing morethan in another. He must be dead alike to all feelingand to all motive of action, for both feeling and actionimply the preference for one condition rather thananother; and where desire is utterly extinguished, nosuch preference can exist.No doubt some one may object that it is only evildesires which are thus to be suppressed; but a perusalof the writings of the schools in question will showthat this is not the case. The foundation of the wholesystem is that all desire must be obliterated, the desirefor the good just as much as the desire for the evil.

The good is as much "illusion" as the evil, and untilwe have reached absolute indifference to both wehave not attained freedom. When we have utterlycrushed out all desire we are free. And the practicalresults of such a philosophy are shown in the case of Indian devotees who, in pursuance of their resolve tocrush out all desire, both for good and evil alike,become nothing more than outward images of men,from which all power of perception and action have



long since fled. The mergence in the Universal, at which they thusaim, becomes nothing more than a self-inducedhypnotism which, if maintained for a sufficient length

of time, saps away every power of mental and bodilyactivity, leaving nothing but the outside husk of anattenuated human form . the hopeless wreck of whatwas once a living man. This is the logical result of asystem which assumes for its starting point that desireis evil in itself, that every desire is per se a form of bondage, independently of the nature of its object. Themajority of the followers of this philosophy may lacksufficient resolution to carry it out rigorously to its

practical conclusions; but whether their ideal is to berealised in this world or in some other, the utterextinction of desire means nothing else than absoluteapathy, without feeling and without action.How entirely false such an ideal is . not only from thestandpoint of our daily life, but also from that of themost transcendental conception of the UniversalPrinciple . is evidenced by the mere fact that anythingexists at all. If the highest ideal is that of utter apathy,then the Creative Power of the Universe must beextremely low-minded; and all that we have hithertobeen accustomed to look upon as the marvellous orderand beauty of creation is nothing but a display of vulgarity and ignorance of sound philosophy.The Law of AttractionBut the fact that creation exists proves that theUniversal Mind thinks differently, and we have onlyto look around us to see that the true ideal is theexercise of creative power. Hence, so far from desirebeing a thing to be annihilated, it is the very root of every conceivable mode of Life. Without it, Lifecould not be. Every form of expression implies theselection of all that goes to make up the form, and thepassing-by of whatever is not required for thatpurpose; hence a desire for that which is selected inpreference to what is laid aside. And this selectivedesire is none other than the Universal Law of Attraction.Whether this law acts as the chemical affinity of



apparently unconscious atoms, or in the instinctive, if unreasoned, attractions of the vegetable and animalworlds, it is still the principle of selective affinity; andit continues to be the same when it passes on into the

higher kingdoms which are ruled by reason andconscious purpose. The modes of activity in each of these kingdoms are dictated by the nature of thekingdom, but the activity itself always results from thepreference of a certain subject for a certain object tothe exclusion of all others; and all action consists inthe reciprocal movement of the two towards eachother in obedience to the law of their affinity.When this takes place in the kingdom of conscious

individuality, the affinities exhibit themselves asmental action; but the principle of selection prevailswithout exception throughout the Universe. In theconscious mind this attraction towards its affinitybecomes desire the desire . to create some condition of things better than that now existing. Our want of knowledge may cause us to make mistakes as to whatthis better thing really is, and so in seeking to carryout our desire we may give it a wrong direction; butthe fault is not in the desire itself, but in our mistakennotion of what it requires for its satisfaction. Henceunrest and dissatisfaction until its true affinity isfound; but, as soon as this is discovered, the law of attraction at once asserts itself and produces thatbetter condition, the dream of which first gavedirection to out thoughts.An Eternal Universal Verdade

Thus it is eternally true that desire is the cause of allfeeling and all action: in other words, of all Life. Thewhole liveliness of Life consists in receiving or inradiating forth the vibrations produced by the Law of Attraction; and in the kingdom of mind thesevibrations necessarily become conscious outreachingsof the mind in the direction in which it feelsattraction; that is to say, they become desires. Desireis therefore the mind seeking to manifest itself insome form which as yet exists only in its thought. It isthe principle of creation, whether the thing created bea world or a wooden spoon; both have their origin in



the desire to bring something into existence whichdoes not yet exist. Whatever may be the scale onwhich we exercise our creative ability, the motivepower must always be desire.

Desire is the force behind all things; it is the movingprinciple of the Universe and the innermost centre of all Life. Hence, to take the negation of desire for ourprimal principle is to endeavour to stamp out Lifeitself; but what we have to do is to acquire therequisite knowledge by which to guide our desires totheir true objects of satisfaction. To do this is thewhole end of knowledge; and any knowledge appliedotherwise is only a partial knowledge which, having

failed in its purpose, is nothing but ignorance. Desireis thus the sum-total of the liveliness of Life, for it isthat in which all movement originates, whether on thephysical level or the spiritual. In a word, desire is thecreative power, and must be carefully guarded,trained, and directed accordingly; but thus to seek todevelop it to the highest perfection is the veryopposite of trying to kill it outright.And desire has fulfilment for its correlative. Thedesire and its fulfilment are bound together as causeand effect; and when we realise the law of theirsequence, we shall be more than ever impressed withthe supreme importance of Desire as the great centreof Life.5: The Central ControlUnityIn contemplating the relations between body, soul, andspirit, between Universal Mind and individual mind,the methodised study of which constitutes MentalScience, we must never forget that these relationsindicate not the separateness, but the unity, of theseprinciples. We must learn not to attribute one part of our action to one part of our being, and another toanother. Neither the action nor the functions are splitup into separate parts. The action is a whole, and thebeing that does it is a whole; and in the healthyorganism the reciprocal movements of the principlesare so harmonious as never to suggest any feelingother than that of a perfectly whole and undivided



self. If there is any other feeling we may be sure thatthere is abnormal action somewhere, and we shouldset ourselves to discover and remove the cause of it.

The reason for this is that in any perfect organism

there cannot be more than one centre of control. Arivalry of controlling principles would be thedestruction of the organic wholeness; for either theelements would separate and group themselves roundone or other of the centres, according to theirrespective affinities, or else they would be reduced toa condition of merely chaotic confusion; in either casethe original organism would cease to exist. Seen inthis light, therefore, it is a self-evident verdade that, if we

are to retain our individuality . in other words, if weare to continue to exist .it can be only by retaining ourhold upon the central controlling principle inourselves; and if this be the charter of our being, itfollows that all our future development depends onour recognising and accepting this central controllingprinciple. To this end, therefore, all our endeavoursshould be directed; for otherwise all our studies inMental Science will lead us into a confused labyrinthof principles and counter-principles, which will beconsiderably worse than the state of ignorantsimplicity from which we started.Will

The central controlling principle is the Will, and wemust never lose sight of the fact that all the otherprinciples about which we have learnt in our studiesexist only as its instruments. The Will is the true self,of which they are all functions, and all our progressconsists of our increased recognition of the fact. It isthe Will that says "I AM"; and therefore, howeverexalted, or even in their higher developmentsapparently miraculous, our powers may be, they areall subject to the central controlling power of the Will.When the enlightened Will shall have learnt toidentify itself perfectly with the limitless powers of knowledge, judgment, and creative thought which areat its disposal, then the individual will have attained toperfect wholeness, and all limitations will have passedaway for ever.



And nothing short of this consciousness of PerfectWholeness can satisfy us. Everything that falls shortof it is in that degree an embodiment of the principleof Death, that great enemy against which the principle

of Life must continue to wage unceasing war, inwhatever form or measure it may show itself, until"death is swallowed up in victory". There can be nocompromise. Either we are affirming Life as aprinciple, or we are denying it, no matter on how greator how small a scale; and the criterion by which todetermine our attitude is our realisation of our ownWholeness. Death is the principle of disintegration;and whenever we admit the power of any portion of

our organism, whether spiritual or bodily, to induceany condition independently of the intention of theWill, we admit that the force of disintegration issuperior to the controlling centre in ourselves, and weconceive of ourselves as held in bondage by anadversary, from which bondage the only way of release is by the attainment of a truer way of thinking.Conscious PurposeAnd the reason is that, either through ignorance orcarelessness, we have surrendered our position of control over the system as a whole, and have lost theelement of Purpose, around which the consciousnessof individuality must always centre. Every state of ourconsciousness, whether active or passive, should bethe result of a distinct purpose adopted by our ownfree will; for the passive states should be quite asmuch under the control of the Will as the active. It isthe lack of purpose that deprives us of power. Thehigher and more clearly defined our purpose, thegreater stimulus we have for realising our control overall our faculties for its attainment; and since thegrandest of all purposes is the strengthening andennobling of Life, in proportion as we make this ouraim, we shall find ourselves in unison with theSupreme Universal Mind, acting each in ourindividual sphere for the furtherance of the samepurpose which animates the ruling principle of theGreat Whole and, as a consequence, shall find that itsintelligence and powers are at our disposal.



But in all this there must be no strain. The trueexercise of the Will is not an exercise of unnaturalforce. It is simply the leading of our powers into theirnatural channels by intelligently recognising the

direction in which those channels go. Howevervarious in detail, they have one clearly definedcommon tendency towards the increasing of Life .whether in ourselves or in others . and if we keep thissteadily in view, all our powers, whether interior orexterior, will be found to work so harmoniouslytogether that there will be no sense of independentaction on the part of any one of them. The distinctionsdrawn for purposes of study will be laid aside, and the

Self in us will be found to be the realisation of a grandideal being, at once individual and Universal,consciously free in its individual wholeness and in its

joyous participation in the Life of the UniversalWhole.6: CompletenessMisconceptionA point on which students of Mental Science often failto lay sufficient stress is the completeness of man .nota completeness to be attained hereafter, but here andnow. We have been so accustomed to have theimperfection of man drummed into us in books,sermons, and hymns, and above all in a mistakeninterpretation of the Bible, that at first the idea of hiscompleteness altogether staggers us. Yet until we seethis we must remain shut out from the highest andbest that Mental Science has to offer, from a thoroughunderstanding of its philosophy, and from its greatestpractical achievements.

To do any work successfully you must believeyourself to be a whole man in respect of it. Thecompleted work is the outward image of acorresponding completeness in yourself. And if this istrue in respect of one work it is true of all; thedifference in the importance of the work does notmatter; we cannot successfully attempt any workuntil, for some reason or other, we believe ourselvesable to accomplish it; in other words, until we believethat none of the conditions for its completion is



wanting in us, and that we are therefore complete inrespect of it. Our recognition of our completeness isthus the measure of what we are able to do, and hencethe great importance of knowing the fact of our own

completeness.But it may be asked, do we not see imperfection allaround? Is there not sorrow, sickness, and trouble?

Yes; but why? Just for the very reason that we do notrealise our completeness. If we realised that in itsfullness, these things would not be; and in the degreein which we come to realise it we shall find themsteadily diminish. Now if we really grasp the twofundamental truths that Spirit is Life pure and simple,

and that external things are the result of interiorforces, then it ought not to be difficult to see why weshould be complete; for to suppose otherwise is tosuppose the creative power of the Universe to beeither unable or unwilling to produce the completeexpression of its own intention in the creation of man.

That it should be unable to do so would be to deposeit from its place as the creative principle, and that itshould be unwilling to fulfil its own intention is acontradiction in terms; so that on either suppositionwe come to a reductio ad absurdum. In forming manthe creative principle therefore must have produced aperfect work, and our conception of ourselves asimperfect can only be the result of our own ignoranceof what we really are; and our advance, therefore,does not consist in having something new added to us,but in learning to bring into action powers whichalready exist in us, but which we have never tried touse, and therefore have not developed, simply becausewe have always taken it for granted that we are bynature defective in some of the most importantfaculties necessary to fit us to our environment.The Source of PowerIf we wish to attain to these great powers, the questionis, Where are we to seek them. And the answer isin ourselves. That is the great secret. We are not to gooutside ourselves to look for power. As soon as we doso we find, not power, but weakness. To seek strengthfrom any outside source is to make affirmation of our



weakness, and all know what the natural result of suchan affirmation must be.We are complete in ourselves; and the reason why wefail to realise this is that we do not understand how far

the "self" of ourselves extends. We know that thewhole of anything consists of all its parts and not onlyof some of them; yet this is just what we do not seemto know about ourselves. We say rightly that everyperson is a concentration of the Universal Spirit intoindividual consciousness; but if so, then eachindividual consciousness must find the UniversalSpirit to be the infinite expression of itself . Itis this part of the "Self" that we so often leave out in

our estimate of what we are; and consequently welook upon ourselves as crawling pigmies when wemight think of ourselves as archangels. We try to workwith the mere shadows of ourselves instead of withthe glorious substance, and then wonder at ourfailures. If we only understood that our "better half" isthe whole infinite of Spirit . that which creates andsustains the Universe . then we should know howcomplete our completeness is.As we approach this conception, our completenessbecomes a reality to us, and we find that we need notgo outside ourselves for anything. We have only todraw on that part of ourselves which is infinite tocarry out any intention we may form in our individualconsciousness; for there is no barrier between the twoparts, otherwise thay would not be a whole. Eachbelongs perfectly to the other, and the two are one.

There is no antagonism between them, for the InfiniteLife can have no interest against its individualisationof itself . If there is any feeling of tension it proceedsfrom our not fully realising this conception of our ownwholeness; we are placing a barrier somewhere whenin verdade there is none; and the tension will continueuntil we find out where and how we are setting up thisbarrier and remove it.Tension

This feeling of tension is the feeling that we are not using our Whole Being. We are trying to make half dothe work of the whole; but we cannot rid ourselves of



our wholeness, and therefore the whole protestsagainst our attempts to set one half against the other.But when we realise that our concentration out of theInfinite also implies our expansion into it, we shall see

that our whole "self" includes both the concentrationand the expansion; and seeing this first intellectually,we shall gradually learn to use our knowledgepractically and bring our whole man to bear uponwhatever we take in hand. We shall find that there isin us a constant action and reaction between theinfinite and the individual, like the circulation of theblood from the heart to the extremities and backagain, a constant pulsation of vital energy quite

natural and free from all strain and exertion.Incommunicable Experience This is the great secret of the liveliness of Life, and itis called by many names and set forth under manysymbols in various religions and philosophies, each of which has its value in proportion as it brings us nearerto the realisation of this perfect wholeness. But thething itself is Life, and therefore can only besuggested but not described by any words or symbols;it is a matter of personal experience which no one canconvey to another. All we can do is point out thedirection in which this experience is to be sought, andto tell others the intellectual arguments which havehelped us to find it; but the experience itself is theoperation of definite vital functions of the inner being,and no one but ourselves can do our living for us.Kindly Intelligent LiberdadeBut, so far as it is possible to express these things inwords, what must be the result of realising that the"self" in us includes the Infinite as well as theindividual? All the resources of the Infinite must be atour disposal; we may draw on them as we will, andthere is no limit save that imposed by the Law of Kindness, a self-imposed limitation which, because of being self-imposed, is not bondage but only anotherexpression of our liberdade. Thus we are free and alllimitations are removed.We are also no longer ignorant, for since the "self" inus includes the Infinite, we can draw thence all



needed knowledge, and though we may not always beable to formulate this knowledge in the mentality, weshallfeel its guidance, and eventually the mentalitywill learn to put this also into form of words; and thus

by combining thought and experience, theory andpractice, we shall by degrees come more and moreinto the knowledge of the Law of our Being, and findthat there is no place in it for fear, because it is the lawof perfect liberdade. And knowing what our whole self really is, we shall walk erect as free men and womenradiating Light and Life all round, so that our verypresence will carry a vivifying influence with it,because we realise ourselves to be an Affirmative

Whole, and not a mere negative disintegration of parts.We know that our whole self includes the GreaterMan which is back of and causes the phenomenalman, and this Greater Man is the true human principlein us. It is, therefore, Universal in its sympathies, butat the same time not less individually ourself , and thusthe true man in us, being at once both Universal andindividual, can be trusted as a sure guide. It is that"Thinker" which is behind the conscious mentalityand which, if we will accept it as our centre, andrealise that it is not a separate entity but ourself, willbe found equal to every occasion, and will lead us outof a condition of servitude into "the glorious liberdade of the sons of God".7: SubmissionTwo Kinds of Submission

There are two kinds of submission: submission tosuperior force and submission to superior verdade. Theone is weakness and the other is strength. It is anexceedingly important part of our training to learn todistinguish between these two, and the more sobecause the wrong kind is extolled by nearly allschools of popular religious teaching at the presentday as constituting the highest degree of humanattainment. By some this is pressed so far as to makeit an instrument of actual oppression; and with all it isa source of weakness and a bar to progress. We areforbidden to question what is called the wise



dispensation of Providence. We are told that pain andsorrow are to be accepted because they are the will of God; and there is much eloquent speaking and writingconcerning the beauty of quiet resignation, all of

which appeals to a certain class of gentle minds whohave not yet learnt that gentleness does not consist inthe absence of power but in the kindly and beneficentuse of it.Minds cast in this mould are peculiarly apt to bemisled. They perceive a certain beauty in the pictureof weakness leaning upon strength, but they attributeits soothing influence to the wrong element of thecombination. A thoughtful analysis would show them

that their feelings consisted of pity for the weak figureand admiration for the strong one, and that thesuggestiveness of the whole arose from its satisfyingthe artistic sense of balance which requires acombination of this sort.But which of the two figures in the picture would theythemselves prefer to be? Surely not the weak oneneeding help, but the strong one giving it. By itself theweak figure only stirs our pity and not our admiration.Its form may be beautiful, but its very beauty onlyserves to enhance the sense of something lacking .andthe something lacking is strength. The attractionwhich the doctrine of passive resignation possessesfor certain minds is based upon an appeal tosentiment, which is accepted without any suspicionthat the sentiment appealed to is a false one.The Beauty of StrengthNow the healthful influence of the movement knownas "The Higher Thought" [or "New Thought" or"Mental Science" or just "Mentalism] consistsprecisely in this .that it sets itself rigorously to combatthis debilitating doctrine of submission. It can see aswell as others the beauty of weakness leaning uponstrength; but it sees that the real source of the beautylies in the strong element of the combination. The truebeauty consists in the power to confer strength, andthis power is not to be acquired by submission, but byexactly the opposite method of continually assertingour determination not to submit.



Of course, if we take it for granted that all the sorrow,sickness, pain, trouble, and other adversity in theworld is the expression of the Will of God, thendoubtless we must resign ourselves to the inevitable

with all the submission we can muster, and comfortourselves with the vague hope that somehow in somefar-off future we shall find that "Good is the final goalof ill" though . even this vague hope is a protestagainst the very submission we are endeavouring toexercise. But to make the assumption that the evil of life is the Will of God is to assume what a careful andintelligent study of the laws of the Universe, bothmental and physical, will show us is not the verdade; and

if we turn to that Book which contains the fullestdelineation of these Universal laws, we shall findnothing taught more clearly than that submission tothe evils of life is not submission to the Will of God.Life and LightNothing that obscures life, or restricts it, can proceedfrom the same source as the Power which gives lightto them that sit in darkness, and deliverance to themthat are bound. Negation can never be Affirmation;and the error we have always to guard against is thatof attributing positive power to the Negative. If weonce grasp the verdade that God is Life, and that Life inevery mode of its expression can never be anythingelse than Affirmative, then it must become clear to usthat nothing which is of the opposite tendency can beaccording to the Will of God. For God (the good) towill any of the "evil" that is in the world would be forLife to act with the purpose of diminishing itself,which contradicts the very idea of Life. God is Life,and Life is, by its very nature, Affirmative. Thesubmission we have hitherto made has been to ourown weakness, ignorance, and fear, and not to thesupreme good.Submission to VerdadeBut is no such thing as submission required of us inany circumstances? Are we always to have our ownway in everything? Assuredly the whole secret of ourprogress to liberdade is involved in acquiring the habit of submission, but it is submission to superior Verdade, not



to superior force. It sometimes happens that, when weattain a higher Verdade, we find that its receptionrequires us to rearrange the truths which we possessedbefore: not, indeed, to lay any of them aside, for Verdade

once recognised cannot be again put out of sight, butto recognise a different relative proportion betweenthem from that which we had seen previously. Thenthere comes a submitting of what has hitherto beenour highest verdade to one which we recognise as stillhigher, a process not always easy of attainment, butwhich must be gone through if our spiritualdevelopment is not to be arrested. The lesser degree of life must be swallowed up in the greater; and for this

purpose it is necessary for us to learn that the smallerdegree was only a partial and limited aspect of thatwhich is more universal, stronger, and of greatersignificance in every way.Now, in going through the processes of spiritualgrowth, there is ample scope for that training inselfknowledgeand self-control which is commonlyunderstood by the word "submission". But thecharacter of the act is materially altered. It is nolonger a half-despairing resignation to a superior forceexternal to ourselves which we can only vaguely hopeis acting kindly and wisely, but it is an intelligentrecognition of the true nature of our own interiorforces and of the laws by which a robust spiritualconstitution is to be developed; and the submission isno longer to limitations which drain life of itsliveliness and against which we instinctively rebel,but to the law of our own evolution which manifestsitself in continually increasing degrees of life andstrength.

The submission which we recognise is the price thathas to be paid for increase in any direction. Even inthe Money Market we must invest before we canrealise profits. It is a Universal rule that nature obeysus exactly in proportion as we first obey Nature; andthis is as true in regard to spiritual science as tophysical. The only question is whether we will yieldan ignorant submission to the principle of death, or a



joyous and intelligent obedience to the principle of Life.Self-recognitionIf we have clearly grasped the fact of our identity with

the Universal Spirit, we shall find that, in the rightdirection, there is really no such thing as submission.Submission is to the power of another . a man cannotbe said to submit to himself. When the "I AM" in usrecognises a greater degree of I AM-ness (if I maycoin the word) than it has hitherto attained, then, bythe very force of this recognition, it becomes what itsees, and therefore naturally puts off from itself whatever would limit its expression of its own

completeness.But this is a natural process of growth, and not anunnatural act of submission; it is not the pouring-outof ourselves in weakness, but the gathering of ourselves together in increasing strength. There is noweakness in Spirit, it is all strength; and we musttherefore always be watchful against the insidiousapproaches of the Negative which would invert thetrue position. The Negative always points to someexternal source of strength. Its formula is "I AMNOT". It always seeks to fix a gulf between us and theInfinite Sufficiency. It would always have us believethat the sufficiency is not our own, but that by an actof uncertain favour we may have occasional spoonfulsof it doled out to us. Jesus' teaching is different. Wedo not need to come with our pitcher to the well todraw water, like the woman of Samaria, but we havein ourselves an inexhaustible supply of the livingwater springing up into everlasting life.Let us then inscribe "No Surrender" in bold charactersupon our banner, and advance undaunted to claim ourrightful heritage of liberdade and life.8: Mind and HandEgyptian SymbolismI have before me a curious piece of ancient Egyptiansymbolism. It represents the sun sending down to theearth innumerable rays, with the peculiarity that eachray terminates in a hand. This method of representingthe sun is so unusual that it suggests the presence in



the designer's mind of some idea rather different fromthose generally associated with the sun as a spiritualemblem. If I interpret the symbol rightly, it sets forththe verdade, not only of the Divine Being as the Great

Source of all Life and all Illumination, but also thecorrelative verdade of our individual relation to thatcentre. Each ray is terminated by a hand, and a hand isthe emblem of active working; and I think it would bedifficult to give a better symbolical representation of innumerable individualities, each working separately,yet all deriving their activity from a common source.

The hand is at work upon the earth, and the sun, fromwhich it is a ray, is shining in the heavens; but the

connecting line shows whence all the strength andskill of the hand are derived.If we look at the microcosm of our own person wefind this principle exactly reproduced. Our hand is theinstrument by which all our work is done . literary,artistic, mechanical, or household . but we know thatall this work is really the work of the mind, the willpowerat the centre of our system, which firstdetermines what is to be done, and then sets the handto work to do it; and in the doing of it the mind andhand become one, so that the hand is none other thanthe mind working. Now, transferring this analogy tothe macrocosm, we see that we each stand in the samerelation to the Universal Mind that our hand does toour individual mind at . least, that is our normalrelation; and we shall never put forth our full strengthexcept from this standpoint.Doing and BeingWe rightly realise our will as the centre of ourindividuality; but we should do better to picture ourindividuality as an ellipse rather than a circle, a figurehaving two "conjugate foci", two equilibrated centresof revolution rather than a single one, one of which isthe will-power or faculty of doing, and the other theconsciousness or perception of being. If we realiseonly one of these two centres we shall lose bothmental and moral balance. If we lose sight of thatcentre which is our personal will, we shall becomeflabby visionaries without any backbone. If, in our



anxiety to develop backbone, we lose sight of theother centre, we shall find that we have lost that whichcorresponds to the lungs and heart in the physicalbody, and that our backbone, however perfectly

developed, is rapidly drying up for want of thosefunctions which minister vitality to the whole system,and is only fit to be hung up in a museum to showwhat a rigid, lifeless thing the strongest vertebralcolumn becomes when separated from theorganisation by which alone it can receivenourishment. We must realise the one focus of ourindividuality as clearly as the other, and bring bothinto equal balance, if we would develop all our

powers and rise to that perfection of Life which hasno limits to its glorious possibilities.Many HandsKeeping the ancient Egyptian symbol before us, andconsidering ourselves as the hand, we find that wederive all our power from an infinite centre; andbecause it is infinite we need never fear that we shallfail to draw to ourselves all that we require for ourwork, whether it be the intelligence to lay hold of theproper tool, or the strength to use it. And, moreover,we learn from the symbol that this central power isgeneric. This is a most important verdade. It is the centrefrom which all the hands proceed, and is as fully opento any one hand as to any other. Each hand is doing itsseparate work, and the whole of the central energy isat its disposal for its own specific purpose. The workof the central energy, as such, is to supply vitality tothe hands, and it is they that differentiate thisuniversal power into all the varied forms of application which their different aptitudes andopportunities suggest.One MindWe, as the hands, live and work because the CentralMind lives and works in us. We are one with it, and itis one with us; and so long as we keep this primalverdade before us, we realise ourselves as beings of unlimited goodness and intelligence and power, andwe work in the fullness of strength and confidenceaccordingly; but if we lose sight of this verdade, we shall



find that the strongest will must get exhausted at lastin the unequal struggle of the individual against theUniverse.For if we do not recognise the Central Mind as the

source of our vitality, we are literally "fighting for ourown hand", and all the other hands are against us, forwe have lost the principle of connection with them.

This is what must infallibly happen if we rely onnothing but our individual will-power. But if werealise that the will is the power by which we giveout, and that every giving out implies a correspondingtaking in, then we shall find in the boundless ocean of central living Spirit the source from which we can go

on taking in ad infinitum, and which thus enables us togive out to any extent we please.Mind and WillBut for the wise and effective giving out, a strong andenlightened will is an absolute necessity; andtherefore we do well to cultivate the will, or the activeside of our nature. But we must equally cultivate thereceptive side also; and when we do this rightly byseeing in the Infinite Mind the one source of supply,our will-power becomes intensified by the knowledgethat the whole power of the Infinite is present to backit up. With this continual sense of Infinite Powerbehind us we can go calmly and steadily to theaccomplishment of any purpose, however difficult,without straining or effort, knowing that it shall beachieved not by the . hand only, but by the invincibleMind that works through it."Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, saiththe Lord of hosts".9: Entering into the Spirit of ItThe Spirit"Entering into the Spirit of It". What a commonexpression! And yet how much it really means, howabsolutely everything! We enter into the spirit of anundertaking, into the spirit of a movement, into thespirit of an author, even into the spirit of a game; andit makes all the difference both to us and to that intowhich we enter.A game without any spirit is a poor affair; an



association in which there is no spirit falls to pieces,and a spiritless undertaking is sure to be a failure. Onthe other hand, the book which is meaningless to theunsympathetic reader is full of life and suggestion to

the one who enters into the spirit of the writer; theman who enters into the spirit of the music finds aspring of refreshment in some fine recital which isentirely missed by the cold critic who comes only to

judge according to the standard of a rigid rule; and soon in every case that we can think of. If we do notenter the spirit of the thing, it has no invigoratingeffect upon us, and we regard it as dull, insipid, andworthless.

This is our everyday experience, and these are thewords in which we express it. And the words are wellchosen. They show our intuitive recognition of thespirit as the fundamental reality in everything,however small or however great. Let us be right as tothe spirit of a thing, and everything else willsuccessfully follow.By entering into the spirit of anything we establish amutual vivifying action and reaction between it andourselves; we vivify it with our own vitality, and itvivifies us with a living interest which we call itsspirit; and therefore the more fully we enter into thespirit of all with which we are concerned, the morethoroughly do we become alive. The more completelywe do this the more we shall find that we arepenetrating into the great secret of Life. It may seem atruism, but the great secret of Life is its Liveliness,and it is just more of this quality of Liveliness that wewant to get hold of; it is that good thing of which wecan never have too much.The NegativeBut every fact implies also its negative, and we neverproperly understand a thing until we not only knowwhat it is, but also clearly understand what it is not.

To a complete understanding the knowledge of thenegative is as necessary as the knowledge of theaffirmative, for the perfect knowledge consists inrealising the relation between the two. The perfectpower grows out of this knowledge by enabling us to



balance the affirmative and negative against eachother in any proportion that we will, thus givingflexibility to what would otherwise be too rigid, andform to what would otherwise be too fluid. By uniting

these two extremes, we produce any result we maydesire. It is the old Hermetic saying, "Coagula et solve" "Solidify the fluid . and dissolve the solid"; andtherefore, if we would discover the secret of "enteringinto the spirit of it", we must get some idea of thenegative, which is the "not-spirit".MechanismIn various ages this negative phase has been expressedin different forms of words suitable to the spirit of the

time. So, clothing this idea in the attire of the presentday, I will sum up the opposite of Spirit in the word"Mechanism". Before all things this is a mechanicalage, and it is astonishing how great a part of what wecall our social advance has its root in the mechanicalarts. Reduce the mechanical arts to what they were inthe days of the Plantagenets [The royal house of England, which reigned from 1154 to 1485 . Ed.] andthe greater part of our boasted civilisation wouldrecede through the centuries along with them.We may not be conscious of all this, but themechanical tendency of the age has a firm grip uponsociety at large. We habitually look at the mechanicalside of things in preference to any other. Everything isdone mechanically, from the carving on a piece of furniture to the arrangement of the social system. Ithas to be fitted to the mechanical exigencies. We enterinto the mechanism of it instead of into the Spirit of it,and so limit the Spirit and refuse to let it have its ownway; and then, as a consequence, we get entirelymechanical action, and complete our circle of ignorance by supposing that this is the only sort of action there is."Spiritual" Science

Yet this is not a necessary state of things even inregard to "physical science", for the men who havemade the greatest advances in that direction are thosewho have most clearly seen the subordination of themechanical to the spiritual. The man who can



recognise a natural law only as it operates throughcertain forms of mechanism with which he is familiarwill never rise to the construction of the highest formsof mechanism which might be built upon that law, for

he fails to see that it is the law which determines themechanism and not vice versa. This man will make noadvance in science, either theoretical or applied, andthe world will never owe any debt of gratitude to him.But the man who recognises that the mechanism forthe application of any principle grows out of the trueapprehension of the principle studies the principlefirst, knowing that when that is properly grasped itwill necessarily suggest all that is wanted for bringing

it into practical use.And if this is true in regard to so-called "physical"science, it is a fortiori true as regards the Science of Spirit. There is a mechanical attitude of mind which

judges everything by the limitations of pastexperiences, allowing nothing for the fact that thoseexperiences were for the most part the results of ourignorance of spiritual law. But if we realise the truelaw of Being we shall rise above these mechanicalconceptions. We shall not deny the reality of the bodyor of the physical world as facts, knowing that theyalso are Spirit, but we shall learn to deny their poweras causes. We shall learn to distinguish betweenthe causa causata and thecausa causans, thesecondary or apparent physical cause and the primaryor spiritual cause without which the secondary causewould not exist; and so we shall get a new standpointof clear knowledge and certain power by steppingover the threshold of the mechanical and entering intothe spirit of it.BalanceWhat we have to do is to maintain our even balancebetween the two extremes, denying neither Spirit northe mechanism which is its form and through which itworks. The one is as necessary to a perfect whole asthe other, for there must be an outside as well asan inside; only we must remember that the creativeprinciple is always inside, and that the outside onlyexhibits what the inside creates. Hence, whatever



external effect we would produce, we must first enterinto the spirit of it and work upon the spiritualprinciple, whether in ourselves or in others. By sodoing our insight will become greatly enlarged, for

from without we can see only one small portion of thecircumference, while from the centre we can see thewhole of it. If we fully grasp the verdade that Spirit isCreator, we can dispense with painful investigationsinto the mechanical side of all our problems.If we are constructing from without, then we have tocalculate anxiously the strength of the materials andthe force of every thrust and strain to which they maybe subjected; and very possibly after all we may find

that we have made a mistake somewhere in ourelaborate calculations. But if we realise the power of creating from within, we shall find all thesecalculations correctly made for us; for the same Spiritwhich is Creator is also that which the Bible calls "theWonderful Numberer". Construction from without isbased upon analysis, and no analysis is completewithout accurate quantitative knowledge; but creationis the very opposite of analysis, and carries its ownmathematics with it.Enter!

To enter into the spirit of anything, then, is to makeyourself one in thought with the creative principle thatis at the centre of it; and therefore why not go to thecentre of all things at once, and enter into the Spirit of Life?Do you ask where to find it? In your self ; and inproportion as you find it there, you will find iteverywhere else. Look at Life as the one thing that is,whether in or around you; try to realise the livelinessof it, and then seek to enter into the Spirit of it byaffirming it to be the whole of what you are.Affirm this continually in your thoughts, and bydegrees the affirmation will grow into a real livingforce within you, so that it will become a secondnature to you, and you will find it impossible andunnatural to think in any other way. The nearer youapproach this point the greater you will find yourcontrol over both body and circumstances, until at last



you shall so enter into the Spirit of it .into the Spirit of the Divine creative power which is the root of allthings. In the words of Jesus, "nothing shall beimpossible to you" because you have so entered into

the Spirit of it that you discover yourself to be onewith it. Then all the old limitations will have passedaway, and you will be living in an entirely new worldof Life, Liberdade, and Love, of which you yourself arethe radiating centre.

You will realise the verdade that your Thought is alimitless creative power, and that you yourself arebehind your Thought, controlling and directing it withKnowledge for any purpose which Love motivates

and Wisdom plans. Thus you will cease from yourlabours, your struggles, and your anxieties, and youwill enter into that new order where perfect rest is onewith ceaseless activity.10: BeautyThe Significance of BeautyDo we sufficiently direct our thoughts to the subjectof Beauty? I think not. We are too apt to regardBeauty as a merely superficial thing, and do notrealise all that it implies. This was not the case withthe great thinkers of the ancient world . see the placewhich no less a one than Plato gives to Beauty as theexpression of all that is highest and greatest in thesystem of the Universe. These great men of old wereno superficial thinkers and, therefore, would neverhave elevated to the supreme place anything that isonly superficial.

Therefore, we shall do well to ask what it is that thesegreat minds found in the idea of Beauty which made itthus appeal to them as the most perfect outwardexpression of all that lies deepest in the fundamentallaws of Being. It is because, rightly apprehended,Beauty represents the supreme living quality of

Thought. It is the glorious overflowing of fullness of Love which indicates the presence of infinite reservesof Power behind it. It is the joyous profusion thatshows the possession of inexhaustible stores of wealthwhich can afford to be thus lavish and yet remain asexhaustless as before. Read aright, Beauty is the index



to the whole nature of Being.HarmonyBeauty is the externalisation of Harmony, andHarmony is the co-ordinated working of all the

powers of being, both in the individual and in therelation of the individual to the Infinite from which itsprings; and therefore this Harmony conducts us atonce into the presence of the innermostundifferentiated Life. Thus Beauty is in mostimmediate touch with the very arcanum of Life; it isthe brightness of glory spreading itself over thesanctuary of the Divine Spirit. For if, viewed fromwithout, this is only because it speeds across the

bridge of Reason with such quick feet that we passfrom the outermost to the inmost and back again inthe twinkling of an eye; but the bridge is still thereand, retracing our steps more leisurely, we shall findthat, viewed from within, Beauty is no less theprovince of the calm reasoner and analyst. What thepoet and the artist seize upon intuitively, he elaboratesgradually, but the result is the same in both cases; forno intuition is true which does not admit of beingexpanded into a rational sequence of intelligiblefactors, and no argument is true which does not admitof being condensed into that rapid suggestion which isintuition.

Thus the impassioned artist and the calm thinker bothfind that the only true Beauty proceeds naturally fromthe actual construction of that which it expresses. It isnot something added on as an afterthought, butsomething pre-existing in the original idea, somethingto which that idea naturally leads up and whichpresupposesthat idea as affording its raison d'etre.The Test of Beauty

The test of Beauty is, What does it express? Is itmerely a veneer, a coat of paint laid on from without?

Then it is indeed nothing but a whited sepulchre, acovering to hide the vacuity or deformity which needsto be removed. But is it the true and natural outcomeof what is beneath the surface? Then it is the index tosuperabounding Life and Love and Intelligence which



is not content with mere utilitarianism hastening toescape as early as possible from the labour of construction as though from an enforced andunwelcome task, but rather rejoicing over its work and

unwilling to quit it until it has expressed this rejoicingin every fittest touch of form and colour and exquisiteproportion that the material will admit of, and thiswithout departing by a hairsbreadth from the originalpurpose of the design.PowerWherever, therefore, we find Beauty, we may infer anenormous reserve of Power behind it; in fact we maylook upon it as the visible expression of the great verdade

that Life-Power is infinite. And when the innermeaning of Beauty is thus revealed to us, and we learnto know it as the very fullness and overflowing of Power, we shall find that we have gained a newstandard for the guidance of our own lives. We mustbegin to use this wonderful process which we havelearnt from Nature. Having learnt how Nature works .how God works we must . begin to work in likemanner, and never consider any work complete untilwe have carried it to some final outcome of Beauty,whether material, intellectual, or spiritual.IntentionIs my intention good? That is the initial question, forthe intention determines the nature of the essence ineverything. What is the most beautiful form in which Ican express the good I intend? That is the ultimatequestion: for the true Beauty which our workexpresses is the measure of the Power, Intelligence,Love . in a word, of the quantity and quality of ourown life .which we have put into it. True Beauty, mindyou . that which is beautiful because it most perfectlyexpresses the original idea, not a mere ornamentationoccupying our thoughts as a thing apart from the useintended.Nothing is of so small account but it has its fullestpower of expression in some form of Beautypeculiarly its own. Beauty is the law of perfect

Thought, be the subject of our Thought some schemeaffecting the welfare of millions or a word spoken to a



little child. True Beauty and true Power are thecorrelatives one of the other. Kindly expressionoriginates in kindly thought; and kindly expression isthe essence of Beauty which, seeking to express itself

ever more and more perfectly, becomes that fine touchof sympathy which is artistic skill, whether applied inworking upon material substances or upon theemotions of the heart. But remember: first Use, thenBeauty, and neither complete without the other. Usewithout Beauty is ungracious giving, and Beautywithout Use is humbug. Never forget, however, thatthere is a region of the mind where the Use is found inthe Beauty, where Beauty itself serves the direct

purpose of raising us to see a higher ideal which willthenceforward permeate our lives, giving a morelively quality to all we think and say and do.Natural BeautySeen thus, the Beautiful is the true expression of theGood. From whichever end of the scale we look, weshall find that they accurately measure each other.

They are the same thing in the outermost and theinnermost respectively. But in our search for a higherBeauty than we have yet found, we must beware of missing the Beauty that already exists. Perfectharmony with its environment and perfect expressionof its own inward nature are what constitute Beauty;and our ignorance of the nature of the thing or itsenvironment may shut our eyes to the Beauty italready has. It takes the genius of a Millet in paint, ora Whitman in words, to show us the beauty of thoseordinary work-a-day figures with which our world isfor the most part peopled, whose originals we pass byas having no form or comeliness.Assuredly the mission of every thinking man andwoman is to help build up everywhere forms of greater beauty, spiritual, intellectual, and material; butif we could make something grander than Watteaugardens or Dresden china shepherdesses, we mustenter the great realistic school of Nature and learn torecognise the beauty that already surrounds us,although it may have a little dirt on the surface. Then,when we have learnt the great principles of Beauty



from the All-Spirit which it is, we shall know how todevelop the Beauty on its own proper lines withoutperpetuating the dirt; and we shall know that allBeauty is the expression of Living Power, and that we

can measure our power by the degree of beauty intowhich we can transform it, rendering our lives"By loveliness of perfect deedsMore strong than all poetic thought".11: Touching LightlyBalanceWhat is our point of support? Is it in ourselves oroutside us? Are we self-poised, or does our balancedepend on something external? According to the

actual belief in which our answer to these questions isembodied, so will our lives be. In everything there aretwo parts, the essential and the incidental . that whichis the nucleus and raison d'etre of the whole thing,and that which gathers round this nucleus and takesform from it. The true knowledge always consists indistinguishing these two from each other, and erroralways consists in misplacing them.In all our affairs there are two factors, ourselves andthe matter to be dealt with, and since for us the natureof anything is always determined by our thought of it,it is entirely a question of our belief which of thesetwo factors shall be the essential and which theaccessory. Whichever we regard as essential, the otherat once becomes the incidental. The incidental cannever be absent. For any sort of action to take placethere must be some conditions under which theactivity passes out into visible results; but the samesort of activity may occur under a variety of differentconditions, and may thus produce very differentvisible results. So in every matter we shall always findan essential or energising factor, and an incidentalfactor which derives its quality from the nature of theenergy.SelectionWe can therefore never escape from having to selectour essential and our incidental factor, and whicheverwe select as the essential, we thereby place the otherin the position of the incidental. If, then, we make the



mistake of reversing the true position and suppose thatthe energising force comes from the merely accessorycircumstances, we make them our point of support andlean upon them, and stand or fall with them

accordingly; and so we come into a condition of weakness and obsequious waiting on all sorts of external influences, which is the very reverse of thatstrength, wisdom, and opulence which are the onlymeaning of Liberdade.Personal ResponsibilityBut if we would ask ourselves the common-sensequestion, Where can the centre of a man's Life beexcept in himself? we should see that in all which

pertains to us the energising centre must be inourselves. We can never get away from ourselves asthe centre of our own universe, and the sooner weclearly understand this the better. There is really noenergy in our universe but what emanates fromourselves in the first instance, and the power whichappears to reside in our surroundings is derivedentirely from our own mind.If once we realise this, and consider that the Lifewhich flows into us from the Universal Life-Principleis at every moment new Life entirely undifferentiatedto any particular purpose besides that of supportingour own individuality, and that it is therefore ours toexternalise in any form we will, then we find that thismanifestation of the eternal Life-Principle inourselves is the standpoint from which we can controlour surroundings. We must lean firmly on the centralpoint of our own being and not on anything else. Ourmistake is in taking our surroundings too much 'augrand sérioux '. We should touch things more lightly.As soon as we feel that their weight impedes our freehandling of them, they are mastering us and not wethem.Light .Not Weak Light handling does not mean weak handling. On thecontrary, lightness of touch is incompatible with aweak grasp of the instrument, which implies that theweight of the tool is excessive relatively to the forcethat seeks to guide it. A light, even playful, handling



therefore implies a firm grasp and perfect control overthe instrument. It is only in the hands of a GrinlingGibbons [1648-1721, British wood-carver known forhis decorative woodwork and for much stone

ornamentation at Blenheim and Hampton Courtpalaces and at St. Paul's Cathedral. . EncyclopaediaBritannica] that the carving tool can create miracles of aerial lightness from the solid wood. The light yetfirm touch tells not of weakness, but of power held inreserve; and if we realise our own out-and-outspiritual nature we know that behind any measure of power we may put forth there is the whole reserve of the infinite to back us up.

As we come to know this we begin to handle thingslightly, playing with them as a juggler does with hisflying knives, which cannot make the slightestmovement other than he has assigned to them, for webegin to see that our control over things is part of thenecessary order of the Universe. The disorder we havemet with in the past has resulted from our neverhaving attempted consciously to introduce thiselement of our personal control as part of the system.The Whole PersonOf course, I speak of the whole man, and not merelyof that part of him which Walt Whitman says iscontained between his hat and his boots.

The whole man is an infinitude, and the visibleportion of him is the instrument through which helooks out upon and enjoys all that belongs to him, hisown kingdom of the infinite. And when he learns thatthis is the meaning of his conscious individuality, hesees how it is that he is infinite, and finds that he isone with Infinite Mind, which is the innermost core of the Universe.Having thus reached the true centre of his own being,he can never give this central place to anything else,but will realise that relatively to this all other thingsare in the position of the incidental and accessory; andgrowing daily in this knowledge he will learn so tohandle all things lightly, yet firmly, that grief, fear,and error will have less and less space in his world,until at last sorrow and sighing shall flee away, and



everlasting joy shall take their place. We may as yethave taken only a few steps on the way, but they are inthe right direction, and what we have to do now is goon.

12: A lesson from BrowningImbalancePerhaps you know a little poem of Browning's called"An Epistle Containing the Strange MedicalExperience of Karshish, the Arab Physician". Thesomewhat weird conception is that the Arabphysician, travelling in Palestine soon after the datewhen the Gospel narrative closes, meets with Lazaruswhom Jesus raised from the dead, and in this letter to

a medical friend describes the strange effect whichthis vision of the other life has produced upon theresuscitated man.

The poem should be studied as a whole, but for thepresent a few lines selected here and there must doduty to indicate the character of the change which hascome over Lazarus. After comparing him to a beggarwho, having suddenly received boundless wealth, isunable to regulate its use to his requirements,Karshish continues:So here we . call the treasure knowledge, say,Increased beyond the fleshly faculty .Heaven opened to a soul while yet on earth,Earth forced on a soul's use while seeing heaven: The man is witless of the size, the sum, The value in proportion of all things.In fact he has become conscious of The spiritual life around the earthly life: The law of that is known to him as this,His heart and brain move there, his feet stay here,

and the result is a loss of mental balance entirely unfitting himfor the affairs of ordinary life.Cosmic Consciousness?Now there can be no doubt that Browning had a farmore serious intention in writing this poem than justto record a fantastic notion that flitted through hisbrain. If we read between the lines, it must be clearfrom the general tenor of his writings that, however hemay have acquired it, Browning had a very deep

acquaintance with the inner region of spiritual causeswhich gave rise to all that we see of outward



phenomenal manifestation. There are continualallusions in his works to the life behind the veil, and itis to this suggestion of some mystery underlying hiswords that we owe the many attempts to fathom his

meaning expressed through Browning Societies andthe like attempts . which fail or succeed according asthey are made from "the without" or from "thewithin". No one was better qualified than the poet torealise the immense benefits of the inner knowledge,and for the same reason he is also qualified to warn usof the dangers on the way to its acquisition, fornowhere is it more true that "a little knowledge is adangerous thing", and it is one of the greatest of these

dangers that he points out in this poem.Under the figure of Lazarus he describes the man whohas practically grasped the reality of the inner side of things, for whom the veil has been removed, and whoknows that the external and visible takes its rise fromthe internal and spiritual. But the description is that of one whose eyes have been so dazzled by the light thathe has lost the power of accommodating his vision tothe world of sense. He now commits the same errorfrom the side of "the within" that he formerlycommitted from the side of "the without", the error of supposing that there is no vital reality in the aspect of things on which his thoughts are not immediatelycentred. This is want of mental balance, whether itshows itself by refusing reality to the inward or theoutward. To be so absorbed in speculative ideas as tobe unable to give them practical application in dailylife is to allow our highest thoughts to evaporate indreams.

There is a world of philosophy in the simple statementthat there can be no inside without an outside; and thegreat secret in life is in learning to see things in theirwholeness, and to realise the inside and the outsidesimultaneously. Each of them without the other is amere abstraction having no real existence, and whichwe contemplate separately only for the purpose of reviewing the logical steps by which they areconnected together as cause and effect. Nature doesnot separate them, for they are inseparable; and the



law of nature is the law of life.Practical ConsciousnessIt is related of Pythagoras that, after he had led hisscholars to the dizziest heights of the inner

knowledge, he never failed to impress upon them theconverse lesson of tracing out the steps by whichthese inner principles translate themselves into thefamiliar conditions of the outward things by which weare surrounded. The process of analysis is merely anexpedient for discovering what springs in the realm of causes we are to touch in order to produce certaineffects in the realm of manifestation. But this is notsufficient. We must also learn to calculate how those

particular effects, when produced, will stand related tothe world of already existing effects among which wepropose to launch them, how they will modify theseand be in turn modified by them; and this calculationof effects is as necessary as the knowledge of causes.We cannot impress upon ourselves too strongly thatreality consists of both an inside and an outside, agenerating principle and a generated condition, andthat anything short of the reality of wholeness isillusion on one side or the other. Nothing could havebeen further from Browning's intention than to deterseekers after verdade from studying the principles of Being, for without the knowledge of them verdade mustalways remain wrapped in mystery; but the lesson hewould impress on us is that of guarding vigilantly themental equilibrium which alone will enable us todevelop those boundless powers whose infiniteunfolding is the fullness of Life.Service

And we must remember above all that the soul of lifeis Love, and that Love shows itself by service, andservice proceeds from sympathy, which is the capacityfor seeing things from the point of view of thosewhom we would help, while at the same time seeingthem also in their true relations; and therefore, if wewould realise that Love which is the inmost vitalisingprinciple even of the most interior powers, it must bekept alive by maintaining our hold upon the exteriorlife as being equally real with the inward principles of



which it is the manifestation.



13: Verdade PresentePoder do PensamentoSe o Poder do Pensamento é bom para uma coisa, é bompara todas. Se pode produzir uma coisa, pode produzir

todas. Pois o que pode impedi-lo? Nada pode nos impedirde pensar. Podemos pensar o que quisermos, e se pensar éformar, então podemos formar o que quisermos.A questão toda, portanto, se resume nisto:É verdadeiro que pensar é formar? Se for, não vemos quenossas limitações são formadas exatamente do mesmomodo que nossas expansões? Pensamos que condiçõesexternas ao nosso pensamento tem poder sobre nós, eassim pensamos poder para elas. Então a grande questão

da vida é se existe algum poder criativo além doPensamento. Se houver, onde está e o que é?Espírito

Tanto a filosofia quanto a religião nos levam à verdade que“no princípio” não havia poder criativo além do Espírito, e oúnico modo de atividade que podemos atribuir ao Espírito éPensamento, e assim encontramos o Pensamento como raizde todas as coisas. E se esse era o caso “no princípio” deveser assim ainda, pois se todas as coisas se originam noPensamento, todas as coisas devem ser modos dePensamento, e assim é impossível para o Espírito entregarsuas criações e algum poder que não é si mesmo – porassim dizer, que não é Poder-pensamento; econsequentemente todas as formas e circunstâncias quenos cercam são manifestações do poder criativo doPensamento.Mas pode-se objetar que isso é o Pensamento de Deus; eque o poder criativo está em Deus e não no Homem. Masisso se dissipa a partir do auto-evidente verdade axiomáticaque “no princípio” nada poderia ter tido outra origemexceto na Mente Divina e o próprio Homem é portanto ummodo do Pensamento Divino. Novamente, o Homem é auto-consciente; portanto o Homem é Pensamento divinoevoluído para consciência individual, e quando ele se tornasuficientemente iluminado para perceber isso como suaorigem, vê então que é uma reprodução em individualidadedo mesmo espírito que produz todas as coisas, e que seupróprio pensamento em individualidade tem exatamente amesma qualidade que o Pensamento Divino em



universalidade, assim como o fogo é igualmente ígeno sejaqueimando uma grande reserva de combustível ou umapequena, e assim somos logicamente trazidos à conclusãoque nosso pensamento deve ter poder criativo.

Não Temas!Mas as pessoas dizem, "Não é o que encontramos. Estamoscercados de todo tipo de circunstâncias que nãodesejamos". Sim, você as teme, e fazendo isso você pensanelas, e dessa maneira está constantemente exercitandoessa prerrogativa Divina de criação pelo Pensamento, sóque através da ignorância você a usa na direção errada.Portanto o Livro das Instruções Divinas tão constantementerepete, "Não temas; não duvides", porque nunca podemos

despir nosso Pensamento de sua inerente qualidadecriativa, e a única questão é se a usaremos ignorantementepara nosso dano ou compreensivamente, para nossobenefício.VerdadeO Mestre resumiu seu ensinamento no aforismo de que oconhecimento da Verdade nos tornaria livres. Aqui não hánenhum anúncio do que devemos fazer, ou de qualquercoisa que deva ser feito para nós, para ganhar nossaliberdade; nem é uma declaração de algo futuro.A Verdade é o que é. Ele não diz, você deve esperar até quealgo que não é verdade agora se torne verdade depois. Eledisse: "Saiba o que é a Verdade agora, e você descobriráque a Verdade relacionada a você é Liberdade". Se oconhecimento da Verdade nos liberta somente pode serporque a em verdade já somos livres, apenas não sabemosdisso.LiberdadeNossa liberdade consiste em nossa reprodução na escala doindivíduo do mesmo poder criativo de Pensamento queprimeiro trouxe o mundo à existência, "para que as coisasvistas não foram feitas de coisas que parecem ". Que nós,então, confiantemente reclamemos nosso direito denascença como "filhos e filhas do Todo Poderoso", e aohabitualmente pensar o bem, e a verdade, cercar-nos comcondições correspondentes a nossos pensamentos,e por nosso ensinamento e exemplo ajudar outros a fazer omesmo.



so grounded upon knowledge that we shall feel theverdade of it, and thus be able to produce in ourselvesthat mental attitude of feeling which corresponds tothe condition which we desire to externalise.

What Should We Do?We cannot think into manifestation a different sort of life to that which we realise in ourselves. As Horacesays, "Nemo dat quod non habet ", we cannot givewhat we have not got. And, on the other hand, we cannever cease creating forms of some sort by our mentalactivity, thinking life into them. The point must bevery carefully noted. We cannot sit still producingnothing: the mental machinery will keep on turning

out work of some sort, and it rests with us todetermine of what sort it shall be. In our entireignorance or imperfect realisation of this, we createnegative forms and think life into them. We createforms of death, sickness, sorrow, trouble, andlimitation of all sorts, and then think life into theseforms, with the result that, however non-existent inthemselves, to us they become realities and throwtheir shadow across the path which would otherwisebe bright with the many-coloured beauties of innumerable flowers and the glory of the sunshine.

This need not be. It is giving to the negative anaffirmative force which does not belong to it.Consider what is meant by the negative. It is theabsence of something. It is not-being, and is theabsence of all that constitutes being. Left to itself, itremains in its own nothingness, and it only assumesform and activity when we give these to it by ourthought.Here, then, is the great reason for practising controlover our thought. It is the one and only instrument wehave to work with, but it is an instrument which workswith the greatest certainty for . limitation if we thinklimitation, for enlargement if we think enlargement.Our thought as feeling is the magnet which draws tous those conditions which accurately correspond toitself. This is the meaning of the saying that "thoughtsare things".Circumstances



But, you say, how can I think differently from thecircumstances? Certainly you are not required to saythat the circumstances at the present moment are whatthey are not; to say so would be untrue; but what is

wanted is not to think from the standpoint of thecircumstances at all. Think from that interiorstandpoint where there are no circumstances, andfrom whence you can dictate what circumstances shallbe, and then leave the circumstances to take care of themselves.Do not think of this, that, or the other particularcircumstances of health, peace, etc., but of health,peace, and prosperity themselves. Here is an

advertisement from Pearson's Weekly : "Think money.Big money-makers think money." This is a perfectlysound statement of the power of thought, although itis only an advertisement; but we may make anadvance beyond thinking "money". We can think"Life" in all its fullness, together with that perfectharmony of conditions which includes all that weneed of money and a thousand other good thingsbesides, for some of which money stands as thesymbol of exchangeable value, while others cannot beestimated by so material a standard.Think Life!

Therefore think Life, illumination, harmony,prosperity, happiness think . the things rather than thisor that condition of them. And then by the sureoperation of the Universal Law, these things will formthemselves into the shapes best suited to yourparticular case, and will enter your life as active,living forces, which will never depart from youbecause you know them to be part and parcel of yourown being.

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